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Reading the Proems of Middle Byzantine Hagiography through Biblical Intertextuality

  • Giulia Gollo ORCID logo EMAIL logo
Veröffentlicht/Copyright: 21. Oktober 2025
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Abstract

Hagiographical proems emerge as crucial sources for contextualising authors and their intended audiences. In Byzantine hagiographical works produced from the late eighth to early eleventh centuries, proems are highly rhetorical and standardised in their language. This standardisation makes it difficult for scholars to situate hagiographers within their social and intellectual networks. I argue that when facing this challenge we can benefit from the study of biblical intertextuality, and select the proem of the Life of Patriarch Nikephoros by Ignatius the Deacon as a case study.

Acknowledgments

An abridged version of this chapter was presented during the workshop Networking through Proems: Proemial Strategies for Intellectual Networking in Antiquity (Leuven, September 12, 2023). I thank the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung for funding my research as part of the project The Bible in Middle Byzantine Hagiography (8th–10th Century) and my supervisors Prof. Dr. Claudia Sode and Prof. Dr. Reinhart Ceulemans for their comments on previous drafts.

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