‘Very great are your words’

2020 ◽  
pp. 114-127
Author(s):  
Nicholas Baker-Brian
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Close Attention ◽  
Sasanian Empire ◽  
Literature And Philosophy ◽  
Ancient Literature ◽  
Recent Developments

This chapter evaluates the Manichaean Kephalaia-collections from the perspective of recent developments in the study of late-antique rhetoric, specifically the role and context of dialogue in ancient literature and philosophy. It pays close attention to the recently edited material from the Coptic text, The Chapters of the Wisdom of my Lord Mani, by analysing the engagements between Mani and a number of teachers associated with the court of the Sasanian monarch, Shapur I. The chapter highlights the importance of Mani’s dialogues with competitor figures from the Sasanian Empire to the development of the religious identity of Manichaeans in late-antique Persia and Egypt.

Rhetoric and Religious Identity in Late Antiquity

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Richard Flower ◽  
Morwenna Ludlow
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Religious Identities ◽  
Cultural Expression ◽  
Literary Forms ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
The Creation

This chapter provides an overview of scholarly trends and approaches to this topic and outlines the place of this volume and its individual chapters within recent developments. In doing so, it considers a number of linked issues, including what was perceived as falling within the sphere of ‘the religious’ in late antiquity; how religious identities were constructed, activated and expressed; how the notion of late-antique religious identity should be understood and classified by scholars; where ‘rhetoric’ can be located within methods of cultural expression including, but not limited to, traditional literary forms and paideia; and how these methods were employed for the creation and reshaping of concepts of religious identity.

Recycling and Reuse in the Roman Economy

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Building Materials ◽  
Computational Modelling ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Roman Economy ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Status ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Methodological Approaches ◽  
First Time ◽  
Site Types

The recycling and reuse of materials and objects were extensive in the past, but have rarely been embedded into models of the economy; even more rarely has any attempt been made to assess the scale of these practices. Recent developments, including the use of large datasets, computational modelling, and high-resolution analytical chemistry, are increasingly offering the means to reconstruct recycling and reuse, and even to approach the thorny matter of quantification. Growing scholarly interest in the topic has also led to an increasing recognition of these practices from those employing more traditional methodological approaches, which are sometimes coupled with innovative archaeological theory. Thanks to these efforts, it has been possible for the first time in this volume to draw together archaeological case studies on the recycling and reuse of a wide range of materials, from papyri and textiles, to amphorae, metals and glass, building materials and statuary. Recycling and reuse occur at a range of site types, and often in contexts which cross-cut material categories, or move from one object category to another. The volume focuses principally on the Roman Imperial and late antique world, over a broad geographical span ranging from Britain to North Africa and the East Mediterranean. Last, but not least, the volume is unique in focusing upon these activities as a part of the status quo, and not just as a response to crisis.

Reinventing spiritual care in a secular context: the chaplain as entrepreneur

2020 ◽  
pp. 21-34
Author(s):  
Hetty Zock
Keyword(s):  
The Netherlands ◽  
Professional Identity ◽  
Religious Identity ◽  
Spiritual Care ◽  
Community Care ◽  
Belief Systems ◽  
The State ◽  
Care Community ◽  
Cultural Climate ◽  
Recent Developments

This paper discusses the state of chaplaincy—professional spiritual care—in the secularized context of the Netherlands. The present religious and cultural climate is sketched, as well as the organization of chaplaincy and the daily practices of chaplains. Two important recent developments are highlighted: the rise of non-denominational spiritual care and spiritual caregivers getting involved in extramural care (community care). Finally, the Guideline Spiritual Care—an interdisciplinary model for providing spiritual care—is presented. It is argued that chaplaincy in the Netherlands has gone through a process of transformation, in which the relation between the professional and the religious identity of the chaplain had to be redefined. Spiritual care may still be denominationally organized in the Netherlands, but the spiritual caregivers share a common professional identity as professionals who focus on meaning, belief systems, and ethics.

