The present thesis examines probably the ultimate focal point in the history of the Christian South Caucasian Cultures – the Caucasian Schism that occurred in the early seventh century – a major scandal that ended the ecclesiastical communion between the Georgian and Armenian Churches and gave impetus to the rise of the so-called national Churches. The schism became the central point of reference in both medieval and modern Caucasian historiographies. Modern scholarship has advanced different claims concerning the nature, reasons and results of the Schism, in many cases arguing that almost all aspects of the respective cultures have been affected by the Schism. As for medieval Armenian historical narratives, they made a good conceptual use of the schism, presenting the schism as a major interpretive schema for the explanation of all aspects of their relations with their northern neighbours. Contrary to such view, I argue that our knowledge of the reasons behind the schism and theological controversies that preceded, accompanied or followed the Schism in the sixth century is in most cases determined by the conceptual framework created in the Middle Ages together with the changes in political state of affairs in the Caucasus. In the period between the tenth to thirteenth centuries, when all major South Caucasian powers were struggling for the unification of the Caucasus under their aegis, the remembrance of the schism became particularly important. The remembrance and indeed forgetting of the Caucasian unity and separation became a rhetorical tool in medieval Armeno-Georgian debates. Therefore instead of taking the Schism at face value, I propose to abandon the traditional liminalist perception of the history of unity and separation in the Caucasus, and adopt a more rewarding approach, that is to say to try to understand when, why and by whom were the crucial events of the Late Antique Caucasian history conceptualized and adapted for contemporary ideological needs.

This dissertation analyzes the struggle between the imperial court and the periphery in the context of Justinian’s reforms in the early A.D. 530s. The reforms targeting select Roman provinces sought to reduce the size of the imperial bureaucracy while simultaneously attempting to maintain imperial vertical authority. The reforms epitomize the imperial court’s struggle to rein in the imperial bureaucracy in the provinces of the Roman Empire. The analysis is framed within the cultural, social, political and economic evolution occurring in Late Antiquity. It shall be proposed that the reforms are one example of the imperial court’s attempt to limit the distance between itself and its provincial resources, particularly with regard to fiscality. The reforms also embody the political dynamics between the emperor and his bureaucracy, which is composed of the Roman elite. Roughly two centuries earlier, the Tetrarchic reforms fundamentally changed the relationship between both parties. Specifically, the upper stratum of the aristocracy saw the balance of power tilt in its favor substantially.

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.

This dissertation focuses on images of Christ that date from the first half of Late Antiquity, defined as the three centuries between AD 200 and 500. The cultural dynamics of this period left a distinct impression on Christian art, and this dissertation traces that impact. Unlike other studies that attempt to resolve ambiguity within the corpus of Christ images, the argument here maintains that ambiguity was a key component in the creation and subsequent interpretation of the Late Antique Christian iconography. The dissertation proceeds in three parts, each comprising two chapters. In the first section, the history and historiography of the image of Christ is explored, and a methodology capable of accommodating the diverse meanings assigned to the Christ’s discrepant and ambiguous iconographies is developed. In order to better understand the socio-religious environment in which the first images of Christ were produced and interpreted, the second section of the dissertation moves away from material culture and towards method and theory. The notion that interpretation is a group level phenomenon is critiqued, and a model explaining how individuals in Late Antiquity could have made sense of ambiguous images of Christ is advanced. The final section turns back to the material culture and applies the framework developed in the second section to two artworks: (1) the sarcophagus of Junius Bassus and (2) the floor mosaic from the Hinton St. Mary Roman Villa now in the British Museum. By complementing the standard analyses of Christian art with interpretations grounded in the diverse interactions viewers had with artworks, new perspectives will emerge that provide a fuller picture of Late Antique Christianity and the iconography of its godhead alike.

This thesis is a study of the pre-Islamic passages of Abū Ḥanīfa Aḥmad ibn Dāwūd ibn Wanand Dīnawarī's Kitāb al-Aḫbār al-Ṭiwāl. This is to say that it stops at the beginning of the Arab conquest of Iran. It is intended for scholars of Late Antiquity. Special emphasis is placed on Dīnawarī's exposition of the rule of the Sasanian dynasty and questions relating to the mysterious Ḫudāynāma tradition which are intimately connected with it. Beginning with a discussion of Dīnawarī and his work, the thesis moves into a discussion of indigenous Iranian historiography. Speculation on the sources of Kitāb al-Aḫbār al-Ṭiwāl follows, and the historiographical investigation of the most substantial portion of Kitāb al-Aḫbār al-Ṭiwāl's notices on the Sasanian dynasty comes next. The conclusion summarises the findings of the thesis. The final section (an appendix) is a translation of the relevant part of Kitāb al-Aḫbār al-Ṭiwāl running from the beginning of that text to the reign of Šīrūya. This thesis was written with one main question in mind: what does Dīnawarī's Kitāb al-Aḫbār al-Ṭiwāl have to say about pre-Islamic Iranian history? A host of other questions arose immediately: who was Dīnawarī; when did he live; what did he do; how was his work perceived by others; where did Dīnawarī get his information and how did he present it; is Dīnawarī's information reliable? These questions are addressed one by one in my thesis.

