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[ SOLD OUT ] BELLEN, H., Metus Gallicus - Metus Punicus. Zum Furchtmotiv in der römischen Republik. Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Literatur, Mainz / Franz Steiner Verlag, Wiesbaden, 1985. 46p. Sewn. Series: Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Literatur, Abhandlungen der Geistes- und sozialwissenschaftlichen Klasse, Jahrgang 1985, Nr. 3. (Rare). ‘The purpose of Heinz Bellen’s monograph is to trace the origin of ‘the Great Fear’ at Rome. Bellen argues that ‘metus Punicus’ originates in ‘metus Gallicus’: that is, the Roman fear of Carthage is an extension of the long-standing fear that the City would once again fall to the Gauls of northern Italy, as had happened ca. 387. Insofar as Bellen emphasizes the reality of such Roman fears, and the grounding of those fears in the harsh situation which the Romans of the Middle Republic faced, his work serves as a salutary corrective to recent ‘revisionist’ historians who have argues that Roman society was itself extraordinary aggressive against its neighbors and that the tradition of Roman fear is mere self-justifying propaganda turned into traditional literary motif. (…) Concerning the reality of Roman fears, Bellen is also right to point out two widely attested Roman customs. The first is the declaration by the Senate of a state of ‘tumulus’, and the subsequent ‘dialects tumultuarius’: the emergency mobilization of Rome’s forces in the face of a sudden fear of attack upon the city, from which mobilization (…) not even old men and priests of the gods were exempt (…). Such a procedure could obviously be quite disruptive to the economy, and it is unlikely that it was often employed merely for the purposes of ‘propaganda’. (…) Bellen is also correct to stress that the existence of human sacrifice at Rome is further independent evidence of deep and abiding Roman fear of foreign enemies. (…) The evidence is uniform that the Romans performed this sacrifice unwillingly, and only under the duress of enormous anxiety about foreign attack, yet perform it they did (three times: in 228, 216, and 114/13. However, the custom of human sacrifice is also the key to Bellen’s theory of the direct development of ‘metus Punicus’ out of ‘metus Gallicus’, and here he runs into trouble. (…) There are problems, further, with Bellen’s understanding of the ritual of Roman human sacrifice itself. (…) However, Bellen’s discussion of the senatorial declaration of ‘tumults’ remains useful, and his discussion of Roman human sacrifice is (at least) stimulating. Most importantly, in those sections of his work where Bellen asserts the reality of Roman fears, and assembles for us the evidence of those fears, he brings a necessary realism to our understanding of the harsh world in which the Romans lived.’ (A.M. ECKSTEIN in The Classical Journal, 1987, pp.335-38). From the library of the late Professor Doktor Nikolaus Himmelmann. (Antiquarian) (approx. delivery time: undeliverable) ISBN: 9783515045575