Floors, Architectural Elevations, and Statuary in Late Antique Residences from Egypt, Cyrenaica, and Cyprus: Some Remarks

2020 ◽  
pp. 153-171
Author(s):  
Eleonora Gasparini
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Hellenistic Period ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Self Presentation ◽  
Specific Choice ◽  
Urban Elites ◽  
Global Vision ◽  
Local Traditions

This paper is focused on the decoration of some late antique residences in Egypt, Cyrenaica, and Cyprus. All of them show common forms of self-presentation of urban elites across the eastern Mediterranean between the 4th and 6th centuries AD. The analysis is based on a global vision of social life in a world that was deeply influenced by a transition from old to new models and by forms of syncretism between various backgrounds which merged in new decorative systems. By recognising their owners’ cultural environment, associations between décor and power can be elucidated in a comparative study of the main elements of these luxury residences. In this context, Christianity is one of the principal issues to be taken into account, along with deep pagan roots of the aristocratic paideia during the investigated period. In fact, the specific choice of the iconographies in the mosaics or the subjects for the statues displayed in these houses can be understood only if contextualised against the spiritual life of the period. In the discussed residences, cultural identity is also manifested by forms of continuity in the architectural elevations. The fact that local traditions developed during the Hellenistic Period were still in use – both as reused building elements and as newly created decoration – can be interpreted as a manifestation of the antiquity and prestige of the families who owned the dwellings. These phenomena are studied through a review of the contexts and their comparative analysis in order to highlight similar developments and their meanings.

A New Project in Progress: Residence as Self-Presentation of Urban Elites. Architecture and Decoration of the House of Orpheus in Nea Paphos, the Ancient Capital of Cyprus. 1 Potentials and Prospects

2020 ◽  
pp. 197-218
Author(s):  
Monika Rekowska ◽  
Demetrios Michaelides ◽  
Patrizio Pensabene ◽  
Eleonora Gasparini
Keyword(s):  
Historical Perspective ◽  
Comprehensive Evaluation ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Self Presentation ◽  
Residential Architecture ◽  
Non Invasive ◽  
Urban Elites ◽  
Dimensional Reconstruction ◽  
Unpublished Information

The so-called House of Orpheus, explored under the direction of Demetrios Michaelides a few decades ago, has so far been studied only fragmentarily. Since 2018, a new project began whose objective is to complete the studies on the site. To this end, non-invasive fieldworks (at Nea Paphos) are currently performed as well as library and archival research focused on gathering all published and unpublished information on the House. The results of the new documentation made on the site, supplemented with archival data, will enable a virtual, three-dimensional reconstruction of selected architectural units. The collected material will serve to re-define the house’s spaces from a historical perspective. The comprehensive evaluation of the architecture of the House of Orpheus will become an important point of reference in studies on the residential architecture of ancient Cyprus and other regions of the eastern Mediterranean.

On the specfics of postcolonial research in the conetmporary Ukrainian literary studies

2019 ◽  
pp. 446-461
Author(s):  
Ekaterina Baydalova
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Postcolonial Theory ◽  
Postcolonial Studies ◽  
Culture Studies ◽  
Self Presentation ◽  
Science Culture ◽  
The Past ◽  
Modus Vivendi ◽  
Ambivalent Attitude

The postcolonial studies have been under discussion in the Ukrainian historiography, social science, culture studies and literary criticism since 1990 years. They have originated from American, European, and Australian academic studies and became more and more popular in modern Ukrainian culture recently. The nation and the nationalism, Orientalism, multicultural and ambivalent individuality self-presentation, the search of cultural identity, the problem of ambivalent attitude to the past are in the paradigm of postcolonial studies. The problems of national identity, the totalitarian past, the interactions with neighboring countries especially Russia and Poland, the instable Ukrainian society’s condition are analyzed under the postcolonial ideas in the Ukrainian intellectual discourse. The postcolonial theory has become the main interpretative strategy of the Ukrainian researchers lately. Nevertheless, there is no unconditional modus vivendi in the Ukrainian academia about postcolonial conceptions, strategies and principles. One of the most important unsolved issues is the question of correlation of postcolonial and postmodern components of the Ukrainian national literature. The inclusion of the studies of trauma and anticolonial and posttotalitarian discourses into the framework of the postcolonial studies is the most distinguishing feature of postcolonial studies in the Ukraine.

Intimation

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. R. F. Ferrari
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
Relevance Theory ◽  
Self Presentation ◽  
Erving Goffman ◽  
Strongly Connected ◽  
Dan Sperber ◽  
Paul Grice

The communicative scale is introduced. What is fundamental to communication is the intention of the communicator rather than the codes that languages employ. Following the model first proposed by Paul Grice and developed in Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson’s ‘relevance theory’, the structure of communicative intentionality is understood to be recursive: its underlying form is ‘I want you to know that I want you to know’. This leaves room for a simpler kind of transmission, to be called ‘intimation’, whose underlying form would be ‘I want you to know’. If communication is a transmission at the ‘full-on’ position of the scale, and if the switch is off when no communication is intended, then intimation would be at the intermediate, ‘half-on’ position. Intimation is particularly useful in contexts where discretion, suggestiveness, or plausible deniability are needed. It is strongly connected to self-presentation in social life (as studied by Erving Goffman).

