Later Roman Empire Research Articles

Христианская истина и политика в романе Ивлина Во «Елена»

The novel Helena (1950) is analyzed as Evelyn Waugh’s profound statement on his most significant problems: the possibility to resolve the crises of the 20th-century consciousness through Christianity and on the nature of power. Cradle Anglo-Catholics were always suspicious of Waugh, seeing him as an errant Catholic; the paper uses the work of Waugh’s biographers and interpreters to pinpoint his personal reception of Catholicism as the most sophisticated, strictly logical system, firmly grounded in historical fact. Waugh’s story of St. Helena is simultaneously a biography of half-legendary Saint, known for her discovery of the Cross of Golgotha, who thus proved the truthfulness of the founding Christian narrative, and an ironic modern historical novel on the decline of the Roman Empire. Many parallels between the period of Helena’s husband and son (Constantius Chlor and Constantine the Great, respectively) and the catastrophic history of the 20th century are suggested through the devices of anachronism, grotesque, figurative style. The author depicts the persistence of paganism, the use of religious cults as political instrument by cynical persons in their pursuit of individual power. High dose of irony prevents the novel from going in the direction of hagiography; nevertheless the author’s concept of his title character brings to life the most positive and optimistic text in Waugh’s whole oeuvre. By the end of her long life, by converting to Christianity, Helena finds her vocation, her providential mission, completes it, and gains in the fact satisfaction and peace.

The location of Tartessos: a fresh case for the reliability of Avienus’ Ora Maritima

Recent geomorphological, paleoenvironmental, and chronological evidence allows for a reconstruction of the coasts of southwest Iberia during the first millennium BCE that accords with descriptions of the region offered by authors of antiquity, most notably the description by the fourth-century CE Roman writer R. F. Avienus in his poem Ora Maritima. This poem contains information that appears to date from the sixth century BCE regarding, for instance, the pre-Roman polity of Tartessos. The reliability of this work as a historical source has been questioned for decades. Critics argue that the information is pertinent to our understanding of the literary, rather than historiographical, context of the Late Roman Empire. However, philological as well as historical analyses reveal no clear cause to doubt the documentary value of the Ora Maritima. Furthermore, geomorphological research makes it possible to identify most place-names in the poem; for example, the city embraced by the river Tartessos, apparently the political and trade center of the realm, may likely have stood on the present-day spit of La Algaida, which was an isle in the first millennium BCE. While this hypothesis has been advanced elsewhere, this article offers an entirely new set of evidences to support it.1

Legal Knowledge among Late Roman Elites: The Evidence of Jerome

Abstract: Hans-Dieter Spengler sodali et iuris consulto Jerome's oeuvre is huge; it comprises translations and commentaries of many books of the Christian Bible, a universal history, a history of Christian literature, biographies of monks, many treatises, and more than 130 letters addressed to people from the educated upper classes of the late Roman West. This article investigates what role Roman law played in Jerome's writings, what he knew about it, and how he evaluated it. It also looks at his views on late Roman jurisdiction and collects the evidence he provides for petitions to the emperor and for imperial rescripts. The main section analyzes Jerome's ideas about imperial legislation, his knowledge of individual laws, and the way he presented them. On this basis, it is argued that Jerome's writings bear impressive witness to the importance of Roman law for both the social practice and the mindset of the provincial and local elites in the late Roman empire.

Христианские символы в росписи склепов Херсонеса

The wall-paintings of 11 burial vaults of Chersonese, including mostly floral and vegetal designs, images of birds and imitation of marble wall-facing, correspond to the iconography of the early Christian funerary painting in the Late Roman Empire dating from the last quarter of the fourth to the early fifth century. Most likely, the outside painters of the Chersonesan vaults followed already established and well-known decorative and symbolic system by making a certain set of scenes. There is an image of undoubtedly Christian symbol, namely the Christogram, surviving on the vaulting of two structures only (uncovered in 1853/1905 and 2003/2006). There are four burial vaults more, featuring by the remains of paintings, possibly also of the Christogram. The line-drawing of the surviving images of Chersonesan Christogram meets with almost exact analogies, for example, in the tombs of Sophia, Thessalonike, and Sardis. For the first time, this article suggests that, apart from the Christogram, there was another Christian symbol used in the early Christian funerary painting of Chersonese, namely the four-petalled rosette, known from the walls of two burial vaults (the first located on N. I. Tur’s land, and the second uncovered in 2003/2006). The images of similar rosettes appeared on the pieces of art and in the funerary painting from the Hellenistic Period on. This extremely popular design of Classical art was primarily a decorative element and attribute of the garden of paradise. However, the Christians, especially in the age when the cult of the cross developed, most likely viewed the cruciform as a symbol. This observation concerns primarily the paintings with four-petal rosettes occupying an accentuated position in their decorative programme, actually replacing the image of the cross. A very vivid example of such use of the cross-shaped flower is the painting of tomb no. 37 in Thessalonike. In Chersonese, a case of the kind is the painting of the back wall of the burial vault located on N. I. Tur’s land. From the symmetrical location of three identical cross-shaped rosettes accompanied with two peacocks, with the middle rosette in the very centre of the composition, framed by a semi-circular fluffy garland, there are reasons to interpret them as cross-shaped symbols rather than simple plant designs.

