Dumbarton Oaks Library Reopening Procedures

Dumbarton Oaks research library will be opening its doors to readers again starting June 6, 2022.  Due to the continued prevalence of COVID-19, the number of readers who can use the library each will be limited each day. All readers must provide proof of having received an approved COVID vaccination and booster, must wear a securely fitting mask while inside the Library, and must provide proof of a negative COVID test. Readers are currently not permitted to enter the Refectory building; current information on access to the Dumbarton Oaks Gardens and Museum can be found online: https://www.doaks.org/visit/visit-safely

Please contact library@doaks.org for more information.

Workshop on ancient and medieval “urbanities” (10-11 June, Fondation Hardt)

The international workshop
 
The city’s finest: exploring notions of “urbanity” between East and West, from antiquity to the Middle Ages,
 
will take place at the Fondation Hardt (Vandœvres, Geneva) on June 10 and 11, 2022. The event is organised by the University of Geneva (Département des Sciences de l’Antiquité, Unité de Grec) and is co-funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation and the Société Académique de Genève.
Should you be interested in participating (both in person and remotely via Zoom) or should you have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact me at the following address: valeria.lovato@unige.ch.

CROSS-CULTURAL CONTACT BETWEEN EGYPT AND THE ROMAN EMPIRE – call for papers

CONFERENCE ‘CROSS-CULTURAL CONTACT BETWEEN EGYPT AND THE ROMAN EMPIRE’ (APRIL 2023)

CALL FOR PAPERS

Egypt was part of the Roman world for seven centuries, from the Roman conquest of Egypt in 31 BC to the annexation of Egypt by the Rashidun caliphate in AD 646. This dynamic period saw the exchange of languages, cultural and religious ideas and concepts across borders, including the spread the Egyptian Isis cult into the Roman West and the emergence of Christian monastic culture in Egypt’s deserts. We call for proposals for 20-minute papers from scholars across diverse disciplines such as Egyptology, Classical archaeology, art history and religious studies, examining the ways in which cross-cultural encounters between Egypt and the Roman Empire resulted in the exchange of religions and ideas, and impacted visual and material culture. We welcome papers dealing with any Roman or Byzantine province, including Egypt; papers focusing on the Western Roman provinces are particularly encouraged.

The conference will take place on 13 and 14 April 2023, at the British School at Rome and the Norwegian Institute in Rome. Please send abstracts to Maiken Mosleth King (Department of Classics & Ancient History, University of Bristol) at mm17686@bristol.ac.uk by 4 September 2022. We look forward to hearing from you.

Archaeology of İzmİr: an internatıonal symposium, İzmir, November 17-18, 2022

The Department of Archaeology is glad to inform you that the first international symposium of this annual series will take place on November 17-18, 2022 at the DEU in İzmir with a focus on latest archaeological discoveries on the region of İzmir in western Turkey. Since the 15th century archaeologically and historically İzmir became a special focus in the fields of ancient Anatolian studies. We warmly invite contributions by scholars and graduate students from a variety of disciplines related to this region. The aim of this symposium is to report on the state of archaeological research concerning İzmir from the Paleolithic period until the end of the Ottoman period. Thematic and geographical focus of the first symposium will be latest archaeological research in İzmir and its close surrounding in Ionia, Aeolis, Lydia and Upper Cayster Valley in the administrative territories of the today’s Turkish province of İzmir.

Intended to bring together scholars of archaeology, ancient history, historical geography, epigraphy and other related disciplines in ancient Anatolian studies to discuss a range of issues concerning this region’s archaeology and history, this symposium should be an excellent opportunity to increase our knowledge about this region. The following theme groups are the main questions of the symposium which are prescriptive:

– Recent archaeological field projects (excavations and surveys) and museum studies as well as discoveries in and around İzmir,

– İzmir in ancient mythology,

– Prehistory and protohistorical researches in İzmir,

– İzmir during the Archaic, Classical, Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine periods,

– İzmir in ancient authors, eg. Homer, Herodotus, Strabo etc.,

– Ethno-cultural landscape of ancient İzmir and ethnoarchaeology,

– Epigraphical research in İzmir,

– Numismatic research in İzmir: circulations, dynamics and mechanisms,

– Relationships between İzmir and other cities of Ionia, the Achaemenid Empire as well as other neighbouring regions,

– Historical geography and settlement patterns in Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine İzmir,

– Ancient roads, routes and population in İzmir,

– İzmir as a part of the Roman province Asia and the “seven churches of Apocalypse”,

– The province İzmir under the tetrarchy reform of Emperor Diocletian in A.D. 296,

– Population and settlement boom in the “Justinianic” era in the region of İzmir,

– Archaeometric researches in İzmir,

– Miscellanea.

