The Book Of Pontiffs Of The Church Of Ravenna Medieval Texts In Translation

This translation makes this fascinating text accessible for the first time to an English-speaking audience. A substantial introduction to Agnellus and his composition of the text is included along with a full bibliography

The Church of St. Polyeuktos is one of the most magnificent, but also most peculiar architectural achievements in Byzantine Constantinople. The accidental rediscovery of the building during construction work in Istanbul in the 1960s is legendary and considered one of the most sensational finds in Byzantine archaeology. Built by the aristocrat Lady Anicia Juliana, the reconstruction of the structure and the interpretation of its strange forms continue to challenge scholars today. The building gave rise to a whole series of archaeo-historical narratives, in which the City's byzantine protagonists and major monuments were woven into a coherent plot. This Element on the archaeology of St. Polyeuktos takes a closer look at these narratives and subject them to critical examination. In the end, the study of St. Polyeuktos will tell us as much about Byzantine architectural history in the second half of the twentieth century as about early Byzantine architecture itself.

Mary M. Schaefer examines the ninth-century church Santa Prassede and its foundation myth, as well as an ideal of balanced male-female relationships and women holding pastoral office in the church of Rome.

This collection of papers, arising from the conference series Late Antique Archaeology, examines the social and political structures of the late antique period and the ways in which they are manifested in the archaeological and textual record.

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are considered kindred religions-holding ancestral heritages and monotheistic belief in common-but there are definitive distinctions between these "Abrahamic" peoples. Shared Stories, Rival Tellings explores the early exchanges of Jews, Christians, and Muslims, and argues that their interactions were dominated by debates over the meanings of certain stories sacred to all three communities. Robert C. Gregg shows how Jewish, Christian, and Muslim interpreters--artists as well as authors--developed their unique and particular understandings of narratives present in the two Bibles and the Qur'an. Gregg focuses on five stories: Cain and Abel, Sarah and Hagar, Joseph and Potiphar's Wife, Jonah and the Whale, and Mary the Mother of Jesus. As he guides us through the often intentional variations introduced into these shared stories, Gregg exposes major issues under contention and the social-intellectual forces that contributed to spirited, and sometimes combative, exchanges among Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Offering deeper insight into these historical moments and their implications for contemporary relations among the three religions, Shared Stories, Rival Tellings will inspire readers to consider--and reconsider--the dynamics of traditional and current social-religious competition.

A exploration of Paschal I's building campaign that illuminates the relationship between the material world and political power in medieval Rome.

Diliana Angelova argues that from the time of Augustus through early Byzantium, a discourse of “sacred founders”—articulated in artwork, literature, imperial honors, and the built environment—helped legitimize the authority of the emperor and his family. The discourse coalesced around the central idea, bound to a myth of origins, that imperial men and women were sacred founders of the land, mirror images of the empire’s divine founders. When Constantine and his formidable mother Helena established a new capital for the Roman Empire, they initiated the Christian transformation of this discourse by brilliantly reformulating the founding myth. Over time, this transformation empowered imperial women, strengthened the cult of the Virgin Mary, fueled contests between church and state, and provoked an arresting synthesis of imperial and Christian art. Sacred Founders presents a bold interpretive framework that unearths deep continuities between the ancient and medieval worlds, recovers a forgotten transformation in female imperial power, and offers a striking reinterpretation of early Christian art.