Sack Of Rome Research Articles

Anticipating Disasters

Following Valens’s defeat at the hands of the Goths at the Battle of Adrianople in August 378 and immediately before Alaric’s sack of Rome in August 410, both Gratian and Honorius issued temporary forbearance measures that relaxed the otherwise coercive religious policies against Donatists in North Africa. The present article analyzes these episodes as case studies in how the late Roman government reacted to disasters and crises in the religious sphere. These episodes are particularly puzzling because they go against the tendency of increasing coercion against schismatics and heretics expressed in late Roman laws and imperial propaganda. The article argues that late Roman religious policy that attempted to enforce theological orthodoxy was mainly the product of episcopal lobbying and petitions, and therefore it could be suspended when more pressing concerns, such as the loyalty of a crucial province for the food supply of the city of Rome, hung in the balance.

Making Sense of Diseases and Disasters: Reflections of Political Theory from Antiquity to the Age of COVID

Making Sense of Diseases and Disasters: Reflections of Political Theory from Antiquity to the Age of COVID

Knowing Fictions: Picaresque Reading in the Early Modern Hispanic World

Knowing Fictions: Picaresque Reading in the Early Modern Hispanic World

Antichità in giardino, giardini nell’antichità: studi sulla collezione Giusti a Verona e sulla tradizione delle raccolte di antichità in giardino

The time span indicated by the subtitle of Kathleen Wren Christian’s fundamental Empire without End: Antiquities collections in Renaissance Rome, c.1350–1527 (2010), eloquently demonstrated the early origins of a phenomenon that she and many others have continued to document for Roman collections of antiquities. Pomponio Leto, probably the most avid of these early collectors of inscriptions, also collected statues, to be judiciously placed in his garden on the Quirinal. Members of the wealthy elite who not only had sumptuous urban residences but also owned property on the outskirts of the city were able to organize excavations on their own estates, and the discovery there of figural nudes and mythological subjects, in particular, helped to bring about a shift in taste in the 1470s and 1480s. From then on, until the Sack of Rome in 1527, popes and princely members of the Curia began to lay out pleasure gardens populated by figural sculptures. By the time of Ulisse Aldrovandi’s involuntary stay in Rome in the mid-century, he was able to compile a list of the antiquities displayed in some eighty private collections, as well in the papal gardens and some public spaces and churches.

«Ozio con dignità». Le carte guicciardiniane dell’esilio lucchese e romano del 1530

This article proposes an in-depth analysis of autographs of letters and other documents contained in File AGF IX of the Francesco Guicciardini Archive. They are tied to a very difficult period in the historian’s life, when following the sack of Rome, he was forced to accept the fact that the anti-Spanish policies which he had so strongly supported had failed and face the shameful accusation of having plotted against the State of Florence. The file contains some drafts written between December 1529 and the spring of 1530, in which Guicciardini seeks to defend himself from such accusations, and these are followed by other documents which bare witness to an intensive period of reflection on the part of the author during his exile in Lucca and subsequently in Rome. These writings are not to be considered - as has been the case to date - as simply laying down the groundwork for his subsequent oeuvre Cose fiorentine, but rather as an attempt by the author to use his own intelligence as a shield against the adversities of history.

The Sack of Rome and Cultural Memory

Cette étude se penche sur les récits de Philip Mélanchthon, théologien luthérien majeur. Il s’agit de repérer comment ses souvenirs du passé, qui dépendent du contexte historique, ont influencé sa conception du rôle et de la place des cités italiennes dans l’histoire européenne et chrétienne. Usant des paradigmes des lieux de mémoire (Pierre Nora) et de la mémoire culturelle (Jan Assman), nous accordons une attention particulière à la ville de Rome qui occupe, au début du XVIe siècle, une place centrale dans la mémoire culturelle des humanistes germanophones. L’importance de cette place s’explique par l’intégration de ceux-ci dans la République des Lettres européenne et elle doit beaucoup à l’intérêt ambiant pour l’Antiquité gréco-romaine. Dès le début de la Réforme allemande en 1517, on voit comment Mélanchthon modifie ses convictions humanistes antérieures. Sous l’influence majeure de Luther, il se met a écrire sur – et à parler de – Rome comme centre du péché et du mensonge, le lieu où sciences et arts reçoivent un traitement barbare. Toutefois, son propos prend un nouveau tournant radical après le Sac de Rome de 1527. Comprendre les causes qui ont amené Mélanchthon à passer outre les fondements de la rhétorique réformée et à se comporter, dans certaines circonstances, comme un humaniste, a été une de nos principales préoccupations. Mélanchthon, qui avait été formé comme un humaniste, l’est demeuré, à travers ses insatiables échanges avec d’autres membres de la République des Savants. Tant en Italie qu’en Allemagne, l’Italie dans son ensemble et ses villes en particulier demeuraient, dans l’esprit des humanistes, un ensemble de paysages sacrés et de lieux de mémoire. Comme nous le montrons par une analyse scrupuleuse de ses récits, bien que Mélanchthon ait été le principal théologien de la Réforme luthérienne, sa conception de la capitale pontificale est restée inscrite dans la vision mondiale des humanistes qui reconnaissait une importance pan-européenne à Rome et à l’Italie.

