TY - BOOK AU - Devlin,Rebecca TI - Bishops, Community and Authority in Late Roman Society: Northwestern Hispania, c. 370-470 C.E. T2 - Late Antique and Early Medieval Iberia SN - 9789048554072 AV - BR1024 .D48 2024 U1 - 282/.46 23/eng/20240805 PY - 2024///] CY - Amsterdam PB - Amsterdam University Press KW - Bishops KW - Spain KW - Church history KW - Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600 KW - AUP Wetenschappelijk KW - Amsterdam University Press KW - Antiquity KW - History, Art History, and Archaeology KW - History KW - Medieval Studies KW - HISTORY / Medieval KW - bisacsh KW - Late Antiquity, Late Roman Empire, Episcopal Authority, Heresy, Visigoths, Sueves, Hydatius N1 - Frontmatter --; Table of Contents --; List of Figures --; List of Abbreviations and Preliminary Notes --; Acknowledgements --; 1 Introduction: The Clerical Communities of Late Roman Gallaecia --; Part 1 The Late Fourth Century --; 2 Symphosius and his Community: Asturicensis in the Late Fourth Century --; 3 Exuperantius, Ortigius, and the Clerical Community of Lucensis in the Late Fourth Century --; 4 Paternus and his Community: Braga in the Late Fourth Century --; Part 2 The Fifth Century --; 5 Travel, Trade and Theological Debates: Orosius and the Clerical and Lay Christian Community of Braga --; 6 Hydatius and the Clerical Community of Gallaecia: Conflict, Chaos, and the Culmination of Episcopal Authority in Society --; 7 Conclusion: From Symphosius of Astorga to Hydatius of Aquae Flaviae and Beyond --; Appendix --; Bibliography --; Index; restricted access N2 - When the bishop Hydatius found himself held hostage in Gallaecia, a Roman province in the northwestern Iberian Peninsula, by a band of Sueves in the year 460, he deployed his experience as an ambassador for his congregation and used his captivity as a tool for negotiating peace. As this example shows, bishops held considerable economic, political, and social power in the early Middle Ages. The expansion of ecclesiastical influence was not, however, a simple consequence of the legalization of Christianity or a power vacuum that followed the withdrawal of imperial authority. The transformation of the episcopate resulted instead from dynamic processes to which all status groups contributed and that are best understood through contextual and diachronic analysis. This monograph focuses on the clerical community in Gallaecia and employs a case study and interdisciplinary approach, incorporating written and material evidence, to put bishops like Hydatius in their larger social and economic contexts to elucidate why the people living and working in their sees would imbue them with increasing authority and explain how their roles within their local communities expanded UR - https://doi.org/10.1515/9789048554072?locatt=mode:legacy UR - https://www.degruyter.com/isbn/9789048554072 UR - https://www.degruyter.com/document/cover/isbn/9789048554072/original ER -