Abstract:
This research volume reassesses one of the most fundamental transformations in Late Antiquity, centered on a pivotal region: the transition from ‘Empire’ to ‘Kingdom’ in Italy c. 250-500. During the first quarter of the first millennium, Italy was still the heart of the Roman Empire; the only political superstructure ever managing to encompass the entire Mediterranean world and its European hinterland. Yet during the second quarter of this millennium, Italy underwent dramatic evolutions from demotion to a provincialized region (c. 285-395), to a new imperial hub kept afloat by cannibalizing other provinces’ resources (c. 395-476), to an autonomous regnum governed by non-Roman rulers as part of an Eastern Roman ‘Commonwealth’ (c. 475-535).
Table of contents:
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
List of Contributors
Introduction: Italy and Its Place in the Roman Empire of Late Antiquity
Jeroen W. P. Wijnendaele
Part I: Political Developments
1. Italy from the Crisis of the Third Century to the Tetrarchy
Umberto Roberto
2. New Paths to Power: The Bipartite Division of Italy and Its
Realignment of Society and Economy in the Fourth Century
Noel Lenski
3. Court, Crisis and Response: Italy from Gratian to Valentinian III
Mark Humphries
4. The Final Western Emperors, Odoacer and Late Roman Italy’s Resilience
Jeroen W. P. Wijnendaele
Part II: Institutions
5. Administering Late Roman Italy: Geographical Changes and the
Appearance of Governors
Daniëlle Slootjes
6. How the West Was Run: Local Government in Late Roman Italy
Stuart McCunn
7. Armed Forces in Late Roman Italy
Philip Rance
Part III: Society, Economy and Environment
8. Elite Women and Gender-Based Violence in Late Roman Italy
Ulriika Vihervalli and Victoria Leonard
9. Land of the Free? Considering Smallholders and Economic Agency in
Late Antique Italy
Niels P. Arends
10. The Human Landscape and Palaeoecology of Late Roman Italy
Edward M. Schoolman
11. Cities and Urban Life in Late Roman Italy: Transformations of the Old,
Impositions of the New
Neil Christie
Part IV: Religion
12. From Local Authority to Episcopal Power: The Changing Roles of
Roman and Italian Bishops
Bronwen Neil
13. Violence and Episcopal Elections in Late Antique Rome, ad 300–00
Samuel Cohen
14. Religious Minorities in Late Roman Italy: Jewish City-Dwellers and
Their Non-Jewish Neighbours
Jessica van ’ Westeinde
Part V: Culture
15. Christian Sarcophagi in Late Roman Italy: Culture and Connection
Miriam A. Hay
16. Late Roman Italy in Latin Panegyric: From the Panegyrici Latini to Ennodius
Adrastos Omissi
17. Stepping Out of the Shadows: Italy in Late Antique Historiography
Peter Van Nuffelen
Epilogue: Late Roman Italy –Paths Explored and Paths to Explore
Giusto Traina
Index
On the editor:
Dr. Jeroen W.P. Wijnendaele is a Senior Fellow of the Bonn Center for Dependency and Slavery Studies. He is the author of The Last of the Romans. Bonifatius, warlord and comes Africae (Bloomsbury Academic 2015), and has published various articles and book-chapters on the political and military history of the Late Roman Empire. Dr. Wijnendaele was guest-editor of the Journal of Late Antiquity’s 2019 theme-issue on ‘Warfare and Food-Supply in the Late Roman Empire’. At the moment, he is preparing a new monograph on Rome’s Disintegration. Violence, War, and the End of Empire in the West for Oxford University Press.
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