Late Antiquity Flashcards
What happened to the classical city in the late antiquity period?
- Began to decline and die
What is late antiquity?
- Peter Brown argued in the 1960s that late antiquity should be recognised as a period on its own.
- Before this historians tended to deny this and moved straight from the Classical period to the Medieval period.
- Was there a dark period and an era of decay between the Classical and Medieval.
- In late antiquity, there is a shift in society and ideology especially in terms of monuments.
What are the characteristics of the late antiquity period?
- Change in religion
- Religious extremism
- Lack of leadership
- Less public involvement
- Famine
- Earthquakes
What can we learn from the image or appearance of towns and cities?
- Can be viewed as a reflection of the society of the time and how well it is doing.
What were the significant differences between the classical city and a city like Constantinople in Late antiquity?
- Spread of Christianity
- Abandoning of temples
- Limited provision of new decorative materials
- Reduction of power of urban elites and less willing to be involved
- Need for fortifications
Describe the spread of Christianity in late antiquity?
- Slow change
- Paegan and Christians prayed at the same time but in very different spaces
- The first church was built in the 4th century and before this Christians worshipped in houses called Dorkus Ecclesiastes. The church was called St John in by Constantine and was a S nave basilica on the edge of the city.
What did Constantine want?
- Wanted to make himself a Christian emperor by building statues of himself and he is still viewed as a saint in the Orthodox Church today.
Why did Constantine continue to link himself to traditional Rome?
- He constructed an arch there, during this transition period.
- He reused sculptures from previous emperors in the construction such as Hadrian’s.
- Frieze of the arch was completely new. Constantine represented as a leader but not as a warrior
What happened with regards to churches in the period of late antiquity?
- Churches became the centre of the cities. However, because the churches were built on the edge of cities, the centre of the city also shifted.
Describe the abandoning of temples during late antiquity?
- Many temples were simply closed and became empty shells
- Pagan cults continued but moved underground, forced to worship in houses.
- In the 5th and 6th centuries, some temples began to be reused. However, church use was rare as Christianity demands a space for a large mass of people.
- Theatres and amphitheatres were also no longer needed and many were transformed into forts. Additionally baths decreased considerably in size due to maintenance and customs.
- Basilicas and Curias were often reused and many became churches e.g. Templum Pacis
- Another feature of this period was spoliation which basically involved selling or reusing materials from monuments. This was partially done to the Colosseum in the 5th century.
What happened to baths in late antiquity?
- End of public involvement of the urban elite.
- Baths became smaller such as the Hunting baths Lepcis Magna
What happened to buildings in late antiquity?
- Towns had derelict buildings inside, although this is not traditionally accepted by the classicists
- Towns also saw a complete decay after the fall of the Roman Empire as it also disappeared the monumentality of the Roman towns
What characterised cities in late antiquity?
- The construction of forts and city walls
- Rome has the construction of the Aurelian city walls in the 3rd century AD which were then reinforced in the 4th century.
What characterised the classical city?
- A clear distinction between public and private, commercial/leisure and living area.
- Late antiquity did not have this distinction.
What is one of the major features of late antiquity?
- Whether for convenience or ideology everything was reused.
What evidence is there to support the beliefs of catastrophists about the decay of urban area during late antiquity?
- The fall of the Roman Empire had an inevitable effect on urban areas
- Monumental buildings of classical Roman town if not reused decayed.
- Some ex public buildings were occupied by private people
- The images of towns changed as the society changed.
What evidence is there to support continuits who don’t believe that there was urban decay during late antiquity?
- Numerous evidence recorded in LA cities resulted from processes that started well before the end of the Roman Empire
- In the modern interpretation of cities there were still urban settlement with residential areas, public spaces
How did the city change into late antiquity?
- Completely different from Roman cities
- Although maintained the roots of the Roman urban settlements, they didn’t have the same function and were inhabited by a different society
- Not comparable
- Necessary to remember that these cities didn’t appear in their new format immediately after the fall of the Roman Empire, and had already begun before.
Describe the structure of Constantine.
- City was constructed above the ancient Byzantium
- Necropolis outside of the city with epigraphic evidence. . - Other than this there are very few monumental remains
What were the monumental remains of the ancient city of Byzantium?
- Part of the wall around the acropolis (now disappeared)
- A Roman tower by the sea (hidden behind the Byzantine wall)
- A mosaic floor dated to the 2nd century AD
- Aqueduct has been attributed to the emperor Valens
Describe the urban city wall of Byzantium
According to tradition
- Built by the mythical figure of Byzantium
- Built by Septimius Severus
Describe the city wall of Septimius Severus
- Cassio Dio informs us that was including the two harbours
- Another source- Dyonisus of Byzantium mention three ports inside the city.
These existed in the Greek city: - Bosphorion and Prosphorion in the region 5th and Neorion or Arsenal in the region 6th
Describe Byzantium’s baths
- Achilles and Zeuxippus
- Achilles were the oldest ones- built in the acropolis of the Greek city
- Zeuxippus baths
- Baths of the Oikonomion under the imperial palace.
What were the Strategion and the Tetrastoon?
- Two public spaces of the former Greek city, which continued to be maintained in the later city
What were some of the temples in Constantinople?
- Aphrodite, Artemis, the Sun God and possibly Poseidon
