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Carl Newell Jackson Lectures
The Roman Near East: 31 BC-AD 337
From Augustus to Constantine, the Roman Empire in the Near East expanded step by step, southward to the Red Sea and eastward across the Euphrates to the Tigris. In a remarkable work of interpretive history, Fergus Millar shows us this world as it was forged into the Roman provinces of Syria, Judaea, Arabia, and Mesopotamia. His book conveys the magnificent sweep of history as well as the rich diversity of peoples, religions, and languages that intermingle in the Roman Near East. Against this complex backdrop, Millar explores questions of cultural and religious identity and ethnicity--as aspects of daily life in the classical world and as part of the larger issues they raise.
As Millar traces the advance of Roman control, he gives a lucid picture of Rome's policies and governance over its far-flung empire. He introduces us to major regions of the area and their contrasting communities, bringing out the different strands of culture, communal identity, language, and religious belief in each. The Roman Near East makes it possible to see rabbinic Judaism, early Christianity, and eventually the origins of Islam against the matrix of societies in which they were formed. Millar's evidence permits us to assess whether the Near East is best seen as a regional variant of Graeco-Roman culture or as in some true sense oriental.
A masterful treatment of a complex period and world, distilling a vast amount of literary, documentary, artistic, and archaeological evidence--always reflecting new findings--this book is sure to become the standard source for anyone interested in the Roman Empire or the history of the Near East.
As Millar traces the advance of Roman control, he gives a lucid picture of Rome's policies and governance over its far-flung empire. He introduces us to major regions of the area and their contrasting communities, bringing out the different strands of culture, communal identity, language, and religious belief in each. The Roman Near East makes it possible to see rabbinic Judaism, early Christianity, and eventually the origins of Islam against the matrix of societies in which they were formed. Millar's evidence permits us to assess whether the Near East is best seen as a regional variant of Graeco-Roman culture or as in some true sense oriental.
A masterful treatment of a complex period and world, distilling a vast amount of literary, documentary, artistic, and archaeological evidence--always reflecting new findings--this book is sure to become the standard source for anyone interested in the Roman Empire or the history of the Near East.
620 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1993
About the author
Fergus Millar
32 books9 followersSir Fergus Millar was a British historian and Camden Professor of Ancient History Emeritus, Oxford University. Millar numbers among the most influential ancient historians of the 20th century.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 25, 2020
"That the Roman Near East could be looked at, in more than a purely geographical sense, as part of Asia, or 'the Orient', cannot be denied. The mere currency there of a group of related Semitic langauges is sufficient evidence of that. But it was also an area of already long-standing Greek city-foundation and settlement. To look at the culture of any one of the sub-regions of the Near East is to see how profoundly the Greek language and Greek culture were rooted in the civilisation of this region. Any notion of a crude contrast between 'Greek' on the one hand and 'Oriental' or 'Semitic' on the other must seem wholly inadequate. Too much time had passed since Alexander's arrival in 332 BC. Yet the military history of the region itself serves to suggest that this contrast is not completely meaningless. The Roman forces here fought many successive campaigns, large and small, in contexts other than rivalry with Parthia or Persia: repeatedly in Judaea but also in Commagene, in Nabataea in 106, against Palmyra and finally, under Diocletian, against the 'Saracens'. But none of these operations was directed against a community or political formation which we would be tempted to characterise as unambiguously Greek.
Nonetheless, any attempt to understand the culture or cultures of the region in terms of a simple contrast between 'Greek' and 'Oriental' would be inevitably misleading. There is little or nothing to suggest that the supposed 'Orientals' shared any sense of common identity. On the contrary, everything shows that Jewish identity, whose maintenance is beyond question, conflicted rather than cohered with the identities of other groups using Semitic languages. Nor did those others show anything like the same capacity for survival. Whether anything distinctive remained of Commagene after the end of the dynasty, of Nabataea after it was made into the province of Arabia, or of Palmyra after Aurelian's reconquest is precisely one of the crucial questions we need to answer.
Equally, perhaps even more puzzling is what appears to be a growing awareness, and a positive encouragement from Rome, of Phoenician identity. The Phoenician cities represent the one case - the Jews apart - where affirmation of a pre-Greek identity and history is clearly visible in the Imperial period. But was it this self-identification, shared even by inland cities like Emesa, Damascus and perhaps Palmyra, as 'Phoenician' which led Septimius Severus to resurrect 'Phoenice' as the name of a Roman province stretching to the Euphrates? Or was the sequence the reverse: that it was this artificial geographical division, with no historical roots, which provided a collective identity which had previously been lacking? Some explanation is at any rate required as to why Heliodorus, at the end of his novel Aethiopica, should have chosen to identify himself as 'a Phoenician Emesene'.
