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The Severans

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Jun 8th, 2016
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  1. Introduction
  2.  
  3. The reigns of the Severi (193–235), from Septimius Severus (the founder of the dynasty) to the last emperor Severus Alexander, symbolize the evolution of the Roman Empire, after the two first centuries of the Principate, and before the so-called crisis of the 3rd century AD: we can observe the progressive transformation of an imperial republic to a monarchical state. The lack of available historical resources made the historians of the 18th and 19th centuries quite unfair to the Severan period, whose status was to be an “entre-deux,” after the supposed peaceful century of the Antonines and before the unsuccessful wars of the 250–270s, the transformations of the Tetrarchy, and then Constantine’s reign. But thanks to the numerous inquiries in the late 20th and early 21st centuries from epigraphic and numismatic sources, the accounts of the Severan period have been profoundly renewed, and our understanding of what was the Severan Empire has improved. We must consider the almost traditional approach of the imperial function and cult by Septimius Severus and his successors, their collective attitude toward cities and citizenship, the increasing appreciation of the role of the equites, and above all the jurists within the imperial council, the reforms pursued within the army, and the impact of the imperial patronage within the art and culture in Rome and in the main provincial cities. The literary evidence, mainly the so-called senatorial historiography (Cassius Dio and the Historia Augusta), has deliberately limited our comprehension of the attitudes of Severan emperors and of what we should analyze as a discourse: the rhetoric in attendance to the princes, ceremonies to commemorate emperors and imperial family (domus divina) in Rome (adventus, triumphus, funus) and outside (adventus), and monuments that participated in the conception of an empire whose project was to assert its eternity (Roma Aeterna). Maybe two themes could be selected in order to characterize this almost half-a-century of Roman history: the universality assumed with the grant of Roman citizenship in 212 by Caracalla, and the eternity proclaimed during the secular games of 204 under Septimius Severus.
  4.  
  5. General Overviews
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  7. Three important events have renewed our general understanding of the Severan period. First of all, a new international society devoted to the study of the Severi has been created in the 1990s in Italy and has organized a colloquium whose publication (Dal Covolo and Rinaldi 1999) was the first to present such a specialized volume dedicated to many aspects of the reigns of the Severan emperors. Then it was from a cultural perspective that an edited collection of essays was released a few years later (Swain, et al. 2007), and finally, thanks to the commemoration in 2011 in Rome of Septimius Severus’s death, another series of papers, these founded on precise case studies, was published (De Sena 2013).
  8.  
  9. Dal Covolo, Enrico, and Giancarlo Rinaldi, eds. 1999. Gli imperatori Severi: Storia, archeologia, religion. Rome: LAS.
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  11. These are the acts of the first congress of the “Severan Studies,” organized in 1996 by the International Center of Studies on the Severan Period. The different perspectives developed during this colloquium offer a comprehensive study from a variety of points of view.
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  13. De Sena, Eric C., ed. 2013. The Roman Empire during the Severan dynasty: Case studies in history, art, architecture, economy and literature. American Journal of Ancient History 6–8. Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias.
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  15. To commemorate the 1800th anniversary of Septimius Severus’s death, a conference was organized in April 2011, and twenty papers have recently been published and distributed in four sections: “Severan History and Literature,” “Urban Transformations,” “Aspects of Society and Economy,” and “Art and Ideology.”
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  17. Swain, Simon C. R., Stephen J. Harrison, and Jas Elsner, eds. 2007. Severan culture. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
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  19. This collection of essays offered to Ewen L. Bowie provides a broad approach to what can be considered “culture” under the Severi: from literature and culture, to art and architecture, and finally to philosophy and religion.
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  21. Narratives
  22.  
  23. Four recent narratives are available, in Italian (Angeli Bertinelli, et al. 1996), French (Christol 1997) and English (Campbell 2005, Ando 2012), that provide a comprehensive access to the period (see Birley 1969 for a complete survey of the events in 193). Usually, the political perspectives are privileged, but the most important social and juridical aspects are also mentioned. Christol proposes an interesting new turning point with the oriental events that occurred in 226.
  24.  
  25. Ando, Clifford. 2012. Imperial Rome AD 193 to 284: The critical century. Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univ. Press.
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  27. This is a handbook for a student audience about the crisis of 3rd-century imperial Rome, from Commodus’s death to the accession of Diocletian. In a general overview of the period, two chapters present the essential narrative on the Severans, and especially on the impact of the Antonine constitution, which is presented as an “Antonine revolution” about law and citizenship.
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  29. Angeli Bertinelli, Gabriela, et al., ed. 1996. Storia della società italiana I:3 La crisi del principato e la società imperiale. Milan: Teti.
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  31. In this general survey about the so-called crisis of the Roman Empire, Mario Mazza gives a comprehensive analysis of the Severan period, from the assassination of Commodus to the death of Severus Alexander. Pays particular attention to the imperial power and the normative aspects of the Roman government during the first part of the 3rd century AD in three chapters: “Da Pertinace all’avvento di Settimio Severo: La Grande crisi degli anni 193–197,” pp. 189–209; “Un uomo forte al potere: il regno di Settimio Severo,” pp. 211–260; and “La dinastia severiana: da Caracalla a Severo Alessandro,” pp. 261–318.
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  33. Birley, Antony R. 1969. The coups d’État of the year 193. Bonner Jahrbücher des Rheinischen Landesmuseums in Bonn und des Rheinischen Amtes für Bodendenkmalpflege im Landschaftsverband Rheinland und des Vereins von Altertumsfreunden im Rheinlande 169:247–280.
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  35. Birley wrote a decisive essay about the plot organized against Commodus, the involvement of Pertinax and the constitution of a so-called African party, and explained the narratives by Cassius Dio, Herodian, and Marius Maximus, as well as the probable influence of a certain Severan vulgate.
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  37. Campbell, Brian. 2005. The Severan dynasty. In Cambridge ancient history: The crisis of empire (A.D. 193–337). Edited by Alan K. Bowman, Peter Garnsey, and Averil Cameron, 1–27. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
  38. DOI: 10.1017/CHOL9780521301992Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  39. In five chronological sections, with a relevant selection of references to the main topics (literary, epigraphic, and numismatic) and a few historical studies, this presentation offers a general overview of the Severan period.
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  41. Christol, Michel. 1997. L’empire romain du iiie siècle: Histoire politique (192–325 après J.-C.). Paris: Errance.
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  43. This is a broad presentation, grounded on a proposition of a new chronological sequence with, as a turning point, the year 226 and the accession of the new Sassanian dynasty with Ardashir. Examples of monument (the Arch of Septimius Severus on the Forum Romanum) and epigraphic texts (a diploma and the Ulpian inscription from Tyre) have been provided. See pp. 11–77, 111.
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  45. Biographies
  46.  
  47. Septimius Severus, Elagabalus, Severus Alexander, and Julia Domna are the main figures of the period, and they have been studied since the beginning of the 20th century (see Historiography: Emperors, especially Platnauer 1965 and Jardé 1925). We can find complementary biographies (Birley 1999 and Daguet-Gagey 2000) for Septimius Severus, with prosopographical and sociopolitical analyses. The women of the imperial family are treated in Kettenhofen 1979, Levick 2007, and Langford 2013. The proverbial “bad emperor” for ancient as well as modern historians, Elagabalus, is the subject of a historiographical essay (Icks 2012).
  48.  
  49. Birley, Anthony R. 1999. Septimius Severus, The African emperor. New York: Routledge.
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  51. The first “modern” biography of the founder of the dynasty gives a chronological narrative of Septimius Severus’s life. It was based on prosopographical inquiries and contained two important appendixes, one with a brief presentation of ancient evidence, the second one with sixty prosopographical accounts (e.g., about Punic ancestors, Septimii, Fulvii, or the Emesene dynasty). Originally published in 1971.
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  53. Daguet-Gagey, Anne. 2000. Septime Sévère. Rome, l’Afrique et l’Orient. Paris: Payot.
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  55. Gives a comprehensive approach to the conception of the empire under Septimius Severus, especially its provincial composition and the double family connection of the princeps with Africa and Syria. A short note about the evidence and a glossary are provided.
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  57. Icks, Martijn. 2012. The crimes of Elagabalus. The life and legacy of Rome’s decadent boy emperor. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.
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  59. The traditional image of an exemplary tyrant is renewed in this historiographical essay, whose aims are to propose a grounded reflection about events and their reception by contemporaries and moderns. The last part of the book is “The Nachleben of Elagabalus in Art and Literature: An Overview,” with a few illustrations.
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  61. Kettenhofen, Erich. 1979. Die syrischen Augustae in der historischen Überlieferung. Ein beitrag zum problem der orientalisierung. Bonn, Germany: Habelt.
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  63. The research here is based firstly on the literary sources (Cassius Dio, Herodian, and the Historia Augusta), and secondly on the epigraphic, numismatic, and archaeological sources on the titulature of the three princesses: Julia Domna, Julia Maesa, and Julia Mamaea. The titles of mater Augusti/Caesaris, castrorum, senatus et patriae are comprehensively analyzed.
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  65. Langford, Julie. 2013. Maternal megalomania: Julia Domna and the imperial politics of motherhood. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press.
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  67. This published doctoral thesis provides a stimulating analysis of the first Severan empress from the perspective of the official message delivered through inscriptions and coins (especially on the titles of “mother of the camp, the Senate and the Country”) and also the relationships established with the army, the senators, and the Populus Romanus.
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  69. Levick, Barbara. 2007. Julia Domna: Syrian empress. London: Routledge.
