Why Did Decius and Valerian Proscribe Christianity?

1933 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 67-77 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Thomas Oborn
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Social Forces ◽  
Rapid Rise ◽  
The Third ◽  
Roman World ◽  
The People ◽  
Mediterranean Countries ◽  
Direct Explanation ◽  
Hard Times

Severe economic depression had the Roman world in its grip during the middle of the third century A. D.; a condition from which the Mediterranean countries never fully recovered. There is much evidence to show that the economic structure of the Empire was crumbling. Very soon the outlying territories of the Empire were overrun by barbarians, trade collapsed, and brigandage and piracy reappeared on a large scale. All of this was accompanied by a rapid rise in the prices of the commodities of life. To-day we look for the causes of economic depressions in intricate and far-reaching social forces. In the third century Romans of the old school had a much more simple and direct explanation. When the Empire fell on hard times and disaster stalked the corners there was only one cause: the gods who had given Rome her power and the Empire its prosperity in the years gone by were being neglected, foreign gods and oriental cults had usurped the religious fervor of the people, and the venerable gods of the Eternal City were angered. The remedy was likewise simple: revive and stimulate the worship of the ancient gods of Rome, thus appeasing their anger, and prosperity would return.

scholarly journals The Role of Imperial Women in the Monetary Distributions (Liberalitas) in Rome in the Light of Numismatic Sources

2019 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-24
Author(s):  
Katarzyna Balbuza
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Considerable Importance ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Social Activities ◽  
Active Involvement ◽  
The Third ◽  
The People ◽  
Participation Of Women ◽  
The Feminine

Abstract Liberalitas was one of the most important forms of social activities of the Roman emperors. In quantitative terms, it is also one of the five most important imperial virtues. It appeared on coins as Liberalitas Augusti, which gave this virtue an additional, divine dimension. The first Empress to depict the idea of imperial generosity on the coins issued on her behalf was Julia Domna. In this respect, her liberalitas coins mark a breakthrough in the exposition of this imperial virtue. The well-known female liberalitas coin issues, or imperial issues with empresses’ portraits, date back to the third century and clearly articulate the liberalitas, both iconographically and literally, through the legend on the reverse of the coin. Other coins, issued on behalf of the emperors (mainly medallions), accentuate in some cases (Julia Mamaea, Salonina) the personal and active participation of women from the imperial house in congiarium-type activities. The issues discussed and analysed, which appeared on behalf of the emperors or the imperial women – with a clear emphasis on the role of women – undoubtedly demonstrate the feminine support for the emperor’s social policy towards the people of Rome, including the various social undertakings of incumbent emperors, to whom they were related. They prove their active involvement and support for the image of the princeps created by the emperors through the propaganda of virtues (such as liberalitas). The dynastic policy of the emperors, in which the empresses played a key role, was also of considerable importance.

scholarly journals Crossbows and imperial craft organisation: the bronze triggers of China's Terracotta Army

Antiquity ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 88 (339) ◽  
pp. 126-140 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiuzhen Janice Li ◽  
Andrew Bevan ◽  
Marcos Martinón-Torres ◽  
Thilo Rehren ◽  
Wei Cao ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Analysis ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Craft Production ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Administrative Control ◽  
The Third ◽  
Trigger Mechanisms ◽  
Qin Shihuang

The Terracotta Army that protected the tomb of the Chinese emperor Qin Shihuang offers an evocative image of the power and organisation of the Qin armies who unified China through conquest in the third century BC. It also provides evidence for the craft production and administrative control that underpinned the Qin state. Bronze trigger mechanisms are all that remain of crossbows that once equipped certain kinds of warrior in the Terracotta Army. A metrical and spatial analysis of these triggers reveals that they were produced in batches and that these separate batches were thereafter possibly stored in an arsenal, but eventually were transported to the mausoleum to equip groups of terracotta crossbowmen in individual sectors of Pit 1. The trigger evidence for large-scale and highly organised production parallels that also documented for the manufacture of the bronze-tipped arrows and proposed for the terracotta figures themselves.

What's in a hump? Re-examining the hunchback in the Villa-Albani-Torlonia

2009 ◽  
Vol 55 ◽  
pp. 130-156
Author(s):  
Lisa Trentin
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Literary Tradition ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
The Third ◽  
Imperial Court ◽  
Private Collection ◽  
Drilling Technique ◽  
And Shifts

The private collection of the Villa Albani-Torlonia in Rome holds the only surviving large-scale sculpture of a hunchback [fig. i]. Although this hunchback has been intensely studied, it remains enigmatic. The hunchback is generally agreed to be Roman and dated to the second century CE on the basis of its portrait head, particularly in the drilling technique of its hairstyle, though the realism of its misshapen and ugly body is in the direct tradition of works of the third century BCE.Whether this hunchback is an original of its time or a copy of a now lost Greek work is still contentious. Since its discovery in the Baths of Caracalla, the figure has been identified as the famous Greek fabulist Aesop, who, according to literary tradition, may have been a hunchback. Although several scholars have suggested new possibilities for the identity of this hunchback, including the proposition that it is a Roman original representing a jester of the imperial court, its association with Aesop has remained. But is its identity necessarily key to understanding its significance? This article intends to move away from the identification of this figure to consider the hunchback primarily as a type, rather than a person, and shifts the emphasis to its context within a bathhouse.