The Lex Dei and the Latin Bible

2007 ◽  
Vol 100 (4) ◽  
pp. 425-441
Author(s):  
Robert Frakes
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Religious Identity ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Roman Law ◽  
Latin Translation ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Hebrew Scriptures ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Latin Work ◽  
Shed Light

Two striking developments in late antiquity are the growing influence of Christianity and the codification of Roman law. The first attempt to harmonize these two developments lies in the late antique Latin work known by scholars as the Lex Dei (“Law of God”) or Collatio Legum Mosaicarum et Romanarum (“Collation of the Laws of Moses and of the Romans”). The anonymous collator of this short legal compendium organized his work following a fairly regular plan, dividing it into sixteen topics (traditionally called titles). Each title begins with a quotation from the Hebrew Bible (in Latin), followed by quotations of passages from Roman jurists and, occasionally, from Roman law. His apparent motive was to demonstrate the similarity between Roman law and the law of God. Scholars have differed over where the collator obtained his Latin translations of passages from the Hebrew Bible. Did he make his own translation from the Greek Septuagint or directly from the Hebrew Scriptures themselves? Did he use the famous Latin translation of Jerome or an older, pre-Jerome, Latin translation of the Bible, known by scholars as the Vetus Latina or Old Latin Bible? Re-examination of the evolution of texts of the Latin Bible and close comparison of biblical passages from the Lex Dei with other surviving Latin versions will confirm that the collator used one of the several versions of the Old Latin Bible that were in circulation in late antiquity. Such a conclusion supports the argument that the religious identity of the collator was Christian (a subject of scholarly controversy for almost a century). Moreover, analysis of the collator's use of the Bible can also shed light on his methodology in compiling his collection.

scholarly journals Sasanian Persia

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Population Growth ◽  
Urban Development ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Urban Culture ◽  
Arabian Peninsula ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Economic Prosperity ◽  
Sasanian Empire ◽  
Roman World

The Sasanian Empire (third-seventh centuries) was one of the largest empires of antiquity, stretching from Mesopotamia to modern Pakistan and from Central Asia to the Arabian Peninsula. This mega-empire withstood powerful opponents in the steppe and expanded further in Late Antiquity, whilst the Roman world shrunk in size. Recent research has revealed the reasons for this success, notably population growth in some territories, economic prosperity and urban development, made possible through investment in agriculture and military infrastructure on a scale unparalleled in the late antique world. This volume explores the empire’s relations with its neighbours and key phenomena which contributed to its wealth and power, from the empire’s armed forces to agriculture, trade and treatment of minorities. The latest discoveries, notably major urban foundations, fortifications and irrigations systems, feature prominently. An empire whose military might and urban culture rivalled Rome and foreshadowed the caliphate will be of interest to scholars of the Roman and Islamic world.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Eberhard W. Sauer
Keyword(s):  
Population Growth ◽  
Urban Development ◽  
Central Asia ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Urban Culture ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Economic Prosperity ◽  
Sasanian Empire ◽  
Roman World

The Sasanian Empire (third-seventh centuries) was one of the largest empires of antiquity, stretching from Mesopotamia to modern Pakistan and from Central Asia to the Arabian Peninsula. This mega-empire withstood powerful opponents in the steppe and expanded further in Late Antiquity, whilst the Roman world shrunk in size. Recent research has revealed the reasons for this success, notably population growth in some territories, economic prosperity and urban development, made possible through investment in agriculture and military infrastructure on a scale unparalleled in the late antique world. This volume explores the empire’s relations with its neighbours and key phenomena which contributed to its wealth and power, from the empire’s armed forces to agriculture, trade and treatment of minorities. The latest discoveries, notably major urban foundations, fortifications and irrigations systems, feature prominently. An empire whose military might and urban culture rivalled Rome and foreshadowed the caliphate will be of interest to scholars of the Roman and Islamic world.

The Garb of Being

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
The Body ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Religious Imagination ◽  
Bodily Experiences ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
Textual Bodies ◽  
Identity Class

This collection of essays explores how the body became a touchstone for late antique practice and the religious imagination. When we read the stories and testimonies of late ancient Christians, what different types of bodies stand before us in such stories and what do they tell us? How do we understand the range of bodily experiences—solitary and social, private and public—that clothed ancient Christians? How might such experiences and the body as garb itself serve as a productive metaphor by which to explore this attention to matters of gender, religious identity, class, and ethnicity? The essays in this book explore these and related questions through stories from the eastern Christian world of antiquity: monks and martyrs, families and congregations, and textual bodies from antiquity subject to modern interpretations.

