Bread and Circuses

Handel's Arminio

I have been waiting for Radio 3 to get to this. At the start of the year the station promised to play all of Handel's operas. This one is based on the Battle of Teutoburg Forest and Arminius. So successful was it that it only managed six performances! Here is Suzanne Aspden andthe Radio 3 blog on the opera:

You have to have stamina to work your way through Handel's operas.  Having enjoyed the delightful magical and pastoral scenes of the operas broadcast in the Handel Opera Cycle in the past few weeks - Orlando, Alcina, Atalanta - we're now back to more traditional heroic stuff with Arminio (1737), this week.  It tells the story (from Tacitus) of warfare between the Romans and the Germans (the barbarian invaders, in other words), with the German tribal ruler Hermann (Arminius) betrayed into captivity by the collaborator, Segestes, but ultimately triumphant. 

The German theme may have meant the opera was intended to honour the Hanoverian monarchy.  Perhaps Handel was inspired in that direction by his recent success with the delightful pastoral opera, Atalanta, written to celebrate the wedding of the Prince of Wales.  Or perhaps he was hoping to ingratiate himself for financial reward - after all, he was still doing battle himself against the so-called 'Opera of the Nobility', who were occupying the opera house, and just as keen to curry favour with the royal family. 

You can listen to the opera here. That link lasts for another couple of days. Recommended.

Colchester pushes for Unesco status

Colchester MP Bob Russell is pushing for Unesco status for the town, thanks, primarily, to its Roman heritage:

“I think Colchester merits consideration through its status as the first capital of Roman Britain,” he said.

“We have so much: the Roman wall, the Gosbecks site, Boudicca, Britain’s only Roman racing circuit, the Norman castle, the rich culture of the Dutch Quarter, the Siege of Colchester during the Civil War, right through to our Victorian barracks and ‘Twinkle, twinkle, little star’ nursery rhyme.

“I am going to suggest to the borough council that they consider going for world heritage site status.”

In the Essex County Standard.

The Grand Strategy of the Byzantine Empire

A review, in the Washington Times (they seem to be on a late Roman trip at the moment) of Edward Luttwak's The Grand Strategy of the Byzantine Empire:

Mr. Luttwak takes up where he left off three decades ago when he wrote "The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire." That book was daring in its revisionism at the time, and people still love or hate it depending on their disposition toward the author. In those ensuing decades, Mr. Luttwak has matured as a writer and a historian. This book is good history as well as being an insightful commentary on strategy. Mr. Luttwak still has some interesting historical interpretations, but he has written good history.

The Eastern Roman Empire has received a bad rap since Edward Gibbon largely dismissed it as an effeminate and unworthy successor to the Western Roman Empire, whose demise he described while writing in the 18th century. The term "byzantine" is still used disparagingly in describing modern bureaucracies that don't work well. As Mr. Luttwak tells it, the bureaucracy usually got the job done.

The Byzantine Empire used a combination of military persuasion and what we now call soft or "smart" power to keep its enemies at bay. By soft power, we are talking about diplomacy, intelligence operations and sometimes outright bribery. American soldiers and diplomats who helped turn enemies into allies in creating the Sunni Awakening in Iraq will recognize and empathize with what the Eastern Romans did for centuries. This is a timely and relevant work.

Small late Roman hoard found in Hiddenhausen

A small hoard of nine late Roman gold coins, which date to the first half of the fourth century, have been found in Hiddenhausen in North Rhine-Westphalia. Eight of the coins were minted in Trier, one, however, in Constantinople:

Die neun Münzen bestehen aus reinem Gold; jede wiegt etwas über eineinhalb Gramm und hat einen Durchmesser von rund zwei Zentimetern. Geprägt wurden die Münzen unter den römischen Kaisern Constantinus I. (Konstantin der Große, 306 bis 337 n. Chr.) sowie seinen Nachfolgern Constantinus II. (317 bis 340 n. Chr.) und Constantius II. (317 bis 361 n. Chr.) in der ersten Hälfte des 4. Jahrhunderts. Acht der Münzen sind in Trier, eine in Konstantinopel hergestellt worden. Beide Städte waren zu dieser Zeit Regierungssitze des Römischen Reiches.

Auf der Vorderseite jeder Münze ist das Porträt des jeweiligen römischen Herrschers abgebildet und benannt, unter dem sie geprägt wurde. Die Rückseiten zeigen die römische Siegesgöttin Victoria beziehungsweise Personifkationen römischer Wertbegriffe.

Full story in the Wochenanzeiger Herford.

A Soap Dish That Changed History

Nice piece by Lars Brownworth in the WSJ on Constans II:

This fall marks the 1,341st anniversary of a watershed moment in history—though not likely one you've heard about before. It began with an event that would have been comical if not for the fact that a murder was involved. Even to those living through it, it must have seemed more farcical than ground-breaking.

The unlikely instigator was a disgruntled chamberlain who was tired of paying outrageous taxes and had taken it into his head to address the situation in the most direct way possible. On the morning of Sept. 15, 668 he snuck into the imperial bathhouse in Sicily and brought a heavy soap dish crashing down on the head of the drowsy emperor Constans II. It was hardly a dignified way to die, but the Roman Empire had seen inglorious deaths before, and this one turned out to be a conclusive turning point for much of Mediterranean history.

