Late Antiquity is a rough periodization (c. AD 300 - 600) used by historians and other scholars to describe the interval between Classical Antiquity and the Middle Ages in both mainland Europe and the Mediterranean world: generally between the decline of the western Roman Empire from the 3rd century AD onward, to the Islamic conquests, and the re-forming of Eastern Europe under the Byzantine Empire. The term Spätantike, literally "late antiquity", has been used by German-language historians since its popularization by Alois Riegl in the early Twentieth Century.^[1] It was given currency in English partly by the writings of Peter Brown. Periodization is the attempt to categorize or divide time into discrete named blocks. ... Dionysius Exiguus invented Anno Domini years to date Easter. ... Franks penetrate into northern Belgium (approximate date). ... The population of the Earth rises to about 208 million people. ... Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, which begins roughly with the earliest-recorded Greek poetry of Homer (7th century BC), and continues through the rise of Christianity and the fall of the Western Roman Empire (5th century AD... The Middle Ages formed the middle period in a traditional schematic division of European history into three ages: the classical civilization of Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and modern times, beginning with the Renaissance. ... For other uses, see Europe (disambiguation). ... The Mediterranean Sea is an intercontinental sea positioned between Europe to the north, Africa to the south and Asia to the east, covering an approximate area of 2. ... The Roman Empire is not the Holy Roman Empire (843-1806). ... (2nd century - 3rd century - 4th century _ other centuries) Events The Sassanid dynasty of Persia launches a war to reconquer lost lands in the Roman east. ... Age of the Caliphs The initial Islamic conquests (632-732) began with the death of Muhammad, were followed by a century of rapid Arab and Islamic expansion, and ended with the Battle of Tours—resulting in a vast Islamic empire and area of influence that stretched from India, across the... Pre-1989 division between the West (grey) and Eastern Bloc (orange) superimposed on current national boundaries: Russia (dark orange), other countries of the former USSR (medium orange),members of the Warsaw pact (light orange), and other former Communist regimes not aligned with Moscow (lightest orange). ... “Byzantine” redirects here. ... Alois Riegl, ca. ... Peter Brown is a prominent historian of Late Antiquity. ...

The continuities between imperial Rome, as it was reorganized by Diocletian, and the Early Middle Ages are stressed by writers who wish to emphasize that: the seeds of medieval culture were already developing in the Christianized empire, and indeed continued to do so in the Eastern, or "Byzantine" Empire, while some migrating Germanic tribes such as the Ostrogoths and Visigoths saw themselves as perpetuating the "Roman" tradition. While the usage "Late Antiquity" suggests that the social and cultural priorities of Classical Antiquity endured throughout Europe into the Middle Ages, the usage of "Early Middle Ages" emphasizes a break with the classical past, and the term "Migrations Period" emphasizes the disruptions in the same period of time. Roman Empire between AD 60 and 400 with major cities. ... Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus (c. ... Justinians wife Theodora and her retinue, in a 6th century mosaic from the Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna. ... St Francis Xavier converting the Paravas: a 19th-century image of the docile heathen The historical phenomenon of Christianization, the conversion of individuals to Christianity or the conversion of entire peoples at once, also includes the practice of converting pagan practices, pagan religious imagery, pagan sites and the pagan calendar... Byzantium (Greek: Βυζάντιον) was an ancient Greek city, which, according to legend, was founded by Greek colonists from Megara in 667 BC and named after their king Byzas or Byzantas (Βύζας or Βύζαντας in Greek). ... Thor/Donar, Germanic thunder god. ... This article deals with the continental Ostrogoths. ... Migrations The Visigoths (Western Goths) were one of two main branches of the Goths, an East Germanic tribe (the Ostrogoths being the other). ... Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, which begins roughly with the earliest-recorded Greek poetry of Homer (7th century BC), and continues through the rise of Christianity and the fall of the Western Roman Empire (5th century AD... For other uses, see Europe (disambiguation). ... The Middle Ages formed the middle period in a traditional schematic division of European history into three ages: the classical civilization of Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and modern times, beginning with the Renaissance. ... The German term Völkerwanderung (lit. ...

Religion

If there was a singular important transformation in Late Antiquity, it was the formation and evolution of the Abrahamic religions: Christianity, post-diaspora Judaism, and eventually Islam; the latter marking a decisive end to Late Antiquity wherever it reached. map showing the prevalence of Abrahamic (purple) and Dharmic (yellow) religions in each country. ... Topics in Christianity Movements · Denominations · Other religions Ecumenism · Preaching · Prayer Music · Liturgy · Calendar Symbols · Art · Criticism Important figures Apostle Paul · Church Fathers Constantine · Athanasius · Augustine Anselm · Aquinas · Palamas · Luther Calvin · Wesley Arius · Marcion of Sinope Archbishop of Canterbury · Catholic Pope Coptic Pope · Ecumenical Patriarch Christianity Portal This box:      Christianity is... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... For people named Islam, see Islam (name). ...

The rise of Christianity as the official state religion of the Roman Empire, starting with the conversion of Emperor Constantine the Great in 312, clearly marked an end to the Classical world. By the late 4th century, the "Christian revolution" had almost completely supplanted over a millennium of Graeco-Roman religious culture, transforming the Classical Roman world "rustling with the presence of many divine spirits" (Brown, Authority and the Sacred). Head of Constantines colossal statue at Musei Capitolini Gaius Flavius Valerius Aurelius Constantinus[1] (February 27, 272–May 22, 337), commonly known as Constantine I, Constantine the Great, or (among Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic[2] Christians) Saint Constantine, was a Roman Emperor, proclaimed Augustus by his troops on... October 28 — Battle of Milvian Bridge: Constantine I defeats Maxentius and becomes the only Roman Emperor in the West. ...

The birth of Christian monasticism in the deserts of Egypt in 4th century, which initially operated outside the authority of the main Church, would become so successful that by the 8th century it penetrated the Church and became the primary Christian rule within. Monasticism was not the only new Christian movement to appear in Late Antiquity. Christian movements notable for their unconventional practices include the Grazers, holy men who ate only grass and chained themselves up like barnyard animals; the Holy Fool movement, in which acting like a fool was considered more divine than folly; and the Stylites movement, where one practitioner lived atop a 50-foot pole for 40-years. The Order of Friars Minor is a major mendicant movement founded by Saint Francis of Assisi. ... For other uses, see abrasion. ... The yurodivy (accented on the second syllable, юро́дивый) is the Russian version of the holy fool. ... Pillar-Saints (Stylites, from Greek stylos) are a class of ascetic who, from early Christian times, retired from the world to the Syrian Desert, and, perched on pillars, used to spend days and nights in fasting and praying, in the belief that by mortification of their bodies they would ensure...

Islam appeared in the 7th century and the Muslim conquests fundamentally changed both the Eastern and Western empires in different ways. See also Pirenne Thesis. For people named Islam, see Islam (name). ... Age of the Caliphs The initial Muslim conquests (632–732), also referred to as the Islamic conquests or Arab conquests,[1] began after the death of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad. ... Henri Pirenne (December 23, 1862, Verviers - October 25, 1935, Uccle) was a leading Belgian historian. ...

Late Antiquity marks the decline of Roman state religion, circumscribed in degrees by edicts inspired by Christian advisers to 4th century emperors, and a period of dynamic religious experimentation and spirituality with many syncretic sects, some formed centuries earlier, such as Gnosticism or Neoplatonism and the Chaldaean oracles, some novel, such as hermeticism. Religion in ancient Rome combined several different cult practices and embraced more than a single set of beliefs. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... Neoplatonism (also Neo-Platonism) is the modern term for a school of religious and mystical philosophy that took shape in the 3rd century AD, based on the teachings of Plato and earlier Platonists. ... The Chaldean Oracles are a body of literature that consists mainly of Greek commentary on a single mystery_poem that was believed to have originated in Chaldea (Babylon). ... Hermetica refers to a category of popular Late Antique literature purporting to contain secret wisdom, and generally attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. ...

Many of the new religions relied on the emergence of the parchment codex (bound book) over the papyrus volumen (scroll), the former allowing for quicker access to key materials and easier portability than the fragile scroll, thus fueling the rise of synoptic exegesis. German parchmenter, 1568 Parchment is a material for the pages of a book or codex, made from fine calf skin, sheep skin or goat skin. ... For other uses, see Papyrus (disambiguation). ... Exegesis (from the Greek to lead out) involves an extensive and critical interpretation of an authoritative text, especially of a holy scripture, such as of the Old and New Testaments of the Bible, the Talmud, the Midrash, the Quran, etc. ...

Laity vs clerical

Within the recently legitimized Christian community of the 4th century, a division could be seen between the laity and a celibate male leadership, who were removed from the traditional Roman motivations of public and private life marked by pride, ambition and kinship solidarity, and who were wholly unlike the married pagan leadership. Unlike later strictures on priestly celibacy, celibacy in Late Antique Christianity tended to take the form of abstinence from sexual relations after marriage, and it came to be the expected norm for urban clergy. Celibate and detached, the upper clergy became an elite equal in prestige, to their admirers, to the traditional prestige of urban notables, the potentes (Brown 1987 p 270). In religious organizations, the laity comprises all lay persons collectively. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... A vow of clerical celibacy is the promise of a Christian priest or bishop to remain unmarried, or, in some churches, of a deacon or priest not to remarry if his wife dies. ...

The Favourites of the Emperor Honorius, 1883: John William Waterhouse expresses the sense of moral decadence that coloured the 19th century historical view of the 5th century.

Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 457 pixelsFull resolution (900 × 514 pixel, file size: 169 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects are not listed): Honorius (emperor) Late antiquity ... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 457 pixelsFull resolution (900 × 514 pixel, file size: 169 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects are not listed): Honorius (emperor) Late antiquity ... John William Waterhouse. ...

Political transformation

The Late Antique period also saw a wholesale transformation of the political and social basis of life in and around the Roman Empire. Politics is the process by which decisions are made within groups. ... For other uses, see Society (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Roman Empire (disambiguation). ...

The Roman citizen elite in the 2nd and 3rd centuries, under the pressure of taxation and the ruinous cost of presenting spectacular public entertainments in the traditional cursus honorum, had found under the Antonines that security could only be obtained by combining their established roles in the local town with new worldly ones, as servants and representatives of a geographically distant Emperor. After Constantine centralized affairs in Constantinople in the early 4th century, the Late Antique upper class was divided among those who had access to the far-away centralized administration (in concert with the great landowners), and those who did not—though they were well-born and thoroughly educated, a classical education was no longer the path to success, rather it was one of access, privileged and often corruption in the centralized and bureaucratic state. Room at the top of Late Antique society was smaller and more status competitive, the plain toga that had identified all members of the ruling class indifferently was replaced with silk gowns, court vestments and massive jewelry. Ordinary Magistrates Extraordinary Magistrates Titles and Honors Emperor Politics and Law The cursus honorum (Latin: course of honour) was the sequential order of public offices held by aspiring politicians in both the Roman Republic and the early Empire. ... The Antonines most often referred to were two successive Roman Emperors who ruled between A.D. 138 and 180: Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius, famous for their skilled leadership. ... Latifundia are pieces of landed property covering tremendous areas. ...

Cities

This period saw the decline of the Western Roman empire into city-states (Rome, Ravenna, Trier, etc) and independent units (Francia, Britannia, Hispania). Concurrently, the continuity of the eastern Roman empire at Constantinople meant that the turning-point for the Greek East came later, as the Byzantine Empire focused on the Balkans. In Europe there was also a general decline in urban populations. Rome went from a population of 800,000 in the beginning of the period to a population of 30,000 by the end of the period. A similar though less marked decline in urban population occurred in Constantinople. As a whole, the period of late antiquity was accompanied by an overall population decline in Western Europe, and a reversion to a more subsistence economy. Markets disappeared, and there was a reversion to a greater degree of domestic production and consumption. Motto Senatus Populusque Romanus The Western Roman Empire in 395. ... “Byzantine” redirects here. ... The term Greek East is used to define the territories of the Greek-speaking, Hellenized, Eastern Roman Empire, as opposed to the Latin West. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ...

Public building

In the cities the strained economics of Roman over-expansion stopped growth. New public building in Late Antiquity came directly or indirectly from the emperors and their representatives, and the privileged supplies of grain and oil, available only to the citizen class, needy or not, was unbroken until the 5th century. But the elite appeared less often in the forums; they withdrew in the cities to an opulent domus but more frequently to the private luxuries of the villa. The basilica of the great man, from Africa to Britannia, functioned in the 4th century as a substitute for the stoas and public basilicas associated with forums and traditional outdoor public life. In the Christianized basilica, the bishop took the chair in the apse reserved in secular structures for the magistrate—or the Emperor himself— as the representative here and now of Christ Pantocrator, the Ruler of All, his characteristic Late Antique icon. This article does not cite any references or sources. ... The Albertian Villa Medici in Fiesole: terraced grounds on a sloping site. ... St. ... For other uses, see Pantokrator (disambiguation). ... Look up icon in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

Sculpture and art

Main articles: Medieval art and Byzantine art

Roman art during Late Antiquity served as a monumental transition from classical idealized realism introduced by the Greeks to the more iconic, stylized art of the Middle Ages. Unlike classical art, Late Antique art does not emphasize the beauty and movement of the body, but rather, hints at the spiritual reality behind its subjects. Additionally, mirroring the rise of Christianity and the collapse of the western Roman Empire, painting and freestanding sculpture gradually fell from favor in the artistic community. Replacing them were greater interests in mosaics, architecture, and relief sculpture. Byzantine monumental Church mosaics are a crowning glory of Medieval Art. ... The most famous of the surviving Byzantine mosaics of the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople - the image of Christ Pantocrator on the walls of the upper southern gallery. ... Realism is a style of painting that depicts the actuality of what the eyes can see. ...

As military heroes and emperors emerged from the Roman provinces in the 3rd century, they brought with them their own regional influences and artistic tastes. For example, artists jettisoned the classical portrayal of the human body for one that was more rigid and frontal. This is markedly evident in the combined porphyry portraits of the four Roman tetrarchs. With these stubby figures clutching each other and their swords, all individualism, naturalism, and idealism are lost. In nearly all artistic media, simpler shapes were adopted and once natural designs were abstracted. Additionally hierarchy of scale overtook the preeminence of perspective and other classical models for representing spatial organization. Porphyry is a very hard igneous rock consisting of large-grained crystals, such as feldspar or quartz, dispersed in a fine-grained feldspathic matrix or groundmass. ... The Tetrarchs, a porphyry sculpture sacked from a Byzantine palace in 1204 CE, Treasury of St. ... Individualism is a term used to describe a moral, political, or social outlook that stresses human independence and the importance of individual self-reliance and liberty. ... Naturalism in art refers to the depiction of realistic objects in a natural setting. ... This section may require cleanup to meet Wikipedias quality standards. ...

The Tetrarchs, a porphyry sculpture sacked from a Byzantine palace in 1204, Treasury of St. Marks, Venice.

Nearly all of these more abstracted conventions could be observed in the glittering mosaics of the era. Although the pebble mosaics had been used for centuries in Asia Minor, a new technique employing tesserae rose as the method of choice by Christians. The glazed surfaces of the tesserae sparkled in the light and illuminated the basilica churches. Unlike their fresco predecessors, much more emphasis was placed on demonstrating a symbolic fact rather than on rendering a realistic scene. It is important to mention that as time progressed during the late antiquity period, art become more Christian themed. Within this Christian subcategory of Roman art, dramatic changes were also taking place. Jesus Christ was more commonly depicted as a teacher or as the “good Shepherd”. Moreover, Jesus was given Roman elite status, and shroud in purple robes like the emperors. Statue of the Tetrarchs, St Marks Basilica, Venice (better quality image) This image has been released into the public domain by the copyright holder, its copyright has expired, or it is ineligible for copyright. ... Statue of the Tetrarchs, St Marks Basilica, Venice (better quality image) This image has been released into the public domain by the copyright holder, its copyright has expired, or it is ineligible for copyright. ... A tessera (plural: tesserae) is an individual tile in a mosaic, usually formed in the shape of a cube. ... For other uses, see Fresco (disambiguation). ...

As for luxury arts, manuscript illumination on vellum and parchment emerged in the late sixth century as a spiritually overwhelming display of Christian scripture in text. Also, ivory carvings were greatly desired by Roman generals (for illustrating their victories in processions) and the Church (usually for creating religious imagery on diptyches and triptyches). Ivory consular diptych of Areobindus, Byzantium, 506 AD, Louvre museum A diptych is any object with two flat plates attached at a hinge. ... The Raising of the Cross, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekathedraal, Antwerp A triptych (from the Greek tri- three + ptychē fold) is a work of art (usually a panel painting) which is divided into three sections, or three carved panels which are hinged together. ...

