Greek Cities and Roman Governors: Placing Power in Imperial Asia Minor

Garrett Ryan, Greek Cities and Roman Governors: Placing Power in Imperial Asia Minor (Abingdon: Routledge, 2022). 9780367756840

Reviewed by Fraser Reed, Independent Scholar, FraserReed2@gmail.com

In Greek Cities and Roman Governors: Placing Power in Imperial Asia Minor, Garrett Ryan provides an innovative exploration of how the built environment of provincial cities in western Asia Minor shaped perceptions of imperial and gubernatorial power among the urban populace from the late first to early third century CE. The book comprises five chapters, a brief epilogue, three appendices, an index, and several helpful figures distributed throughout. 

The study of Roman governors and provincial administration during the imperial period has been an area of continued interest in recent years and this volume is a welcome addition to ongoing research being conducted across the Mediterranean.¹ Although it is a concise treatment of the subject, Ryan’s analysis of how the monumental architecture of cities was used in shaping and communicating messages of authority, legitimacy, and prestige nevertheless provides a new and intriguing perspective on the political significance of urban space. Furthermore, the focus throughout on the provinces of western Asia Minor—primarily Asia but also Bithynia-Pontus as well as Lycia-Pamphylia—is a helpful complement to research being carried out in the western provinces.² This publication, therefore, is somewhat specialised but is particularly useful for researchers or students of Roman imperial administration, the provincial aristocracy, urbanism, and political power dynamics in the ancient world. 

The volume begins with a pair of introductory chapters that outline the two pillars of Ryan’s analysis: “The City” and “The Governor.” The title of the first chapter, however, is somewhat of a misnomer; rather than a broad discussion of a city’s built environment, the chapter instead focuses on monumental city streets and their associated decorations. Consequently, there is little discussion of other elements of a city’s topography that played an important role in the performance of power such as the basilica or agora. Nevertheless, Ryan’s discussion of the ways in which city councils and local elites funded the construction of monumental streets (and their associated decorations) as well as the justifications for undertaking such substantial and expensive building projects is detailed and compelling. The three examples used in the chapter are the gate complex sponsored by Plancia Magna at Perge, the colonnaded street at Termessos, and the nymphaeum of Sagalassos. The underlying goal of the sponsors in each case is presented as being the (re)affirmation of the wealth and prestige of the dedicand, thereby enhancing their social standing. The latter half of the chapter also introduces the contexts in which the built urban environment would be most visible to visiting dignitaries—namely, during civic festivals, games, and visits by the provincial governor or even the emperor—with particular emphasis on the processional portion of each event.

After having established monumental streets as a backdrop for civic displays of prestige and wealth, Ryan then turns his attention to investigating the role and status of the Roman provincial governor, who was one of the primary audiences for such displays. A brief introduction to the hierarchy of governors in western Asia Minor and their basic duties opens the chapter before Ryan details particular aspects of a governor’s typical visit to a provincial city. These aspects are presented as the governor’s audiences, his performance techniques, and the symbols of his authority. The chapter concludes with a discussion of Roman attitudes towards contemporary Greek cities and culture, in which it is suggested official visits were seen by the governors as an opportunity to contrast Roman integrity and virtue with Greek decadence. This is a somewhat simplistic perspective of the socio-political situation in western Asia Minor and appears to be based on the assumption that provincial governors were ostensibly Roman (i.e., Latin) despite admissions that “a sizeable minority” (p. 31) and “a growing fraction” (p. 38, n. 64) were decidedly not. A consideration of identity in the Roman Empire would have strengthened this section considerably.³

The rest of the volume uses the information established in the earlier chapters in order to explore specific instances of interplay between the urban built environment and its viewers, beginning with an examination of adventus ceremonies at three cities of western Asia Minor. Through reconstructing the ceremonial entrance (adventus) of provincial governors into Ephesus, Miletus, and Pergamum, Ryan explores the monuments and images presented along the processional routes in each city and suggests various ways in which these images may have been intended to be read/understood by the visiting governor. At Ephesus, for instance, the vitality and orderliness of the citizenry is said to be emphasised through the use of wide colonnaded streets and the orderly distribution of the assembled crowd. The monuments and decorations along the route at Miletus are meant instead to highlight that city’s long and exalted history, whereas the use of Roman architectural styles at Pergamum stresses a close connection with Rome. The crux of this chapter is the conclusion that the information communicated, whether intentionally or not, by the built environment along a processional route could vary significantly depending on several factors, including artistic or architectural style, the location of elements along the route, or the surrounding context of individual features. This conclusion relies heavily on the assumption that a visiting governor could understand all of the relevant allusions presented during their adventus, which is explained by Ryan through the presence of a local guide who could interpret references to local history and myth for the governor. Despite the reliance on this assumption, the chapter is nevertheless a valuable examination of the visual dialogue that occurs during such ceremonies. 