This study aims to establish a depositional framework for an area of the Louisiana shelf, north-central Gulf of Mexico. The depositional history of the study area is poorly understood, especially within the last cycle of major eustatic fluctuation (~18, 000 yrs BP – present). Data sets used in this study include pre-existing and previously unanalyzed two-dimensional, highresolution seismic profile records (Acadiana 86 and Acadiana 89), geotechnical foundation boring data (Coleman and Roberts, 1988a), and an industry lease block survey report (Cole, 1983). Seismic sequence stratigraphic methods are employed in this study to analyze seismic profile data. Seismic sequence analysis results indicate the presence of five unconformable surfaces and five seismic facies units. Through correlation of seismic profile data with lithologic and chronologic data, it is possible to conclude that these seismic facies units represent shelf-margin deltaic deposition during the last lowstand of sea level (~18, 000 yrs BP), sourced by the Pearl River. .

A travers l'analyse de matériel macrobotanique (charbon et graines / fruits) issus de trois sites majeurs du Later Stone Age (LSA) d'Afrique australe, cette étude s'intéresse à reconstituer les conditions environnementales durant l'Holocène dans la région, en particulier au cours des deux à trois derniers millénaires. L'étude de ce matériel, accompagné de la constitution d'une collection moderne de références de la végétation du bassin Kgalagadi, vise à mieux cerner l'impact quel'environnement a pu avoir sur les sociétés humaines (subsistance, peuplements, etc.) à une période-clé du (LSA), qui marque l'émergence des pratiques pastorales dans la région. L'étude des environnements est ici primordiale pour interpréter les conditions qui ont pu favoriser l'arrivée de ces premiers éleveurs et leurs lieux d'installation. En complément, une approche ethnographique a été menée, en travaillant avec les communautés locales dans la région de l'Erongo en Namibie, qui peuvent aider à comprendre et reconstituer les pratiques passées d'utilisation de la végétation. / Through macrobotanical (wood charcoal and seeds / fruit) analysis from three major Later Stone Age (LSA) sites located in the Kgalagadi Basin in southern Africa, this study is interested in reconstructing the environmental conditions during the Holocene in the region, in particular in the last two to three millennia. Initially this work couples archaeological macrobotanical analysis with the construction of modern reference material in an effort to trace the environmental / vegetal evolution as well as to comprehend socio-ecological and socio-environmental dynamics in Southern Africa during the late Holocene. The scope of this study covers the period spanning the last 3000-2000 years, with the main objective of understanding what relationships humans had with their environment at a time linked with the arrival or the appearance of the first herding practices in that part of Africa. These herding practices are believed to be accompanied by significant human movement from eastern or central Africa southwards. Favourable environmental conditions may have influenced their routes as well as settlement choices, and these are aspects that this archaeobotanical study aims to address. This study also employed an ethnographic approach, working with local communities in the Erongo region of Namibia, so as to make inferences to past vegetation utilisation practices while at the same time discerning and reconstituting past human activities.

