Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
  1. Home
  2. Browse subjects
  3. Classical Studies
  4. Ancient history
  5. Content listing

Refine search

Refine search

Access:
Content type:
Publication date:
Apply   From and To filters
Subject: Show more
Journals Show more
Publishers: Show more
Societies Show more
Series: Show more
Collections: Show more

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

23990 results in Ancient history

Page 371 of 1200

  • Chapter 5 - Political Alliances and Rivalries in Contiones in the Late Roman Republic

  • from Part II - Political Alliances
  • Edited by Henriette van der Blom, University of Birmingham, Christa Gray, University of Reading, Catherine Steel, University of Glasgow
  • Book:
    Institutions and Ideology in Republican Rome
    Published online:
    08 May 2018
    Print publication:
    17 May 2018, pp 107-127

  • Summary

    The contio was the only institutionalised venue in which a Roman orator might address the people directly. However, not everybody could speak freely in a meeting. A contio had to be convened by a magistrate, who decided who took the floor. A politician who was not a magistrate and wanted to deliver a speech to the people needed the co-operation of a magistrate willing to convene a meeting and allow him to speak (producere in contionem). On other occasions, some of the most prominent politicians were brought to a contio for the purpose of finding out their opinion on a current topic, sometimes with the intention of embarrassing or pressing them. In both cases, the custom of bringing somebody to speak in an assembly was an essential strategy and vital to an understanding of how Roman politics worked, and promoted a dialectical dynamism that allowed the plebs to obtain first-hand information on significant political debates. This paper focuses on these strategies as a means of disclosing short-term or lasting political alliances and friendships within the Roman senate and enmities and rivalries among politicians.

  • Chapter 8 - Cato, Pompey’s Third Consulship and the Politics of Milo’s Trial

  • from Part II - Political Alliances
  • Edited by Henriette van der Blom, University of Birmingham, Christa Gray, University of Reading, Catherine Steel, University of Glasgow
  • Book:
    Institutions and Ideology in Republican Rome
    Published online:
    08 May 2018
    Print publication:
    17 May 2018, pp 165-180

  • Summary

    In 52 BC, Pompey was made ‘consul without a colleague’ on the initiative of M. Porcius Cato and M. Calpurnius Bibulus. This moment is sometimes regarded as signalling an alliance between Pompey and the optimates. Others argue that it was no more than a necessary but temporary expedient. This chapter draws on detailed evidence surrounding the trial of T. Annius Milo to make the case for real co-operation between Pompey and ‘Cato’s circle’ in 52. Most obviously, Cato’s ally L. Domitius Ahenobarbus presided over the trial, while Cato himself served as juror. Moreover, though a supporter of Milo, Cato conducted himself so as not to undermine Pompey’s authority or the terms of the trial, which excluded any defence that Milo had acted for the good of the state. Cooperation did not end with Milo’s trial. Indeed, Cato helped to shape Pompey’s legislative programme as sole consul, even while Pompey continued to support Caesar. Tracking these and other alignments at work in 52 provides insights into the nature of political alliance in Republican Rome and the potential for constructive collaboration both through and despite pre-existing personal relationships.

  • Chapter 4 - Gods, Change and Civic Space in Late Republican Oratory

  • from Part I - Modes of Political Communication
  • Edited by Henriette van der Blom, University of Birmingham, Christa Gray, University of Reading, Catherine Steel, University of Glasgow
  • Book:
    Institutions and Ideology in Republican Rome
    Published online:
    08 May 2018
    Print publication:
    17 May 2018, pp 88-104

  • Summary

    This chapter explores some of the claims that were made about divinities in public oratory in Rome in the late-second and first centuries BCE in the context of broader responses to change in those years. It focusses principally on Mars and Venus, deities whose place in the civic fabric grew denser in these years, contending that they featured in public oratory in ways that allowed speakers to make a stand against perceived changes. The argument is not that such a capacity was limited to gods, but rather that their connections to other entities (Rome, myths, legions, temples, statues) made them particularly resonant, given that Roman oratory and ‘religion’ both connect words, objects and actions to a significance that lies beyond themselves, by triggering ideas and associations. Oratory explored in the chapter includes Metellus Numicidus’ address about marriage, the claim about Venus Palatina by M. Iunius Brutus that was possibly deployed in the trial of a Planc(i)us in the early 1st century BCE, Cicero’s allegations about Clodia’s statue of Venus in the pro Caelio, and about Mars in the pro Marcello and in particular his claims about the legio Martia in the Philippicae.

  • Chapter 13 - Servilia’s Consilium

  • from Part III - Institutions in Theory and Practice
  • Edited by Henriette van der Blom, University of Birmingham, Christa Gray, University of Reading, Catherine Steel, University of Glasgow
  • Book:
    Institutions and Ideology in Republican Rome
    Published online:
    08 May 2018
    Print publication:
    17 May 2018, pp 252-264

  • Summary

    This paper examines evidence from Cicero’s letters about two family councils held by Caesar’s assassins after the Ides of March, in 44 and 43 BC respectively. Servilia, mother of Marcus Brutus, appears as the key organiser, even as many other invited participants are also present, including several prominent women. Cicero and other politicians give prepared speeches that introduce debates about various possible courses of action, sometimes over many hours. These meetings apparently follow at least some customs also observed by the Roman senate, itself a grand consilium called to advise a magistrate (consul or praetor). Formal rhetorical speeches (orationes) were evidently specially prepared (or compiled from existing material and rumours or other political opinions circulating in Rome) specifically for such private venues, where friends and family debated what had already been done and what policies seemed best for the future. Servilia herself is portrayed by Cicero as fully capable of convening and presiding over such a family council, even as she calls on speakers to present a case or to stop speaking.

Page 371 of 1200