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  71. Three aspects should be emphasized in this short but comprehensive biography of the first Syrian princess: the importance of travels during Julia Domna’s life, her subsequent “intellectual” image and the possibility of a literary “circle” around her, and the cult before (as Tyche tes oikoumenes, the “Good Fortune of the Inhabited World”) and after her death during the last years of the Severan dynasty.
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  73. Historiography
  74.  
  75. During the 20th century, the research on the Severan period was enriched by a good many epigraphic and numismatic discoveries, and it reviewed the periodization between the Principate and the late Roman Empire. From that perspective, the Severi could be reconsidered on the basis of a new understanding of the approach to government in Rome and the provinces. The notion of crisis has provoked new appraisals of what we used to call the “Senatorial historiography”: that is, the conception by Roman and Greek historians, from the Severan period to the late 4th century AD, of the evolution of the empire from Septimius Severus to Constantine, and the meaning of the main reforms: political, military, and social. Emperors and politics have been revalued over the years: for example, there has been reconsideration of Septimius Severus and his military and provincial reforms, of Caracalla and his constitution granting peregrines the Roman citizenship, as well as of Severus Alexander and his conception of imperial power.
  76.  
  77. Emperors
  78.  
  79. Two examples from the first decades of the 20th century may be used to understand the traditional approach of the Severan emperors, from Septimius Severus (Platnauer 1965) to Severus Alexander (Jardé 1925). They give an appropriate survey of the excellent scholarship on the Roman Empire after the death of the greatest prince, the philosopher Marcus Aurelius, at the beginning of the so-called decline.
  80.  
  81. Jardé, Auguste. 1925. Études critiques sur la vie et le règne de Sévère Alexandre. Paris: de Boccard.
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  83. Jardé singled out four aspects of the reign: first the accession, and above all the name of Alexander; second are the reforms, the consilium principis, and the praetorian prefect; third are the problems within the empire, especially with praetorians and soldiers; and finally the Germanic wars and the assassination of the emperor are covered.
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  85. Platnauer, Maurice. 1965. The life and reign of the emperor Lucius Septimius Severus. Rome: L’Erma di Bretschneider.
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  87. After two chapters on literary and then epigraphic and numismatic evidence, this biography has concentrated on civil wars after Commodus’s assassination (against Julianus, Niger, and Albinus), then the military and provincial aspects of Septimius Severus’s reign (e.g., in the East and in Brittany). Originally published by Oxford in 1918.
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  89. Crisis
  90.  
  91. To interpret a new era, ancient authors were used to theories based on a circular vision of time, from the Golden Age to the Iron Age. They usually understood a civil war as a sign of the breaking down of the Pax deorum (a contract made between men and gods). So to speak, the Severan period was the beginning of a new era, rich in transformations and conflicts, and our contemporary literary scholarship tried to analyze the signs of decay as well as rebirth, as much as modern historians tried to reevaluate some reigns. From the years 193–197 (Rubin 1980) to the Severan period (Schettino 2008) and the entire 3rd century (Alföldy 1974), different approaches to research have reconsidered certain sources to scrutinize the true meaning of imperial discourses.
  92.  
  93. Alföldy, Géza. 1974. The crisis of the third century as seen by contemporaries. Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 15:89–111.
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  95. Giving a broader perspective on the 3rd century AD, this essay allows us to reconsider the Severan authors such as Cassius Dio and Herodian in the debate about the beginning of the so-called crisis after the death of Marcus Aurelius, which has produced numerous social, military, and political transformations. Also published as Die Krise des Römischen Reiches. Geschichte, Geschichtsschreibung und Geschichtsbetrachtung. Ausgewählte Beiträge (Stuttgart: F. Steiner, 1989), pp. 319–342.
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  97. Rubin, Zick. 1980. Civil-war propaganda and historiography. Brussels: Latomus-Revue d’Études latines.
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  99. Even if it remains difficult to prove the different hypotheses developed by Rubin, this essay presents some fresh perspectives on the Severan civil war in 193–197, through the testimonies of Cassius Dio, Herodian and the Historia Augusta.
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  101. Schettino, Maria Teresa. 2008. Conscience de la crise, utopie et perspectives réformatrices à l’époque des Sévères. Latomus 67.4: 985–999.
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  103. Many assume that a major part of the discourse on crisis and decay of the empire during the 3rd century AD is the product of a peculiar reading of senatorial historiography of the late Principate and empire (from Cassius Dio to the Historia Augusta and the epitomators). This is the result of modern historians confronted with a complex situation: Schettino, however, suggests a few answers, for example, to the Constitutio Antoniniana.
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  105. Sources
  106.  
  107. The main difficulty concerning the study of the Severi has been the nature of the sources at our disposal. Until the last half-century, the research was grounded on narratives provided by literary sources, usually biased ones, especially Cassius Dio and the Historia Augusta. With the recent systematic inquiries based on epigraphic, papyrological, and numismatic evidence, we are able to renew our perspective on the history of the Severan period and of the 3rd century AD. Our understanding of the most important evolutions about the army, the careers of senators and equites, the perception of the imperial power, and the wars between Romans and Barbarians, has completely changed. A comparative study of the entire body of scholarly evidence is now available with a new comprehension of the period, which is more a transition between the Antonines and the so-called crisis than a decline.
  108.  
  109. Epigraphy
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  111. To study the imperial power of the Roman society from top to bottom (i.e., from senators to freedmen), the epigraphic evidence is above all one of the most reliable testimonies. The Severan period was surely the acme of the epigraphic habit (MacMullen 1982), linked to the development of the Roman citizenship. On the functioning of the government in Rome and in the provinces, it is essential to our understanding to study the characteristics of practices under the Severi (Christol 1999). Epigraphy is also effectively used to consider what was concretely a Severan emperor, for which the acts of the Arval Brethren are an important source for identifying urban ceremonies or members of the elite (Scheid 1998).
  112.  
  113. Christol, Michel. 1999. L’épigraphie latine impériale des Sévères au début du ive siècle ap. J.-C. In XI Congresso Internazionale di Epigrafia Greca e Latina: Rome, 18–24 settembre 1997: atti, 333–357. Rome: Quasar.
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  115. This is a general report about the epigraphic practices, from the Severi to Constantine, delivered during the 11th International Congress of Epigraphy in Rome. It presents important remarks about imperial titulatures and careers of members of the two ordines (Senatorius et Equester), especially from Septimius Severus to Severus Alexander.
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  117. MacMullen, Ramsay. 1982. The epigraphic habit in the Roman Empire. American Journal of Philology 103.3: 233–246.
  118. DOI: 10.2307/294470Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  119. Using the results of the accounts made by S. Mrożek (“À propos de la répartition chronologique des inscriptions latines dans le Haut-Empire,” Epigraphica 35 [1973]: 113–118), this classic essay offers a general overview about epigraphic practices under the Antonines and then especially under Septimius Severus.
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  121. Scheid, John. 1998. Commentarii Fratrum Arvalium qui supersunt. Recherches archéologiques à la Magliana. Les copies épigraphiques des protocoles annuels de la confrérie arvale (21 av.–304 ap. J.-C.). Rome: École française de Rome and Soprintendenza archeologica di Roma.
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  123. This is the new edition, with a presentation, the Latin text, and a French translation of the Arval Brethren’s acts. We can mention the texts nos. 97–109, from 193 to Severus Alexander’s reign. They provide important elements about the official rituals of an “imperial” religious college and the different connections with the emperor and his family.
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  125. Papyrology
  126.  
  127. The papyri from Egypt or Dura Europos give important information for reconsidering the chronology of events (e.g., Martin 1982), the true nature of imperial power as perceived in Egypt (De Jong 2006), and the concrete conception of an imperial time (with festivals and empire-wide ceremonies celebrated the prince and his family), introduced during Augustus’s reign in the traditional Roman calendar (Fink, et al. 1940).
  128.  
  129. De Jong, Janneke. 2006. Emperors in Egypt: The representation and perception of Roman imperial power in Greek papyrus texts from Egypt, AD 193–284. Nijmegen, The Netherlands: Drukkerij Quickprint.
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  131. Provides a comprehensive analysis of the Greek papyri from Egypt, especially during the Severan period. The appendices give important references for the imperial visits of Caracalla or the imperial epithets from the Severi to Aurelian and finally about the process of condemnation of memory (see Memoria and Practices of Condemnation).
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  133. Fink, Robert O., Allan S. Hoey, and Walter F. Snyder, eds. 1940. The Feriale Duranum, Yale Classical Studies 7.
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  135. From the 3rd century AD, this is the only example of a Roman calendar, used by the Palmyrenian archers of Dura Europos’s camp: it provides information on traditional military festivals in March and imperial ceremonies about accession or anniversaries, from Augustus to Severus Alexander (dies imperii; dies natalis), including women of the imperial family and the memoria of Germanicus. English translation by Helgeland, John. ANRW 2.16 (1978): 1470–1505; French translation is Benoist, Stéphane. ThesCRA 7: Festivals and contests. Vol. 3. (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2011), pp. 226–229.
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  137. Martin, Alain. 1982. Les événements des années 193–194 dans les papyrus, les ostraca et les inscriptions d’Égypte. Anagennesis 2:83–98.
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  139. This paper tries to reconstruct the main events of the first part of the civil war, from Commodus’s death to Pescennius Niger’s defeat. It delivers a fine comparative analysis of papyrological and epigraphic evidence (see Narratives).
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  141. Literature
  142.  
  143. We have two contemporary sources at our disposal for study of the Severan period: a Bithynian senator, Cassius Dio, and Herodian, an imperial freedman from Anatolia. Their perspectives are certainly different, but the understatement of Herodian has been abandoned, and we can use this author to fill the gaps of Dio’s Roman History, which is partly preserved by its Byzantine epitomators. The Historia Augusta provides information that needs to be evaluated and separated from its ideological bias. The contemporary inquiries about those literary sources have rendered many new insights about the conception of the so-called imperial discourse that those historians have shared.
