Lee E. Patterson
Eastern Illinois University, History, Faculty Member
- Roman Near East, Armenian History, Parthian Empire, Sasanian History, Achaemenid, Parthian, and Sasanian History; International Relations and Diplomacy between Roman-Byzantine and Persian Empires, Roman military history, and 52 moreKinship Diplomacy, Ancient Greek Mythology, Classical Mythology, Mythography, Greek and Roman Mythology and Mythography, Ancient Greek History, Greek political history, Greek Historiography, Ancient Greek Historiography, Fragmentary Greek Historiography, Ancient Geography, Alexander the Great, Strabo, Herodotus, Thucydides, Roman-Persian wars, Roman-sassanid wars and diplomacy, Iranian Archaeology, Roman History, Sasanian Archaeology, Late Antiquity, Constructed Identity, Hecataeus, Iranian Sudies, Sasanian Iran, Parthian Iran, Archaeology of Central Asia in Parthian, Kushan and Sasanian times, Ancient History, Hellenistic and Roman Asia Minor, History of the Hellenistic World (Focus: Seleucid Empire), Achaemenid Persia, Parthia, Parthian/Arsacid history, Parthian Archaeology, Arsacid and Sasanian Iran, Caucasus, Archaeology of Caucasus, Ancient Armenia, Constructed Identities, Greek Heroes, Cassius Dio, Politics of Mythology and Folklore, Greek Historians, Greek Mythography, Tyrtaeus, Mythopoesis, Pausanias, Greek Myth, Ancient Persia, Herodian, Armenian Studies, Armenia, Armenian Culture, and Armenian Genocideedit
- Two distinct fields compete for my scholarly time: political uses of myth in the Greek world (and related issues invo... moreTwo distinct fields compete for my scholarly time: political uses of myth in the Greek world (and related issues involving perceptions of myth by Strabo, Pausanias, Herodotus, etc.) and Roman Armenia (and related issues involving the Arsacids, the Sasanians, Roman frontier studies, etc.).edit
A history of Armenia's relations with the Romans/Byzantines and Arsacids/Sasanians from c. 190 BCE to c. 650 CE. Included for consideration will be Armenia’s negotiation of its identity and political position between the eastern and... more
A history of Armenia's relations with the Romans/Byzantines and Arsacids/Sasanians from c. 190 BCE to c. 650 CE. Included for consideration will be Armenia’s negotiation of its identity and political position between the eastern and western superpowers and Armenia's role in Roman relations with the Parthian Arsacids and the Sasanians. [book in progress]
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This book examines the Greeks' use of myth in the context of interstate relations, such as the formation of alliances and territorial conquest. The relationship between two states involved in such diplomacy was often grounded in a... more
This book examines the Greeks' use of myth in the context of interstate relations, such as the formation of alliances and territorial conquest. The relationship between two states involved in such diplomacy was often grounded in a putative consanguinity, a perception usually (but not always) shared by both communities. In these cases, the common ancestor was most often a legendary personage. In each case study I note the historical circumstances of the diplomacy, the myths involved in the justification of the diplomatic venture, and the degree to which the participants actually believed in the links (i.e., how much credulity came into play). Examples come from both the literary and epigraphical records.
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Previous scholarship on the role of Armenia in Augustus’ eastern frontier policy, particularly in relation to Roman-Arsacid relations, has taken insufficient account of the effect of indigenous agency on the historical outcomes of that... more
Previous scholarship on the role of Armenia in Augustus’ eastern frontier policy, particularly in relation to Roman-Arsacid relations, has taken insufficient account of the effect of indigenous agency on the historical outcomes of that policy. Augustus’ efforts to hold Armenia as a vassal state and a check on Arsacid ambitions were repeatedly frustrated by the machinations of the Armenian noble families. These frustrations arose in part from the Romans’ inability to understand fully the multidirectional political alignments that characterize royal-noble and noble-noble relations in Armenia’s political system.
