scholarly journals The Garrison of the Roman Fort at Porolissum (Dacia). The Analysis of the Tile-Stamps

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 365-372
Author(s):  
Coriolan Horatiu Oprean

Abstract The author is dealing with the tile-stamps found in the Roman auxiliary fort at Porolissum attempting to establish which of the many units recorded on tile-stamps stayed in garrison at Porolissum. The author of the present article is arguing his own hypothesis on the subject, based on his own excavations at Porolissum and on all the data gathered from the scientific literature. He finally proposes two tables and a graph that correlate all the information on the troops known from the tile-stamps and stone inscriptions, establishing which of them were in garrison at Porolissum and which were only temporarily attached for building activity. At the same time he sets in chronological order the tile-stamps, demonstrating that the three units which built the headquarters building and the gates of the fort (coh III, L VII GF, L III G) were brought to the Porolissum area late in Hadrian‘s reign, to build in stone the fort and other military facilities in the limes area of Porolissum. The permanent garrison of the fort was composed during the 2nd century AD of two infantry auxiliary units, cohors I Brittonum and cohors V Lingonum, while a third one, numerus Palmyrenorum was probably lodged in a smaller fort situated 500 m away, on the Citera Hill. In the third century, cohors V Lingonum was still there, cohors I Brittonum also for Caracalla‘s time (even not recorded by any later inscription, but, at the same time, not attested in another fort), while the smaller Citera Hill fort was out of use and the numerus Palmyrenorum Porolissensium was moved inside the big fort from Pomet Hill. The author is concluding that the garrison of the military site Porolissum was not changed during the Roman rule in Dacia, all the other tile-stamps found belonging to units brought mainly during the 2nd century to built the military facilities of this strengthened sector of the frontier.

1923 ◽  
Vol 13 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 127-151 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. B. Bury

§ 1. The exact measure of the originality of Diocletian's statesmanship has not yet been taken. ‘Like Augustus,’ said Gibbon, ‘Diocletian may be considered the founder of a new empire’ and these words express the accepted view. In the whole work of pulling the Empire together, which went on from A.D. 270 to 330, the three outstanding actors were Aurelian, Diocletian, and Constantine, and the part played by Aurelian was indispensable for the restitutio orbis. It was he who destroyed the Principate, notwithstanding the negligible episode of Tacitus. It was he who founded the autocracy; Diocletian who regularized and systematized it. Two new things Diocletian certainly did, one of which was a success and the other a failure though not a fruitless one. His division of the Empire into Dioceses was permanent for nearly three hundred years. His throne system led to disaster and disappeared; yet the territorial quadripartition which it involved was afterwards stereotyped in the four Prefectures, and Nicomedia pointed to Constantinople. But in many of the other changes which distinguished the Empire of Constantine from the Empire of Severus and which have generally been regarded as inventions of Diocletian, it is becoming clear that he was not the initiator but was only extending and systematizing changes which had already been begun. The separation of civil from military powers in provincial government had been initiated by Gallienus (the importance of whose reign has in recent years been emerging). Some of the characteristics which mark the military organization of the fourth century had come before Diocletian's accession. Mr. Mattingly's studies in the numismatic history of the third century have been leading him, as he tells us, to similar conclusions.


1924 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 141-157 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. W. Tarn

In this paper I am considering two things; the position of Delos as a ‘holy place,’ and the rules of the practice among Greek cities with regard to the grant of a τόπος or site for a stele. From these it follows automatically that the somewhat fashionable dogma of the ‘neutrality’ of Delos is not only (on our present materials) untrue, but is impossible,—it has no chance whatever of being true. It is strange that it should have gained the acceptance it has without any examination of its foundations ever having been made; however, this is so, and it presents rather a striking instance of the effect of mere repetition. Its importance, of course, consists in this, that, if it were true, then the festivals, etc., at Delos can never have any political meaning and we lose our only sure basis for the chronology of the middle of the third century. If this were necessary, one would naturally accept the consequences; the necessity, however, is in fact the other way. I am not going through what others have written; but I have borne in mind Professor Kolbe's argument for Delian neutrality in his drastic reconstruction of this period, a reconstruction which is ingenious, but is unfortunately based on other unsound hypotheses beside the Delian; and I shall notice in their place the four inscriptions with regard to the grant of a site on which he relied as exceptional, but which are really simple illustrations of well-established practice. I am dealing with that practice at some length, as I hope it may possess some interest of its own apart from the theme of this paper, seeing that the rules have never been formulated; but I was glad to find that Professor Wilhelm, who has done so much to elucidate the machinery of setting up decrees, in the two pages which he has incidentally given to the subject, at once noticed what I take to be the important matter, viz. that a question of interstate courtesy is involved.


