Teoderico e gli allori dei Magni

Abstract

This paper deals with some of Cassiodorus’ letters focused on the relations between Theoderic’s kingdom and the Roman nobility of southern Gaul after the victory against the Franks; in particular, it examines the letters on the appointment of Arcadius Placidus Magnus Felix to the consulship (Var. 2, 1-3), and the letter on the restitution to the spectabilis Magnus of the properties he had lost during the war (Var. 3, 18). The contents and rhetorical strategies of these texts strengthen the links between the Ostrogothic present and the Roman past, so that Cassiodorus, for the first and only time in the Variae, establishes a full identification between the Gothic kingdom and the imperium Romanum. These messages must be interpreted both in the light of the external relations of the Ostrogothic kingdom and in the light of the new ties between Italy and the Gallic prefecture.