Browse our books below. You can also search for books.
[ SOLD OUT ] ACTA ALEXANDRINORUM. De mortibus Alexandriae nobilium fragmenta papyracea Graeca. Edidit et notis instruxit H. Musurillo. Teubner, Leipzig, 1961. XI,94p. Cloth. Cover grimy. Signature on paste-down endpaper. Together with: H.A. MUSURILLO, The Pagan Acts of the Martyrs. Offprint Theological Studies, X, 4, 1949, pp.555-564. Wire stitched. Edges wrinkled. With dedication and a few annotations from H.A. Musurillo. (Rare).'Acts of the Pagan (or Heathen) Martyrs is the name given by modern scholars to about a dozen fragments of Alexandrian nationalist literature, preserved mostly written in the 2nd or early 3rd cent. AD. The majority of the fragments give, in dramatic form, reports of the hearing of Alexandrian embassies and to the trials of Alexandrian nationalist leaders before various Roman emperors. The episodes related, of which the dramatic dates range from the time of Augustus to that of Commodus, are probably basically historical and the accounts appear to be dereived to some extent from official records. But they have been coloured up, more in some cases, than in others, for propaganda purposes, to caricature the emperors, to stress the fearless outspokenness of the Alexandrians (...) and to represent their punishment, usually execution, as martyrdom in the nationalist cause. This literature is in general bitterly hostile to Rome, reflecting the tensions between Alexandria and her overlord during the first two centuries of Roman rule. These included antagonism between the Greeks and Rome's protégés, the Jews, and three episodes concern their quarrels. But despite the violent hatred expressed by the Greeks for the Jews, anti-Semitism is only a subsidiary feature in these primarily anti-Roman compositions.' (MIRIAM T. GRIFFIN in The Oxford Classical Dictionary, 3rd rev.ed., 2003, p.11). (Antiquarian) (approx. delivery time: undeliverable)