The new ‘vogue’ for Herodian, which one contribution to this collection identifies (p. 88), is a welcome development. The present tome is a pleasing addition to it. Galimberti, the editor, notes (p. 6) that the volume ‘aims to explore aspects of Herodian's work that have hitherto never been the object of systematic investigation’; this fairly characterises its achievement. There is not much in Herodian's World that is definitive, but much that is suggestive. It will certainly help ‘to create new paths of study’ (p. 6).
After an introduction, in which Galimberti gracefully summarises the state of play for Herodian studies (pp. 4–6) and the nature of the articles to follow, A. Kemezis, in ‘Narrative Technique and Genre: Herodian the Novelist?’, begins the collection with a study of the historian's narrative techniques and how ‘these techniques resemble or do not resemble those of earlier ancient historians, and also on occasion of the Greek novelists’ (p. 22). The useful idea of Herodian as being akin to a novel is well-entrenched in the scholarship; Kemezis, intriguingly, looks at the novelistic preoccupations that the historian does not share (p. 24). While aware of historiographical precedent, Kemezis is perhaps inclined to overstate the extent to which Herodian presents as generically unorthodox in comparison to other extant historians. Thucydides, too, can be surprisingly omniscient about motivation (Thuc. 1.5.1, on hypothetical Minoan pirates, with Hornblower's note ad loc.; cf. p. 37 n. 61); Polybius (16.22.5) and Appian (Syr. 40.206, Mith. 2.4) can linger on details of clothing (cf. p. 33); Sallust's Bellum Iugurthinum, which Kemezis aptly quotes (p. 40) as a contrast to one sort of Herodianic narrative procedure, is as casual about fourteen years passing as Herodian is about thirteen years of Severus Alexander's reign (Sall. Iug. 9.4; cf. p. 29). All the same, there is much to take away from this, particularly on Herodian's distribution of narrative functions amongst minor characters (p. 31).
C. Mallan, in ‘Speeches and Speech Units in Herodian: the Limitations of Rhetoric?’, looks at direct speech in Herodian. This article and my recent one on the same theme (in: M. de Bakker and I. de Jong [edd.], Speech in Ancient Greek Narrative [2022], pp. 329–49) were written in mutual ignorance. Pleasingly, they complement each other, with Mallan being more interested (and successfully so) in how Herodian's speeches punctuate and articulate the narrative. The handy summary of direct speech in Herodian on p. 67 is less comprehensive than the one in the SAGN volume (p. 329 n. 2), since Mallan, as a matter of policy, is dealing only with the more extended speech units (p. 48 n. 7). Mallan's is, however, much more user-friendly.
M. Baumann, in ‘Caracalla on Stage: a Case Study in Herodian's Dramatic Historiography and Reader-Response’, studies the metatheatricality of Herodian's Caracalla. This is a deft piece of close reading, demonstrating the narrative subtlety of which Herodian is still too often thought incapable. It is one of the articles in this collection that might be particularly susceptible to further development. Baumann sketches a Caracalla who delights in his own stage management, and provokes inconclusive and/or divergent readings from his audience. It might be profitable to set this against other cases where Herodian's internal audiences are divided or change their minds – one thinks in particular of those fascinated, but then appalled, by Commodus as a gladiator (Hdn. 1.15.1–7) – and also against literary treatments of other theatrical emperors – above all, Nero (Suet. Ner. 20.1; Tac. Ann. 15.33).
K. Laporte and O. Hekster, in ‘Herodian, Memory and Judgement: Emperors and Their Death’, examine Herodian's imperial death notices. This is another case where an article turns out to be nicely complementary with other recent work on the same topic. Where C. Chrysanthou (Reconfiguring the Imperial Past [2022], pp. 249–310) looks thought-provokingly at the deaths of Herodian's emperors and pretenders principally in relation to each other, Laporte and Hekster primarily study the immediate narrative context of the death notice (exactly where it appears; what happens around it). The results are instructive.
A. Arbo, in ‘Βασιλεύς, δεσπότης or ἄρχων? Thoughts on the Lexicon of the Emperor and the Principate in Herodian's Work’, looks at Herodian's vocabulary for talking about the Emperor and speculates interestingly on the ideology behind it. She sees a concern with the potential rashness of young rulers and the need to manage them properly, as new to Herodian's age (p. 120 with n. 100); in fact, self-diagnosis of this issue is as old as Herodotus’ Xerxes (Hdt. 7.13.2), and it also appears in Polybius (7.4.4–6). Some textual issues possibly merit slightly more attention in this regard. It makes a difference for these matters at 2.4.1 whether one reads ἄρχοντα καὶ πατέρα, οὐ βασιλέα ἕξειν ἐλπίζοντες or καὶ βασιλέα, a variant mentioned by C.R. Whittaker, but not discussed, and whether one thinks that there is an interpolation in the discussion of Balbinus’ and Pupienus’ motives at 8.8.4 (with L. Mendelssohn) or not (with C.M. Lucarini).
U. Roberto explores ‘Herodian and the Paideia of the Good Emperor: the Case of Severus Alexander’. Paideia in Herodian is now a well-worn topic, on which it is hard to shine. Still, the article has some striking moments, especially when Herodian's account of Severus Alexander is tested against other sources, such as P. Fayum 20.
Galimberti examines ‘Religion in Herodian’. Galimberti shows, as we see elsewhere in the collection, that absences can be as instructive as emphases; Herodian does not mention Christianity or the affiliations of known Christians (pp. 165–8) and is cool towards some known Severan enthusiasms. I am not as convinced as Galimberti seems to be (p. 158) that 1.13.6 shows Herodian's indifference to τύχη – a more natural reading would suggest the reverse –, but he is surely right that τύχη lacks the overarching importance for Herodian that it has for (say) Polybius.
D. Motta's ‘The Demos in Herodian’ argues convincingly that the historian uses δῆμος in different ways and notes the importance of passages where he does not treat that body as an undifferentiated mass. In particular, she observes the occasions on which Herodian differentiates those within the δῆμος of greater wealth or distinction (p. 181).
P. Buongiorno, in ‘The Attitude of Herodian towards the Roman Senate’, maps out the interesting position of the Senate in Herodian's text. On the one hand, references to it are ‘often incidental’ (p. 202); on the other, attentive reading discloses allusion to considerable senatorial activity, especially once it takes centre stage in the closing books. Buongiorno is acute on the narrative role of the Senate, as helping to indicate the infractions of a discreditable emperor (pp. 210–11).
A. Bérenger, in ‘Herodian's Perception of the Provincial Reality’, is particularly good on the symbolic use that Herodian makes of Antioch. Herodian plays up its aspect as a potential den of decadence, while skating over its potential strategic significance (p. 226). Herodian's own origins and audience remain a topic vigorously contested throughout this volume; the issue of whether he was, or was not, an Antiochene himself plays out in its pages (compare p. 209 n. 30 to p. 222 n. 1).
P. Porena, in ‘The Emperor, the Coin, the Soldiers’, examines the Severan dynasty from the perspective of its coinage and expenditures. Rather more World than Herodian's here, except towards the end (pp. 250–3), but instructive, all the same.
M. Ruiz del Árbol Moro's ‘Landscape and Geography in Herodian's Work’ nicely exemplifies the commitment to ‘new paths of study’ that the volume is visualised as undertaking. In this case, the area of innovation lies in applying archaeological registers of exploited, delimited and perceived space to illuminate Herodian's landscapes. As with Mallan's article, the student of Herodian will be grateful for the addition of a helpful appendix: in this case, summarising the main theatres of activity throughout the historian's text (pp. 278–9).
L. Mecella, in ‘Herodian and the Italic Peninsula’, continues the theme of landscapes by examining the spaces of Italy, as seen in the closing books of the history. She is cogent on how Herodian's narrative plays up Maximinus’ task of descending into Italy in Book 8, in a way that signally does not happen when Septimius Severus engages in a similar activity at 2.11.3 (p. 282); again, there is a possibility for cross-fertilisation of themes across articles here, since Herodian's strategies for downplaying or magnifying spaces and times in line with his own needs interact interestingly with the concerns of Kemezis's article. Mecella concludes with an incisive look at the narrative geography of Herodian's Rome (pp. 289–96).
The final contribution, O. Coloru's ‘The Iranian World of Herodian’, is another article distinguished by widening the range of evidence and lines of enquiry for thinking about Herodian. Coloru illustrates, inter alia, the unlikelihood of the Sasanians, as Herodian avers, framing their claims to empire in Achaemenid terms, and persuasively argues that this claim has more to do with the ultimately Herodotean discourse within which Herodian is composing. Coloru is also illuminating on Herodian's echoes of the Late Republican preoccupation with the idea of Roman soldiers going over to the Eastern enemy; to the example of Labienus, which Coloru gives (p. 305), one might add the miles Crassi of Horace (Hor. Carm. 3.5.5–12).
This is generally a well-produced volume, with few obvious errors of fact that evaded the proof-reader. That being said, Herodian does not provide a ‘scholarly gloss about the male and female gender of the cult of the Moon’ near Carrhae (p. 162). That gloss appears in the SHA (M. Ant. 7.3–4), as correctly stated earlier in the same article (p. 161 n. 31); Herodian refers merely to a temple of Selene (Hdn. 4.13.3). Commodus does not feel ‘threatened by the possibility of losing power at the advent of his reign’ (p. 204); Herodian makes it clear that this is a pretext to mask his desire for the soft life of Rome (Hdn. 1.6.3). The nominative form of τοὺς ἐξέχοντας is οἱ ἐξέχοντες, not οἱ ἐξέχονται (p. 205). None of these small glitches affects the argument, however.
In sum, then, the Herodian vogue continues; long may it do so. Galimberti and his contributors have, with this volume, played a signal role in its continuance.
