Books by Emanuele E . Intagliata
Economic circularity is the ability of a society to reduce waste by recycling, reusing, and repai... more Economic circularity is the ability of a society to reduce waste by recycling, reusing, and repairing raw materials and finished products. This concept has gained momentum in academia, in part due to contemporary environmental concerns. Although the blurry conceptual boundaries of this term are open to a wide array of interpretations, the scholarly community generally perceives circular economy as a convenient umbrella definition that encompasses a vast array of regenerative and preservative processes.
Despite the recent surge of interest, economic circularity has not been fully addressed as a macrophenomenon by historical and archaeological studies. The limitations of data and the relatively new formulation of targeted research questions mean that several processes and agents involved in ancient circular economies are still invisible to the eye of modern scholarship. Examples include forms of curation, maintenance, and repair, which must have had an influence on the economic systems of premodern societies but are rarely accounted for. Moreover, the people behind these processes, such as collectors and scavengers, are rarely investigated and poorly understood. Even better-studied mechanisms, like reuse and recycling, are not explored to their full potential within the broader picture of ancient urban economies.
This volume stems from a conference held at Moesgaard Museum supported by the Carlsberg Foundation and the Centre for Urban Networks Evolutions (UrbNet) at Aarhus University. To enhance our understanding of circular economic processes, the contributions in this volume expand the framework of the discussion by exploring circular economy over the longue durée and by integrating an interdisciplinary perspective. Furthermore, the volume gives prominence to classes of material, processes, agents, and methodologies generally overlooked or ignored in modern scholarship.
Chapter 6: Lighting up Arrian's room� Preliminary remarks on the lamps found in the Roman fort in... more Chapter 6: Lighting up Arrian's room� Preliminary remarks on the lamps found in the Roman fort in Apsaros (Gonio, Georgia) �����������������������������������������������������������������������������������99 Maria Jaworska Chapter 7: Early Christian (4th-6th centuries AD) monuments of the Kingdom of Lazika,
Oxbow books, 2020
The construction of urban defences was one of the hallmarks of the late Roman and late-antique pe... more The construction of urban defences was one of the hallmarks of the late Roman and late-antique periods (300–600 AD) throughout the western and eastern empire. City walls were the most significant construction projects of their time and they redefined the urban landscape. Their appearance and monumental scale, as well as the cost of labour and material, are easily comparable to projects from the High Empire; however, urban circuits provided late-antique towns with a new means of self-representation. While their final appearance and construction techniques varied greatly, the cost involved and the dramatic impact that such projects had on the urban topography of late-antique cities mark city walls as one of the most important urban initiatives of the period.
To-date, research on city walls in the two halves of the empire has highlighted chronological and regional variations, enabling scholars to rethink how and why urban circuits were built and functioned in Late Antiquity. Although these developments have made a significant contribution to the understanding of late-antique city walls, studies are often concerned with one single monument/small group of monuments or a particular region, and the issues raised do not usually lead to a broader perspective, creating an artificial divide between east and west. It is this broader understanding that this book seeks to provide.
The volume and its contributions arise from a conference held at the British School at Rome and the Swedish Institute of Classical Studies in Rome on June 20-21, 2018. It includes articles from world-leading experts in late-antique history and archaeology and is based around important themes that emerged at the conference, such as construction, spolia-use, late-antique architecture, culture and urbanism, empire-wide changes in Late Antiquity, and the perception of this practice by local inhabitants.
This book casts light on a much neglected phase of the UNESCO world heritage site of Palmyra, nam... more This book casts light on a much neglected phase of the UNESCO world heritage site of Palmyra, namely the period between the fall of the Palmyrene ‘Empire’ (AD 272) and the end of the Umayyad dominion (AD 750).
The goal of the book is to fill a substantial hole in modern scholarship - the late antique and early Islamic history of the city still has to be written.
In late antiquity Palmyra remained a thriving provincial city whose existence was assured by its newly acquired role of stronghold along the eastern frontier. Palmyra maintained a prominent religious role as one of the earliest bishoprics in central Syria and in early Islam as the political centre of the powerful Banu Kalb tribe.
Post-Roman Palmyra, city and setting, provide the focus of this book. Analysis and publication of evidence for post-Roman housing enables a study of the city’s urban life, including the private residential buildings in the sanctuary of Ba’alshamin. A systematic survey is presented of the archaeological and literary evidence for the religious life of the city in Late Antiquity and Early Islam. The city’s defences provide another focus. After a discussion of the garrison quartered in Palmyra, Diocletian’s military fortress and the city walls are investigated, with photographic and archaeological evidence used to discuss chronology and building techniques. The book concludes with a synthetic account of archaeological and written material, providing a comprehensive history of the settlement from its origins to the fall of Marwan II in 750 AD.
https://www.oxbowbooks.com/oxbow/palmyra-after-zenobia-ad-273-750.html
This volume represents a selection of papers presented at the 2013 Edinburgh Seventh Century Coll... more This volume represents a selection of papers presented at the 2013 Edinburgh Seventh Century Colloquium, showcasing the latest scholarship from a rising generation of academics. The volume traverses the globe from Iran to the Atlantic and from Sweden to the Sahara and ranges from the establishment of the early Islamic state to the beginnings of English Christianity. Topics include the transmission of high culture across time, settlement patterns in a rapidly changing world and the formation of new and emerging identities. The essays also bring into dialogue a wide range of disciplinary and methodological perspectives, including archaeology, literature, history, art, papyrology and economics. Together, they generate valuable new insights into the still unchartered territories of the long seventh century.
Articles, chapters by Emanuele E . Intagliata
Antiquity, 2024
This article reports on the archaeological survey of a (military) fort and (trade) caravanserai a... more This article reports on the archaeological survey of a (military) fort and (trade) caravanserai at Khirbet al-Khalde in southern Jordan, along the eastern Roman frontier. The results reveal the site's resilience and destruction up until the present day and the need for monitoring of threats to its preservation.
Open Archaeology, 2023
In recent years, studies on reuse practices in premodern societies have multiplied. Nonetheless, ... more In recent years, studies on reuse practices in premodern societies have multiplied. Nonetheless, a linear model (production – usage – discard) is still widely employed for describing past economic systems. Integrating it with a circular model, instead of assuming that products were discarded after their usage, would greatly benefit our knowledge of ancient and medieval economies. In this work, we present a model of circular economy and define the terms used in this context. Thereafter, a possible agenda on how to study circularity both through archaeological material and written sources is traced. This covers archaeological fieldwork methods, as well as the process of interpretation and the re-evaluation of old data. It also proposes new strategies to use and read written sources to explore reuse practices. If different theoretical and methodological approaches are combined, a more holistic and vivid picture of premodern economies can be gained and help our understanding of how past societies used the resources available to them.
Syria 98, 2021
This article aims to provide the first scholarly overview of the practice of reuse of building ma... more This article aims to provide the first scholarly overview of the practice of reuse of building material in late antique and early Islamic Palmyra (273-750 ce) and to examine this phenomenon more systematically within the Sanctuary of Baalshamin. To achieve this, it makes use of previously unpublished archival data. The way in which this material was used at Palmyra varied depending on the function of the buildings. By examining evidence from the Sanctuary of Baalshamin in more detail, the article also advances several hypotheses on building practices and the organisation of the workforce.
Daghmehchi, M., Priestman, S.M.N., Puschnigg, G., et al. 2022: In E.W. Sauer, J. Nokandeh & H. Omrani Rekavandi (eds.) Ancient Arms Race: Antiquity’s Largest Fortresses and Sasanian Military Networks of Northern Iran. British Institute of Persian Studies Monograph Series VII, Oxbow: Oxford, 475-551.
WIREs Water, 2020
Before the advent of steam power and railroads, rivers acted as important highways for trade and ... more Before the advent of steam power and railroads, rivers acted as important highways for trade and transport, allowing for considerable reductions in the time spent moving people and goods inland from the coast. However, ancient written sources provide little information about how this transport was conducted in fluvial systems of local or regional significance, focusing instead on major rivers like the Nile or the Tiber. A good example of this is the Rioni River (known in ancient literature as the Phasis) in western Georgia, which functioned as a crucial route for communication and trade throughout history. Travel reports from 16th to 19th century describe in detail the navigation of this river. This contribution aims to use these sources to provide perspectives on how such a fluvial network might have functioned in antiquity. In addition to suggesting that a transport network must have needed a closely-knit set of river stations to operate, the examination of these sources has important implications for the approach of archeologists to the study of anthropogenic activities in this riverine environment. It calls for a research methodology that goes beyond the site-based approach currently followed by modern scholarship and explores riverine settlement patterns from a landscape and network perspective.
The construction of urban defences was one of the hallmarks
of the late Roman and late antique pe... more The construction of urban defences was one of the hallmarks
of the late Roman and late antique periods (AD 300–600)
throughout the Western and Eastern Empire. While a number
of cities already had existing urban defences, most urban
centres seem to have been entirely unfortifed prior to late
antiquity; however, between the third and sixth centuries
AD, the situation changed drastically, with walled circuits
of varying types and designs being erected in many cities
throughout the Roman world (Sarantis 2013a, 256). This
included not only the imperial and provincial capitals but
also smaller cities and towns. In Gaul, for example, some
85% of the 125 largely undefended towns were provided with
walls through the third, fourth, and into the ffth centuries
(Bachrach 2010, 38 with bibliography). That city walls were
the most signifcant construction proMects of their time and
that they redefned the urban landscape cannot therefore be
understated. In both the West and the East of the Empire,
many cities followed a reduced course, excluding large sections of the existing imperial city (e.g. Bordeaux, Pergamon,
Sagalassos, and Hierapolis). Moreover, their appearance and
monumental scale (varied as they may be), as well as the
cost of labour and material, are easily comparable to proMects
from the High Empire; however, urban circuits provided
late antique towns with new means of self-representation
and represent one of the most important urban initiatives
of the period.
To-date, research on city walls has highlighted chronological and regional variations, enabling scholars to rethink
how and why urban circuits were built and how they
functioned in late antiquity. Scholarship also has sought
to question traditional historical narratives of barbarian
invasions and instead shown that benefaction, civic pride,
availability of military labour, or a combination of these,
alongside defence, acted as powerful motivations for the
construction of city walls (see Laurence et al. 2011, 141–
169, for arguments about urban status; Dey 2011, 112–121,
for a discussion of the motivation for the Aurelian Wall in
Rome and the various factors involved in its construction,
including defence, prestige, and the undertaking of a largescale public work to aid in the stability of Aurelian’s regime
in the capital). Although these developments have made a
signifcant contribution to the understanding of late antique
city walls, studies are often concerned with one single monument, small groups of monuments, or a particular region.
As a result, broader perspectives, especially those that
consider walls from both the Western and Eastern parts of
the Empire, are still lacking and therefore create an artifcial
divide between East and West.
This divide appears to have been well established already
in the 1 s, when fortifcations experienced a surge of
interest in scholarly literature. In this respect, the summary
works of Johnson (1983) and Lander (1984), which cover up
to the fourth century AD, can be considered as indicative of
this. While the former is mostly concerned with case studies
from the West, Lander focuses his attentiun to the East. That
this tendency still persists is refected by the excellent bibliographic reviews (on ‘West’, ‘East’, and ‘Africa’) written
by Sarantis and Christie (Sarantis and Christie 2013, Sarantis
2013a, 2013b) in the volume edited by the same scholars
on ‘War and Warfare in Late Antiquity’.
Despite the fact that single-site and regional approaches ....
Fortifications have traditionally been studied through autoptic examination. This approach is not... more Fortifications have traditionally been studied through autoptic examination. This approach is not without shortfalls, especially when used to identify different phases of a wall whose building techniques appear similar over a long period of time. A high-definition approach to fortifications that integrates analytical analyses to more traditional methodologies could contribute considerably to shed more light on the relative chronology of this type of monument. Yet, this approach is far from being used widely by researchers.
This contribution aims to reflect on the benefits of approaching fortifications through a high-definition methodology. In so doing, it takes as a case study the walls on the citadel at Tsikhisdziri, in western Georgia. The remains at Tsikhisdziri have traditionally been interpreted as those of Petra Pia Justiniana, which is reported by Procopius as being constructed by Justinian in the first half of the sixth century AD and destroyed soon thereafter. Procopius’ account has often steered archaeological investigations at the site towards early Byzantine remains, whilst there is evidence to suggest that the site survived well into the seventh century AD and beyond.
Through a traditional study of the remains coupled with petrographic study and X-Ray fluorescence analyses on brick and mortar amples, thse authors have managed to reach a better understanding of the relative chronology of the fortifications at Tsikhisdiziri. The investigation has proven the existence of an important late antique phase at this site, but has also found evidence to suggest that the walls remained in use and were constantly repaired well after the events glorified by Procopius.
Phasis, 2019
This article presents the artefacts found during the excavation of a
building at Napurvala Hill, ... more This article presents the artefacts found during the excavation of a
building at Napurvala Hill, Pichvnari, in the 1960s and 1970s and now at
the Batumi Archaeological Museum (BAM). Besides discussing the bulk
finds, some of which were already published in 1980 by Chkhaidze, this
contribution provides, for the first time, a study of a small white marble cross found during the excavation and now on display at the BAM. It will
conclude that, although the interpretation of the building as a church remains sound, the chronology of the artifacts is problematic as their dating ranges from the Hellenistic to the Medieval periods.
This article collates the evidence of coin hoards from Palmyra in order to refl ect on the causes... more This article collates the evidence of coin hoards from Palmyra in order to refl ect on the causes behind some of the most dramatic events that befell the city in Late Antiquity and early Islam. After having stressed the importance of coin hoards as sources to reconstruct the city's past by looking at a couple of examples dated to the fourth century , the article moves on to the early Islamic period. It argues that the unusual concentration of coin hoards dated to the second half of the seventh century suggests that the city underwent a period of unrest at that time and refl ects on the causes that might have triggered it.
Compared to other stretches of the eastern frontier, northeastern Anatolia has rarely attracted t... more Compared to other stretches of the eastern frontier, northeastern Anatolia has rarely attracted the attention of scholars of the Roman and late antique periods. The region is known, through late antique written sources, to have housed a belligerent confederation of tribes, the Tzani, who lived off raids conducted against their neighbours. Until the fifth century AD, the Roman approach to the Tzanic problem was one of quiet co-existence, but, in the early sixth century AD, after war broke out again with Persia, necessity moved the emperor Justinian (r. AD 527–565) to intervene more actively against the Tzani. According to the sixth-century historian Procopius, the Tzani were subdued and a chain of forts was constructed in their lands to protect access to the Black Sea coast. The remains of these forts, as well as those of other sixth-century AD infrastructure allegedly built under Justinian, are still elusive. Nonetheless, evidence on the ground and in the written sources can still help investigate the nature of the Justinianic frontier defensive system.
---
Doğu Roma sınırının kuzeydoğu Anadolu kısmı, Roma ve geç antik dönemlerini çalışan akademisyenlerin ilgisini, sınırın diğer uzantılarına kıyasla daha az çekmiştir. Bu bölge, geç antik dönem yazılı kaynaklarına göre, komşularına karşı yapılmış baskınları durdurarak yaşamını kazanmış olan savaşçı kavimler birliği Tzan’a ev sahipliği yapmakla bilinir. MS 5. yüzyıla kadar Romalıların Tzan sorununa yaklaşımı sessizce birarada yaşamaktan ibaret olmuştur. Ancak, MS 6. yüzyılın başlarında, Perslerle savaşın tekrar patlak vermesinden sonra, İmparator Justinian (MS 527–565) Tzanlara daha aktif müdahale etmek zorunda kalmıştır. Altıncı yüzyıl tarihçisi Procopius’a göre, Tzanlar baskı görmüş ve Karadeniz kıyılarına ulaşımı engellemek üzere topraklarında bir dizi kale inşa etmişlerdir. MS 6. yüzyılda yapılmış diğer altyapılar gibi, Justinian döneminde inşa edildiği iddia edilen bu kalelerin kalntılarının da bulunması hala zordur. Bununla birlikte, toprak üstündeki kalıntılar ve yazılı kaynaklardaki kanıtlar, Justinian dönemi sınır savunma sistemi yapısının araştırılmasına yardımcı olabilir.
The aim of this paper is to present the late antique and early islamic numismatic material from t... more The aim of this paper is to present the late antique and early islamic numismatic material from the Sanctuary of Baalshamin (Palmyra) as reported in an unpublished notebook belonging to Paul Collart, and currently kept at the Fonds d’Archives Paul Collart (University of Lausanne). A brief comparison between the numismatic records of the Sanctuary of Baalshamin and those of the Polish archaeological team recently published, will allow to review the publications of Palmyra coins, as well as to make some observations on the coin distribution in the ancient city.
Uploads
Books by Emanuele E . Intagliata
Despite the recent surge of interest, economic circularity has not been fully addressed as a macrophenomenon by historical and archaeological studies. The limitations of data and the relatively new formulation of targeted research questions mean that several processes and agents involved in ancient circular economies are still invisible to the eye of modern scholarship. Examples include forms of curation, maintenance, and repair, which must have had an influence on the economic systems of premodern societies but are rarely accounted for. Moreover, the people behind these processes, such as collectors and scavengers, are rarely investigated and poorly understood. Even better-studied mechanisms, like reuse and recycling, are not explored to their full potential within the broader picture of ancient urban economies.
This volume stems from a conference held at Moesgaard Museum supported by the Carlsberg Foundation and the Centre for Urban Networks Evolutions (UrbNet) at Aarhus University. To enhance our understanding of circular economic processes, the contributions in this volume expand the framework of the discussion by exploring circular economy over the longue durée and by integrating an interdisciplinary perspective. Furthermore, the volume gives prominence to classes of material, processes, agents, and methodologies generally overlooked or ignored in modern scholarship.
To-date, research on city walls in the two halves of the empire has highlighted chronological and regional variations, enabling scholars to rethink how and why urban circuits were built and functioned in Late Antiquity. Although these developments have made a significant contribution to the understanding of late-antique city walls, studies are often concerned with one single monument/small group of monuments or a particular region, and the issues raised do not usually lead to a broader perspective, creating an artificial divide between east and west. It is this broader understanding that this book seeks to provide.
The volume and its contributions arise from a conference held at the British School at Rome and the Swedish Institute of Classical Studies in Rome on June 20-21, 2018. It includes articles from world-leading experts in late-antique history and archaeology and is based around important themes that emerged at the conference, such as construction, spolia-use, late-antique architecture, culture and urbanism, empire-wide changes in Late Antiquity, and the perception of this practice by local inhabitants.
The goal of the book is to fill a substantial hole in modern scholarship - the late antique and early Islamic history of the city still has to be written.
In late antiquity Palmyra remained a thriving provincial city whose existence was assured by its newly acquired role of stronghold along the eastern frontier. Palmyra maintained a prominent religious role as one of the earliest bishoprics in central Syria and in early Islam as the political centre of the powerful Banu Kalb tribe.
Post-Roman Palmyra, city and setting, provide the focus of this book. Analysis and publication of evidence for post-Roman housing enables a study of the city’s urban life, including the private residential buildings in the sanctuary of Ba’alshamin. A systematic survey is presented of the archaeological and literary evidence for the religious life of the city in Late Antiquity and Early Islam. The city’s defences provide another focus. After a discussion of the garrison quartered in Palmyra, Diocletian’s military fortress and the city walls are investigated, with photographic and archaeological evidence used to discuss chronology and building techniques. The book concludes with a synthetic account of archaeological and written material, providing a comprehensive history of the settlement from its origins to the fall of Marwan II in 750 AD.
https://www.oxbowbooks.com/oxbow/palmyra-after-zenobia-ad-273-750.html
Articles, chapters by Emanuele E . Intagliata
of the late Roman and late antique periods (AD 300–600)
throughout the Western and Eastern Empire. While a number
of cities already had existing urban defences, most urban
centres seem to have been entirely unfortifed prior to late
antiquity; however, between the third and sixth centuries
AD, the situation changed drastically, with walled circuits
of varying types and designs being erected in many cities
throughout the Roman world (Sarantis 2013a, 256). This
included not only the imperial and provincial capitals but
also smaller cities and towns. In Gaul, for example, some
85% of the 125 largely undefended towns were provided with
walls through the third, fourth, and into the ffth centuries
(Bachrach 2010, 38 with bibliography). That city walls were
the most signifcant construction proMects of their time and
that they redefned the urban landscape cannot therefore be
understated. In both the West and the East of the Empire,
many cities followed a reduced course, excluding large sections of the existing imperial city (e.g. Bordeaux, Pergamon,
Sagalassos, and Hierapolis). Moreover, their appearance and
monumental scale (varied as they may be), as well as the
cost of labour and material, are easily comparable to proMects
from the High Empire; however, urban circuits provided
late antique towns with new means of self-representation
and represent one of the most important urban initiatives
of the period.
To-date, research on city walls has highlighted chronological and regional variations, enabling scholars to rethink
how and why urban circuits were built and how they
functioned in late antiquity. Scholarship also has sought
to question traditional historical narratives of barbarian
invasions and instead shown that benefaction, civic pride,
availability of military labour, or a combination of these,
alongside defence, acted as powerful motivations for the
construction of city walls (see Laurence et al. 2011, 141–
169, for arguments about urban status; Dey 2011, 112–121,
for a discussion of the motivation for the Aurelian Wall in
Rome and the various factors involved in its construction,
including defence, prestige, and the undertaking of a largescale public work to aid in the stability of Aurelian’s regime
in the capital). Although these developments have made a
signifcant contribution to the understanding of late antique
city walls, studies are often concerned with one single monument, small groups of monuments, or a particular region.
As a result, broader perspectives, especially those that
consider walls from both the Western and Eastern parts of
the Empire, are still lacking and therefore create an artifcial
divide between East and West.
This divide appears to have been well established already
in the 1 s, when fortifcations experienced a surge of
interest in scholarly literature. In this respect, the summary
works of Johnson (1983) and Lander (1984), which cover up
to the fourth century AD, can be considered as indicative of
this. While the former is mostly concerned with case studies
from the West, Lander focuses his attentiun to the East. That
this tendency still persists is refected by the excellent bibliographic reviews (on ‘West’, ‘East’, and ‘Africa’) written
by Sarantis and Christie (Sarantis and Christie 2013, Sarantis
2013a, 2013b) in the volume edited by the same scholars
on ‘War and Warfare in Late Antiquity’.
Despite the fact that single-site and regional approaches ....
This contribution aims to reflect on the benefits of approaching fortifications through a high-definition methodology. In so doing, it takes as a case study the walls on the citadel at Tsikhisdziri, in western Georgia. The remains at Tsikhisdziri have traditionally been interpreted as those of Petra Pia Justiniana, which is reported by Procopius as being constructed by Justinian in the first half of the sixth century AD and destroyed soon thereafter. Procopius’ account has often steered archaeological investigations at the site towards early Byzantine remains, whilst there is evidence to suggest that the site survived well into the seventh century AD and beyond.
Through a traditional study of the remains coupled with petrographic study and X-Ray fluorescence analyses on brick and mortar amples, thse authors have managed to reach a better understanding of the relative chronology of the fortifications at Tsikhisdiziri. The investigation has proven the existence of an important late antique phase at this site, but has also found evidence to suggest that the walls remained in use and were constantly repaired well after the events glorified by Procopius.
building at Napurvala Hill, Pichvnari, in the 1960s and 1970s and now at
the Batumi Archaeological Museum (BAM). Besides discussing the bulk
finds, some of which were already published in 1980 by Chkhaidze, this
contribution provides, for the first time, a study of a small white marble cross found during the excavation and now on display at the BAM. It will
conclude that, although the interpretation of the building as a church remains sound, the chronology of the artifacts is problematic as their dating ranges from the Hellenistic to the Medieval periods.
---
Doğu Roma sınırının kuzeydoğu Anadolu kısmı, Roma ve geç antik dönemlerini çalışan akademisyenlerin ilgisini, sınırın diğer uzantılarına kıyasla daha az çekmiştir. Bu bölge, geç antik dönem yazılı kaynaklarına göre, komşularına karşı yapılmış baskınları durdurarak yaşamını kazanmış olan savaşçı kavimler birliği Tzan’a ev sahipliği yapmakla bilinir. MS 5. yüzyıla kadar Romalıların Tzan sorununa yaklaşımı sessizce birarada yaşamaktan ibaret olmuştur. Ancak, MS 6. yüzyılın başlarında, Perslerle savaşın tekrar patlak vermesinden sonra, İmparator Justinian (MS 527–565) Tzanlara daha aktif müdahale etmek zorunda kalmıştır. Altıncı yüzyıl tarihçisi Procopius’a göre, Tzanlar baskı görmüş ve Karadeniz kıyılarına ulaşımı engellemek üzere topraklarında bir dizi kale inşa etmişlerdir. MS 6. yüzyılda yapılmış diğer altyapılar gibi, Justinian döneminde inşa edildiği iddia edilen bu kalelerin kalntılarının da bulunması hala zordur. Bununla birlikte, toprak üstündeki kalıntılar ve yazılı kaynaklardaki kanıtlar, Justinian dönemi sınır savunma sistemi yapısının araştırılmasına yardımcı olabilir.
Despite the recent surge of interest, economic circularity has not been fully addressed as a macrophenomenon by historical and archaeological studies. The limitations of data and the relatively new formulation of targeted research questions mean that several processes and agents involved in ancient circular economies are still invisible to the eye of modern scholarship. Examples include forms of curation, maintenance, and repair, which must have had an influence on the economic systems of premodern societies but are rarely accounted for. Moreover, the people behind these processes, such as collectors and scavengers, are rarely investigated and poorly understood. Even better-studied mechanisms, like reuse and recycling, are not explored to their full potential within the broader picture of ancient urban economies.
This volume stems from a conference held at Moesgaard Museum supported by the Carlsberg Foundation and the Centre for Urban Networks Evolutions (UrbNet) at Aarhus University. To enhance our understanding of circular economic processes, the contributions in this volume expand the framework of the discussion by exploring circular economy over the longue durée and by integrating an interdisciplinary perspective. Furthermore, the volume gives prominence to classes of material, processes, agents, and methodologies generally overlooked or ignored in modern scholarship.
To-date, research on city walls in the two halves of the empire has highlighted chronological and regional variations, enabling scholars to rethink how and why urban circuits were built and functioned in Late Antiquity. Although these developments have made a significant contribution to the understanding of late-antique city walls, studies are often concerned with one single monument/small group of monuments or a particular region, and the issues raised do not usually lead to a broader perspective, creating an artificial divide between east and west. It is this broader understanding that this book seeks to provide.
The volume and its contributions arise from a conference held at the British School at Rome and the Swedish Institute of Classical Studies in Rome on June 20-21, 2018. It includes articles from world-leading experts in late-antique history and archaeology and is based around important themes that emerged at the conference, such as construction, spolia-use, late-antique architecture, culture and urbanism, empire-wide changes in Late Antiquity, and the perception of this practice by local inhabitants.
The goal of the book is to fill a substantial hole in modern scholarship - the late antique and early Islamic history of the city still has to be written.
In late antiquity Palmyra remained a thriving provincial city whose existence was assured by its newly acquired role of stronghold along the eastern frontier. Palmyra maintained a prominent religious role as one of the earliest bishoprics in central Syria and in early Islam as the political centre of the powerful Banu Kalb tribe.
Post-Roman Palmyra, city and setting, provide the focus of this book. Analysis and publication of evidence for post-Roman housing enables a study of the city’s urban life, including the private residential buildings in the sanctuary of Ba’alshamin. A systematic survey is presented of the archaeological and literary evidence for the religious life of the city in Late Antiquity and Early Islam. The city’s defences provide another focus. After a discussion of the garrison quartered in Palmyra, Diocletian’s military fortress and the city walls are investigated, with photographic and archaeological evidence used to discuss chronology and building techniques. The book concludes with a synthetic account of archaeological and written material, providing a comprehensive history of the settlement from its origins to the fall of Marwan II in 750 AD.
https://www.oxbowbooks.com/oxbow/palmyra-after-zenobia-ad-273-750.html
of the late Roman and late antique periods (AD 300–600)
throughout the Western and Eastern Empire. While a number
of cities already had existing urban defences, most urban
centres seem to have been entirely unfortifed prior to late
antiquity; however, between the third and sixth centuries
AD, the situation changed drastically, with walled circuits
of varying types and designs being erected in many cities
throughout the Roman world (Sarantis 2013a, 256). This
included not only the imperial and provincial capitals but
also smaller cities and towns. In Gaul, for example, some
85% of the 125 largely undefended towns were provided with
walls through the third, fourth, and into the ffth centuries
(Bachrach 2010, 38 with bibliography). That city walls were
the most signifcant construction proMects of their time and
that they redefned the urban landscape cannot therefore be
understated. In both the West and the East of the Empire,
many cities followed a reduced course, excluding large sections of the existing imperial city (e.g. Bordeaux, Pergamon,
Sagalassos, and Hierapolis). Moreover, their appearance and
monumental scale (varied as they may be), as well as the
cost of labour and material, are easily comparable to proMects
from the High Empire; however, urban circuits provided
late antique towns with new means of self-representation
and represent one of the most important urban initiatives
of the period.
To-date, research on city walls has highlighted chronological and regional variations, enabling scholars to rethink
how and why urban circuits were built and how they
functioned in late antiquity. Scholarship also has sought
to question traditional historical narratives of barbarian
invasions and instead shown that benefaction, civic pride,
availability of military labour, or a combination of these,
alongside defence, acted as powerful motivations for the
construction of city walls (see Laurence et al. 2011, 141–
169, for arguments about urban status; Dey 2011, 112–121,
for a discussion of the motivation for the Aurelian Wall in
Rome and the various factors involved in its construction,
including defence, prestige, and the undertaking of a largescale public work to aid in the stability of Aurelian’s regime
in the capital). Although these developments have made a
signifcant contribution to the understanding of late antique
city walls, studies are often concerned with one single monument, small groups of monuments, or a particular region.
As a result, broader perspectives, especially those that
consider walls from both the Western and Eastern parts of
the Empire, are still lacking and therefore create an artifcial
divide between East and West.
This divide appears to have been well established already
in the 1 s, when fortifcations experienced a surge of
interest in scholarly literature. In this respect, the summary
works of Johnson (1983) and Lander (1984), which cover up
to the fourth century AD, can be considered as indicative of
this. While the former is mostly concerned with case studies
from the West, Lander focuses his attentiun to the East. That
this tendency still persists is refected by the excellent bibliographic reviews (on ‘West’, ‘East’, and ‘Africa’) written
by Sarantis and Christie (Sarantis and Christie 2013, Sarantis
2013a, 2013b) in the volume edited by the same scholars
on ‘War and Warfare in Late Antiquity’.
Despite the fact that single-site and regional approaches ....
This contribution aims to reflect on the benefits of approaching fortifications through a high-definition methodology. In so doing, it takes as a case study the walls on the citadel at Tsikhisdziri, in western Georgia. The remains at Tsikhisdziri have traditionally been interpreted as those of Petra Pia Justiniana, which is reported by Procopius as being constructed by Justinian in the first half of the sixth century AD and destroyed soon thereafter. Procopius’ account has often steered archaeological investigations at the site towards early Byzantine remains, whilst there is evidence to suggest that the site survived well into the seventh century AD and beyond.
Through a traditional study of the remains coupled with petrographic study and X-Ray fluorescence analyses on brick and mortar amples, thse authors have managed to reach a better understanding of the relative chronology of the fortifications at Tsikhisdiziri. The investigation has proven the existence of an important late antique phase at this site, but has also found evidence to suggest that the walls remained in use and were constantly repaired well after the events glorified by Procopius.
building at Napurvala Hill, Pichvnari, in the 1960s and 1970s and now at
the Batumi Archaeological Museum (BAM). Besides discussing the bulk
finds, some of which were already published in 1980 by Chkhaidze, this
contribution provides, for the first time, a study of a small white marble cross found during the excavation and now on display at the BAM. It will
conclude that, although the interpretation of the building as a church remains sound, the chronology of the artifacts is problematic as their dating ranges from the Hellenistic to the Medieval periods.
---
Doğu Roma sınırının kuzeydoğu Anadolu kısmı, Roma ve geç antik dönemlerini çalışan akademisyenlerin ilgisini, sınırın diğer uzantılarına kıyasla daha az çekmiştir. Bu bölge, geç antik dönem yazılı kaynaklarına göre, komşularına karşı yapılmış baskınları durdurarak yaşamını kazanmış olan savaşçı kavimler birliği Tzan’a ev sahipliği yapmakla bilinir. MS 5. yüzyıla kadar Romalıların Tzan sorununa yaklaşımı sessizce birarada yaşamaktan ibaret olmuştur. Ancak, MS 6. yüzyılın başlarında, Perslerle savaşın tekrar patlak vermesinden sonra, İmparator Justinian (MS 527–565) Tzanlara daha aktif müdahale etmek zorunda kalmıştır. Altıncı yüzyıl tarihçisi Procopius’a göre, Tzanlar baskı görmüş ve Karadeniz kıyılarına ulaşımı engellemek üzere topraklarında bir dizi kale inşa etmişlerdir. MS 6. yüzyılda yapılmış diğer altyapılar gibi, Justinian döneminde inşa edildiği iddia edilen bu kalelerin kalntılarının da bulunması hala zordur. Bununla birlikte, toprak üstündeki kalıntılar ve yazılı kaynaklardaki kanıtlar, Justinian dönemi sınır savunma sistemi yapısının araştırılmasına yardımcı olabilir.
Centre for Urban Network Evolutions (UrbNet), Aarhus University
Venue: Moesgaard Museum, Moesgård Allé 15, DK-8270 Højbjerg, Building 4240, room 301
https://urbnet.au.dk/news/events/2022/invisible-circularity
This conference is funded by the Carlsberg Foundation and the Centre for Urban Network Evolutions (UrbNet).
This session will showcase examples of collaborative working in the South Caucasus, projects which have enabled a sharing of ideas and scholarly traditions, helping to develop new methodologies, and bringing new technology and scientific advances to bear on regional archaeological debates. This session is a celebration of both the archaeology of the South Caucasus, and of the power of scholarly cooperation to bridge divides and widen horizons.
Abstract submission deadline: 11th February 2021
Please register via https://www.e-a-a.org//eaa2021
This one-day research-led course will provide the participants with an introduction to a diverse range of methodologies and approaches to the study of reuse practices in the Roman world. The course will focus in particular on the reuse of architecture and sculpture, but it will also touch upon the reuse of ceramic material – especially amphorae – to shed light on the evolution of the Roman economy. The course will consist of four keynote lectures that will explore how the topic can be tackled from different perspectives and with different tools. The PhD students will actively contribute to the course by presenting their own research. In so doing, the course aims to provide the participants with a forum to discuss their work with peers and specialists and to receive feedback.
For further information and updates, see: https://urbnet.au.dk/news/phd-courses/
Please apply via this link https://events.au.dk/reusepracticesinromanlateantiquecitiesf2021 no later than 15th April 2021.
The lectures given at the course will focus on methodological approaches and problems when discussing resilience and the evidence connected to it in the archaeological record.
Four keynote lectures together with presentations by the phd students constitute the core of the course and will give participants the possibility of discussing methodological approaches both relating to their own research but also to broader theoretical and empirical discussions of resilience and archaeological research and evidence.
For more information and updates, please see: https://urbnet.au.dk/news/phd-courses/
Please apply via this link https://events.au.dk/urbanresilenceintheancientworldf2021 not later than 15 March 2021.
2-3 October 2019, UrbNet, Aarhus University
Summary - A prime source of information for archaeologists, pottery has been studied for centuries across a wide range of cultures and periods. From a long-held focus on types and styles, ceramic study is today amongst the most dynamic and diversifying branches within archaeology, where innovative conceptual approaches and methodologies are opening new, exciting avenues into the study of the past. If defining typologies and chronologies remains the priority of any researcher dealing with this type of material, analytical approaches have considerably expanded the number of questions that archaeologists can answer. These include, for example, reconstructing the biography of pots through the profiling of food residues and use wear, mapping the provenance and processing of clay and temper, charting the use, recycling and trade, to mention but a few topics. Further important developments concern the study of people-pot interactions and the ways in which ceramic shapes and decoration evolved as a result of changing social, cultural, and economic relations. The study of the humble pot, thus, is offering new ways in which archaeologists can study societal development, culture transformation, socio-ecological changes and resilience in high-definition. This research led-course will provide the participants with an introduction to a diverse range of methodologies for ceramic studies, from traditional, typologically-driven approaches to state-of-the-art laboratory analyses. In so doing, the course will provide a forum to discuss and reflect on how new research approaches are gradually transforming archaeology.
Register: https://phdcourses.dk/Course/65813
Comparative analysis of building techniques and construction processes at regional and empire-wide levels;
Spolia and the impact of the urban landscape;
Perception of city walls in Late Antiquity and the post-Antique period;
Comparative scientific analyses;
N. Burkhardt, Historische Zeitschrift, 2019, Vol.309(1), pp.165-168
P. Maranzana, American Journal of Archaeology, 4/2019, Vol.123(2)
https://www.ajaonline.org/book-review/3856
E. Zanini, Medioevo Greco 19, 2019, 453-455
https://www.academia.edu/41221431/Reviev_of_Efthymios_Rizos_ed._New_Cities_in_Late_Antiquity._Documents_and_Archaeology_Turnhout_2017
M. Sartre, in Syria 96 (2019)
https://journals.openedition.org/syria/8971