Rome-sacking and barebacking: longing, rhetoric, and revolution in Augustine and queer theory

ABSTRACT Augustine’s sermon on ‘The Sacking of the City of Rome’ appears to lack the pastoral rhetoric that readers of his Confessions are so familiar with. This paper recovers the pastoral dimension of Augustine’s discourse by reading it alongside recent reinterpretations of barebacking subculture in queer theory. Maia Kotrosits argues that the rhetorical turn in the categorization of HIV/AIDS produced senses of asynchrony, and that barebacking responds to these by rooting the individual in an irreversible timeline of HIV-positivity. Barebacking can therefore be read as ‘pastoral’ rhetoric that resolves the agony of uncertainty. Augustine’s sermon is pastoral in this sense; Augustine imposes an historical ending that resolves the temporal anxiety he and his contemporaries felt after the sack of Rome in 410. Nevertheless, writing an ending – pastoral as that may be – can be a violent process if it negates or replaces the revolutionary work of making history.

The Camp of God: Reimagining Pilgrimage as Migrancy in Augustine’s City of God 1

ABSTRACT Following the Sack of Rome in 410 CE, African Christians like Augustine welcomed migrants from Italy. This was part of a trend of catastrophic human displacement that anticipated – albeit in an inverted manner – the Mediterranean migrant crisis of the twenty-first century. It was in this context that Augustine wrote, in his City of God, of a civitas made up of peregrini – not merely “pilgrims,” but “migrants” or “refugees.” The vision of community corresponding to Augustine’s sense of peregrinatio was not the city, but the camp: the civitas that plays host to the migrant. As Agamben has reminded us, the prevalence of camps tells us something about the regime of law conditioning even those who supposedly live “outside the walls.” In light of Agamben’s insight, this article makes the case that Augustine’s political theology of peregrinatio and civitas is best understood in terms of migrancy and the refugee camp.

An Ambassador as a Diversion? Giuliano Soderini and His Florentine Mission in France (1527–29)

In 1527, after the Sack of Rome by Imperial Troops, the Medici are chased from Florence. The oligarchic government of the Dieci is reinstated. The Dieci need a new ambassador. In particular, they need a man of trust in France, where the king ought still to be convinced to defend Florence and Tuscany against imperial troops. They choose pro-republic Bishop Giuliano Soderini of Saintes. The embassy and life of Giuliano Soderini have been strangely and almost systematically omitted in the existing literature on the subject. His letters were completely excluded from previous editions of Florentine letters of this period. This paper aims to restore them to their rightful place. It presents Giuliano Soderini’s personal and political background before and after his French mission. His diplomatic functions, needs and difficulties are detailed thanks to an extended and thorough reading of his correspondence in and out of France, preserved in France and Italy. This archival work led to the writing of an updated catalogue of his diplomatic correspondence from July 1527 to February 1529.

A bloody carnival? Charles V’s soldiers and the sack of Rome in 1527

AbstractThe sack of Rome in 1527 was one of the most violent and shocking events in early modern European history, especially when considering the spread of Lutheranism in the Holy Roman Empire and the general dubious status of Rome in Europe. Most studies usually and naturally focus on the extraordinary effects of the sack while offering a superficial and simplistic exploration of the experience and motivations of the sacking soldiers. In this article I would like to suggest that the sack offered the deprived soldiers a temporary opportunity to violently undermine the prevalent social order. A “time out of time”, and much like the medieval and early modern carnival, the sack provided the soldiers with an opportunity to act under a set of norms and ideals that would have seemed peculiar and even socially and culturally offensive under normal circumstances.

Galla Placidia as ‘Human Gold’: Consent and Autonomy in the Sack of Rome, CE 410

Gender & HistoryVolume 31, Issue 2 p. 334-352 Article Galla Placidia as ‘Human Gold’: Consent and Autonomy in the Sack of Rome, CE 410 Victoria Leonard, Victoria Leonard orcid.org/0000-0002-9512-4051 Search for more papers by this author Victoria Leonard, Victoria Leonard orcid.org/0000-0002-9512-4051 Search for more papers by this author First published: 30 April 2019 https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-0424.12423Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Volume31, Issue2July 2019Pages 334-352 RelatedInformation

Henry VIII: Conciliarist?

