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Author: Adrastos Omissi
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192558277
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 334
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Book Description
One of the great maxims of history is that it is written by the victors, and nowhere does this find greater support than in the later Roman Empire. Between 284 and 395 AD, no fewer than 37 men claimed imperial power, though today we recognize barely half of these men as 'legitimate' rulers and more than two thirds died at their subjects' hands. Once established in power, a new ruler needed to publicly legitimate himself and to discredit his predecessor: overt criticism of the new regime became high treason, with historians supressing their accounts for fear of reprisals and the very names of defeated emperors chiselled from public inscriptions and deleted from official records. In a period of such chaos, how can we ever hope to record in any fair or objective way the history of the Roman state? Emperors and Usurpers in the Later Roman Empire is the first history of civil war in the later Roman Empire to be written in English and aims to address this question by focusing on the various ways in which successive imperial dynasties attempted to legitimate themselves and to counter the threat of almost perpetual internal challenge to their rule. Panegyric in particular emerges as a crucial tool for understanding the rapidly changing political world of the third and fourth centuries, providing direct evidence of how, in the wake of civil wars, emperors attempted to publish their legitimacy and to delegitimize their enemies. The ceremony and oratory surrounding imperial courts too was of great significance: used aggressively to dramatize and constantly recall the events of recent civil wars, the narratives produced by the court in this context also went on to have enormous influence on the messages and narratives found within contemporary historical texts. In its exploration of the ways in which successive imperial courts sought to communicate with their subjects, this volume offers a thoroughly original reworking of late Roman domestic politics, and demonstrates not only how history could be erased, rewritten, and repurposed, but also how civil war, and indeed usurpation, became endemic to the later Empire.
Author: Adrastos Omissi
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192558277
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 334
Get Book Here
Book Description
One of the great maxims of history is that it is written by the victors, and nowhere does this find greater support than in the later Roman Empire. Between 284 and 395 AD, no fewer than 37 men claimed imperial power, though today we recognize barely half of these men as 'legitimate' rulers and more than two thirds died at their subjects' hands. Once established in power, a new ruler needed to publicly legitimate himself and to discredit his predecessor: overt criticism of the new regime became high treason, with historians supressing their accounts for fear of reprisals and the very names of defeated emperors chiselled from public inscriptions and deleted from official records. In a period of such chaos, how can we ever hope to record in any fair or objective way the history of the Roman state? Emperors and Usurpers in the Later Roman Empire is the first history of civil war in the later Roman Empire to be written in English and aims to address this question by focusing on the various ways in which successive imperial dynasties attempted to legitimate themselves and to counter the threat of almost perpetual internal challenge to their rule. Panegyric in particular emerges as a crucial tool for understanding the rapidly changing political world of the third and fourth centuries, providing direct evidence of how, in the wake of civil wars, emperors attempted to publish their legitimacy and to delegitimize their enemies. The ceremony and oratory surrounding imperial courts too was of great significance: used aggressively to dramatize and constantly recall the events of recent civil wars, the narratives produced by the court in this context also went on to have enormous influence on the messages and narratives found within contemporary historical texts. In its exploration of the ways in which successive imperial courts sought to communicate with their subjects, this volume offers a thoroughly original reworking of late Roman domestic politics, and demonstrates not only how history could be erased, rewritten, and repurposed, but also how civil war, and indeed usurpation, became endemic to the later Empire.
