Emperors and Usurpers in the Later Roman Empire: Civil War, Panegyric, and the Construction of Legitimacy by Adrastos Omissi

Abstract

BOOK REVIEWS/COMPTES RENDUS 393 The following chapters read more like afterthoughts than as expansions upon this core argument. Chapter Eighteen argues (on the basis of an unconventional reconstruction of the text) that the papyrus fragments traditionally ascribed to a “Ninus Romance” and the Ctesian account of Ninus and Semiramis in Diodorus provide another example of an exogamous match trumping an earlier endogamous match. Chapter Nineteen analyzes similarities between Musaeus’ Hero and Leander and the Greek novel. There are, as Whitmarsh acknowledges, differences from the convention as well, not least the verse form and the story’s tragic ending, and one wonders whether this interesting short essay really belongs in the larger work, but it does nicely round out the survey in a chronological sense. The conclusion (Chapter Twenty) is brief, and deals with three apparently disparate topics: “The Foundation of Marseilles, Some Brooch Pins and the History of the Novel.” What connects these three topics is the argument that a “colonial space offers greater freedom for tactical play” (177), that is, for improvisation. The emphasis, in the end, is upon the creativity, the experimentation, the unpredictability of the novel form. Whitmarsh’s study covers a dizzying range of topics, often devoting only a few pages to each before moving on. Not every analysis achieves the same level of depth or persuasiveness , and scholars coming from different areas may find themselves wishing for more or picking faults at different points. But a book that aims to cast so wide a net cannot always hope to go deep. More important is what the book does achieve: an enormously stimulating journey through a wide range of texts, relative to the environment out of which the Greek novel emerged. The stress laid throughout on the novel’s willingness, even eagerness, to cross cultural boundaries carries conviction regardless of whether the arguments of individual chapters stand or fall. Dirty Love should be required reading for any future course in the Greek novel, and for anyone who wishes to dip further into one of the topics that it touches on, the rich footnotes on every page attest to the depth of scholarship throughout. University of Connecticut Sara R. Johnson Emperors and Usurpers in the Later Roman Empire: Civil War, Panegyric, and the Construction of Legitimacy. By Adrastos Omissi. Oxford: Oxford University Press (Oxford Studies in Byzantium). 2018. Pp. xvii, 348 pages, 1 map, 1 graph, 4 plates. This excellent monograph, a revised version of a 2013 Oxford D.Phil. thesis, investigates how Roman panegyrists describe seizures of imperial power between a.d. 284 and 395. Omissi’s focus is on the numerous surviving prose panegyrics from this period, in both Greek and Latin (forty-eight, according to an appendix, though several of these were speeches written by Libanius but not delivered in front of an emperor). Chapter One provides a rapid run through the ambivalent constitutional nature of the Roman emperor’s position, concluding that there was nothing except the acceptance of an emperor by others to make one. The majority of modern scholars would agree on this, but how one feels about what this meant in terms of being emperor is interesting. For a few scholars, all those who claimed to be emperors were legitimate. For others, only those who did not rebel against an incumbent were legitimate (though even for these scholars, an agnosticism often surrounds Diocletian, Constantine, Julian, and perhaps 394 PHOENIX Theodosius i). There is a political point at stake here too. Just how much tyranny is acceptable in a ruler and are there means short of violence to overturn them? Modern writers living in stable democracies may see this differently from those living in totalitarian states. Omissi is very good on why emperors were needed (no one else could appoint subordinates, strike coins, or issue laws), but less interested in pursuing questions such as why individual Romans would support a challenge to an incumbent. Chapter Two examines the role of the panegyrics in studying challengers to imperial power. There is a deft sketch of the background, with numerous insightful observations. One in particular is worth stressing: “These ideas and messages might often be deeply encoded but we can find them...