Athens at the Margins

Athens at the Margins PDF Author: Nathan T. Arrington
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691175209
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 342

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Book Description
How the interactions of non-elites influenced Athenian material culture and society The seventh century BC in ancient Greece is referred to as the Orientalizing period because of the strong presence of Near Eastern elements in art and culture. Conventional narratives argue that goods and knowledge flowed from East to West through cosmopolitan elites. Rejecting this explanation, Athens at the Margins proposes a new narrative of the origins behind the style and its significance, investigating how material culture shaped the ways people and communities thought of themselves. Athens and the region of Attica belonged to an interconnected Mediterranean, in which people, goods, and ideas moved in unexpected directions. Network thinking provides a way to conceive of this mobility, which generated a style of pottery that was heterogeneous and dynamic. Although the elite had power, they were unable to agree on the norms of conspicuous consumption and status display. A range of social actors used objects, contributing to cultural change and to the socially mediated production of meaning. Historiography and the analysis of evidence from a wide range of contexts—cemeteries, sanctuaries, workshops, and symposia—offers the possibility to step outside the aesthetic frameworks imposed by classical Greek masterpieces and to expand the canon of Greek art. Highlighting the results of new excavations and looking at the interactions of people with material culture, Athens at the Margins provocatively shifts perspectives on Greek art and its relationship to the eastern Mediterranean.

Athens at the Margins

Athens at the Margins PDF Author: Nathan T. Arrington
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691175209
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 342

Get Book

Book Description
How the interactions of non-elites influenced Athenian material culture and society The seventh century BC in ancient Greece is referred to as the Orientalizing period because of the strong presence of Near Eastern elements in art and culture. Conventional narratives argue that goods and knowledge flowed from East to West through cosmopolitan elites. Rejecting this explanation, Athens at the Margins proposes a new narrative of the origins behind the style and its significance, investigating how material culture shaped the ways people and communities thought of themselves. Athens and the region of Attica belonged to an interconnected Mediterranean, in which people, goods, and ideas moved in unexpected directions. Network thinking provides a way to conceive of this mobility, which generated a style of pottery that was heterogeneous and dynamic. Although the elite had power, they were unable to agree on the norms of conspicuous consumption and status display. A range of social actors used objects, contributing to cultural change and to the socially mediated production of meaning. Historiography and the analysis of evidence from a wide range of contexts—cemeteries, sanctuaries, workshops, and symposia—offers the possibility to step outside the aesthetic frameworks imposed by classical Greek masterpieces and to expand the canon of Greek art. Highlighting the results of new excavations and looking at the interactions of people with material culture, Athens at the Margins provocatively shifts perspectives on Greek art and its relationship to the eastern Mediterranean.

Athens After Empire

Athens After Empire PDF Author: Ian Worthington
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0190633980
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 425

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Book Description
"When we think of ancient Athens, the image invariably coming to mind is of the Classical city, with monuments beautifying everywhere; the Agora swarming with people conducting business and discussing political affairs; and a flourishing intellectual, artistic, and literary life, with life anchored in the ideals of freedom, autonomy, and democracy. But in 338 that forever changed when Philip II of Macedonia defeated a Greek army at Chaeronea to impose Macedonian hegemony over Greece. The Greeks then remained under Macedonian rule until the new power of the Mediterranean world, Rome, annexed Macedonia and Greece into its empire. How did Athens fare in the Hellenistic and Roman periods? What was going on in the city, and how different was it from its Classical predecessor? There is a tendency to think of Athens remaining in decline in these eras, as its democracy was curtailed, the people were forced to suffer periods of autocratic rule, and especially under the Romans enforced building activity turned the city into a provincial one than the "School of Hellas" that Pericles had proudly proclaimed it to be, and the Athenians were forced to adopt the imperial cult and watch Athena share her home, the sacred Acropolis, with the goddess Roma. But this dreary picture of decline and fall belies reality, as my book argues. It helps us appreciate Hellenistic and Roman Athens and to show it was still a vibrant and influential city. A lot was still happening in the city, and its people were always resilient: they fought their Macedonian masters when they could, and later sided with foreign kings against Rome, always in the hope of regaining that most cherished ideal, freedom. Hellenistic Athens is far from being a postscript to its Classical predecessor, as is usually thought. It was simply different. Its rich and varied history continued, albeit in an altered political and military form, and its Classical self lived on in literature and thought. In fact, it was its status as a cultural and intellectual juggernaut that enticed Romans to the city, some to visit, others to study. The Romans might have been the ones doing the conquering, but in adapting aspects of Hellenism for their own cultural and political needs, they were the ones, as the poet Horace claimned, who ended up being captured"--

Chasing the Past

Chasing the Past PDF Author: Pierre Sintès
Publisher: Liverpool University Press
ISBN: 1786948494
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 246

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Book Description
This book aims to provide an original perspective on the changes that Greece has undergone in recent decades, by examining questions related to border disputes and migration, minority issues and national inclusion, and their effect in reinforcing discourses of glorification of the past and tradition on the fringes of Greek territory.

The Athenian Adonia in Context

The Athenian Adonia in Context PDF Author: Laurialan Reitzammer
Publisher: University of Wisconsin Pres
ISBN: 0299308200
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 282

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Book Description
A fresh examination of a marginalized women's festival that influenced Athenian art, drama, philosophy, and public institutions.

Margins and Metropolis

Margins and Metropolis PDF Author: Judith Herrin
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 140084522X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 390

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Book Description
This volume explores the political, cultural, and ecclesiastical forces that linked the metropolis of Byzantium to the margins of its far-flung empire. Focusing on the provincial region of Hellas and Peloponnesos in central and southern Greece, Judith Herrin shows how the prestige of Constantinople was reflected in the military, civilian, and ecclesiastical officials sent out to govern the provinces. She evokes the ideology and culture of the center by examining different aspects of the imperial court, including diplomacy, ceremony, intellectual life, and relations with the church. Particular topics treat the transmission of mathematical manuscripts, the burning of offensive material, and the church's role in distributing philanthropy. Herrin contrasts life in the capital with provincial life, tracing the adaptation of a largely rural population to rule by Constantinople from the early medieval period onward. The letters of Michael Choniates, archbishop of Athens from 1182 to 1205, offer a detailed account of how this highly educated cleric coped with life in an imperial backwater, and demonstrate a synthesis of ancient Greek culture and medieval Christianity that was characteristic of the Byzantine elite. This collection of essays spans the entirety of Herrin's influential career and draws together a significant body of scholarship on problems of empire. It features a general introduction, two previously unpublished essays, and a concise introduction to each essay that describes how it came to be written and how it fits into her broader analysis of the unusual brilliance and longevity of Byzantium.

Greek Bastardy in the Classical and Hellenistic Periods

Greek Bastardy in the Classical and Hellenistic Periods PDF Author: Daniel Ogden
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780198150190
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 454

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Book Description
Societies are defined at their margins. In the ancient Greek world bastards were often marginalized, their affinities being with the female, the alien, the servile, the poor, and the sick. The study of bastardy in ancient Greece is therefore of an importance that goes far beyond the subject's intrinsic interest, and it provides insights into the structure of Greek society as a whole. This is the first full-length book on the subject, and it reviews major evidence from Athens, Sparta, Gortyn, and Hellenistic Egypt, as well as collating and analysing fragmentary evidence from other Greek states. Dr Ogden shows how attitudes towards legitimacy differed across the various city states, and analyses their developments across time. He also advances new interpretations of more familiar problems of Athenian bastardy, such as Pericles' citizenship law. The book should interest historians of a wide range of social topics - from law and the economy, to sexuality and the study of women in antiquity.

Girls and Women in Classical Greek Religion

Girls and Women in Classical Greek Religion PDF Author: Matthew Dillon
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 113436508X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 452

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Book Description
It has often been thought that participation in fertility rituals was women's most important religious activity in classical Greece. Matthew Dillon's wide-ranging study makes it clear that women engaged in numerous other rites and cults, and that their role in Greek religion was actually more important than that of men. Women invoked the gods' help in becoming pregnant, venerated the god of wine, worshipped new and exotic deities, used magic for both erotic and pain-relieving purposes, and far more besides. Clear and comprehensive, this volume challenges many stereotypes of Greek women and offers unexpected insights into their experience of religion. With more than fifty illustrations, and translated extracts from contemporary texts, this is an essential resource for the study of women and religion in classical Greece.

Space, Place, and Landscape in Ancient Greek Literature and Culture

Space, Place, and Landscape in Ancient Greek Literature and Culture PDF Author: Kate Gilhuly
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139992716
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 295

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Book Description
This book brings together a collection of original essays that engage with cultural geography and landscape studies to produce new ways of understanding place, space, and landscape in Greek literature from the fifth and fourth centuries BCE. The authors draw on an eclectic collection of contemporary approaches to bring the study of ancient Greek literature into dialogue with the burgeoning discussion of spatial theory in the humanities. The essays in this volume treat a variety of textual spaces, from the intimate to the expansive: the bedroom, ritual space, the law courts, theatrical space, the poetics of the city, and the landscape of war. And yet, all of the contributions are united by an interest in recuperating some of the many ways in which the ancient Greeks in the archaic and classical periods invested places with meaning and in how the representation of place links texts to social practices.

The Black Hunter

The Black Hunter PDF Author: Pierre Vidal-Naquet
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 9780801859519
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 398

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Book Description
The black hunter travels through the mountains and forests of Greek mythology. Taking its title from this mythological figure, this book approaches the Greek world by charting the elaborate system of contradictions which pervaded Greek society and culture - wild yet cultivated, real yet imaginary.

Ashes, Images, and Memories

Ashes, Images, and Memories PDF Author: Nathan T. Arrington
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0199369070
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 361

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Book Description
This study argues that the institution of public burial for the war dead and images of the deceased in civic and sacred spaces fundamentally changed how people conceived of military casualties. In a period characterized by war and the threat of civil strife, the nascent democracy claimed the fallen for the city and commemorated them with rituals and images that shaped a civic ideology of struggle and self-sacrifice on behalf of a unified community