Stanislav Doležal | University of South Bohemia (original) (raw)

Books by Stanislav Doležal

Palgrave Macmillan, 2022

Explores political developments during the reign of Constantine, 306–337. Traces the history of t... more Explores political developments during the reign of Constantine, 306–337. Traces the history of the Roman Empire through the third century, placing Constantine in context. Highlights the essential continuity between Constantine's reign and those of the Illyrian emperors. Palgrave Macmillan, book series New Approaches to Byzantine History and Culture.

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Jihočeská univerzita, České Budějovice, 2020

The monograph „Constantine: The Path to Power“ deals mainly with political events in the Roman Em... more The monograph „Constantine: The Path to Power“ deals mainly with political events in the Roman Empire in the beginning of the 4th century CE, when a very ambitious army officer called Constantine emerged from the remains of an interesting system of government called the Tetrarchy to get possession of the whole Empire and to establish his own dynasty. However, the author´s intention is not only to present to the reader a thorough analysis of the political situation at the time of Constantine´s rise to power, which is based on sources and scholarly literature, but also to explain the political developments under the Tetrarchy period and the so-called crisis of the 3rd century, to put Constantine´s career and many of his decisions into historical context and thus to make them more understandable.

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Prague, 2008

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Prague, 2012

Two historical monographs, usually called Getica and Romana, by Jordanes (fl. ca 550 CE), transla... more Two historical monographs, usually called Getica and Romana, by Jordanes (fl. ca 550 CE), translated from Latin to Czech and accompanied by an extensive commentary (over 1000 notes).

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Papers by Stanislav Doležal

Graeco-Latina Brunensia 29/1, 2024

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In the article, the author tried to identify the main changes that the imperial court underwent d... more In the article, the author tried to identify the main changes that the imperial court underwent during the period of tetrarchy and, by comparing it with earlier periods, to see what was new about it. Of course, the imperial court of Diocletian and other tetrarchs, including Constantine, was an institution that was constantly evolving, not least due to the changing political situation (each emperor created his own court after ascending the throne), but also due to the mobility of the imperial court and the very large and varied agenda of the consistory, which came to form a core of the imperial court during the second part of Constantine’s reign.

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Royal Insignia of Late Antiquity from Mšec and Řevničov. Magnificent Finds from the Migration Period from Central Bohemia, 2023

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Graeco-Latina Brunensia, 2022

This article deals with the question of Roman control of the Agri Decumates in the age of the Tet... more This article deals with the question of Roman control of the Agri Decumates in the age of the Tetrarchy, summing up its history from the 260s and particularly focusing on the campaign of Diocletian and Maximian in 288. The fate of the Agri Decumates is compared to the fate of the old Roman Dacia, which was abandoned by the Romans in about 271 to become a theatre of operations for Emperor Constantine in the 330s. Although Diocletian and Maximian may have achieved some success in their campaign, it appears to have been short-lived and comparable to what Constantine achieved, or rather failed to achieve, in Dacia.

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Auriga (ZJKF) 62/1, pp. 7-24, 2020

The article revisits all the relevant sources and all recent major works on Constantine and argue... more The article revisits all the relevant sources and all recent major works on Constantine and argues that the most probable year of birth of Constantine the Great is 272 CE. Furthermore, his father, the Emperor Constantius I, was in all probability born in around 240 and not, as is sometimes supposed, in around 250 CE. It is very probable that Constantius as a military tribune helped in 271 his master Aurelian secure Asia Minor. During this mission, probably in June, he met Helena, a girl of a very low social standing, who was about ten years his junior, and fathered Constantine. It is also argued that owing to different social standing, Constantius and Helena were not legally married. The article once more disproves the „official lies“ spread by some of our sources and by Constantine himself: namely, that Constantine was born in 280s and that he was related to the Emperor Claudius Gothicus.

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Graeco-Latina Brunensia, 2020

The article deals with the twin lie, devised by the Emperor Constantine the Great in 310: his fak... more The article deals with the twin lie, devised by the Emperor Constantine the Great in 310: his fake ancestry (his relationship to the Emperor Claudius Gothicus) and his alleged „pagan vision“ of Apollo (which was either a lie or, perhaps less probably, a product of hallucination). Both lies served to buttress his shaken political position in that year and to provide him with a hereditary claim to rule. This claim was presented as superior to the tetrarchic principles of succession which were already flouted by Constantine in 306 by his usurpation, and to his elevation to the position of augustus by Maximian in 307. In contrast, the story of the famous „Christian vision“ was most probably fabricated by Eusebius after Constantine´s death and bears no relation (not even a resemblance) to the „pagan vision“ of Constantine.

