{"product_id":"the-importance-of-being-gorgeous-gender-and-christian-imperial-rule-in-late-antiquity-volume-66","title":"The Importance of Being Gorgeous: Gender and Christian Imperial Rule in Late Antiquity Volume 66","description":"\u003cb\u003eA free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press's Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e In this book, Susanna Elm radically changes our understanding of imperial rule in the later Roman Empire. As she shows, the so-called eastern decadence of the Emperor Theodosius and his successors was in fact a calculated revolution in masculinity and the representation of imperial power. Here, the emperor's hard yet soft, mature yet youthfully gorgeous beauty was central. Because the Theodosian emperors were divine--gods one could see--so was their beauty: their manliness was the face and body of God. The emperors' gorgeousness, their sparkling regalia, how they wished their bodies to be seen by their elite subjects--who authored the texts on which Elm's analysis is based--were as important as laws, taxes, and armies. Their \u003ci\u003evir\u003c\/i\u003e-ness strategically deployed male same-sex erotic desire to enhance the unity of the realm in times of tension, incorporate the signifying potency of child emperors, and create a flexible yet stable model of Christian sovereignty.","brand":"University of California Press","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":48515701440761,"sku":"9780520413344","price":34.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0813\/1811\/7625\/files\/imageloader_e7b8511a-0d9a-452f-9017-0ca2f1ee21dc.jpg?v=1781209027","url":"https:\/\/hookeandplotte.com\/products\/the-importance-of-being-gorgeous-gender-and-christian-imperial-rule-in-late-antiquity-volume-66","provider":"Hooke and Plotte Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}