Download or read book The Religion of Senators in the Roman Empire written by Zsuzsanna Várhelyi and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2010-04-22 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines political and religious power as practised by the elite of the Roman Empire. Based on a fresh collection of the evidence, it argues that religion was crucial in power negotiations between emperor and Senate, and that Roman senators embraced and contributed to the emperors' new, individualized religious power.
Download or read book The Roman Republic of Letters written by Katharina Volk and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2023-12-05 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An intellectual history of the late Roman Republic—and the senators who fought both scholarly debates and a civil war In The Roman Republic of Letters, Katharina Volk explores a fascinating chapter of intellectual history, focusing on the literary senators of the mid-first century BCE who came to blows over the future of Rome even as they debated philosophy, history, political theory, linguistics, science, and religion. It was a period of intense cultural flourishing and extreme political unrest—and the agents of each were very often the same people. Members of the senatorial class, including Cicero, Caesar, Brutus, Cassius, Cato, Varro, and Nigidius Figulus, contributed greatly to the development of Roman scholarship and engaged in a lively and often polemical exchange with one another. These men were also crucially involved in the tumultuous events that brought about the collapse of the Republic, and they ended up on opposite sides in the civil war between Caesar and Pompey in the early 40s. Volk treats the intellectual and political activities of these “senator scholars” as two sides of the same coin, exploring how scholarship and statesmanship mutually informed one another—and how the acquisition, organization, and diffusion of knowledge was bound up with the question of what it meant to be a Roman in a time of crisis. By revealing how first-century Rome’s remarkable “republic of letters” was connected to the fight over the actual res publica, Volk’s riveting account captures the complexity of this pivotal period.
Download or read book Roman Religion written by Valerie M. Warrior and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2006-10-16 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examining sites that are familiar to many modern tourists, Valerie Warrior avoids imposing a modern perspective on the topic by using the testimony of the ancient Romans to describe traditional Roman religion. The ancient testimony recreates the social and historical contexts in which Roman religion was practised. It shows, for example, how, when confronted with a foreign cult, official traditional religion accepted the new cult with suitable modifications. Basic difficulties, however, arose with regard to the monotheism of the Jews and Christianity. Carefully integrated with the text are visual representations of divination, prayer, and sacrifice as depicted on monuments, coins, and inscriptions from public buildings and homes throughout the Roman world. Also included are epitaphs and humble votive offerings that illustrate the piety of individuals, and that reveal the prevalence of magic and the occult in the spiritual lives of the ancient Romans.
Download or read book The Religious Life of Ancient Rome written by Jesse Benedict Carter and published by . This book was released on 1911 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Eight lectures delivered before the Lowell Institute in Boston, January, 1911.
Download or read book The Religion of Senators in the Roman Empire written by Zsuzsanna Várhelyi and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2010-04-22 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the connection between political and religious power in the pagan Roman Empire through a study of senatorial religion. Presenting a new collection of historical, epigraphic, prosopographic and material evidence, it argues that as Augustus turned to religion to legitimize his powers, senators in turn also came to negotiate their own power, as well as that of the emperor, partly in religious terms. In Rome, the body of the senate and priesthoods helped to maintain the religious power of the senate; across the Empire senators defined their magisterial powers by following the model of emperors and by relying on the piety of sacrifice and benefactions. The ongoing participation and innovations of senators confirm the deep ability of imperial religion to engage the normative, symbolic and imaginative aspects of religious life among senators.
Download or read book Patricians in the Roman Empire written by Denise Jacobs and published by Cavendish Square Publishing, LLC. This book was released on 2016-12-15 with total page 82 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Patricians in the Roman Empire provides a glimpse into the day-to-day lives of ancient Rome's ruling class. Emperors, senators, and generals wielded almost unimaginable power at the height of the empire, and their decisions shaped not just the people they ruled but the history of Rome. This book examines the consequences of that power, from the luxury of a patrician life to the power plays that could erase it all.
Download or read book Ritual Dynamics and Religious Change in the Roman Empire written by Impact of Empire (Organization). Workshop and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2009 with total page 393 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume presents the proceedings of the eighth workshop of the international network 'Impact of Empire', which concentrates on the history of the Roman Empire and brings together ancient historians, archaeologists, classicists and specialists in Roman law from some thirty European and North American universities. The eighth volume focuses on the impact of the Roman Empire on religious behaviour, with a special focus on the dynamics of ritual. The volume is divided into three sections: ritualising the empire, performing civic community in the empire and performing religion in the empire.
