Book contents
- The Roman Republic and Political Culture
- Classical Scholarship in Translation
- The Roman Republic and Political Culture
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Part I Original Essays
- Part II Translations
- Chapter 4 Benevolence and Freedom
- Chapter 5 Capitol, Comitium, and Forum
- Chapter 6 Face to Face with the Ancestors
- Chapter 7 Rituals of Integration in the Roman Republic
- Chapter 8 The Message of the Medium
- Chapter 9 The memoria of the gentes as the Backbone of Collective Memory in Republican Rome
- Chapter 10 The Ritual Grammar of Institutionalized Politics
- Chapter 11 Aristocratic Roles and the Crisis of the Roman Republic
- Chapter 12 Monuments and Consensus
- Chapter 13 Publicity or Participation?
Chapter 11 - Aristocratic Roles and the Crisis of the Roman Republic
from Part II - Translations
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 January 2025
- The Roman Republic and Political Culture
- Classical Scholarship in Translation
- The Roman Republic and Political Culture
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Part I Original Essays
- Part II Translations
- Chapter 4 Benevolence and Freedom
- Chapter 5 Capitol, Comitium, and Forum
- Chapter 6 Face to Face with the Ancestors
- Chapter 7 Rituals of Integration in the Roman Republic
- Chapter 8 The Message of the Medium
- Chapter 9 The memoria of the gentes as the Backbone of Collective Memory in Republican Rome
- Chapter 10 The Ritual Grammar of Institutionalized Politics
- Chapter 11 Aristocratic Roles and the Crisis of the Roman Republic
- Chapter 12 Monuments and Consensus
- Chapter 13 Publicity or Participation?
Summary
The Roman senatorial elite laid claim to all roles of prominence in society. The very notion of nobilitas made prominence an all-inclusive virtue, in office-holding as much as in other public arenas. Indeed, scrutinizing an inherent tension between annual roles as embodied by the honores and more durable, sometimes life long, roles of prominence, Hans Beck argues that the aristocracy’s integrated claim to leadership wielded significant stabilizing impact upon Roman society. L. Quinctius Flamininus was expelled from the senate in 184 BCE but maintained his other social rules, his public standing, and his overall notability. In the century and a half that followed, Beck detects a gradual erosion of inclusive ideals of prominence. The crisis of the Republic is thus understood as a disintegration of social roles. In the era of the great extraordinary commands, the performance of prestige duties of the collective became less and less important. Augustus’ ostentatious unification of these under his watchful guard as princeps propelled a change in role behaviour that could easily be portrayed as a restitution of the Republican outlook.
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- The Roman Republic and Political CultureGerman Scholarship in Translation, pp. 328 - 349Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2025