Kleine Schriften zur Germanienpolitik in der römischen Kaiserzeit
Krešimir Matijević, Wolfgang Spickermann, Rainer Wiegels
On the occasion of the 75th birthday of the ancient historian Rainer Wiegels from Osnabrück, 23 of his most important publications have been reprinted, supplemented by a foreword of the editors, a bibliography of the honoured from 2005 onwards, and a comprehensive source index. Corresponding to the favourite research topics of the jubilarian, the focus has been laid on early Roman Imperial military history, particularly on research on the supposed battlefield of Varus at Kalkriese in the scientific presentation and interpretation of which Wiegels has been and still is decisively involved since its initial stage in 1988/89. By doing so he always placed the regional event into the overall context of Roman Imperial politics of the Julio-Claudian period. Important themes are e. g. the evidence from and localisation of the battlefield, the antique written sources on the clades Variana, the legions involved, coin finds, the contemporaneous term and notion of Germanic peoples, the Germanic politics of post-Caesarean times, but also the myth of Arminius as well as the relation between the Roman army and civil society during the principate.
