the Senate of the City of Rome

The Roman Senate (Senatus Populusque Romanus) was the ancient governing council of Rome, and though stripped of real sovereignty under the emperors, it survived as a prestigious corporate body of the city's aristocracy well into the post-imperial period. In Cassiodorus's Variae it appears as the collective recipient of formal letters issued in the name of the Ostrogothic kings (Theoderic the Great and his successors, c. 507-540), who governed Italy from Ravenna and addressed the Senate to announce appointments, confirm honors, justify policy, and court the loyalty of the senatorial elite. These letters are a vivid witness to the continuity of senatorial institutions and ceremonial in sixth-century Italy, even as effective political power had passed to the Gothic court. The Senate as an institution faded from the historical record during the Gothic War and the disruptions of the mid-sixth century.