The Remarkable Life, Death, and Afterlife of an Ordinary Roman
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- Publisher:
- Cambridge University Press
- Publication date:
- 16 December 2024
- 23 January 2025
- ISBN:
- 9781009536080
- 9781009536066
- 9781009536097
- Dimensions:
- (228 x 152 mm)
- Weight & Pages:
- 0.46kg, 204 Pages
- Dimensions:
- (228 x 152 mm)
- Weight & Pages:
- 0.33kg, 204 Pages
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Book description
When we think of Romans, Julius Caesar or Constantine might spring to mind. But what was life like for everyday folk, those who gazed up at the palace rather than looking out from within its walls? In this book, Jeremy Hartnett offers a detailed view of an average Roman, an individual named Flavius Agricola. Though Flavius was only a generation or two removed from slavery, his successful life emerges from his careful commemoration in death: a poetic epitaph and life-sized marble portrait showing him reclining at table. This ensemble not only enables Hartnett to reconstruct Flavius' biography, as well as his wife's, but also permits a nuanced exploration of many aspects of Roman life, such as dining, sex, worship of foreign deities, gender, bodily display, cultural literacy, religious experience, blended families, and visiting the dead at their tombs. Teasing provocative questions from this ensemble, Hartnett also recounts the monument's scandalous discovery and extraordinary afterlife over the centuries.
Reviews
‘A richly illustrated book which should be required reading for every Classics undergraduate … While learning about Flavius, readers are exposed to such fields as archaeology, epigraphy, literary analysis, history, and numismatics and come away with a rich appreciation of the broad range of studies which ‘the Classics’ encompass, reenforced by Hartnett’s sweeping twelve-page bibliography … Hartnett demonstrates how learning about the life of an ordinary individual like Flavius brings the world of ancient Rome to life in ways that texts like Suetonius’ biography of Julius Caesar can never do.’
Thomas J. Sienkewicz Source: The Classical Journal
‘While this is a relatively short book, Hartnett has included a great deal of information in its pages. Indeed, it is impressive just how much Hartnett can parse from a funerary monument …. Readers … will be well rewarded by this insightful biography about ordinary Romans.’
Owain Williams Source: Ancient History
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