The Later Roman Empire. AD 284-430

254 Pages·2016·3.9 MB·English

by  Cameron Averil.

VERJL С А
FONTANA HISTORY OF THE ANCIENT WORLD
THE LATER ROMAN EMPIRE
AVERIL CAMERON is Professor of Late Antique and Byzantine
Studies at King's College London, where she has long experience
in teaching the history of late antiquity. She is the author of several
books, most recently Christianity and the Rhetoric of Empire,
Sather Classical Lectures 55 (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1991),
History as Text у ed., (London, 1989), and Procopius and the Sixth
Century (London, 1985).
FONTANA HISTORY
OF THE ANCIENT WORLD
Series Editor: Oswyn Murray
ALREADY PUBLISHED:
Early Greece Oswyn Murray
Democracy and Classical Greece J. K. Davies
The Hellenistic World F. W. Walbank
The Roman Republic Michael Crawford
The Roman Empire Colin Wells
The Later Roman Empire Averil Cameron
IN PREPARATION:
Early Rome and the Etruscans Carmine Ampolo
AVERIL CAMERON
T HE LATER
ROMAN EMPIRE
AD 284-430
Fontana Press
An Imprint ofHarperColYinsPublishers
Fontana Press
An Imprint of HarpcrCoUinbPublishers,
77-85 Fulham Palace Road,
Hammersmith, London W6 8JB
A Fontana Press Original
First published 1993
9
Copyright © Averil Cameron 1993
Averil Cameron asserts the moral right to
be identified as the author of this work
ISBN о со 686172 5
Set in Imprint
Typeset by Whitelaw and Palmer Ltd, Glasgow
Printed in Great Britain by
Clays Ltd, St Ives pic
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted,
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Introduction to the
Fontana History of the Ancient World
NO JUSTIFICATION is needed for a new history of the ancient world;
modern scholarship and new discoveries have changed our picture
in important ways, and it is time for the results to be made available
to the general reader. But the Fontana History of the Ancient
World attempts not only to present an up-to-date account. In the
study of the distant past, the chief difficulties are the comparative
lack of evidence and the special problems of interpreting it; this in
turn makes it both possible and desirable for the more important
evidence to be presented to the reader and discussed, so that he
may see for himself the methods used in reconstructing the past,
and judge for himself their success.
The series aims, therefore, to give an outline account of each
period that it deals with and, at the same time, to present as much
as possible of the evidence for that account. Selected documents
with discussions of them are integrated into the narrative, and
often form the basis of it; when interpretations are controversial
the arguments are presented to the reader. In addition, each
volume has a general survey of the types of evidence available for
the period and ends with detailed suggestions for further reading.
The series will, it is hoped, equip the reader to follow up his own
interests and enthusiasms, having gained some understanding of
the limits within which the historian must work.
OSWYN MURRAY
Fellow and Tutor in Ancient History,
Balliol College, Oxford
General Editor
Preface
THE MAIN IDEAS and emphases expressed in this book and its
companion volume, The Mediterranean World in Late Antiquity,
ABj95-6oo Routledge History of Classical Civilization (London,
y
1993), have evolved over twenty or so years of teaching and
lecturing. Although during that period the later Roman empire
has become fashionable, especially in its newer guise of 'late
antiquity', there is still, strangely, no basic textbook for students
in English. I am very glad therefore to have been given this
opportunity to attempt to fill that gap. My own approach owes a
great deal to the influence over the years of my colleagues in
ancient history, especially to those who have been associated with
the London Ancient History Seminars at the Institute of Classical
Studies. Not least among them is Fergus Millar, who initiated
the seminars, and who both encouraged a broad and generous
conception of ancient history and insisted on the great import
ance of lucid and helpful presentation. Most important of all,
however, have been the generations of history and classics
students, by no means all of them specialists, who have caused me
to keep returning to the old problems, and to keep finding
something new.
This book was written at speed, and with great enjoyment,
partly as a relief from more difficult and recalcitrant projects.
Though of course infinitely more can be said than is possible in
this limited compass, I hope that it will at least provide a
good starting point from which students can approach this
fascinating period. It is a characteristic of this series to embody
translated excerpts from contemporary sources; in the case of
Ammianus Marcellinus, such translations are taken from the
viii THE LATER ROMAN EMPIRE
Penguin edition by W. Hamilton. I am grateful to the editor of
the series, Oswyn Murray, for wise guidance, and to several others
for various kinds of help, notably to Dominic Rathbone and
Richard Williams. But they, needless to say, had no part in the
book's defects.
London, August 1992
Contents
List of Illustrations xi
Maps xiit
I Introduction: the third-century background i
II The Sources 13
III The New Empire: Diocletian 30
IV The New Empire: Constantine 47
V Church and State: the legacy of Constantine 66
VI The Reign of Julian 85
VII The Late Roman State: Constantius to Theodosius 99
VIII Late Roman Economy and Society 113
IX Military Affairs, Barbarians and the Late Roman Army 133
X Culture in the Late Fourth Century 151
XI Constantinople and the East 170
XII Conclusion 187
Date Chart 195
List of Emperors 197
Primary Sources 199
Further Reading 209
Index 229
List of Illustrations
i. Notitia Dignitatum, insignia of dux Arabiae. MS. Canon.
Misc. 378, fol. n8r, Bodleian Library, Oxford. Page 34.
2. Head of colossal statue of Constantine, Rome, Palazzo dei
Conservatori. Courtauld Institute of Art. Page 50.
3. Arch of Constantine, Rome, AD 315. Courtauld Institute о I"
Art. Page 51.
4. Largitio dish, silver, with the name of the Emperor Licinius.
Trustees of the British Museum. Page 52.
5. Greek dedication to Constantius II and a Caesar (name
missing), by Eros Monaxius, governor of Caria, ? AD 355—
60, Aphrodisias. Mossman Roueche. Page 70.
6. Sarcophagus with scenes from the story of Jonah. Trustees of
the British Museum. Page 77.
7. S. Maria Maggiore, interior. Courtauld Institute of Art.
Page 80.
8. Head of Socrates, from mosaic floor showing Socrates and six
sages, Apamea, Syria. J. Baity. Page 96.
9. Chair ornament in the form of a City Tyche, Esquiline
Treasure. Trustees of the British Museum. Page 104.
10. Villa mosaic, Tabarka, North Africa. Musee National du
Bar do. Page 120.
11. Leaf of ivory diptych showing a priestess performing religious
rites; the inscription at the top reads 'of the Symmachi\
Trustees of the Victoria and Albert Museum. Page 160.
12. Leaf of ivory diptych apparently showing the consecratio of
an emperor, perhaps Julian, though the monogram at the top
may refer to the Symmachi family. Trustees of the British
Museum. Page 161.