Diversity in Late Antique Christianity: The Cultural Turn, Provincial Archaeology, and Church Building

Abstract This paper considers archaeological evidence for various aspects of early Christian church building and comes to the conclusion that diversity was an essential quality of late antique Christianity. The diversity in question is ill-attested in written sources, but becomes apparent when the material record and everyday life are taken into consideration (cultural/material/pictorial/iconic turn). Church buildings looked and functioned differently in various regions and provinces of the late Roman empire. The diversity does not appear to have been accidental, but was cultivated throughout late antiquity. It was sometimes related to, but did not depend on, differences in liturgical practice, nor was it a matter of knowledge, ability, and workshop tradition alone. Provincial diversity was maintained even when and where the metropolitan alternative was manifestly known and available and although secular art and architecture continued to uniformly emulate the capital cities. A combination of written and material evidence suggests that the diverse formal repertoire of early Christian art and architecture was chosen and decided individually, but tended to form local/provincial/regional clusters. The decision makers seem to have been guided by religious conventions as well as by personal or political allegiances, many of which appear to have been determined locally, each province or region onto itself.

Isaiah and the Issue of Genre in the Chronicle of Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite

Abstract: This article seeks to elucidate the thesis and literary programme of the Chronicle of Pseudo-Joshua the Stylite, which was written in Syriac in Edessa by an anonymous author sometime in the first two decades of the sixth century during the reign of the Roman emperor Anastasius. To do so, it examines how the anonymous author situates events in the Chronicle against historical and theological precedent from the book of Isaiah, through both implicit allusions and explicit references. It suggests that the creation of this inter-text between the Chronicle and the book of Isaiah was intended to function as both a model of and model for the harmonization of local history with the much larger trajectories of salvation history and the history of the late Roman empire. It argues, therefore, that the Chronicle represents one of the many ways in which late antique Syriac writers negotiated not only their place in the late Roman empire but also their place in contemporary Roman literary discourses. As a result, its ultimate contention is that the Chronicle is an example of the trend of "theological Roman patriotism" found in other historiographical texts written in Greek and Latin from the eastern empire in the sixth century.

Gotland in the context of the Varange legend of the Tale of Bygone years

Gotland is considered in many works as an important geographical point in the context of the ‟Varangian legend” of the Tale of Bygone Years. The obscurity of the general ethnic and geographical attribution of the Varangians, with the more obvious linking of the corresponding chronicle plots to an island in the Baltic Sea, the concentration on this island of evidence of its important role in the international trade of the Viking Age, the finds of Gotlandic artifacts in Eastern Europe make one see in Gotland, if not home, then significant stronghold of the Varangians. However, the origin of the most enigmatic ethnic group, perhaps, is connected with other regions and is rooted in the history of the late Roman Empire and the nomadic states of the Danube that arose on its ruins. Finds of coins, other artifacts, traditions in art and fortification, toponymy data show that the groups that migrated to the island largely adopted the cultural symbols of the Roman Empire. This fact is compared with genetic and other data showing that the migrants could differ from the indigenous Gutnish population of the island.

