Staying Roman: Conquest and Identity in Africa and the Mediterranean, 439-700

by Jonathan Conant

Overview

What did it mean to be Roman once the Roman Empire had collapsed in the West? Staying Roman examines Roman identities in the region of modern Tunisia and Algeria between the fifth-century Vandal conquest and the seventh-century Islamic invasions. Using historical, archaeological and epigraphic evidence, this study argues that the fracturing of the empire's political unity also led to a fracturing of Roman identity along political, cultural and religious lines, as individuals who continued to feel 'Roman' but who were no longer living under imperial rule sought to redefine what it was that connected them to their fellow Romans elsewhere. The resulting definitions of Romanness could overlap, but were not always mutually reinforcing. Significantly, in late antiquity Romanness had a practical value, and could be used in remarkably flexible ways to foster a sense of similarity or difference over space, time and ethnicity, in a wide variety of circumstances.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781139333900
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	04/12/2012
Series:	Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought: Fourth Series , #82
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Jonathan Conant is Assistant Professor of History at the University of San Diego, where his teaching and research focus is on the ancient and medieval Mediterranean.

Table of Contents

Introduction; 1. The legitimation of Vandal power; 2. Flight and communications; 3. The old ruling class under the Vandals; 4. New Rome, new Romans; 5. The Moorish alternative; 6. The dilemma of dissent; Aftermath; Conclusions.

Editorial Reviews

"… an important study."
Eric Fournier, Bryn Mawr Classical Review

"Staying Roman is not only intellectually stimulating and an important contribution to the field of study of late antique North Africa, it is noticeably well founded and at the same time a pleasure to read."
Ralf Bockmann, The Medieval Review

"This is a sophisticated volume … excellent and subtle …"
Guy Halsall, Early Medieval Europe

"As a starting point for Vandal and Moorish history in this period - still better as a thorough overview of the status quaestionis on the murky world of Byzantine Africa - Conant's book is to be warmly recommended."
A. H. Merrills, The Journal of Roman Studies

"It is impossible to do justice to this finely argued and richly evidenced book in … a short review. Although the book’s specific arguments will no doubt provoke continued debate and further research, its overall thesis that Roman cultural identity was paradigmatic throughout the period is highly convincing and will hopefully inform studies of "long" late antiquity elsewhere in the post-Roman West."
Jamie Wood, Al-Masaq: Journal of the Medieval Mediterranean

From the Publisher