These essays examine how various communities remembered and commemorated their shared past through the lens of utopia and its corollary, dystopia, providing a framework for the reinterpretation of ...rapidly changing religious, cultural, and political realities of the turbulent period from 300 to 750 CE. The common theme of the chapters is the utopian ideals of religious groups, whether these are inscribed on the body, on the landscape, in texts, or on other cultural objects. The volume is the first to apply this conceptual framework to Late Antiquity, when historically significant conflicts arose between the adherents of four major religious identities: Greaco-Roman 'pagans', newly dominant Christians; diaspora Jews, who were more or less persecuted, depending on the current regime; and the emerging religion and power of Islam. Late Antiquity was thus a period when dystopian realities competed with memories of a mythical Golden Age, variously conceived according to the religious identity of the group. The contributors come from a range of disciplines, including cultural studies, religious studies, ancient history, and art history, and employ both theoretical and empirical approaches. This volume is unique in the range of evidence it draws upon, both visual and textual, to support the basic argument that utopia in Late Antiquity, whether conceived spiritually, artistically, or politically, was a place of the past but also of the future, even of the afterlife. Memories of Utopia will be of interest to historians, archaeologists, and art historians of the later Roman Empire, and those working on religion in Late Antiquity and Byzantium.
The aim of this paper is to provide new data on forest management and arboricultural practices in the Roman and Late Antique periods in the north-eastern Iberian Peninsula. In this study, the ...waterlogged branches found in three wells at the sites of Iesso and Vilauba in the northeast of the Iberian Peninsula were analysed. To determine management practices the roundwood method, based on the correlation between age and diameter, has been applied. The study has revealed the presence of a wide range of species collected on surrounding forests, especially in riparian forest. Moreover, it is remarkable the abundance of fruit trees at both sites, being the most abundant Prunus sp. The comparison of the archaeological branches with a reference collection of modern twigs from cultivated and non-managed individuals of the Prunaceae family, Salix sp. and Sambucus nigra, has provided clear evidence of management practices in these taxa. In addition, direct evidence of pruning was observed on some branches of Vitis vinifera.
Abstract
In his treatise
The Exposition of the Content of Virgil according to Moral Philosophy
, Fabius Fulgentius allegorically interpreted the contents of Virgil's epic the
Aeneid.
The aim of our ...paper is to explain the main principles of Fulgentius' allegorization by analysing the first verse of Virgil's
Aeneid
. In Fulgentius' view, the 12 books of the epic depicted the three main stages of a human life as they follow the “natural order”: childhood, adolescence and adulthood. In his prologue (Fulg.
Cont
. 87. 4–6; 87. 11–89. 3; 89. 19–90. 17), the author supports his claim by presenting an allegorical interpretation of the first line of Virgil's epic (Verg.
A
. 1. 1), which contains three famous words:
arma
(“arms”),
vir
(“man”) and
primus
(“first”). According to Fulgentius, the first term
arma
(“arms”) represents
virtus
(“manliness”) in the sense of characteristics that are available to all human individuals during childhood. The second term
vir
(“man”) refers to
sapientia
(“wisdom”), which is related to the development of the
ingenium
(“mind”) during adolescence. The third term
primus
(“first”) symbolises the adult ability
ornare
(“to ornament”) what we have learnt in the first phases of our life. With life experience in childhood and adolescence, a person can gradually become
princeps
(“a ruler”). In other words, they can be “first” within a given society and thus conclude their personal development towards perfection. As such, the contents of Virgil's
Aeneid
correspond to these three terms: Books 1–3 to childhood, Books 4–6 to adolescence, and Books 7–12 to adulthood.
The Early Christian churches of the Late Antique hilltop settlement in Lavant (Lienz, Austria) have been investigated for almost a century. In recent years (2017–2021), a large conservation campaign ...took place within the ruins of the so-called Episcopal Church. During this campaign, it was possible to carry out targeted excavations inside the Early Christian church to understand the consecutive building phases and their dating better. In addition to new insights into the history of the building, several new finds also came from these excavation campaigns, providing further information about the church’s interior. In the following, all objects associated with lighting are presented.
The Justinianic Plague Mordechai, Lee; Eisenberg, Merle; Newfield, Timothy P. ...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS,
12/2019, Letnik:
116, Številka:
51
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Existing mortality estimates assert that the Justinianic Plague (circa 541 to 750 CE) caused tens of millions of deaths throughout the Mediterranean world and Europe, helping to end antiquity and ...start the Middle Ages. In this article, we argue that this paradigm does not fit the evidence. We examine a series of independent quantitative and qualitative datasets that are directly or indirectly linked to demographic and economic trends during this two-century period: Written sources, legislation, coinage, papyri, inscriptions, pollen, ancient DNA, and mortuary archaeology. Individually or together, they fail to support the maximalist paradigm: None has a clear independent link to plague outbreaks and none supports maximalist reconstructions of late antique plague. Instead of large-scale, disruptive mortality, when contextualized and examined together, the datasets suggest continuity across the plague period. Although demographic, economic, and political changes continued between the 6th and 8th centuries, the evidence does not support the now commonplace claim that the Justinianic Plague was a primary causal factor of them.
Desire and Disunity explores the struggles of Christianising late ancient sexuality in the late Roman West. Through an examination of fourth to sixth century sermons, letters, laws, and treatises in ...Latin-speaking communities, the difficulties of late antique clerics in moving ascetically influenced sexual ideals into wider practice become evident. Western clerics faced challenges on several fronts: the dedication and devoutness of lay Christians varied, while the military-political upheavals of the fifth century created new challenges and opportunities for influencing one’s flock. Furthermore, Roman sexual norms continued to inform the thinking of many clerics and lay figures alike, even when in opposition to more scripturally based moral reasoning. Problems of bigamy, concubinage, sex work, incest, homosexual acts, adultery, and more troubled western Christian communities, with contradicting rules and traditions on what was acceptable and what was not. What reach did elite clerical perspectives on sexual norms have amongst the non-elite? How did clerics navigate tensions between the idealisation of Christian communal purity and the actions of congregants that fell short of these ideals? What influenced clerical perceptions of sex and how did they articulate these ideas to their audiences? Clerical sources of this time reflect these challenges as well as varying church attempts to reform the sex lives of their congregants – and, indeed, church failure in doing so.
"This volume is dedicated to the cultural and religious diversity in Jewish communities from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Age and the growing influence of the rabbis within these communities ...during the same period. Drawing on available textual and material evidence, the fourteen essays presented here, written by leading experts in their fields, span a significant chronological and geographical range and cover material that has not yet received sufficient attention in scholarship. The volume is divided into four parts. The first focuses on the vantage point of the synagogue; the second and third on non-rabbinic Judaism in, respectively, the Near East and Europe; the final part turns from diversity within Judaism to the process of ""rabbinization"" as represented in some unusual rabbinic texts. Diversity and Rabbinization is a welcome contribution to the historical study of Judaism in all its complexity. It presents fresh perspectives on critical questions and allows us to rethink the tension between multiplicity and unity in Judaism during the first millennium CE. L’École Pratique des Hautes Études has kindly contributed to the publication of this volume."
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