La rhétorique du blâme dans l’Histoire Auguste se propose d’étudier comme un objet littéraire le recueil de biographies impériales connu sous le nom d’Historia Augusta, officiellement rédigé par six auteurs à la fin du IIIe siècle ap. J.C. et au début du IVe siècle ap. J.C., mais qui serait en réalité issu du fruit de l’imagination d’un unique rédacteur ayant vécu à la fin du IVe siècle ap. J.C., si l’on s’en tient à la thèse de l’historien allemand Hermann Dessau formulée à la fin du XIXe siècle. Le présent mémoire entend analyser les différentes stratégies destinées à dépeindre des images sombres d’une série d’empereurs légitimes et d’usurpateurs, compris dans la période historique qui débute avec le règne d’Hadrien et s’achève avec la chute de Carin (IIe-IIIe siècles ap. J.C.), dans un texte mêlant étroitement réalité et fiction. Le recours à des procédés de nature lexicale, stylistique, thématique et structurelle que l’on peut observer révèle l’importance de la mise en œuvre des ressources de la rhétorique épidictique, ainsi que la présence de nombreux phénomènes d’intertextualité, fondés notamment sur les Vies des douze Césars de Suétone, principal modèle du recueil. L’enquête conduit à un élargissement de la réflexion qui s’intéresse aux cibles de la critique. Si, derrière les figures des mauvais princes, le rédacteur cherche à fustiger les dérives du principat, il cherche également à mettre en oeuvre sa propre écriture, en tâchant de se distinguer des autres historiographes, dans un style qui accorde une large place à la fantaisie, à l’autodérision et au persiflage. Le mémoire s’efforce donc d’étudier la représentation des figures et des événements de l’histoire et de souligner les articulations entre poétique et rhétorique dans un texte majeur de la littérature latine de l’Antiquité tardive. / Rhetoric of Condemnation in the 'Historia Augusta' intends to study the collection of imperial biographies known as Historia Augusta as a literary object. The biographies were officially written by six authors at the end of the 3rd Century A.D. and at the beginning of the 4th Century A.D., but they were actually produced through the imagination of a single writer who lived at the end of the 4th Century A.D. according to the 19th Century thesis of the German historian Hermann Dessau. Through analysing a text that intricately mixes reality and fiction, this thesis will examine the different strategies intended to depict the sombre images of both legitimate and usurping emperors throughout the historical period that begins with Hadrian's reign and ends with the fall of Carin (2nd to 3rd Centuries A.D.). Observing the lexical, stylistic, thematic and structural methods reveals the importance of utilizing epideictic rhetoric as well as numerous intertextuality phenomena, particularly based on Suetonius's Vitae XII Caesarum, which is the main model of the collection. This inquiry drives to widen the thought interested by the target of the critic. If, behind the figures of bad princes, the writer tries to castigate the principate system that enables princely transgressions, he also tries to enhance his own writing. The writer tries to be different from other historiographers in a style that grants a large place to fantasy, self-mockery and raillery. This thesis endeavours, therefore, to study the representation of historical characters and events while underlining articulations between poetics and rhetoric in a major text of late Antiquity Latin literature.

本論文的土魯番政權研究，旨在剖析以察合台裔蒙古統治者為領導的土魯番政治勢力，是如何形成為十四至十七世紀期間活動力甚強的區域政權? 因此，本文研究架構分為: 緒論，為研究動機、路徑的鋪陳敘述。第一章，為剖述其政權興起的時空背景。第二章，針對土魯番政權結構的變化等政治特徵之描述。第三章，分析其政權涉外之關係特色。第四章，著重於政權所處空間領域面的變化，及其社會文 化的變遷。第五章，為綜合探索土魯番政權興起所呈現之時代意義和影響。筆者最後於結論部份，綜述了土魯番政權史之縱（時間）、橫（空間）面向下政治社會的探討。其反映於新疆史中，更代表了當時全疆社會文化轉型至伊斯蘭化的一關鍵期和例證等諸多意義與影響。 / This thesis is to deal with A Research for Turfan Polity from the late 14th century to the late 17th century. From this thesis it follows that topic will be discussed as follows: In connection with analyzing the background when Turfan political power rose abruptly, a change of Turfan polity, and arguing the relations between Turfan and other nations and a change of political territory. And besides, it is put much emphasis on the transformation of Turfan society and culture from primary Buddhistical life to Islamization finally. At the end, it general summaries the meanings and affection of Turfan polity.

This essay discusses the width of the late medieval desertion of farms in Sweden from an archaeological perspective. The object of the essay is to investigate if archaeological investigations and research during the last 10-15 years have changed the view of the late medieval desertion in relation to the Scandinavian research project on deserted farms and villages. The essay also deals with questions on causes to the desertion and when desertion occurred. An ambition of the essay is also to give a general picture of archaeological investigations during the last 10-15 years considering the late medieval desertion. The analyses-material consists mainly of reports from archaeological investigations. Most of the investigations analysed in this essay are investigations of single farms. Because of this it is natural these investigations do not say much about the width of the desertion. As long as an archaeological investigation is not a part of a large project, where the purpose is to show the width of the desertion, one cannot expect that one single investigation will give much information or knowledge about the width. However, if the ambition is to obtain a complete picture of a medieval deserted farm or village, this essay confirms that an archaeological investigation is necessary, willingly in an interdisciplinary cooperation.