Late Antique Iran and the Arabs: The Case of al-Hira

2013 ◽  
Vol 6 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 115-126 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isabel Toral-Niehoff
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Studies ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Historical Perspective ◽  
Third Space ◽  
Cultural Exchange ◽  
The Political ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Cultural Dynamics ◽  
Sasanian Empire

Abstract This article reevaluates our evidence for the interaction of Arab and Iranian elements in the Arab frontier-state of al-Hira, a state in late antiquity, which can be seen as a paradigmatic “third space” of special cultural dynamics. First, it sums up our evidence about the political and commercial ties connecting the Lakhmid principality and the Sasanian Empire; next, it focuses on the possible agents of cultural exchange between the two; finally, we direct our attention to the cultural spheres themselves and the issue of where and how Iranian-Arab transculturation as a process can be detected in the Hiran context. The article argues for a cautious reassessment of the material in light of current research in cultural studies. This is significant in its wider historical perspective, as such a process might have prepared the path for later developments in Islamic times, when the apogee of Arab-Iranian interaction is supposed to have taken place, i.e., in Abbasid Iraq.

scholarly journals Ecclesiastical Economies: The Integration of Sacred and Maritime Topographies of Late Antique Cyprus

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (11) ◽  
pp. 989
Author(s):  
Catherine T. Keane
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Archaeological Research ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Sacred Landscapes ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
Cultural Networks ◽  
Pragmatic Aspects ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Productive Landscapes ◽  
The Church

This article focusses on the relationship of the church with productive landscapes and coastal topographies within numerous Cypriot contexts of the 4th–8th centuries. Through synthesising the archaeological research and architectural remains of these aspects and categories, the coastal settlements of the island are recontextualised in terms of their mercantile, religious, and cultural networks, on inter- and intraregional scales. The advantages of researching late antique insular societies on local, individual scales and within economic contexts are therefore highlighted. These integrative approaches can illuminate the constructions of religious identity across many coastal contexts, particularly in larger islands with micro-regions and trans-Mediterranean connectivity, like Cyprus. By considering the importance of the administrative and economic roles of the late antique church within these maritime topographies, future archaeological research can integrate both the monumentality and pragmatic aspects of sacred landscapes.

scholarly journals Ivan Turgenev’s Rome (1840)

2018 ◽  
pp. 124-142 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexey Kara-Murza
Keyword(s):  
Russian Literature ◽  
Literary Work ◽  
The Novel ◽  
The South ◽  
Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev ◽  
Literature And Philosophy ◽  
The North ◽  
Ancient Literature

This article examines the siginifcant role that Romeplayed in the life of Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev (1818–1883). The author researches the “Roman” preferences of young Turgenev, who specialized in ancient literature and philosophy in Moscow, St. Petersburgand Berlin. Special attention is paid to the circumstances of 21-years-old Turgenev’s stay in the Eternal City in February–April 1840 and his relationship with members of Khovrins’ salon in Rome, espesially with the eldest daughter of Khovrin, Alexandra Nikolaevna, in marriage Bakhmeteva (1823–1903), whо became later a wellknown writer on religious and philosophical topics. The author substantiates the version that it was young “Sashenka” Khovrina who became the prototype of Lisa Kalitina in the novel Home of the Gentry, started in Rome at the end of 1857. The author studies the “Italian traces” in the literary work of Turgenev: in early romantic poem Steno (1834), poem Venus of Medicis (1837), novel On the Eve (1859), etc. The author notes that the “civilizational” contrasts between the “North” and the “South”, abundantly scattered in the works of young Turgenev, suggest that in his work has found a kind of continuation of the tradition of the “Russian Northernship,” deriving in Russian literature from G.R. Derzhavin, N.M. Karamzin, Prince P.A. Vyazemsky.

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