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Often appears with: tyber sacrifices · the city and urban life · secular games · festivals, games, and spectacle · fate, destiny, and necessity · campus martius
Usually: narrative (1) · detachment (1)
“The magnificence of Philip’s shows and entertainments dazzled the eyes of the multitude. The devout were employed in the rites of superstition, whilst the reflecting few revolved in their anxious minds the past history and the future fate of the empire.” Edward Gibbon, History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire · observation
On returning from the East to Rome, Philip celebrates the secular games with elaborate rites and exclusions, then Gibbon describes how Rome’s empire and discipline decline under oppression and barbarian pressure.
Maximin.—Part III. On his return from the East to Rome, Philip, desirous of obliterating the memory of his crimes, and of captivating the affections of the people, solemnized the secular games with infinite pomp and magnificence. Since their institution or revival by Augustus, 56 they had been celebrated by Claudius, by Domitian, and by Severus, and were now renewed the fifth time, on …