Bryn Mawr Classical Review

J. den Boeft, Jan Willem Drijvers, Daniël den​ Hengst, H. C. Teitler, Philological and Historical Commentary on Ammianus Marcellinus. XXXI. Philological and historical commentary on Ammianus Marcellinus, 12. Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2017. Pp. 388. ISBN 9789004353817. €169,00.

Reviewed by David Woods, University College Cork (d.woods@ucc.ie)

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This is the final volume of the Dutch commentary on the Res Gestae of Ammianus Marcellinus, so bringing to completion a project begun by P. de Jonge with the publication of his commentary on the first half of book 14 of this text in 1935. It beggars belief now that de Jonge should have been allowed to persist almost undisturbed in his production of commentaries on books 14-19 over nearly 50 years ending in 1982, or that the original trio of den Boeft, den Hengst, and Teitler, soon joined by Drijvers also, should have been allowed to continue for another 35 years in the production of the commentaries on books 20-31. The result is a monumental work of scholarship that no historian of the late fourth century can afford to ignore. The earliest volumes remain very useful, even if written before the explosion of interest in and research into Late Antiquity, while the latter volumes are utterly indispensable.

The structure of the present volume follows the traditional pattern. A short summary of the contents of book 31 of the Res Gestae is followed by a description of the chronology of the same, then by a description of the main abbreviations used throughout the commentary. The commentary proper begins next, proceeding according to chapters within the Latin text. Each chapter is introduced by a short summary of its content and analysis of its structure. A detailed analysis of every line within its text then follows, with equal attention paid both to historical and to philological questions. Next, there is a bibliography of all secondary works referred to in the commentary. Here one should emphasize the breadth of coverage resulting in the citation of scholarship from across all the major European languages, and some not so major. Finally, a set of nine comprehensive indices is followed by a group of three maps. These maps are shaded to indicate elevation, so that the various mountain ranges are clearly marked and one can begin to understand how these might have impacted on the large-scale movements described by Ammianus within book 31. This is a great improvement on earlier volumes within the series, many of which did not contain any maps at all, while others contained maps that were rudimentary at best. Nevertheless, it might have been useful to provide some indication of provincial boundaries on these maps also, or even to mark the major roads.

Book 31 of the Res Gestae describes events from 376 to early autumn 378, focussing almost exclusively on events in the Eastern half of the empire. The main focus of the volume is on the Gothic invasion of the empire resulting in the defeat of the Roman army and the death of the emperor Valens at the battle of Hadrianopolis on 9 August 378. Perhaps one of the most remarkable features of this volume is that although the authors wrote at a time when over a million migrants were streaming almost unchecked into Europe across borders that were suddenly revealed to be as permeable and ill-defended as the Danube frontier in 376, they never once allude to this fact. There are no simplistic comparisons and no virtue-signalling, so that one is left entirely ignorant of their political beliefs. In this, and in other matters, the authors reveal awareness that they are writing a timeless monument of scholarship for all posterity, not a fashionable opinion piece to be discarded next year: no brownie points gained here for outraged attacks on the discomfiting views of Niall Ferguson. ¹ Such restraint is entirely commendable.

This volume displays many of the same virtues or vices as its predecessors in the series. One of the strengths of a commentary such as this is that it re-examines old assumptions in the translation of the text, and no-one can afford now to reproduce any part of an older translation of book 31 without checking what the authors of this volume have to say first. For example, the Loeb translation by Rolfe translates 31.11.1 to mean that the general Sebastianus was sent from Italy to the East as he himself had demanded, but the authors here support recent arguments that the subject of the key verb is actually Valens rather than Sebastianus (p. 184). However, they are then silent as to the implications of this new translation of the text. How likely really is it that Valens requested the transfer of Sebastianus alone from West to East? Given the almost adulatory tone subsequently in respect of Sebastianus and his achievements under Valens, one ought perhaps to suspect any implication that Valens had asked for him personally. But there is no discussion of any of this.

In addition to drawing the reader's attention to different ways of construing and translating certain passages of text, the editors subtly include more modern translations into English of certain terms or phrases, which gently remind one of how archaic even the standard Loeb translation by Rolfe (1935-39) can sometimes sound. For example, Rolfe translates 31.15.4 as 'a great number of soldiers and batmen', but den Boeft and colleagues (p. 262) refer to 'soldiers and stable boys'. Naturally, Rolfe did not realize that at the very moment that he wrote, someone elsewhere was dreaming up a very different Batman whose name would resonate far more with later generations than the traditional understanding of the term.

Another strength of this volume is that the editors pay due attention to textual problems, and sometimes attempt new solutions to the same, even when the temptation may be quietly to ignore these because they do not impact significantly on the overall understanding of what is being described. For example, translators can force the phrase difficiles Martis eventus (31.15.7) to mean something that makes sense in the context by pushing one of the terms difficilis or eventus beyond its standard meaning. However, the editors point to the earlier use of the phrase eventu dissimili (19.7.5) in order convincingly to suggest that difficiles Martis eventus should be corrected to read dissimiles Martis eventus 'the unequal results of the fighting' (p. 266).

It is noteworthy that the authors do not shirk from sometimes quoting several lines even of Greek text in order to draw due attention to key similarities or contradictions between what Ammianus has to say about something and what later sources such as Socrates of Constantinople, Zonaras or Cedrenus have to say about the same thing. This is immensely helpful because it saves the reader from having to root out some underused Greek text that their university has kindly placed in closed storage. More importantly, the editors normally translate such quotations into English, so revealing a clear awareness that fewer and fewer of their intended readers will be able to translate such passages for themselves.