Palaeoenvironmental Framing of the O Areal Roman Saltworks and Related Anthropogenic Activities in North-western Iberia

ABSTRACT The NW Iberian city of Vigo contains buried structures of a Roman salinae that follow the ancient coastline. To investigate its environmental legacy, we studied two pedo-sedimentary profiles at the O Areal saltworks to reconstruct human activities during and after the salinae use, as well as framing them within the last two millennia of climate variability. The bottom layer consists of organic-rich sands, with marine palynomorphs, confined within the saltworks’ structures that operated during the Early Roman Empire, when the demand in fish-salted products increased and the salting industry fluorished on the Atlantic coast of Iberia. During the Late Roman Empire, salt production at the O Areal may have ended, coeval with the development of a marsh with hydro-hygrophyte vegetation and the salting industry demise. The Roman environment also experienced intense agropastoralism that triggered water eutrophication. After Roman times, a dune phase sealed the archaeologicl structures. The overall trend points to a shift from a marine to a terrestrial setting coeval to known periods of climate variability. Therefore, humans and climate impacted the coast during the last two millennia, including the very intense Roman-period saltworks, agriculture and livestock. Roman times climate would have also influenced the saltworks’ establishment and abandonment.

Ancient and Byzantine Coins from the N. K. Minko’s Collection (State Historical Museum of the Southern Urals). Part II. Bosporus, Late Roman Empire, Byzantine Empire

Ancient and Byzantine Coins from the N. K. Minko’s Collection (State Historical Museum of the Southern Urals). Part II. Bosporus, Late Roman Empire, Byzantine Empire

Emperor Theodosius and the Roman World Restoration

The article examines a complex of various measures (military, political, diplomatic, economic, financial, social, and religious) of Emperor Theodosius undertaken by him in the first years of his reign and aimed at overcoming the consequences
 of the Adrianople catastrophe, which put the Roman Empire on the brink of survival. The author defines what exactly had to be restored and what the «Roman World»
 meant. The main attention is paid to the activities of Emperor Theodosius and his measures in various areas of domestic and foreign policy, as well as to the estimation
 of their effectiveness in the context of the history of the Late Roman Empire. The analysis of the sources does not allow us to call Theodosius in the full sense of the word «the restorer of the Roman world», and his contemporaries did
 not give him such a title. Nevertheless, these measures turned out to be effective for a certain period, and they can be recognized as quite logical and correspond-
 ing to the historical situation. Some of them had a long-term effect and significance that went far beyond the reign of their initiator; others were limited to the current moment or were intended for the near historical perspective

Iustitia and Corruptio in Liber Constitutionum sive Lex Gundobada

After 476, Flavius Gundobadus, King of the Burgundians (473–516), sought ways and means to consolidate and strengthen his power, including through legal regulation of the relations between the Burgundians themselves, on the one hand, and between the Burgundians and the Gallo-Romans, on the other. Thus, Liber Constitutionum sive Lex Gundobada was issued, the main purpose of which is the legal regulation of the complex relations in the kingdom, through a codification of the preserved customary law – an embodiment of tribal traditions, practices, and customs, with reasonable use of Roman legal ideas, notions, and norms. The translation and analysis of selected provisions from Lex Gundobada in this paper show the extent to which the Burgundians perceived, received, adopted, and adapted some of the most valuable Roman legal and moral rules and principles, especially the Roman concepts of iustitia and corruptio, and how the rights of both the Burgundians and the Romans were regulated and protected through them. Lex Burgundionum is part of a series of legal Barbarian codes, compiled, adapted, published, and applied in the Barbarian regna between the 5th and 9th centuries. These codes are one of the significant and true sources for the historical reconstruction of the socio-political, socio-cultural, and legal-administrative transition from the late Roman Empire to the German kingdoms and early medieval Europe. They manifest how historically the arena of clashes, confrontations, and wars between Romanitas and Barbaritas gradually became a contact zone of legal reception, of cultural, legal, and socio-political influences, from which a new world will be born, a successor to the old ones, and a new legal system – the Romano-Germanic one.

Natural cave usage in the Late Roman Empire. Shelter in times of instability?

In 2014 we began an ambitious study of the usage of natural caves in between first and fifth centuries AD in the area between the Ebro and the Pyrenees (Navarre, Basque Country, and northern Aragon). The aim was to make an inventory of all natural caves with Roman remains in the western Pyrenees in a database, to clarify the chronology of different cave usages thanks to the study of the archaeological material, to establish the function of those kinds of sites, and finally, to put into relation the caves with their surroundings in the cases that it is possible. In this article, we analyse a disputed subject in the historiography of this phenomenon: the possible use of the caves as shelter in times of instability during the Low Empire period. This interpretation has been repeated since the 70s of the 20th century until today, despite the inexistence of clear evidence.