Abstract Henry VIII is seldom considered a steerer of religious policy and theories of his political ambition, conservative religiosity and susceptibility to manipulation by his advisors dominate the historiography. Accordingly, the notion that Henry may be characterised as a conciliarist is one that has only ever been rejected outright. However, a preliminary consideration of this heretofore unconsidered matter reveals uncertainty in the verity of our existing historical paradigms. Henryʼs writings (which we maintain are authentic), actions following the Sack of Rome and approach to his annulment proceedings serve as evidence which suggests that Henry was an interested amateur theologian with a sincere appreciation of conciliarism. An understanding of the Kingʼs Great Matter as essentially a dispute over papal power and Henryʼs solution of a royal supremacy are developed as the ecclesiological backdrop against which this appreciation is to be viewed. In the light that other such matters may have been similarly overlooked, indications of the need for further research are outlined throughout.

The Gallic Ransom and the Sack of Rome

AbstractThe article challenges the widespread view that the Gallic ransom mentioned in a number of sources for the events traditionally known as the Sack of Rome in 390BCshould be understood as evidence that the Gauls did not take Rome in its entirety. The article shows in contrast that, whatever happened in the night when the geese suffered from insomnia on the Capitoline Hill, a ransom is a perfectly suitable element in a story of a Gallic take-over of Rome—hill and all; and that it cannot be taken as evidence that an alternative narrative to the successful defence of the Capitoline Hill never existed.

Le « jour de l’Allia » (dies Alliensis) : recherches sur l’anniversaire d’une défaite dans les calendriers romains

Les Romains ont associé une réputation funeste au 18 juillet. Cette journée marquait pour eux l’anniversaire de la défaite de l’Allia, subie contre une armée celte en 390 avant J.-C. Ce désastre militaire aurait provoqué la prise de Rome par les Gaulois quelques jours plus tard. D’après Tite-Live, les Romains se seraient dès lors abstenus de participer aux affaires publiques le « jour de l’Allia ». Cependant, une analyse approfondie révèle toute la complexité de la tradition du dies Alliensis. En effet, les sources se contredisent sur le statut officiel de cette journée dans le calendrier romain, et sur les interdictions publiques et religieuses qui lui auraient été associées. Le réexamen de cette documentation permet d’envisager de manière différente l’origine et la signification du dies Alliensis. En réalité, l’annalistique de la fin de l’époque républicaine pourrait avoir eu un rôle déterminant dans l’épanouissement de cette tradition, que les textes antiques datent pourtant du début du IVe siècle avant J.-C.

Editor’s Note

Editor’s Note

Review: Architectural Master Drawings from the Albertina

Architectural Master Drawings from the Albertina Tchoban Foundation Museum for Architectural Drawing, Berlin 12 March–10 July 2016 It began, quite rightly, in Rome. Consisting of thirty-eight meticulously selected works from the architectural drawings collection of the Albertina in Vienna, the exhibition filled both of the Tchoban Foundation's exhibition rooms. The bringing together of exquisite, and in some cases paradigmatic, individual works amounted to an exhibition that was itself an artistic achievement. It began with a delicate study of a Gothic tower on parchment from Pisanello's workshop. Although this work originated in Rome as part of a sketchbook, as an ideal study and as the product of an international court culture, it was not bound to any particular place. Next was a drawing by Maarten van Heemskerck completed about a hundred years later, immediately after the Sack of Rome, the greatest crisis of the Roman High Renaissance. With his view of Saint Peter's Square, Heemskerck, using a sharp perspective, plunges down into the very soil of the Eternal City, offering a thoroughly down-to-earth angle on two epoch-making—and unfinished—architectural projects: Pius II's Benediction Loggia and the loggias commissioned by Julius II (Figure 1). Figure 1 Maarten van Heemskerck, view of Old St. Peter's and the Vatican Palace in Rome, 1532–34, pen and brown ink, 27.5 × 62.1 cm (© ALBERTINA, Wien, GSA 31.681). The opposite wall displayed an anonymous plan of the Pantheon stemming from Sangallo's circle and an impressionistic perspective view of the south side of the Colosseum by Gianmaria Pomedello. This pairing showed not only the buildings that had the greatest impact on early modern Europe but also the broad formal possibilities of architectural drawing in …

J. Lipps, C. Machados et P. von Rummel, éd. The Sack of Rome in 410 AD. The Event, its Context and its Impact. 2013. Proceedings of the Conference held at the German Archaeological Institute at Rome, 04-06 November 2010. Deutsches Archäologisches Institut Rom. PALLIA 28. Wiesbaden : Reichert Verlag, 2013. 456 p.