Heresiology in the Third-Century Mishnah: Arguments for Rabbinic Legal Authority and the Complications of a Simple Concept

2015 ◽  
Vol 108 (4) ◽  
pp. 508-529
Author(s):  
Naftali S. Cohn
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Discourse ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Legal Authority ◽  
Legal Text ◽  
The Third ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Simple Concept

When members of the early rabbinic group created the Jewish legal text known as the Mishnah in the late second or early third century, the concept of heresy was relatively common in the wider cultural discourse of the Roman world. Christian apologists, among others, frequently employed the Greek termhairesis(“heresy”/“heretic,” originally meaning “school of thought”/“adherent”) as part of their larger projects of drawing boundaries, defining identities, and making an argument for the authority of their own ideas and practices.

scholarly journals Hadis dari Masa ke Masa (Kodifikasi Era Mutaqaddimin)

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 57
Author(s):  
Fatimah Fatimah
Keyword(s):  
Research Method ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
The Third ◽  
Library Research ◽  
The People ◽  
Significant Difference

<p><em>Hadith as the second Islamic teaching has a significant difference with the Qur'an in terms of official bookkeeping. In terms of the preservation of the Qur'an since the beginning of the Qur'an, there has been a decree to keep watch over and be protected from falsehood, but not with the Prophet's hadith. As before the reign of Caliph Umar bin Abdul Aziz even the writing or bookkeeping was prohibited. But after considering some of the impending advances if the hadith was not made up of books, the false hadiths would have arisen from irresponsible people, the death of the companions who had memorized the war, and dispersed the scholars to various territories with their death. Moreover, hadith memorization has become a tradition among the people and the fear of memorization has decreased. It was from these questions that the caliphate of Umar bin Abdul Aziz raised concerns about the bookkeeping in order to preserve and maintain its legitimacy. The official formulation of the hadith dates back to the second century H. under the command of Umar bin Abdul Aziz. Hadith as a teaching of Islam, produced various books of hadith scholars who were born mutaqaddimin and endowed. However in this article the author will focus more on the development of the books of the hadith in the mutaqaddimin period. The period of mutaqaddimin is the period between I H and the third century H, the opening of the hadith of the mutaqaddimin period from the end of the second century H to III H. In this period of mutaqaddimin the books of the hadith were born by the scholars including: first, the century to II H there are many scholars who produce the book of the hadith, among them the most famous is the book of hadith of the priest of Malik called the book of Muwaththa 'Malik. Secondly, in the third century </em><em>H</em><em> the books of the hadith were born including the Book of Sahih Bukhari, the Book of Muslim Tradition, the Book of Sunan Abu Dawud, the Book of Sunan At-Tirmidzi, the Book of Sunan An-Nasa'iy, the Book of Sunan Ibn Majah and others. The writing of this journal uses the library research method that the author has obtained from various reading sources related to this research.</em><strong><em></em></strong></p>

Roman Water-Power

2020 ◽  
pp. 147-194
Author(s):  
Andrew Wilson
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
The Body ◽  
First Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Archaeological Evidence ◽  
Water Power ◽  
The Third ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Grain Milling ◽  
Over Time

This chapter summarizes the archaeological evidence currently known for Roman water-mills, tracing the development and spread of water-powered grain milling over time across the Roman Empire. Problems of quantification and evidence bias, both documentary and archaeological, are addressed. In particular, it is argued that large discoidal millstones, formerly thought to derive either from animal-powered or water-powered mills, must come from water-mills, and that the idea of Roman animal-driven mills with discoidal millstones is a myth. This dramatically increases the amount of evidence available for water-powered grain milling, although very unevenly spread across the empire, and heavily dependent on the intensity of research in particular regions—good for Britain, parts of France, and Switzerland; poor everywhere else. The chapter also summarizes the state of knowledge on other applications of water-power—for ore-crushing machines at hard-rock gold and silver mines (by the first century AD), trip-hammers, tanning and fulling mills, and marble sawing (by the third century AD). The picture is fast-changing and the body of evidence continues to grow with new archaeological discoveries. The chapter ends with some thoughts about the place of water-power in the overall economy of the Roman world, and on the transmission of water-powered technologies between the Roman and medieval periods.

Pottery Manufacture in Roman Egypt: A New Papyrus

1981 ◽  
Vol 71 ◽  
pp. 87-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen Cockle
Keyword(s):  
Subject Matter ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Ancient Egypt ◽  
The Other ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Chemical Analyses ◽  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Pottery Industry ◽  
The Third ◽  
Roman Egypt

Our knowledge of the pottery industry in ancient Egypt has so far been derived from sculptured reliefs showing potters at work, from a few excavations of kilns and from chemical analyses of pottery wares. Documentary evidence has now come to light in the form of three pottery leases from Oxyrhynchus, all dated to the middle of the third century a.d.They are so closely related in subject-matter, terminology, date and the names of the contracting parties that I publish in full only the earliest and most complete (which I shall refer to as A); but I include references to the more significant details of the other two (B and C). Their importance lies in the fact that they reveal a remarkably large scale industry, and also much concerning the techniques and terminology of the pottery industry, especially the names of the clays used and the sizes of the jars.

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