New Approaches to Byzantine History and Culture – serie
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47 produkter
47 produkter
Inbunden, Engelska, 2016
1 448 kr
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This book explores the professional and social lives of the soldiers who served in the army of the Byzantine Empire in the sixth century. More than just a fighting force, this army was the setting in which hundreds of thousands of men forged relationships and manoeuvred for promotion. The officers of this force, from famous generals like Belisarius and Narses to lesser-known men like Buzes and Artabanes, not only fought battles but also crafted social networks and cultivated their relationships with their emperor, fellow officers, families, and subordinate soldiers. Looming in the background were differences in identity, particularly between Romans and those they identified as barbarians. Drawing on numerical evidence and stories from sixth-century authors who understood the military, Justinian’s Men highlights a sixth-century Byzantine army that was vibrant, lively, and full of individuals working with and against each other.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2018
1 191 kr
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This book examines the views of Greek Church Fathers on hoarding, saving, and management of economic surplus, and their development primarily in urban centres of the Eastern Mediterranean, from the late first to the fifth century. The study shows how the approaches of Greek Fathers, such as Clement of Alexandria, Basil of Caesarea, John Chrysostom, Isidore of Pelusium, and Theodoret of Cyrrhus, to hoarding and saving intertwined with stances toward the moral and social obligations of the wealthy. It also demonstrates how these Fathers responded to conditions and practices in urban economic environments characterized by sharp inequalities. Their attitudes reflect the gradual widening of Christian congregations, but also the consequences of the socio-economic evolution of the late antique Eastern Roman Empire. Among the issues discussed in the book are the justification of wealth, alternatives to hoarding, and the reception of patristic views by contemporaries.
Häftad, Engelska, 2020
885 kr
Skickas inom 5-8 vardagar
This book examines the views of Greek Church Fathers on hoarding, saving, and management of economic surplus, and their development primarily in urban centres of the Eastern Mediterranean, from the late first to the fifth century. The study shows how the approaches of Greek Fathers, such as Clement of Alexandria, Basil of Caesarea, John Chrysostom, Isidore of Pelusium, and Theodoret of Cyrrhus, to hoarding and saving intertwined with stances toward the moral and social obligations of the wealthy. It also demonstrates how these Fathers responded to conditions and practices in urban economic environments characterized by sharp inequalities. Their attitudes reflect the gradual widening of Christian congregations, but also the consequences of the socio-economic evolution of the late antique Eastern Roman Empire. Among the issues discussed in the book are the justification of wealth, alternatives to hoarding, and the reception of patristic views by contemporaries.
Häftad, Engelska, 2019
1 448 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book explores the professional and social lives of the soldiers who served in the army of the Byzantine Empire in the sixth century. More than just a fighting force, this army was the setting in which hundreds of thousands of men forged relationships and manoeuvred for promotion. The officers of this force, from famous generals like Belisarius and Narses to lesser-known men like Buzes and Artabanes, not only fought battles but also crafted social networks and cultivated their relationships with their emperor, fellow officers, families, and subordinate soldiers. Looming in the background were differences in identity, particularly between Romans and those they identified as barbarians. Drawing on numerical evidence and stories from sixth-century authors who understood the military, Justinian’s Men highlights a sixth-century Byzantine army that was vibrant, lively, and full of individuals working with and against each other.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2019
1 226 kr
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This book is a microhistory of eleventh-century Byzantium, built around the biography of the state official Michael Attaleiates. Dimitris Krallis presents Byzantium as a cohesive, ever-evolving, dynamic, Roman political community, built on traditions of Roman governance and Hellenic culture. In the eleventh century, Byzantium faced a crisis as it navigated a shifting international environment of feudal polities, merchant republics, steppe migrations, and a rapidly transforming Islamic world. Attaleiates’ life, from provincial birth to Constantinopolitan death, and career, as a member of an ancient empire’s officialdom, raise questions of identity, family, education, governance, elite culture, Romanness, Hellenism, science and skepticism, as well as political ideology during this period. The life and work of Attaleiates is used as a prism through which to examine important questions about a long-lived medieval polity that is usually studied as exotic and distinct from both theEuropean and the Near Eastern historical experience.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2019
894 kr
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This book examines the remarkable Velestino hoard, found in Thessaly in the 1920s, and analyses the light that this collection of artifacts sheds on a poorly studied period of Byzantine history, and on largely neglected aspects of Byzantine civilization. Many collections of Byzantine gold- and silverware, such as Vrap and Seuso, have been surrounded by controversy. None, however, has been under more suspicion than the Velestino hoard, particularly with regards to its authenticity. The hoard contains no gold and no silver, and is in fact a collection of bronze and leaden plaques, some with human, and others with animal or geometric representations. The authors examine three distinct aspects of the hoard: the iconography of its components, the method of its production, and the function of those components. The conclusions that they reached provide valuable new insights into eighth-century Byzantine culture. The book explores the Byzantine cultural and political context of the Velestino hoard and will appeal to historians and art historians of early Byzantium, as well as archaeologists and historians of early medieval technologies.
