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23990 results in Ancient history

Page 886 of 1200

  • 17b - The individual and the gods

  • from 17 - Late polytheism
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 538-552

  • Summary

    The late polytheist world-view affords the historian a first orientation amidst an exceptionally complex body of evidence. But daily contact with the Gods came to most people not through philosophy or theurgy, nor even the occult sciences, but through public and domestic cult, dreams, the rites of the dead, and so on. The building of temples was among the most fundamental human social acts. During the major festivals of Artemis, the emperor too was honoured - it was on such occasions that the imperial cult came closest to everyday life. The need for special relationships with Gods arose either from some objective problem, such as illness, or, less commonly, from what one might call intellectual or spiritual curiosity. Walls and floors were adorned with frescoes or mosaics depicting, not just mythological scenes, but also rituals of the mysteries and other cults, and allegories of mystical philosophical teachings. The individual's last encounter with his gods came of course at death.

  • 15 - Armenia and the eastern marches

  • from PART V - THE NON-ROMAN WORLD
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 481-497

  • Summary

    In antiquity most of eastern Anatolia was contained within the kingdom of Armenia. As a consequence of the Armenian wars fought in the reign of the emperor Nero, a new dynasty was established on the Armenian throne, that of the Arsacids, a branch of the Parthian royal house. Religion plays a significant role in the struggle over Armenia. The indigenous polytheism had long been mixed with Iranian elements and pagan religion was essentially syncretic. On the eastern borders of Armenia lay the Median march, comprising lands in Atropatene and Adiabene that were wrested from the Persians in 298. To the south were the all-important Syrian and Arabian marches, themselves divided up into a number of autonomous principalities. The Syrian march, formerly the kingdom of Sophene, included the principalities of Ingilene, Anzitene, Lesser and Greater Sophene, each with its own local ruler.

  • 11 - Coinage and taxation: the state's point of view, a.d. 193–337

  • from PART IV - THE ECONOMY OF THE EMPIRE
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 327-392

  • Summary

    Coinage serves as a point of reference in the political, social and military life of the Roman empire. This chapter examines the problems of coinage and tax system in the specific context of the Roman economy, an economy that is neither modern nor archaic, but more simply different from subsequent ones. Coins are among the best preserved and the most thoroughly studied artefacts of imperial period. Throughout the period, the Roman coinage combines, three categories of coins corresponding to three categories of metals: gold, silver and aes or pure copper, or copper mixed with other metals. The currency is made up of a certain quantity of metals minted as coins and put into circulation. The metal stock is actually subject to three types of outflows: hoarding, the export of currency and the wear of coins. At the end of the third century, taxation perhaps replaces the coinage as a unifying factor.

  • 6a - General developments

  • from 6 - The emperor and his administration
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 131-136

  • Summary

    The novelty of the constitutions in the Codex Theodosianus within the overall context has often unconsciously led historians to believe that the procedures of government and administration attested from the age of Constantine onwards were always genuine fourth century innovations. According to a widely accepted reconstruction of the procedures of government and administration between the Augustan and Constantinian ages, the emperor Theodosius II management of the empire was characterized, on the one hand, by a substantial lack of initiative; on the other, by frenetic activism and personal commitment in the response to appeals from his subjects. While the second-century empire was perhaps less randomly governed and more 'bureaucratic' than is generally thought, its late antique counterpart was surely much less bureaucratized than is suggested by a deeply rooted tradition of studies. The age running from Severus to Constantine was an age of both fracture and continuity.

  • 18b - Third-century Christianity

  • from PART VI - RELIGION, CULTURE AND SOCIETY
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 589-671

  • Summary

    This chapter explains the geographical coverage of Christianity in the third century. It deals with Christians relations with the Roman state and the persecutions which formed a backdrop to the mental lives of many Christians even if physically they may have been little affected by them. The chapter describes the literary and intellectual life of third-century Christianity. Persecution of Christians by Roman officials had been in the course of the second century sporadic and unsystematic, and basically local in range, and is best seen in the context of the occasional harassment of many another exotic group equally regarded as deviant. By autumn 249 the emperor Decius was secured in power after his usurpation. Mani and his disciple missionaries, the narrow band of high achieving 'Elect' and their devoted faithful, the 'Hearers', had in the course of the third century made remarkable proselytizing progress both inside and outside the permeable boundaries of the Roman world, especially in the eastern empire.

