“Inscribing Community” examines Greek inscriptions from Rome, between the first and fourth centuries CE, in order to understand the spaces and presentation of multicultural communities within the topography of the city. Literary sources, from Martial to Aelius Aristides, cite Rome’s multiculturalism as a defining feature of the city. These literary sources, however, separate Rome’s diverse population from the city’s built environment. For all the presentation of the city as a culturally diverse capital, did its multicultural population contribute to the topography of the city? Understanding the relationship between the city’s multicultural population and landscape comes as a challenge given the difficulties of tracing identity within material culture and the flawed preservation of Rome’s archaeological record. For this dissertation, I turn to Greek inscriptions – as both social historical texts and archaeological objects – in order to examine the organization and spaces of multicultural communities in Rome. Greek inscriptions, despite the cultural popularity of the language, remained a rarity in the landscape of Rome, accounting for less than 5% of the existing epigraphic record of the city. Within the center of Rome, inscribed Greek represented a cultural practice of the eastern half of the empire, where Greek functioned as the administrative language. When the Greek epigraphic record is mapped onto the topography of Rome, three distinct clusters of inscriptions can be seen in the areas of the Sacra Via, the Baths of Trajan, and the southern Transtiberim region. The contents of the inscriptions within these areas not only demonstrate the existence of communities organized by people from the different parts of eastern Mediterranean but also reveal their physical impression on the city. The three sites mark the only known structures and spaces devoted to multicultural communities in the urban topography of Rome. The Greek inscriptions of these three sites, when examined together, reveal the tension between motivation and perception in imperial Rome. Individuals and communities created inscriptions in Greek as an expression of their identities and native cultures. Yet, the display of inscriptions made the texts perceptible objects within the landscape of Rome, which anyone in the city might interpret in their own way. At each of the sites, imperial power mediated this tension, affecting their presentation and articulation of identity. Whether displayed in the center of the city or its periphery, Greek inscriptions in Rome represent eastern cultural identity that can also serve as a message of imperial dominance.

Between the fourth and the seventh centuries CE, Christian patrons erected thousands of churches, chapels, and monasteries in cities and villages across the Mediterranean, decorating the apses, walls and floors of many of these structures with figural and geometric mosaics. These late antique Christian mosaics have been studied for their iconography, their Graeco-Roman components, and as evidence for the religious beliefs of newly-Christian patrons. However, art historians largely have ignored the ways that texts, inscribed within the visual field and composed of the same mosaic material, functioned as images in Christian spaces. For the first time, this thesis assembles the foundations of a comprehensive catalogue of early Christian mosaic inscriptions, places them back into the physical spaces in which they were meant to be read, and analyzes how these texts functioned both verbally and visually for the late antique reader/viewer, against the backdrop of Graeco-Roman traditions. I first examine the ekphrastic components of Christian inscriptions and look more closely at the different ways in which texts work with and against images and spaces, encouraging the viewer to react physically and mentally. Second, I study the language of light used by the inscriptions, and argue that this language linked text to the material of mosaic and enabled patrons to make complex statements about their cultural erudition and religious affiliation. Third, I investigate the functions and visual forms of short tituli which label scenes or name figures to simplify, authenticate or transform static images into narratives in motion. Finally, I turn to the frames of the inscriptions and contend that different forms conveyed powerful visual arguments. By writing these texts back into their mosaics, this thesis argues that texts and images were inseparable in the period, and that text written into images performed and played in more complex ways than has been previously thought.

"Based on the thesis submitted by the author for the degree 'Doctor of Philosophy' to the Senate of Hebrew University, Jerusalem, in 1976"--P. viii. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 265-275) and indexes.

Doctorat en philosophie et lettres / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

La présente thèse de doctorat est consacrée à l'étude d'un lot de papyrus conservés aux Musées Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire de Bruxelles. La plupart de ces textes proviennent du monastère d'apa Apollô de Baouît en Moyenne-Égypte.<p>L'introduction s'attache à retracer la genèse du lot et se conclut par un inventaire des papyrus qui peuvent lui être attribués.<p>Un premier chapitre présente le monastère de Baouît (sources, le fondateur, le site monastique et son histoire, les moines, l'organisation, la place du monastère dans le contexte régional).<p>Le deuxième chapitre est consacré aux textes documentaires du monastère de Baouît. Différents thèmes sont ensuite abordés: les supports de l'écriture, la paléographie, l'usage des langues (grec et copte), les particularités linguistiques et l'apport des textes édités.<p>Les 100 papyrus publiés sont répartis dans les sections suivantes: 1. ordres de l'administration monastique, 2. ordres de paiements; 3. comptes et listes; 4. reçus; 5. contrats de prêt; 6. autres contrats; 7. lettres; 8. protocoles; 9. varia; 10. annexe. Divers tableaux et annexes complètent les éditions.<p>Un dernier chapitre traite des activités économiques du monastère de Baouît (sources, patrimoine, productions, revenus et dépenses).<p> / Doctorat en philosophie et lettres, Orientation langue et littérature / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished