Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik: 80 (1990) 81–100
Abstract
It is well established in scholarly literature that the incidence of formal, civic patronage in the eastern part of the Roman Empire during the Principate decreases precisely at the same time that it dramatically increases in the West. How is this phenomenon to be explained? Was there a different policy regarding civic patronage in the eastern and western parts of the Empire?
Unfortunately, the raw data for such a study has never been systematically collected and organized. Gelzer, Touloumakos and Chiranky have collected many cases for the Late Republic; Harmand provides some data for the Republic, but stresses the developments in the Principate and Dominate. Not one of them can be said to have provided a complete list.2 There is, however, general agreement on several issues. First, the bulk of the Greek evidence on civic patronage is Late Republican or Augustan. Second (and during this period), the cities of the Greek speaking part of the empire extended traditional Hellenistic titles (euergetes, soter, theos, etc.) to Roman magistrates more frequently than they extended the imported title “patron”. By my count, and based on incomplete data for the Late Republic, euergetes and soter are about four times more likely to occur epigraphically than is “patron”. Beginning with Tiberius, however, the traditional Hellenistic titles, with the exception of euergetes, cease to be used in respect to Roman magistrates.
John Nicols
Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik: 80 (1990) 81–100
Abstract
It is well established in scholarly literature that the incidence of formal, civic patronage in the eastern part of the Roman Empire during the Principate decreases precisely at the same time that it dramatically increases in the West. How is this phenomenon to be explained? Was there a different policy regarding civic patronage in the eastern and western parts of the Empire?
Unfortunately, the raw data for such a study has never been systematically collected and organized. Gelzer, Touloumakos and Chiranky have collected many cases for the Late Republic; Harmand provides some data for the Republic, but stresses the developments in the Principate and Dominate. Not one of them can be said to have provided a complete list.2 There is, however, general agreement on several issues. First, the bulk of the Greek evidence on civic patronage is Late Republican or Augustan. Second (and during this period), the cities of the Greek speaking part of the empire extended traditional Hellenistic titles (euergetes, soter, theos, etc.) to Roman magistrates more frequently than they extended the imported title “patron”. By my count, and based on incomplete data for the Late Republic, euergetes and soter are about four times more likely to occur epigraphically than is “patron”. Beginning with Tiberius, however, the traditional Hellenistic titles, with the exception of euergetes, cease to be used in respect to Roman magistrates.
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