  144.  
  145. Cassius Dio
  146.  
  147. This true Severan historian has been studied in the last decades to give a better understanding of the period from Commodus’s death to Dio’s own exile, terminus ante quem for his Roman History (e.g., for Septimius Severus’s time, Moscovich 2004). Dio’s Roman history should be analyzed in order to find in his account clues about his own time: for example to understand in his narrative of the crisis of 68–69 some episodes belonging to the civil war of 193–197, or in the Augustan debate between Maecenas and Agrippa a real definition of the Severan imperial state (Espinoza Ruiz 1982 and Roddaz 1983). Two aspects have been developed in that research field: the conception of emperor and empire in his Roman History (De Blois 1998–1999) and his “Greek” culture (Millar 2005). See the separate Oxford Bibliographies article Cassius Dio by David Wardle.
  148.  
  149. De Blois, Lukas. 1998. The world a city: Cassius Dio’s view of the Roman Empire. In L’ecumenismo politico nella coscienza dell’occidente. Edited by Luciana Aigner Foresti, 359–370. Rome: L’Erma di Bretschneider.
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  151. This systematic analysis of Dio’s conception of the Roman Empire through words and images, some of them based on an approach to the world inspired by stoicism, participates in our increasing comprehension of an “imperial discourse” from Augustus to Constantine.
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  153. De Blois, Lukas. 1998–1999. The perception of emperor and empire in Cassius Dio’s “Roman history.” Ancient society 29:267–281.
  154. DOI: 10.2143/AS.29.0.630060Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  155. How do we consider the “Augustan history” presented by Cassius Dio in his fifty-second and fifty-third books, especially in the famous Maecenas discourse? The ideological expression given in those books about the empire and his leader is above all Severan, but on no account is this a flawless depiction of the realities of Dio’s own period.
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  157. Espinoza Ruiz, Urbano. 1982. Debate Agrippa-Mecenas en Dion Cassio: Repuesta senatorial a la crisis del Imperio Romano en época severiana. Madrid: Univ. of Complutense.
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  159. This is a published doctoral thesis that has offered a systematic analysis of the dialogue written by Dio between two of Augustus’s friends and assistants. It is presented as an ideological construction whose meaning is essentially Severan and could be understood as the traditional senatorial point of view in front of the new imperial power.
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  161. Millar, Fergus. 1964. A study of Cassius Dio. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
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  163. The first general study on the Severan Bithynian historian, based on an Oxonian thesis supervised by Sir Ronald Syme. It included two chapters dealing with the composition of the Roman History and the proper events of Cassius Dio’s own time, especially the general context of the Severan emperors. Special edition published by Sandpiper Books, 1999.
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  165. Millar, Fergus. 2005. Rome in Greek culture: Cassius Dio and Ulpian. In La cultura storica nei primi due secoli dell’Impero romano. Edited by Troiani Lucio and Giuseppe Zecchini, 17–40. Rome: L’Erma di Bretschneider.
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  167. Forty years after his dissertation (see Millar 1964), Millar proposes a new assessment of the importance of Cassius Dio’s history and tries to concentrate on the conception of a Greek culture within the bilingual Roman Empire. He begins with a fresh perspective on the dating of the Roman History (first the preparation, and then the redaction).
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  169. Moscovich, M. James. 2004. Cassius Dio’s palace sources for the reign of Septimius Severus. Historia 53.3: 356–368.
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  171. It deals with the evidence of Cassius Dio from his connections with close members of Septimius Severus’s court, such as the sophist Philostratus and Aelius Antipater, Caracalla’s and Geta’s preceptor. Different passages are analyzed from the Severan books of the Roman History (74–76) in order to present a clear picture of Dio’s own time.
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  173. Roddaz, Jean-Michel. 1983. De César à Auguste. L’image de la monarchie chez un historien du siècle des Sévères. Réflexions sur l’œuvre de Dion Cassius, à propos d’ouvrages récents. Revue des Études Anciennes 85:67–87.
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  175. This review article (about Espinoza Ruiz 1982) by a specialist in the Roman republic and the Augustan Principate was an opportunity to deliver an overview about the magnum opus by the Bithynian historian, Cassius Dio. Usually, the Augustan narrative is considered to be a truly Severan account of the Principate.
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  177. Herodian
  178.  
  179. After the introduction in Whittaker 1969–1971, the interest in Herodian’s testimony was renewed, and the biographical information contained in his work gave insight into the nature of his “person” (Alföldy 1971). As a matter of fact, it is possible to analyze his History of the Empire from the same perspective as Dio and to reconsider his interpretation of the Roman Empire of his own time (De Blois 2003).
  180.  
  181. Alföldy, Géza. 1971. Herodian’s person. Ancient Society 2:209–233.
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  183. After the perspectives offered by Whittaker 1969–1971, Alföldy proposed to clarify the identity of the author of History of the Roman Emperors from the Death of Marcus Aurelius and produced a chronology of his life and some hypotheses about his social position and political function within the Roman state. Much of what we know about Herodian can be traced to certain biographical elements disseminated in his work.
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  185. De Blois, Lukas. 2003. The perception of Roman imperial authority in Herodian’s work. In The Representation and perception of Roman imperial power. Edited by Lukas De Blois, Paul Erdkamp, Olivier Hekster, Gerda de Kleijn, and S. Mols, 148–156. Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben.
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  187. This is a systematic overview of what could be called an “ideological message” conveyed by Herodian’s work. De Blois looks at the “imperial discourse” that had been developed by the different emperors and their court, from the Last Antonine princes (Marcus Aurelius and Commodus) to Gordian and Philip the Arab.
  188. Find this resource:
  189. Whittaker, Charles Richard. 1969–1971. History of the Empire. Loeb Classical Library. Vol. 1. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.
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  191. The general introduction of the first volume provides an excellent overview about the life of the author and his History of the Empire. Herodian witnessed festivals organized by Commodus, a man seventy years of age when he was writing his work after the death of Gordian, and having already belonged to an imperial office.
  192. Find this resource:
  193. Historia Augusta
  194.  
  195. The Severan biographies from the late 4th century AD collection of vitae could be compared to the testimony of Cassius Dio and Herodian and analyzed in the perspective of a possible contemporary third author, Marius Maximus or an Ignotus (Syme 1971). Chastagnol 1994 provides a complete survey about the Historia Augusta: from the famous article by Dessau in 1889, who assumed this unique author writing at the end of the 4th century, to the regular series of colloquia held in Bonn during the 1960s to the 1980s. The majority of biographies have been known for their accuracy, such as Severus Alexander’s, which is the longest and a rhetorical model for the portrait of the greatest emperor (Bertrand-Dagenbach 1990). See the separate Oxford Bibliographies article Historia Augusta by François Paschoud.
  196.  
  197. Bertrand-Dagenbach, Cécile. 1990. Alexandre Sévère et l’Histoire Auguste. Brussels: Latomus.
  198. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  199. The longest biography devoted to an exemplary emperor, the polar opposite of the worst tyrant, Elagabalus, is analyzed thanks to the modern theory of narratology. This research program has tried to concentrate on the 4th century AD contextualization of some events of the last Severan reign (e.g., the accession) and on the impact of Cassius Dio’s own testimony.
  200. Find this resource:
  201. Chastagnol, André. 1994. Édition, traduction et commentaire de Histoire Auguste, Les empereurs romains des iie et iiie siècles. Paris: Robert Laffont.
  202. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  203. This is the most comprehensive and accessible introduction to the collection of imperial biographies written at the end of the 4th century AD. The general overview of the so-called Historia Augusta, the introduction of each Severan vita, and the commentaries given in the footnotes of the Latin text and the French translation remain useful.
  204. Find this resource:
  205. Syme, Ronald. 1971. Emperors and biography: Studies in the Historia Augusta. Oxford: Clarendon.
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  207. Eighteen papers, some of them already published in the series Bonner Historia-Augusta-Colloquia, have been collected in this study of the anonymous work Historia Augusta, from Cassius Dio and Herodian to Marius Maximus and an Ignotus, through scrupulous analyses of various historical narratives.
  208. Find this resource:
  209. Emperors and Empire
  210.  
  211. After the Antonine century, which was an important era for the apprehension of the imperial power in Rome and in the empire, the turning point of the civil war of 193–197 has to be understood as a general and long process from an “imperial republic” to a “monarchical state.” It was usually said that with the Severi began a real monarchy, which was sometimes qualified as “absolute.” In fact, this assessment of the Severi was not quite true, and we should consider the Augustan tradition that the fictitious son of Marcus Aurelius tried to reaffirm (e.g., in his being a Roman emperor to create a dynasty and to celebrate a “Severan” Roman time). Also important to mention are the Severan titulature with its inflexions (i.e., “Our Lord,” dominus noster), the ceremonies (adventus “solemn Entry,” and funus “funerals”), the imperial cult (with new associated divinities), and the commemoration of eternity: for example, in 198, the association of Caracalla as Augustus with his father, was decided to celebrate the Parthian victory, and to commemorate the centenary of Trajan’s accession, on the 950s of Rome; as well as in 204 the Secular Games (see the coins’ legends with laetitia temporum “the joy of times,” felicitas saeculi “the felicity of the century,” and the “Eternity of the Empire,” aeternitas Imperii). The different aspects of a true “imperial discourse” participate as an appropriation of the function by Septimius Severus and his will to broadcast a precise message within the Antonine framework of a two-faced portrait: the good emperor and the tyrant, the future God (a divus after the consecration ceremony), and the condemned prince by the abolitio memoriae (a process of systematic condemnation of memory by erasure of inscriptions and destruction of images).
