Urban Developments in Late Antique and Medieval Rome

Revising the Narrative of Renewal

Gregor Kalas, Ann Dijk, Ann van Dijk

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2025
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9781040772676
• Subtopic: European Medieval History
• Index: History

A narrative of decline punctuated by periods of renewal has long structured perceptions of Rome's late antique and medieval history. In their probing contributions to this volume, a multi-disciplinary group of scholars provides alternative approaches to understanding the period. Addressing developments in governance, ceremony, literature, art, music, clerical education and the construction of the city's identity, the essays examine how a variety of actors, from poets to popes, productively addressed the intermittent crises and shifting dynamics of these centuries in ways that bolstered the city's resilience. Without denying that the past (both pre-Christian and Christian) consistently remained a powerful touchstone, the studies in this volume offer rich new insights into the myriad ways that Romans, between the fifth and the eleventh centuries, creatively assimilated the past as they shaped their future.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Preface and Acknowledgments
• List of Abbreviations
• 1. Introduction: Revising the Narrative of Renewal for Late Antique and Medieval Rome
• 2. Rome at War: The Effects of Crisis on Church and Community in Late Antiquity
• 3. Portraits of Poets and the Lecture Halls in the Forum of Trajan : Masking Cultural Tensions in Late Antique Rome
• 4. Rolling Out the Red Carpet, Roman-Style : The Arrival at Rome From Constantine to Charlemagne
• 5. (Re-)Founding Christian Rome: The Honorian Project of the Early Seventh Century
• 6. After Antiquity: Renewing the Past or Celebrating the Present? Early Medieval Apse Mosaics in Rome
• 7. The Re-Invention of Rome in the Early Middle Ages: John Osborne
• 8. Rewriting the Renouveau
• 9. Renewal, Heritage, and Exchange in Eleventh-Century Roman Chant Traditions
• 10. Reforming Readers, Reforming Texts : The Making of Discursive Community in Gregorian Rome
• Manuscripts Cited
• Index