The book under discussion is an updated version of the prosopographical part of O.'s postdoctoral thesis originally submitted in 2007, in which he presents prosopographical entries (biograms) for all ministers with membership in the imperial consistory (comites consistoriani) of the Roman Empire active in the fourth century (until a.d. 395). Among these, O. includes the magister officiorum (mag. off.), the comes sacrarum largitionum (CSL), the comes rei privatae (CRP) and the quaestor (QSP). O. intends to remedy ‘the lack of [a] modern monograph dedicated to the group of four heads of [the] palace administration’ (p. 7). Indeed, the four officials, although subject to detailed studies individually, have not yet been discussed as a group; even more importantly, most of the fundamental studies on this topic appeared in the 1980s, with multiple additions, corrections and revisions having been published since then. Therefore, a study which critically examines and combines this material and presents the results in a clear and precise fashion would be of great help for future scholars tackling this area of research.

The book is divided into two parts: an introduction provides a brief overview of the ‘Palace ministries in the hierarchy of ranks’ (p. 9) and the ‘Civil law privileges’ (p. 23) of the comites consistoriani; the next and central part of the book is made up of a prosopographic register of dignitaries arranged in alphabetical order, followed up by a very brief 1.5 page summary and a table presenting the reworked fasti of the discussed office-holders. A list of abbreviations, a bibliography (subdivided into primary sources and modern literature) and an index of names complete the volume.

The introduction treats in a cursory fashion the development of the four court ministries within the context of the social and political developments of the fourth-century imperial court. In the first section, O. relies largely on preceding studies, citing key ancient texts and offering his interpretations on several points of detail; the second section is a classic discussion of the legal evidence, without much attention being given to modern scholarship on the topic (only five modern works are cited). Unfortunately, O.'s interpretations often fail to convince the reader fully: such is the case (p. 9) when he attributes the elevation of the mag. offic. from the rank of an ‘ordinary tribune’ to Licinius (instead of Constantine), on the basis that his mag. offic. Martinianus is identified as the first magister in Lydus, De mag. 2.25. However, in the same section, Lydus uses the identical title when speaking of Palladius, Constantine's mag. offic. in a.d. 324. Interestingly, Palladius’ two predecessors Heraclianus (a.d. 320) and Proculeianus (a.d. 323) are presented as tribunus et magister officiorum (CTh 16.10.1 and CTh 11.9.1, respectively) in the Theodosian Code. Given the later commonplace use of magister to designate the mag. offic. in combination with the fact that Lydus is relying on Peter the Patrician (sixth century) in this section, we might do best not to take his use of terminology too literally in this instance. Furthermore, frequent mistakes in the citation of legal evidence (e.g. p. 10: CTh 10.4.2 instead of 10.14.2, CTh 11.116.7 instead of 11.16.7; p. 21: CI 3.24.3 instead of 12.3.3) or missing or imprecise references (e.g. p. 13 n. 19; p. 20: ‘Book I’; ‘Book VI’) at times make it difficult and time-consuming to follow O.'s arguments.

O. begins the second part of the study by outlining the methodology with which he approaches his prosopographical work. The information for each individual is organised in a biogram following the same pattern: (1) ‘identification and names’; (2) ‘social and regional background’; (3) ‘career before obtaining palace ministry’; (4) ‘holding a post in the consistory: a) the circumstances of taking the post; b) the age at which the post was obtained; c) the course of service; d) the end of service’; (5) ‘further career’; (6) ‘religion’; (7) ‘family and connections’; (8) ‘other information: e.g. education and professional qualification, fortune, etc.’; (9) ‘literature’. In order to determine the social background of the subjects of his study, O. intends to use a model of Roman society developed by K. Christ. As Christ developed his model to describe the society of the High Empire, its application to the fourth century is problematic to say the least. Regarding the other aspects of interest, no methodological approach is offered. This shortcoming becomes particularly clear when interpretations go beyond the letter of the text, as is the case, for example, when discussing religious orientation (cf. R. von Haehling, Religionszugehörigkeit der hohen Amtsträger [1978]). The inclusion of other approaches, such as onomastics, but also a discussion of the problems inherent in using sources with great temporal remove from the described action or patristic literature, would have given the study further depth.

The biograms themselves are of varying quality and length, but wherever possible offer a detailed and at times critical discussion of the relevant modern literature. Moreover, O. relies on a broad spectrum of primary sources, including fourth-century writers as well as the works of Byzantine scholars of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, inscriptions and above all legal sources. Important secondary literature is rarely missed, but the works on various magistrates under Valentinian I and Gratian by A. Coşkun (e.g. Die gens Ausonia an der Macht [2002]) should have been taken into consideration. More important is to note that the revisions of imperial legislation undertaken by P.O. Cuneo (La legislazione di Costantino II, Costanzo II e Costante [1997]), F. Pergami (La legislazione di Valentiniano e Valente [1993]) and S. Schmidt-Hofner (ZRG 125 [2008], 498–602) have evidently been missed by O. Given that the legal texts in many cases make up the most important category of evidence for this type of study, it would have been imperative at least to take the results of these authors into consideration.

On a more general note, there are a number of remarks that apply to the entire volume. The quality of Latin and Greek citations as well as the English text is absolutely unacceptable for this type of publication. Grammatical, stylistic and orthographic errors pervade the volume to such a degree that there is hardly a single page free of them; this includes the bibliography, which also misses a number of works referenced in the footnotes. All this hardly makes the book – which owing to its subject matter is already rather dry –a pleasure to read.

These shortcomings notwithstanding, O. unites in his study a considerable range of sources, both secondary and modern, for every individual discussed. The book, if critically used, may therefore serve as a helpful guide to further scholarship and source literature on a specific individual; the discussions themselves should, however, only be used critically and carefully.