Compitum

William Fitzgerald et Efrossini Spentzou (éd.), The Production of Space in Latin Literature, Oxford, 2018.

Éditeur : Oxford University Press
320 pages
ISBN : 9780198768098
65 £

Recent decades have seen a marked shift in approaches to cultural analysis, with the critical role of location and spatial experience in the formation of the human subject gaining increasing prominence. This volume applies the insights and concerns of the 'spatial turn' to this specifically Roman engagement with space, and explores its representation and manipulation in Latin literature. The terrain covered by the contributions is broad, both temporally (from Catullus to St Augustine) and in terms of genre, with lyric, epic, elegy, satire, epistolography, and historiography all finding their place in discussions that focus mainly on movement and the mobile subject in the experience and making of space. Offering a detailed exploration of Roman engagement with space, the ideological stakes of this engagement, and its intersections with empire, urbanism, identity, ethics, exile, and history, the volume contains a wealth of insights for readers across and beyond the discipline of classical studies: those looking equally for new approaches to ancient texts and authors or to explore the relationship between the materiality of antiquity and its literary aspects will find these discussions illuminating.

Maureen Carroll, Infancy and Earliest Childhood in the Roman World, Oxford, 2018.

Éditeur : Oxford University Press
336 pages
ISBN : 9780199687633
75 £

Despite the developing emphasis in current scholarship on children in Roman culture, there has been relatively little research to date on the role and significance of the youngest children within the family and in society. This volume singles out this youngest age group, the under one-year-olds, in the first comprehensive study of infancy and earliest childhood to encompass the Roman Empire as a whole: integrating social and cultural history with archaeological evidence, funerary remains, material culture, and the iconography of infancy, it explores how the very particular historical circumstances into which Roman children were born affected their lives as well as prevailing attitudes towards them. Examination of these varied strands of evidence, drawn from throughout the Roman world from the fourth century BC to the third century AD, allows the rhetoric about earliest childhood in Roman texts to be more broadly contextualized and reveals the socio-cultural developments that took place in parent-child relationships over this period. Presenting a fresh perspective on archaeological and historical debates, the volume refutes the notion that high infant mortality conditioned Roman parents not to engage in the early life of their children or to view them, or their deaths, with indifference, and concludes that even within the first weeks and months of life Roman children were invested with social and gendered identities and were perceived as having both personhood and value within society.

Dylan Kelby Rogers, Water culture in Roman society, Leyde, 2018.

Éditeur : Brill
Collection : Ancient History
xii, 118 pages
ISBN : 9789004368941
70 €

Water played an important part of ancient Roman life, from providing necessary drinking water, supplying bath complexes, to flowing in large-scale public fountains. The Roman culture of water was seen throughout the Roman Empire, although it was certainly not monolithic and it could come in a variety of scales and forms, based on climatic and social conditions of different areas. This article seeks to define ‘water culture' in Roman society by examining literary, epigraphic, and archaeological evidence, while understanding modern trends in scholarship related to the study of Roman water. The culture of water can be demonstrated through expressions of power, aesthetics, and spectacle. Further there was a shared experience of water in the empire that could be expressed through religion, landscape, and water's role in cultures of consumption and pleasure.

Source : Brill

Chiara Croci et Vladimir Ivanovici (éd.), Entre terre et ciel. Les édifices à coupole et leur décor entre l'Antiquité tardive et le Moyen Âge, Lausanne, 2018.

Éditeur : Université de Lausanne
Collection : Etudes de lettres
188 pages
ISBN : 978-2-940331-68-0
22 CHF / 20 €

Couronnement des édifices les plus prestigieux, charnière entre l'espace architectural et le monde céleste, la coupole s'avère être un «système» crucial dans l'art de l'Antiquité tardive et du haut Moyen Âge. Signe de commandes très distinguées, elle caractérise des bâtiments de grande importance – mausolées, martyria et memoria, baptistères, églises impériales, chapelles palatines – et incarne des défis architecturaux et décoratifs majeurs. En raison de la complexité de leurs problématiques, les bâtiments à coupole ont rarement fait l'objet d'études d'ensemble. Durant ces quinze dernières années, toutefois, d'importantes recherches ont révolutionné l'état des connaissances d'une partie de ces bâtiments et ont fondé les présupposés d'une nouvelle étude d'ensemble. Dans ce volume anthologique, les bâtiments à coupole majeurs de l'Antiquité tardive et du haut Moyen Âge sont étudiés selon des perspectives variées, afin d'éclaircir la structure et la décoration de ces bâtiments par rapport à leur fonction et d'offrir ainsi une ouverture sur un tournant historique crucial.

Caitlin C. Gillespie, Boudica: Warrior Woman of Roman Britain, Oxford, 2018.

Éditeur : Oxford University Press
216 pages
ISBN : 9780190609078
47,99 £

In AD 60/61, Rome almost lost the province of Britain to a woman. Boudica, wife of the client king Prasutagus, fomented a rebellion that proved catastrophic for Camulodunum (Colchester), Londinium (London), and Verulamium (St Albans), destroyed part of a Roman legion, and caused the deaths of an untold number of veterans, families, soldiers, and Britons. Yet with one decisive defeat, her vision of freedom was destroyed, and the Iceni never rose again. Boudica: Warrior Woman of Roman Britain introduces readers to the life and literary importance of Boudica through juxtaposing her different literary characterizations with those of other women and rebel leaders. This study focuses on our earliest literary evidence, the accounts of Tacitus and Cassius Dio, and investigates their narratives alongside material evidence of late Iron Age and early Roman Britain. Throughout the book, Caitlin Gillespie draws comparative sketches between Boudica and the positive and negative examples with which readers associate her, including the prophetess Veleda, the client queen Cartimandua, and the rebel Caratacus. Literary comparisons assist in the understanding of Boudica as a barbarian, queen, mother, commander in war, and leader of revolt. Within the ancient texts, Boudica is also used as an internal commentator on the failures of the emperor Nero, and her revolt epitomizes ongoing conflicts of gender and power at the end of the Juilio-Claudian era. Both literary and archaeological sources point towards broader issues inherent in the clash between Roman and native cultures. Boudica's unique ability to unify disparate groups of Britons cemented her place in the history of Roman Britain. While details of her life remain elusive, her literary character still has more to say.

Daniel Hoyer, Money, Culture, and Well-Being in Rome's Economic Development, 0-275 CE, Leyde, 2018.

Éditeur : Brill
Collection : Mnemosyne, Supplements
xiii, 215 pages
ISBN : 978-90-04-35828-7
89 €

The Roman Empire has long held pride of place in the collective memory of scholars, politicians, and the general public in the western world. In Money, Culture, and Well-Being in Rome's Economic Development, 0-275 CE, Daniel Hoyer offers a new approach to explain Rome's remarkable development.
Hoyer surveys a broad selection of material to see how this diverse body of evidence can be reconciled to produce a single, coherent picture of the Roman economy. Engaging with social scientific and economic theory, Hoyer highlights key issues in economic history, placing the Roman Empire in its rightful place as a special—but not wholly unique—example of a successful preindustrial state.