Cassius Dio and the Principate
open access | peer reviewed
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a cura di
- Christopher Burden-Strevens - University of Kent - email
- Jesper Majbom Madsen - University of Southern Denmark - email
- Antonio Pistellato - Ca' Foscari University of Venice - email orcid profile
Abstract
In the Imperial books of his Roman History, Cassius Dio focuses on individual emperors and imperial institutions to promote a political framework for the ideal monarchy, and to theorise autocracy’s typical problems and their solutions. The distinctive narrative structure of Dio’s work creates a unique sense of the past and allows us to see Roman history through a specific lens: that of a man who witnessed the Principate from the Antonines to the Severans. When Dio was writing, the Principate was a full-fledged historical fact, having experienced more than two hundred years of history, good and bad emperors, and three major civil wars. This collection of seven essays sets out to address these issues, and to see Dio not as an ‘adherent’ to or ‘advocate’ of monarchy, but rather as a theorist of its development and execution.
Keywords Cicero • Septimius Severus • Caracalla • Consilium • Commodus and Pertinax • Ideal emperor • Civilitas Principis • Cassius Dio • Mixed Constitution Theory • The Flavian dynasty • Titus • Caligula and Claudius • Cassius Dio’s contemporary history • Iron age • Ideal Government • Macrinus • Virtue • Political structure • Vespasian • Ancient Rome • Principate • Severan dynasty • Pertinax • Domitian • Augustus • Contemporary historiography • Caesar • Elagabalus • Imperator • Emperor-Senate relationships • Imperial Historiography • Monarchy • Roman History • Dynastic succession • Senate • Stoicism
Thema codes NHDA • DSB • 1QBAR • 3KB
Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-472-1 | e-ISBN 978-88-6969-472-1 | ISBN (PRINT) 978-88-6969-473-8 | Numero pagine 188 | Dimensioni 16x23cm | Pubblicato 21 Dicembre 2020 | Lingua en, it
Sottoserie Studi di Letteratura Greca e Latina e-ISSN 2724-0142 ISSN 2724-377X
Copyright © 2020 Christopher Burden-Strevens, Jesper Majbom Madsen, Antonio Pistellato. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.