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The recycling and reuse of materials and objects were extensive in the past, but have rarely been embedded into models of the economy: this volume is the first to explore these practices in the Roman economy, drawing on a variety of methodological approaches and new scientific developments in a wide-ranging interdisciplinary study.
Heir of Ptolemy son of Lagus, Alexander the Great's general (who took Egypt over in 323BC), Ptolemy II Philadelphus reigned in Alexandria from 282 to 246. The greatest of the Hellenistic kings of his time, Philadelphus exercised power far beyond the confines of Egypt, while at his glittering royal court the Library of Alexandria grew to be a matchless monument to Greek intellectual life. In Egypt the Ptolemaic régime consolidated its power by encouraging immigration and developing settlement in the Fayum. This book examines Philadelphus' reign in a comprehensive and refreshing way. Scholars from the fields of Classics, Archaeology, Papyrology, Egyptology and Biblical Studies consider issues in Egypt and across Ptolemaic territory in the Mediterranean, the Holy Land and Africa.
"This is the most important and original study of literacy and the function of writing in ancient society to have appeared in the last twenty years. In a masterly and detailed survey of evidence from across the ancient Mediterranean world, Bagnall shows how and why 'routine' writing was essential to social and administrative infrastructures from the Hellenistic to the Byzantine periods. Essential reading for anyone interested in understanding the role and function of the written text in human social behaviour." —Alan Bowman, Camden Professor of Ancient History, Oxford University "This richly illustrated and annotated book takes the reader on an extended tour from North Africa to Afghanista...
Documents such as papyri and inscriptions are essential to our knowledge of ancient history in a broad sense. This volume turns the attention to the texts themselves, and explores in an interdisciplinary way how people communicated with each other in antiquity.
This volume is the first in a new series of editions of Coptic-language "magical" manuscripts from Egypt, written on papyrus, ostraca, parchment, and paper, and dating to between the fourth and twelfth centuries CE. Their texts attest to non-institutional rituals intended to bring about changes in the lives of those who used them – heal disease, curse enemies, bring about love or hatred, or see into the future. These manuscripts represent rich sources of information on daily life and lived religion of Egypt in the last centuries of Roman rule and the first centuries after the Arab conquest, giving us glimpses of the hopes and fears of people of this time, their conflicts and problems, and their vision of the human and superhuman worlds. This volume presents 37 new editions and descriptions of manuscripts, focusing on formularies or "handbooks", those texts containing instructions for the performance of rituals. Each of these is accompanied by a history of its acquisition, a material description, and presented with facing text and translations, tracings of accompanying images, and explanatory notes to aid in understanding the text.
This book investigates Hellenistic popular religion through an interdisciplinary study of terracotta figurines of Egyptian deities, mostly from domestic contexts, from the trading port of Delos. A comparison of the figurines’ iconography to parallels in Egyptian religious texts, temple reliefs, and ritual objects suggests that many figurines depict deities or rituals associated with Egyptian festivals. An analysis of the objects’ clay fabrics and manufacturing techniques indicates that most were made on Delos. Additionally, archival research on unpublished notes from early excavations reveals new data on many figurines’ archaeological contexts, illuminating their roles in both domestic and temple cults. The results offer a new perspective on Hellenistic reinterpretations of Egyptian religion, as well as the relationship between “popular” and “official” cults.
Throughout history, the study of sacred texts has focused almost exclusively on the content and meaning of these writings. Such a focus obscures the fact that sacred texts are always embodied in particular material forms—from ancient scrolls to contemporary electronic devices. Using the digital turn as a starting point, this volume highlights material dimensions of the sacred texts of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The essays in this collection investigate how material aspects have shaped the production and use of these texts within and between the traditions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, from antiquity to the present day. Contributors also reflect on the implications of transiti...
Egypt in the early Byzantine period was a bilingual country where Greek and Egyptian (Coptic) were used alongside each other. Historical studies along with linguistic studies of the phonology and lexicon of early Byzantine Greek in Egypt testify to this situation. In order to describe the linguistic traces that the language-contact situation left behind in individuals' linguistic output, Coptic Interference in the Syntax of Greek Letters from Egypt analyses the syntax of early Byzantine Greek texts from Egypt. The primary object of interest is bilingual interference in the syntax of verbs, adverbial phrases, clause linkage as well as in semi-formulaic expressions and formulaic frames. The study is based on a corpus of Greek and Coptic private letters on papyrus, which date from the fourth to mid-seventh centuries, originate from Egypt and belong to bilingual, Greek-Coptic, papyrus archives.
In Greco-Roman Egypt, recipes for magical undertaking, called magical formularies, commonly existed for love potions, curses, attempts to best business rivals—many of the same challenges that modern people might face. In The Greco-Egyptian Magical Formularies: Libraries, Books, and Individual Recipes, volume editors Christopher Faraone and Sofia Torallas Tovar present a series of essays by scholars involved in a multiyear project to reedit and translate the various magical handbooks that were inscribed in the Roman period in the Greek or Egyptian languages. For the first time, the material remains of these papyrus rolls and codices are closely examined, revealing important information abou...
In The Craft of a Good Scribe, Steve Vinson offers a comprehensive study of the Demotic Egyptian First Tale of Setne Khaemwas (Third Century BCE), the first to appear since 1900. "First Setne" is the most important extant Demotic literary text, and among the most important fictional compositions from any period of ancient Egypt. The tale, which is by turns lurid, tragic and ultimately comic, deals with Setne's theft of a magic book written by the god Thoth himself, and subsequently Setne's punishment through a hallucinatory encounter with the ghostly femme fatale Tabubue. Vinson provides a new textual edition and commentary, and explores the tale's cultural background, its modern reception, and approaches to its interpretation as a work of literature.