The authors are careful not to become too engaged in attempts to respond to the latest theory about this or that, presumably because such engagement could cause the volume to look dated over a longer period of time. Furthermore, it is difficult to reduce long and complex arguments to their essentials for inclusion in a commentary such as this. Yet it might have proven useful if they had responded in a more systematic fashion to the argument of Kulikowski that book 31 was originally a separate monograph, composed in Greek at Antioch sometime shortly after the battle of Hadrianopolis.² The short paragraph that they do devote to this subject in their general introduction (p. IX) does not perhaps do justice to the importance and relevance of his arguments in this context.

Finally, the authors are not too proud to admit occasional slips in earlier volumes. For example, in their discussion of 31.5.13 (p. 100) they draw attention to an 'attractive conjecture of Rosen, 1994 (in an article which we unfortunately missed when we prepared our commentary on Book 29)'.

Given the nature of the content of book 31, and the sometimes problematic nature of the text with the apparent occasional doublet (p. 197) or contradiction (p. 267), there is plenty of scope to disagree about what exactly happened, when, or why during Valens' campaign against the Goths. However, there are very few occasions when one would dare to claim that the authors have erred in their judgement of some historical or philological problem. One may conclude with a rare example of such occurring at the very start of the commentary. Book 31 begins with a description of a group of alarming omens portending the death of Valens. One of these was that people at Antioch in Syria had begun shouting Vivus ardeat Valens, 'May Valens be burnt alive', whenever they thought that they were being wronged in a dispute (31.1.2). The authors describe this as a 'surprising curse', and then express wonder that anyone who dared to say this was allowed to escape 'scot-free' (pp. 3-4). The answer is that they have misunderstood the play upon the name Valens here. The original curse was Vivus ardeat valens, 'May he be burnt alive and in good health!', but in hindsight, after the death of Valens, it became clear that it could also have been translated as 'May Valens be burnt alive!', interpreting the last word as a real name rather than as an adjective. In this way, it seemed to constitute an omen of Valens' death that was unrecognised as such at the time, assuming, of course, that this account has some historical basis, and is not a complete literary invention intended either to reinforce the reader's belief in divination or simply to amuse.

No-one can fail to learn something new about either Ammianus as a historian or the events which he describes as a result of reading this volume. Not only does it provide instant access to a huge range of modern scholarship on these topics from across all of the major European languages, but it sometimes adds its own new insights also. One could hardly expect more of any commentary, so that it brings one of the great projects in the study of Late Antiquity to a fitting end.

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Notes:

1.   Niall Ferguson, Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University, wrote an opinion piece entitled 'Paris and The Fall of Rome', published in The Boston Globe, 16 November 2015, as well as in some other newspapers. His comparison of the migrants streaming into Europe in 2015 to the 'barbarian' invasions of the Roman empire provoked a predictable response. For a full discussion, see A. Gillett, 'The Fall of Rome and the Retreat of European Multiculturalism: A Historical Trope as a Discourse of Authority in Public Debate', Cogent Arts & Humanities (2017), 4 (here).
2.   See M. Kulikowski, 'Coded Polemic in Ammianus Book 31 and the Date and Place of its Composition', JRS 102 (2012), 79-102, at 85-86.

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Andrew Burnett, Richard Simpson, Deborah Thorpe (ed.), Roman Coins, Money, and Society in Elizabethan England: Sir Thomas Smith's 'On the Wages of the Roman Footsoldier'. Numismatic studies, 36. New York: American Numismatics Society, 2017. Pp. xxii, 205. ISBN 9780897223522. $80.00.

Reviewed by William Stenhouse, Yeshiva University (stenhous@yu.edu)

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[The Table of Contents is listed below.]

Roman Coins, Money, and Society in Elizabethan England is a study of Sir Thomas Smith (1513-77), an Elizabethan Renaissance man, and his work on ancient numismatics. Richard Simpson contributes an intellectual biography of Smith, Andrew Burnett discusses his treatise on soldiers' pay and the value of coinage, and Deborah Thorpe provides an edition of the text (titles are listed at the end of the review). Smith was a remarkable figure, who probably deserves to be more famous than he is; his unpublished essay on coins is more or less completely unknown, and certainly deserves a wider circulation. This is a fine book, thoughtful, learned, and accessible, which provides a fascinating picture of Smith and sixteenth-century classical scholarship in England.

Smith's academic talents were pronounced. He went up to Cambridge at the age of eleven, and became a fellow of Queen's College at seventeen, Public Orator at twenty, and then, after a trip to visit legal scholars in France and Italy between 1540 and 1542, Regius Professor of civil law at the beginning of his thirtieth year. His lectures on Roman law show him taking a strongly humanist, philological approach to legal texts, which he argued were to be understood in their original context, and not through the lens of later, anachronistic commentaries. Two years later he was vice-chancellor at Cambridge. If he is known today, however, it is not primarily for these achievements—he climbed the academic ladder without having published anything—but for his next moves as a politician and diplomat. He became secretary of state in 1548 under Edward VI and was knighted in 1549, but soon lost favor and lay relatively low in the reign of Mary Tudor. Under Elizabeth his star gradually rose once more: he served as ambassador to France between 1562 and 1566, and then with the support of William Cecil, a former pupil, he became Chancellor of the Order of the Garter and Secretary to Elizabeth in 1572.

