Spectacle Benefaction and the Politics of Appreciation
Case Studies from Italy, Gallia Narbonensis and Africa Proconsularis
By (author) Rosemary Morgan
Citing epigraphic evidence from Italy, Gaul and North Africa in the imperial period, this study identifies the ways local elites accessed and exploited political representation to achieve lasting esteem through public munificence
In the remotest corners of the Roman Empire, large crowds were as beguiled by spectacles as their Roman counterparts. Provincial spectacles however, did not share the technical wonders of flying machines, elephant dressage and synchronised swimming seen at imperial extravaganzas. Is it this lack of the sensational that accounts for the relative paucity of scholarly attention paid to regional spectacles and in particular, their sponsors? When spectacles are viewed purely as entertainment, the messy realities of institutionalized social, economic and political power that regulated them are obscured. A clearer understanding of the spectacle can therefore be achieved by contextualizing it in the big picture of regional and provincial life against the backdrop of Roman power and control. The spectacle itself was highly political in its aims and intent. Access to sponsorship of a spectacle similarly relied on hierarchies of political power and privilege, and consequently required strategic negotiation of candidacy, promises, expenditure and recognition. Rivalry, competition and emulation was endemic. This epigraphic analysis, focusing on the western Roman Empire (Italy, Gaul and North Africa) during the Imperial period, identifies the milieux of provincial sponsors, their strategies and quest for public honours.
- By (author) Rosemary Morgan
Other Titles in this Series
‘Madness’ in the Ancient World
Innate or Acquired?: From Theoretical Concepts to Daily Life
Volume 10
Religion and Material Culture
Studying Religion and Religious Elements on the Basis of Objects, Architecture, and Space: Proceedings of an international Conference held at the Centre for Bible and Cultural Memory (BiCuM), University of Copenhagen and the National Museum of Denmar
Volume 3
Similar Books
As Messianism Turns to Heresy
The Regenstein Chair Lectures On Lurianic Kabbalah and Shabbatai Tzevi at Hebrew Union College - Cincinnati
Beyond Sovereign Courts
Agents and Practices in Early Modern Spanish and Habsburg Diplomacy
Volume 3
Caesar’s Visions and Impact on the Roman Empire
Revisiting the Archaeological and Historical Record of the 40s BC
Volume 2
Etruscan and Roman Hellenistic Anatomical ex votos
Reassessing Popular Religious Expressions in Central Italy
Volume 8
Food Security under Armed Conflict
Global Knowledge Landscape and Public Attention to Social, Economic, and Humanitarian Dimensions
Innovationes Lovanienses: Arts, Law and Theology at the University of Louvain (1425–1797)
Studium Lovaniense: Learning across Borders, 2
Volume 18
Invisible Labour in Antiquity
Visualizing Obscure Work in the Ancient Mediterannean and West Asia
Volume 1
Late Antique villae in the Balkans (3rd–7th c. AD): Current Research Questions and Perspectives
HAEMUS Companion to the Late Antique Balkans 1
Volume 4
Myths and Tales of the Inughuit
Erik Holtved's Polar Eskimo Texts Revised and Re-translated into Danish and English
Volume 475, 12
Portraying the Individual in the Roman East
Local–Imperial Entanglements in Sculpture, Mosaics, and Paintings (First–Fourth Centuries AD)
Volume 18
Small Worlds and Relational Agencies: Local Societies in Early Medieval Iberia
Pequeños mundos y Agencias relacionales: Sociedades locales altomedievales en la PenÃnsula Ibérica
Students, Scholars and Their Books at the University of Louvain (1425-1797)
Studium Lovaniense: Learning across Borders, 1
Volume 17