J. Lipps, C. Machados et P. von Rummel, éd. The Sack of Rome in 410 AD. The Event, its Context and its Impact. 2013. Proceedings of the Conference held at the German Archaeological Institute at Rome, 04-06 November 2010. Deutsches Archäologisches Institut Rom. PALLIA 28. Wiesbaden : Reichert Verlag, 2013. 456 p.

The sudden death of Alaric I (c. 370–410 AD), the vanquisher of Rome: A tale of malaria and lacking immunity

BackgroundAlaric I (c. 370–410AD), King of the Visigoths, sacked Rome for the second time in over eight centuries of history. Historians suggest that malaria, probably contracted either in Rome or in the Pontine Marshes, was responsible for his sudden death in Cosenza (Calabria) in the autumn of 410AD, where he was allegedly buried in the River Busento. In this article, we aim to examine this hypothesis through a full pathographic reassessment of the most likely cause of Alaric's demise. MethodsTo achieve this, we resorted to a dual philological–medical approach: clinical likelihood and malaria seasonality coupled with primary historical sources (mainly Jordanes' work De origine actibusque Getarum) and the reconstruction of the itineraries followed by Alaric and his army after the sack of Rome. ResultsSudden death is caused by several factors. The possibility that Alaric died of a cardiovascular disease was discarded since no description of potentially pathological signs emerged from the available sources. Given his lack of semi-immunity, falciparum malaria was considered as the most likely cause of his demise. It took him over two months to reach the coasts of Calabria during the peak of malaria's transmission (summer–autumn). During the march, Alaric did not suffer from recurrent fevers or other ailments, which would have been reported by historians. ConclusionThe scenario emerging from this multidisciplinary reanalysis allows us to hypothesise that Plasmodium falciparum malaria, contracted during his journey through Calabria, was the most likely candidate responsible for Alaric's unexpected demise.

Juan de Valdés and the Italian Reformation by Massimo Firpo

Reviewed by: Juan de Valdés and the Italian Reformation by Massimo Firpo W. R. Albury Firpo, Massimo, Juan de Valdés and the Italian Reformation (Catholic Christendom, 1300–1700), Farnham, Ashgate, 2015; hardback; pp. 278; R.R.P. £70.00; ISBN 9781472439772. In the decades between the Sack of Rome in 1527 and the closing of the Council of Trent in 1563, a significant number of high-ranking Catholic clergy and aristocratic laypeople in Italy had hopes of reconciliation with Protestants and a re-unification of the Church. One of the bases for such hopes was their acceptance of the doctrine of justification by faith, a key premise of Protestant theology, but interpreted in such a way as to allow a role for most traditional Catholic practices. This position was inspired in large measure by the writings of the Spaniard, Juan de Valdés (c. 1500–41), and his immediate followers. Both Juan and his twin brother Alfonso (d. 1532) had worked as secretaries for Emperor Charles V and were associated with the Erasmian circle in the imperial court. Both also found it prudent to leave their homeland, for fear of the Spanish Inquisition, because of their writings; those of Alfonso were mainly political (pro-imperial but strongly anti-papal), while those of Juan were mainly theological. In addition to Erasmian humanism, Juan's views were also shaped by a Spanish spiritual movement known as alumbradismo, which stressed the individual believer's divine illumination (alumbramiento), and by his family's background as conversos, people of Jewish heritage who had converted to Catholicism but who often had reservations about Trinitarianism and some of the ceremonial practices of the new faith. After leaving Spain, Juan established himself in Naples, where he became the leader of a spiritual community, attracted to him by his writings and conversation. Massimo Firpo's study deals with the life and writings of Valdés in its first chapter, and then goes on to trace the many strands of the reform movement in Italy inspired by him. The informal network of Valdesians included such figures as Cardinal Reginald Pole of England, who came within a few votes of being elected pope in 1550, and the Marchesa Vittoria Colonna, celebrated poet and [End Page 233] confidante of Michelangelo. As the Roman Inquisition gained in power and became more aggressive in attacking unorthodox thinking throughout Italy, many followers of Valdesian principles emigrated to Switzerland or beyond, where their religious views often evolved in the direction of Anabaptism. In Italy, however, the Council of Trent's final rejection of the doctrine of justification by faith abolished any possibility of the middle ground that Valdés had sought between Protestantism and traditional Catholicism, and the movement dwindled into non-existence. W. R. Albury University of New England Copyright © 2017 W. R. Albury

Metus Gallicus: “metus” come spinta al cambiamento

A partire dall'episodio del Sacco di Roma da parte dei Galli di Brenno (390 a.C.) Tommaso Gnoli (Università di Bologna) sviluppa un'analisi della paura romana verso i Galli (metus gallicus) e delle successive rielaborazioni.