A Court of Fear and Paranoia: The Impact of Emotional Communities on the Court of Constantius II in Ammianus Marcellinus’ Res Gestae

Abstract

The third-century crisis brought about fundamental change in Roman imperial governing, a shift that recognised the emperor’s inability to control the entire empire on his own. Ammianus Marcellinus provides key insights into the flaws of this new heavily bureaucratised system of imperial government through his study of the career of Constantius II. Whilst literature surrounding Ammianus often focuses on his reliability as a source, this thesis will examine how he frames his historical narrative around the central theme of the corrupting and corrosive influence of the imperial court. Constantius attempts to cling to the power of sole rulership, whilst his imperial court becomes an amalgamation of his own fears, desires, and paranoias. By using Barbara Rosenwein’s theories on emotional communities, I will attempt to identify the affective spread of emotion from the emperor across the imperial court. In doing so, I intend to prove that emotional communities provide a new way of analysing texts in Late Antiquity to further understand competition, conflict, and motivation within different parts of society. Emotional communities form across every part of society, separating and bringing together individuals to form a collective that act and react through affective bonds. My thesis will focus primarily on the court of Constantius II and the communities that emerge from the ‘emotional arena’ of his court. Rather than utilising Ammianus’ text as a historical account, his narrative provides an allegorical perspective that reveals the flaws of the governing structures of Constantius’ rule.