Urban Roman Research Articles

„Freikauf“ oder „Erlösung in Jesus Christus“? (Röm 3,24)

Abstract This contribution examines the lexeme ἡ ἀπολύτρωσις in the top text of Paul’s doctrine of justification in Rom 3:21–31 exegetically. In particular, one should ask how the syntagma διὰ τῆς ἀπολυτρώσεως τῆς ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ in Rom 3:24b is to be translated correctly. The interpretation is based on the hermeneutical assumption of a translation of ἀπολύτρωσις with “free purchase” or “redemption”. It is important to consider whether the propositio generalis and especially the syntagma δύναμις … εἰς σωτηρίαν in Rom 1:16–17 can contribute aspects to the decision of this translation. Last but not least, it is asked which fields of imagination are called up by the urban Roman Christians through the use of the metaphor of ransom.

The Melite Civitas Romana Project: The Case for a Modern Exploration of the Roman Domus, Malta

Abstract The Roman Domus in Mdina, Malta, has become an idealised example of the Roman presence in the Maltese Islands; the partial remains of a lavishly decorated domus that would have in its time been situated within the walls of the urbanised Roman city of Melite. The site, last excavated more than 100 years ago, is also home to the only museum in the Maltese Islands, which is solely dedicated to house and showcase a collection of artefacts that date from the Roman period in Maltese history. This site alone provides a unique perspective on Roman Malta, being our only substantial remnant from the Roman Maltese capital, and needs a refocused and renewed exploration. For a long time, the archaeology of Roman sites in Malta has suffered a distinct lack of priority, and it has only been in the last two decades that considerably more focus has been placed on understanding the Roman period. Most of the archaeological focus, in this respect, has centred on agricultural villas, and though this study has illuminated a better understanding of the Roman period, very little has been undertaken in the last century in piecing together the importance of urban Melite to the broader nature of life in the islands, as well as their place in the larger context of the central Roman Mediterranean. The Melite Civitas Romana Project offers the potential of new understanding of the domus and the surrounding archaeological environment through a modern exploration of the site and the promise of the first available assemblage of Roman material from an urban Roman context.

Орден доминиканцев на землях Галицко-Волынского княжества (Русского королевства) (на примере Львова XIII–XIV вв.): между легендой и историей

The purpose of the publication is to find out the circumstances of the emergence of the Roman Catholic Dominican monastic order on the territory of the Galicia-Volyn principality (Russian Kingdom) and its efforts to consolidate in these lands. General scientific methods (comparison, analysis) are used as a research methodology. In preparation for publication, the leading methods were historical-comparative, synchronous and retrospective. The use of these scientific methods made it possible to analyze the sources and draw conclusions about the scientific problem. The scientific novelty of the study is that the researcher attempted to analyze available sources and formed historiographical narratives about the emergence of the Dominican Order in the Galicia-Volyn principality in general and in Lviv in particular. Conclusions. The emergence of the Dominican Order in the 13-th – 14-th centuries in the territory of the n kingdom was not accidental. The missions of the spiritual order served for the penetration of the Roman Catholic clergy, the establishment of missionary centers and were preparation for the establishment of a permanent church administration in the lands of the Galicia-Volyn principality. The expansion of the Order's network was closely linked to the growth of the urban network and the intensification of the migration processes of the urban Roman Catholic population from German and Polish lands. The issue of religion played an important role in the diplomacy of the Galician-Volyn princes and Polish kings of this period. Balancing between the Catholic and "steppe" worlds, the princes of the Russian kingdom were forced to compromise and give permission for the establishment of Roman Catholic centers in Lviv and other cities. The Dominican Order actively led the penetration of Catholicism and the influence of the Apostolic See in Rome on the territory of Kyiv Rus.

