In both the narratives of their reigns and as objects of allusion in accounts of later periods of Roman history, the seven kings of Rome (r. 753-509 BCE, traditionally) frequently feature in historiographical and biographical works written after the death of Livy (17 CE) with meaningful nuance despite the relative crystallization of Rome's founding and regal legends during the age of Augustus (r. 31 BCE-14 CE). I demonstrate how 12 authors writing over a period of four centuries, from late in the reign of Tiberius (r. 14-37 CE) to shortly after the death of Theodosius I (r. 378-395), refashion the kings as creative reflections of, or reactions to, the Roman emperors in both their narratives and the time of writing those narratives. These writers are, in Latin, Velleius Paterculus, Tacitus, Suetonius, Florus, Justin, Aurelius Victor, Eutropius, Ammianus Marcellinus, and the anonymous authors of the Historia Augusta and Epitome de Caesaribus; in Greek, Appian and Cassius Dio. Through close, contextual readings I examine how and explain why certain authors present the kings as exemplary monarchs whose conduct should be imitated or avoided, especially in contexts where those kings are by a variety of rhetorical tactics compared or contrasted with figures in narratives of later history. I then place those readings along a chronological spectrum to reveal common elements of continuity and evolution of the kings among these 12 authors at various points in imperial history. It can be shown that the idealization of the kings is roughly a function of the author's audience and social class (i.e. Roman senators are less favorable to them than equestrians and provincials). Moreover, the kings evolve over time, beginning as blood ancestors of emperors in the early Principate, expanding to products and benefactors of a diverse, Mediterranean cosmopolis during the High Empire, then restricting to symbols of traditional political, cultural, and religious notions tied to the physical city of Rome in Late Antiquity, when the political, spatial, and spiritual transformation of the imperial office made the kings obsolete as persuasive models of imperial rulership. More broadly, this project adds to our understanding that at any point, societies tend to not only reinvent their histories as reflections of their own time, but also credit "Great Men" both as explanatory devices for major events and as embodiments of national identity.

Rezensiertes Werk: Michael Sokoloff and Joseph Yahalom, Jewish Palestinian Arameic Poetry from Late Antiquity: Critical Edition with Introduction and Commentary (Publications of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities

Oration 30 (Or. 30) has been commonly used in scholarship as positive affirmation of religious violence and temple destruction in late Antique Syria. This view of widespread violence in late 4th century Syria was previously supported by scholarship on temple destruction and conversion, which tended to argue that temple destruction and conversion was a widespread phenomenon in the 4th and 5th centuries. Recent archaeological scholarship, however, argues against this perspective, in favour of temple destruction and conversion being a rather exceptional and late phenomenon. The question must therefore be asked, to what extent can Libanius’ Or. 30 be used as a source of temple destruction in the Antiochene countryside in Late Antiquity? This question is explored through three chapters which examine: the text and context of Or. 30, the use and application of Roman law in Or. 30, and the archeological evidence for temple destruction and conversion in the Antiochene countryside. This research has revealed that Libanius tends to use similar arguments in his ‘reform speeches,’ that there was no legal basis for temple destruction in the late 4th century, and that there is no archaeological evidence for widespread temple destruction occurring around the composition of Or. 30. Thus, the evidence shows that Libanius’ claim of widespread violence must be seen as an exaggeration. Meaning that Or. 30 cannot be used to support the idea of widespread destruction and religious violence in the Antiochene countryside at the end of the 4th century or, for that matter, Late Antiquity in general.

The existence of an infrastructure that allowed reliable communication between the emperors and all parts of the Roman civil and military administration was integral for the dissemination of ideologies, the promulgation of laws, and the implementation of Roman power in an organized and coherent fashion throughout the empire. This infrastructure was represented by the imperial information and transportation system (IITS, most commonly known by its 4th century name cursus publicus): a network of roadside stations set up in regular intervals along most major roads that could be used by officials of the central administration properly authorized with a permit. An integral aspect of Roman rule, the IITS has received relatively little attention in scholarship, particularly with regards to the question how structural and constitutional developments of the Roman Empire translated into changes to the communication system during the transition from the 3rd until the late 4th century. The aim of this thesis is twofold: after determining the ways in which the applications of the IITS changed over the course of the first three centuries CE on the basis of epigraphic evidence, the first part explores and explains factors that led to the creation of the cursus publicus with its two sub-divisions (cursus uelox, cursus clauulari(u)s) under Diocletian and Constantine through a comprehensive study of military, administrative, legal, and structural developments of the Roman Empire. The second part undertakes a comprehensive review of the structure, history, and development of the cursus publicus in the 4th century (e.g., infrastructure, financing, administration, usage rights, authorization, and control), primarily on the basis of a close reading of book 8.5 of the Theodosian Code. The evolution of the cursus publicus shows not only the interdependency between its development vis-à-vis that of the central administration, but also that the central government perceived it increasingly consciously as a valuable and important tool in ruling the empire. This thesis argues that on account of ongoing regulatory activity and reforms as a result of this shift in perception, the cursus publicus was firmly integrated into the imperial administration and streamlined to such a degree that it could be used with unprecedented effectiveness by the end of the 4th century.