Presentism and the Study of Late Antiquity

Presentism and the Study of Late Antiquity

Sacramentum. O prawnym znaczeniu terminu na kanwie listów Pliniusza Młodszego

The article is a scientific and research paper. The subject of research is letters exchanged between Pliny the Younger and Emperor Trajan, whereas the discussion addresses some aspects of the legal meaning of the term sacramentum . To expound the problem conclusively, the etymology of the term was explained, and next, sacramentum was discussed as a terminius technicus to denote an action by wager and a military oath. The use of the concept in the letters of Pliny the Younger and in the legislation of the Late Roman Empire was highlighted. In conclusion, the Latin term sacramentum was confirmed to have had both a religious and a legal connotation. In the juridical sense, sacramentum meant an action by wager known from the civil proceedings of legis actio sacramento . But it received yet another meaning for the purposes of military discipline – it was a name of a military oath. These conclusions contribute to the scientific aspect of the problem and demonstrate the originality of the research. They have an international significance as Roman law is a discipline studied across the globe.

An Analysis of The Decline of The Roman Empire From The Perspective of Daily Life

The Roman Empire created a prosperous situation in western history and experienced many major attempts and problems in western society since modern times. The rise and fall of the Roman Empire has always been a thought-provoking and important issue. This paper mainly reexamines the decline of the late Roman Empire from the perspective of life. This paper is mainly divided into two parts. The first part mainly combs the relevant research on life culture and civil life in ancient Rome in recent years from the perspective of civil life and social change. It can be seen that lifestyle has always been an important factor to measure the rise and fall of a country, whether in the period of the Roman Republic or the Roman Empire. The second part mainly analyzes the text based on Histories, and summarizes the final response of many factors to the decline of the Roman Empire in public life. This paper holds that the main manifestation of the decline of the Roman Empire is the numbness of people's life. Due to the growing gap between the rich and the poor, the social class has been destroyed, the city has become increasingly declining, and the rural atmosphere has swept through the city. The people are completely dependent on religion, and the church undertakes the function of people's moral education and ideal vision. The numbness of life became an important reason and symbol of the decline of the Roman Empire. This paper will be helpful to further discuss the root causes of the decline of the Roman Empire from the cultural perspective of daily life.

Cymbals playing in a Roman mosaic from Mariamin in Syria

The mosaic of the six female musicians from Mariamin in Syria depicts in exquisite detail a late antique musical performance. The present study focuses on the cymbal tongs player and the finger cymbals player from this mosaic, who have raised little interest so far, yet provide much information on cymbal playing in the Roman-Imperial period. The first part of this work studies the technical aspects of cymbal playing revealed by the Mariamin mosaic. It discusses the typology and playing techniques of cymbal tongs, using a comparative iconographic approach and an experimental reconstruction approach. The Mariamin mosaic portrays a type of cymbal tongs in which the cymbals are struck laterally, in contrast to cymbals tongs in which cymbals are struck frontally, the only type discussed by archaeomusicologists to date. Significantly, lateral cymbal tongs similar to those of Mariamin appear in other late antique mosaics from Bulgaria and Algeria, suggesting that this instrument was widespread. The reconstruction of lateral and frontal cymbal tongs shows that the two instruments sounded different. The Mariamin mosaic also provides information on the use of small cymbals attached directly to fingers. It shows a finger cymbal tying system that seems to differ from the few other Roman examples known to date. It also shows that finger cymbals players could use two different pairs of cymbals to make two different musical notes, one with each hand. These findings illustrate the technical richness of cymbal playing in the Roman Empire. The second part of this work discusses the instrumental associations visible in the Mariamin mosaic, placing them in the context of other late antique representations. The trio of three resonant metallic instruments discernible in the Mariamin band (cymbal tongs, finger cymbals and acetabuli) illustrates the Roman-Imperial taste for abundant metallic tinkling. Finally, the inclusion of cymbal tongs or finger cymbals in musical bands recurs in mythological representations. The cupid disguises of the two children in the Mariamin mosaic echo these images. However, the scene depicted by the mosaic seems anchored in the reality of the late Roman Empire. Remarkably, the Mariamin mosaic shows that ‘simple’ small cymbals could hold an important place in a high-class musical band equipped with prestigious instruments.

Benennungskrisen

Abstract This paper examines the question raised by Louis Althusser concerning what it means for ideology to interpellate concrete individuals as concrete subjects. Under what conditions does ideological identification succeed or fail? I answer this question by analyzing three scenarios of interpellation: Erich Auerbach investigates the scene of successful police identification and arrest in connection with a revolt in the late Roman Empire; Karl Marx describes the adoption of Roman names, phrases, and costumes by French revolutionaries as the necessary conditions for bringing about bourgeois society; and finally, analyses of today’s political networks reveal an extensive crisis of interpellation manifested in controversies surrounding the naming and classification of political actors without official status.

