Classical Studies

A Greek Roman Empire: Power and Belief under Theodosius II (408-450)

Fergus Millar

Todd Keeler-Wolf, Allan Schoenherr (eds)

In the first half of the fifth century, the Latin-speaking part of the Roman Empire suffered vast losses of territory to barbarian invaders. However, in the Greek-speaking half of the ... More

In the first half of the fifth century, the Latin-speaking part of the Roman Empire suffered vast losses of territory to barbarian invaders. However, in the Greek-speaking half of the Eastern Mediterranean, with its capital at Constantinople, there was a stable and successful system, using Latin as its official language but communicating with its subjects in Greek. This book takes an inside look at how this system worked in the long reign of the pious Christian Emperor Theodosius II (408–50) and analyzes its largely successful defense of its frontiers, its internal coherence, and its relations with its subjects, with a flow of demands and suggestions traveling up the hierarchy to the Emperor, and a long series of laws, often set out in elaborately self-justificatory detail, addressed by the Emperor, through his officials, to the people. Above all, it focuses on the Imperial mission to promote the unity of the Church, the State's involvement in intensely debated doctrinal questions, and the calling by the Emperor of two major Church Councils at Ephesus in 431 and 449. Between the Law codes and the acts of the Church Councils, the material illustrating the working of government and the involvement of State and church is detailed and vivid. Less

The Hellenistic Settlements in Syria, the Red Sea Basin, and North Africa

Getzel Cohen

This authoritative and sweeping compendium, the second volume in an organized survey of the Greek settlements founded or refounded in the Hellenistic period, provides historical ... More

This authoritative and sweeping compendium, the second volume in an organized survey of the Greek settlements founded or refounded in the Hellenistic period, provides historical narratives, detailed references, citations, and commentaries on all the settlements in Syria, The Red Sea Basin, and North Africa from 331 to 31 B.C.E. Organized geographically, the volume pulls together discoveries and debates from dozens of widely scattered archaeological and epigraphic projects. The text's breadth of focus enables this book to provide more than a compilation of information; the volume also contributes to ongoing questions and will point the way toward new avenues of inquiry. Less

Hesiod's Ascra

Anthony Edwards, Malte Ebach

In Works and Days, one of the two long poems that have come down to us from Hesiod, the poet writes of farming, morality, and what seems to be a very nasty quarrel with his brother ... More

In Works and Days, one of the two long poems that have come down to us from Hesiod, the poet writes of farming, morality, and what seems to be a very nasty quarrel with his brother Perses over their inheritance. This book extracts from the poem a picture of the social structure of Ascra, the hamlet in northern Greece where Hesiod lived, most likely during the seventh century b.c.e. Drawing on the evidence of trade, food storage, reciprocity, and the agricultural regime as Hesiod describes them in Works and Days, the author reveals Ascra as an autonomous village, outside the control of a polis, less stratified and integrated internally than what we observe even in Homer. In light of this reading, the conflict between Hesiod and Perses emerges as a dispute about the inviolability of the community's external boundary and the degree of interobligation among those within the village. The book directly counters the accepted view of Works and Days, which has Hesiod describing a peasant society subordinated to the economic and political control of an outside elite. Through this analysis, the book suggests a new understanding of both Works and Days and the social and economic organization of Hesiod's time and place. Less

Historical Fictions and Hellenistic Jewish Identity: Third Maccabees in Its Cultural Context

Sara Raup Johnson

This study investigates the creation of historical fictions in a wide range of Hellenistic Jewish texts. Surveying so-called Jewish novels, including the Letter of Aristeas, Second ... More

This study investigates the creation of historical fictions in a wide range of Hellenistic Jewish texts. Surveying so-called Jewish novels, including the Letter of Aristeas, Second Maccabees, Esther, Daniel, Judith, Tobit, and Josephus's account of Alexander's visit to Jerusalem and of the Tobiads, Artapanus, and Joseph and Aseneth, the book demonstrates that the use of historical fiction in these texts does not constitute a uniform genre. Instead it cuts across all boundaries of language, provenance, genre, and even purpose. It argues that each author uses historical fiction to construct a particular model of Hellenistic Jewish identity through the reinvention of the past. The models of identity differ, but all seek to explore relations between Jews and the wider non-Jewish world. The book goes on to present a focal in-depth analysis of one text, Third Maccabees. Maintaining that this is a late Hellenistic, not a Roman, work it traces important themes in Third Maccabees within a broader literary context. It evaluates the evidence for the authorship, audience, and purpose of the work and analyzes the historicity of the persecution described in the narrative. Illustrating how the author reinvents history in order to construct his own model for life in the diaspora, this book weighs the attitudes and stances, from defiance to assimilation, of this crucial period. Less

The History of Make-Believe: Tacitus on Imperial Rome

Holly Haynes

This work points to a new understanding of the logic of Roman rule during the early Empire. The book shows that Tacitus does not write about the reality of imperial politics and culture ... More

This work points to a new understanding of the logic of Roman rule during the early Empire. The book shows that Tacitus does not write about the reality of imperial politics and culture but about the imaginary picture that imperial society makes of these concrete conditions of existence—the “making up and believing” that figure in both the subjective shaping of reality and the objective interpretation of it. The book traces Tacitus's development of this fingere/credere dynamic both backward and forward from the crucial year ad 69. Using recent theories of ideology, especially within the Marxist and psychoanalytic traditions, it exposes the psychic logic lurking behind the actions and inaction of the protagonists of the Histories. This work demonstrates how Tacitus offers penetrating insights into the conditions of historical knowledge and into the psychic logic of power and its vicissitudes, from Augustus through the Flavians. By clarifying an explicit acknowledgment of the difficult relationship between res and verba, in the Histories, this book shows how Tacitus calls into question the possibility of objective knowing—how he may in fact be the first to allow readers to separate the objectively knowable from the objectively unknowable. Thus, Tacitus appears here as going further toward identifying the object of historical inquiry—and hence toward an “objective” rendering of history—than most historians before or since. Less

Holy Bishops in Late Antiquity: The Nature of Christian Leadership in an Age of Transition

Claudia Rapp

Between the years 300 and 600, Christianity experienced a momentous change from persecuted cult to state religion. One of the consequences of this shift was the evolution of the role of ... More

Between the years 300 and 600, Christianity experienced a momentous change from persecuted cult to state religion. One of the consequences of this shift was the evolution of the role of the bishop—as the highest Church official in his city—from model Christian to model citizen. This work traces this transition with a twofold aim: to deemphasize the reign of the emperor Constantine, which has traditionally been regarded as a watershed in the development of the Church as an institution, and to bring to the fore the continued importance of the religious underpinnings of the bishop's role as civic leader. The book rejects Max Weber's categories of “charismatic” versus “institutional” authority that have traditionally been used to distinguish the nature of episcopal authority from that of the ascetic and holy man. Instead it proposes a model of spiritual authority, ascetic authority and pragmatic authority, in which a bishop's visible asceticism is taken as evidence of his spiritual powers and at the same time provides the justification for his public role. The book provides an analysis of the changing dynamics of social mobility as played out in episcopal appointments. Less

Homosexuality in Greece and Rome: A Sourcebook of Basic Documents

Thomas Hubbard (ed.)

The most important primary texts on homosexuality in ancient Greece and Rome have been translated into modern, explicit English and collected together in this sourcebook. Covering an ... More

The most important primary texts on homosexuality in ancient Greece and Rome have been translated into modern, explicit English and collected together in this sourcebook. Covering an extensive period—from the earliest Greek texts in the late seventh century B.C.E. to Greco-Roman texts of the third and fourth centuries C.E.—the volume includes well-known writings by Plato, Sappho, Aeschines, Catullus, and Juvenal, as well as less well known but relevant and intriguing texts such as graffiti, comic fragments, magical papyri, medical treatises, and selected artistic evidence. These texts, together with introductions, clearly show that there was in fact no more consensus about homosexuality in ancient Greece and Rome than there is today. The material is organized by period and by genre, allowing readers to consider chronological developments in both Greece and Rome. Individual texts are presented with a short introduction contextualizing them by date and, where necessary, discussing their place within a larger work. Chapter introductions discuss questions of genre and the ideological significance of the texts, while the general introduction to the volume addresses issues such as sexual orientation in antiquity, moral judgments, class and ideology, and lesbianism. Less