On these themes and questions, all approaches and methods susceptible to bring some progress to our current knowledge are of course welcome: archaeology, ancient history, classics, historical geography, epigraphy, numismatic, history of art, cultural anthropology etc. English is the official language of the symposium and both abstracts as well as papers should be written and presented in English. The symposium will take place live at the Faculty of Letters of the DEU in Buca, İzmir as well as virtually on a conference platform (most probably on Zoom). The proceedings of the symposium will be published in December 2022. The symposium is free of charge. A post-symposium excursion is planned on November 19 to the archaeological sites in the metropolitan area of İzmir.

We would be delighted, if you could consider contributing to our symposium and contact us with the required information below before September 9, 2022. Our e-mail address is: arkeoloji.sempozyumu@deu.edu.tr or ergun.lafli@deu.edu.tr

Every abstract submitted to our symposium should at least be two pages, but not exceed four pages in total, and must include two or three figures related to its subject.

For all your queries concerning the symposium our phone number is: +90.539.577 07 33 (Professor Ergün Laflı).

CfP: Constructing and performing hope in the premodern world

Call for papers for a workshop (April 13-14, 2023) and a volume:

Constructing and performing hope in the premodern world

Throughout history, people have gone on with their lives despite many kinds of trials and tribulations. In this, hope has been a main driving force to manage uncertainty, mitigate despair, and to give meaning to living. There are historically changing sets of practices anchored in social and cultural values, through which individuals deal with the ultimate question of existence and anxiety: how is one to live a meaningful life in the face of inevitable death?

To this end, people have constructed different strategies for hope and futurity in their everyday life. These can be categorized as strategies for securing one’s life – hope to recover from an illness or overcome poverty or old age; strategies for reproduction – which have at their core the hope of continuity through children; strategies for the preservation of memory and reputation, transmission of values and family traditions; and strategies for transcendental hope and continuity. As is easy to recognise, most of these strategies are, ultimately, social and communal. Therefore, hope is a central factor in everyday life through which both individuals and communities think about future and negotiate their personal and communal crisis.

Indeed, in historical research, hope refers not so much to a psychological state maintaining meaningfulness in life, but it points to a goal-oriented disposition and strategical agency. Hope, therefore, offers a fresh perspective on human experiences and action, as it has only too seldom been discussed in historical research.

With the described methodological background, we aim at organizing a workshop concentrating on the ways in which the future of individuals, their families and communities were negotiated in ancient, Byzantine and Western medieval Europe, with special focus on the practices and practicalities of everyday life. Analyzing how premodern societies found ways of managing anxieties about the future amidst cultural change is of essential relevance for understanding the functions and motivations of individuals and communities.

We especially welcome papers which explore experience-related and performative aspects of hope and futurity: How did the practices of hope manifest in everyday life and what shapes did they take? What kind of agency and strategies would have given people a sense of hope? What kind of strategies to maintain hope and plan for the future were adopted in everyday life? How did changing discourses and social circumstances affect decision-making aimed at maintaining hope, and how did this manifest in the longue durée? Comparing the continuities and changes in the ways in which individuals pursued their future-oriented goals is at the very heart of our project. Themes we seek to discuss in the workshop include the following (but are not limited to these):

• practices to ascertain the continuity of the family in social capital, wealth and progeny (e.g., marriage, divorce, childlessness, adoption)

• permanence of the individual/communal memory and name (e.g., material donations, gifts and promises, benefactions and vows, as well as death and wills)

• religious hope and futurity through personal piety, religious rituals and lifestyle

• emotions and experiences related to hope and futurity

• legal, ideological and conceptual aspects (while keeping in mind the relationship with lived experience)

We aim at publishing an edited volume (with a leading publisher) based on the papers presented in the workshop in April 13-14, 2023, Tampere, Finland. Therefore, those whose papers are accepted to the workshop are asked to send their early drafts of what will become their contributions to the edited volume beforehand (in mid-March 2023), so that we can circulate them to all the workshop participants. This way we will be able to give discussion a good start, to concentrate on discussing the central ideas of the papers in the workshop, and to move swiftly to the final phases to write the volume with 9000 word chapters (inc. bibliography, notes).

Keynote speakers:
Stavroula Constantinou (University of Cyprus)
Jenni Kuuliala (Tampere University)
Ville Vuolanto (Tampere University)

There is a place for ca. twelve to fifteen participants for the workshop and the volume.

Deadline for the abstracts (with 300 to 500 words, with description of the theme, methodology,

main questions, and sources) is JUNE 20, 2022.

