Rome in late antiquity : everyday life and urban change, AD 312-609
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Rome in late antiquity : everyday life and urban change, AD 312-609
Edinburgh University Press, 2000
- : hbk
- : pbk
- Other Title
-
Rome dans l'Antiquité tardive
Available at 7 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
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  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
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Note
Includes bibliographical references (p. 179-182) and index
French original edition published in 1995 by Hachette Littératures
Description and Table of Contents
Description
This is a history of life in ancient Rome from the third to the seventh centuries AD. At the beginning of the period Rome was the centre of civilisation, by far the greatest city in the world, whose vast revenues supplied its million people with lavish provisions of food and wine and at least one hundred days of spectacular entertainment each year. It was a city of pristine marble, brightly coloured stucco, with temple and government buildings roofed in dazzling gold and bronze. Its citizens had access to public baths, gardens, libraries, circuses, amphitheatres, and venues for sea-fight spectacles. Well-maintained roads and aqueducts stretched from it in all directions. When Pope Gregory died in Rome in 604 Rome had become a papal power, the centre of western Christianity, the Pantheon itself transformed into a church. The author examines the conversion first of the plebs and later of the nobility, the long struggle between ancient rituals of worship and Christianity, and charts the effects of the latter's triumph on the social and physical fabric of the city.
Professor Lancon describes the building of the great city wall which in 410 failed to prevent the first of a series of violent Gothic and Vandal incursions, and the citizens' valiant and repeated efforts to restore their city's glory. He considers changes in sexuality, the position of women, education, the family and life cycle, in the measurement, of time, and in the calendar of games and festivals. He examines the continuing role and prestige of the Senate, and the early years and rise of the papacy. Bertrand Lancon brings three turbulent centuries of life in the world's greatest city vividly before the reader's eye: his account is as readable as it is scholarly. The book is introduced by Mark Humphries, who has also provided a guide to further reading for anglophone readers.
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