Häftad, Engelska, 2019
1 559 kr
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This book examines the gendered dimensions of emotions and the emotional aspects of gender within Byzantine culture and suggests possible readings of such instances. In so doing, the volume celebrates the current breadth of Byzantine gender studies while at the same time contributing to the emerging field of Byzantine emotion studies. It offers the reader an array of perspectives encompassing various sources and media, including historiography, hagiography, theological writings, epistolography, erotic literature, art objects, and illuminated manuscripts. The ten chapters cover a time span ranging from the early to the late Byzantine periods. This diversity is secured by an expanded and enriched exploration of the collection’s unifying theme of gendered emotions. The scope and breadth of the chapters also reflect the ways in which Byzantine gender and emotion have been studied thus far, while at the same time offering novel approaches that challenge established opinions in Byzantinestudies.
Häftad, Engelska, 2018
620 kr
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This book examines ideas of spiritual nourishment as maintained chiefly by Patristic theologians –those who lived in Byzantium. It shows how a particular type of Byzantine frescoes and icons illustrated the views of Patristic thinkers on the connections between the heavenly and the earthly worlds. The author explores the occurrence, and geographical distribution, of this new type of iconography that manifested itself in representations concerned with the human body, and argues that these were a reaction to docetist ideas. The volume also investigates the diffusion of saints’ cults and demonstrates that this took place on a North-South axis as their veneration began in Byzantium and gradually reached the northern part of Europe, and eventually the entirety of Christendom.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2019
711 kr
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This book examines the Avar siege of Constantinople in 626, one of the most significant events of the seventh century, and the impact and repercussions this had on the political, military, economic and religious structures of the Byzantine Empire. The siege put an end to the power politics and hegemony of the Avars in South East Europe and was the first attempt to destroy Constantinople, the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. Besides the far-reaching military factors, the siege had deeper ideological effects on the mentality of the inhabitants of the Empire, and it helped establish Constantinople as the spiritual centre of eastern Christianity protected by God and his Mother. Martin Hurbanič discusses, from a chronological and thematic perspective, the process through which the historical siege was transformed into a timeless myth, and examines the various aspects which make the event a unique historical moment in the history of mankind – a moment in which the modern story overlaps with the legend with far-reaching effects, not only in the Byzantine Empire but also in other European countries.