  • 19 - Art and architecture, a.d. 193–337

  • from PART VI - RELIGION, CULTURE AND SOCIETY
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 672-703

  • Summary

    The reflexive relationship between art and society is particularly evident in the period AD 193-337, with art reflecting social developments and also shaping them. Art and architecture had a major role in creating the imperial image and in establishing a new Christian empire. The increasingly structured society had an impact on the development of style and form, while the enhanced status of the emperor and court ceremonial led to new themes in iconography and building types. From the Severans to the last quarter of the third century the picture is more changeable. Some of the most striking pieces are portraits of soldier emperors such as Maximinus Thrax and Philip the Arab. In contrast, portraits of Gallienus show a range of styles, rather as those of Septimius Severus had done, but bringing back a softer classicizing treatment of form. The development of Christian motifs on sarcophagi represents a new start and a progression from which there is no turning back.

  • 13 - The Germanic peoples and Germanic society

  • from PART V - THE NON-ROMAN WORLD
    • By Malcolm Todd, Emeritus Professor of Archaeology in the University of Durham, and former Principal of Trevelyan College, Durham
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 440-460

  • Summary

    The Germanic communities of the early Roman Iron Age had developed settlement forms that were much more complex and sophisticated than would have been deduced from the literary record. In terms of tactics, Germanic warfare probably changed little during the third and early fourth centuries. Weaponry certainly improved, and access to Roman armament, however achieved, added a new dimension. Trading and other exchanges continued unabated between the Roman provinces and the Germanic peoples throughout the late second and third centuries, though with significant changes in the goods which changed hands and in the overall pattern of trade. The status of iron smiths was carefully defined in the later Germanic law codes and it is a reasonable surmise that they enjoyed a relatively elevated position in earlier Germanic society. Cult-places of several kinds are strongly in evidence from the end of the second century and a number remained in use until the fourth or fifth centuries.

  • 17c - Public religion

  • from 17 - Late polytheism
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 553-572

  • Summary

    The Severan dynasty's attitude to religion was well exemplified by Caracalla. It was in the nature of things that an emperor's personal piety could not remain a private matter. The significance even of well-known gods varied widely from place to place. Roma, the emperor, the Capitoline Triad and the 'Twelve Gods' were revered throughout the empire, but in a way that varied according to the degree of their assimilation to local tradition, and of the natives zeal for Rome. Tripolitania and Trier illustrate well the variety of the regional perspective. The historic centre of Lepcis Magna was the old forum, whose shrines offer a first orientation in Tripolitanian religion. Earthquakes, nomad invasions and failure to effect repairs were probably more significant than Christianity as causes of the ruin that overcame many temples in the coastal cities, Sabratha, Oea and Lepcis Magna, during the latter part of the century.

  • 6b - The age of the Severans

  • from 6 - The emperor and his administration
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 137-155

  • Summary

    The victorious contender of the civil war that followed Commodus' assassination, Lucius Septimius Severus, the governor of the province of Pannonia Superior and an African of Lepcis Magna, found it expedient to present himself as Pertinax's legitimate successor. As for the women of the Severan dynasty, they played a decisive role not only during the palace intrigues accompanying the moments of succession, but also in the daily exercise of imperial power and in the very construction of the princeps' image. During the first two centuries of the imperial age the administrative fields dependent on the princeps steadily grew in importance. The Praetorian prefecture had extended its authority to cover matters of public order in Italy during the second century. The greatest changes in the administrative organization of the empire during the Severan age were those resulting from the large accretions of imperial property after the confiscation of individual urban estates belonging to the followers of Niger and above all Albinus.

  • 17a - The world-view

  • from 17 - Late polytheism
  • Edited by Alan Bowman, Brasenose College, Oxford, Averil Cameron, Keble College, Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    08 September 2005, pp 521-537

  • Summary

    The only late polytheist thinker considered worthy of serious study by historians of philosophy was Plotinus. Since Plotinus' attitude to conventional religion was misunderstood no less by his contemporaries than by modern scholars, it must be emphasized that he was recognized to be a focus of holiness, a holy man. In polytheism, the pursuit of virtue and the spiritual life were primarily the domain of the philosophers. The effect on the broad polytheist community of hearing the street-corner preaching of a wandering Cynic was scarcely to be compared with the regular instruction received by the Christian community from its bishop during the weekly house-church liturgy. The common ground between the Hermetica and the theurgists' sacred texts, the Chaldaean Oracles, lies not just in their Graeco-Oriental character, but also in their acceptance that humans may attain to the divine by many routes, in which cultic practices as well as philosophical intellection have a part.

Page 886 of 1200