Imperatores severi et senatores

In the history of Rome the Severan dynasty was the last ruling house preceding the empire’s decline and fall in the 3rd century. This imperial crisis could only be overcome owing to the reign of emperors-military men whose actions led to the recreation of Rome’s political system into a more authoritarian form such as the dominate. The genesis of these changes can be traced back to the reign of Emperor L. Septimius Severus and his successors, a context which is crucial for understanding the political and social history of not only the 3rd but also subsequent centuries.

This publication is divided into five chapters. The first of them presents the balance of the reign of Emperor Septimius Severus with which the monograph SEPTIMIUS SEVERUS ET SENATORES (Szczecin 2012) concluded. For a study discussing the personal policy of the Emperor’s successors such a beginning must be treated as a significant springboard to the latter topic. The remaining four chapters characterize the personal policy of the subsequent emperors from the Severan dynasty (Caracalla, Macrinus, Elagabalus, Alexander Severus). For the sake of the clarity of the text, each of these chapters is structurally resolved in the same way. Accordingly, the first subdivision of each chapter concentrates upon presenting the political events fundamental for the rulers’ “employment policy”. The second subdivision shows the profiles of the repressed senators eliminated in the course of the power struggle and their stabilization aspirations. The next chapter subdivisions demonstrate the other (as regards the repressions) end of the personal policy, that is, the groups of promoted senators: imperial collaborators, provincial representatives, young senators – the princeps’ protégés, and consuls.