City Walls in Late Antiquity: An Empire Wide Perspective

Description

The construction of urban defences was one of the hallmarks of the late Roman and late-antique periods (300&;600 AD) throughout the western and eastern empire. City walls were the most significant construction projects of their time and they redefined the urban landscape. Their appearance and monumental scale, as well as the cost of labour and material, are easily comparable to projects from the High Empire; however, urban circuits provided late-antique towns with a new means of self-representation. While their final appearance and construction techniques varied greatly, the cost involved and the dramatic impact that such projects had on the urban topography of late-antique cities mark city walls as one of the most important urban initiatives of the period. To-date, research on city walls in the two halves of the empire has highlighted chronological and regional variations, enabling scholars to rethink how and why urban circuits were built and functioned in Late Antiquity. Although these developments have made a significant contribution to the understanding of late-antique city walls, studies are often concerned with one single monument/small group of monuments or a particular region, and the issues raised do not usually lead to a broader perspective, creating an artificial divide between east and west. It is this broader understanding that this book seeks to provide. The volume and its contributions arise from a conference held at the British School at Rome and the Swedish Institute of Classical Studies in Rome on June 20-21, 2018. It includes articles from world-leading experts in late-antique history and archaeology and is based around important themes that emerged at the conference, such as construction, spolia-use, late-antique architecture, culture and urbanism, empire-wide changes in Late Antiquity, and the perception of this practice by local inhabitants. Cover Book Title Copyright Table of Contents Contributors Acknowledgements Preface : Emanuele E. Intagliata, Simon J. Barker, and Christopher Courault 1. Approaching late antique city walls with an empire-wide perspective : Emanuele E. Intagliata, Christopher Courault, and Simon J. Barker Section A. Regional trends 2. Late Roman urban walls in Hispania: a reappraisal1 : Carmen Fernández Ochoa and Ángel Morillo 3. The city walls of Lusitania revisited: a current perspective : Adriaan De Man 4. Urban defences in late Roman Gaul: civic monuments or state installations : Simon Esmonde Cleary 5. The late Roman city walls in southern Gaul : Marc Heijmans Section B. City walls in old and new capitals 6. Power and glory: ceremonial gates in Constantinople and the Balkans: prototypes and legacy : James Crow 7. An exceptional city wall? Re-thinking the fortificationsof Nicaea in an empire-wide contextAyşe Dalyancı-Berns 8. Defending a new capital: Ravenna, Classe, and the revival of the construction industry in late antiquity : J. Riley Snyder Section C. Case studies: West and East 9. Dismantling, re-carving, and re-using: some observations about the late antique city wall of Agedincum : Pierre-Antoine Lamy and Mathieu Ribolet 10. A statement on the late antique city walls of Córdoba : Christopher Courault 11. The wall circuit of Segni in late antiquity: urban and topographic issues : Francesco Maria Cifarelli and Federica Colaiacomo 12. The revivification of earthen outworks in the late Eastern Empire: the case study of Resafa, Syria : Catharine Hof 13. The fortifications of Zenobia reinterpreted : Sylvie Blétry Section D. The afterlife of city walls 14. Disuse, re-use, and misuse of the early Byzantine fortress at Isthmia : Jon M. Frey 15. Popes, senators, barons, and popes again: the Aurelian wall from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries : Hendrik Dey