Oration 30 (Or. 30) has been commonly used in scholarship as positive affirmation of religious violence and temple destruction in late Antique Syria. This view of widespread violence in late 4th century Syria was previously supported by scholarship on temple destruction and conversion, which tended to argue that temple destruction and conversion was a widespread phenomenon in the 4th and 5th centuries. Recent archaeological scholarship, however, argues against this perspective, in favour of temple destruction and conversion being a rather exceptional and late phenomenon. The question must therefore be asked, to what extent can Libanius’ Or. 30 be used as a source of temple destruction in the Antiochene countryside in Late Antiquity? This question is explored through three chapters which examine: the text and context of Or. 30, the use and application of Roman law in Or. 30, and the archeological evidence for temple destruction and conversion in the Antiochene countryside. This research has revealed that Libanius tends to use similar arguments in his ‘reform speeches,’ that there was no legal basis for temple destruction in the late 4th century, and that there is no archaeological evidence for widespread temple destruction occurring around the composition of Or. 30. Thus, the evidence shows that Libanius’ claim of widespread violence must be seen as an exaggeration. Meaning that Or. 30 cannot be used to support the idea of widespread destruction and religious violence in the Antiochene countryside at the end of the 4th century or, for that matter, Late Antiquity in general.

This dissertation explores the transmission of the letters of Pope Leo the Great (pope, 440-461). In Chapter 1, I set out the contours of Leo’s papacy from external sources and from the letters, showing the significance of these letters for understanding his papacy and its context: our vision of the mid-fifth century would be much scantier without them. After discussing the letters in context and as sources, I conclude this chapter by examining the varied editions of his letters from Giovanni Bussi in 1470, through the only full edition, that of the Ballerini brothers in the 1750s, to the partial editions of Eduard Schwartz and Carlos Silva-Tarouca in the 1930s, a tribute to Leo’s enduring importance. Chapter 2 deals in detail with the pre-Carolingian canonical collections of Leo’s letters, beginning with the earliest in the late 400s and early 500s. Through these collections, I trace the ongoing significance of Leo for canon law as well as noting the links between early Italian collections, e.g. Teatina, Sanblasiana, and Quesnelliana, and postulate that one Gallic collection, Corbeiensis, was the source of another, Pithouensis. I also question the concept of a ‘renaissance gélasienne’ while still admitting the importance of this period for canonical activity. Chapter 3 deals with the letter collections gathered in relation to the Council of Chalcedon (451) – the old Latin version, Rusticus’ version, and the later Latin text, assessing their relationships and importance for our knowledge of Leo as well. Chapter 4 is an exploration of Leo’s letters through the Carolingian and post-Carolingian Middle Ages. The Carolingian explosion of manuscripts is the most important assessed, and I deal with Leo’s various collections in the period, especially Pseudo-Isidore, and demonstrate their relationships and those between them and the earlier collections. To give the reader a sample of the editorial implications of my scholarship, I include as an appendix an edition of Ep. 167 with an apparatus detailing the most significant manuscripts and a translation of my edition as a second appendix. This popular letter exists in different recensions, so it serves an important key to Leo’s text criticism. The third appendix is a conspectus of the letters.

