Augustus and the destruction of history


Book Description

Augustus and the Destruction of History explores the intense controversies over the meaning and profile of the past that accompanied the violent transformation of the Roman Republic into the Augustan principate. The ten case studies collected here analyse how different authors and agents (individual and collective) developed specific conceptions of history and articulated them in a wide variety of textual and visual media to position themselves within the emergent (and evolving) new Augustan normal. The chapters consider both hegemonic and subaltern endeavours to reconfigure Roman memoria and pay special attention to power and polemics, chaos, crisis and contingency – not least to challenge some long-standing habits of thought about Augustus and his principate and its representation in historiographical discourse, ancient and modern. Some of the most iconic texts and monuments from ancient Rome receive fresh discussion here, including the Forum Romanum and the Forum of Augustus, Virgil’s Aeneid and the Fasti Capitolini.




Augustus and the Destruction of History


Book Description

Augustus and the Destruction of History explores the intense controversies over the meaning and profile of the past that accompanied the violent transformation of the Roman Republic into the Augustan principate. The ten case studies collected here analyse how different authors and agents (individual and collective) developed specific conceptions of history and articulated them in a wide variety of textual and visual media to position themselves within the emergent (and evolving) new Augustan normal. The chapters consider both hegemonic and subaltern endeavours to reconfigure Roman memoria and pay special attention to power and polemics, chaos, crisis and contingency - not least to challenge some long-standing habits of thought about Augustus and his principate and its representation in historiographical discourse, ancient and modern. Some of the most iconic texts and monuments from ancient Rome receive fresh discussion here, including the Forum Romanum and the Forum of Augustus, Virgil's Aeneid and the Fasti Capitolini.




Augustus and the Creation of the Roman Empire


Book Description

During his long reign of near-absolute power, Caesar Augustus established the Pax Romana, which gave Rome two hundred years of peace and social stability, and established an empire that would endure for five centuries and transform the history of Europe and the Mediterranean. Ronald Mellor offers a collection of primary sources featuring multiple viewpoints of the rise, achievements, and legacy of Augustus and his empire. His cogent introduction to the history of the Age of Augustus encourages students to examine such subjects as the military in war and peacetime, the social and cultural context of political change, the reform of administration, and the personality of the emperor himself. Document headnotes, a list of contemporary literary sources, a glossary of Greek and Latin terms, a chronology, questions for consideration, and a selected bibliography offer additional pedagogical support.




A Universal History of the Destruction of Books


Book Description

Examines the many reasons and motivations for the destruction of books throughout history, citing specific acts from the smashing of ancient Sumerian tablets to the looting of libraries in post-war Iraq.




Augustus


Book Description

He found Rome made of clay and left it made of marble. As Rome’s first emperor, Augustus transformed the unruly Republic into the greatest empire the world had ever seen. His consolidation and expansion of Roman power two thousand years ago laid the foundations, for all of Western history to follow. Yet, despite Augustus’s accomplishments, very few biographers have concentrated on the man himself, instead choosing to chronicle the age in which he lived. Here, Anthony Everitt, the bestselling author of Cicero, gives a spellbinding and intimate account of his illustrious subject. Augustus began his career as an inexperienced teenager plucked from his studies to take center stage in the drama of Roman politics, assisted by two school friends, Agrippa and Maecenas. Augustus’s rise to power began with the assassination of his great-uncle and adoptive father, Julius Caesar, and culminated in the titanic duel with Mark Antony and Cleopatra. The world that made Augustus–and that he himself later remade–was driven by intrigue, sex, ceremony, violence, scandal, and naked ambition. Everitt has taken some of the household names of history–Caesar, Brutus, Cassius, Antony, Cleopatra–whom few know the full truth about, and turned them into flesh-and-blood human beings. At a time when many consider America an empire, this stunning portrait of the greatest emperor who ever lived makes for enlightening and engrossing reading. Everitt brings to life the world of a giant, rendered faithfully and sympathetically in human scale. A study of power and political genius, Augustus is a vivid, compelling biography of one of the most important rulers in history.