Imperial Ideology and Provincial Loyalty in the Roman Empire

Clifford Ando

Giday WoldeGabriel (ed.)

The Roman empire remains unique. Although Rome claimed to rule the world, it did not. Rather, its uniqueness stems from the culture it created and the loyalty it inspired across an area ... More

The Roman empire remains unique. Although Rome claimed to rule the world, it did not. Rather, its uniqueness stems from the culture it created and the loyalty it inspired across an area that stretched from the Tyne to the Euphrates. Moreover, the empire created this culture with a bureaucracy smaller than that of a typical late-twentieth-century research university. In approaching this problem, the book does not ask: Why did the Roman empire fall? Rather, it asks, Why did the empire last so long? The book argues that the longevity of the empire rested not on Roman military power but on a gradually realized consensus that Roman rule was justified. This consensus was itself the product of a complex conversation between the central government and its far-flung peripheries. The book investigates the mechanisms that sustained this conversation, explores its contribution to the legitimization of Roman power, and reveals as its product the provincial absorption of the forms and content of Roman political and legal discourse. Throughout, the book is informed by thinking on social formation by theorists such as Max Weber, Jürgen Habermas, and Pierre Bourdieu. Less

Interpreting a Classic: Demosthenes and His Ancient Commentators

Craig Gibson

Demosthenes (384–322 B.C.) was an Athenian statesman and a widely read author whose life, times, and rhetorical abilities captivated the minds of generations. Sifting through the rubble ... More

Demosthenes (384–322 B.C.) was an Athenian statesman and a widely read author whose life, times, and rhetorical abilities captivated the minds of generations. Sifting through the rubble of a mostly lost tradition of ancient scholarship, this book tells the story of how one group of ancient scholars helped their readers understand Demosthenes' writings. This book collects, translates, and offers explanatory notes on all the substantial fragments of ancient philological and historical commentaries on Demosthenes. Using these texts to illuminate an important aspect of Graeco-Roman antiquity that has hitherto been difficult to glimpse, this book gives a detailed portrait of a scholarly industry that touched generations of ancient readers from the first century B.C. to the fifth century and beyond. The book surveys the physical form of the commentaries, traces the history of how they were passed down, and explains their sources, interests, and readership. It also includes a complete collection of Greek texts, English translations, and detailed notes on the commentaries. Less

Landscapes, Gender, and Ritual Space: The Ancient Greek Experience

Susan Guettel Cole

The division of land and the consolidation of territory that created the Greek polis also divided sacred from productive space, sharpened distinctions between purity and pollution, and ... More

The division of land and the consolidation of territory that created the Greek polis also divided sacred from productive space, sharpened distinctions between purity and pollution, and created a ritual system premised on gender difference. Regional sanctuaries ameliorated competition between city-states, publicized the results of competitive rituals for males, and encouraged judicial alternatives to violence. Female ritual efforts, focused on the reproduction and the health of the family, are less visible, but, as this study shows, no less significant. Taking a fresh look at the epigraphical evidence for Greek ritual practice in the context of studies of landscape and political organization, the book illuminates the profoundly gendered nature of Greek cult practice and explains the connections between female rituals and the integrity of the community. In an integration of ancient sources and current theory, the book brings together complex evidence for Greek ritual practice. The book discusses relevant medical and philosophical theories about the female body; considers Greek ideas about purity, pollution, and ritual purification; and examines the cult of Artemis in detail. This nuanced study demonstrates the social contribution of women's rituals to the sustenance of the polis and the identity of its people. Less