Häftad, Engelska, 2020
711 kr
Skickas inom 5-8 vardagar
This book examines the Avar siege of Constantinople in 626, one of the most significant events of the seventh century, and the impact and repercussions this had on the political, military, economic and religious structures of the Byzantine Empire. The siege put an end to the power politics and hegemony of the Avars in South East Europe and was the first attempt to destroy Constantinople, the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. Besides the far-reaching military factors, the siege had deeper ideological effects on the mentality of the inhabitants of the Empire, and it helped establish Constantinople as the spiritual centre of eastern Christianity protected by God and his Mother. Martin Hurbanič discusses, from a chronological and thematic perspective, the process through which the historical siege was transformed into a timeless myth, and examines the various aspects which make the event a unique historical moment in the history of mankind – a moment in which the modern story overlaps with the legend with far-reaching effects, not only in the Byzantine Empire but also in other European countries.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2019
1 514 kr
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This book uses Pseudo-Dionysius and his mystic theology to explore attitudes and beliefs about images in the early medieval West and Byzantium. Composed in the early sixth century, the Corpus Dionysiacum, the collection of texts transmitted under the name of Dionysius the Areopagite, developed a number of themes which have a predominantly visual and spatial dimension. Pseudo-Dionysius’ contribution to the development of Christian visual culture, visual thinking and figural art-making are examined in this book to systematically investigate his long-lasting legacy and influence. The contributors embrace religious studies, philosophy, theology, art, and architectural history, to consider the depth of the interaction between the Corpus Dionysiacum and various aspects of contemporary Byzantine and western cultures, including ecclesiastical and lay power, politics, religion, and art.
Häftad, Engelska, 2020
1 514 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book uses Pseudo-Dionysius and his mystic theology to explore attitudes and beliefs about images in the early medieval West and Byzantium. Composed in the early sixth century, the Corpus Dionysiacum, the collection of texts transmitted under the name of Dionysius the Areopagite, developed a number of themes which have a predominantly visual and spatial dimension. Pseudo-Dionysius’ contribution to the development of Christian visual culture, visual thinking and figural art-making are examined in this book to systematically investigate his long-lasting legacy and influence. The contributors embrace religious studies, philosophy, theology, art, and architectural history, to consider the depth of the interaction between the Corpus Dionysiacum and various aspects of contemporary Byzantine and western cultures, including ecclesiastical and lay power, politics, religion, and art.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2020
1 559 kr
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This edited collection focuses on the Roman empire during the period from AD 337 to 361. During this period the empire was ruled by three brothers: Constantine II (337-340), Constans I (337-350) and Constantius II (337-361). These emperors tend to be cast into shadow by their famous father Constantine, the first Christian Roman emperor (306-337), and their famous cousin Julian, the last pagan Roman emperor (361-363). The traditional concentration on the historically renowned figures of Constantine and Julian is understandable but comes at a significant price: the neglect of the period between the death of Constantine and the reign of Julian and of the rulers who governed the empire in this period. The reigns of the sons of Constantine, especially that of the longest-lived Constantius II, mark a moment of great historical significance. As the heirs of Constantine they became the guardians of his legacy, and they oversaw the nature of the world in which Julian was to grow up. The thirteen contributors to this volume assess their influence on imperial, administrative, cultural, and religious facets of the empire in the fourth century.
Häftad, Engelska, 2021
1 559 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This edited collection focuses on the Roman empire during the period from AD 337 to 361. During this period the empire was ruled by three brothers: Constantine II (337-340), Constans I (337-350) and Constantius II (337-361). These emperors tend to be cast into shadow by their famous father Constantine, the first Christian Roman emperor (306-337), and their famous cousin Julian, the last pagan Roman emperor (361-363). The traditional concentration on the historically renowned figures of Constantine and Julian is understandable but comes at a significant price: the neglect of the period between the death of Constantine and the reign of Julian and of the rulers who governed the empire in this period. The reigns of the sons of Constantine, especially that of the longest-lived Constantius II, mark a moment of great historical significance. As the heirs of Constantine they became the guardians of his legacy, and they oversaw the nature of the world in which Julian was to grow up. The thirteen contributors to this volume assess their influence on imperial, administrative, cultural, and religious facets of the empire in the fourth century.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2020
1 448 kr
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This book is the history of the Eastern Vikings, the Rus and the Varangians, from their earliest mentions in the narrative sources to the late medieval period, when the Eastern Vikings had become stock figures in Old Norse Romances. A comparison is made between sources emanating from different cultures, such as the Roman Empire, the Abbasid Caliphate and its successor states, the early kingdoms of the Rus and the high medieval Scandinavian kingdoms. A key element in the history of the Rus and the Varangians is the fashioning of identities and how different cultures define themselves in comparison and contrast with the other. This book offers a fresh and engaging view of these medieval sources, and a thorough reassessment of established historiographical grand narratives on Scandinavian peoples in the East.