Mobility and rickets: Investigating Vitamin D deficiency and regional mobility in Aventicum, Roman Switzerland (first to third century CE)

AbstractThe aims of this study are twofold: first, to consider Vitamin D deficiency during two periods of growth and, second, consider Vitamin D deficiency with respect to evidence for migration and mobility in a skeletal assemblage (n = 169) from Aventicum, Roman Switzerland (first to third century CE). Vitamin D deficiency was evaluated macroscopically, and individuals with evidence of Vitamin D deficiency (n = 3) were assessed histologically for interglobular dentine. Dentine was examined from teeth that span from 6 months to 18 years of age. Enamel from an incisor and third molar of possibly deficient individuals were also explored for evidence of migration using oxygen isotope analysis. The only skeletal evidence for Vitamin D deficiency occurred in three adult individuals (two males and one female, all aged 25–35). All three individuals showed skeletal and histological evidence of early childhood deficiency. Further, two individuals presented histological evidence of deficiency associated with pubertal growth. Isotopic values in the incisors of all three individuals were in keeping with geographic origins in Central and Eastern Europe; however, the two with evidence for pubertal deficiency had higher δ18O values (by 1.3‰) in their third molars, whereas the individual with no evidence of pubertal rickets did not. The overall lack of Vitamin D deficiency at Aventicum is rare when compared with other urban Roman sites. For the three individuals with evidence of deficiency, one suggestion is that they may have moved from elsewhere. The mobility of the two individuals with pubertal rickets suggests that risks for repeat deficiency were affected by their location. As this is the first study to consider osteological and histological evidence for Vitamin D deficiency in conjunction with isotopic evidence of mobility, further studies of mobility and health across the Empire are required.

Torres Vedras, um exemplo da organização e da estruturação do espaço urbano medieval português

Este é um estudo de caso desenvolvido em três momentos, de história urbana e de urbanismo medieval, aplicado à cidade de Torres Vedras, no qual o autor procurar identificar a sua matriz, assim como os principais elementos que condicionaram a organização e a estruturação do espaço urbano. Parte das origens do povoamento do sítio de Torres Vedras, independentemente da origem do nome, identifica a matriz romana na estruturação do espaço urbano, e termina com a organização do espaço da vila torriense no período medievo, sobretudo em torno dos principais edifícios do poder — a casa da Câmara ou o paço do Concelho, o paço régio, as quatro igrejas matrizes (Santa Maria, São Pedro, São Tiago e São Miguel), um convento, o castelo e a muralha com as suas portas — incluindo uma referência à judiaria. Neste estudo, de natureza empírica, o autor recorre, sobretudo, à pesquisa documental e à observação direta para analisar os dados recolhidos e interpretar a evolução urbana de Torres Vedras, para concluir, na senda de Isabel de Luna e Guilherme Cardoso, assim como de André Baptista, acerca da matriz urbana fundacional romana de Torres Vedras, condicionada, no período medievo, pela presença dos edifícios do poder que, a par das ruas, faziam a cidade, e contribuíam para definir a organização e a estruturação do espaço.

Man and Animal in Severan Rome: The Literary Imagination of Claudius Aelianus by Steven D. Smith (review)

