Review article
Selections and Surveys of Ancient Literary Sources for the History of Southern Pannonia
Josip Parat
Abstract
This paper overviews selections of literary sources pertinent to the ancient history of Croatian part of the Roman province of Pannonia. Emphasis has primarily been put on modern editions of Greek and Latin texts, selected and organized into thematic collections according to specific topics such as place, people, social group, etc. Since the literary data for Roman Pannonia were seldom treated in separate studies, one should mention numerous selections that discussed the area only sporadically. M. Petar Katančić (18th/19th c.) was the first Croatian scholar to undertake an analyis of literary sources for the area between the Sava and Drava rivers. His work was followed by other prominent authors, but the real thematic series and special collections have been continuously published only from the mid-20th century. Apart from many sparce studies in the Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft, the literary accounts for southern Pannonia can be found in special editions published by Romanian Academy (1960 and 1964), Bosnia and Herzegovina's Academy (1969), Slovenian Academy (1986 and 2004) and German Academy of Science (1988-1992). Notwithstanding the fact that literary data were predominantely published as appendices in archaeological and historical discussions, some of them were also treated in special linguistics and geography manuals. However, the first special selection of literary sources for Pannonian history is of relatively recent date. Brought by Hungarian scholars Fehér and Kovács, the thorough series Fontes Pannoniae antiquae – The Sources of Pannonian Antiquity gathered almost all literary and epigraphic evidence for Pannonia, from the Greek epics up to the period of late antiquity. Although this recent and still ongoing endeavour aptly presented sources relevant to Croatian territory, there is a considerable need for other up-to-date contributions and comprehensive studies. It is therefore strongly recommended that they should be equipped with translation, commentary and technical references in the standard philological manner.
Keywords
ancient history literary sources; southern Pannonia; ancient authors; surveys of sources
Hrčak ID:
164529
URI
Publication date:
15.10.2015.
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