Yet the complexities of personal and communal identity do not end there. One of the most distinctive features of the period is the way in which many small places found themselves elevated, by Herodian kings or by Roman Emperors, into being Greek cities with Greek - or Latin-Greek - names. But this was above all a feature of Judaea/Syria Palaestina and Arabia: in each, for instance, there appeared under the Tetrarchy a new 'city' with the Latin-Greek name 'Maximianopolis'. But it was not a prominent feature of Phoenice: its major cities - Berytus, Sidon, Tyre, Ptolomais, Heliopolis, Emesa, Damascus and Palmyra - kept names which owed nothing to Rome. But then again, that is true only if we keep to the single geographical name used to locate them. For every one of these places in fact became in the course of the Empire a Roman colonia, and Heliopolis even owed its status as a city to Severus, as it did its full Roman name: 'Colonia Iulia Augusta Felix Heliopolis'. The impact of Roman measures, going far beyond the universal grant of Roman citizenship by Caracalla, is an important further influence on the curiously malleable identities of Near Eastern communities, and one whose significance has yet to be assessed. Above all, the military and political history of the third century, when looked at in detail, at least raises the question as to whether the 'empire of Palmyra', far from being an Arab uprising against Rome, is not to be explained as a movement led by a Roman senator from within a colonia.
Had it been consciously an 'Arab' movement, whatever that might have meant, it is hard to imagine that VAballathus would have included in the list of victory-titles which he took as Emperor the name 'Arabicus'. That would not of course mean that others in antiquity might not have seen the Palmyrenes themselves as 'Arabs', or even that we should not. How, and whether, we should use 'Arab' as a way of characterising the origins and true nature of any settled or urban groups in the Roman Near East is the most treacherous of all the questions which confront us. But what does seem clearly established is that ancient observers generally associated the term 'Arab' not with a language or culture but with an unsettled way of life, as they did even more clearly with the word 'Saracen'. Whatever else remains uncertain about the role of Empire and its forces in the Near East, one thing is clear, that the long evolution of Roman military dispositions brought them everywhere into more and more direct contact with the 'Saracens' of the steppe. One indication of this is the changing geographical and military share of Judaea/Syria Palaestina. Up to the second century the level of Roman forces there steadily increased; and it was there above all that the Roman army could be seen as an occupation force directed to the control of a civilian population. So it remained for perhaps a century and a half after the end of the great revolt under Bar Kochba in the 130s. But in the Tetrarchic period we find that the province has expanded to cover the southern part of Trajan's Via Nova; and the legion X Fretensis has left Jerusalem and moved to Aila. Most of the units, forts and walled cities which now constituted the Roman 'frontier' in the Near East were not now disposed so as to confront Persia, but along the steppe from the Euphrates to the Red Sea. That is not to say that we can simply characterise the army as it now was as a defence force positioned against external enemies. For Roman guard-posts lined the roads within the provinces also; and it is precisely in the fourth century that, from Sinai in the south to Mesopotamia in the north, vivid evidence shows that 'Saracens' were to be found within the provinces as well as outside. What looks on the map like a 'frontier' was also itself a police-system protecting roads. How we should see the tripartite relations of the Roman forces, the settled population and the 'Arabs' or 'Saracens' is precisely the most complex question raised by the military history of the Near East."
Nonetheless, any attempt to understand the culture or cultures of the region in terms of a simple contrast between 'Greek' and 'Oriental' would be inevitably misleading. There is little or nothing to suggest that the supposed 'Orientals' shared any sense of common identity. On the contrary, everything shows that Jewish identity, whose maintenance is beyond question, conflicted rather than cohered with the identities of other groups using Semitic languages. Nor did those others show anything like the same capacity for survival. Whether anything distinctive remained of Commagene after the end of the dynasty, of Nabataea after it was made into the province of Arabia, or of Palmyra after Aurelian's reconquest is precisely one of the crucial questions we need to answer.
