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  • 428 AD: An Ordinary Year at the End of the Roman Empire
  • Claudia Rapp
428 AD: An Ordinary Year at the End of the Roman Empire. By Giusto Traina. Translated by Alan Cameron. (Princeton: Princeton University Press. 2009. Pp. xxii, 203. $24.95. ISBN 978-0-691-13669-1.)

This deceptively slim volume represents a pioneering effort to illuminate the entire political and cultural zone of the Roman Empire and its immediate neighbors at a given moment in time. The geographical starting point where the author—an Italian Armenologist, now a professor at the University of Rouen (France)—begins his panoramic tour of the Mediterranean is the end of the Kingdom of Armenia after the deposition of its last king by the Sasanian Empire of Persia, an event that would not have been possible without the collusion of the Roman Empire. From there, a total of twelve chapters take the reader on a journey along the eastern, northern, western, and southern shores of the later Roman Empire. The chronological anchor is well chosen: a century after Emperor Constantine introduced Christianity onto the political scene, twenty-one years before the Council of Chalcedon resulted in the first lasting schism within Christendom, two generations before the year 476 spelled the end of imperial rule in Rome, at a time when “barbarians” were actively seeking the benefits of an association with the Roman Empire while Visigoths, Vandals, and Huns were threatening the territorial unity of the Roman Empire. In the course of this journey, we encounter emperors, generals, and influential women at the court, pagan philosophers and Christian monks, anxious aristocrats and feisty bishops, as well as enterprising and ambitious “barbarians” of all stripes.

Traina wears his erudition lightly. It is only documented in the endnotes (an excellent resource in themselves), the maps that precede each chapter, and the index. The value of the book for classroom use would have been greatly enhanced by the inclusion of a bibliography, a list of abbreviations, and perhaps a glossary of terms.

The unique format requires a level of attention to detail that would otherwise be encountered only in historical novels, and Traina draws on recent archaeological findings to set the stage for his regional episodes. In contrast to a novelist, however, the historian cannot invent a plot to hold the narrative together or conjure up a protagonist to propel the action. Yet, Traina succeeds admirably in bringing out connections of people (imperial official Flavius Dionysius, Bishop Nestorius, and General Aetius make repeated appearances) or of ideas (the construction of the barbarian “other,” the definition of “heresy”). [End Page 342]

It is here that he also shows his true colors as a historian. As the title suggests, Traina’s interest is in the “end of the Roman Empire,” a notion that cannot be pinned down to a single event and hence requires explanation rather than mere description. Traina’s measure for the persistence of the Roman Empire is its territorial unity and integrity, combined with a strong and universally acknowledged imperial center. His tour around the Mediterranean is thus a well-chosen method to highlight the different fate of each region in terms of internal and external political challenges, economic prosperity, building and literary activity, and the slow progression of Christianization. Past events and future developments are conjured up to give historical depth into the narrative. Even with his spotlight on one specific year, the historian cannot escape the demand for a teleological narrative.

Written in an accessible style, Traina’s book will be read with profit by anyone interested in the transition from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages, whether from a political, cultural, or religious perspective. His nuanced treatment of the interaction between an increasingly beleaguered paganism and an increasingly assertive Christianity in the urban centers and rural backwaters around the Mediterranean should be especially welcome to anyone interested in the history of the Church.

Claudia Rapp
University of California at Los Angeles
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