The Language of Empire
Rome and the Idea of Empire from the Third Century BC to the Second Century AD

This book seeks to discover what the Romans themselves thought about their empire by examining the changing meaning of key terms.

John Richardson (Author)

9781107402799, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 11 August 2011

232 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.3 cm, 0.35 kg

The Roman Empire has been an object of fascination for the past two millennia, and the story of how a small city in central Italy came to dominate the whole of the Mediterranean basin, most of modern Europe and the lands of Asia Minor and the Middle East, has often been told. It has provided the model for European empires from Charlemagne to Queen Victoria and beyond, and is still the basis of comparison for investigators of modern imperialisms. By an exhaustive investigation of the changing meanings of certain key words and their use in the substantial remains of Roman writings and in the structures of Roman political life, this book seeks to discover what the Romans themselves thought about their imperial power in the centuries in which they conquered the known world and formed the empire of the first and second centuries AD.

Preface
1. Ideas of empire
2. The beginnings: Hannibal to Sulla
3. Cicero's empire: imperium populi Romani
4. The Augustan empire: imperium romanum
5. After Augustus
6. Conclusion: Imperial presuppositions and patterns of empire
Appendix 1. Cicero analysis
Appendix 2. Livy
Appendix 3. Imperium and provincia in legal writers
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Classical history / classical civilisation [HBLA1], Ancient history: to c 500 CE [HBLA]