Reviewed by: Man and Animal in Severan Rome: The Literary Imagination of Claudius Aelianus by Steven D. Smith Fabio Tutrone Steven D. Smith. Man and Animal in Severan Rome: The Literary Imagination of Claudius Aelianus. Greek Culture in the Roman World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014. 308pp. $99. When Otto Keller published his meticulous work Die Antike Tierwelt (1909–13), classical scholars still conceived of ancient zoological knowledge as an astonishingly labyrinthine corpus of tales. One felt the need to separate objective truths and fabulous accounts on the basis of a modern-oriented comparatist approach which was especially suspicious of Aelian’s De Natura Animalium and the so-called paradoxographic tradition. At that time, classicists were also keen to [End Page 532] see Severan literature as a scarcely original (and relatively uninteresting) digest of earlier writings—a faithful mirror of the beginning of the end. Steven Smith’s book on Aelian’s “literary imagination” and its culturally embedded use of animal figures is paradigmatic of the notable progress of scholarship in both such fields of research—the role of animals as revealing symbolic constructs and the intellectual life of Severan Rome. Throughout his well-structured survey, Smith offers new insights into Aelian’s worldview as a profoundly Hellenized Roman writer creatively combining biological notions and literary mirabilia, socio-political patterns, and sophistic aesthetics. On the one hand, the book clearly situates itself in the flourishing area of cultural and animal studies, making the most of both well-known and newly emerging theoretical frameworks (from Michel Foucault to Donna Haraway, from Derrida and Deleuze to Giorgio Agamben). Of course, the purpose of Smith as well as of other contemporary scholars interested in the ancient representation of animals is no longer to identify reliable “scientific” data as distinct from ancient folklore. Rather, it is the intersection of rhetorical, historical, and anthropological factors which seems to characterize most properly the Graeco-Roman discourse on animal life. On the other hand, however, Smith engages in an ambitious reconfiguration of Aelian’s (admittedly enigmatic) profile as an exponent of the Second Sophistic, at the same time indebted and alien to the milieu of the third century c.e. The multifaceted textual construction of Aelian’s animal narratives is shown to entail a critical (and at times ambiguous) reflection on such different issues as gender, religion, ethnicity, natural philosophy, and kingship. The book is composed of ten chapters, each one investigating a specific aspect of Aelian’s Weltanschauung on the basis of thematically connected passages. While the main focus is on De Natura Animalium (and thus on animal-related topics), two chapters (2 and 10, respectively) extend the scope of the inquiry to Aelian’s Rustic Letters and Varia Historia (VH). The monograph as a whole is framed by an introductory overview (starting with a fictional first-person speech by Aelian) and a conclusive note which sums up Smith’s most relevant theses. In addition, a more “philological” appendix discusses seventeen short fragments possibly pertaining to Aelian’s lost Katēgoria tou gunnidos (“The Indictment of the Little Woman”), a bitter invective against Elagabalus prudently written after the emperor’s death (cf. Philostr. Vit. Soph. 625). The question of Aelian’s elusive literary persona figures prominently in the general introduction and is the core subject of chapter 1. By qualifying the author of the De Natura Animalium (NA) as “independent” and “countercultural,” Smith does not mean to remove him from his social and political context. On the contrary, the evidence drawn from the NA itself (especially from the impressionistic self-portrait of the preface and the epilogue), together with the biographical sketches in Philostratus’ Lives of the Sophists and in the Byzantine Souda lexicon, is used to demonstrate that, though “inextricably bound up with and perhaps even unwittingly celebratory of urban Roman culture of the early third century c.e., Aelian nevertheless also fashions a literary persona that is critical of that same [End Page 533] cultural milieu” (16). In Smith’s view, such a fascinatingly ambivalent effect is made possible by the overwhelming stylistic variety (poikilia) of the NA, which appears as an “open” work (in Umberto Eco’s terms) intentionally lacking any large-scale...

Romana urbs: levels of Roman and imperial identity in the city of Rome

This contribution investigates how the urban Roman identity of the popes and the papacy developed in relation to the Romanness of the Roman empire of the eighth century and the perception of a ‘state’ (res publica, but also imperium). It then shows examples of how the city of Rome itself was used and perceived in papal writings of the time and how all these concepts were consciously altered by the papacy in the course of the eighth century to enhance Rome's ecclesiastical and political prestige as well as its secular power.

