Prosopography is the investigation of the common background characteristics of a group of actors in history by means of a collective study of their lives stone, 1971. While the majority of the names are akkadian assyrian and babylonian, names from other semitic languages represent another large part of the onomasticon. Prosopography of the later roman empire usually abbreviated as plre is a set of three volumes collectively describing many of the people attested or claimed to have lived in the roman empire from ad 260, the date of the beginning of gallienus sole rule, to 641, the date of the death of heraclius, which is commonly held to mark the end of late antiquity. Plre is defined as prosopography of the later roman empire somewhat frequently. Volumes 1 through 17 of medieval prosopography appeared biannually, spring and fall. Stone considers prosopography primarily as an investigation into the common characteristics of a population. Berkeley prosopography services wiki home ist research and.
For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual subscription. The unit is dedicated to the study and promotion, and, where necessary, development, of the disciplines and methods of medieval prosopography. Terms of use this article is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to open access policy articles, as set forth at. The factoids may be onedimensional, referring only to a single person e. Aramaic, phoenician, moabite and hebrew, dominate but there are also a number of arabic names. Bulst, zum gegenstand, in medieval lives and the historian, eds. Berkeley prosopography services bps is an opensource prosopographical toolkit that generates interactive visualizations of the biological and social connections that link documented individuals, providing a dynamic and heuristic tool for researching historical communities documented in legal and administrative archives we are currently exploring and developing a prototype. Collective biography can be called prosopography that is, personawriting. Prosopography of the middle byzantine period online usc. Prosopography definition of prosopography by merriamwebster. Numbers, narratives, and the integration of research and theory oxford. Because relatively few sources were created by or about individuals during the middle ages the prosopographical. By prosopography we mean the database and the list of all persons from a. This articles assesses the careers and impact of lawrence stone and j.
Lawrence stone 191991 joined the princeton history department in 1963, where he served as its chair during 196770, and from 1968 until his retirement in 1990 he was the founding director of the shelby cullom davis center for historical studies. The purpose of this site is to collect and publish prosopographical information about ancient roman republican and imperial senatorial and equestrian families. It claims to make statements about both the past and the present. It deals with subjects of considerable topical interest and great complexity about which we know little. Prosopography has been defined as an independent science of social history embracing genealogy, onomastics and demography. Find the 1271 englishlanguage books that collect chapterlength biographies of women of all types, famous and obscure, from queens to travelers, from writers to activists. Lawrence stone defines prosopography as the investigation of the common background characteristics of a group of actors in history through a collective study of their lives.
The prosopography of the later roman empire arnold hugh. Mobile pastoralism and the formation of near eastern civilizations half title page. In this case, the tiril spelling would refer not to shakespeares play but to heywoods 2 edward iv, and the scholar is advised to check all spellings given n. The british scientific community, 17001900 the harvard community has made this article openly available. Gathering all available data on persons and personal names in the neoassyrian period, the prosopography of the neoassyrian empire pna is meant to be a research tool that makes this enormous body of information accessible both to assyriologists and to scholars in related fields. Lawrence stone defines prosopography as the investigation of the common background characteristics of a group of actors in history through a collective study. Short, medieval prosopographies and the prosopography of anglosaxon england, in fifty years of prosopography. According to its wikipedia entry, it is a method that attempts to understand relationships and patterns based on data collected from large groups of human beings, a methodology that. Lawrence stone 4 december 1919 16 june 1999 was an english historian of early modern britain, after a start to his career as an art historian of english medieval art. Stone sees a twofold historical purpose in the use of prosopography. Plre stands for prosopography of the later roman empire. Born in epsom, uk, he was educated at charterhouse, sorbonne, and oxford. Here lies the difference between prosopography and biography, thought this does not mean that prosopography does not play an essential part in biography and viceversa. Fouracre the history of the early middle ages has of late.
Numerous languages are represented in the neoassyrian onomastic material. How is prosopography of the later roman empire abbreviated. Nelson, the aims and objects of the prosopography of anglosaxon england. Prosopography of the later roman empire usually abbreviated as plre is a set of three volumes that describes prominent individuals who lived from 260 ad to 641 ad, whose careers, writings and relations had influence over the outcome of recognizable historical events. Because relatively few sources were created by or about individuals. Prosopography definition is a study that identifies and relates a group of persons or characters within a particular historical or literary context. Home resources byzantine seals seals bibliography the prosopography of the later roman empire, vol. According to lawrence stone, prosopography had become a twofold tool for historical research. Yesterday, today and tomorrow article pdf available july 2003 with 1, reads how we measure reads. Berkeley prosopography services bps is an opensource prosopographical toolkit that generates interactive visualizations of the biological and social connections that link documented individuals, providing a dynamic and heuristic tool for researching historical communities documented in legal and administrative archives. A short manual to the art of prosopography by koenraad verboven myriam carlier jan dumolyn. Cuthbert and the prosopography of anglosaxon england database.
Archi the interpretation of the personal names is by p. Their genealogies were wellresearched, and social webs and kinship linking could be traced, allowing a prosopography of a power elite to emerge. Although names such as the rosetta stone or the book of. Interpreting these narratives with the bess schema reveals the building blocks of. For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual. Buy the prosopography of the later roman empire 2 part set. According to lawrence stone, prosopography had become a two fold tool for historical research. The prosopography of ancient rome is an approach to classical studies and ancient history that focuses on family connections, political alliances, and social networks in ancient rome. The prosopography of the later roman empire provides a complete secular biographical dictionary of the period ad 527 the beginning of the reign of justinian to 641 the death of heraclius. The fundamental elements of structure in the mdb are. Field prosopography derives from the greek word prosopon, initially denoting face or mask in a theatrical context, but later acquiring a technical theological meaning, translating as person.
