In this substantial and finely argued monograph, Manfredi Zanin makes a major contribution to the study of Roman imperialism in the second century BC. The work stands out for its ability to move beyond schematic interpretations, often polarized between structuralist models and ideological readings of Roman expansion. The author brings the focus back to the senatorial aristocracy, not conceived as a monolithic social bloc but rather as a network of individuals, families, and ambitions, whose decisions, rivalries, and alliances concretely shaped the forms of Roman hegemony in the Mediterranean.
The methodological core of the book lies in its renewed use of prosopography. Zanin employs it not as a mere tool of cataloguing, but as an interpretative lens that brings to light logics of action, strategies of advancement, and political calculations. In this respect, the volume engages in dialogue with the tradition inaugurated by Matthias Gelzer, while updating its coordinates in light of recent reflections on microhistory and elite theory. Central to this endeavor is a critical reassessment of Friedrich Münzer, whose prosopographical legacy has sometimes been dismissed as overly descriptive or narrowly genealogical. Zanin demonstrates instead that Münzer’s approach, when properly integrated with contemporary analytical tools, still provides valuable insights into family dynamics and individual careers within the Roman senate. In doing so, the author overcomes some of the more superficial criticisms levelled against Münzer—for example, the charge of reducing political history to a mere succession of names and kinships—and reclaims his work as a pioneering form of microanalysis ante litteram[1]. The result is a fertile reappraisal: far from being an antiquated exercise, prosopography proves to be a powerful instrument for illuminating the relational nature of aristocratic power and for restoring to Roman imperialism its dimension as concretely lived through individual and familial trajectories.
The volume is structured into fifteen chapters, framed by a substantial methodological introduction and a conclusion that effectively opens onto broader reflections on the theme of imperialism. These chapters are grouped into two major thematic sections: the first offers a general portrait of the world of the senatorial aristocracy, while the second is devoted to the study of specific individual and family case studies. The book closes with two prosopographical appendices and detailed analytical indexes.
The first part of the volume defines the theoretical framework, offering a robust defense of the prosopographical method within a historiographical context increasingly oriented toward abstract theory. Zanin is fully aware of the tension between structuralist readings and interpretations centered on the agency of individual actors: his defense of a “particularist” approach is balanced and persuasive, emphasizing the heuristic value of historical microanalysis over the construction of overarching models. It is precisely this stance that enables him to move beyond the traditional dichotomy between the advocates of “defensive imperialism” (Erich Gruen) and those who have insisted on an “aggressive,” programmatic reading of Roman expansion (William Harris). Whereas scholarship has often oscillated between mutually exclusive positions, Zanin demonstrates how individual and familial trajectories combined to shape an empire that cannot be reduced to a single dominant logic. In this respect, his model succeeds where even Arthur Eckstein’s paradigm of “multipolar anarchy” proved less than fully convincing: despite its opposition to a teleological view of expansionism, Eckstein’s framework ultimately reproduces, under a different guise, the notion of a fundamentally defensive imperialism. By contrast, Zanin’s particularist approach highlights the complexity of aristocratic choices and restores the plurality of factors that contributed to shaping Roman hegemony in the Mediterranean.
The second chapter addresses the construction and consolidation of aristocratic identity in the first half of the second century BC, focusing in particular on magistracies, family strategies, and the crucial role of provincial commands. The analysis of family trajectories (e.g., the Aemilii, Fabii, and Fulvii, fully developed in the second part of the book) is accompanied by a notable attention to terminological nuances: concepts such as imperium, dignitas, and auctoritas are treated with philological finesse that reveals full mastery of the sources. This linguistic sensitivity is also reflected in the author’s lexical choices, which are never accidental: modern terms such as “aristocracy” or “imperialism” are employed with caution and always accompanied by critical reflection on their applicability in the ancient context. Zanin is acutely aware of the risk of projecting contemporary categories onto the Roman world, yet he succeeds in using them productively, clarifying both their limits and their heuristic value. “Aristocracy,” for example, is adopted not as a rigid sociological concept but as a tool to designate a network of families and individuals who constructed their authority through titles, memories, and shared political practices. Likewise, “imperialism” is not conceived as a unitary ideological project but rather as a set of competitive behaviors and choices that, in their accumulation, produced Roman hegemony. In this sense, terminological refinement is not merely a philological exercise but an integral component of the book’s theoretical framework.
Chapters three and four form the core of this first part and address directly the practices of governance and the mechanisms of Roman domination in the conquered territories. Rejecting the binary between economic exploitation and ideological legitimation, Zanin highlights the cumulative effect of aristocratic strategies of distinction, self-promotion, and competition. Particularly valuable is his focus on the temporal and spatial rhythms of senatorial mobility—from diplomatic missions to repeated commands—and how these trajectories shaped Rome’s presence in the Mediterranean. In this regard, the volume positions itself consciously within a recent line of scholarship that has placed “mobility” at the center of inquiry, redefining the interpretative boundaries of the Mediterranean as a privileged space for the circulation of people, practices, and knowledge. While most of this scholarship has concentrated on the imperial age or the late Republic, Zanin pushes the chronological horizon back further, showing how, already in the second century BC, senatorial mobility was a decisive factor in configuring power relations and articulating Roman presence in local contexts[2]. In this way, the book not only enriches our understanding of the second century but also provides an excellent foundation for explaining the emergence of the interconnected Mediterranean world that would characterize later periods. In these early chapters Zanin also turns to the language of senatorial identity and the discursive construction of Roman hegemony. Here the author’s philological acumen comes fully to the fore: his examination of senatus consulta, ethnographic passages in historiography, and political oratory shows how members of the elite were able to negotiate their imperial role through highly formalized expressive codes. Zanin stresses that these codes were not mere rhetorical ornaments but concrete instruments of legitimation and collective self-representation, capable of building consensus and establishing hierarchies within the senatorial body and in relation to subject peoples. In this context, key concepts such as maiestas, auctoritas, and even the very notion of libertas populi Romani appear as linguistic resources that could be mobilized flexibly, depending on circumstances and interlocutors.
