Bread & Circuses

Attila at Aquileia

I blogged about Aquileia a couple of weeks back.

When Attila and the Huns tried to take the city in 452, it was a long entrenchment on both sides, though Aquileia eventually fell. At dawn one day, so the story went, Attila saw a stork leaving the city with its young. He took this avian departure as a sign that he was going to capture the city.

The story, originally in Procopius' History of the Wars is an image that was much used by medieval scribes and appears in numerous manuscripts.

Here is an example from the Basel printing of Sebastian Münster’s Cosmographia from 1561. As always, click to enlarge.

Constantine the Exhibition

I hadn't realised that this year is the 1,700th anniversary of Constantine I's acclamation as emperor in Britain. He was the only emperor to be hailed here - in York on 26 July 306. The Independent carries a story on an exhibition that opens tomorrow in York that might be worth a look. Less so the article.

I like the claim in the piece that:

Only Augustus Caesar, the first Roman emperor, rivalled Constantine's achievements in a reign that lasted until 387.

Not even Augustus managed to reign for 81 years. I am curious too about the "Christian basilica at the Lanteran in Rome" and the historian "Lanctitius" mentioned! All dangers, I suspect, of a telephone interview.

More seriously, not sure which tradition is being alluded to with Constantine's mother, Helena:

She was probably born a Christian, though virtually nothing is known of her background, save that her father was a successful soldier.

I thought there was pretty much consensus that she was the daughter of an inn-keeper from Bithynia (Sozomen, 2.2.5; Procopius, de Aedificiis, 5.2; Philostorgius, 2.12). Certainly Ambrose (De obitu Theodosii, 42) calls her a stabularia.

And that is long before we get to the Battle of Milvian Bridge. Oh well.

Anyway, here is the link to the exhibition website. There are some downloadable resources in the press information section and the exhibition catalogue (criminally expensive as ever) looks especially good.

Getica and Romulus

Jordanes' account of Romulus Augustulus:

241 When the Emperor Nepos heard of this, he ordered Ecdicius to leave Gaul and come to him, appointing Orestes in his stead as Master of the Soldiery. This Orestes thereupon received the army, set out from Rome against the enemy and came to Ravenna. Here he tarried while he made his son Romulus Augustulus emperor. When Nepos learned of this, he fled to Dalmatia and died there, deprived of his throne, in the very place where Glycerius, who was formerly emperor, held at that time the bishopric of Salona.

242 Now when Augustulus had been appointed Emperor by his father Orestes in Ravenna, it was not long before Odoacer, king of the Torcilingi, invaded Italy, as leader of the Sciri, the Heruli and allies of various races. He put Orestes to death, drove his son Augustulus from the throne and condemned him to the punishment of exile in the Castle of Lucullus in Campania.

243 Thus the Western Empire of the Roman race, which Octavianus Augustus, the first of the Augusti, began to govern in the seven hundred and ninth year from the founding of the city, perished with this Augustulus in the five hundred and twenty second year from the beginning of the rule of his predecessors and those before them, and from this time onward kings of the Goths held Rome and Italy.

Waiting for the Barbarians

From the New York Times at the weekend, a review of a new translation of the collected poems of the Alexandrian poet CP Cavafy. It is difficult for anyone interested in late antiquity not to be affected by his poems.

“A gentleman in a straw hat, at a slight angle to the universe”, is how EM Forster described him. Little read in his own lifetime – he died in 1933 – Cavafy spent most of his working life with the Egyptian Ministry of Public Works, publishing only privately. His reputation did not begin to grow until after World War II, when he was championed by writers like the Greek Nobel laureate George Seferis and Lawrence Durrell.

He wrote a cycle of seven poems on Julian the Apostate: Julian Seeing Contempt, Julian in Nicomedia, A Great Procession of Priests and Laymen, Julian and the Antiochenes and You Didn’t Understand which were published between September 1923 and January 1928. Julian at the Mysteries which dates from November 1896 and On the Outskirts of Antioch, written just before his death, remained unpublished at his death.

Aliki Barnstone's translation looks good, but will have to be very good indeed to rival, let alone surpass that of Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard. 

Anonymous Valesianus and Romulus

On-line version in English/Latin - the old Loeb. Useful if you can't face wading through MGH. The beginning of part two:

7 Now during the reign of Zeno Augustus at Constantinople, the patrician Nepos came to the Port of the city of Rome, deposed Glycerius, who was made a bishop, while Nepos himself became emperor at Rome. Presently Nepos came to Ravenna; he was followed by the patrician Orestes with an army, and in fear of his coming Nepos embarked on board a ship and fled to Salona, where he remained for five years; but later he was slain by his own men. Soon after Nepos left Rome Augustulus was made emperor and ruled for ten years.

8 Augustulus, who was called Romulus by his parents before he mounted the throne, was made emperor by his father, the patrician Orestes. Then Odoacar made his appearance with a force of Sciri and killed the patrician Orestes at Placentia, and his brother Paulus at the Pine Grove, outside the Classis at Ravenna. Then he entered Ravenna, deposed Augustulus from his throne, but in pity for his tender years, granted him his life; and because of his beauty he also gave him an income of six thousand gold-pieces and sent him to Campania, to live there a free man with his relatives. Now his father Orestes was a Pannonian, who joined with Attila at the time when he came to Rome, and was made his secretary, a position from which he had advanced to the rank of patrician.

Ennodius

Good on-line bibliography of Ennodius.

Cash for Kalkriese

Via Archaeology in Europe, news of €700,000 for Kalkriese which will be spent, in the short term, on cataloguing small finds from the site, part of the Battle of Teutoburg Forest.

Another Romulus Augustulus novel

I have been surprised how few historical novelists have based their fiction in the fifth century. It has always struck me as an era ripe in intrigue. Finally managed to track down a copy of The Twelfth Vulture of Romulus. The first novel by (retired, I think) history professor Boris Raymond, it is worth a look.

King Arthur

Rarely have I typed two words with such a heavy heart. I have been conscious that I have been avoiding writing about fifth century Britain, just so that I don't have to touch the subject. But the book is in its final stages and I can no longer ignore the "paragraphs to come" note I wrote ages ago. The difficulty is that it is an area of history seemingly overwhelmed by Graham Hancock/Da Vinci Code types.

Christopher Snyder's An Age Of Tyrants, which I cannot recommend highly enough (this has nothing to do with the fact that we share a publisher) is an honourable exception and has made my missing paragraphs a pleasure to write. He addresses the subject like this:

[Arthur and Merlin] either dominate books written about the period or else linger in the background with such a presence that the writer feels forced to stop and say: "Look, I know that you're waiting for me to say something about King Arthur, so let me just make it clear where I stand on this issue".

Diocletian's Palace

The town of Split is most famous as the home of Diocletian, but I have been looking at it because two Roman emperors in the fifth century ended up there: Glycerius and Julius Nepos (Romulus Augustulus' predecessor).

I have come across a couple of quite stunning sites. The first is Robert Adam’s 1764 book the Ruins of the palace of the Emperor Diocletian at Spalatro in Dalmatia. The second is a site devoted to the city, hosted by Michael Greenhalgh, Department of Art History, Australian National University.