Download or read book Pagans and Christians in Late Antique Rome written by Michele Renee Salzman and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2016 with total page 439 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book sheds new light on the religious and consequently social changes taking place in late antique Rome. The essays in this volume argue that the once-dominant notion of pagan-Christian religious conflict cannot fully explain the texts and artifacts, as well as the social, religious, and political realities of late antique Rome. Together, the essays demonstrate that the fourth-century city was a more fluid, vibrant, and complex place than was previously thought. Competition between diverse groups in Roman society - be it pagans with Christians, Christians with Christians, or pagans with pagans - did create tensions and hostility, but it also allowed for coexistence and reduced the likelihood of overt violent, physical conflict. Competition and coexistence, along with conflict, emerge as still central paradigms for those who seek to understand the transformations of Rome from the age of Constantine through the early fifth century.
Download or read book A Consequence of Legitimacy written by Kevin W. Rhodes and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Consequence of Legitimacy examines the political interaction between the Roman emperor Domitian, the Roman senate, the province of Asia, the imperial cult, the Jewish population, and the emerging Christian population at the end of the first century AD. Surveying the first century from various points of view, Rhodes offers a fresh perspective on the relationship of Domitian to a persecution of Christians during his reign, an historical perspective that has implications for the date of the New Testament book of Revelation. Historians agree that Domitian and the Senate were in conflict, but they fail to identify the reason why, outside of blaming Domitian's character. However, by considering the nature of this relationship and the political interaction it produced, one can construct a series of spiraling events that held consequences for the Senate, for Domitian, and, though almost wholly unconnected to them, for Christians as well. In the pages ahead, I hope to explain adequately how these events transpired to produce these unintended consequences. The Senate resented Domitian's ascension to the Principate and considered him an illegitimate emperor. Domitian first sought to combat this by establishing legitimacy in those areas where the Senate noted his deficiencies, but he eventually realized that even these efforts would not appease them. Therefore, he sought legitimacy in his own way in a manner that could bypass the Senate and in a way in which they could not compete by approving a new temple for the imperial cult. However, Domitian's answer to his conflict with the Senate created unintentional consequences elsewhere, particularly for Christians in the province of Asia. As a result of Domitian's own attention to the imperial cult, a zealous provincial administration, intent on proving loyalty during an era of distrust and wanting very much to maintain the economy of the province used the imperial cult in the manner consistent with that province's culture and in conjunction with the provincial elites to show enthusiastic support for the emperor. This revival and emphasis on ruler cult created a crisis for Christians in Asia. Their lifestyle appeared "Jewish" to Romans, yet they did not have the same religious protections that Jews had historically enjoyed. This allowed the enemies of Christianity, most of whom were Jewish, the opportunity to pressure them, using the laws of Rome, the imperial cult, the culture of the province, and the politics of the local magistrates as the means, just as they had from Christianity's birth. Therefore, while Domitian did not institute a policy of persecution or pressure against Christians directly, his own pursuit of imperial legitimacy led to this consequence in the province of Asia where conditions proved favorable for the enemies of Christians.
Download or read book The Religion of the Romans written by Jörg Rüpke and published by Polity. This book was released on 2007-12-03 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The gods were the true heroes of Rome. In this major new contribution to our understanding of ancient history, Jörg Rüpke guides the reader through the fascinating world of Roman religion, describing its unique characteristics and bringing its peculiarities into stark relief. Rüpke gives a thorough and engaging account of the multiplicity of cults worshipped by peasant and aristocrat alike, the many varied rites and rituals daily observed, and the sacrifices and offerings regularly brought to these immortals by the population of Ancient Rome and its imperial colonies. This important study provides the perfect introduction to Roman religion for students of Ancient Rome and Classical Civilization.