Häftad, Engelska, 2021
911 kr
Skickas inom 5-8 vardagar
This book is the history of the Eastern Vikings, the Rus and the Varangians, from their earliest mentions in the narrative sources to the late medieval period, when the Eastern Vikings had become stock figures in Old Norse Romances. A comparison is made between sources emanating from different cultures, such as the Roman Empire, the Abbasid Caliphate and its successor states, the early kingdoms of the Rus and the high medieval Scandinavian kingdoms. A key element in the history of the Rus and the Varangians is the fashioning of identities and how different cultures define themselves in comparison and contrast with the other. This book offers a fresh and engaging view of these medieval sources, and a thorough reassessment of established historiographical grand narratives on Scandinavian peoples in the East.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2020
1 448 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book explores the history of banditry in the medieval Balkans between the ninth and fifteenth centuries. While several scholars have recognized the problems which various outlaw groups caused in the region during the Middle Ages, few have given much attention to the bandits themselves, their origins, their reasons for taking up brigandage, and the steps taken by the central authorities to control their activity. Among other things, this book identifies three main sources of banditry: shepherds, soldiers and peasants. Far from being ʻlone wolvesʼ, these men operated within well-defined social networks. Poverty played a decisive role in driving them to a life of crime, but there is strong evidence to suggest that the growing economic prosperity in parts of the Balkans from the ninth century onwards may have also contributed to the rise of the phenomenon.
Häftad, Engelska, 2021
1 448 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book explores the history of banditry in the medieval Balkans between the ninth and fifteenth centuries. While several scholars have recognized the problems which various outlaw groups caused in the region during the Middle Ages, few have given much attention to the bandits themselves, their origins, their reasons for taking up brigandage, and the steps taken by the central authorities to control their activity. Among other things, this book identifies three main sources of banditry: shepherds, soldiers and peasants. Far from being ʻlone wolvesʼ, these men operated within well-defined social networks. Poverty played a decisive role in driving them to a life of crime, but there is strong evidence to suggest that the growing economic prosperity in parts of the Balkans from the ninth century onwards may have also contributed to the rise of the phenomenon.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2020
1 337 kr
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This book illuminates Byzantines' relationship with woodland between the seventh and twelfth centuries. Using the oak and the olive as objects of study, this work explores shifting economic strategies, environmental change, and the transformation of material culture throughout the middle Byzantine period. Drawing from texts, environmental data, and archaeological surveys, this book demonstrates that woodland's makeup was altered after Byzantium's seventh-century metamorphosis, and that people interacted in new ways with this re-worked ecology. Oak obtained prominence after late antiquity, illustrating the shift from that earlier era's intensive agriculture to a more sylvan middle Byzantine economy. Meanwhile, the olive faded into the background, re-emerging in the eleventh and twelfth centuries thanks to the initiative of people adapting yet again to newly changed political and economic circumstances. This book therefore shows that Byzantines' relationship with their ecology was far from static, and that Byzantines' decisions had environmental impacts.