  212.  
  213. Imperial Identity
  214.  
  215. To define a Roman emperor, according to the practices of the Severi, it is necessary to consider the entire body of scholarly work (Millar 1992). The different titulatures, with names, titles, and powers, deliver a precise message of what was an “Imperator Caesar Augustus”: from an accurate analysis of the nomenclature (Chastagnol 1988) to the study of information about victories and commemorations (Loriot 1981), we understand how each emperor tried to define his own identity (Mastino 1981, about Caracalla and Geta), as well as the princesses who had gained a real “person,” i.e. a recognized place in the Imperial state as the emperor’s counterpart (Kuhoff 1993). This evolution participates in a wider message through images (Kosmetatou 2002, about Julia Domna), and a general politics of what we call “communication” (Veyne 2005).
  216.  
  217. Chastagnol, André. 1988. Le formulaire de l’épigraphie latine officielle dans l’antiquité tardive. In La terza età dell’epigrafia. Edited by Angela Donati, 11–65. Faenza, Italy: Lega.
  218. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  219. In this systematic inquiry about imperial epigraphic titulatures (the first part of the paper), we can find an exhaustive inventory of the different practices and the major evolutions, from the Principate to late Antiquity. The Severan approach of the official and nonofficial titulature was an excellent transition in a much more general process. Also published in Le pouvoir impérial à Rome: Figures et commémorations. Scripta varia IV. Edited by Stéphane Benoist and Ségolène Demougin, pp. 133–187 (Geneva, Switzerland: Droz, 2008).
  220. Find this resource:
  221. Kosmetatou, Elizabeth. 2002. The public image of Julia Mamaea: An epigraphic and numismatic inquiry. Latomus 61.2: 398–414.
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  223. Beyond the expression of “Syrian princesses,” we can find some links—even if it was with a certain evolution—between Julia Domna and Julia Mamaea, whose son Severus Alexander was presented as less of an imperator than a civilis princeps, because her mother was supposed to have a different attitude toward soldiers.
  224. Find this resource:
  225. Kuhoff, Wolfgang. 1993. Iulia Aug. mater Aug. n. et castrorum et senatus et patriae. Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 97:259–271.
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  227. From the inscription on the Gate of the Argentarii in the Forum Boarium (lines 4–5), in which Geta has been erased after his death in late 211 and Plautian and his daughter have been suppressed, we can find a possibly valid new perspective on Iulia Domna. From this we are able to redefine the princess’s attitude toward the army, the senate, and the people.
  228. Find this resource:
  229. Loriot, Xavier. 1981. Les acclamations impériales dans la titulature de Sévère Alexandre et de Gordien III. Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 43:225–235.
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  231. This is a comprehensive study on the imperial titulatures and their evolution at the end of the Severan period. It explains how the epigraphic references to imperial acclamations should be interpreted in this precise context of a deeper threat from the Barbarian armies and with regard to the conception of the imperial power.
  232. Find this resource:
  233. Mastino, Attilio. 1981. La titolature di Caracalla e Geta attraverso le iscrizioni (Indici). Bologna, Italy: CLUEB.
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  235. An important part of the imperial discourse is largely broadcasted by emperors’ titulatures (see Chastagnol 1988), usually inscribed on monuments or in normative texts produced by the chancellery. A systematic inventory is the best way to analyze the peculiarities of a reign.
  236. Find this resource:
  237. Millar, Fergus. 1992. The emperor in the Roman world (31 BC–AD 337). London: Duckworth.
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  239. Thanks to a sophisticated body of references and sources (epigraphic, papyrological, and literary authorities), this extensive survey shows how the Roman Empire functioned. The imperial figure is analyzed through different activities, as well as through the communications between emperors and subjects (mostly from the latter’s perspective). Originally published in 1977, this edition contains a useful afterword (pp. 636–652).
  240. Find this resource:
  241. Veyne, Paul. 2005. Qu’était-ce qu’un empereur romain? In L’empire gréco-romain. Paris: Éditions du Seuil.
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  243. A provocative and useful essay for approaching the conception of the Roman imperial power from the Augustan setting to the late practices of the 4th and 5th centuries AD. Ancient evidence and modern sociological theories, as well as comparative experiences of power until the 20th century, are included.
  244. Find this resource:
  245. Representation and Dynastic Message
  246.  
  247. Reappraisals of the imperial use of a kind of “propaganda,” whose definition is not suited to ancient societies, have tried to concentrate on conceptual approaches grounded in solid research based upon a wide range of sources. The monarchical display (Veyne 2005), or the notion of imperial discourse, has been proposed. The numismatic evidence was systematically studied as being a privileged medium for the emperors and their family (Manders 2012). Septimius Severus and his family had developed a true political program, which is broadcasted through a very elaborate message delivered by various media (coins, inscriptions, and statues) (Brenot 2000, Daguet-Gagey 2004). Some scientific methods have been used to reconsider the physiognomy of portraits (Anzani 1997), and there have been general attempts to contextualize identity, from past heritage and new assessment (see Fejfer 1985 on Julia Domna).
  248.  
  249. Anzani, Alessandro. 1997. Aphorismes sur le développement du portrait monétaire romain impérial: essai de physiognomonie sur les empereurs de la dynastie des Sévères. Chronozones 3:46–59.
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  251. How an “imperial discourse” could be analyzed from a numismatic point of view, with a clear evolution from Septimius Severus to Severus Alexander. Discourse ranges from an Antonine heritage of imperial representations and conceptions to a less individualized portrait.
  252. Find this resource:
  253. Brenot, Claude. 2000. La famille de Septime Sévère à travers les images monétaires. Cahiers du Centre Gustave Glotz 11:331–345.
  254. DOI: 10.3406/ccgg.2000.1539Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  255. This study of the Severan numismatic imagery, used to commemorate a family (domus divina), analyzes the links with the messages delivered by Julio-Claudian and Antonine emperors. A man, his wife, and their two children give a positive image of unity and stability at the head of the state.
  256. Find this resource:
  257. Daguet-Gagey, Anne. 2004. Septime Sévère et ses fils, “Restitutores Vrbis”: la personnalisation des mérites impériaux. Revue numismatique 160:175–199.
  258. DOI: 10.3406/numi.2004.2557Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  259. This is a comprehensive study of an imperial discourse created through formulas on coin legends such as “Restitutor Vrbis,” “Rector Orbis,” “Fundator pacis,” “Pacator orbis,” and “Propagator imperii.” It gives a sensible and well-constructed image of the commemoration of emperors urbi et orbi.
  260. Find this resource:
  261. Fejfer, Jane. 1985. The portraits of the Severan empress Julia Domna. A new approach. Analecta Romana Instituti Danici 14:129–138.
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  263. This study of the remaining few portraits of Septimius Severus’s wife is completed by the epigraphic evidence and gives important contextualized information about a concrete imperial discourse in its provincial sense and development.
  264. Find this resource:
  265. Manders, Erika. 2012. Coining images of power: Patterns in the representation of Roman Emperors on imperial coinage, A.D. 193–284. Leiden, The Netherlands, and Boston: Brill.
  266. DOI: 10.1163/9789004224001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  267. This study is from a wider research program in Nijmegen known as “Image and Reality of Roman Imperial Power,” which is about the 3rd century AD practice of an “imperial discourse” through numismatic messages. A dedicated chapter (pp. 225–252) analyzes the images of Caracalla, especially the divine association versus the military representation.
  268. Find this resource:
  269. Veyne, Paul. 2005. Buts de l’art, propagande et faste monarchique. In Id. L’empire gréco-romain, 379–418. Paris: Éditions du Seuil.
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  271. This is a stimulating reflection about a notion that was overused during the last century to explain some totalitarian regimes (i.e., propaganda). In the specific context of imperial Rome, Veyne proposes to understand the communication as a monarchic ritualized display and gives us a few examples from Augustus to the 4th century AD.
  272. Find this resource:
  273. Festivals, Ceremonies, and the Imperial Cult
  274.  
  275. A systematic use of urban space and Roman time by emperors since the beginnings of the Principate with Augustus can be interpreted as a main approach of the “imperial discourse” developed to create a specific link between princes and the people of Rome and the imperial cities (Benoist 2005). The so-called imperial cult (Gradel 2002, Benoist 2006) was a process of carefully manipulated loyalty toward the Imperial power for men, women, and children of any condition (from slaves to members of the elite, Roman and peregrines). Urban ceremonies play an essential part in the message developed and broadcasted by the different emperors: for example, jubilees (Chastagnol 2008) or secular games since Augustus (Gagé 1934).
  276.  
  277. Benoist, Stéphane. 2005. Rome, le prince et la Cité: Pouvoir impérial et cérémonies publiques (ier siècle av.–début du ive siècle ap. J.-C.). Paris: Presses Universitaires de France.
  278. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  279. This essay aims to analyze the relationships between the city and her prince through the different ceremonies organized regularly. The triumph and the funerals of emperors, as well as the celebration of eternity, are studied as a process of commemoration and legitimization of a family in charge of an empire.
  280. Find this resource:
  281. Benoist, Stéphane. 2006. Images des dieux, images des hommes. Réflexions sur le “culte impérial” au iiie siècle. In La crise de l’empire romain de Marc Aurèle à Constantin. Edited by Quet, Marie-Henriette, 27–64. Paris: Presses de l’Université de Paris-Sorbonne.
  282. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  283. The evolution of the imperial discourse and of some ritual ceremonies during the 3rd century AD can be analyzed through a variety of historical evidence, from the Severan period to Constantine’s (epigraphic, literary, and archaeological), partly to understand how the Augustan and Antonine traditions were reconsidered.
