© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���6 | doi ��.��63/97890043�5938_00�
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
Jonathan J. Arnold, M. Shane Bjornlie, and Kristina SessaThe transformation of the ancient world has long been associated with the
geopolitical fragmentation of the late Roman Empire and the rise of barbarian
kingdoms in the West. Among the most successful was the Ostrogothic king-
dom, a regime that lasted for more than sixty years and encompassed at its
height the whole of the Italian peninsula, the island of Sicily as well as sections
of southern Gaul, Hispania, and the Balkans (see Figure 1.1). By all accounts,
Ostrogothic Italy was a multi-cultural state comprised of Romans and barbar-
ians, Latin, Greek, and Gothic speakers, Nicene Catholics and Arians, pagans
and Jews. The Ostrogoths ruled Italy during a period marked by economic
contraction, demographic decline, urban violence, and war. Yet they also
oversaw considerable social and religious stability as well as some remark-
able achievements, especially in the areas of literary and intellectual culture
and church building. While the rise and fall of Ostrogothic Italy has long been
recognized as a significant chapter in late antique and early medieval history,
recent research has dramatically revised and reshaped our understanding of
this polity and period. Thanks to archaeological discoveries and new method-
ological approaches to the sources, we now have more nuanced and complex
understandings of Ostrogothic ethnicity and identity, social and political rela-
tions among Romans and non-Romans, administrative structures and military
cultures, ecclesiastical figures and modes of religious authority, material land-
scapes, economic trajectories, and the environment.
Ostrogothic Italy has long played a central role in the framing of Late
Antiquity as a historical epoch. Was it a period marked by continuity or discon-
tinuity? Was it a time of transformation or an era of crisis and catastrophe?
For some scholars, the Ostrogothic regime functions as a peaceful interlude or
buffer between the breakdown of imperial military and administrative author-
ity in the West during the 5th century and the permanent fragmentation of
Italy into Byzantine and Lombard polities in the late 6th century, when many
1 For a general discussion of the ‘continuist’ and ‘catastrophist’ narratives of Late Antiquity:
Ward-Perkins, “Continuists, Catastrophists” and Marcone, “A Long Late Antiquity?”