'Lock up your valuables': Perceptions of sailors and sea-merchants in port cities of late antiquity and early Byzantium

2014 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 47-75
Author(s):  
Janet Wade
Keyword(s):  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Social Stigma ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Port Cities ◽  
Negative Perception ◽  
The Social ◽  
Integral Role ◽  
The Church ◽  
Maritime Community ◽  
Early Byzantine

The ongoing presence of sailors and sea-merchants in the major port cities of the late antique and early Byzantine periods made them an important and influential subculture. This paper looks at the range of perceptions of the maritime community that exist in late Roman and early Byzantine sources. Various secular and ecclesiastical attitudes are discussed and compared with relevant sections of the civil and maritime law codes. When sailors, sea-merchants, and other mariners are mentioned by their contemporaries, they are more often than not portrayed in an unfavourable light. The legislation suggests that the negative perception of these men does have some basis in reality, yet the traditional view of these men as unsavoury and dishonest characters needs to be questioned. This paper asks why the ancient sources perceived sailors and sea-merchants in the way that they did. It discusses the social stigma attached to these men, the potential moral threat that they posed, their superstitious nature, and their socially disruptive and subversive behaviour. This paper highlights the reasons why modern scholars have tended to overlook the presence of the maritime community and their sociological importance in major port cities of this period. It argues that the maritime crowd had an integral role in the shaping of the economy, society, and even the church during this period.

Late Antique Letter Collections

2016 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Literary Genre ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Comprehensive Overview ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
The Social ◽  
Letter Writer ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Letter Collection ◽  
Latin Letter

This volume provides the first comprehensive overview of the extant Greek and Latin letter collections of late antiquity (ca. 300-600 C.E.). Bringing together an international team of historians, classicists, and scholars of religion, it illustrates how letter collections advertised an image of the letter writer and introduces the social and textual histories of each collection. Nearly every chapter focuses on the letter collection of a different late ancient author—from the famous (or even infamous) to the obscure—and investigates its particular issues of content, arrangement, and publication context. On the whole, the volume reveals how late antique letter collections operated as a discrete literary genre with its own conventions, transmission processes, and self-presentational agendas while offering new approaches to interpret both larger letter collections and the individual letters contained within them. Each chapter contributes to a broad argument that scholars should read letter collections as they do representatives of other late antique literary genres, as single texts made up of individual components, with larger thematic and literary characteristics that are as important as those of their component parts.

Urban Space and Aristocratic Power in Late Antique Rome

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Machado
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
Urban Space ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
The Social ◽  
Traditional Elite ◽  
History Of ◽  
The City

This book analyses the physical, social, and cultural history of Rome in late antiquity. Between AD 270 and 535, the former capital of the Roman empire experienced a series of dramatic transformations in its size, appearance, political standing, and identity, as emperors moved to other cities and the Christian church slowly became its dominating institution. Urban Space and Aristocratic Power in Late Antique Rome provides a new picture of these developments, focusing on the extraordinary role played by members of the traditional elite, the senatorial aristocracy, in the redefinition of the city, its institutions, and spaces. During this period, Roman senators and their families became increasingly involved in the management of the city and its population, in building works, and in the performance of secular and religious ceremonies and rituals. As this study shows, for approximately three hundred years the houses of the Roman elite competed with imperial palaces and churches in shaping the political map and the social life of the city. Making use of modern theories of urban space, the book considers a vast array of archaeological, literary, and epigraphic documents to show how the former centre of the Mediterranean world was progressively redefined and controlled by its own elite.

scholarly journals LATE ANTIQUE OR EARLY BYZANTINE? THE SHIFTING BEGINNINGS OF BYZANTINE LITERATURE

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Panagiotis A. Agapitos
Keyword(s):  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Methodological Approach ◽  
Structural Break ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Historical Period ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Methodological Problems ◽  
The One ◽  
Early Byzantine

The aim of the paper is twofold. On the one hand, it examines the epistemological reasons behind the shifting beginnings of Byzantine literature, a shift that covers a period of four centuries (AD 300-700), as well as the methodological problems for the study of Byzantine literature resulting from the rise of Late Antiquity as a new historical period and a new field of studies. On the other hand, the paper proposes a series of four textually immanent criteria and seven internal operative principles by means of which a different methodological approach to the «beginning» of Byzantine literature can be reached. For this purpose Eusebios of Caesarea and Lactantius will be used as the textual basis for establishing a structural break in literary production in the first two decades of the fourth century. For the purpose of controlling this proposal a comparison with an important but highly debated monument (the Arch of Constantine in Rome) will be made and some final conclusions as to the course of Greek literature in early Byzantine times will be made.

scholarly journals From the Tombs into the City: Grave Robbing and the Reuse of Funerary Spolia in Late Antique Italy

2019 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 115-137
Author(s):  
Cristina Murer
Keyword(s):  
Social Practice ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Sixth Century ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Archaeological Evidence ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
The Third ◽  
Political Transformations ◽  
The Social ◽  
The City

Archaeological evidence demonstrates that funerary spoil (e.g. sarcophagus lids, funerary altars, epitaphs, reliefs, and statues) were frequently reused to decorate the interiors of public and private buildings from the third to the sixth century. Therefore, the marble revetments of high imperial tombs must have been spoliated. Imperial edicts, which tried to stamp part the overly common practice of tomb plundering, confirm that the social practice of tomb plundering must have been far more frequent in late antiquity than in previous periods. This paper discusses the reuse of funerary spoil in privet and public buildings from Latium and Campania and contextualizes them by examining legal sources addressing tomb violation. Furthermore, this study considers the extent to which the social practice of tomb plundering and the reuse of funerary material in late antiquity can be connected with larger urbanist, sociohistorical, and political transformations of Italian cityscapes from the third to the sixth century.

The pagan holy man in late antique society

1982 ◽  
Vol 102 ◽  
pp. 33-59 ◽  
Author(s):  
Garth Fowden
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Religious Tradition ◽  
Francis Bacon ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Common ◽  
Indefinite Future ◽  
Holy Man ◽  
The Church

A Love and desire, to sequester a Mans Selfe, for a Higher Conversation … is found, to have been falsely and fainedly, in some of the Heathen; As Epimenides the Candian, Numa the Roman, Empedocles the Sicilian, and Apollonius of Tyana; And truly and really, in divers of the Ancient Hermits, and Holy Fathers of the Church.F. Bacon, Of friendshipThe holy men of Greco-Roman paganism will never inspire either the reverence or the fascinated horror that the ascetics and monks of early Christianity have commanded ever since they first impinged on the common mind in the time of Antony and Athanasios. Writing for a Christian audience, Francis Bacon could dismiss the semi-mythical Epimenides and Numa, and notorious exhibitionists like Empedokles and Apollonios, as self-evident imposters; while in our own less devout times the abundance of the hagiographical literature ensures that the Christian saint will preoccupy scholars for the indefinite future, if only as the unwitting patron of a mass of historical and sociological data that is only just beginning to be analysed. Yet this is poor excuse for neglecting the pagan holy man, who came in the later Roman empire to play a conspicuous part in his own religious tradition, and also affords instructive points of comparison with his Christian competitors. This paper offers a first orientation towards such wider perspectives, by investigating the social and historical consequences entailed by the distinctive pagan concept of personal holiness. It will be suggested that a tendency to associate holiness with philosophical learning (Section I) determined the essentially urban (II) and privileged (III) background of the pagan holy man, and also encouraged his gradual drift to the periphery of society (IV).

scholarly journals The development of the Church of St Mary at Ephesos from late antiquity to the Dark Ages

2019 ◽  
Vol 69 ◽  
pp. 175-194
Author(s):  
Nikolaos Karydis
Keyword(s):  
Present Article ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Design Patterns ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Dark Ages ◽  
Wall Structures ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Church ◽  
Archaeological Excavations

AbstractThe Church of St Mary is one of the most significant monuments of Ephesos, but also one of the most enigmatic. Its repeated modifications prior to its destruction created an amalgam of different phases that have proven difficult to decipher within the present remains. Written records and inscriptions suggest that this church was the venue of the riotous Ecumenical Council of AD 431, but the identification of the phase of the building that corresponds to this event is controversial. And, although the remains make it clear that at some point the church was transformed into a domed basilica, the latter’s form and date have not been established with certainty. The present article tries to fill these lacunae through a new survey of the remains of the church and a re-examination of the evidence from the archaeological excavations of the 20th century. This new investigation of wall structures and design patterns within the remains leads to new interpretations of the evidence, and sheds further light on the history of the Church of St Mary from its late antique origins to the Dark Ages.

Islands in the stream

1986 ◽  
Vol 13 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 323-342
Author(s):  
Robert A. Kaster
Keyword(s):  
Late Antiquity ◽  
First Century ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Rational Analysis ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Status ◽  
Personal Qualities ◽  
The Stability ◽  
Conceptual Foundations ◽  
Do So