  284. Find this resource:
  285. Chastagnol, André. 2008. Le pouvoir impérial à Rome: Figures et commémorations. Scripta varia IV. Edited by Stéphane Benoist and Ségolène Demougin, 243–316. Geneva, Switzerland: Droz.
  286. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  287. This volume features four fundamental studies on jubilee festivals (decennalia, vicennalia) that combine numismatic, epigraphic, and archaeological sources to present the urban conception of an imperial commemoration of the prince’s power (imperium) by urban ceremonies and dedicated monuments.
  288. Find this resource:
  289. Gagé, Jean. 1934. Les jeux séculaires de 204 ap. J.-C. et la dynastie des Sévères. Paris: de Boccard.
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  291. This is about the specific use of ceremonies to legitimate a new power. The value of this book (comprising two papers published in 1932 and 1933, after the discovery of new fragments of the acts of the secular games) is not just for its historiographical perspective but also because it features an important methodological survey of a conception of a dynastic appropriation of urban time and space.
  292. Find this resource:
  293. Gradel, Ittai. 2002. Emperor worship and Roman religion. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
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  295. This published Oxonian doctoral dissertation can provide an overview of the evolution of the so-called imperial cult during the 3rd century AD, and especially during the Severi, through three chapters: chapter 7 is about the imperial genius, chapter 10 is on the emperor’s numen, and chapter 12 is on the problem of death and emperors’ deification.
  296. Find this resource:
  297. Memoria and Practices of Condemnation
  298.  
  299. The research on the process of condemnation of emperors and members of the elites of the empire, the so-called damnatio memoriae (Vittinghoff 1936) (that should be renamed correctly abolitio memoriae) have been renewed and particularly after the discovery of the senatus-consultum de Cn. Pisone in the 1990s. The Severan period offers numerous examples of erased inscriptions and images of some glorious victims of those condemnations (e.g., Plautian in 205 and Geta in 211–212). The epigraphic evidence is well known and studied, especially for Geta (Mastino 1978–1979), along with the imperial titulatures that brought new assessments about the conception of imperial power (Benoist 2004). Some Roman monuments may be studied more systematically to find a comprehensive approach to the nature of an imperial communication (Flower 2008 and Daguet-Gagey 2005). The literary sources (Bats 2003) can supplement our understanding of administrative and political processes of decision and diffusion, from Rome to the provinces.
  300.  
  301. Bats, Maria. 2003. Mort violente et “damnatio memoriae” sous les Sévères dans les sources littéraires. Cahiers du Centre Gustave Glotz 14:281–298.
  302. DOI: 10.3406/ccgg.2003.1593Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  303. This is an inventory of the literary sources on the process of abolitio memoriae under the Severan emperors. The proceeding is usually presented by the authors from the current perspective of the emperor’s death as a perfect tyrant, and then of its different consequences (physical with the maltreatment of the cadaver, or political and symbolic: i.e., the destruction of portraits).
  304. Find this resource:
  305. Benoist, Stéphane. 2004. Titulatures impériales et damnatio memoriae: l’enseignement des inscriptions martelées. Cahiers du Centre Gustave Glotz 15:175–189.
  306. DOI: 10.3406/ccgg.2004.864Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  307. From the testimony of imperial titulatures, there are a few remarks here about the abolitio memoriae, especially with forty-eight documents concerning Geta. The imperial power and the functioning of the Roman government are questioned.
  308. Find this resource:
  309. Daguet-Gagey, Anne. 2005. L’arc des argentiers à Rome: à propos de la dédicace du monument (CIL VI, 1035 = 31232 = ILS 426). Revue historique 635:499–519.
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  311. From a careful analysis of the erasures of the inscription (Geta, Plautian, and Plautilla), a proposition is made about the title of the praetorian prefect. It is necessary to renounce to the comitia (comes) on behalf of an expression of the privileged links between Plautian and the domus Augusta.
  312. Find this resource:
  313. Flower, Harriet. 2008. Les Sévères et l’usage de la “memoria”: L’“arcus” du Forum Boarium à Rome. In Un discours en images de la condamnation de mémoire. Edited by Stéphane Benoist and Anne Daguet-Gagey, 97–115. Metz, France: CRULH.
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  315. This a comprehensive study of the process of abolitio memoriae during the Severi from a few examples in Rome (in the Forum Romanum and the Forum Boarium) and within the empire. The erasure of names is linked to the different proceedings of official recognition of power.
  316. Find this resource:
  317. Mastino, Attilio. 1978–1979. L’erasione del nome di Geta dalle iscrizioni nei quadro della propaganda politica alla corte di Caracalla. Annali della Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia dell’Università di Cagliari 2:47–81.
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  319. This is the first inventory of the numerous erased inscriptions after the condemnation of Geta’s memory by his brother Caracalla. It is the most systematic use of a practice, which went back to the beginnings of the Principate, with Mark Antony’s case. It counterbalances the ideological discourse of Concordia and Temperantia, which was developed by Septimius Severus’s son.
  320. Find this resource:
  321. Vittinghoff, Friedrich. 1936. Der Staatsfeind in der römischen Kaiserzeit. Untersuchungen zur “damnatio memoriae.” Berlin: Junker and Dünnhaupt.
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  323. This published Bonn dissertation has provided the first comprehensive analysis of what we know about the process of condemnation of memory, especially those literary sources dealing with imperial “bad” emperors and victims of plots: Caligula, Nero, Domitian, and, from a Severan perspective, Geta’s exemplary case.
  324. Find this resource:
  325. Imperial Government and Administration
  326.  
  327. From the Antonines to the Tetrarchy, the evolution of the Roman Empire was partly influenced by the military situation and the economic consequences of wars engaged against Barbarians, on the Rhine and the Danube, and in the East with the Parthians and then the Sassanians. The equilibrium between senators and equites in attendance upon the emperors and within the general administration (Lo Cascio 2005) was gradually questioned, and before the great reform realized by Gallienus, the Severan emperors were the first to reconsider the organization of the Roman government. We can notice the increasing power of the equites, especially the praetorian prefects, the successive adjustments of a more mobile Roman Army using detachments, and the systematic resort to jurists that participate in the normative power of the emperors within the imperial council, because of the princes’s constant implication in proceedings of justice as a regular court of appeal, and their politics on behalf of a universal Roman citizenship by a general grant.
  328.  
  329. Lo Cascio, Elio. 2005. The emperor and his administration. The age of the Severans. In Cambridge Ancient History XII2. The Crisis of Empire (A.D. 193–337). Edited by Alan K. Bowman, Peter Garnsey, and Averil Cameron, 137–155. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
  330. DOI: 10.1017/CHOL9780521301992Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  331. This is a synthetic presentation of what was at that time the Roman emperor and his government, from the designation of the new emperor to the organization of his army, his chancellery, and the concrete aspects of his finances (see Lo Cascio 1971–1972, cited under Social and Economic Perspectives), as well as the relationships between emperor and plebs urbana.
  332. Find this resource:
  333. Ordines and Prosopography
  334.  
  335. To understand the function of the Roman government of the empire during the Severan period, we must look at the facts provided by epigraphic and papyrological evidence. The Severan historians have introduced some biases that fogged our understanding of the politics followed by the Severi. But thanks to the systematic prosopographical approach (see Groag, et al. 1933–) developed on senators and equites in attendance of the emperors, it has been possible to gain new insight into this essential period of the Roman Empire.
  336.  
  337. Groag, Edmund, Arthur Stein, Leiva Petersen, et al. eds. 1933–. PIR2: Prosopographia Imperii Romani. 2d ed. Berlin and Leipzig: de Gruyter.
  338. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  339. The second and last edition of this systematic prosopographical collection of research on the members of the ordines of the Roman Empire, from its Augustan origins to the crisis of the 3rd century AD (with Gallienus in 260), is forthcoming under the supervision of Werner Eck (letter S in 2006, T in 2009).
  340. Find this resource:
  341. Senators and Senate
  342.  
  343. The first order of the empire and the senatorial assembly have been essential for the imperial regime because they had assumed the principal functions of the Roman state and participated in the process of legitimation of each new emperor since Augustus (Talbert 1984). The instable compromise is regularly questioned during civil wars and during the difficult accession of new princes (Alföldy 1968 and Sillar 2001). Septimius Severus was said to have had bad relationships with senators and to have engaged in a radical purging of the assembly (Fitz 1969 and Jacques 1992). The prosopographical inquiries try to reevaluate the historiographical vulgate and to trace a new perspective on the connections between emperors and senators through the accurate study of careers (Camodeca 1985 and Leunissen 1989 on consulares).
  344.  
  345. Alföldy, Géza. 1968. Septimius Severus und der senat. Bonner Jahrbücher des Rheinischen Landesmuseums in Bonn und des Rheinischen Amtes für Bodendenkmalpflege im Landschaftsverband Rheinland und des Vereins von Altertumsfreunden im Rheinlande 168:112–160.
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  347. This is a prosopographical essay that tends to confront a senatorial historiography, generally against Septimius Severus, and the data given by the epigraphic evidence. Alföldy has established a list of executed senators (see Jacques 1992), ordinary consuls, governors of imperial provinces, and candidati Augusti.
  348. Find this resource:
  349. Camodeca, Giuseppe. 1985. Due nuove iscrizioni-cursus di C. Octavius Suetrius Sabinus, cos. ord. 214, II 240. CIL VI 1551+1477 e CIL IX 2848. Atti della Accademia di Scienze Morali e Politiche della Società Nazionale di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti di Napoli 96:115–129.
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  351. This is an epigraphic study devoted to the understanding of the senatorial cursus honorum under the Severi: this article is ideal in the way it exemplifies the precise work of an epigraphist. Shows that the Severan political society can be analyzed through a few individual cases in order to reconstruct the entire imperial administration.