• Arch of Constantine
• Spolia

The Arch of Constantine seen from the Colosseum The arch seen from Via Triumphalis Detail of the arch (southern side, left) The Arch of Constantine is a triumphal arch in Rome, situated between the Colosseum and the Palatine Hill. ... Datation of the reliefs in the Arch of Constantine. ...

Literature

In the field of literature, Late Antiquity is known for the declining use of classical Greek and Latin, and the rise of literary cultures in Syriac, Armenian, Arabic, Coptic, vulgar Latin and, in some cases, Romance dialects. It also marks a shift in literary style, with a preference for encyclopedic works in a dense and allusive style, consisting of summaries of earlier works often dressed up in elaborate allegorical garb (e.g. De Nuptiis Mercurii et Philologiae (The Marriage of Mercury and Philology) of Martianus Capella, and the De Arithmetica, De Musica, and Consolatio Philosophiae of Boethius—both later key works in Medieval education). Syriac ( Suryāyā) is an Eastern Aramaic language that was once spoken across much of the Fertile Crescent. ... Arabic ( or just ) is the largest living member of the Semitic language family in terms of speakers. ... The Coptic language is a direct descendant of the ancient Egyptian language which was once written in Egyptian hieroglyphic, hieratic, and demotic scripts. ... Vulgar Latin, as in this political graffito at Pompeii, was the speech of ordinary people of the Roman Empire — different from the classical Latin used by the Roman elite. ... The Romance languages (sometimes referred to as Romanic languages) are a branch of the Indo-European language family, comprising all the languages that descend from Latin, the language of the Roman Empire. ... A dialect (from the Greek word διάλεκτος, dialektos) is a variety of a language characteristic of a particular group of the languages speakers. ... Martianus Minneus Felix Capella was a writer of the late Latin period, whose career flourished some time during the 5th century, before the year 439. ... This early printed book has many hand-painted illustrations depicting Lady Philosophy and scenes of daily life in fifteenth-century Ghent (1485) Consolation of Philosophy (Latin: Consolatio Philosophiae) is a philosophical work by Boethius written in about the year 524 AD. It has been described as the single most important... Boethius teaching his students (initial in a 1385 Italian manuscript of the Consolation of Philosophy). ...

Notes

References

• Peter Brown, The World of Late Antiquity Ad 150-750, 1989, ISBN 0-393-95803-5
• Peter Brown, 1987. "The World of Late Antiquity Ad 150-750" in A History of Private Life: 1. from Pagan Antiquity to Byzantium, Paul Veyne, editor, ISBN 0-393-95803-5
• Peter Brown, Authority and the Sacred : Aspects of the Christianisation of the Roman World, Routledge, 1997, ISBN 0-521-59557-6
• Peter Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity 200-1000 AD, Blackwell, 2003, ISBN 0-631-22138-7
• Averil Cameron, The Later Roman Empire: Ad 284-430, Harvard University Press, 1993, ISBN 0-674-51194-8
• Averil Cameron, The Mediterranean World in Late Antiquity Ad 395-600 (Routledge History of the Ancient World), 1993, ISBN 0-415-01421-2
• Averil Cameron et al. (editors), The Cambridge Ancient History, vols. 12-14, Cambridge 1997ff.
• Fred Kleiner, Christin Mamiya, & Richard Tansey, Gardner's Art Through the Ages, 11th edition, Harcourt Publishers, New York, 2001, p. 292- 323
• Bertrand Lancon, Rome in Late Antiquity : AD 313 - 604, Routledge, 2001
• Stephen Mitchell, A history of the Later Roman Empire. AD 284-641, Blackwell, London 2006.
• Barbara Rosenwein, A Short History of the Middle Ages, 2nd edition, Broadview Press, New York, 2004, p. 30-39

Peter Robert Lamont Brown (b. ... Dame Averil Cameron, DBE, CBE, FBA, is Warden of Keble College, Oxford, Professor of Late Antique and Byzantine History in the University of Oxford, and Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford. ...

External links

• Worlds of Late Antiquity, from the University of Pennsylvania
• Mosaic, source documents and key themes in Late Antiquity.
• The End of the Classical World, source documents from the Internet Medieval Sourcebook
• Overview of Late Antiquity, from ORB [1]
• ORB Encyclopedia's section on Late Antiquity in the Mediterranean from ORB [2]