As Simpson shows, Smith's interests in the Roman past informed his practical political experience and vice versa. In 1549, for example, he wrote a "Discourse of the Commonweal", a dialogue reflecting on recent unrest against the government. The most persuasive interlocutor, a doctor, claimed that debasement of coinage lay behind England's more visible problems, drawing parallels with Rome, and recommended that the farmer study Columella and the knight Vegetius. In the 1570s, Smith suggested a program of colonization to Ireland based firmly on Roman models, as a means of reducing England's overpopulation and pacifying the restive Irish. There is little doubt that his treatise on numismatics, probably finished in 1562, was written with pragmatic policy questions in mind. It addresses two problems: what a Roman soldier was paid, and the relationship between Roman and English weights and measures. The first was suggested to Smith by William Cecil, at that point Secretary to the Queen. Smith refers to the development of English military pay, remembers how he asked his father about soldiers' wages when he witnessed them going past, "hired to fighte against the Frenchmen or Scottes" (p.194), and ends up talking about a "naturall order of wages" for the labourer and soldier (p.198). He concludes that Roman and English soldiers were paid the same, a denarius and a grote a day, respectively. Smith's concerns about debasement and inflation inform the second question; at one point, pointing to the difficulties Greek authors had with Roman measures, he imagines the problems a historian would face when dealing with English measures of the sixteenth century: "it is soone seene," he claims, "how madde a reckoning he should make and how farre he should goe out of square from the verie trewe valor" (p.190). Smith probably wrote this work just after the recoinage early in Elizabeth I's reign, and so it seems very likely that his readers would have had this in mind, although Smith, tactfully, does not insist on the connection.

Smith drew on the best of contemporary scholarship for his arguments. Burnett demonstrates his debt to Andrea Alciato, Guillaume Budé's De Asse, and Georgius Agricola, who published a work on weights and measures in 1530. Smith also used Cuthbert Tunstall's earlier attempts to equate English and Roman measures. In addition to works such as these, many of which Smith owned, he also referred to the evidence of coins. To a reader of Alciato, Renaissance numismatics can seem a very technical and theoretical discipline, involving lots of analysis of Latin texts, and no discussion of coins themselves; from today's perspective, there is a basic divide between sixteenth-century treatises on weights and measures and those that discuss and illustrate coins' iconography. Smith, however, had a more practical bent, and he tried to collect coins that "neither semed clipped nor washed" (p.176) in order to establish their weights. He also included general information about other collectors, providing evidence for a circle of fellow coin enthusiasts in Cambridge and London interested in examining coins and their meaning. He described eight examples in sufficient detail that Burnett can identify them: seven Republican denarii, and most strikingly, a gold aureus of Claudius that commemorated the conquest of Britain, found by a farmer in 1537. Smith used his coins and the evidence of his texts to conclude, wrongly, that the Roman and English (Troy) pound were the same; thanks to his careful documentation, though, Burnett can show where Smith went wrong. The equivalence that Smith established, however, supported one of his basic arguments, that despite its distance from Rome, in its customs his native land was "most neare of all other nations to the olde and auncient Romanes" (p.149). This argument, in turn, could support his attempt to draw political lessons from Roman models.

As the quotations from his works suggest, Smith wrote in an energetic and sometimes colorful vernacular. Budé's De Asse, for example, demonstrated an "infinite and unwearied diligence", and was "as it were a medowe full of most pleasaunte flowers to beholde and taste" (p.165); scholars today are more likely to agree with the former than the latter. Before his conclusion, Smith acknowledged that "we have ronne now an harde and large race" (p.192). Thorpe bases her edition on British Library Add. MS 48047, with reference to the other two main manuscripts that survive. She keeps Smith's variable orthography and includes marginal annotations that appear in two of the manuscripts. The text is clear, though contemporary readers trying to follow Smith's argument will find themselves referring back to Burnett's analysis. The use of English and the slightly disorganized contents suggest that Smith composed it initially for a small circle. In 1576 he wrote to Cecil, then Lord Burghley, asking for a copy of it, showing that he had lost his own and suggesting that he wanted to revise it for publication. His health declined quickly, however, and the work was soon forgotten.

The answers that Smith provided to his two basic problems would not find favor with modern numismatists, but the methods that he followed, and the range of sources that he used, offer a fascinating glimpse of sixteenth-century classical scholarship in action. His hints at a comparison between Roman and English economic policies, however rudimentary, are unusually precocious. As Burnett points out, his direct references to current affairs are relatively understated, but the work is more impressive as a result. This review barely does justice to the depth of learning in the essays and notes that the three authors have produced, which is a worthy tribute to Smith's talents.

Table of Contents

Richard Simpson, "Sir Thomas Smith (1513-77). An Overview of His Life and Works", 1-71
Andrew Burnett, "Thomas Smith's On the Wages of the Roman Footsoldier", 73-144
Deborah Thorpe, ed., "Text of On the Wages of the Roman Footsoldier", 145-200
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Paul Cartledge, Democracy: A Life. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2018. Pp. xxvi, 387. ISBN 9780190866273. $19.95 (pb).