  352. Find this resource:
  353. Fitz, Jeno. 1969. Die personalpolitik des Septimius Severus im bürgerkrieg von 193–197. Alba Regia 10:69–86.
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  355. This is a prosopographical analysis of the so-called Severan Party during the civil war, from the acclamation given by the Pannonian legions to Clodius Albinus’s defeat in Lyons. It is a fine point of departure for any comprehensive approach to studying a social circle at the beginning of a new regime (see Birley 1999, cited under Biographies, pp. 81–128).
  356. Find this resource:
  357. Jacques, François. 1992. Les nobiles exécutés par Septime Sévère selon l’Histoire Auguste: liste de proscription ou énumération fantaisiste? Latomus 51:119–144.
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  359. This is a scrupulous inquiry into the so-called senatorial purging by Septimius Severus during the civil war, especially after the defeat of Clodius Albinus near Lyons in 197. The thirty-eight senators mentioned by Cassius Dio are exceeded by the forty-one cited by the Historia Augusta. A prosopographical list separates the fictitious from the real victims.
  360. Find this resource:
  361. Leunissen, Paul M. M. 1989. Konsuln und konsulare in der zeit von commodus bis Severus Alexander (180–235 n. Chr.): Prosopographische Untersuchungen zur senatorischen Elite im römischen Kaiserreich. Amsterdam: Gieben.
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  363. Despite the scarcity of evidence, Leunissen has been able to construct a synthesis of how the senators attained the consulate during half a century, of what was the part of the homines novi within them, and has provided different prosopographical lists (e.g. consular fasti and provincial fasti).
  364. Find this resource:
  365. Sillar, Shamus. 2001. Caracalla and the senate: The aftermath of Geta’s assassination. Athenaeum 89.2: 407–423.
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  367. Even if the senatorial historiography (Cassius Dio and the Historia Augusta) is generally negative when it comes to Caracalla, and especially so concerning the elimination of his brother, a prosopographical analysis of the senate in 212–217 shows that the victims of the emperor were limited.
  368. Find this resource:
  369. Talbert, Richard J. A. 1984. The senate of imperial Rome. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press.
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  371. Thanks to its general index with entries for each Severan emperors, this general overview of the Roman Senate during the first three centuries of the Principate gives numerous details on the attendance of emperors (e.g., Severus Alexander), relationships between emperors and senators as well as the institution, and the senatorial legislation.
  372. Find this resource:
  373. Equites and Government of Empire
  374.  
  375. The rising participation of the equites in the government of the Roman Empire (Brunt 1983), as a process engaged in during the last Antonine emperors (Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius, and Commodus), is obvious under the Severi (for a prosopographical survey, Pflaum 1960–1961). The imperial council (Christol 2007) or the different praetorian prefects prove that there was increased power of the members of the second imperial order. But this strategic position could have some diverse consequences: positive consequences with the accession of a prefect to the emperorship with Macrinus, or negative consequences when some prefects are killed: Plautian (Christol 2008) or Ulpian (Modrzejewski and Zawadzki 1967), with a direct impact for the composition and the equilibrium of the college of praetorian prefects.
  376.  
  377. Brunt, Peter Astbury. 1983. Princeps and equites. Journal of Roman Studies 73:42–75.
  378. DOI: 10.2307/300072Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  379. This general survey about the equestrian service is useful for the Severan period. Includes helpful remarks about the prefecture of Egypt and the evolution of the relationships between emperors and equites at this turning point of the organization of the imperial administration.
  380. Find this resource:
  381. Christol, Michel. 2007. Le conseil impérial, rouage de la monarchie administrative sous les Antonins et les Sévères. In Herrschen und verwalten: Der alltag der römischen administration in der hohen kaiserzeit. Edited by Rudolf Haensch and Johannes Heinrichs, 31–59. Cologne: Böhlau.
  382. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  383. This work tells of how the normative power of the Severan emperors had been reinforced and how this evolution had consequences for the general administration of the empire, especially from the top with the reorganization of the imperial council. The Antonine emperors participated in this process.
  384. Find this resource:
  385. Christol, Michel. 2008. Les “Excerpta Vaticana” de Dion Cassius, l’“Histoire Auguste” et la collégialité de la préfecture du prétoire après Plautien. Revue Philologique 82.1: 25–45.
  386. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  387. This prosopographical inquiry about the praetorian prefects deals with the period after the assassination of Plautian, from 205 to 217. It gives a new list of prefects from 205 to 212 until the nomination of a new college, with M. Oclatinius Aduentus and M. Opellius Macrinus, the future emperor, after Geta’s death.
  388. Find this resource:
  389. Modrzejewski, Joseph, and Tadeusz Zawadzki. 1967. La date de la mort d’Ulpien et la préfecture du prétoire au début du règne d’Alexandre Sévère. Revue historique de droit français et étranger 45:565–611.
  390. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  391. According to papyrological evidence (P.Oxy 2565), it seems possible that Ulpianus’s death occurred in the summer of 223. It is also possible to reconstruct the fasti of the prefecture of the praetorians and of Egypt during the first years of Severus Alexander’s reign.
  392. Find this resource:
  393. Pflaum, Hans Georg. 1960–1961. Les carrières procuratoriennes équestres sous le haut-Empire romain. 3 vols. Paris: P. Geuthner.
  394. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  395. This is an essential study about equestrian careers during the first three centuries of the Roman Empire. The addenda in the third volume should be consulted as well as the different notices.
  396. Find this resource:
  397. Severan Jurists, Normative Power, and Making of Law
  398.  
  399. The Roman government during the Principate was essentially based on the emperor’s powers. Since Augustus and the Julio-Claudian princes, a process of progressive definition of the emperor’s normative power has been developed. From that perspective, the reigns of the Severi signal a turning point in the late Antiquity approach of lawmaking and in the juridical process that was controlled by Roman power and jurists. Historians of Roman law, such as Honoré 1994 and Coriat 1997, have been pioneers in the study of the function of Roman legislation, which was also analyzed by Roman historians to understand the true nature of the Roman Empire (Millar 2004), as well as the true personalization by each prince of the process of lawmaking, that can be analyzed through the style of imperial constitutions (Williams 1979 and Lewis 1995). Some Severan jurists have provided the opportunity to engage in precise inquiries about their “person” (Giuffrè 1974, Honoré 2002, Millar 2002).
  400.  
  401. Coriat, Jean-Pierre. 1997. Le prince législateur: La technique législative des Sévères et les méthodes de création du droit impérial à la fin du principat. Rome: École française de Rome.
  402. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  403. This is the complete study of the process of law under the Severan emperors by a historian of Roman law, thanks to an exhaustive inventory of the evidence. The style of imperial constitutions is studied, as well as the composition of the imperial chancellery to understand, through the juridical technique, just how the Severan Roman state functioned.
  404. Find this resource:
  405. Giuffrè, Vincenzo. 1974. Arrio Menandro e la letteratura De re militari. Labeo 20:27–63.
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  407. One of the preceptors of Caracalla, chosen by Septimius Severus, was in charge of the composition of this treaty, which was written for the chancellery as a technical companion. He belonged to the “Severan jurists” and was the opponent of Aemilius Macer.
  408. Find this resource:
  409. Honoré, Tony. 1994. Emperors and lawyers. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.
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  411. Honoré studies the function of the imperial chancellery and the relationships between emperors and lawyers in charge of the normative production. The system of rescripts is accurately analyzed. A palingenesia of Latin private rescripts from 193 to 305 AD is provided. Originally published in 1981.
  412. Find this resource:
  413. Honoré, Tony. 2002. Ulpian: Pioneer of human rights. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.
  414. DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199244249.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  415. Honoré was the first historian of Roman law to accurately study the style of the different imperial constitutions. He was able to propose identifications for juridical texts, and for example, to reveal the substantial part played by Ulpian, a lawyer from Tyre. The stoic dimension of law is carefully established (Roman law as law of a cosmopolis). Originally published in 1982.
  416. Find this resource:
  417. Lewis, Naphtali. 1995. Personal style or imperial style? Latomus 54.3: 634–641.
  418. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  419. In the debate begun by Williams about the individualization of laws during Caracalla’s reign, Lewis dealt with six documents, four papyri and two inscriptions, to reconsider Williams’s point of view by balancing imperial and personal writings.
  420. Find this resource:
  421. Millar, Fergus. 2002. Government and law: Ulpian, a philosopher in politics? In Philosophy and power in the Greco-Roman world. Edited by Gillian Clark and Tessa Rajak, 69–87. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
  422. DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198299905.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  423. Millar has developed in this essay the conception of the Severan government according to one of the major jurists and members of the consilium principis and finally praetorian prefect under Severus Alexander. Ulpian’s stoicism is essential to understand his personal interpretation of the Roman universal empire.
  424. Find this resource:
  425. Millar, Fergus. 2004. A new approach of the Roman jurists. In Rome, the Greek world, and the East: Government, society and culture in the Roman Empire. Vol. 2. Edited by Hannah M. Cotton and Guy M. Rogers, 417–434. Chapel Hill and London: Univ. of North Carolina Press.
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  427. Honoré’s essential contribution to Roman history and to the study of how the empire functioned under Severan has been emphasized by Millar in a review-article about Emperors and Lawyers and Ulpian. Originally published in Journal of Roman Studies 76 (1986): 272–280.
  428. Find this resource:
  429. Williams, W. 1979. Caracalla and the authorship of imperial edicts and epistles. Latomus 38:67–89.
  430. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  431. Beginning in the early 1980s, a stimulating debate between specialists of papyrological and juridical evidence began about the individualization of laws during an emperor’s reign (e.g., Caracalla’s reign). Williams looks critically at personal characteristics in some imperial edicts and epistulae.