Death of Augustus his Conversion to Christ


Book Description

Myth and the Church Augustus Caesar, Son of God, started the Christiancalendar. Moreover, he also contributed massively to thepersona of Christ, to Christianity and to the ChristianChurch. Indeed, Jesus, a Jewish prophet, was transformedin the process to become the God of Christian Europe. Augustus, the Godfather of Europe, spawned a religion aliento Rome and the world of Rome he had created. This was not the work of Augustus himself. However, Augustus was the luminary of the Roman state religion before he was transformed into the second person of the Trinity. The processes involved in these changes are followedthrough the first four centuries of the Christian era. A brieflook at developments since highlight the Christian church's continued influence on the western European knowledgebase. Here you can check out your own mindset, against factors that are still crazily influential. The cover illustration is of a restored cult figure of Augustus, one of thousands destroyed by Christian zealots let loose in 395. Most of the hood of the toga of Pontifex Maximus is missing. This example is at Thyatira, to where John sent a copy of his Revelations. All seven churches of the Apocalypse were in the Roman province of Asia. Just off the coast is the island of Samos, where Augustus lived when he was in the area. Patmos, where John wrote his Revelations during his exile there, is a bit further out in the Aegean Sea. The reverse of an Augustan aureus, on the spine, shows the winged victory standing on the globethat Augustus had installed as centerpiece of the Roman Curia. It was carried at his funeral to leadthe procession from the forum to his mausoleum. At the end of the fourth century it was removed from the Curia and reinstated three times. Finally Ambrosius, Bishop of Milan, insisted it be takenout and utterly destroyed. Rome and the world of Rome collapsed shortly afterwards. Augustus' last 100 days were extremely busy. He was supposedto have suffered from the weariness of old age before then. But after official functions in Rome he went to Capri for a few days, thenon to the Games in Naples, where heindulged in horse play with the athletes and on to Beneventum to review his armies, before they set off to war. His death at the old family home atNola is well documented, down totime and day. It's the year that's in dispute here. Christian historians strove to proveJesus was the Messiah by his dateof birth. They also wanted to knowwhen the Second Coming of Christwould occur. In the process they hadto alter the date of Augustus death. Much was destroyed to cover their tracks. Fortunately enough remainsin the debris to reconstruct the real chronology of the period. Surprisingly much else remainedto be unearthed. Cicero, not Herod,ordered the massacre of the innocents. Wise men from the east visited Augustus. It's all there for the digging.




Rome and the Making of a World State, 150 BCE - 20 CE


Book Description

A new historical survey that recasts the 'fall of the Roman Republic' as part of the rise of a uniquely successful world state.




Mortal Republic


Book Description

Learn why the Roman Republic collapsed -- and how it could have continued to thrive -- with this insightful history from an award-winning author. In Mortal Republic, prize-winning historian Edward J. Watts offers a new history of the fall of the Roman Republic that explains why Rome exchanged freedom for autocracy. For centuries, even as Rome grew into the Mediterranean's premier military and political power, its governing institutions, parliamentary rules, and political customs successfully fostered negotiation and compromise. By the 130s BC, however, Rome's leaders increasingly used these same tools to cynically pursue individual gain and obstruct their opponents. As the center decayed and dysfunction grew, arguments between politicians gave way to political violence in the streets. The stage was set for destructive civil wars -- and ultimately the imperial reign of Augustus. The death of Rome's Republic was not inevitable. In Mortal Republic, Watts shows it died because it was allowed to, from thousands of small wounds inflicted by Romans who assumed that it would last forever.




Romanization in the Time of Augustus


Book Description

During the lifetime of Augustus (from 63 B.C. to A.D. 14), Roman civilization spread at a remarkable rate throughout the ancient world, influencing such areas as art and architecture, religion, law, local speech, city design, clothing, and leisure and family activities. In his newest book, Ramsay MacMullen investigates why the adoption of Roman ways was so prevalent during this period.Drawing largely on archaeological sources, MacMullen discovers that during this period more than half a million Roman veterans were resettled in colonies overseas, and an additional hundred or more urban centers in the provinces took on normal Italian-Roman town constitutions. Great sums of expendable wealth came into the hands of ambitious Roman and local notables, some of which was spent in establishing and advertising Roman ways. MacMullen argues that acculturation of the ancient world was due not to cultural imperialism on the part of the conquerors but to eagerness of imitation among the conquered, and that the Romans were able to respond with surprisingly effective techniques of mass production and standardization.




Augustus: From Republic to Empire


Book Description

Proceedings from the conference ‘AUGUSTUS. 23 September 63 BC – 19 August 14 AD – 2000 years of divinity’ held in Kakow, 2014. Papers deal with a variety of topics ranging from architecture, urban issues and painting to fine art represented by glyptics and numismatics.