Reviewed by Kerry Phelan, Maynooth University (kerry.phelan@mu.ie)

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Abiding by its concise title, Democracy: A Life, this book presents a stimulating and lucid study on the history of democracy. In this monograph, Paul Cartledge offers an engaging biographical account, based on a series of final-year undergraduate lectures that he delivered at the University of Cambridge between 2009 and 2013 ('Ancient Greek Democracy—and its Legacies'). His Preface includes the prospectus for the advanced lecture programme; here, it is clearly stated, for his classes and his book in turn, that his principal aim is to explore the meaning of democracy both ancient and modern, up until the present day. To trace democracy's existence in its various forms, and across national boundaries, over more than two and a half millennia is by no means a small undertaking! Not least because there is no single form of democracy with which to compare the rest; indeed, as Cartledge correctly notes right from the outset (p. 1), there were as many as a thousand different political entities in ancient Greece between 500 and 300 BC. As such, he must detail the origins of democracy and so he dedicates a substantial amount of time (over two thirds of the entire book) to exploring the historical particulars of ancient Greek politics and society. For the remainder of the work, Cartledge examines more recent ideologies and specifically how democracy continues in a variety of forms today, but his final evaluation warns his reader that its future is far from secure. Cartledge attractively structures the book as a drama that unfolds in five acts, documenting not just the economic and cultural elements that sculpted democracies within each epoch, but also the leading figures and intellectuals of those different societies. Throughout the twenty chapters, the reader is introduced to such a breadth of interesting characters as Cleisthenes, Plato, Thomas Rainborough, John Milton, Gracchus Babeuf, and George Grote. Though originally published in March/April 2016, Cartledge's most recent edition of Democracy bears a new Afterword, which specifically reflects on political events in the Britain, France, and the United States since its first print. Such deliberations prove that the history of democracy is still being written.

The Prologue sets the scene by providing a synopsis of the recent scholarly discussion, diminishing the Western claim on the history of democracy. Most notably, Cartledge is responding to the revisionist claims of Amartya Sen and Jack Goody that the standard democratic model is too narrowly defined as Eurocentric and imperialistic; Cartledge seeks to counter their more 'inclusive' view that democracy was not a specifically Greek invention. His success in doing so can be measured in Act I, as he engages with the problems posed by translating specifically ancient Greek terms, such as demokratia itself and politika, and the works of authors like Aristotle who are amongst the earliest surviving sources to have used them. He discusses the nature of the ancient sources, and the contexts in which they were written. In Cartledge's view, no demos exercised any measure of kratos until the end of the sixth century BC. Though he recounts that there were significant attempts at citizen empowerment in states like Chios, Megara, and Naxos during the archaic period, Act II centres on the birth of direct government at Athens in 508/7 BC, and its resonating impact on the legal, religious, and economic elements of Athenian life thereafter in the fifth century BC. By thus surveying democracy in practice, Cartledge directs the reader to see the difference between the Athenian direct form of government and the more familiar representative examples in present-day democracies.

Act III follows a similar thread as Cartledge delves into the better documented history of the Athenian democracy in the fourth century BC, which he maintains is the true 'golden age of ancient Greek democracy' (p. 185). Though the evidence is heavily weighted in favour of the Athenian example, he nevertheless introduces his reader to a variety of democratic practices elsewhere in the Greek world, for instance in Thebes, Boeotia, and Rhodes, and some may very well have been unknown to a general audience. The very existence of these other democracies (even if they were imposed by the dominant Athenians, as in Samos) emphasises Cartledge's argument that the emergence and spread of democracy was owed to a uniquely Greek setting. Even by acknowledging Spartan opposition to democracy and their role in inhibiting the spread of democratic constitutions throughout the Aegean, Cartledge underscores the fact that the flourishing of democracy was a specifically Greek phenomenon in the fourth century BC. His final thoughts then turn to tracing the demise of the democratic Greek institutions as Greece was subjugated by the Macedonians.

Still, in Act IV, Cartledge carefully exposes some smouldering democratic embers in the Hellenistic cities, as the Macedonian kings strategically tolerated some democratic liberty under their system of governors and garrisons. As the era of independent Greek city-states drew to a close, the rise of the decidedly anti-democratic Rome comes to the forefront of Cartledge's democratic biography. He first evaluates and finally dispels the claim that the Roman Republic was a species of democracy, before he renders an overview of the monarchical rule of Augustus and the reigns of the successive Caesars during the Roman age of empire. This section then tracks the widespread retreat of democratic ideology beneath the broad collective heading of 'Late Antiquity, the European Middle Ages, and the Renaissance'; under the power of feudalism and divinely sanctioned kingship in medieval Europe, democracy endured a long hibernation. Democratic ideals had to wait until the age of Enlightenment for the question of some form of equality to be raised once again, in the words of Rousseau, Voltaire, and Thomas Paine.

'After a long sleep, democracy—as an idea, and in name, but not yet substance—began to reawaken' (p. 283). Both Act V and the Epilogue discuss how democracy was roused in various forms during several key periods: the English Civil War in the 1640s, through revolutionary France in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and right up until the 9/11 attacks of 2001 and the United States' ensuing war on terrorism, and on to Brexit and the present day. Again, Cartledge assesses the key figures who played a part in reviving and debating democratic ideas: Thomas Jefferson, Alexis de Toqueville, Edmund Burke, and John Stuart Mill, to name but a few. But rather than delve into their roles in any great depth, Cartledge gives his reader a concise overview of their theories in order to show how constitutional debates developed in Britain, France, and the United States, and how they were influenced by the ancient Greek democratic model. Here, Cartledge specifically seeks to locate democratic ideologies within a modern setting and hence his analysis centres on contemporary forms of government; as he had stressed in his Preface, the necessity of such an examination is the 'current global preoccupation with democracy and its global extension makes constant re-examination of the original ancient Greek version imperative' (p. xvi). For Cartledge, however, the separation between ancient and modern is currently an insurmountable gulf; ultimately, he propounds the idea that the use of representatives and parliamentary parties in modern democracies has alienated citizens from the ancient concept that the people themselves should wield direct executive power. Moreover, without the ancient Greek model of compulsory voter registration and indeed voting, referendums like the infamous one held in Britain in 2016 do signal disaster for the future of modern democracies.

It is clear throughout the book that Cartledge is writing for a non-specialist audience. He explains every ancient or technical term, but skilfully avoids guiding his reader with a condescending tone. He does not provide specific references for his ancient and modern sources, undoubtedly in keeping with his intended easily digestible presentation, but he provides a vital bibliography for further study, in addition to a timeline, six maps, and copious illustrations throughout each section which provide necessary context. In places, his recognition of modern scholarship and his attempt to document their ideas sufficiently for a novice reader dominates to such an extent that it can be easy to lose sight of Cartledge's own argument; though, it must be said, that it would be easier to criticise his work for neglecting to give even a nod to such sources should he have opted to leave them out. The index is substantial, and would serve as vital tool for those using the text at either school or university level.

Cartledge offers a compact, yet thoroughly compelling, biography on the forms of democracy from ancient to modern times. A valuable resource, this book grants every reader the timely opportunity to revaluate what they understand by the term democracy, and thus the chance to consider the implications of that understanding in a world whereby national politics can so readily be scrutinised by a global audience. Indeed, closing the final pages of his book, Cartledge's reader ought to question the very application of such a label to some societies and, more importantly, whether they can even claim to live in an actual democracy themselves. The Greeks may have invented democracy but is it now up to us to save it?

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Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, Augustan Rome, second edition. London; New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2018. Pp. 176. ISBN 9781472534262. $20.95 (pb).

Reviewed by S. J. Northwood, Charterhouse (sjn@charterhouse.org.uk)

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Since its original publication in 1993 Andrew Wallace-Hadrill's Augustan Rome has been an essential item on A-level and undergraduate reading lists on the Augustan principate. A powerful interpretative essay, it has maintained its position as an important complement to the standard textbooks and surveys. This new edition, appearing now under the imprint of Bloomsbury, retains the main body of the text unaltered¹: 'Were I to write it now, it would be a different and much longer text. But, in fact, there is nothing now I would unsay'(xv). This reflects the continued strength of the original text in spite of the wealth of interest and new research into Augustus in the intervening quarter century. We get a new short introduction (1-7), concerned chiefly with the contribution of contemporary literature and visual and archaeological material to our understanding of the Augustan principate in Rome, and the impact that fascist uses of Augustan monuments and ideology has had on the reception of Augustus. There is now also a really excellent postscript on the legacy of Augustus (131-7), and up-to-date suggestions for further reading (139-42).² (The 'Augustan Authors (Who's Who)', which I am sure many will have found a useful reference tool when teaching A-level, has regrettably been removed.) But the main improvement in this new edition is in the quantity and quality of its illustrations.

Augustan Rome now has 56 figures where the original had 33, and the overall feel of the book is much better (glossy pages, more readable text). Many of the images are of the same subject matter, but are often better chosen examples (e.g. coins) and viewpoints (e.g. buildings), and almost always—at least when it comes to photographic images—more clearly reproduced. For example, the aerial photo of the victory monument at Actium (fig. 1.5), supported now with artistic reconstructions of the monument and its triumphal relief, and a photographic detail (figs. 1.6-8), is a great improvement on the obscure view looking out from the monument and along its front in the first edition (fig. 3). The temple of Mars Ultor in the Forum of Augustus (fig. 4.8) receives a much fuller and clearer photograph than previously (fig. 20). Likewise the new photographs and reconstructions of the Ara Pacis (figs. 5.3-8 compared with figs. 24-8). There are some valuable additions, such as coins showing Agrippa wearing the naval crown (fig. 1.2), Venus Genetrix as ancestress of Caesar (fig. 7.1), Augustus distributing suffimenta (fig. 5.1), and now of course the aureus of 28 BC showing Augustus restoring the laws and rights of the people (fig. 2.3). We have a plan of the Solarium, showing the relationship between the obelisk and the Ara Pacis (fig. 6.5), a plan of Bruno and Carandini's reconstruction of the House of Augustus (fig. 3.2) in addition to the plan of the area from the first edition (fig. 3.1 = fig.7), and there is a view of the Pantheon (fig. 4.10). Some items have been combined, e.g. the clipeus virtutis and oak wreath are illustrated using a single coin (fig. 2.4) rather than two (fig. 6 b-c), allowing space for another coin showing the laurels outside the door of Augustus' house (fig. 2.5) (maybe unnecessarily since they are also illustrated on another coin (fig. 3.3)).

In only three cases are the illustrations disappointing. The close-up of the breastplate on the Prima Porta statue (fig. 3.6) is smaller and less clear than in the first edition (fig. 10); and in neither edition can we see clearly in the detail of the Altar of the Vicomagistri the Genius of Augustus in his toga or the Lares 'dancing in short skirts' as advertised (fig. 4.2; fig. 15). The line illustrations of the Parthian arch and fragment of the Fasti triumphales (fig. 4.4), taken directly from the first edition (fig.17), have lost definition and appear in bold smudge. Nevertheless the overall quality of illustration is much, much higher than in the first edition.