  432. Find this resource:
  433. Society, Economy, Culture, and Religion
  434.  
  435. The Roman civilization was definitely an urban one, and the Severi were representative of an Augustan tradition in Rome and the provincial cities. The emperor was the natural protector of those communities as euergetes, builder, and patron whose action was essential, with an economical, social, and cultural impact. For the last time until the reign of Maxentius, emperors would have a decisive role of intervention in Roman urban life: thanks to their patrimony, the Severi developed a true monumental building program, and thus celebrated the specific link between the prince, the city, and all its inhabitants—from the nobilitas to the plebs urbana and the freedmen. A decisive step had been taken toward becoming a universal city, with the grant of the Roman citizenship by Caracalla and the cultural consequences of the sophistic and the art promoted by the Severan emperors. During this half-century, we can consider the collective results of those politics: the promotion of personal and collective statutes; the social, cultural and religious evolution involved; and the conception of a Severan Empire in transition between the Principate and late Antiquity.
  436.  
  437. Emperors and Cities
  438.  
  439. The vitality of the civic communities and everyday life (see Lepelley 1990, cited under Social and Economic Perspectives) could be analyzed through the specific action of the Severi toward cities. We can mention their politics about collective statutes (e.g., during civil war, see Robert 1977; on the municipalization of Egypt, see Bowman and Rathbone 1992) and the relationships they developed, based on a constant link of reciprocity: on the one hand, you had commemoration of the princes by cities (Christol 2003) with festivals, rhetorical discourses, and monuments, and on the other, promotion of colonies (Dupuis 1996 and Millar 1990) but also remission of poll tax (Corbier 1977) and euergetism.
  440.  
  441. Bowman, Alan Keir, and Dominic Rathbone. 1992. Cities and administration of Egypt. Journal of Roman Studies 82:107–127.
  442. DOI: 10.2307/301287Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  443. The concrete transformation of capitals of nomes into cities under the Severans is analyzed through the papyrological and epigraphic evidence as a process of municipalization connected to the general administration of the province.
  444. Find this resource:
  445. Christol, Michel. 2003. Entre la cité et l’empereur: Ulpien, Tyr et les empereurs de la dynastie sévérienne. In “Consuetudinis amor”: Fragments d’histoire romaine (iie–vie siècles) offerts à Jean-Pierre Callu. Edited by François Chausson and Étienne Wolff, 163–188. Rome: L’Erma di Bretschneider.
  446. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  447. Study of two discourses by Ulpian during the reception ceremony of Septimius Severus and Caracalla, in the jurist’s native city Tyre in 201. These are preserved in the De censibus (D.50.15.1), which was probably written in 213. Those texts could be understood as an imperial panegyric as well as a gratiarum actio.
  448. Find this resource:
  449. Corbier, Mireille. 1977. Le discours du prince, d’après une inscription de Banasa. Ktema 2:211–232.
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  451. One of Caracalla’s edicts is found on a tabula of the colony of Banasa (Morocco) about a decision on the remission of the poll tax. This developed into a real imperial discourse, which is supposed to celebrate the virtues of the emperor, especially his indulgentia, and the relationships between Moroccan communities and Roman power. Also published as Donner à voir, donner à lire: Mémoire et communication dans la Rome ancienne, (Paris: CNRS Éditions, 2006), pp. 197–213.
  452. Find this resource:
  453. Dupuis, Xavier. 1996. La concession du ius italicum à Carthage, Utique et Lepcis Magna: Mesures d’ensemble ou décisions ponctuelles? In Splendidissima civitas: Études en hommage à François Jacques. Edited by André Chastagnol, Ségolène Demougin, and Claude Lepelley, 57–65. Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne.
  454. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  455. Thanks to the epigraphic and numismatic evidence, an approximation of the jurist Paul (D.50.15.8.11) can be corrected and a precise dating proposed for the granting of the ius italicum to African colonies: 202 for Lepcis Magna in connection with the imperial African journey, 211 for Carthage and before the end of Caracalla’s reign for Utica.
  456. Find this resource:
  457. Millar, Fergus. 1990. The Roman coloniae of the Near East: A study of cultural relations. In Roman eastern policy and other studies in Roman history. Edited by Heikki Solin and Mika Kajava, 7–58. Helsinki: Societas Scientiarum Fennica.
  458. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  459. In this important survey based on all the available evidence (above all epigraphic and numismatic), a section is dedicated to the reign of Septimius Severus and analyzes the consequences of the war against Pescennius Niger for defeated cities and loyal ones (e.g., Laodicea and Tyre versus Antioch and Berytus). Also published in Cotton, Hannah M. and Guy M. Rogers, eds. The Greek World, the Jews, and the East. Vol. 3. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2006), pp. 164–222.
  460. Find this resource:
  461. Robert, Louis. 1977. La titulature de Nicée et Nicomédie: La gloire et la haine. Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 87:1–39.
  462. DOI: 10.2307/311109Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  463. The honorific titles of Nicomedia and Nicaea from Bithynia, on inscriptions as well as coins, reveal the rivalry between them, both pretending to be the first city of the province after having made different choices during the civil war between Pescennius Niger and Septimius Severus. Nicomedia was punished, and her territory was transferred for a while to Nicaea. Also published in Rousset, Denis, Philippe Gauthier, and Ivana Savalli-Lestrade, eds. Choix d’écrits (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2007), pp. 673–703.
  464. Find this resource:
  465. Social and Economic Perspectives
  466.  
  467. The emperor’s impact on the everyday life of the population of his empire could be difficult to evaluate precisely, but by no means was it inessential. His relationships with the soldiers of his army (Birley 1969, under Septimius Severus); the urban population of Rome (see Bruun 1989 on the grain supply), the elites of the different cities, senators, equites and decuriones (see Salway 2000 for the example of the Canusium album); and the increasing civic population of his empire (Spagnuolo Vigorita 1993) attest to the centrality of the imperial power. The economic consequences of its riches (see Lo Cascio 1971–1972 on the emperor’s patrimony) and the social consequences of its normative power (Marasco 1994) are indisputable. Even a Christian author may recognize the good fortune of African cities during Septimius Severus’s reign (Lepelley 1990).
  468.  
  469. Birley, Eric. 1969. Septimius Severus and the Roman Army. Epigraphische Studien 8:63–82.
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  471. The main post–civil war reforms made by Septimius Severus are presented in this essay: the concept of a field army, the increase in troops stationed in or near Rome, the use of cavalry as a separate fighting force, and the raising of three new legions. Aspects of recruitment and social status are also developed. Also published in The Roman Army Papers 1929–1986 (Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben, 1988), pp. 21–40.
  472. Find this resource:
  473. Bruun, Christer. 1989. The Roman “Minucia” business. Ideological concepts, grain distribution and Severan policy. In Opuscula Instituti Romani Finlandiae 4:107–121.
  474. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  475. From a topographical and administrative perspective, this article provides a precise account of the imperial policy toward the people of Rome about the grain supply and distribution, from the accession of Septimius Severus to the reign of Severus Alexander. The author’s ideas on the first part of the period is much more developed.
  476. Find this resource:
  477. Lepelley, Claude. 1990. Ubique res publica. Tertullien témoin méconnu de l’essor des cités africaines à l’époque sévérienne. In L’Afrique dans l’Occident romain (ier siècle av. J.-C.–ive siècle ap. J.-C.), 403–421. Rome: École française de Rome.
  478. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  479. Tertullian’s treaties could be analyzed in order to provide an interesting testimony on the vitality of urban life under the Severi. This broad survey gives the sources on the magistrates and the councils of African cities and allows us to understand how those flourishing pagan communities were administered. Also published in Aspects de l’Afrique romaine. Les cités, la vie rurale, le christianisme (Bari, Italy: Edipublia, 2001), pp. 23–38.
  480. Find this resource:
  481. Lo Cascio, Elio. 1971–1972. Patrimonium, ratio privata, res privata. Annali dell’Istituto Italiano per gli Studi Storici 3:55–121.
  482. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  483. Answers the question of how to understand a vexata quaestio about the emperor’s fortune, from private to public funds, from the Antonines to the Severans, and then for the 3rd and 4th centuries AD. A few examples from the epigraphic evidence make more comprehensible the transformations after the accession of Septimius Severus to the Principate. Also published in Il “princeps” e il suo impero: Studi di storia amministrativa e finanziaria romana (Bari, Italy: Edipuglia, 2000), pp. 97–149.
  484. Find this resource:
  485. Marasco, Gabriele. 1994. L’inscription de Takina et la politique sociale de Caracalla. Mnemosyne 47:495–511.
  486. DOI: 10.1163/156852594X00258Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  487. The discovery of the inscription from Takina (a rescript written in Greek to the inhabitants of the city, brought by the procurator Philokyrios in 213) provides a new perspective on Caracalla’s social policy: it contradicts the traditional image of a tyrant developed by Cassius Dio dealing with his famous constitution.
  488. Find this resource:
  489. Salway, Benet. 2000. Prefects, patroni, and decurions: A new perspective on the album of Canusium. In The epigraphic landscape of Roman Italy. Edited by Alison Cooley, 115–171. London: Institute of Classical Studies.
  490. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  491. This inquiry about the municipal album of Canusium in Italy is grounded on a scrupulous prosopographical analysis of the numerous names of senators and equites inscribed on this table of patronage. Some hypotheses are proposed about the different praetorian prefects during Severus Alexander’s reign and the composition of his council.
  492. Find this resource:
  493. Spagnuolo Vigorita, Tullio. 1993. Cittadini e dudditi tra II e III secolo. In Storia di Roma 3: L’età tardoantica. I. Crisi e trasformazioni. Edited by Momigliano Arnaldo and Aldo Schiavoni, 5–50. Torino, Italy: Giulio Einaudi.
