ISTITUZIONI E SOCIETA' 27              (visiona tutti i volumi della serie)

Spoleto 2022, pp. XII-280, ISBN 9788868093655

Questo libro costituisce la prima monografia dedicata al re ostrogoto Baduila (541-552), comunemente noto come Totila. Basandosi su fonti letterarie, numismatiche, epigrafiche e papirologiche, Marco Cristini esamina le campagne militari, la politica esterna, le relazioni con vescovi e monaci, le presunte riforme sociali, la monetazione, la regalità e la comunicazione politica di Baduila. Gli storici hanno tradizionalmente indagato il regno di questo sovrano basandosi sulla Guerra Gotica di Procopio di Cesarea, ma studi recenti hanno dimostrato che le sue opere sono fortemente influenzate dalla comunicazione politica di Giustiniano e dai canoni della storiografia del VI secolo. Grazie agli studi sull’età giustinianea e sull’Italia ostrogota pubblicati nel corso degli ultimi anni, è ora possibile esaminare le iniziative politiche e militari di Baduila con una crescente consapevolezza dei limiti del resoconto procopiano. Nel ripercorrere lo svolgimento e la conclusione della seconda fase della Guerra Gotica, questo libro offre un quadro esaustivo del decennio che segnò la fine dell’antichità classica e l’inizio dell’alto medioevo nella penisola italiana.

Indice:
Acknowledgements - A Note on Translations and Names - Introduction - 1. Baduila in Sixth-Century Sources - 1.1. The Historian and his Victim: Procopius’ Portrait of Baduila - 1.2. Baduila in Jordanes’ Works - 1.3. Baduila in the Liber Pontificalis and Other Sixth-Century Latin Chroniclers - 1.4. Baduila vs. Totila: A Tale of Two Names - 2. The Goths in the Aftermath of Ravenna’s Fall - 2.1. 540: The End of Gothic History? - 2.2. Ildibad - 2.3. Erarich - 3. Baduila’s Military Campaigns - 3.1. Waiting for Justinian: Pockets of Gothic Resistance between 540 and 541 - 3.2. The Imperial Offensive of 542 - 3.3. The Battle of Faenza - 3.4. The Gothic Offensive of 542 - 3.5. The Campaign of 543 and the Fall of Naples - 3.6. Belisarius’ Return to the West and the War in 544-5 - 3.7. The First Siege of Rome - 3.8. Belisarius at Bay: Military Operations between Early 547 and Late 548 - 3.9. 550: The Capture of Rome and the Invasion of Sicily - 3.10. Baduila’s Naval War and Narses’ March towards Italy (551-552) - 3.11. Baduila’s Finest Hour: The Battle of Busta Gallorum (July 552) - 3.12. Mission Accomplished? The Long Aftermath of Busta Gallorum - 3.13. Baduila’s Strategy and Military Expertise: A Reappraisal - 4. Baduila’s Foreign Policy - 4.1. Gothic Foreign Policy before Baduila - 4.2. Diplomatic Silence: The First Years of Baduila - 4.3. The Meeting with Pelagius - 4.4. Baduila’s First Embassy to Justinian - 4.5. Baduila and the Franks - 4.6. Baduila’s Second Embassy to Justinian - 4.7. Baduila and the Slavs - 4.8. Baduila’s Third Embassy to Justinian - 4.9. Baduila the Diplomat: A Decade of One-Way Embassies - 5. Baduila’s Relationship with Monks and Bishops - 5.1. Baduila’s Meeting with Benedict - 5.2. A Repentant Sinner: Baduila’s Relationship with the Italian Bishops - 5.3. Baduila’s Faith: The Irrelevance of Being Arian - 5.4. Vigilius, Baduila, and Justinian: Controlling Rome in the Early 540s - 5.5. The Alleged Profanation of the Roman Catacombs by Baduila’s Soldiers - 6. Social Reforms in Sixth-Century Italy?A Reappraisal - 6.1. A Twentieth-Century Revolutionary in Sixth-Century Italy - 6.2. Mission Impossible: Collecting Taxes from the Italian Landowners in the 540s - 6.3. Rents or Robbery? - 6.4. Baduila’s “Land Reform”: The Enduring Fortune of a Misunderstanding - 6.5. Baduila’s Enrolment of Slaves - 7. Baduila’s Coinage - 7.1. Coinage in Ostrogothic Italy: Imperial Models and the Process of ‘Gothicization’ - 7.2. Baduila’s Gold Coinage: Delegitimizing Justinian through Anastasius - 7.3. Baduila’s Silver Coinage: A Most Invincible Ruler - 7.4. Baduila’s Copper Coinage: The Portrait of a Gothic Emperor - 8. From Warlord to New Theoderic: The Evolution of Baduila’s Kingship - 8.1. Baduila’s Rise to Power - 8.2. The Dawn of a Warlord - 8.3. Joys and Sorrows of Warlordism - 8.4. Imitatio Theoderici: Baduila’s Political Communication from 543 to 550 - 8.5. Imitatio imperii: Baduila’s Kingship from 550 to 552 - 9. Loyalty and Identity in Baduila’s Italy - 9.1. Desertion and Deserters during Baduila’s Reign - 9.2. Fluid Loyalties - 9.3. Identity in Ostrogothic Italy - 9.4. Italian Goths or Gothic Italians in the 540s? - 10. “Of Criminal Memory”: Baduila in the Aftermath of Justinian’s Victory - 10.1. Baduila in the Pragmatica Sanctio - 10.2. Baduila and Narses’ Inscription on the Bridge over the River Aniene - 10.3. Tyrant or King? Baduila in the Second Half of the Sixth Century - Epilogue - Chronology - Maps - Bibliography - Index.