Britannia ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 37 ◽  
pp. 295-336 ◽  
Author(s):  
R.J.A. Wilson

ABSTRACTThe fourth-century Rudston ‘aquatic’ mosaic is likely to show Oceanus at the centre rather than Neptune, and the dominant position of the head on the floor suggests that the inspiration for it derives, however remotely, from North African models where the scene was common. This is made more plausible by the fact that African influence, as is well known, is also detectable on the famous Venus mosaic by the same mosaicist in an adjacent room in the same building. At Brading, the central figure in the main reception room – a half-naked man with stick, globe and sundial – is identified, not just as a generic ‘philosopher’ type, but specifically as the third-century B.C. astronomer and poet, Aratus, on the basis of comparanda on mosaics, tapestry, silverware and in an illustrated manuscript of his work, thePhaenomena. It is further suggested that the key to reading the damaged larger part of the Brading floor above Aratus might be a Latin translation of his work, possibly that by Avienusc.A.D. 350, if the mosaic is indeed approximately of that date rather than earlier, and that the subject-matter of the panels alluded to constellations described in the poem. A very tentative attempt is made to identify what might have been depicted in the panels, on the basis of the mythology behind the constellations as explained in Latin adaptations of the poem: those of Perseus and Andromeda are illustrated in the surviving panel, and possibly Phaethon and Eridanus, Hercules and the serpent in the Garden of the Hesperides, and conceivably Pegasus at a spring were shown in the other three. It is also suggested that these unusual scenes might have been based on an illustrated manuscript of the work in the possession of thedominusat Brading. Be that as it may, the mosaic does appear to provide further evidence of the depth of classical learning displayed by at least some members of the Romano-British rural élite in the fourth century A.D.


1963 ◽  
Vol 53 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 1-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. W. Walbank

Any discussion of the policy of the Roman Senate towards the Hellenistic world at the end of the third century B.C. must inevitably take account of the work of two men who wrote their most important books around this topic. One is, of course, Polybius, the other Maurice Holleaux. Holleaux's book on Rome, Greece and the Hellenistic monarchies appeared in 1921; but it came as the culmination of several studies on this subject, which had been exercising his attention particularly since 1913. Today, then, we stand virtually at the fiftieth anniversary of Holleaux's thesis, and we can appropriately consider how far it has stood the test of time. However, that is not my main purpose in this paper, which will be concerned much more with what Polybius has to say on the subject. As everyone knows, it is the evidence of Polybius that stands behind Holleaux's remarkable reconstruction of Roman policy; and Holleaux's problem is quite central to Polybius' interests—indeed it is very close to, though not identical with, his main theme. ‘Who,’ he asks, ‘is so worthless and so indolent as not to want to know by what means and under what constitutional system the Romans in less than fifty-three years have succeeded in subjecting nearly the whole inhabited world to their sole government—a thing unique in history?’ It is perhaps not unfair to judge a historian by the degree of success he attains in tackling his main theme. If that seems a reasonable proposition, we may ask ourselves: Does Polybius in fact offer a satisfactory answer to the question he has raised?


Transfers ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 115-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan E. Bell ◽  
Kathy Davis

Translocation – Transformation is an ambitious contribution to the subject of mobility. Materially, it interlinks seemingly disparate objects into a surprisingly unified exhibition on mobile histories and heritages: twelve bronze zodiac heads, silk and bamboo creatures, worn life vests, pressed Pu-erh tea, thousands of broken antique teapot spouts, and an ancestral wooden temple from the Ming dynasty (1368–1644) used by a tea-trading family. Historically and politically, the exhibition engages Chinese stories from the third century BCE, empires in eighteenth-century Austria and China, the Second Opium War in the nineteenth century, the Chinese Cultural Revolution of the mid-twentieth century, and today’s global refugee crisis.