In summary, we had in its 1993 edition an important interpretative essay that stood the test of time but was not illustrated consistently to the same high standard. In its new incarnation the illustrations are now worthy of the text, thus ensuring that in a more visually demanding age Augustan Rome will surely maintain its special place in the teaching of the Augustan principate.

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Notes:

1.   The small number of typos/proof errors in the original edition have been corrected, but there is now one in the new introduction (3). In the 'Chronological Overview' (xvii-xx) we still have Munda instead of Mutina under 43 BC, in spite of this mistake having been pointed out by Andrew Fear in his review of the first edition: CR 44.2 (1994) 414-15.
2.   The only important omission is Catherine Edwards's 2008 annotated translation of Suetonius, Lives of the Caesars in the Oxford World's Classics series.

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Giovanni Alberto Cecconi, Andrea Raggi, Eleonora Salomone Gaggero (ed.), Epigrafia e società dell'Etruria romana. Atti del Convegno di Firenze, 23-24 ottobre 2015​. Roma: Edizioni Quasar, 2017. Pp. 286. ISBN 9788871407722. €28.00 (pb).

Reviewed by Philippe Mauget, Institut Ausonius (UMR 5607 CNRS / Université Bordeaux Montaigne​) (p.mauget@wanadoo.fr ; philippe.mauget@u-bordeaux-montaigne.fr)

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[Authors and titles are listed at the end of the review.]

Cette publication, dirigée par G.A. Cecconi, A. Raggi et E. Salomone Gaggero et parue en 2017 chez les réputées Edizioni Quasar de Rome, rassemble les actes du congrès qui s'est tenu à Florence les 23 et 24 octobre 2015. La découverte continue de nouvelles inscriptions nécessitait en effet une mise au point sur les recherches en cours relatives à la population et à la société de nombreuses cités d'Etrurie à l'époque romaine. Les problématiques abordées dans cet ouvrage l'ont été dans une connexion étroite avec le projet 2010-2011 Colonie e municipi dell'Italia romana nell'éra digitale et la réalisation de la banque de données épigraphiques italienne en ligne Epigraphic Database Roma (EDR, au sein du projet EAGLE), comme l'explique G.A. Cecconi (p. 27-33). S. Orlandi propose d'ailleurs un état des lieux des avancées récentes et des travaux à venir relatifs à cette database (p. 15-26).

Concernant l'Etrurie septentrionale, deux communications viennent compléter la vaste bibliographie existant déjà sur Luna. Dans la continuité des travaux épigraphiques de M.G. Angeli Bertinelli, E. Salomone Gaggero propose tout d'abord une importante et méthodique mise à jour des structures politiques et administratives de cette cité en se fondant principalement sur les inscriptions publiées récemment ou tout simplement encore inédites bien que recueillies dans les années 1970 (p. 35-56). Parmi les nouveaux textes, citons notamment ceux qui mentionnent de nouveaux duouiri, venant s'ajouter à la longue liste de magistrats municipaux déjà connus. Ces membres de l'élite civique sont malheureusement presque tous anonymes mais l'itération du duovirat relatée dans la pierre fait assurément d'eux des hommes de tout premier plan. L'un d'entre eux le fut d'ailleurs trois fois avant de devenir augure et de se diriger vers la carrière équestre. F. Frasson propose ensuite l'édition complète et révisée d'une inscription votive fragmentaire dédiée au Genius plebis à Luna, probablement entre la moitié du II^e et le premier quart du III^e s. p.C. (p. 57-73). L'extrême rareté d'une telle dédicace, attestée seulement à deux reprises dans le monde romain, permet à l'a. de revenir sur les occurrences connues et de comparer très pertinemment les contextes dans lesquels furent gravées ces inscriptions. L'interrogation majeure réside donc dans la définition de cette plebs concernée par le Genius protecteur. Au regard du contexte local, l'a. cherche à démontrer que ce vocable pourrait concerner le populus de la cité, c'est-à-dire l'ensemble de la population de la colonie de Luna.

À propos de la cité voisine de Pise, S. Segenni propose un focus sur la société municipale de Pise à l'époque romaine à travers les inscriptions (p. 75-88). L'a. s'intéresse principalement à la classe dirigeante de la cité à l'époque augustéenne à travers l'étude de deux décrets mentionnant notamment la liste des décurions. Une étude onomastique très détaillée retrace justement l'importance de chaque gens au sein de la cité et plus largement au niveau de la regio VII elle-même. L'a. engage par ailleurs une problématique bienvenue sur la continuité gentilice des familles dirigeantes aux différentes phases institutionnelles de la ciuitas, de la Guerre sociale au municipe et jusqu'au II^e s. p.C. Le rôle de l'ordo populusque Pisanus et de la plebs Pisanorum n'est toutefois pas oublié, puisque l'a. présente également deux textes récents mais fragmentaires, de nature honorifique, qui laissent le champ libre à de nombreuses hypothèses, parfois audacieuses, sur l'identité des damnati présents dans ces inscriptions.

