Dieser Band vereinigt die Beitr�ge zu einem internationalen Kolloquium, das am 30. und 31. Mai 2003 an der LMU Muenchen stattgefunden hat. Er widmet sich der Frage, ob die Entwicklung des sp�tantiken St�dtewesens durch das Modell eines langsamen, jedoch nicht notwendigerweise negativ belegten �Wandels� oder doch eher durch das Paradigma des �Niederganges� der sp�tantiken Stadtkultur zu beschreiben ist. Er enth�lt deshalb sowohl �berblicke zur Situation des sp�tantiken St�dtewesens in ausgesuchten Kernregionen des Imperium Romanum als auch Beitr�ge zu wichtigen Strukturen und Institutionen innerhalb der St�dte, die fuer eine Beurteilung der Fragestellung von entscheidender Bedeutung sind. Inhaltsverzeichnis J.U. Krause/C. Witschel: Vorwort I. Die sp�tantiken St�dte im Westen des r�mischen Reiches: C. Lepelley: La cit� africaine tardive, de l'apog�e du IVe si�cle � l'effondrement du VIIe si�cle F. Marazzi: Cadavera urbium, nuove capitali e Roma aeterna: l'identit� urbana in Italia fra crisi, rinascita e propaganda (secoli III-V ) S.T. Loseby: Decline and Change in the Cities of Late Antique Gaul J. Guyon: La topographie chr�tiennes des villes de la Gaule M. Kulikowski: The Late Roman City in Spain II. Die sp�tantiken St�dte im Osten des r�mischen Reiches: P. van Minnen: The Changing World of the Cities of Later Roman Egypt S. Westphalen: �Niedergang oder Wandel?� - Die sp�tantiken St�dte in Syrien und Pal�stina aus arch�ologischer Sicht M. Waelkens et al.: The Late Antique to Early Byzantine City in Southwest Anatolia. Sagalassos and its Territory: A Case Study W. Tietz: Die lykischen St�dte in der Sp�tantike III. St�dtische Eliten und Institutionen in der Sp�tantike: G.A. Cecconi: Crisi e trasformazioni del governo municipale in Occidente fra IV e VI secolo A. Laniado: Le christianisme e l'�volution des institutions municipales du Bas-Empire: l'exemple du defensor civitatis N. Lenski: Servi Publici in Late Antiquity C. Witschel: Der epigraphic habit in der Sp�tantike: Das Beispiel der Provinz Venetia et Histria J.U. Krause: �berlegungen zur Sozialgeschichte des Klerus im 5./6. Jh. n. Chr. M. Whitby: Factions, Bishops, Violence and Urban Decline IV. Ausblick: J.H.W.G. Liebeschuetz: Transformation and Decline: Are the Two Really Incompatible? Register: Sachregister, Geographisches Register.

The first full-scale history of Theoderic and the Goths in more than seventy-five years, tracing the transformation of a divided kingdom into a great power In the year 493, the leader of a vast confederation of Gothic warriors, their wives, and children personally cut down Odoacer, the man famous for deposing the last Roman emperor in 476. That leader became Theoderic the Great (454–526). This engaging history of his life and reign immerses readers in the world of the warrior-king who ushered in decades of peace and stability in Italy as king of Goths and Romans. Theoderic transformed his roving “warrior nation” from the periphery of the Roman world into a standing army that protected his taxpaying Roman subjects with the support of the Roman elite. With a ruling strategy of “integration through separation,” Theoderic not only stabilized Italy but also extended his kingdom to the western Balkans, southern France, and the Iberian Peninsula. Using sources as diverse as letters, poetry, coins, and mosaics, Hans-Ulrich Wiemer brings readers into the world of Theoderic’s court, from Gothic warriors and their families to the notables, artisans, and shopkeepers of Rome and Ravenna to the peasants and enslaved people who tilled the soil on grand rural estates. This book offers a fascinating history of the leader who brought peace to Italy after the disintegration of the Roman Empire.

Museum Archetypes and Collecting in the Ancient World offers a broad, yet detailed analysis of the phenomenon of collecting in the ancient world through a museological lens. In the last two decades this has provided a basis for exciting interdisciplinary explorations by archaeologists, art historians, and historians of the history of collecting. This compendium of essays by different specialists is the first general overview of the reasons why ancient civilizations from Archaic Greece to the Late Classical/Early Christian period amassed objects and displayed them together in public, private and imaginary contexts. It addresses the ranges of significance these proto-museological conditions gave to the objects both in sacred and secular settings.

Der auf den Referaten einer Tagung beruhende Band stellt Aspekte des mittelalterlichen und frühneuzeitlichen Städtewesens Mittel- und Westeuropas und des byzantinischen, später osmanischen Reichs vergleichend gegenüber. In jeweils zwei Beiträgen werden ausgehend von einem gemeinsamen Fragenkatalog grundlegende Themen der Städteforschung sowohl aus der „westlichen“ als auch aus der „östlichen“ Perspektive behandelt. Themenfelder sind Kontinuitäten und Brüche in der langfristigen Entwicklung, der städtische Raum, Rechtsverhältnisse und Eliten, theologische und sakrale Aspekte. Auch Ergebnisse und Methoden der Archäologie und der Georeferenzierung in der Stadtgeschichtsforschung sind einbezogen.

Between 270 and 535 AD the city of Rome experienced dramatic changes. The once glorious imperial capital was transformed into the much humbler centre of western Christendom in a process that redefined its political importance, size, and identity. Urban Space and Aristocratic Power in Late Antique Rome examines these transformations by focusing on the city's powerful elite, the senatorial aristocracy, and exploring their involvement in a process of urban change that would mark the end of the ancient world and the birth of the Middle Ages in the eyes of contemporaries and modern scholars. It argues that the late antique history of Rome cannot be described as merely a product of decline; instead, it was a product of the dynamic social and cultural forces that made the city relevant at a time of unprecedented historical changes. Combining the city's unique literary, epigraphic, and archaeological record, the volume offers a detailed examination of aspects of city life as diverse as its administration, public building, rituals, housing, and religious life to show how the late Roman aristocracy gave a new shape and meaning to urban space, identifying itself with the largest city in the Mediterranean world to an extent unparalleled since the end of the Republican period.