As the royal head disappeared beneath the lukewarm water of the imperial bath, the emperor could have been forgiven for being slightly relieved—had he been conscious—at his release from the heavy cares of office. His service as emperor had been a largely thankless task, a desperate scramble to stop a bewilderingly powerful enemy from swallowing up North Africa and the Middle East. At the start of his reign those provinces had been thoroughly Roman, full of Greek and Latin cities of colonnaded streets, civic buildings and public monuments, but the last chance to preserve their common culture was already slipping away.

CSEL Online

Via Roger Pearse, a list of the volumes of the CSEL in Google Books:

Fr. Stefan Zara’s site used to contain a list of the volumes of the CSEL in Google Books.  Unfortunately it has just been shut down.   It was hosted by Wordpress who understandably took exception to some of the material that he was sharing.  I think that some was copyright in the US if not in his native Romania.  I thought I would add his banner at the left here, so we can remember it.

However I found a cached version of this useful list from 8 October 2009 in Google cache.  To preserve this useful item, I have edited it down and post it here.

When barbarians were not

A pleasant discussion of James O'Donnell's The Ruin of the Roman Empire in the Washington Times by Claire Hopley:

In particular, Mr. O'Donnell shows that after 330, when Constantine made Constantinople the capital of the empire, the newcomers who moved into Italy, Gaul and Spain effectively preserved the Western Roman Empire. Most notably, in the early sixth century Theodoric, one of the maligned Goths, stabilized life in Italy and set the stage for prosperity and perhaps the continued integrity of the empire. Unfortunately, ruling from Constantinople in the years after Theodoric's death, Justinian squandered his gains by losing control of the borders, and most disastrously, by not concluding a peace with the Persians.

Almost equally problematic was Justinian's efforts to resolve the doctrinal differences among Christians. Most of these were about the divine and human characteristics of Jesus Christ. Since doctrinal allegiance was often regional, Justinian thought that if rival theologians could reach agreement, then he could decree one form of Christianity for the whole empire - a consummation devoutly to be wished from the administrative as well as religious point of view. But Mr. O'Donnell shows that chasing the chimera of Christian accord wasted time Justinian could have better spent more fruitfully. In his view, Justinian almost always chose the wrong policy. Even his buildings in Constantinople emerge from this book as the overweening of a man plodding on and on, ever more out of his depth as the dream of restoring the empire faded into the distance.

Cry for Byzantium

Via Medieval News, news of a splendid site on Twitter called Cry for Byzantium. The author, Sean Munger, is microblogging the history of the Byzantine empire. The most recent post is:

479. I’ve heard Marcian is planning to march on the palace! I’ve got to get out of here! *begins packing frantically*

I like the rather dry humour; another recent post reads: "Odoacer has sent me a delegation. I hate to recognize him as the de facto ruler of the West, but I have no choice. *sighs*". Even more than that, I like the flavour of the early chronicles that is given by the form of the tweets. See for example, Isidore of Seville, Chronicon, 108:

108. Honorius, with Theodosius the Younger, the son of his brother, ruled for fifteen years. With these two governing, the Goths took Rome and the Vandals, Alans and Suevi seized Spain. In this time Pelagius preached the dogma of his error against the grace of Christ. A council of 214 of bishops was convoked in Carthage for his condemnation. In this time Cyril, bishop of Alexandria, was regarded as noteworthy.

And the tweet:

July 410. Alaric the Goth has sacked Rome. Three days of pillage. I don’t even know what happened to Honorius.

Munger's website is here.

Fifth century discoveries in Horta

The Global Arab Network has an article about this season's excavations at Horta in Syria. The focus has been on a temple to Mithras:

The excavations of the Syrian-Polish Joint Expedition during 2009 in the site of Horta, 15 kilometers north of the ancient city of Apamea in Hama, uncovered a number of clay lamps and glass kohl jars dating back to the Roman and Byzantine periods.

Representative of the Syrian side in the expedition Nadim al-Khouri pointed out that the Horta site has two levels, one Roman and one Byzantine, and that excavations for this season focused on uncovering a temple dedicated to the god Mithras, the principal figure of the Greco-Roman religion of Mithraism.

A big part of the temple was uncovered, particularly the altar and the main hall. The walls of the main hall bear frescos depicting Mithras and other gods associated with him.

The roof western side of the temple is almost completely collapsed, and the clay lamps and glass kohl jars were found during the process of clearing the rubble from that area, in addition to uncovering remains pottery that possibly date back to the Byzantine period since they bear the sign of the cross.

Fourth century temple found in Tuscany

Early reports are emerging of a fourth century temple found in Tuscany. There appears to be a north African connection. Sadly there is no report of to whom the temple might be dedicated:

A Roman temple dating from the fourth century AD was discovered inside the Maremma Park, located in the central Italian region of Tuscany. The rectangular-shaped temple was found by a group of archaeologists after three months of work about three kilometres from the beach of Marina di Alberese, in the province of Grosseto.

The rectangular-shaped structure measures 11.5 metres by 6.5 metres and was built using a Roman-building technique called 'opus testaceum'. A loose stone foundation covered by bricks which are then covered in slabs of marble.

According to archaeologists, the temple suggests there was once an important Roman settlement in the area, which served as a trading port that handled goods coming from Africa and from the entire Mediterranean basin.

Story in adnkronos, NIB at Yahoo. Same report in Italian.