Banishment in the Later Roman Empire, 284-476 CE Published
November 13th 2012 by Routledge – 240 pages This book offers a
reconstruction and interpretation of banishment in the final era
of a unified Roman Empire, 284-476 CE. Author Daniel Washburn
argues that exile was both a penalty and a symbol. It applied to
those who committed a misstep or crossed the wrong person; it
also stood as a marker of affliction or failure. Like other
punishments, it articulated and cemented the power asymmetry
between the punisher and the punished. Distinctively, it
maneuvered the body of the banished in order to tell that tale.
The process of banishment also operated as a form of negotiation
between the party that exiled and the one banished. In so doing,
the punishment offered the possibility for pardon, an event that
glorified the pardoner and signaled submissiveness on the part
of the restored. In its sources, this work employs evidence from
legal as well as literary materials to forge a complete picture
of exile. To harves