Author: Adrastos Omissi
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198824823
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 369
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Book Description
One of the great maxims of history is that it is written by the victors, and nowhere does this find greater support than in the later Roman Empire. Between 284 and 395 AD, no fewer than 37 men claimed imperial power, though today we recognize barely half of these men as 'legitimate' rulers and more than two thirds died at their subjects' hands. Once established in power, a new ruler needed to publicly legitimate himself and to discredit his predecessor: overt criticism of the new regime became high treason, with historians supressing their accounts for fear of reprisals and the very names of defeated emperors chiselled from public inscriptions and deleted from official records. In a period of such chaos, how can we ever hope to record in any fair or objective way the history of the Roman state? Emperors and Usurpers in the Later Roman Empire is the first history of civil war in the later Roman Empire to be written in English and aims to address this question by focusing on the various ways in which successive imperial dynasties attempted to legitimate themselves and to counter the threat of almost perpetual internal challenge to their rule. Panegyric in particular emerges as a crucial tool for understanding the rapidly changing political world of the third and fourth centuries, providing direct evidence of how, in the wake of civil wars, emperors attempted to publish their legitimacy and to delegitimize their enemies. The ceremony and oratory surrounding imperial courts too was of great significance: used aggressively to dramatize and constantly recall the events of recent civil wars, the narratives produced by the court in this context also went on to have enormous influence on the messages and narratives found within contemporary historical texts. In its exploration of the ways in which successive imperial courts sought to communicate with their subjects, this volume offers a thoroughly original reworking of late Roman domestic politics, and demonstrates not only how history could be erased, rewritten, and repurposed, but also how civil war, and indeed usurpation, became endemic to the later Empire.
Author: Andrew G. Scott
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190879599
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 217
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Book Description
This historical commentary examines books 79(78)-80(80) of Cassius Dio's Roman History, which cover the period from the death of Caracalla in A. D. 217. to the reign of Severus Alexander and Cassius Dio's retirement from political life in 229. Cassius Dio, a Roman Senator, provides a valuable eyewitness account of this turbulent period, which was marked by the assassination of Caracalla, the rise of Macrinus, Rome's first equestrian emperor, and his subsequent overthrow, the tempestuous, and by all accounts peculiar, reign of Elagabalus, and the continuation of the Severan dynasty under the young Severus Alexander. In addition to elucidating important passages from these books, this study assesses Cassius Dio's political life and its relationship to his literary career; his call to history and time of composition; his historical method; and his attitude toward and subsequent presentation of the later Severan dynasty. In its investigation of books 79(78)-80(80), the work assesses an important stretch of Dio's actual text, which for other parts has been preserved largely in epitome and excerpts. Finally, the work aims to fill a gap in scholarship, as no commentary on these books of Cassius Dio's history has been produced since the nineteenth century, and its publication coincides with a renewed interest in the history and historiography of the Severan period.
Author: P J Casey
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 113578227X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 212
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Book Description
This extraordinary episode in the history of Roman Britain has been brilliantly pieced together by John Casey, through a painstaking - and at times detective-like - sifting of the literary, archaeological and numismatic evidence.
Author: Raymond Van Dam
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139499726
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 311
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Book Description
Constantine's victory in 312 at the battle of the Milvian Bridge established his rule as the first Christian emperor. This book examines the creation and dissemination of the legends about that battle and its significance. Christian histories, panegyrics and an honorific arch at Rome soon commemorated his victory, and the emperor himself contributed to the myth by describing his vision of a cross in the sky before the battle. Through meticulous research into the late Roman narratives and the medieval and Byzantine legends, this book moves beyond a strictly religious perspective by emphasizing the conflicts about the periphery of the Roman empire, the nature of emperorship and the role of Rome as a capital city. Throughout late antiquity and the medieval period, memories of Constantine's victory served as a powerful paradigm for understanding rulership in a Christian society.
Author: Inge Mennen
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004203591
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 321
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Book Description
This book deals with changing power and status relations between AD 193 and 284, when the Empire came under tremendous pressure, and presents new insights into the diachronic development of imperial administration and socio-political hierarchies between the second and fourth centuries.