Please, let us hear about you!
Oana Cojocaru & Ville Vuolanto
oana.cojocaru@tuni.fi / ville.vuolanto@tuni.fi

Tampere Institute for Advanced Study
Department of History, Tampere University
Trivium – Tampere Centre for Classical, Medieval, and Early Modern Studies

**

For further references on the study of hope you may want to check some of the following:

Bobou, O. 2018. ‘Hope and the Sub-Adult’, in Kazantzidis & Spatharas 2018, 329–350.

Caston R.R. and Kaster R.A. (eds.) 2016. Hope, Joy, & Affection in the Classical World. Oxford University Press.

Chaniotis, A. 2018. ‘Elpis in the Greek Epigraphic Evidence, from Rational Expectation to Dependence from Authority’, in Kazantzidis & Spatharas 2018, 351–364.

Feldman, D.B. 2013. ‘The Meaning of Hope and Vice Versa: Goal Directed Thinking and the Construction of a Meaningful Life’, in J.A. Hicks and C. Routledge (eds.), The Experience of Meaning in Life: Classical Perspectives, Emerging Themes, and Controversies. Springer, 141–150.

Kazantzidis, G. and Spatharas, D. 2018. Hope in Ancient Literature, History, and Art. De Gruyter.

Nelis, D. 2016. ‘Emotion in Vergil’s Georgics: Farming and the Politics of Hope’, in Caston and Kaster 2016, 45–74.

Rosenwein, B. 2006. Emotional Communities in the Early Middle Ages. Cornell University Press.

Scheer, M. 2012. ‘Are Emotions a Kind of Practice (And Is That What Makes Them Have A History?)’, History and Theory 51, 193–220.

Tataranni, F. 2013. ‘Hope and Leadership in Ancient Rome’, Teoria. Rivista di filosofia 32:2, 65–75.

Vlassopoulos, C. 2018. ‘Hope and Slavery’, in Kazantzidis & Spatharas 2018, 235–258.

Vuolanto V. 2015. Children and Asceticism in Late Antiquity: Continuity, Family Dynamics and the Rise of Christianity. Ashgate.

Wisman, A. and Heflick, N.A. 2015. ‘Hopelessly Mortal: The Role of Mortality Salience, Immortality and Trait Self-esteem in Personal Hope’, Cognition and Emotion 30:5.

From Roman to Late Antique Butrint: The Evidence on Houses and the Topography of Urban Quarters

HAEMUS Online Guest Lecture no. 8 will be presented on 27 June, at 5 p.m. (UTC+02:00):

From Roman to Late Antique Butrint: The Evidence on Houses and the Topography of Urban Quarters
by Nevila Molla (Institute of Archaeology of the Academy of Albanian Studies)

Abstract: Butrint, a multi-period urban settlement on the Ionian coast of south-west Albania, offers ample archaeological evidence on the change and transformation of the Mediterranean city at the end of the Roman period. Recent archaeological excavations in the peninsular lower town area of the so-called Triconch Palace, and on the Vrina Plain suburb on the southern side of the Vivari Channel, inform this subject from the perspective of secular residential buildings. Now published, these excavations chart the development and transformation phases of two large residential complexes from their construction in the early and late Roman imperial periods to their abandonment as areas of human activity in the late medieval period. This presentation will discuss the urban fabric of Butrint in the late antique period (c. AD300 to c. AD600) in the light of the evidence from these excavated domus, pieced together with other fragmentary clues on houses and associated residential facilities elsewhere at the site. Among the few known and archaeologically investigated examples in Albania and in the Balkans, the construction of these domus and their transformation in the late antique period shed light on the nature of houses and house-building, and on the overall changing topography of a small, but significant port-town that enjoyed trade and economic ties with the Adriatic and the wider Mediterranean region.

To register: https://forms.gle/yagKg5fVdfBdisXw8

Late Byzantine Metrical Metaphraseis

Late Byzantine Metrical Metaphraseis, June 23, 2022 9:00–17:30 (hybrid form)

To participate in the workshop online or in person, please contact Dr Ekaterini Mitsiou via email: ekaterini.mitsiou@oeaw.ac.at. Registration is mandatory.

“Medieval Origins and Modern Constructs, Rus –Ukraine –Russia” Virtual Lecture

“Medieval Origins and Modern Constructs, Rus –Ukraine –Russia” Virtual Lecture

Date: June 16, 2022, at 12:00pm ET via Zoom

Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has pushed both countries into the world’s spotlight. One aspect that is becoming particularly clear is the battle that is taking place, and has been ongoing for decades, if not longer, for the ownership of the idea of the history of the region we know as Rus. This talk will discuss the place of Rus in European history, and the ways that modern scholars have minimized that place; the latter fact being directly relevant to the Russian claim on the history of Rus. Perhaps if we can untangle the history of Rus from modern constructs of nationalism, we can see a new picture of Rus that helps us better understand Europe as a whole.