Download or read book The Religious History of the Roman Empire written by J. A. North and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2023-04-13 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Religious History of the Roman Empire: The Republican Centuries is the second Oxford Readings in Classical Studies volume on the religious history of the Roman Empire, accompanying the volume on paganism, Judaism, and Christianity. This volume presents fourteen chapters dealing with aspects of the religious life of Republican Rome between c. 500 BCE and the fall of the Republican constitution in c. 30 BCE. The topics covered include Iron Age rituals (Christopher Smith); Roman Priesthood (John Scheid; Mary Beard); religion and war (Jörg Rüpke); religious behaviour in the context of polytheism (Andreas Bendlin); religious ritual in early and middle Republic (John North); Italian warfare practices (Olivier de Cazanove); the role of women (Rebecca Flemming); sacrificial ritual in Roman poetry (Denis Feeney); the centuriation-ritual (Daniel Gargola); Roman divination (Mary Beard); Augustan Peace and the stars (Alfred Schmid); the great cult-places of Italy (John Scheid); the grove of Pesaro (Filippo Coarelli). Originally published between 1981 and 2011, these chapters provide a vivid picture of key issues under discussion in this period, providing a missing link in the historiography of Roman republican religion. A central question concerns the balance to be found between ritual and belief, both problematic concepts in interpreting this religious tradition. While there can be no question that the performance of rituals was a regular traditional activity to which Romans attached great significance, particularly those who were in a responsible position as priests or senators, the later years of the Republic increasingly saw religious issues taken as matters for debate, and books on religious themes, unknown before the age of Cicero and Varro, began to appear.
Download or read book Constructing Autocracy written by Matthew B. Roller and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2001-01-22 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rome's transition from a republican system of government to an imperial regime comprised more than a century of civil upheaval and rapid institutional change. Yet the establishment of a ruling dynasty, centered around a single leader, came as a cultural and political shock to Rome's aristocracy, who had shared power in the previous political order. How did the imperial regime manage to establish itself and how did the Roman elites from the time of Julius Caesar to Nero make sense of it? In this compelling book, Matthew Roller reveals a "dialogical" process at work, in which writers and philosophers vigorously negotiated and contested the nature and scope of the emperor’s authority, despite the consensus that he was the ultimate authority figure in Roman society. Roller seeks evidence for this "thinking out" of the new order in a wide range of republican and imperial authors, with an emphasis on Lucan and Seneca the Younger. He shows how elites assessed the impact of the imperial system on traditional aristocratic ethics and examines how several longstanding authority relationships in Roman society--those of master to slave, father to son, and gift-creditor to gift-debtor--became competing models for how the emperor did or should relate to his aristocratic subjects. By revealing this ideological activity to be not merely reactive but also constitutive of the new order, Roller contributes to ongoing debates about the character of the Roman imperial system and about the "politics" of literature.
Download or read book Divine Institutions written by Dan-el Padilla Peralta and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-10-13 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Revision of the author's thesis (doctoral)--Stanford University, 2014, titled Divine institutions: religious practice, economic development, and social transformation in mid-Republican Rome.
Download or read book Foreign Cults in Rome written by Eric Orlin and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2010-08-27 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Religion is a particularly useful field within which to study Roman self-definition, for the Romans considered themselves to be the most religious of all peoples and ascribed their imperial success to their religiosity. This study builds on the observation that the Romans were remarkably open to outside influences to explore how installing foreign religious elements as part of their own religious system affected their notions of what it meant to be Roman. The inclusion of so many foreign elements posed difficulties for defining a sense of Romanness at the very moment when a territorial definition was becoming obsolete. Using models drawn from anthropology, this book demonstrates that Roman religious activity beginning in the middle Republic (early third century B.C.E.) contributed to redrawing the boundaries of Romanness. The methods by which the Romans absorbed cults and priests and their development of practices in regard to expiations and the celebration of ludi allowed them to recreate a clear sense of identity, one that could include the peoples they had conquered. While this identity faced further challenges during the civil wars of the Late Republic, the book suggests that Roman openness remained a vital part of their religious behavior during this time. Foreign Cults in Rome concludes with a brief look at the reforms of the first emperor Augustus, whose activity can be understood in light of Republican activity, and whose actions laid the foundation for further adaptation under the Empire.
Download or read book Roman Religion written by J. A. North and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2000-11 with total page 112 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Provides an account of the religious history of Rome starting from its mythical origins.
Download or read book Roman Art written by Nancy Lorraine Thompson and published by Metropolitan Museum of Art. This book was released on 2007 with total page 218 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A complete introduction to the rich cultural legacy of Rome through the study of Roman art ... It includes a discussion of the relevance of Rome to the modern world, a short historical overview, and descriptions of forty-five works of art in the Roman collection organized in three thematic sections: Power and Authority in Roman Portraiture; Myth, Religion, and the Afterlife; and Daily Life in Ancient Rome. This resource also provides lesson plans and classroom activities."--Publisher website.
Download or read book The Conversion of the Roman Empire written by Charles Merivale and published by . This book was released on 1865 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