ОCОБЛИВОСТІ ВИКЛАДАННЯ ЛАТИНСЬКОЇ МОВИ МАЙБУТНІМ ФІЛОЛОГАМ

The article considers some aspects of teaching the Latin language to future philologists. Special attention has been paid to the historical aspect of teaching Latin. The differences between teaching Latin and teaching modern languages have been distinguished. It has been stressed that Ukrainian students do not need to obtain all language competencies while learning this course. Among them are philologists, Law students, medical students, etc. The authors pay special attention to training philologists as they are likely to teach the basics of Latin to the students of other majors. There are some problems connected with the study of Latin in the 21st century. For instance, this language is learnt only for one or two semesters in modern Ukrainian institutions of higher education. Therefore, it is impossible to learn a large number of Latin words. So, the authors recommend choosing some frequently used words, as well as some proper nouns. It has been underlined that learning Latin is a complicated activity because of the absence of native speakers and lack of definitive knowledge about the Latin phonetics. It has been mentioned that not so many texts survive from Classical Antiquity and there is only a limited number of post-classical Latin-language texts. This language, like any other one, has changed a lot, so we focus on learning Classical Latin. It was used as a literary standard by writers of the late Roman Republic and early Roman Empire. But we use the texts adapted for the present-day students. Foe example, the words are spelt separately and the letters u and j are used. In this article the authors have distinguished several clusters of Latin words that are to be learnt. Students are asked to find out the etymology of modern English words that have Latin origin. It has been shown that Latin helps students to get ready for learning other languages. The linguodidactic potential of Latin proverbs has been shown. Besides, the authors have used some mottos of countries, regions and cities. It is suggested to use modern Internet sources including Englishlanguage ones. The article contains an example of a multiple-choice exercise aimed at training grammar skills. The authors assume that learning Latin should be supported with discussions and self-study work presentations. Special attention is paid to motivation of students.

Χρήσεις του προσωνυμίου "Γαλιλαίοι" και του εθνωνύμου "Έλλην" στο έργο του Ιουλιανού.

After the first half of the fourth century, the Christian doctrine appeared to be the indisputable, sovereign cult, in the religious conflicts that took place in the vast acreage of Late Roman Empire. Not only it prevailed upon the various pagan cults of the empire, but it also ended up as the imperial cult. Earlier this period, the ethnonym “Hellen” adopted a novice, “religious-based” meaning, designating “pagans”, which would prevail among others in the following centuries.Emperor Julian’s reign (361-363) comprised a brief disruption of the inevitable domination of Christianity. In the present paper, we study the functions of the appellative “Galilean” and the ethnonym “Hellen” in the julianic corpus, in order to contribute to the apprehension of the julianic philosophical and religious thought, as well as to illuminate undiscernible shades in the functions of the terms under study.

Reading Jerome’s De viris illustribus in the Post-Roman World: Cataloguing Community in Gennadius of Marseille and Frechulf of Lisieux

Catalogues of the names and writings of religious authors and authorities were one of the most enduring forms of biographical collection in the Middle Ages, with rich and varied traditions surviving in both Christian and Islamic contexts. In the Christian world, Jerome’s De viris illustribus (On Illustrious Men) was foundational. Written in 392/393, Jerome’s catalogue of authorities was frequently read and used as a source of information for over a millennium; furthermore, its list of authors was variously expanded and continued. In this chapter, we focus on two moments in the long history of Jerome’s De viris illustribus: the Late Roman Empire and the Carolingian world respectively. More specifically, we examine two particular instances of this reception: Gennadius of Marseille’s late 5th-century continuation of Jerome’s original list of ›illustrious men‹ provides the first case study; the Carolingian historian Frechulf of Lisieux, who was critical reader of Jerome’s catalogue, is the subject of the second case study. In each of these case studies, we analyse – individually and then comparatively – the reworkings and reinterpretations of Jerome’s bio-bibliographic compendium in order to gain to a better understanding of the thematic structure, the authorial choices and the genre-related methodological problems presented in the texts of Gennadius and Frechulf. We examine the tensions that are inherent to such continuations and reworkings, between the thematic foci and agenda introduced by different author-continuators and between groups represented within the texts and the specific authors and audiences writing and reading them.