Christian Raffensperger is the Kenneth E. Wray Chair in the Humanities at Wittenberg University. He is the author of several books including Reimagining Europe: Kievan Rus’ and the Medieval World and Conflict, Bargaining, and Kinship Networks in Medieval Eastern Europe. The larger goal of his work is to demonstrate the interconnectivity of medieval Europe and to break down the barrier between eastern and western Europe created and perpetuated in the historiography.

This event is co-organized by Dumbarton Oaks in collaboration with North of Byzantium and Connected Central European Worlds, 1500-1700.

Sponsors and Endorsers: Dumbarton Oaks | Princeton University | Boise State University | Tufts University College Art Association (CAA) | Byzantine Studies Association of North America (BSANA) | Society of Historians of Eastern European, Eurasian and Russian Art and Architecture (SHERA) | Centre for Medieval and Early Modern Studies, University of Kent | Historians of German, Scandinavian, and Central European Art (HGSCEA) | British Association for Slavonic and East European Studies (BASEES) | International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA) | Renaissance Society of America (RSA)

University of Bologna: Summer School in Classical Languages  

University of Bologna: Summer School in Classical Languages
(20 June – 23 July 2022)
Applications deadline: 10 June

Apologies for cross-posting. This is a reminder that he Summer School in Classical Languages (formerly Greek and Latin Summer School) of the University of Bologna is now confirmed for Summer 2022. Applications are open!

All courses will be held in person. The deadline for applying is Friday 10 June, but places are limited.

The School offers intensive classes in Greek and Latin (50 hours each) and a complementary Classical Literature class (4 hours). The following courses are available:
Beginners Latin (20 June – 5 July)
Intermediate Latin (20 June – 5 July)
Beginners Greek (7 – 23 July)

A single course lasts for 3 weeks, Monday to Friday; students can choose to attend a double course (Greek + Latin) at a discounted fee, attending classes for the whole 5-week period above.

Discounts are also available for Erasmus students, former SSCL students, and Unibo students.

Classes will be held fully in person, at the Department of Classical Philology and Italian Studies of the University of Bologna, with the assistance of a resident tutor.

Our courses are open to students (any level) and non-students alike. Participants must be aged 18 or over; admission is also allowed to 17-year-old students currently enrolled to the last year of high school.

All teaching and activities will be in English.

For further information please read the full call and the application form at:
https://ficlit.unibo.it/it/didattica/summer-e-winter-school

Please feel free to get in touch:
diri_school.latin@unibo.it

Lecture at the Gennadius Library by Robert Ousterhout: “Rethinking the Greek School of Byzantine Architecture”

The Gennadius Library invites you to a lecture by Professor Robert Ousterhout entitled “Rethinking the Greek School of Byzantine Architecture” on June 10, 2022, at 7pm (Greek time) – 12 noon (EST)
 
If you cannot attend in person in Cotsen Hall, on Anapiron Polemou 9, Kolonaki, Athens, please register on zoom (https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_DxDzCv2_TbmZLDFJrvV-mA) or watch on youtube (https://www.ascsa.edu.gr/events/details/rethinking-the-greek-school-of-byzantine-architecture#YouTube).
 
Abstract: The Middle Byzantine architectural resurgence in Attica and the Peloponnese corresponds to the period of prosperity following the Byzantine defeat of the Arabs in 961, and the subsequent military interventions in the Balkans by Basil II, who celebrated a triumph in Athens in 1018. Hundreds of churches survive across the region – more than two dozen in Athens alone – many of them small and domed and distinctive in their architectural style. Gabriel Millet offered an important assessment of their stylistic features and construction techniques in his dissertation, L’école grecque dans l’architecture byzantine, published in 1916, situating them in contrast to those of Constantinople. The talk will examine several characteristic aspects of Helladic architecture and ask if we might view these within a broader geographical perspective, as participants in the “global” Middle Ages.
 
Robert G. Ousterhout is Professor Emeritus in the History of Art at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author most recently of Visualizing Community: Art, Material Culture, and Settlement in Byzantine Cappadocia, Dumbarton Oaks Studies 46 (Washington, DC, 2017); and Eastern Medieval Architecture: The Building Traditions of Byzantium and Neighboring Lands, (Onassis Series in Hellenic Culture: Oxford University Press, 2019), as well as co-editor of Piroska and the Pantokrator, with M. Sághy (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2019); and The Holy Apostles: A Lost Monument, a Forgotten Project, and the Presentness of the Past, with M. Mullett, Dumbarton Oaks Symposia and Colloquia (Washington, DC, 2020).

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