The primary objective of the project is to facilitate prosopographical research into the elite of the roman republic, its structure, scale and changes in composition over time. We learn of its ups and downs in war and peace, its relations to the naval. He is noted for his work on the english civil war and the history of marriage, families and the aristocracy. They are tested both for internal correlations and for correlations with other forms of behaviour or action. Medieval prosopography medieval institute publications. Prosopography as a research tool in history of science. Prosopography of the byzantine empire i, 641867 vol 1 9780754606. Prosopography of the middle byzantine period online prosopography of the middle byzantine period online. Your story matters citation shapin, steven and arnold thackray.
Exploring new methods for prosopography, esf exploratory workshop ew06216, uppsala, may 10th11th, 2007 started as a critique of the methodological positivisms ways to construct the research objects. Prosopography is the investigation of the common background characteristics of a group of actors in history by means of a collective study of their lives. See this link on the website of the prosopography centre for a fuller discussion. Once the documentation has been compiled, which is the most timeconsuming aspect of the work, the data can be evaluated with the. The project makes available for the first time in one work mass of information. Mobile pastoralism and the formation of near eastern civilizations. An exercise in data capturing, medieval prosopography, 22 2001, pp.
If a notice refers to other characters or character names, the. Professor stone argues, for example, that the modern western family system is. A short manual to the art of prosopography by koenraad verboven myriam carlier jan dumolyn preprint draft. Byzantine studies, 55, 706720, names network perspective. The prosopography of the later roman empire 2 part set. Family trees, woodbridge, 1997, traces the origins of the concept to the 16th century, when it was. Published volumes of medieval prosopography medieval. Pdf this article provides a general presentation of the research methodology of prosopography. Historians such as theodore momsen, ronald symes and lewis namier worked with the concept of generations using what today we would call prosopography as a method. A prosopographical network is a system which represents a historical group made up by. A data structure diagram showing the structure of the mdb is available see pdf file.
Plumb, examining their formative influences, and the effect which. Sources and exemplars of collective biography in british methodism clive d. One of the main ambitions has been to overcome the gulfs between macro and micro analyses within sociology. Rebenich, mommsen, harnack, and the prosopography of late antiquity, in r. Exploring new methods for prosopography in the humanities. Reviewed by alan macfarlane this is an important book. View medieval prosopography research papers on academia. Berkeley prosopography services wiki home ist research.
Prosopography has been an effective way to assemble representative personalities in social, historical, or vocational categories such as the learned men of oxford, the founders of the united states, prominent asian americans, engineers. This site and the tools are still under development, but you are welcome to look around and see whats here. Theres some background on the project on our about page, and links to the related project homes are in the footer, below. The eastern dynasties have been added to show the relationships to roman families and other eastern dynasties. Social network analysis, prosopography, and history people of. The goal of the prosopography of the byzantine world project, formerly known as the prosopography of the byzantine empire pbe, is to record in a computerised relational database all surviving information about every individual mentioned in byzantine sources during the period from 641 to 1261, and every individual mentioned in nonbyzantine. Prosopography china biographical database project cbdb. Stone was born on 4 december 1919 in epsom, surrey, england. The digital prosopography of the roman republic dprr is the result of a threeyear, ahrcfunded project based at the department of classics and the department of digital humanities at kings college london. Archi the interpretation of personal names is by p. A contribution to the prosopography of the senate of the french third republic paul smith university of nottingham writing in 1961, francois pietri remembered his former cabinet colleague louis barthou as one of.
Prosopography of the byzantine world the digital classicist. The information has been gathered from a wide variety of sources in latin, greek, arabic, syriac and other languages. Prosopography is the inquiry into common characteristics of a group of. The network science methodology offers an alternative way of analyzing the patterns of relationships, composition and activities of people studied in their own historical context.
Bps supersedes the limitations of traditional penandpaper research by providing researchers with a flexible and intuitive corpusbased. Exploring new methods for prosopography in the humanities and. The methodology of roman prosopography involves defining a group for studyoften the social ranking called ordo in latin, as of senators and equestrians then. In his 1971 essay, lawrence stone discussed an older form of prosopography which was principally concerned with wellknown social elites, many of whom were already wellknown historical figures. The methodology of roman prosopography involves defining a group for studyoften the social ranking called ordo in latin, as of senators and equestriansthen collecting and analyzing data. Plre prosopography of the later roman empire acronymfinder. The prosopography of the later roman empire 1971 edition. Berkeley prosopography services bps is a set of services for prosopographic analysis developed at berkeley in response to historians needs to mine prosopographic data from text corpora, supporting study of societal relations among documented individuals.
Medieval prosopography was founded in 1980 when methodologies of social science were combined with social history in an attempt to explore and explicate the lives of people who, when treated as individuals, often remain obscure. To do so, all known written sources for the neoassyrian period. Two other useful papers are lawrence stone, prosopography, daedalus 100 1971, 4679, and paul magdalino, the contribution of prosopography. A question of identity, fifty years of prosopography. Cbw studies versions of womens lives over time, as well as networks of types, to discover a rich international history of gender roles. A prosopographical network is a system which represents a historical group made up by individual actors and their interactions within a delimited spatial and temporal range.
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