Unit 2: Civilizations of the Mediterranean World
Chapter 7: The Roman World
16. Thu, Oct 24, 2013
The Emperor Marcus Aurelius, 2nd Century A.D. Paris, Musée du Louvre.
The transition from the Roman Republic to the Empire is one of the more fascinating puzzles we have. The change did not come about through the exertion of one or more powerful leaders who crushed the fledgling Republic. The Republic had fully matured, and was arguably failing under the burden of its own weight. Augustus' settlements were — as the book does not make entirely clear — at least framed as an attempt to restore the Republic after a period of social upheaval, civil war, and unrest. In the long run, however, his "restoration" of the Republic wound up transforming it more thoroughly than any other set of events we might name.
The other fact we need to keep in mind while trying to assess what happened in Imperial Rome is the sheer duration involved. From Romulus to Augustus was a stretch of about seven hundred years. From Augustus to Romulus Augustulus (the last emperor of the west) was another five hundred. The social, philosophical, religious, political, and economic structures of the west were massively altered over that period. Another way to think about it is this: would we be able to fathom trying to operate today's society on the social and political models prevalent five hundred years ago? How about twelve hundred years ago?
- What necessitated the replacement of the Republican form of government with that of the Roman Empire? What were some of the consequences of that transition?
- How did Rome understand the derivative nature of its culture while still also considering itself a unique one?
- The religious culture of later Rome — what are the mutual interactions of Roman civic religion, the late mystery religions, the Isis cult, and Christianity? What conditions in the world were propitious for the rise of Christianity? What practical obstacles did it have to overcome?
- It is popular in almost every age for certain cultural critics to compare how badly things are going at the time with the condition of the declining Roman state in the fourth and fifth centuries A.D. Does that comparison really help us see anything we wouldn't otherwise see? If so, what?
- What pieces of the Roman vision of the world are still useful to us today?
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