The volume’s fourth chapter examines the situational context surrounding a provincial governor during the undertaking of official judicial duties. By employing the modern concepts of “framing” and “frame bridging,” Ryan is able to demonstrate how the various components of a governor’s appearance at trial shaped perceptions of the proceedings and conveyed authority. He discusses how the presence of images of the emperor and other members of the imperial family near the governor’s court could emphasise the legitimacy and dignity of the proceedings and of the governor himself through physical proximity. Ryan also considers how a city’s local elite, who often appeared on the tribunal alongside the governor and helped with the legal proceedings, could benefit from such associations as well. The chapter concludes by examining the court of assize at Ephesus. Ryan rightly acknowledges cases were likely tried in several locations throughout the city so he concentrates his investigation on the urban square called the Triodos, which he suggests served as an atrium of sorts for an adjacent building in which cases were tried called the Auditorium. While the exact location of the Auditorium has not been definitively established, it is generally agreed to have occupied one of the buildings adjacent to the Triodos square. Despite this uncertainty, the analysis of the Triodos establishes convincingly how the monumental architecture and decoration of the Library of Celsus would have reinforced the civic virtues of Ephesus as the governor and litigants approached the court.

In the final chapter, Ryan focuses on another major civic occasion at Ephesus, namely the quadrennial festival called the Koina Asias, which is so named due to the fact it was sponsored by the provincial council (koinon). After outlining the underlying impetus for sponsoring and running such substantial festivals, as well as the governor’s role in the process, the bulk of the chapter is devoted to analysing two key events during the Koina Asias using Actor Network Theory (ANT). By assessing the inaugural sacrifice at the Temple of the Flavians and the artistic contests held in the theatre of Ephesus, Ryan argues that proximity to the governor influenced the social esteem of local and provincial elites and that perceptions of both the governor and the built environment surrounding him—regardless of where he was located—were inseparable and interdependent. It is notable, however, that the analysis of these two events focuses almost entirely on the distribution of the crowd rather than the content of the proceedings; for example, there is no discussion of how the artistic and rhetorical contests and contestants may be understood using ANT. It is also not clear why only two aspects of the Koina Asias are investigated in such a fashion since other events—such as a ceremonial procession, athletic contests, beast hunts, gladiatorial combats, and a concluding feast—are all mentioned as being part of the two-week-long festival. This may, however, simply be a result of limitations of space. An extended treatment of the entire festival may be an intriguing opportunity for future research.

The volume concludes with three brief appendices that supplement the main text. The first appendix considers the rhetorical descriptions of cities by Aelius Aristides and Dio Chrysostom and highlights the parallels drawn between a city’s monumental architecture and its populace. The second appendix reflects on the Roman aristocrat’s use of Greek architecture, decoration, and culture, especially at their villas, while the third recounts how local notables could use the commemoration of provincial governors to strengthen their own positions and prestige.

Due in part to the temporal scope and geographic specificity of the study, this monograph would benefit from an introductory discussion of the primary sources used in the ensuing analysis. Ryan draws on a rich variety of literary, epigraphic, and archaeological sources, most of which are produced in the second century CE, but there are a few outliers that need additional scrutiny to properly justify their inclusion in the current study. It is worth discussing, for example, why the views of Cicero in the first century BCE are still relevant to the performance of power centuries later, especially considering the shift from republican to imperial governance during this period. Similarly, there are a few instances in which evidence from the western provinces, such as Apuleius’s praise of the proconsul of Africa (p. 29), is presented without inspecting how different geographic contexts may impact its applicability. It would also be useful to highlight the elite perspective of many of the sources used—e.g., Pliny’s letters to the emperor, honourary inscriptions, Cicero’s musings—and the limited representation of the urban lower classes. 

Additionally, Ryan’s choice of case studies inadvertently raises some methodological considerations. By focusing heavily on Ephesus, for instance, which is used for three of the five core case studies, the analysis skews heavily towards large, politically prominent cities with a robust urban aristocracy. Any potential idiosyncrasies of smaller cities are thus overlooked. It is also somewhat surprising that one of the region’s assize cities was not used as the case study for the chapter on the assizes. Furthermore, while the stated goal of the volume is to investigate all of western Asia Minor, only the cities of the province of Asia (Ephesus, Miletus, Pergamum) are used as core case studies; cities of Lycia-Pamphylia or Bithynia-Pontus are mentioned in a substantial way only in the first two introductory chapters. Consequently, the resultant analysis may have a tendency to reflect the predominantly wealthy, coastal, western-facing cities along the Aegean coast of Asia Minor. 

Finally, the eighteen figures provided in the publication are helpful, but there are some very important omissions and the volume would benefit greatly from additional maps and plans. As this publication is largely an analysis of space and spatial relationships, plans and illustrations showing elements such as urban street systems, the arrangement of buildings, the sequence of processions, and decorative ensembles are essential for helping the reader understand the spaces being discussed and how they relate to each other. The plan of central Miletus showing the route of the governor’s adventus procession (p. 48, fig. 3.2) was very welcome, for instance, but there are no similar plans included for Ephesus and Pergamum. Similarly, a map of the sites named in the text would be a substantial aid in appreciating the urban distribution of western Asia Minor. 