Author(s):  
Adrastos Omissi

This chapter begins by considering what made the late Roman state distinctive from the early Empire, exploring the political developments of the later third century, in particular the military, administrative, and economic reforms undertaken by the tetrarchs. It then explores the presentation of the war between the tetrarchy and the British Empire of Carausius and Allectus (286‒96), taking as its core sources Pan. Lat. X, XI, and VIII. These speeches are unique in the panegyrical corpus, in that two of them (X and XI) were delivered while the usurpation they describe was still under way, the third (VIII) after it was defeated. In this chapter, we see how the British Empire was ‘othered’ as piratical and barbarian, and how conflict with it helped to create the distinctive ideology of the tetrarchy.


2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 104-112
Author(s):  
Michał Skoczyński

Abstract The article presents the military cooperation between the King of Galician-Volhynian Ruthenia, Daniel Romanowicz, and the Dukes of Mazovia, Konrad and his son Siemowit. The alliance, based as a counterweight for the cooperation between the King of Hungary and the Piast princes of Lesser Poland, who were trying to conquer Ruthenia and dominate all Piast principalities in then fragmented Poland. It lasted for several decades from the 1220’s to the 1260’s and was primarly aimed at mutual protection against the invasions of the pagan Yotvingians and supporting each other in armed conflicts. The text contains an analysis of war expeditions, tactics and ways of support that were given by both sides of the allianace. It is a new point of view on this aspect of political strategy of both sides that in some ways defined the regional situation. Ruthenians granted masovian Piasts some mobile and political uncommited support in fight with their relatives in Poland, and also secured their border with the Yotvingians. On the other hand, masovian knights were an additional strike force in ruthenian plundering expeditions to Yotvingia. The research was based on the analysis of preserved historical sources and scientific literature using historical methodology.


2021 ◽  
pp. 095269512098224
Author(s):  
Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad

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’.


2015 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wojciech Włoskowicz

Abstract Materials from topographic surveys had a serious impact on the labels on the maps that were based on these surveys. Collecting toponyms and information that were to be placed as labels on a final map, was an additional duty the survey officers were tasked with. Regulations concerning labels were included in survey manuals issued by the Austro-Hungarian Militärgeographisches Institut in Vienna and the Polish Wojskowy Instytut Geograficzny in Warsaw. The analyzed Austro-Hungarian regulations date from the years 1875, 1887, 1894, 1903 (2nd ed.). The oldest manual was issued during the Third Military Survey of Austria-Hungary (1:25,000) and regulated the way it was conducted (it is to be supposed that the issued manual was mainly a collection of regulations issued prior to the survey launch). The Third Survey was the basis for the 1:75,000 Spezialkarte map. The other manuals regulated the field revisions of the survey. The analyzed Polish manuals date from the years 1925, 1936, and 1937. The properties of the labels resulted from the military purpose of the maps. The geographical names’ function was to facilitate land navigation whereas other labels were meant to provide a military map user with information that could not be otherwise transmitted with standard map symbols. A concern for not overloading the maps with labels is to be observed in the manuals: a survey officer was supposed to conduct a preliminary generalization of geographical names. During a survey both an Austro-Hungarian and a Polish survey officer marked labels on a separate “label sheet”. The most important difference between the procedures in the two institutes was that in the last stage of work an Austro-Hungarian officer transferred the labels (that were to be placed on a printed map) from the “label sheet” to the hand-drawn survey map, which made a cartographer not responsible for placing them in the right places. In the case of the Polish institute the labels remained only on the “label sheets”.


1976 ◽  
Vol 56 (2) ◽  
pp. 198-216 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barry Cunliffe

SummaryThe results of five seasons of excavation (1971–5) are summarized. A continuous strip 30–40 m. wide extending across the centre of the fort from one side to the other was completely excavated revealing pits, gullies, circular stake-built houses, rectangular buildings, and 2-, 4-, and 6-post structures, belonging to the period from the sixth to the end of the second century B.C. The types of structures are discussed. A sequence of development, based largely upon the stratification preserved behind the ramparts, is presented: in the sixth–fifth century the hill was occupied by small four-post ‘granaries’ possibly enclosed by a palisade. The first hill-fort rampart was built in the fifth century protecting houses, an area of storage pits, and a zone of 4-and 6-post buildings laid out in rows along streets. The rampart was heightened in the third century, after which pits continued to be dug and rows of circular houses were built. About 100 B.C. rectangular buildings, possibly of a religious nature, were erected, after which the site was virtually abandoned. Social and economic matters are considered. The excavation will continue.


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