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Eirene 55, 2019

The article attempts to construe the chronology of Constantine’s campaigns against the Goths and ... more The article attempts to construe the chronology of Constantine’s campaigns against the Goths and Sarmatians in 332 and 334, respectively, and to assess the extent of Roman control of Gothia (the former Roman Dacia) in the following years. The article also argues that there is a link between military operations of Constantine on the lower Danube in 334 and colonies or military units of Sarmatians in Italy, possibly in Gaul and elsewhere in the Empire, which are attested by a number of sources, primarily the Notitia Dignitatum.

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Graeco-Latina Brunensia 24, 2019

The article argues that Constantine the Great, until he was recognized by Galerius, the senior Em... more The article argues that Constantine the Great, until he was recognized by Galerius, the senior Emperor of the Tetrarchy, was an usurper with no right to the imperial power, nothwithstanding his claim that his father, the Emperor Constantius I, conferred upon him the imperial title before he died. Tetrarchic principles, envisaged by Diocletian, were specifically put in place to supersede and override blood kinship. Constantine’s accession to power started as a military coup in which a military unit composed of barbarian soldiers seems to have played an important
role.

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Eirene, 2018

In his New History, Zosimus narrates that some time before 324, Sarmatian warriors led by king Ra... more In his New History, Zosimus narrates that some time before 324, Sarmatian warriors led by king Rausimod and coming from an area near the Sea of Azov, had crossed the Danube and laid waste to Roman territory before being pursued by Constantine and utterly destroyed on the barbarian soil. I argue that their home was probably the Bosporan kingdom which was then largely Sarmatian in its culture, and that the province which suffered from their incursion was Scythia minor, and not Moesia or even Pannonia, as scholarly accounts tend to claim. Other Sarmatian attacks on the Danubian frontier, recorded by the poet Optatianus, and a Gothic invasion, remembered by the Origo Constantini imperatoris, were in all probability different events and should not be conflated with Rausimod’s Sarmatian invasion, although the king himself may have been a Goth or a Sarmatian with a Gothic name. The year of both invasions seems to be 323, the Gothic invasion preceding the Sarmatian one. On the verge of the civil war, Constantine encroached Licinius’ territory to destroy Rausimod, to defy Licinius, and to show the world that he is now in control of the whole Danubian frontier.

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Auriga, 2018

The article deals with the attitude of the late Roman poet and former high-ranking official Rutil... more The article deals with the attitude of the late Roman poet and former high-ranking official Rutilius Namatianus towards two Western generalissimos of his time: Stilicho and Constantius, both of whom he probably knew personally. Rutilius attacks the former and extols the latter without supplying his readers with adequate reasons. Their stance on the Visigoths presents itself as a suitable explanation: Rutilius hates the Goths and therefore gives praise to Constantius for subduing them. Stilicho, charged by Rutilius and several other sources as a traitor who allowed Alaric to plunder Italy, is therefore to Rutilius an enemy of the Roman world. Personal or religious reasons of Rutilius´ hatred seem to play a lesser role.

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Graecolatina Pragensia, 2017

There has been an assumption in the scholarly literature about Emperor Hadrian´s meeting with a P... more There has been an assumption in the scholarly literature about Emperor Hadrian´s meeting with a Parthian king in about 123 CE. This assumption, based on a single passage in a source whose veracity and reliability has repeatedly been questioned (i.e., Historia Augusta), cannot be proved and appears to be false. However, Hadrian´s summit has been accepted without question as a fact in many scholarly books, although some authors chose to ignore this doubtful event. In this article, the whole history of Romano-Parthian relations is briefly summed up and the author tries to point out that, in reality, no summit of heads of these two states ever occurred.

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There is a brief mention of a learned man Jamblichus in the Romana, a treatise on Roman history b... more There is a brief mention of a learned man Jamblichus in the Romana, a treatise on Roman history by Jordanes. No known author can be identified with him but there was a physician Jamblichus living in Constantinople in the mid-6th century, known only through a poem by Leontius, a lawyer who also lived in the mid-6th century Constantinople. The article argues that this Jamblichus may very well have been the Jordanes´ Jamblichus.

