| Religion and Authority in Roman Carthage: From Augustus to Constantine Contributor(s): Rives, J. B. (Author) |
|
 |
ISBN: 0198140835 ISBN-13: 9780198140832 Publisher: Clarendon Press OUR PRICE: $213.75 Product Type: Hardcover Published: April 1995 Annotation: This book examines the organization of religion in the Roman empire from Augustus to Constantine. Although there have been illuminating particular studies of the relationship between religious activity and socio-political authority in the empire, there has been no large-scale attempt to assess it as a whole. Taking as his focus the situation in Carthage, the greatest city of the western provinces, J. B. Rives argues that traditional religion, predicated on the structure of a city-state, could not serve to integrate individuals into an empire. In upholding traditional religion, the government abandoned the sort of political control of religious behaviour characteristic of the Roman Republic, and allowed people to determine their own religious identities. The importance of Christianity was thus that it provided the model for a new type of religious control suited to the needs of the increasingly homogeneous Roman empire. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Religion | Leadership - History | Ancient - General - Religion | Christianity - History |
| Dewey: 291.650 |
| LCCN: 94022708 |
| Physical Information: 1.07" H x 5.82" W x 8.84" (1.27 lbs) 348 pages |
| Themes: - Chronological Period - Ancient (To 499 A.D.) - Religious Orientation - Christian |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: This book examines the organization of religion--Christian, pagan, and Jewish--in the Roman Empire at the time of Constantine and Augustine. The author argues that because official pagan religion was inextricably tied to the structure of individual cities, Christianity was the only religion that could unite the inhabitants of the Empire as a whole. |