According to its first great historian, the story of the English Church began in a street market in Rome sometime around 580. There, Bede reported, a young cleric named Gregory joined a large crowd examining what newly arrived merchants had to sell: Dicunt, quia die quadam cum, aduenientibus nuper mercatoribus, multa uenalia in forum fuissent conlata, multi ad emendum confluxissent, et ipsum Gregorium inter alios aduenisse, ac uidisse inter alia pueros uenales positos candidi corporis, ac uenusti uultus, capillorum quoque forma egregia. Quos cum aspiceret, interrogauit, ut aiunt, de qua regione uel terra essent adlati. Dictumque est, quia de Brittania insula, cuius incolae talis essent aspectus. The conversation continued as Gregory quizzed them regarding their religion and homeland, including the part usually summarized as “non Angli, sed Angeli!” The slaves were from Deira and their king was named Ælla; Gregory made further puns on these. Afterward, he went to the Bishop of Rome, begging to be sent as a missionary to the English. Though the Pope was willing to send him, the Roman people would not allow Gregory to leave the city. Eventually, Gregory himself became Pope and dispatched Augustine and his companions to fulfil his ambition. Gregory’s encounter with the angelic slaves has long been one of the most familiar stock-images of English history even though, in the principal source, Bede himself warns that he cannot testify to its veracity as he only knows the story from oral accounts. However, the very strength of an oral tradition makes it seem likely that the idea of English slaves being sold in Rome did not surprise Bede or his audience while, as Pope, Gregory himself wrote instructing his representatives in Marseille to purchase English slaves there. Other written evidence demonstrates that, at the end of the sixth century, there was a movement of slaves from the Anglo- Saxon kingdoms southwards to Gaul as well as a further movement of slaves from Gaul into the Mediterranean world. Whether or not Gregory ever actually had the reported conversation, it was widely seen as likely that slaves from Britain would be offered for sale in Rome. This slave trade across Gaul, as well as a second route along the Atlantic coasts of western Europe, brought a steady supply of goods from the developed economies of the eastern and southern Mediterranean to these western lands while, in return, the peoples of those regions exported both raw materials and other humans. At the time of Gregory’s papacy, this system of exchange linked all the parts of the former Roman Empire. Within little more than a century, however, it had all but disappeared. That trade within the former boundaries of the Roman Empire and its disappearance in the period between the time of Gregory’s visit to the market (roughly 580) and Bede’s recording of it (sometime before 731) is the subject of this thesis. Investigating the slave trade in the long seventh century in the post-Roman world will involve investigations into both slavery and commerce in a period in which neither was static. Instead, the seventh century was an era of rapid and profound change in many things, not least of which were transformations within the slave trade itself. Yet, the slave trade, as argued in this thesis, can be seen as providing a critical framework for understanding the economic and cultural developments of the entire period. The slave trade and its fluctuations may even have been a driving force in some of the enormous social changes of the time that continue to shape the present world. Four principal theses will be advanced and supported through the combination of a reading of the written sources (primarily, though not exclusively, those in Arabic, Greek, and Latin), an examination of relevant archaeological data, and the use of analogous evidence from other periods. These four propositions may be seen as the basis of the overall argument demonstrating 1) that slaves were numerous and that they played a crucial role in the societies of the post-Roman world, 2) that the continuing function of these societies required a greater supply of slaves than could be provided internally, 3) that this resulted in a long-distance slave trade that was a key force in the post-Roman system of exchange in the Mediterranean world, 4) and that the breakdown of this system of trade and of many contacts across the Mediterranean during the seventh century was caused primarily by alterations in the sources of the slave supply of the most developed economies. None of these four has been argued previously though academics have been increasingly examining the pre-modern history of slavery and of the slave trade. Though numerous articles and volumes have looked at particular aspects of slave-systems in the periods immediately before or after, none have examined the slave trading systems of the long seventh century itself. Similarly, those works that do touch on it have been largely concerned with other issues or focussed solely on a single region, whether that is the Byzantine Empire, the British Isles, Spain, Gaul, or the earliest Islamic societies. Older works were similarly limited in geographic scope, with even the broadest concentrating solely on European or Islamic materials. No one has previously attempted to bring together materials from the whole of the post-Roman world in a single coherent account nor has any prior scholarship shown either the ubiquity of slavery in the period or the extent of the slave trade at the time. By putting together these four arguments, an overall thesis that provides an original synthesis and reconciliation between divergent interpretations of the economies of the end of the Roman Empire and the formation of the medieval world will be created.