10.5937/kultura1443219m = The cult of Saint Archangel Michael among Benedictans in the area of Bar mitropoly and Kotor episcopacy: Social and cultural conditions ( 9th - 13th century)

In the middle of the 9th century, the Benedictan order was on the rise in South Italy. Since the end of the 8th century, Montecasino has been the champion of cultural revival, and a network of abbeys has been established across the regions of Benevento, Puglia, Campania, Calabria and other regions. Members of this order, within European borders, were reputed missionairies who contributed greatly to the christianisation of many Germanic and Slavic peoples. However, the Benedictans from South Italy had suffered attacks by the Saracenes and other invadors who raided and plundered their monasteries, which culminated with their conquer of Montecasino in 883AD. Because of the strengthening of the Byzantine rule, the conditions on the east Adriatic coast seemed far more suitable and stable for life of monastery communities. Also, Slavic population settled back to Byzantine cities, and slowly, they moved towards the coastline zones, building good relations with the urban Roman population. The Slavs had still worshiped old gods or were only partly christianized. In addition to being respected as successful missionaries, the Benedicants raised their monasteries in rural communities close to main roads and city centers, while their way of life fitted in the mentality and habits of an aggrarian society. Christianisation of the Slavic population enabled spreading of cultural models from the city centres under the Byzantine rule, which lead to strenghtening of ideological positions and fortification of their factual rule. On the other side, the Holy See looked benevolently on these efforts, since the Benedictans almost unnoticably contributed to strenghtening of the Roman Church positions in Dalmatia. The Benedictans took their missonary endevours seriously, as we can see from a very smart selection of the cults of saints - primarily patrons of big abbeys.

Can You Tell Me How to Get to the Roman Brothel? Public Prominence of Prostitutes in the Roman World

Modern scholarship on the location of sex work in the Roman city has focused almost exclusively on an attempt to label and count brothels, largely within the small city of Pompeii. This is a search concerned, naturally, with definitions and vocabulary: what makes a building a brothel? This hunt for brothels also seeks to locate and segregate Roman prostitutes themselves: both Ray Laurence and Andrew Wallace-Hadrill have suggested “red-light districts” for prostitutes in Pompeii, separating the shameful women from the eyes of respectable matrons and maidens. While Thomas McGinn has recently successfully debunked this theory of “zoning shame” for Pompeii, this article establishes that prostitutes worked in highly public locations in urban areas throughout the Roman Empire. While meretrices certainly did not share the same social status or respect as married women, they formed a ubiquitous part of the urban landscape. This article will examine both literary and archaeological evidence in order to determine in what sort of cultural context urban Roman prostitutes of the first several centuries CE might have worked. Through a set of case studies of possible brothel sites in Pompeii, Ephesus, Ostia, Dougga, and Scythopolis, as well as a review of the surviving literary descriptions, we can further illuminate Roman attitudes towards prostitutes and how they functioned in Roman society. Since brothels are the best archaeological evidence of sex work in areas where graffiti have not survived, this article will primarily concentrate on using brothels as a means of establishing the prominence of prostitutes in the urban environment.

Book Review of Drei Hanghäuser in Thugga: Maison des Trois Masques, Maison du Labyrinthe, Maison de Dionysios et d'Ulysse, by Rainer Stutz

Roman Thugga (Dougga) is the best-known ruined city in modern Tunisia and one of the most visited sites in North Africa. A huge number of urban Roman houses are known from Tunisia, and although only three houses are included here, the significance of the site and the province make this an important book. The book is even more interesting to the specialist on houses since two of the houses are “nonstandard” and relations between different house types help us understand the residential fabric of the city.

The Challenge of Pluralism: Articulating a Rationale for Religiously Diverse Urban Roman Catholic Schools in the United States

This essay explores the challenge of pluralism through an examination of religiously diverse urban Roman Catholic schools in the United States. Changes in student demographics have forced members of the sponsoring religious body to ask: Why should schools with a large number of non-Catholics be sponsored, often at great cost, by a church community with limited resources and expanding needs in other domains? Based on the belief that religious institutions must be seen in their particular historical, sociological and political context, the essay begins with a discussion of these issues. In that light, the author presents three rationales for continued support that emanate from the heart of contemporary Catholic thought: ecumenism, racial justice and solidarity. Finally, he offers reflections for a multi faith, international audience about the legitimation of religiously affiliated educational institutions.