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Palgrave Macmillan, 2022

Explores political developments during the reign of Constantine, 306–337. Traces the history of t... more Explores political developments during the reign of Constantine, 306–337. Traces the history of the Roman Empire through the third century, placing Constantine in context. Highlights the essential continuity between Constantine's reign and those of the Illyrian emperors. Palgrave Macmillan, book series New Approaches to Byzantine History and Culture.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Jihočeská univerzita, České Budějovice, 2020

The monograph „Constantine: The Path to Power“ deals mainly with political events in the Roman Em... more The monograph „Constantine: The Path to Power“ deals mainly with political events in the Roman Empire in the beginning of the 4th century CE, when a very ambitious army officer called Constantine emerged from the remains of an interesting system of government called the Tetrarchy to get possession of the whole Empire and to establish his own dynasty. However, the author´s intention is not only to present to the reader a thorough analysis of the political situation at the time of Constantine´s rise to power, which is based on sources and scholarly literature, but also to explain the political developments under the Tetrarchy period and the so-called crisis of the 3rd century, to put Constantine´s career and many of his decisions into historical context and thus to make them more understandable.

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Prague, 2008

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Prague, 2012

Two historical monographs, usually called Getica and Romana, by Jordanes (fl. ca 550 CE), transla... more Two historical monographs, usually called Getica and Romana, by Jordanes (fl. ca 550 CE), translated from Latin to Czech and accompanied by an extensive commentary (over 1000 notes).

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Graeco-Latina Brunensia 29/1, 2024

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

In the article, the author tried to identify the main changes that the imperial court underwent d... more In the article, the author tried to identify the main changes that the imperial court underwent during the period of tetrarchy and, by comparing it with earlier periods, to see what was new about it. Of course, the imperial court of Diocletian and other tetrarchs, including Constantine, was an institution that was constantly evolving, not least due to the changing political situation (each emperor created his own court after ascending the throne), but also due to the mobility of the imperial court and the very large and varied agenda of the consistory, which came to form a core of the imperial court during the second part of Constantine’s reign.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Royal Insignia of Late Antiquity from Mšec and Řevničov. Magnificent Finds from the Migration Period from Central Bohemia, 2023

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Graeco-Latina Brunensia, 2022

This article deals with the question of Roman control of the Agri Decumates in the age of the Tet... more This article deals with the question of Roman control of the Agri Decumates in the age of the Tetrarchy, summing up its history from the 260s and particularly focusing on the campaign of Diocletian and Maximian in 288. The fate of the Agri Decumates is compared to the fate of the old Roman Dacia, which was abandoned by the Romans in about 271 to become a theatre of operations for Emperor Constantine in the 330s. Although Diocletian and Maximian may have achieved some success in their campaign, it appears to have been short-lived and comparable to what Constantine achieved, or rather failed to achieve, in Dacia.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Auriga (ZJKF) 62/1, pp. 7-24, 2020

The article revisits all the relevant sources and all recent major works on Constantine and argue... more The article revisits all the relevant sources and all recent major works on Constantine and argues that the most probable year of birth of Constantine the Great is 272 CE. Furthermore, his father, the Emperor Constantius I, was in all probability born in around 240 and not, as is sometimes supposed, in around 250 CE. It is very probable that Constantius as a military tribune helped in 271 his master Aurelian secure Asia Minor. During this mission, probably in June, he met Helena, a girl of a very low social standing, who was about ten years his junior, and fathered Constantine. It is also argued that owing to different social standing, Constantius and Helena were not legally married. The article once more disproves the „official lies“ spread by some of our sources and by Constantine himself: namely, that Constantine was born in 280s and that he was related to the Emperor Claudius Gothicus.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Graeco-Latina Brunensia, 2020

The article deals with the twin lie, devised by the Emperor Constantine the Great in 310: his fak... more The article deals with the twin lie, devised by the Emperor Constantine the Great in 310: his fake ancestry (his relationship to the Emperor Claudius Gothicus) and his alleged „pagan vision“ of Apollo (which was either a lie or, perhaps less probably, a product of hallucination). Both lies served to buttress his shaken political position in that year and to provide him with a hereditary claim to rule. This claim was presented as superior to the tetrarchic principles of succession which were already flouted by Constantine in 306 by his usurpation, and to his elevation to the position of augustus by Maximian in 307. In contrast, the story of the famous „Christian vision“ was most probably fabricated by Eusebius after Constantine´s death and bears no relation (not even a resemblance) to the „pagan vision“ of Constantine.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Eirene 55, 2019