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  495. Even if this general overview about personal statutes covers the history of the Principate, from the 1st century AD to the middle of the 3rd, it uses precise examples to give a comprehensive account of the most important evolutions (i.e., the distinctions between Romans and provincials, honestiores and humiliores) and the consequences of Caracalla’s constitution in terms of personal and collective rights.
  496. Find this resource:
  497. Severan Rome
  498.  
  499. For the last time before the rule of Maxentius, at the beginning of the 4th century AD, the Severan emperors spent enough time in Rome to have a real impact on the urban space and to develop a monumental program (Benario 1958). The evidence is partly archaeological and partly literary (e.g., for Severus Alexander’s politics see Coarelli 1987). Some monuments can be analyzed to trace the political discourse (Aguado García 2005, Veyne 2005, Desnier 1993, Brilliant 1967) and the different influences, from the Antonine model to the so-called orientalization of art (DeLaine 1997).
  500.  
  501. Aguado García, Paloma. 2005. Arquitectura religiosa y propaganda imperial en Roma bajo Septimio Severo y Caracalla. Habis 36:371–388.
  502. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  503. The paper deals with the Severan monumental program in Rome. The Severan arch of the Roman forum, the Septizonium, and Caracalla’s public baths have been studied in order to differentiate Severus’s politics (with its Antonine models) from his son’s politics—the objectives of which are truly religious and oriental.
  504. Find this resource:
  505. Benario, Herbert W. 1958. Rome of the Severi. Latomus 17:712–722.
  506. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  507. This is the first comprehensive analysis of the impact of the Severan emperors’ urban construction in Rome, taken from archaeological as well as literary evidence. A complete inventory of Severan buildings is provided, as well as a chronological overview.
  508. Find this resource:
  509. Brilliant, Richard. 1967. The arch of Septimius Severus in the Roman Forum. Rome: American Academy in Rome.
  510. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  511. This is the first comprehensive study of the Severan triumphal monument in the Forum Romanum that was built after the Parthian victories and the celebration of the triumph of Septimius Severus and Caracalla, Parthici maximi, in the city.
  512. Find this resource:
  513. Coarelli, Filippo. 1987. La situazione edilizia di Roma soto Severo Alessandro. In L’Urbs. Espace urbain et histoire (ier siècle avant J.-C.–iiie siècle après J.-C.), 429–456. Rome: École française de Rome.
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  515. The evidence provided by the Historia Augusta in the biography of Severus Alexander is confronted with the archaeological survey concerning the monumental program of this emperor. The author concludes by looking at the quality of the testimony on Alexander’s urban activities.
  516. Find this resource:
  517. DeLaine, Janet. 1997. The baths of Caracalla: A study in the design, construction, and economics of large-scale building projects in imperial Rome. Portsmouth, RI: Journal of Roman Archaeology.
  518. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  519. This is an excellent approach to what could be named an imperial building in an imperial city to commemorate the princeps. From that perspective, concrete aspects (economic as well as architectural) are linked in a harmonious dialogue with a more political if not propagandistic dimension.
  520. Find this resource:
  521. Desnier, Jean-Luc. 1993. Omnia et realia: Naissance de l’Urbs sacra sévérienne (193–204 ap. J.-C.). Mélanges de l’École française de Rome-Antiquité 105:547–620.
  522. DOI: 10.3406/mefr.1993.1814Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  523. From a three-way perspective, looking at the arch of the Roman forum, the Gate of the Argentarii, and the Septizodium, this is a subtle inquiry about Septimius Severus’s ideological program: for example, the conception of the imperial power, with an Augustan heritage, the relationship with the Roman plebs, and the cosmocratic dimension of the present age.
  524. Find this resource:
  525. Severan Art and Culture
  526.  
  527. From a cultural and artistic point of view, the Severan period could be understood as a transition between the Principate (and particularly the Antonine age) and the second part of the 3rd century AD, which announces the transformations of the late Roman Empire. A few perspectives can be traced in that respect: there is the urban perspective, with the case of Lepcis Magna (Ward-Perkins 1948, Ward-Perkins 1993); the artistic perspective, with the evolution of the imperial portrait (von Heintze 1966–1967); the intellectual perspective, with the sophistic movement (Ritti 1988, Bowersock 1969) and the so-called literary circle (Robiano 2009); and the social perspective, with the freedmen’s monuments (Smith 2012).
  528.  
  529. Bowersock, Glen W. 1969. Greek Sophists in the Roman Empire. Oxford: Clarendon.
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  531. In a chronological study of the sophistic movement in the Roman Empire according to Philostratus’s own perspective, the Severan period is analyzed through an accurate approach to the circle of Julia Domna and through some remarks about the relationships between sophists and emperors.
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  533. Ritti, Tullia. 1988. Il sofista Antipatros di Hierapolis. Miscellanea greca e romana 13:71–128.
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  535. A biography of a Severan “intellectual,” closed to the imperial “circle” (see Robiano 2009), from literary (e.g., Philostratus, Vitae Soph. 2.24) and epigraphic evidence. Illustrates some political aspects of a life dedicated to rhetoric and epistolary, with a real official career in attendance on Septimius Severus in Rome, as well as a municipal one in Hierapolis.
  536. Find this resource:
  537. Robiano, Patrick. 2009. Le cercle, une image récurrente chez Philostrate et dans l’idéologie impériale de son temps. Ktema 34:453–464.
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  539. A double approach of ideology and cultural life is provided by this inquiry about the figure of the circle and the existence of a literary “circle” around Julia Domna. The evidence is given by Philostratus’s treaties.
  540. Find this resource:
  541. Smith, Roland R. R. 2012. Monuments for new citizens in Rome and Aphrodisias. In Kunst von unten? Stil und Gesellschaft in der antiken Welt von der “arte plebea” bis heute. Beiträge zu einem Kolloquium anlässlich des 70. Geburtstags von Paul Zanker, Rom, Villa Massimo, 8. bis 9. Juni 2007. Palilia vol. 27. Edited by Francesco De Angelis, Jens-Arne Dickmann, Felix Pirson, and Ralf von den Hoff, 171–184. Wiesbaden, Germany: Reichert Verlag.
  542. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  543. Imperial Roman reliefs from Rome (mainly reliefs adorning tombs), and Aphrodisias (sarcophagi) are compared in order to understand how the status of freedmen (known as “new citizens”) was represented. The major part of the sarcophagi is from the early 3rd century AD, maybe a consequence of Caracalla’s constitution.
  544. Find this resource:
  545. von Heintze, Helga. 1966–1967. Studien zu den Porträts des 3. Caracalla, Geta, Elagabal und Severus Alexander. Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Römische Abteilung: Bullettino dell’Istituto Archeologico Germanico, Sezione romana 73–74:190–231.
  546. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  547. This is the first systematic inquiry about the Severan portraits from Septimius Severus’s sons, Caracalla and Geta, to Severus Alexander. It gives perspectives on some important aspects of a process of innovation, as well as the use at once of traditional ways of representing the prince.
  548. Find this resource:
  549. Ward-Perkins, John Bryan. 1948. Severan art and architecture at Lepcis Magna. Journal of Roman Studies 38:59–80.
  550. DOI: 10.2307/298172Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  551. This is the first accurate analysis of the Severan transformations of Septimius Severus’s native city, the Punic Lepcis Magna, through art and architecture—especially the program linked to the imperial journey and the provincial celebration of the decennalia.
  552. Find this resource:
  553. Ward-Perkins, John Bryan. 1993. The Severan buildings of Lepcis Magna: An architectural survey. London: Society for Libyan Studies.
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  555. Here we are given a direct look at an imperial provincial city (i.e., the native city of Septimius Severus) deeply transformed after Severus’s accession to the empire (e.g., the new Severan forum), with three main influences: Roman, Hellenistic, and “Oriental,” even if in the last case the word is difficult to apply.
  556. Find this resource:
  557. Religion during the Severan Emperors’ Reigns
  558.  
  559. Can we think about the Severan period as a real “turning point” in the evolution of religious practices and approaches of the religion (see Beard, et al. 1998 and Lane Fox 1986)? The perception of some imperial experiences, like that of Elagabal (Frey 1989), and the diverse influences coming from the provinces, could give some answers, as well as the evolution of the so-called imperial cult (see Gradel 2002) and some festivals and ceremonies organized in Rome (see supra Festivals, Ceremonies, and the Imperial Cult).
  560.  
  561. Beard, Mary, North John, and Price Simon. 1998. Religions of Rome. I. A History. II. A sourcebook. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
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  563. The chapters “Religions of Imperial Rome” and “Roman Religion and Roman Empire” provide a general overview of the major changes that came along during the Severans’ administration of an “imperial” religion. A few documents (from literary, iconographic, and papyrological evidence) illustrate the evolution during the Severi.
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  565. Frey, Martin 1989. Untersuchungen zur Religion und zur Religionspolitik des Kaisers Elagabal. Stuttgart: F. Steiner.
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  567. From an accurate analysis of the entire spectrum of evidence, the concept of a religious program by Elagabal is presented: first by the cultic acts of the emperor, and then through an inquiry about the supposed religious reforms by the high priest of Emesa becoming emperor and having reached Rome.
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  569. Lane Fox, Robin. 1986. Pagans and Christians in the Mediterranean world from the second century AD to the conversion of Constantine. Harmondsworth, UK: Viking.
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  571. Gives a comprehensive perception of the evolution of paganism and Christianism, from the Antonines to Constantine. The two first parts, dealing with Pagans and then Christians, provide good examples from the Severi using the different sources available.
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