A presente tese é sobre gnosticismo, doutrina religiosa da Antiguidade tardia, em sua relação com a poesia. Procura circunscrever seu âmbito, definir suas características e localizar seus principais temas: entre outros, o dualismo, os mito do demiurgo, das duas almas, do andrógino primordial, sua noção do tempo e sua relação com hermetismo, astrologia e alquimia. Mostra como mitos e temas gnósticos e até um estilo, um modo gnóstico de escrever, reaparecem ou são retomados por poetas românticos, simbolistas e modernistas, inclusive aqueles de língua portuguesa. Entre outros, examina William Blake, Novalis, Gérard de Nerval, Baudelaire, Rimbaud, Mallarmé, Lautréamont, Breton, Fernando Pessoa, Dario Veloso e Hilda Hilst. Sustenta que, sendo arcaico e anacrônico em seu dualismo e sua complexa cosmovisão e teologia, ao mesmo tempo o gnosticismo pode ser associado a uma mentalidade moderna e, como parte dela, a criações literárias, algumas inovadoras, pelo caráter sincrético e por formular uma crítica total, cósmica, na era da crítica. Também mostra como poetas não apenas absorveram ou reproduziram aquela doutrina, mas o fizeram de modo pessoal e original, transformando-a e reinventando-a. E, principalmente, como, utilizando suas categorias e temas, tentaram promover uma subversão do senso comum, da percepção instituída do mundo, justificando paralelos do gnosticismo como misticismo rebelde com a rebelião romântica e seus continuadores. / The present thesis is about Gnosticism, the religious doctrine of Late Antiquity, in its relationship to poetry. The focus is to establish the realm of Gnosticism, to define its characteristics, and to locate its main themes. Dualism, the myth of the demiurge, the two souls, the primordial androgynous, its notion of time, and relations of Gnosticism with Hermetism, Astrology and Alchemy are, amongst others, some of the subjects and themes. The thesis shows how Gnostic myths and subjects and even a Gnostic style of writing reappear or is resumed by romantic poets, symbolists and modernists, including those of Portuguese language. Among others, examines William Blake, Novalis, Gérard de Nerval, Baudelaire, Rimbaud, Mallarmé, Lautréamont, Breton, Fernando Pessoa, Dario Veloso and Hilda Hilst. Holds that Gnosticism, being archaic and anachronic in its dualism, complex weltanschauung and theology, can be associated at the same time with a modern mentality and, as part of it, with literary creations, some innovative, for its syncretism and its formulation of a total and cosmic review in the era of the criticism. Finally, also shows how poets didn\'t just absorb or reproduce that doctrine, but that they did it in a personal and original way, transforming and reinventing Gnosticism. And, most outstandingly, how, using its categories and themes, poets encouraged subversion of the common sense, and the formal perception of the world, therefore justifying parallels of Gnosticism as a rebellious mysticism with the Romantic rebellion and its followers.

A pesquisa ter por objetivo analisar a escrita da história na Antigüidade Tardia à luz de dois dos mais importantes autores do período: Gregório de Tours e Isidoro de Sevilha. Desta forma, esperamos compreender as razões que levaram os autores a escolher o gênero histórico para narrar os acontecimentos que tomavam curso na Gália e na Hispânia. Defendemos que é só mediante a análise do papel outorgado pelos bispos aos francos e visigodos que é possível compreender efetivamente as intenções que motivaram a produção dos Decem Libri Historiarum e da Historia Gothorum, Wandalorum et Sueborum. / The objective of our research is analyze the writing of history in Late Antiquity in the light of the two most important authors of the period: Gregory of Tours and Isidore os Seville. Thereby, we aim to understand the reasons which made they choose the historical narrative gender to describe the events which took course in Gaul and Hispania. We advocate that it is only through the studing of the role awarded by the bishops to the Franks and Visigoths that is possible to appreciate the intentions which motivated the production of the Decem Libri Historiarum and the Historia Gothorum, Wandalorum et Sueborum.

This thesis examines the evidence surrounding the Battle of Nedao, an engagement between Ardaric, leader of the Gepids and other rebelling tribes, and Ellac, the eldest son of Attila. It argues against the claim that, after Attila’s death, it was the sons of Attila who ruined the Hunnic empire through civil war. Instead, the political crisis which inevitably led to the battle was brought about by Attila’s murdering of his brother and co-king, Bleda, in 445 and his intestate death in 453. If there was civil war between Attila’s sons, it did not occur until after Nedao. Furthermore, Ardaric was not of Royal Hunnic status fighting for succession at Nedao. He was, instead, one of the leaders of a rebellion that was not limited to Germanic tribes. The thesis focuses primarily on one source, Jordanes, since his Getica is the only known account of the battle which is not mentioned by any other contemporary source. The paper analyzes both Jordanes as an author and the language in his Getica, finding him not to be the semiliterate copyist of Cassiodorus, but instead underlines his own agency in the organizing of the work. From this broader understanding of Jordanes and Getica, it furthermore determines that he may, in fact, harbor an anti-Gepid sentiment towards the Gepid kingdom of his own day in the sixth century. Jordanes may, therefore, be anachronistically ascribing strength and importance to the Gepids’ role at Nedao, as Gepid-Constantinopolitan tension reached its zenith at the time he composed his work, thereby critically affecting our interpretation of the Battle of Nedao narrative.