Passing on the Rites of Passage. Girls' Initiation Rites in the Context of an Urban Roman Catholic Community on the Zambian Copperbelt

This book is an up-to-the-minute survey of best practice showing companies how to achieve excellence through quality by effecting a total transformation of the way they do business. Total quality management is about people and attitudes, rather than techniques and systems, although it includes those. Quality is attained by people linked together to form a chain of suppliers and customers. Everyone in every part of an organization is a supplier to someone else and this book shows how quality can be achieved in every link in the chain by empowering each employee to strive for continuous improvement. Case studies, which include Holloway Prison and Braintree District Council, are supported by analysis of the teachings of major quality gurus - such as Deming and Juran - with explanation of their relevance to today's manager. An increasing number of companies are seeking to be awarded BS5750 - the British National Standard for Quality Management Systems - which will play a crucial role in European trade after 1992.

RASING, Thera, Passing on the Rites of Passage. Girls' Initiation Rites in the Context of an Urban Roman Catholic Community on the Zambian Copperbelt. Amsterdam, (Avebury Press), African Studies Centre, 1995, x, 112 pp., £22.50, 1 85972 301 2

RASING, Thera, Passing on the Rites of Passage. Girls' Initiation Rites in the Context of an Urban Roman Catholic Community on the Zambian Copperbelt. Amsterdam, (Avebury Press), African Studies Centre, 1995, x, 112 pp., £22.50, 1 85972 301 2

THE IBERIAN PENINSULA AND THE FORMATION OF EARLY WESTERN CHANT

Studies in plainchant have increasingly focused on the different regional repertories ?Roman, Beneventan, Ravennate, Milanese, Gallican, Old Hispanic, Celtic, etc.? that flourished before the Gregorian-Roman re pertory came to be universal during the later 8th century. The local chant ?dialects? are of interest not only for themselves but for what thay reveal in comparisons with their sister dialects. Their styles, substances, and in terrelationships enlarge the prespectives on plainchant origins. For long it was supposed that the authoritative, mainstream chant was Gregorian chant, and that this flowed from a single source ?a written model that was neumed at Rome in the time of Gregory the Great. Other regional dialects seemed no more than local tributaries of the ?Gregorian-Roman? usage. This Roman-centered view has been replaced, and the regional dialects are now understood as potential indicators of musical states be fore the Gregorian was given its definitve Carolingian form. There are rich materials for studying this question. Four complete musical repertories have come down from the medieval Latin West. Where primacy was long assigned to the Gregorian-Roman, now the Ur ban Roman repertory, with a liturgy and music that are in many respects more Roman than those of Gregorian chant, is recognized as of equal im portance. There is also the ?Milanese? repertory that flourished in parts of cisalpine Gaul. Covering a large area, there is the Old-Hispanic reper tory, with some important subdivisions. Old-Hispanic is the most difficult of access because its surviving transmissions are almost exclusively in un heighted neumes.Yet it has the allure of being in some respects the most archaic as well as the most complete surviving repertory. It may also have played a larger role than the historical picture has so far assigned it. This Round Table focuses on aspects of the Old Hispanic chant, in its own manifestations and in its contribution to the larger picture. Alongside the four full surviving repertories from the Latin West

Recent Excavations of a Cemetery of 'Londinium'

Since 1983 the Museum of London's Department of Greater London Archaeology has completed nine rescue excavations (HGS. I and 2) and numerous watching briefs in advance of redevelopment within the area of the Roman cemetery to the east of the City of London. The excavations have uncovered 104 cremations and 575 inhumations, dating from the first to the fifth centuries A.D. This article is intended to make known some of the initial results in advance of full publication.The cemetery lay on a gravel terrace 600–700 m north of the River Thames. The geology of the area consists of sands and gravels, locally overlain by brickearth. The cemetery was typical of urban Roman cemeteries, sited beyond the city limits and adjacent to a road from the city. It extended at least 600 m to the east of the city wall and covered an area of over 16.5 ha.