Equally, perhaps even more puzzling is what appears to be a growing awareness, and a positive encouragement from Rome, of Phoenician identity. The Phoenician cities represent the one case - the Jews apart - where affirmation of a pre-Greek identity and history is clearly visible in the Imperial period. But was it this self-identification, shared even by inland cities like Emesa, Damascus and perhaps Palmyra, as 'Phoenician' which led Septimius Severus to resurrect 'Phoenice' as the name of a Roman province stretching to the Euphrates? Or was the sequence the reverse: that it was this artificial geographical division, with no historical roots, which provided a collective identity which had previously been lacking? Some explanation is at any rate required as to why Heliodorus, at the end of his novel Aethiopica, should have chosen to identify himself as 'a Phoenician Emesene'.
Yet the complexities of personal and communal identity do not end there. One of the most distinctive features of the period is the way in which many small places found themselves elevated, by Herodian kings or by Roman Emperors, into being Greek cities with Greek - or Latin-Greek - names. But this was above all a feature of Judaea/Syria Palaestina and Arabia: in each, for instance, there appeared under the Tetrarchy a new 'city' with the Latin-Greek name 'Maximianopolis'. But it was not a prominent feature of Phoenice: its major cities - Berytus, Sidon, Tyre, Ptolomais, Heliopolis, Emesa, Damascus and Palmyra - kept names which owed nothing to Rome. But then again, that is true only if we keep to the single geographical name used to locate them. For every one of these places in fact became in the course of the Empire a Roman colonia, and Heliopolis even owed its status as a city to Severus, as it did its full Roman name: 'Colonia Iulia Augusta Felix Heliopolis'. The impact of Roman measures, going far beyond the universal grant of Roman citizenship by Caracalla, is an important further influence on the curiously malleable identities of Near Eastern communities, and one whose significance has yet to be assessed. Above all, the military and political history of the third century, when looked at in detail, at least raises the question as to whether the 'empire of Palmyra', far from being an Arab uprising against Rome, is not to be explained as a movement led by a Roman senator from within a colonia.
Had it been consciously an 'Arab' movement, whatever that might have meant, it is hard to imagine that VAballathus would have included in the list of victory-titles which he took as Emperor the name 'Arabicus'. That would not of course mean that others in antiquity might not have seen the Palmyrenes themselves as 'Arabs', or even that we should not. How, and whether, we should use 'Arab' as a way of characterising the origins and true nature of any settled or urban groups in the Roman Near East is the most treacherous of all the questions which confront us. But what does seem clearly established is that ancient observers generally associated the term 'Arab' not with a language or culture but with an unsettled way of life, as they did even more clearly with the word 'Saracen'. Whatever else remains uncertain about the role of Empire and its forces in the Near East, one thing is clear, that the long evolution of Roman military dispositions brought them everywhere into more and more direct contact with the 'Saracens' of the steppe. One indication of this is the changing geographical and military share of Judaea/Syria Palaestina. Up to the second century the level of Roman forces there steadily increased; and it was there above all that the Roman army could be seen as an occupation force directed to the control of a civilian population. So it remained for perhaps a century and a half after the end of the great revolt under Bar Kochba in the 130s. But in the Tetrarchic period we find that the province has expanded to cover the southern part of Trajan's Via Nova; and the legion X Fretensis has left Jerusalem and moved to Aila. Most of the units, forts and walled cities which now constituted the Roman 'frontier' in the Near East were not now disposed so as to confront Persia, but along the steppe from the Euphrates to the Red Sea. That is not to say that we can simply characterise the army as it now was as a defence force positioned against external enemies. For Roman guard-posts lined the roads within the provinces also; and it is precisely in the fourth century that, from Sinai in the south to Mesopotamia in the north, vivid evidence shows that 'Saracens' were to be found within the provinces as well as outside. What looks on the map like a 'frontier' was also itself a police-system protecting roads. How we should see the tripartite relations of the Roman forces, the settled population and the 'Arabs' or 'Saracens' is precisely the most complex question raised by the military history of the Near East."
March 26, 2020
Great summary of the roman relations with its Near Eastern neighbours into late antiquity and the administration of the roman Neat east. Recommend it for a beginner in the topic
May 3, 2020
This dense academic work is not for the faint of heart. I read it because I wanted to understand better how Rome was able to exercise control over such far-flung provinces. For example, Dura Europus, captured by the Romans in 161 A.D. and forming a border post with the Parthian Empire, is almost 2500 miles from Rome by land. What I got was an incredibly detailed look at how the cultures of the Roman Near East were a complex mix of Greek, Jewish, and Syrian influences based on epigraphic evidence and a close analysis of language use. Rome, and in particular its Army, had an impact, but most of the cities and villages in the region were grounded in an underlying Greek civilization that had been present for centuries.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews