Marcomannic Wars and Antonine Plague. Selected essays on two disasters that shook the Roman World

0535887 - ARÚB 2021 CZ eng, ger B - Monografie kniha jako celek
Erdrich, M. (ed.) - Komoróczy, Balázs (ed.) - Madejski, P. (ed.) - Vlach, Marek (ed.)
Marcomannic Wars and Antonine Plague. Selected essays on two disasters that shook the Roman World.
Brno: Czech Academy of Sciences, Institute of Archaeology, Brno, 2020. 298 s. Spisy Archeologického ústavu AV ČR Brno, 61. ISBN 978-80-7524-026-2. ISSN 1804-1345
Institucionální podpora: RVO:68081758
Klíčová slova: Roman Empire * Marcus Aurelius * Antonine Plague * Marcomannic Wars * Roman history * Roman archaeology
Obor OECD: Archaeology

The book written by the international team is dedicated to various aspects of one of the key stages in the ancient history of the European continent. The dynamic era of the reign of Emperor Marcus Aurelius (161-180 AD) was filled with extraordinary events affecting the population of the entire Roman Empire, as well as many tribes that lived beyond its borders. One of the largest pandemic events in history - the so-called Antonine Plague – presumably affected the lives of millions of people on three continents and erupted with varying intensity in various regions of the Roman Empire for several decades. Fragmentary testimonies of it have been preserved in literary, epigraphic and archaeological sources, which are presented and evaluated in the relevant chapters of the book from the point of view of the current state of knowledge. The Antonine Plague certainly also affected the course of another current event of no less far-reaching and destructive scale, the so-called Marcomannic Wars. The description of this extensive confrontation between the Roman Empire and a number of so-called barbarian tribes beyond its borders by eyewitnesses has not been preserved in literary sources, so it is still a great challenge for epigraphy and historiography to thoroughly and critically evaluate inscription sources and later references. However, many of the current conclusions of historical research presented in the book are increasingly being synchronized with the growing results of archaeological research. The Marcomannic Wars took place most intensively in the region of the Middle Danube, leaving an extremely abundant and for its knowledge completely unique archaeological sources of information. Leading specialists present a summary of current knowledge about the archaeological fingerprints of these wars in individual European regions, while the most extensive and most convincingly historically interpretable set of archaeological data from today´s Czech Republic, Slovakia and Austria is presented in the extensive and richly illustrated final chapter. The new book with chapters written in English and German thus brings current scientific views on the entire era of the reign of Emperor Marcus Aurelius. Unfortunately, the current global Covid-19 pandemic demonstrates the vulnerability of human communities to threats of this type, and it is only now becoming clear to the general public how much their strength depends on factors such as population density, mobility and the state of communication infrastructure. However, similar threats have often been present in human history and are therefore also the subject of historical and archaeological research. The book “Marcomannic Wars and Antonine Plague. Selected essays on two disasters that shook the Roman World“ coincidentally comes out in this difficult time and can undoubtedly be perceived as a contribution of historic sciences to the reflection not only of our past, but also of current conditions. The book, authored by specialists from the seven European countries, was published by the Institute of Archaeology of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Brno in cooperation with the Institute of Archaeology of the Marie Curie Skłodowska University in Lublin (Poland).
Trvalý link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0318713