Crises of leadership in Late Antiquity: turning points in the history of the first millennium

The Introduction aims to inform readers about the circumstances in which this double issue was inspired and compiled. Its starting point was a research project, funded by the Australian Research Council, on the various types of crises people experienced during Late Antiquity, when ‘crisiology,’ to use the term of Edgar Morin, was at its peak. While the preoccupation of our own era with various crises informed the arguments of our research proposal, the project acquired immediate currency because of the Covid pandemic. Both Covid and the ongoing debates on crises, crisis management, and leadership highlight the need to define our key terms in their historical context, starting with the term ‘Late Antiquity.’ Thus, the Introduction explains the chronological, geographical, and thematic scope of the project alongside its key methodological considerations, as reflected in the individual articles.