C. Gabrielli (p. 117-133) tente de définir les points de convergence entre les deux cités voisines de Florentia et Faesulae et de mettre en avant leur identité propre, par l'épigraphie notamment. L'a., exemples à l'appui, utilise certaines inscriptions pour mettre en évidence l'existence de frontières diffuses entre les deux territoires. Pourtant, sur le plan religieux, l'a. montre aussi une proximité institutionnelle et administrative entre les deux centres politiques, notamment dans le cas du culte d'Isis, bien attesté épigraphiquement dans les deux cités, qui possédaient chacune un temple dédié, mais aussi à l'occasion de la restauration du Capitolium uetus de Faesulae soutenu par Florentia ou par la présence conjointe à la fin du II^e s. d.C. d'un pontificat municipal. Le principal intérêt de cette contribution réside assurément dans le rejet de la thèse souvent admise d'une décadence progressive de Faesulae après la création de la colonie de Florentia à la fin de l'époque républicaine, tant les preuves épigraphiques d'une vitalité conjointe des deux centres abondent. G. Firpo revient sur la partition de la population de la cité d'Arretium après la Guerre sociale en examinant notamment le cas des partisans de Marius touchés par l'ademptio ciuitatis infligée par Sylla (p. 135-146). L'a. passe notamment en revue les différents procès auxquels participa Cicéron sur la question des statuts juridiques liés à cette privation de la pleine citoyenneté et conclut sur la probable inefficacité de cette loi syllanienne jusqu'au recensement de 69/70 a.C., qui marque un retour à la stabilité au sein de la population arrétine.

Pour clore les présentations axées sur le nord de l'Etrurie, G. Caracciolo et G.L. Gregori reviennent sur la remarquable quantité et variété de l'épigraphie relative à la cité de Clusium et nous présentent trois textes inédits de l'ager Clusinus conservés à Chianciano Terme, au nord-ouest du territoire civique antique (p. 147-160). Un autel funéraire du début du II^e s. p.C. mentionne un esclave, uilicus d'une propriété terrienne appartenant à un membre de la gens Sulpicia, dont la présence à Arretium permet de supposer des liens étroits entre les deux cités, par le biais sans doute de la uia Cassia. L'anonyme d'une plaque funéraire fragmentaire de l'époque trajane pourrait quant à lui être un vétéran des légions, devenu curator ueteranorum à son retour dans la cité et chargé sans doute de cette mission civile au sein d'un collège. Le troisième document, plus énigmatique, nous renseigne sur la carrière d'un chevalier dont seul subsiste le cognomen et qui fut tribun militaire de la legio I Italica en Mésie Inférieure avant d'occuper les fonctions de procurateur financier dans la province de Lyonnaise, à une date comprise entre le I^er et le II^e s. p.C. Pour l'a., ces trois inscriptions semblent donc confirmer la présence dans cette partie du territoire clusien de propriétés foncières appartenant à la classe dirigeante locale.

La proximité géographique des cités de l'Etrurie romaine avec la capitale de l'Empire permet inévitablement de poser la question des rapports entretenus au fil des siècles entre ces ciuitates et Rome. C'est de cette thématique que s'est emparée N. Lapini en étudiant les liens de Rome avec Saturnia et Heba, deux centres importants de la Maremme, dès la chute de Volci en 280 a.C. et le contrôle de toute l'Etrurie méridionale par l'Urbs (p. 161-181). L'a. revient ainsi avec précision sur la fondation de ces deux colonies vers la moitié du IIe s. a.C. et le renforcement de liens étroits avec Rome, si l'on en juge par l'importance accrue de l'évergétisme municipal et le nombre des dédicaces honorifiques aux empereurs et à leur famille sous les Julio-Claudiens et les Sévères. A peu de distance vers l'est, c'est la cité de Volsinii qui a motivé la communication de A. Rossi, chargée pour la base EDR des nombreuses notices épigraphiques sur cette cité.¹ Là encore, l'étude des inscriptions connues a fait naître une problématique ambitieuse, à savoir l'analyse des liens entretenus entre ce petit municipe et la grande cité de Carthage, principalement aux IIe-IIIe s. p.C. au sein de membres de l'élite et dans le cadre d'une dynamique plus large de contacts entre l'Italie et l'Afrique romaine (p. 183-190). L'exemple le plus probant, analysé par l'a., concerne un sénateur volsinien du milieu du II^e s., proconsul d'Afrique, qui pourrait avoir fait bénéficier la communauté carthaginoise de son influence et de sa protection dans le cadre d'une reconstruction édilitaire à la suite d'un incendie, geste qui aurait induit un hommage lointain à cet homme, dans sa petite patrie. Dans le contexte bien connu de l'héritage étrusque intégré par l'Etrurie romaine, M. Torelli a choisi de nous livrer une enquête prosopographique en abordant de manière complexe et érudite le cas de la defixio de trois membres de la gens sénatoriale romaine des Mamilii, dont le texte, découvert dans la nécropole de la Banditaccia à Caere, est connu depuis 1930 (p. 191-204). La démonstration du maître italien aborde successivement l'histoire de la gens Mamilia, les liens étroits entretenus entre les élites de Rome et de Caere dès le IVe s. a.C. et surtout les raisons du dépôt d'une telle défixion dont l'a. attribue la paternité à l'un des Calpurnii de Caere, en représailles à la chute de leur patron L. Calpurnius Bestia, le consul de 111 a.C. condamné à l'exil suite à la loi anti-corruption de C. Mamilius Limetanus.

