Although the provinces of the Roman Empire have received much scholarly attention over the past decades, remarkably the rôle and functioning of provincial councils, the so-called koina in the East and concilia in the West, have remained somewhat under-explored. Traditionally, and strongly influenced especially by Jürgen Deininger's Die Provinziallandtage der römischen Kaiserzeit (1965) and by Duncan Fishwick's many contributions on provincial cultic life, provincial councils have been regarded as institutions that were restricted to overseeing the provincial imperial cult, including the organization of provincial games. In addition, provincial councils were seen as a type of mediator between provincial subjects and Roman provincial government. However, as Babett Edelmann-Singer aims to demonstrate, these ideas offer too limited a perspective on provincial councils. Rather, she argues for an additional and active rôle in the political and economic life of the provinces that impacted the Empire at large as well.
E.-S. offers a detailed analysis of the provincial councils with extensive discussions of the available source materials from the various regions of the Empire. The reader of this book is constantly reminded of tension between the specifics of individual councils and the attempt to discern general and empire-wide patterns. This is in part the consequence of an unevenly spread corpus of evidence, as well as notable regional differences. Even terminological difficulties with translating koina and concilia are illustrative of differences between councils in the East and West.
The book is divided into five chapters, with the core of the argumentation in ch. 4 with its focus on the economic aspects of the provincial councils. In the first chapter, E.-S. offers an introduction and overview of the state-of-the-art of the subject in which she emphasizes that modern scholarship should move beyond the dominance of the Deininger's ideas. The second chapter deals with the origins of the provincial councils. In the eastern half of the Empire leagues, societies and associations of the earlier periods of the Roman Republic and the Hellenistic age served as valuable examples for the provincial councils of the Roman Imperial period. According to E.-S., continuity in the provincial councils with previous organizations should be seen more as eclectic arrangements than as conscious take-overs. She also successfully demonstrates that Deininger's previous view that especially in the West provincial councils did not appear until a provincial reform programme under the emperor Vespasian is no longer tenable, as the evidence points to earlier functioning councils.
Apart from addressing the legal status of provincial councils, the third chapter also briefly touches upon the potential of councils as facilitators for the creation of a collective provincial identity, as also reflected in the coins struck by the councils, especially in the East. Similarly, councils offered the Roman government the opportunity of using them as possible instruments of Romanization.
Ch. 4 lays out one of the book's core economic arguments, that we should consider the councils as social-economic networks, an aspect neglected by Deininger. The fact that the ancient sources have reflected so little on this particular function of councils has led scholars to overlook this function as well. However, based on the scarce evidence, for the most part inscriptions, E.-S. suggests that councils were much more involved in economic life and financial transactions than has so far been acknowledged. This involvement is linked with the argument that councils had a solid financial base that existed independently from the money given to the councils by private persons. Furthermore, although we might not be quite clear on the precise nature of the organization of councils, they were spending and receiving money in the province and beyond. For instance, the organization of games or the payment of the council's personnel stimulated economic activities in the province. Similarly, if the councils as the owners of the temples and their lands had to pay taxes to the imperial government, then the council's economic activities could even be linked to the empire-wide economy (although this issue needs to be researched in more depth). Furthermore, E.-S. explains the minting of coins by provincials councils — only in the East and only in copper — not only as a means of representation but also as a powerful economic instrument by which emperors were guaranteed sufficient available coinage when armies moved through the East and soldiers needed to be paid. The involvement of the provincial councils in various economic activities should also underpin the conclusion that their financial organization must have been much more complex than acknowledged so far.
Ultimately, the book under review convincingly demonstrates that the rôle of provincial councils was not confined to the administering of the imperial cult and the organization of provincial games, but should rather be seen as being interwoven into the political, social and economic life of the provinces. E.-S. has mainly focused on the economic rôle of councils, and so more work is needed to connect the economic activities of the councils more strongly to the political and social life in the provinces. Furthermore, if provincial councils are to be seen as much more involved in provincial life, then we also need to explore further the way in which they related to the functioning of the official structures of Roman provincial government with its own local officials and those that were sent out by the imperial government. In other words, this book is successful in triggering new questions that need to be further pursued.
