Overview

The Material Dynamics of Festivals in the Graeco-Roman East explores the various ways in which the experience of civic festivals in the Graeco-Roman East was created and framed by material culture. By the second and third centuries AD, Greek festivals were thriving across the eastern Mediterranean. Much of our knowledge of these festivals, and their associated processions, rituals, banquets, and competitions, comes from material culture-- inscriptions, coins, architecture, and art-works. Yet each of these pieces of material evidence was the result of a conscious act, of what to record, and where and how to record it, with varying patterns discernible across different areas, and in different media. This volume draws attention to the choices made in a variety of different forms of material culture relating to Greek festivals from the Hellenistic to Roman periods, and unpicks the ways in which they encode or forge particular social relationships and power structures, as well as creating senses of community or communication between different groups. These helped to fix ephemeral events into public memory, to present particular views of their significance for the wider community, and to frame the experience of their participants.

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9780192868794

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Zahra Newby is Professor of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Warwick. Her research focuses on how Greek culture was experienced and adapted in the period of the Roman Empire, explored through the lens of material culture. She has published books and articles on ancient athletics, festivals and mythology in Roman art, including a monograph on Greek Athletics in the Roman World: Victory and Virtue (2005). She was Principal Investigator of the Leverhulme Trust-funded project Materiality and Meaning in Greek Festival Culture of the Roman Imperial Period (2017-2021).

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