The article attempts to construe the chronology of Constantine’s campaigns against the Goths and ... more The article attempts to construe the chronology of Constantine’s campaigns against the Goths and Sarmatians in 332 and 334, respectively, and to assess the extent of Roman control of Gothia (the former Roman Dacia) in the following years. The article also argues that there is a link between military operations of Constantine on the lower Danube in 334 and colonies or military units of Sarmatians in Italy, possibly in Gaul and elsewhere in the Empire, which are attested by a number of sources, primarily the Notitia Dignitatum.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Graeco-Latina Brunensia 24, 2019

The article argues that Constantine the Great, until he was recognized by Galerius, the senior Em... more The article argues that Constantine the Great, until he was recognized by Galerius, the senior Emperor of the Tetrarchy, was an usurper with no right to the imperial power, nothwithstanding his claim that his father, the Emperor Constantius I, conferred upon him the imperial title before he died. Tetrarchic principles, envisaged by Diocletian, were specifically put in place to supersede and override blood kinship. Constantine’s accession to power started as a military coup in which a military unit composed of barbarian soldiers seems to have played an important
role.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Eirene, 2018

In his New History, Zosimus narrates that some time before 324, Sarmatian warriors led by king Ra... more In his New History, Zosimus narrates that some time before 324, Sarmatian warriors led by king Rausimod and coming from an area near the Sea of Azov, had crossed the Danube and laid waste to Roman territory before being pursued by Constantine and utterly destroyed on the barbarian soil. I argue that their home was probably the Bosporan kingdom which was then largely Sarmatian in its culture, and that the province which suffered from their incursion was Scythia minor, and not Moesia or even Pannonia, as scholarly accounts tend to claim. Other Sarmatian attacks on the Danubian frontier, recorded by the poet Optatianus, and a Gothic invasion, remembered by the Origo Constantini imperatoris, were in all probability different events and should not be conflated with Rausimod’s Sarmatian invasion, although the king himself may have been a Goth or a Sarmatian with a Gothic name. The year of both invasions seems to be 323, the Gothic invasion preceding the Sarmatian one. On the verge of the civil war, Constantine encroached Licinius’ territory to destroy Rausimod, to defy Licinius, and to show the world that he is now in control of the whole Danubian frontier.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Auriga, 2018

The article deals with the attitude of the late Roman poet and former high-ranking official Rutil... more The article deals with the attitude of the late Roman poet and former high-ranking official Rutilius Namatianus towards two Western generalissimos of his time: Stilicho and Constantius, both of whom he probably knew personally. Rutilius attacks the former and extols the latter without supplying his readers with adequate reasons. Their stance on the Visigoths presents itself as a suitable explanation: Rutilius hates the Goths and therefore gives praise to Constantius for subduing them. Stilicho, charged by Rutilius and several other sources as a traitor who allowed Alaric to plunder Italy, is therefore to Rutilius an enemy of the Roman world. Personal or religious reasons of Rutilius´ hatred seem to play a lesser role.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Graecolatina Pragensia, 2017

There has been an assumption in the scholarly literature about Emperor Hadrian´s meeting with a P... more There has been an assumption in the scholarly literature about Emperor Hadrian´s meeting with a Parthian king in about 123 CE. This assumption, based on a single passage in a source whose veracity and reliability has repeatedly been questioned (i.e., Historia Augusta), cannot be proved and appears to be false. However, Hadrian´s summit has been accepted without question as a fact in many scholarly books, although some authors chose to ignore this doubtful event. In this article, the whole history of Romano-Parthian relations is briefly summed up and the author tries to point out that, in reality, no summit of heads of these two states ever occurred.

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact

There is a brief mention of a learned man Jamblichus in the Romana, a treatise on Roman history b... more There is a brief mention of a learned man Jamblichus in the Romana, a treatise on Roman history by Jordanes. No known author can be identified with him but there was a physician Jamblichus living in Constantinople in the mid-6th century, known only through a poem by Leontius, a lawyer who also lived in the mid-6th century Constantinople. The article argues that this Jamblichus may very well have been the Jordanes´ Jamblichus.

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Eirene (Studia Graeca et Latina), 2014

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Byzantion (Revue internationale des Études Byzantines), 2014

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