Despite these concerns, there is no question that this publication ably meets the initial goal set out in the introduction, which is to explore how monumental urban architecture influenced the performance of power during a governor’s visit to a city. Through the deft combination of a wide range of sources and the analysis of three prominent civic ceremonies, Ryan demonstrates how the use of space, physical proximity, and references to external factors like the emperor or a city’s history could shape the ways in which the power of a visiting governor was understood by local urban elites. This power could also, in turn, be used by the same local elites for their own benefit. Moreover, the malleability of the message conveyed by the urban cityscape is also established, based on the specific characteristics and views of each respective individual. This volume, therefore, provides an interesting new perspective on the political importance of monumental city construction and is a meaningful addition to the study of Roman provincial administration.

Table of Contents

Introduction (1–3)
1. The City (4–24)
2. The Governor (25–40)
3. Adventus (41–72)
4. The Assizes (73–96) 
5. A Festival at Ephesus (97–118) 
Epilogue (119–20)
Appendix I. Monumental Cityscapes in Imperial Greek Rhetoric (121–23)
Appendix II. Building Greek Places in Italy (124–26)
Appendix III. Remembering a Governor (127–29)

Notes

1. Rudolf Haensch, Capita Provinciarum: Statthaltersitze und Provinzialverwaltung in der römischen Kaiserzeit (Mainz: von Zabern, 1997); Frédéric Hurlet, Le proconsul et le prince d’Auguste à Dioclétien (Bordeaux: Ausonius, 2006); Agnès Bérenger, Le métier de gouverneur dans l’Empire romain de César à Dioclétien (Paris: De Boccard, 2014); Richard Duncan-Jones, Power and Privilege in Roman Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016).

 2. E.g. Rúben Olmo López, El centro en la periferia: Las competencias de los gobernadores provinciales romanos en Hispania durante el Principado (Zürich: Lit, 2018).

 3. An interesting analysis of the complex interplay of identity in a city of western Asia Minor can be found, for example, in Onno van Niif, “Being Termessian: Local Knowledge and Identity Politics in a Pisidian City,” in Local Knowledge and Microidentities in the Imperial Greek World, ed. Tim Whitmarsh (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 163-188.

Discussion

1. The cities of Ephesus, Miletus, and Pergamum are the three core case studies of your analysis due to their “extensive and well-published excavations” (p. 3, n. 3), yet there are several other ancient cities in western Asia Minor that are similarly well-represented in the scholarly literature. Can you explain how you arrived at your choice of core case studies and what drew you to those three cities in particular (e.g., prior research, personal experience, availability of evidence, methodological limitations, language barriers, etc.)?

I decided to focus on Ephesus, Miletus, and Pergamum because they were the most comprehensively excavated conventus cities. I could have introduced additional sites—the archaeology of western Asia Minor is wonderfully rich—but I felt that my purpose was best served by presenting readers with a small set of detailed case studies.

2. This monograph was adapted from your doctoral thesis – were there any sections or topics from your thesis that you think particularly interesting or relevant to the study of imperial urban power dynamics that you were not able to include in the monograph?

As so often, the transformation from thesis to book involved a great deal of trimming. Most of what was lost in that transition was redundant—examples reiterating what other examples had adequately shown. The only section I really regretted cutting was a discussion of how the changing urban landscapes of late antiquity mirrored the shifting power dynamics between governor and city. Although I was able to redeploy most of this material later as a festschrift contribution, I think that it added a diachronic element missing from the book as published. 

3. You mention in the chapter on festivals and the Koina Asias that non-elite members of the audience could purposefully disrupt performances in the theatre (p. 109). What do you think may be some possible motivations for such interruptions? And do you think this was an effective method of civic discourse?

Since it was in the interest of the governing class to emphasize political solidarity, the epigraphic record tends to obscure civic conflict. A few literary examples, however, demonstrate the power of the demos to disrupt public rituals and public places. Perhaps the most interesting instance appears in a late antique life of the Apostle John, in which the newly converted people of Ephesus (joined, eventually, by the Roman governor himself) carve a baptismal font at the top of the theater, reorienting the focus of the space from the stage to the upper deck. Although this never actually happened, it conveys an awareness of the crowd’s latent potential to impose itself on an elite-managed space. 

Historically, the people of Ephesus were spurred to action by changes in the status quo; one thinks of the silversmiths’ riot, sparked by the preaching of Paul. In most cases, however, the demos exerted political influence by the simple act of assembling. Even if the people did nothing to disturb the proceedings at, say, the festivities of the Koina Asias, they were massively visible—an undeniable presence, and in that sense an implicit threat.

Thank you for your response to the discussion questions. I am intrigued by the changing situation during late antiquity so I will certainly need to track down that festschrift. I look forward to reading more of your work in the future!