Hellenistic Sacred Dedications

2020 ◽  
pp. 114-126
Author(s):  
Supratik Baralay
Keyword(s):  
Social Processes ◽  
First Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Hellenistic Period ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Physical Objects

Dedications of physical objects placed in a sanctuary or some other space sacred to the gods were very common in all places and at all times in the Graeco-Roman world. While a number of these dedications were not inscribed, many dedicators chose to make a written record of their act of dedication, usually upon the object itself. This chapter sets out the typical formats employed in Greek sacred dedicatory inscriptions during the Hellenistic period. It then discusses in detail a pair of documents: an inscribed marble plaque from Alexandria dated to the mid-third century BC and an inscribed limestone stele from Krokodilopolis (Arsinoe) in the Fayum, dated to the mid-second to mid-first century BC It shows that although both inscriptions are part of a wider Hellenistic epigraphic koine, they exhibit features that are peculiar to the sacred dedications of Hellenistic Egypt and arose due to particular social processes at work there.

scholarly journals The Kosmētai Portraits in Third Century Athens. Recutting, Style, Context and Patronage

2019 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 139-167
Author(s):  
Marina Prusac
Keyword(s):  
Building Material ◽  
First Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Hellenistic Period ◽  
Public Philosophy ◽  
The Third ◽  
Written Sources

Portraits of a group of thirty kosmētai, public philosophy teachers in Athens, were found among the fill in the Valerian Wall by the Roman Agora in Athens in 1861. From the Hellenistic period onwards, the kosmētai had taught the philosophy or Aristotle, though, with time, the teaching became more varied. In the first century AD, the number of students had a peak of three hundred a year. In the third century, when the portraits were buried in the Valerian Wall, the number of students had decreased, much as it had in other pedagogic institutions. The activity of the kosmētai ended about AD 280 when the Valerian Wall was built. The dating of the Valerian Wall is based on coins with the portrait of emperor Probus (AD 276-282), which have been found among the building debris. What we know about the kosmētai from the written sources leads to several questions, such as why the kosmētai portraits were used as building material at a time when the identity of the sitters could sill be remembered. Why were some of the portraits recut into those of other individuals shortly before they were put into the wall? Some of the kosmētai portraits were produced recut and discarded during the span of a few decades. This paper discusses the portraits of the kosmētai and their significance in Roman Athens and explores questions related to the disposal of them, as well as to context, style, workshop, and patronage.

scholarly journals Third-Century Inflation Reassessed

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Kelly
Keyword(s):  
Free Market ◽  
First Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
State Action ◽  
Conventional View ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Roman Egypt ◽  
Quantitative Treatment

The conventional view of inflation in the Roman world, based on evidence from Roman Egypt, is that prices were steady from the middle of the first century AD until around AD 274, other than a doubling of prices between AD 160 and 190. By a quantitative treatment of the data for all available prices, and indicators of prices, this paper shows that this picture is broadly correct for wheat, but that prices for other goods increased throughout the period from AD 160 to 270. This pattern suggests that there were two co-existing market sectors. One for wheat, where prices appear to have been impacted by state action, and another where other commodities were left to find their own market level within a relatively free market.

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.

Coasting Britannia: Roman Trade and Traffic Around the Shores of Britain

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Fulford
Keyword(s):  
Olive Oil ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
First Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Major Theme ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Equal Importance ◽  
Roman Coins ◽  
Hadrian's Wall

A major theme of Barry’s research has been the investigation of the relations between the Roman world and western Europe, particularly Britain. While, as we shall see below, his Weldwork has contributed very substantially to this theme, there have been several major synthetic treatments (e.g. Cunlifie 1988; 2001a). He has also sailed vicariously the seaways of the Atlantic and the British Isles through reconstructing the voyage to northern waters of Pytheas, the Greek ‘discoverer of Britain’ in the fourth century bc (Cunlifie 2001b). This contribution explores a little further maritime activity around Britain’s shores in the Roman period, particularly in the period of the first century BC to third century ad, and the ideas expressed by Barry in his Facing the Ocean (Cunlifie 2001a: 417–21; 443–6). Between the last quarter of the first century BC and the mid-third century ad Britain was in receipt of tens of, if not hundreds of thousands, conceivably millions of consumer goods and containers of wine, olive oil, etc. from the Roman world, mostly from the provinces of Gaul and Spain, but also Germany and from across the Mediterranean (Fulford 1991). Universally among military sites of this period, and almost ubiquitous among sites in ‘lowland’ Britain, are finds of Roman coins, originating mostly from the mints of Rome and Lyons, samian pottery from Gaul and, among amphorae, sherds of the olive-oil-carrying Dressel 20s from the Guadalqivir valley of Baetica. How did this material reach Britain? Considerable evidence has been amassed for the location of Roman ports and harbours around the coast of Britain, either indirectly on the basis of, for example, extrapolating the line of a Roman road heading towards an unidentified or lost site on the coast, or directly on the basis of the remains of harbour works such as quays and piling, but were these all of equal importance throughout the period in question (e.g. Brigham 1990; Cleere 1978; Fryer 1973; Milne 1985)? Many categories of material have distributions across Britain, though the incidence of finds is usually greater in the ‘lowland’ southeast, rather than in Wales or in the northern counties south of Hadrian’s Wall, or between the Hadrianic and Antonine frontiers.

