Maas - Readings in Late Antiquity: a Sourcebook

READINGS IN LATE ANTIQUITY

This is a wonderful anthology. Clear, accessible, and vividly engaging, it presents the panoply of Late Antique life from east to west, from city to village, from the powerful to the humble, from transcendent hopes to ordinary burdens a world to explore, relish, and ponder.

Susan Ashbrook Harvey, Brown University

Unusually comprehensive and enterprising in its selections, this sourcebook will give an entire new generation a choice and a challenge.

Peter Brown, Princeton University

Late Antiquity (c. 250650) witnessed the transition from Classical Antiquity to the Middle Ages in the Mediterranean and Near Eastern worlds. Christianity displaced polytheism over a wide area, offering new definitions of identity and community. The Roman Empire collapsed in western Europe to be replaced by new Germanic kingdoms. In the East, Byzantium emerged, while the Persian Empire reached its apogee and collapsed. Arab armies carrying the banner of Islam reshaped the political map and brought the Late Antique era to a close.

This sourcebook illustrates the dramatic political, social and religious transformations of Late Antiquity through the words of the men and women who experienced them. Drawing from Greek, Latin, Syriac, Hebrew, Coptic, Persian, Arabic, and Armenian sources, the carefully chosen passages illuminate the lives of emperors, abbesses, aristocrats, slaves, children, barbarian chieftains, and saints. The Roman Empire is kept at the centre of the discussion, with chapters devoted to its government, cities, army, law, medicine, domestic life, philosophy, and its Jewish population. Further chapters deal with the peoples who surrounded the Roman state: Persians, Huns, northern barbarians, and the followers of Islam.

This revised and updated second edition provides an expanded view of Late Antiquity with a new chapter on domestic life, as well extra material throughout, including passages that appear for the first time in English translation. Readings in Late Antiquity is the only sourcebook that covers such a wide range of topics over the full breadth of the Late Antique period.

Michael Maas is Professor of History and Classical Studies at Rice University, USA, where he teaches ancient history. His research focuses on Late Antiquity. His most recent books are The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian (2005) and Exegesis in the Early Byzantine Mediterranean (2003).

ROUTLEDGE SOURCEBOOKS FOR THE ANCIENT WORLD

READINGS IN LATE ANTIQUITY

Second edition

Michael Maas

GREEK AND ROMAN EDUCATION

Mark Joyal, J.C. Yardley and Iain McDougall

THE REPUBLICAN ROMAN ARMY

Michael M. Sage

THE STORY OF ATHENS

Phillip Harding

ROMAN SOCIAL HISTORY

Tim Parkin and Arthur Pomeroy

DEATH IN ANCIENT ROME

Valerie Hope

ANCIENT ROME

Matthew Dillon and Lynda Garland

SEXUALITY IN GREEK AND ROMAN LITERATURE

Marguerite Johnson and Terry Ryan

ATHENIAN POLITICAL ORATORY

David Phillips

POMPEII

Alison E. Cooley and M.G.L. Cooley

GREEK SCIENCE OF THE HELLENISTIC ERA

Georgia Irby-Massie and Paul Keyser

WOMEN AND LAW IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE

Judith Evans Grubbs

WARFARE IN ANCIENT GREECE

Michael M. Sage

READINGS IN LATE ANTIQUITY

Michael Maas

THE GOVERNMENT OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE

Barbara Levick

PAGANS AND CHRISTIANS IN LATE ANTIQUITY

A.D. Lee

ANCIENT GREECE

Second edition

Matthew Dillon and Lynda Garland

ANCIENT GREEK LAWS

Ilias Arnaoutoglou

TRIALS FROM CLASSICAL ATHENS

Christopher Carey

GREEK AND ROMAN TECHNOLOGY

John Humphrey, John Oleson and Andrew Sherwood

ROMAN ITALY 388 BCAD 200

Kathryn Lomas

THE ROMAN ARMY 31 BCAD 337

Brian Campbell

THE ROMAN HOUSEHOLD

Jane F. Gardner and Thomas Wiedemann

ATHENIAN POLITICS

G.R. Stanton

GREEK AND ROMAN SLAVERY

Thomas Wiedemann

FORTHCOMING:

ANCIENT GREECE

Third edition

Matthew Dillon and Lynda Garland

ANCIENT CITY OF ROME

Christopher Smith, J.C.N. Coulston, Hazel Dodge

WOMEN OF THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST

Mark Chavalas

GREEK RELIGION

Emma Stafford and Karen Stears

READINGS IN LATE ANTIQUITY

A Sourcebook

Second edition

Michael Maas

First published 2000

by Routledge

Reprinted 2003

This second edition published 2010 by

Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada

by Routledge

270 Madison Ave., New York, NY 100016

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

2000, 2010 Michael Maas

The right of Michael Maas to be identified as the Author of this Work

has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and

Patents Act 1988

Typeset in Times New Roman by

Keystroke, Tettenhall, Wolverhampton

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication Data

Maas, Michael, 1951

Readings in late antiquity : a sourcebook / Michael Maas.

p. cm.

Simultaneously published in the USA and CanadaT.p. verso.

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

1. RomeHistoryEmpire, 284476Sources. 2. Byzantine EmpireCivilizationTo

527Sources. 3. Byzantine EmpireCivilization5271081Sources. I. Title.

DG78.M22 2009

937.06dc22

2009042117

ISBN10: 0415473365 (hbk)

ISBN10: 0415473373 (pbk)

ISBN13 9780415473361 (hbk)

ISBN13 9780415473378 (pbk)

CONTENTS

EXTENDED CONTENTS

A list of passages new to the second edition may be found on the Routledge website: http://www.routledge.com/books/Readings-in-Late-Antiquity-isbn9780415473378

JUSTINIAN, EDICT 6, ON THE REGULATION OF SKILLED
LABOR, PREFACE, 1

ANONYMOUS ORATOR, SPEECH OF THANKS TO
CONSTANTINE 56

THEODOSIAN CODE 11.24.2
JUSTINIAN, CODE II.54.1

AGATHIAS, ON PORPHYRIUS OF THE BLUE FACTION,
GREEK ANTHOLOGY 16.380

RUTILIUS NAMATIANUS, A VOYAGE HOME TO GAUL,
LINES 3766

2.8 Secular and Christian education

THE HENOTIKON: LETTER OF ZENO TO THE BISHOPS, MONKS AND LAITY OF EGYPT (EVAGRIUS, ECCLESIASTICAL
HISTORY 111.14)

Further reading

MAPS

Map 1 The world of Late Antiquity c.300c.400