Häftad, Engelska, 2021
1 337 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book illuminates Byzantines' relationship with woodland between the seventh and twelfth centuries. Using the oak and the olive as objects of study, this work explores shifting economic strategies, environmental change, and the transformation of material culture throughout the middle Byzantine period. Drawing from texts, environmental data, and archaeological surveys, this book demonstrates that woodland's makeup was altered after Byzantium's seventh-century metamorphosis, and that people interacted in new ways with this re-worked ecology. Oak obtained prominence after late antiquity, illustrating the shift from that earlier era's intensive agriculture to a more sylvan middle Byzantine economy. Meanwhile, the olive faded into the background, re-emerging in the eleventh and twelfth centuries thanks to the initiative of people adapting yet again to newly changed political and economic circumstances. This book therefore shows that Byzantines' relationship with their ecology was far from static, and that Byzantines' decisions had environmental impacts.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2021
1 298 kr
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This book asks how the inhabitants and neighbours of the Eastern Roman Empire understand their identity as Romans in the centuries following the emergence of Islam as a world-religion. Its answers lie in exploring the nature of change and continuity of social structures, self-representation, and boundaries as markers of belonging to the Roman group in the period from circa AD 650 to 850. Early medieval Romanness was integral to the Roman imperial project; its local utility as an identifier was shaped by a given community’s relationship with Constantinople, the capital of the Roman state. This volume argues that there was fundamental continuity of Roman identity from Late Antiquity through these centuries into later periods. Many transformations which are ascribed to the Romans of this era have been subjectively assigned by outsiders, separated by time or space, and are not born out by the sources. This finding dovetails with other recent historical works re-evaluating the early medieval Eastern Roman polity and its ideology.
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
1 298 kr
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This book asks how the inhabitants and neighbours of the Eastern Roman Empire understand their identity as Romans in the centuries following the emergence of Islam as a world-religion. Its answers lie in exploring the nature of change and continuity of social structures, self-representation, and boundaries as markers of belonging to the Roman group in the period from circa AD 650 to 850. Early medieval Romanness was integral to the Roman imperial project; its local utility as an identifier was shaped by a given community’s relationship with Constantinople, the capital of the Roman state. This volume argues that there was fundamental continuity of Roman identity from Late Antiquity through these centuries into later periods. Many transformations which are ascribed to the Romans of this era have been subjectively assigned by outsiders, separated by time or space, and are not born out by the sources. This finding dovetails with other recent historical works re-evaluating the early medieval Eastern Roman polity and its ideology.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2021
1 448 kr
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This book examines the many ways Byzantines lived with their trees. It takes seriously theological and hagiographic tree engagement as expressions of that culture’s deep involvement—and even fascination—with the arboreal. These pages tap into the current attention paid to plants in a wide range of scholarship, an attention that involves the philosophy of plant life as well as scientific discoveries of how communicative trees may be, and how they defend themselves. Considering writings on and images of trees from Late Antiquity and medieval Byzantium sympathetically, the book argues for an arboreal imagination at the root of human aspirations to know and draw close to the divine.
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
1 448 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book examines the many ways Byzantines lived with their trees. It takes seriously theological and hagiographic tree engagement as expressions of that culture’s deep involvement—and even fascination—with the arboreal. These pages tap into the current attention paid to plants in a wide range of scholarship, an attention that involves the philosophy of plant life as well as scientific discoveries of how communicative trees may be, and how they defend themselves. Considering writings on and images of trees from Late Antiquity and medieval Byzantium sympathetically, the book argues for an arboreal imagination at the root of human aspirations to know and draw close to the divine.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2021
1 540 kr
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This book analyzes Byzantine examples of witness literature, a genre that focuses on eyewitness accounts written by slaves, prisoners, refugees, and other victims of historical atrocity. It focuses on such episodes in three nonfictional texts – John Kaminiates’ Capture of Thessaloniki (904), Eustathios of Thessaloniki’s Capture of Thessaloniki (1186), and Niketas Choniates’ History (ca. 1204–17) – and the three extant twelfth-century Komnenian novels to consider how the authors’ positions as both eyewitness and victim require an interpretive method that distinguishes witness literature from other kinds of writing about the past. Drawing on theoretical developments in the fields of Holocaust and Genocide Studies (such as Giorgio Agamben’s homo sacer and Michel Foucault’s biopolitics) and comparisons with modern examples (Elie Wiesel’s Night and Primo Levi’s If This is a Man), Witness Literature emphasizes the affective, subjective, and experiential in medieval Greek historical writing.
