Mae'r cynnwys hwn ar gael yn Saesneg yn unig.
Trosolwg
I am a researcher of Roman frontier life, focusing on the Roman military communities and their surroundings in Late Antiquity. My key interests lie in the interactions between the soldiers present in Roman provinces, provincial populations, and the people living in proximity to the empire. In particular I enjoy exploring how this affected identity expression and political power structures. The transformation of the Roman world has always fascinated me, and I aim to improve understanding of the interactions between extra-territorial groups and the Roman Empire in Late Antiquity. My current approach concerns the influence of military officials on trans-frontier regions and how this impacted social structures and identity in these areas. I have studied Roman military equipment at both Undergraduate and Master's level prior to my current PhD research, and am hoping to advance these studies further in my PhD thesis.
Ymchil
Traethawd ymchwil
The impact of the Roman military ‘officer class’ on the transformation of power and identity expression in trans-frontier social structures, 200-600 CE.
My research is focused upon exploring the ways in which the so-called professional officers of the Roman military affected the identity expression and power structures of trans-frontier societies such as the Garamantes of North Africa for example. It is clear from scholarly research that the Roman military can be detected as possessing a distinct and highly developed sense of their own identity within the wider Roman cultural landscape, based upon material culture such as dress, weapons and staffs of office. It is furthermore evident that, to phrase it in modern terms, 'middle-ranking' officers often presented the key contact between frontier populations and the Roman imperial state. Centurions for example could serve as magistrates in remote locations, such as can be seen in inscriptions from Britain, and it is known from a Late Antique archive discovered in Egypt that unit commanders were frequently embedded in the legal structures of the empire elsewhere. Commerce, as attested in some epigraphic evidence from North Africa, and literary evidence for the Rhine-Danube, was broadly monitored and administered by military officials. Trade across the provincial limes was not inconsiderable. As well as commodities bound for civilian markets in the provincial interior, many groups were invested in supplying the Roman military itself with food, clothing, materials for equipment and even with men for military service.
Based upon these factors, my research intends to develop our current understanding of the people who co-operated with the empire and bought into its political and economic structures, such as the Roman frontiers and their entrenched army units. Evidence from as diverse locations as North Africa, Scandinavia, 'post-Roman' Britain and perhaps Arabia may offer evidence that there was a much broader social impact on the empire's neighbours through the presence of military officials and their soldiers than simply the concept of raiding and punitive expeditions. I hope that by examining the evidence available I shall be able to assess the effects of militarised identity expression on these extra-territorial societies.
Goruchwyliaeth