MORE THAN MISTRESSES, LESS THAN WIVES: THE ROLE OF ROMAN CONCUBINAE IN LIGHT OF THEIR FUNERARY MONUMENTS

2020 ◽  
Vol 88 ◽  
pp. 151-184
Author(s):  
Tatjana Sandon ◽  
Luca Scalco
Keyword(s):  
Point Of View ◽  
First Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Funerary Monuments ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Roman Italy ◽  
Marital Union ◽  
Legal Marriage

This article focuses on the role of concubinae in the Roman world, through analysis of inscriptions and reliefs on funerary monuments involving these women and their relatives. It investigates why concubinatus was chosen in preference to legal marriage, and how the concubina was perceived as a member of her partner's family. The results bring to light how this type of quasi-marital union was an appealing option for men of social standing, and that the role of concubinae accepted by their partners was not so dissimilar to that of legal wives. The article considers funerary monuments from Roman Italy, dating from the first century BC to the early third century AD. It deals with the role of Roman concubinae by analysing tombstones from both an archaeological and historical point of view; the aim of this analysis is to reconstruct a social pattern of concubinatus and of the individuals involved in this type of quasi-marital relationship, with the aid of two different types of ancient sources.

The Roman Empire and the Kushans

1979 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 181-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Thorley
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Central Asia ◽  
Economic Importance ◽  
Roman History ◽  
First Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
The Third ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Ganges Plain ◽  
The Ganges

It may seem strange to link the Roman Empire with a Himalayan kingdom which hardly gets a mention in most standard works on Roman history, but in fact during the second and early third centuries A. D. these two powers enjoyed a cordial and mutually profitable relationship which was of considerable economic importance to both. From the end of the first century A. D. to the middle of the third century the Kushans controlled what is now Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kashmir, parts of Soviet and Chinese Central Asia, and much of the Ganges plain. Their history has proved difficult to reconstruct, since they left no historical writing, and even the chronology of their kings is still disputed, but enough is now known for us to begin to piece together, though still somewhat tentatively, the strange and exotic relationship between this distant state and the Roman world, and perhaps in the process to contribute from Roman history to the problems of Kushan dating.

History of Recording Demotic Epigraphy

2020 ◽  
pp. 491-507
Author(s):  
Jan Moje
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Seventh Century ◽  
First Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Late Period ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Rosetta Stone ◽  
Roman Egypt ◽  
History Of ◽  
Twenty First Century

This chapter gives an overview of the history of recording and publishing epigraphic sources in Demotic language and script from the Late Period to Greco-Roman Egypt (seventh century bce to third century ce), for example, on stelae, offering tables, coffins, or votive gifts. The history of editing such texts and objects spans over two hundred years. Here, the important steps and pioneering publications on Demotic epigraphy are examined. They start from the beginning of the nineteenth century, when Napoleon’s expedition to Egypt found the Rosetta stone, until the twenty-first century.

Madness, virtue, and ecology: A classical Indian approach to psychiatric disturbance

2021 ◽  
pp. 095269512098224
Author(s):  
Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad
Keyword(s):  
Mental Illness ◽  
Human Subject ◽  
Philosophical Anthropology ◽  
First Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Psychiatric Disturbance ◽  
Indian Medical ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Moral Relationship

The Caraka Saṃhitā (ca. first century BCE–third century CE), the first classical Indian medical compendium, covers a wide variety of pharmacological and therapeutic treatment, while also sketching out a philosophical anthropology of the human subject who is the patient of the physicians for whom this text was composed. In this article, I outline some of the relevant aspects of this anthropology – in particular, its understanding of ‘mind’ and other elements that constitute the subject – before exploring two ways in which it approaches ‘psychiatric’ disorder: one as ‘mental illness’ ( mānasa-roga), the other as ‘madness’ ( unmāda). I focus on two aspects of this approach. One concerns the moral relationship between the virtuous and the well life, or the moral and the medical dimensions of a patient’s subjectivity. The other is about the phenomenological relationship between the patient and the ecology within which the patient’s disturbance occurs. The aetiology of and responses to such disturbances helps us think more carefully about the very contours of subjectivity, about who we are and how we should understand ourselves. I locate this interpretation within a larger programme on the interpretation of the whole human being, which I have elsewhere called ‘ecological phenomenology’.

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