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As he is ubiquitous in myth, Heracles is also ubiquitous in political myth-making, especially in his role as ancestor of communities and dynasties in the archaic through Hellenistic periods. Whether invoking his heroic qualities to... more
As he is ubiquitous in myth, Heracles is also ubiquitous in political myth-making, especially in his role as ancestor of communities and dynasties in the archaic through Hellenistic periods. Whether invoking his heroic qualities to enhance their own virtues or linking themselves to a Heraclid tradition to promote their own historical significance, such communities found Heracles to be useful in the context of political legitimization, kinship diplomacy, religion, and other areas. Examples include the creation and promotion of the Return of the Heraclidae by the Dorian regimes of the Peloponnese and attempts by individual Spartans to benefit personally from their putative Heraclid ancestry.
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The emperor Justin II achieved one of his main goals when a new war with the Sasanians broke out in 572. A number of causes have been asserted, but it was the unstable political situation in Armenia that provided Justin the best... more
The emperor Justin II achieved one of his main goals when a new war with the Sasanians broke out in 572. A number of causes have been asserted, but it was the unstable political situation in Armenia that provided Justin the best opportunity to initiate hostilities. The war began with the revolt of Armenian nobles against Sasanian authority in 572. Understanding this instability requires a reckoning with the historiography along the lines of recent scholarly reassessments of Armenia’s relationship with the Sasanian world. To that end a brief analysis of the Armenian sources for the revolt of 451 can provide useful analogies. The respective sources cast both revolts in religious terms, but deeper, more political motivations lie behind the actions taken by the players in Armenia, the Sasanian realm, and Byzantium.
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Gauging the importance of religion to the exercise of political will in the Sasanian world requires enormous care. It is all too easy to take the Great Kings at their word as they championed the doctrines of Zoroastrianism in their... more
Gauging the importance of religion to the exercise of political will in the Sasanian world requires enormous care. It is all too easy to take the Great Kings at their word as they championed the doctrines of Zoroastrianism in their political pronouncements, especially as some of them also persecuted Christianity. Whether or not such sentiments were genuine, a closer analysis of the evidence suggests a more pragmatic royal use of religion. The political realities on the ground were more often the deciding factor in how the kings related to the religious sectors of Sasanian society. This state of affairs sometimes set the kings against the Zoroastrian clerics, whose agendas were not always in alignment, and it explains why Christian persecutions were usually motivated more by politics than doctrine. Moreover, this dynamic also explains the prominence of the Christian church in the later Sasanian period as kings employed it as a base of support, much as they had the Zoroastrian hierarchy.
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Although he expresses periodic misgivings about the reality of mythological accounts, Strabo relies heavily on myth to achieve his geographical, historical, and ethnographical goals. History, topography, and other markers shape the... more
Although he expresses periodic misgivings about the reality of mythological accounts, Strabo relies heavily on myth to achieve his geographical, historical, and ethnographical goals. History, topography, and other markers shape the identity of most locations in Strabo’s opus, and myth often helps determine that shape, as when, for example, a charter myth expresses a location’s origins or ethnic make-up. This essay offers the first extensive catalogue of Strabo’s use of myth as evidence for modern geographical phenomena and analyzes the criteria by which Strabo found such myths useful.
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We are hard pressed to understand the events of Caracalla’s Parthian war, including the role Armenia played in the conflict, because of gross inadequacies in our sources. A careful analysis suggests that Caracalla intended to annex... more
We are hard pressed to understand the events of Caracalla’s Parthian war, including the role Armenia played in the conflict, because of gross inadequacies in our sources. A careful analysis suggests that Caracalla intended to annex Armenia but never saw the project through. His intentions can be gauged by his treatment of Edessa, for whose annexation the evidence is more solid. Caracalla was trying to secure his rear, from Osrhoene to Armenia, in preparation for a full-scale Parthian war. Because the goal of stabilizing Armenia proved elusive, given local hostilities, Caracalla had to scale back his plans.