Urban Space and Aristocratic Power in Late Antique Rome

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Machado
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
Urban Space ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
The Social ◽  
Traditional Elite ◽  
History Of ◽  
The City

This book analyses the physical, social, and cultural history of Rome in late antiquity. Between AD 270 and 535, the former capital of the Roman empire experienced a series of dramatic transformations in its size, appearance, political standing, and identity, as emperors moved to other cities and the Christian church slowly became its dominating institution. Urban Space and Aristocratic Power in Late Antique Rome provides a new picture of these developments, focusing on the extraordinary role played by members of the traditional elite, the senatorial aristocracy, in the redefinition of the city, its institutions, and spaces. During this period, Roman senators and their families became increasingly involved in the management of the city and its population, in building works, and in the performance of secular and religious ceremonies and rituals. As this study shows, for approximately three hundred years the houses of the Roman elite competed with imperial palaces and churches in shaping the political map and the social life of the city. Making use of modern theories of urban space, the book considers a vast array of archaeological, literary, and epigraphic documents to show how the former centre of the Mediterranean world was progressively redefined and controlled by its own elite.

Amphoras in the Apollonia Museum Store

1981 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. 75-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
John A. Riley
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean Region ◽  
Western Mediterranean ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Hellenistic Period ◽  
Royal Air Force ◽  
Agricultural Produce ◽  
Representative Selection ◽  
Coarse Wares ◽  
Selection Of

The store rooms of the Department of Antiquities at Apollonia contain pottery from excavations at Apollonia and Ras el Hilal, together with a few stray finds from other sites (including some from the sea collected by the Royal Air Force Aqualung Society in the 1950s and early 1960s). The bulk of this material dates in the later Roman period (i.e. sixth century A.D. onwards), but includes a little earlier Roman and some Hellenistic pottery. There is a representative selection of coarse wares, including amphoras, as yet unpublished. These are mainly in fragmentary condition but their typological range conforms with that from the well stratified and dated excavations at Berenice-Benghazi (Riley, in press).Publication of the more complete of these amphoras seems justified as there is a relative scarcity of published information on Roman amphoras from the eastern Mediterranean, at a time when many eastern types are being recognised in western Mediterranean excavated contexts (Panella, 1974; Hayes, 1976a; Riley, 1981). In addition, a brief consideration of the other amphoras helps to illustrate the diversity of trade in liquid agricultural produce within the eastern Mediterranean region. No locally made amphoras were noted on the Apollonia stone: all were imported into Cyrenaica.The Hellenistic period is represented by Rhodian (Inv. Nos. 321, 322 and 1582) and Knidian (Inv. Nos. 141 and 723) amphora fragments. There are several sherds of early Imperial amphoras, and attention has been drawn to these by Panella (1974). These include a first to second century A.D. Aegean type (ibid., 477, Ostia Form LXIII; Apollonia Box 2036, from Ras el Hilal); a Spanish garum amphora of the same period (ibid., 513, Ostia Form LXIII; Apollonia Inv. No. 256); several Tripolitanian amphoras of the first and second centuries A.D. (ibid., 562, Ostia Form LXIV; Apollonia Inv. Nos. 253, 254, 315 and 317); and a common Aegean amphora of the third and fourth centuries A.D. (ibid., 597, Ostia Form VI).

scholarly journals Ceramic finds from the Byzantine fort of Gradina on the island of Žirje

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ana Karađole ◽  
Igor Borzić
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Mediterranean Area ◽  
The Other ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
North African ◽  
The North ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Main Production ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean Area

Repeated excavations of the area of the early Byzantine fort on Žirje, an island in the Šibenik archipelago, resulted in recovery of a substantial amount of movable finds, predominantly pottery. Most finds date to the period of Justinian's reconquista in the mid-6th century when the fort was used, but there are also some artifacts of earlier or later dating (Iron Age, Hellenistic and early Imperial periods; medieval and postmedieval periods) whose presence is explained by continuous strategic importance of the fort position. Late antique material has been analyzed comprehensively in terms of typology. Dating and provenance contexts of the finds have also been determined. Presence of pottery from the main production centers that supplied the eastern Adriatic at the time has been attested. This refers in particular to the north African and Aegean-eastern Mediterranean area providing fine tableware and kitchen pottery, lamps and various forms of amphorae. On the other hand, participation of local workshops in supply of the Byzantine soldiers stationed in Gradina probably relates to prevailing forms of kitchenware.

scholarly journals CULT PLACES OF MARI AS A SYMBOL OF CULTURAL IDENTITY

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 678-687
Author(s):  
Vladimir Gennadyevich Kudryavtsev
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Landscape Design ◽  
Religious Organizations ◽  
Self Defense ◽  
The People ◽  
National Movements ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Local Traditions

The article is devoted to the study of places of worship in traditional Mari culture, which are in varying degrees of sacredness. They have so far preserved artifacts and symbols that form the cultural identity of the people. The Mari religion in the most complete local traditions preserves the system of pagan cults and rites. The trend towards the revival of pagan religion and the creation of religious organizations and communities is associated with a general upsurge in national identity. This became necessary in the context of national movements as a means of ethnic self-defense and a factor of ethnocultural revival. Original ethnocultural traditions and formative elements of folk architecture are relevant and important in the design of modern architectural complexes and the creation of small architectural forms in folk architecture, landscape design, and the formation of an ethnocultural environment. Further sacralization of places of worship will contribute to the preservation of natural monuments and the manifestation of artifacts and symbols of cultural identity.

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