Summary The Latin grammarians of late antiquity seem to personify the cultural stagnation and decline that have commonly been thought to typify the age. Resting upon conceptual foundations that had been laid centuries earlier and repeating the same doctrine from generation to generation, their texts appear by and large to be wholly untouched by originality. This paper addresses the question: why was this so? To suggest one answer to this question, the argument begins from the premise that the tradition remained as stable as it did because it continued to satisfy certain needs; the paper then goes on to consider these needs and their interaction. First, there are the needs of the grammarians themselves. From the beginnings of the profession’s history in the first century B.C. and first century A.D., when the grammarians’ schools first emerged as distinct institutions at Rome, the grammarians’ doctrine, with its emphasis on the rational analysis of the language’s ‘nature’, provided them with the authority they needed to prescribe correct speech for the social and cultural elite that they served. Once this exercise of reason had made a place for the grammarians as relative newcomers to the world of liberal letters, the doctrine was something to be prized and defended: the vivid instruction of the late antique grammarian Pompeius shows us a man fortified and buoyed up by his profession’s tradition, eager to assert its soundness or to add an improving touch here or there – and without the least wish or incentive to attempt some fundamental innovation; for to do so would be to tamper with the honorable social position that the profession provided. At the same time, the mainstream of the educated elite – the second group whose needs must be considered – would themselves have had little reason to encourage innovation: since a liberal education, based of course on grammar, had come to be one of the most important marks of social – and even moral – status, the honorable position of the elite was as much tied as the grammarians’ to the maintenance of the traditional doctrine. As a result, when the interests of the grammarians and the educated elite met in the institution of patronage, on which all teachers depended, the stability of the tradition was reinforced: for patrons did not seek innovative brilliance in their dependents, nor did they even look primarily for technical competence; they rather looked first for traditionally valued personal qualities like modesty and diligence, and other such qualities that would tend to preserve the status quo.

scholarly journals Philanthropy and places of care (xenodochia) in the late Roman empire, 350-600 CE

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Júlio Matzenbacher Zampietro ◽  
Pedro Paulo Abreu Funari
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
General Population ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Good Tool ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Common ◽  
Common Era

Hospitals and places of care in general are topics that have received little attention from historians of Late Antiquity. The scarcity of detailed studies, although explained by a proportional scarcity of primary sources, written or archaeological, seems unjustified. The study of places of care can be a good tool to assess changes in power relations in the Later Roman Empire, as well as a way of comprehending important features of the Late Antique landscape that affected the general population in a myriad of ways. Our research chiefly intends to learn how Byzantine places of care related to the social surroundigs from the fourth to the sixth centuries of the Common Era, while also aiming to understand internal aspects of these institutions, ranging from its healthcaring practices to the objectives of their members.

History, Eschatology, and the Development of the Six Ages of the World

Augustinianum ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
pp. 181-206
Author(s):  
John Joseph Gallagher ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Church Fathers ◽  
Augustine Of Hippo ◽  
Salvation History ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The World ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
The Church

The sex aetates mundi constituted the defining framework for understanding biblical and salvation history in the Early Christian and Late Antique worlds. The origins of the idea that history can be divided into six epochs, each lasting roughly a thousand years, are commonly attributed to Augustine of Hippo. Although Augustine’s engagement with this notion significantly influenced its later popularity due to the prolific circulation of his works, he was by no means the sole progenitor of this concept. This bipartite study undertakes the first conspectus in English-speaking scholarship to date of the origins and evolution of the sex aetates mundi. Part I of this study traces the early origins of historiographical periodisation in writings from classical and biblical antiquity, taking account in particular of the role of numerology and notions of historical eras that are present in biblical texts. Expressions of the world ages in the writings of the Church Fathers are then traced in detail. Due consideration is afforded to attendant issues that influenced the six ages, including calendrical debates concerning the age of the world and the evolution of eschatological, apocalyptic, and millenarian thought. Overall, this article surveys the myriad intellectual and exegetical currents that converged in Early Christianity and Late Antiquity to create this sixfold historiographical and theological framework. The first instalment of this study lays the groundwork for understanding Augustine’s engagement with this motif in his writings, which is treated in Part II.

Ireland in Late Antiquity

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 107-123 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elva Johnston
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Fifth Century ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Binary Opposition ◽  
The Social ◽  
Nuanced Understanding ◽  
Scholarly Discourse ◽  
The Relationship

It is often assumed that Ireland entered recorded history with the emergence of organized Christianity on the island at some point in the fourth or fifth century C.E. This assumption has meant that the histories of late antique and early medieval Ireland are primarily viewed through the lens of conversion. Religious identities, frequently imagined as a binary opposition of “Christian” and “pagan,” have been a dominant historiographical focus. This essay argues that it is more fruitful to examine the relationship between Ireland and its neighbors from c. 150–c. 550 C.E. through a frontier dynamic, a dynamic in which religious identity was but one factor among many. By recasting the Irish experience in this way, it is possible to take a more comparative approach which cuts against the grain of Irish exceptionalism. Moreover, situating Ireland within the scholarly discourse of late antiquity allows for a new and nuanced understanding of the social and religious changes that characterized this period on the island.

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