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
1 540 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book analyzes Byzantine examples of witness literature, a genre that focuses on eyewitness accounts written by slaves, prisoners, refugees, and other victims of historical atrocity. It focuses on such episodes in three nonfictional texts – John Kaminiates’ Capture of Thessaloniki (904), Eustathios of Thessaloniki’s Capture of Thessaloniki (1186), and Niketas Choniates’ History (ca. 1204–17) – and the three extant twelfth-century Komnenian novels to consider how the authors’ positions as both eyewitness and victim require an interpretive method that distinguishes witness literature from other kinds of writing about the past. Drawing on theoretical developments in the fields of Holocaust and Genocide Studies (such as Giorgio Agamben’s homo sacer and Michel Foucault’s biopolitics) and comparisons with modern examples (Elie Wiesel’s Night and Primo Levi’s If This is a Man), Witness Literature emphasizes the affective, subjective, and experiential in medieval Greek historical writing.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2021
1 226 kr
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This book explores the Byzantine city and the changes it went through from 610 to 1204. Throughout this period, cities were always the centers of political and social life for both secular and religious authorities, and, furthermore, the focus of the economic interests of local landowning elites.This book therefore examines the regional and subregional trajectories in the urban function, landscape, structure and fabric of Byzantium’s cities, synthesizing the most cutting-edge archaeological excavations, the results of analyses of material culture (including ceramics, coins, and seals) and a reassessment of the documentary and hagiographical sources. The transformation the Byzantine urban landscape underwent from the seventh to thirteenth centuries can afford us a better grasp of changes to the Byzantine central and provincial administrative apparatus; their fiscal machinery, military institutions, socio-economic structures and religious organization. This book will be of interest to students and researchers of the history, archaeology and architecture of Byzantium.
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
1 226 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book explores the Byzantine city and the changes it went through from 610 to 1204. Throughout this period, cities were always the centers of political and social life for both secular and religious authorities, and, furthermore, the focus of the economic interests of local landowning elites.This book therefore examines the regional and subregional trajectories in the urban function, landscape, structure and fabric of Byzantium’s cities, synthesizing the most cutting-edge archaeological excavations, the results of analyses of material culture (including ceramics, coins, and seals) and a reassessment of the documentary and hagiographical sources. The transformation the Byzantine urban landscape underwent from the seventh to thirteenth centuries can afford us a better grasp of changes to the Byzantine central and provincial administrative apparatus; their fiscal machinery, military institutions, socio-economic structures and religious organization. This book will be of interest to students and researchers of the history, archaeology and architecture of Byzantium.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2022
1 540 kr
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This book is an exploration of political memory and disgrace in the reigns of Constantine and his sons. It uses the conditions of the early to mid-fourth century to argue that the deconstruction of political legitimacy should be viewed, first and foremost, as a collective phenomenon, the result of the actions of a diverse range of people responding to political change. It also challenges many positivist and teleological narratives of the ‘Age of Constantine’. Shifting the focus from the emperor and his sons onto their rivals and opponents, the Constantinian dynasty is placed back into the messy and ambiguous political environment from which it emerged.
Häftad, Engelska, 2023
1 540 kr
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This book is an exploration of political memory and disgrace in the reigns of Constantine and his sons. It uses the conditions of the early to mid-fourth century to argue that the deconstruction of political legitimacy should be viewed, first and foremost, as a collective phenomenon, the result of the actions of a diverse range of people responding to political change. It also challenges many positivist and teleological narratives of the ‘Age of Constantine’. Shifting the focus from the emperor and his sons onto their rivals and opponents, the Constantinian dynasty is placed back into the messy and ambiguous political environment from which it emerged.