Author: Peter Crawford
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 1473883938
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 283
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Book Description
A compelling biography of Constantine I’s heir: “Excellent analyses of a number of battles and sieges . . . a good read for anyone interested in the late Empire.” —The NYMAS Review The reign of Constantius II has been overshadowed by that of his titanic father, Constantine the Great, and his cousin and successor, the pagan Julian. But as Peter Crawford shows, Constantius deserves to be remembered as a very capable ruler in dangerous, tumultuous times. When Constantine I died in 337, twenty-year-old Constantius and his two brothers, Constans and Constantine II, all received the title of Augustus to reign as equal co-emperors. In 340, however, Constantine II was killed in a fraternal civil war with Constans. The two remaining brothers shared the Empire for the next ten years, with Constantius ruling Egypt and the Asian provinces, constantly threatened by the Sassanid Persian Empire. Constans in turn was killed by the usurper Magnentius in 350. Constantius refused to accept this fait accompli, made war on Magnentius, and defeated him at the battles of Mursa Major and Mons Seleucus, leading Magnentius to commit suicide. Constantius was now sole ruler of the Empire—but it was an empire beset by external enemies. This historical biography recounts Constantius’ life and his successful campaigns against the Germanic Alamanni along the Rhine and the Quadi and Sarmatians across the Danube, as well as his efforts against the Persians in the East, which had more mixed results—and reveals how he defended the Empire until his dying day.
Author: Johannes Wienand
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190201746
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 553
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Book Description
This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Contested Monarchy reappraises the wide-ranging and lasting transformation of the Roman monarchy between the Principate and Late Antiquity. The book takes as its focus the century from Diocletian to Theodosius I (284-395), a period during which the stability of monarchical rule depended heavily on the emperor's mobility, on collegial or dynastic rule, and on the military resolution of internal political crises. At the same time, profound religious changes modified the premises of political interaction and symbolic communication between the emperor and his subjects, and administrative and military readjustments changed the institutional foundations of the Roman monarchy. This volume concentrates on the measures taken by emperors of this period to cope with the changing framework of their rule. The collection examines monarchy along three distinct yet intertwined fields: Administering the Empire, Performing the Monarchy, and Balancing Religious Change. Each field possesses its own historiography and methodology, and accordingly has usually been treated separately. This volume's multifaceted approach builds on recent scholarship and trends to examine imperial rule in a more integrated fashion. With new work from a wide range of international scholars, Contested Monarchy offers a fresh survey of the role of the Roman monarchy in a period of significant and enduring change.
Author: John D. Grainger
Publisher: Pen and Sword History
ISBN: 1526766051
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 494
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Book Description
An investigation of how a man could become a Roman emperor, and the failure to create an enduring, consistent system for selecting the next emperor. John D. Grainger analyses the Roman imperial succession, demonstrating that the empire organized by Augustus was fundamentally flawed in the method it used to find emperors. Augustus’s system was a mixture of heredity, senatorial, and military influences, and these were generally antagonistic. Consequently, the Empire went through a series of crises, in which the succession to a previous, usually dead, emperor was the main issue. The infamous “Year of the Four Emperors,” AD 69, is only the most famous of these crises, which often involved bouts of bloody and destructive civil war, assassinations and purges. These were followed by a period, usually relatively short, in which the victor in the “crisis” established a new system, juggling the three basic elements identified by Augustus, but which was as fragile and short lived as its predecessor; these “consequences” of each crisis are discussed. The lucid and erudite text is supported by over 22 genealogical tables and 100 images illustrating the Emperors. Praise of The Roman Imperial Succession “For a general introduction to the question of how one becomes a Roman emperor, Grainger has provided a sound guide.” —Bryn Mawr Classical Review
Author: Mark Hebblewhite
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1317034309
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 257
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Book Description
With The Emperor and the Army in the Later Roman Empire, AD 235–395 Mark Hebblewhite offers the first study solely dedicated to examining the nature of the relationship between the emperor and his army in the politically and militarily volatile later Roman Empire. Bringing together a wide range of available literary, epigraphic and numismatic evidence he demonstrates that emperors of the period considered the army to be the key institution they had to mollify in order to retain power and consequently employed a range of strategies to keep the troops loyal to their cause. Key to these efforts were imperial attempts to project the emperor as a worthy general (imperator) and a generous provider of military pay and benefits. Also important were the honorific and symbolic gestures each emperor made to the army in order to convince them that they and the empire could only prosper under his rule.