E. Benelli fonde son étude sur l'analyse des usages épigraphiques du I^er s. a.C., qui se caractérisent par la survivance de l'écriture étrusque dans l'Etrurie romaine et cible sa démonstration sur trois cités majeures et éclairantes du Nord : Arretium, Clusium et Perusia (p. 205-215). L'a. ne néglige pas les difficultés d'une telle recherche, basée majoritairement sur des inscriptions de nature funéraire souvent difficilement datables. Il revient avec précision sur le cas de Chiusi, déjà bien connu par ses nombreux articles, mais l'exemple de Pérouse, assez brièvement détaillé, montre comment une méthode analytique à la fois onomastique et prosopographique participe à la compréhension de l'interpénétration des langues étrusque et latine dans un microcosme social à l'échelle de la cité. L'a., qui inclut également les contextes archéologiques dans ces phénomènes linguistiques, propose utilement de nombreuses hypothèses expliquant la persistance de la langue étrusque, basées notamment sur le niveau social des scripteurs. E. Zuddas revient à son tour sur la praetura Etruriae et le rescrit d'Hispellum qui ont tant fait couler d'encre depuis les travaux désormais lointains de B. Liou en 1969 (p. 217-235). L'a. revient ainsi avec force sur les nombreux courants historiographiques traitant notamment de la simultanéité ou de la succession de la fonction de praetor Etruriae et de celle de coronatus Tusciae et Umbriae ou de la nature civique et religieuse de la magistrature étudiée, sans oublier les hypothèses sur l'identification du lieu d'organisation des ludi de la province au IVe s. à Orvieto ou Bolsena. En fin d'ouvrage, P. Liverani présente enfin la dernière attestation chronologiquement connue de l'ordo Rusellanorum (p. 237-260). Ce texte inédit daté de 305 p.C. nous transporte dans la Rosellae du règne de Constance Chlore, à qui était dédiée la statue autrefois supportée par cette base. Au-delà du simple commentaire de l'inscription, l'a. approfondit longuement le contexte archéologique de la découverte du support inscrit, qui a laissé place à de nombreuses interprétations mais qui semble être plutôt une basilique à deux nefs avec tribunal. L'a. conclut à une certaine vitalité de la Roselle du début du IV^e s., à en juger également par l'inscription éditée ici de manière complète et attestant de la restauration à cette époque des termes centraux de l'époque d'Hadrien.

Pour conclure, si l'on excepte l'originale contribution de M.L. Caldelli, A. Raggi et C. Slavich relative à la présence de nombreuses inscriptions d'Ostie dans les cités côtières de l'Etrurie romaine (p. 89-115), l'ensemble des articles présents dans ces Actes permet de dresser un panorama précis, rigoureux et mis à jour des institutions, de la population et de la société de la Regio VII, émanant pour la plupart de grands spécialistes de l'Etrurie étrusco-romaine. Si l'ensemble des cités d'Etrurie n'est pas traité dans cette publication – certaines sans doute par manque de sources suffisantes comme en témoigne N. Lapini pour Suana (p. 162) –, il faut reconnaître de nombreuses qualités à ce projet éditorial, parmi lesquelles la présence de plusieurs inscriptions inédites, accompagnées d'indispensables photographies, ou le vaste arc chronologique considéré dans ces présentations, allant des Etrusques à l'Antiquité tardive. Signalons enfin l'initiative louable des éditeurs de l'ouvrage qui ont permis la communication des adresses électroniques personnelles des participants au congrès, ce qui permettra, soyons-en sûrs, de multiples échanges féconds à l'avenir entre les chercheurs sur l'Etrurie romaine.

Authors and Titles

Premessa
Programma dei lavori
Giulio Ciampoltrini, "Saluti della Soprintendenza Archeologia Toscana"
Silvia Orlandi, "Il progetto EAGLE/EDR: obiettivi iniziali, acquisizioni recenti, prospettive future"
Giovanni Alberto Cecconi, "L'unità fiorentina (EDR-PRIN 2010-2011) e le ricerche sulle comunità dell'Etruria romana"
Eleonora Salomone Gaggero, "Ordo populusque Lunensium : un aggiornamento con documenti editi e inediti"
Federico Frasson, "Il culto del Genius plebis a Luna : un'attestazione epigrafica"
Simonetta Segenni, "La società municipale pisana tra nuove e vecchie iscrizioni"
Maria Letizia Caldelli, Andrea Raggi,, Carlo Slavich, "La dispersione delle iscrizioni ostiensi sulle coste tirreniche"
Chantal Gabrielli, "I rapporti fra Florentia e Faesulae in età imperiale"
Giulio Firpo, "Epigrafia e società ad Arretium in età tardo repubblicana"
Giuliano Caracciolo, Gian Luca Gregori, "Epigrafia e storia del territorio. Inediti dall'ager Clusinus nel Museo Civico Archeologico delle Acque di Chianciano Terme"
Novella Lapini, "I rapporti di Roma con due centri di spicco della Maremma : Saturnia e Heba"
Alice Rossi, "Da Volsinii a Carthago : sulle tracce dei legami tra un piccolo municipio e una grande città dell'impero"
Mario Torelli, "Prosopografia etrusca, prosopografia romana. Il caso della defixio di Mamilius Limetanus da Caere"
Enrico Benelli, "Epigrafia etrusca nell'Etruria romana"
Enrico Zuddas, "La praetura Etruriae tardoantica"
Paolo Liverani, "Roselle tardoantica e l'ultima attestazione dell'ordo Rusellanorum"
Gianfranco Paci, Conclusioni
Indici analitici (a cura di Federico Frasson)
Fonti
Fonti di tradizione manoscritta
Fonti epigrafiche
Fonti numismatiche
Nomi
Nomi di persona
Nomi geografici
Soggetti e termini notevoli

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Notes:

1.   A noter la publication prochaine du Corpus des inscriptions latines de Volsinii par le recenseur même.

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