The second part of the volume (chapters 5–14), the true heart of the work, focuses on a rich series of family and individual case studies, ranging from the Valerii Laevini to the Caecilii Metelli, from the Claudii to the Domitii Ahenobarbi, and culminating in the figure of Scipio Aemilianus. The breadth of this repertoire enables Zanin to traverse the entire geographical spectrum of Roman expansion, from the Iberian West to the Hellenistic East, and to capture both the distinctive features of individual aristocratic strategies and the elements they held in common. His analysis illuminates the various ways in which senatorial families adjusted their political choices, adapting them in each case to context, resources, and available opportunities. At the same time, Zanin demonstrates how these individual and familial actions converged into a web of shared practices—from the use of provincial commands as stages for distinction to the construction of family memories tied to military and diplomatic successes—that ultimately guaranteed a surprising coherence to the Roman imperial model. The picture that emerges is of a fragmented and competitive universe in which, nevertheless, all actors, whether consciously or not, contributed to sustaining a common dynamic that reinforced, and ultimately legitimized, Rome’s Mediterranean hegemony.
The argument is solid, supported by a careful reading of the sources and a mature engagement with modern scholarship, and situates itself in dialogue with the most recent studies on the political language of the Roman Republic (from Hölkeskamp to Flaig)[3]. Zanin’s achievement lies in showing that the expressions of imperialism cannot be understood solely in terms of economic structures or military dynamics, but must also be examined in their symbolic and communicative dimensions: it was through language, ritual, and discursive codification that aristocratic power secured its legitimacy and continuity. In this respect, the final chapter not only completes the framework of the book but also provides its interpretative climax, presenting Roman hegemony as a phenomenon at once material and linguistic-cultural. Throughout the volume, Zanin engages with a wide and up-to-date bibliography—in Italian, English, and especially German—without ever lapsing into mere displays of erudition. The book thus stands as a model of balance between rigorous empirical research and broad historiographical reflection.
Naturally, there is room for further development and for critical perspectives. Some readers may wish for a more systematic treatment of the economic dynamics of imperialism, or for a broader engagement with post-colonial models. Others might contend that the book, with its strong emphasis on the role of the elites, at first glance appears to return historiographical debate to boundaries some consider outdated, overlooking the participation of subaltern groups and the marginal actors whose political agency recent studies of the Middle Republic have brought back into focus[4]. Yet such criticisms would be unfair: Zanin begins from a fact that is difficult to dispute, namely that in the decisive centuries of Mediterranean expansion, Rome was effectively governed by a relatively small number of noble families, capable of maintaining a firm grip on the institutions and determining both domestic and foreign politics. L’aristocrazia senatoria e l’egemonia del Mediterraneo demonstrates how these mechanisms of domination can be investigated without lapsing into reductionism, thanks to an impeccable use of sources, a refined philological sensibility, and a constant care for the particular and singular dynamics that shaped political action. It is precisely this combination that makes the book an ideal point of departure for fruitful dialogue with methodological approaches of a different kind, including those that focus on the margins of Roman citizenship or on the behavior of provincial communities. Zanin does not deny the relevance of such perspectives, but implicitly reminds us that any discussion of Roman expansionism cannot disregard the agency of those who, above all others, held the power to decide: the members of the senatorial aristocracy.
Notes
[1] See also the recent book by Carey M. Barber, Politics in the Roman Republic: Perspectives from Niebuhr to Gelzer, Leiden-Boston 2023.
[2] On the 2nd century BC see the papers collected in M. Balbo, F. Santangelo (eds.), A Community in Transition. Rome between Hannibal and the Gracchi, Oxford University Press 2023.
[3] K.-J. Hölkeskamp, Rekonstruktionen einer Republik. Die politische Kultur des antiken Rom und die Forschung der letzten Jahrzehnte, München 2004; E. Flaig, Ritualisierte Politik. Zeichen, Gesten und Herrschaft im Alten Rom, Göttingen 20042.
[4] See for example the recent works by Seth Bernard, Lisa Marie Mignone, Dan-el Padilla Peralta, Making the middle Republic: new Approaches to Rome and Italy, c.400-200 BCE. Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2023; and of Dominic Machado, Voluntas militum. Community, Collective Action, and Popular Power in the Armies of the Middle Republic (300–100 BCE). Libera Res Publica 9, Zaragoza, Prensas de la Universidad de Zaragoza, 2023.