Mocking Parades and the Place of Pagan Statuary in Late Antique Alexandria
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Jonathan Stutz
Abstract
With the present paper I would like to discuss a particular form of procession which we may term mocking parades, a collective ritual aimed at ridiculing cultic objects from competing religious communities. The cases presented here are contextualized within incidents of pagan/Christian violence in Alexandria between the 4th and 5th centuries, entailing in one case the destruction of the Serapeum and in another the pillaging of the Isis shrine at Menouthis on the outskirts of Alexandria. As the literary accounts on these events suggest, such collective forms of mockery played an important role in the context of mob violence in general and of violence against sacred objects in particular. However, while historiographical and hagiographical sources from the period suggest that pagan statues underwent systematic destruction and mutilation, we can infer from the archaeological evidence a vast range of uses and re-adaptation of pagan statuary in the urban space, assuming among other functions that of decorating public spaces. I would like to build on the thesis that the parading of sacred images played a prominent role in the discourse on the value of pagan statuary in the public space. On the one hand, the statues carried through the streets became themselves objects of mockery and violence, involving the population of the city in a collective ritual of exorcism. On the other hand, the images paraded in the mocking parades could also become a means through which the urban space could become subject to new interpretations. Entering in visual contact with the still visible vestiges of the pagan past, with the temples and the statuary of the city, the “image of the city” became affected itself by the images paraded through the streets, as though to remind the inhabitants that the still-visible elements of Alexandria’s pagan topography now stood as defeated witnesses to Christianity’s victory.
Acknowledgements
The present article builds on a conference paper delivered at the workshop Topographies in Motion: Urban Movement and Mobility in Late Antiquity (4–5 October 2018). I am thankful to Dr. Florian Wöller (Copenhagen) for the organization of the conference and the useful suggestions for the present paper.
© 2020 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
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- Rezensionen
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- Agnès Bastit und Joseph Verheyden, Hgg.:Irénée de Lyon et les débuts de la Bible chrétienne. Actes de la Journée du 1.VII. 2014 à Lyon, Instrumenta Patristica et Mediaevalia 77, Turnhout (Brepols) 2017, 502 S., ISBN 978-2-503-57544-5, € 110,–.
- Anthony Briggman:God and Christ in Irenaeus, Oxford Early Christian Studies, Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2019, XIII + 233 S., ISBN 978-0-19-879256-7, £ 65,–.
- Irmgard Männlein-Robert, ed.:Die Christen als Bedrohung? Text, Kontext und Wirkung von Porphyrios, Roma Aeterna, Beiträge zu Spätantike und Frühmittelalter 5, Stuttgart (Franz Steiner) 2017, 348 pp., ISBN 978-3-515-11537-7, € 56,–.
- Mark S. Smith: The Idea of Nicaea in the Early Church Councils, AD 431–451, Oxford Early Christian Studies, Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2018, XIII + 256 pp., ISBN 978-0-19-883527-1, £ 65,–.
- Michal Bar-Asher Siegal:Jewish-Christian Dialogues on Scripture in Late Antiquity: Heretic Narratives of the Babylonian Talmud, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2019, VII + 228 S., ISBN 978-1-107-19536-3, £ 75,–.
- Jesse A. Hoover:The Donatist Church in an Apocalyptic Age, Oxford Early Christian Studies, Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2018, 264 pp., ISBN 978-0-1988-2551-7, £ 70,–.
- Tim Denecker:Ideas on Language in Early Latin Christianity: From Tertullian to Isidore of Seville, Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae 142, Leiden (Brill) 2017, XV + 497 S., ISBN 978-90-04-34987-2, € 25,– / $ 30, –.
- Pascal H.E. Bertrand und Lois Gandt, Hgg.:Vitae Antonii Versiones latinae. Vita beati Antonii abbatis Euagrio interprete. Versio uetustissima, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 170, Turnhout (Brepols) 2018, CCXLII + 363 S., ISBN 978-2-503-57748-7, € 335,–.
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Titelseiten
- Vorankündigung: Eine unbekannte lateinische Übersetzung der Predigten des Pseudo-Makarios
- Artikel
- Porphyry, Steuco and the Journey of Oracles betweenSymphony and Conflict
- Fighting in Verses: Behind the Scenes of Gregory of Nazianzus’Carmen 2,1,39
- Mocking Parades and the Place of Pagan Statuary in Late Antique Alexandria
- Rom, der Tomus Leonis und das 6. Ökumenische Konzil (680/681)
- Der Fall Jerusalem, Timiou Staurou 104 (12. Jh.):Eine Untersuchung zur Herkunft patristischerExzerpte in den Tetraevangelien
- Rezensionen
- Brent Nongbri: God’s Library: The Archeology of the Earliest Christian Manuscripts, New Haven (Yale University Press) 2018, XII + 403 S., ISBN 978-0-300-21541-0, $ 35,–.
- Éric Rebillard:Greek and Latin Narratives about the Ancient Martyrs, Oxford Early Christian Texts, Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2017, 412 S., ISBN 978-0-19-873957-9, £ 132,50.
- Katharina Degen:Der Gemeinsinn der Märtyrer. Die Darstellung gemeinwohlorientierten Handelns in den frühchristlichen Martyriumsberichten, Potsdamer altertumswissenschaftliche Beiträge 64, Stuttgart (Franz Steiner Verlag) 2018, 347 S., ISBN 978-3-515-12153-8, € 54, –.
- Agnès Bastit und Joseph Verheyden, Hgg.:Irénée de Lyon et les débuts de la Bible chrétienne. Actes de la Journée du 1.VII. 2014 à Lyon, Instrumenta Patristica et Mediaevalia 77, Turnhout (Brepols) 2017, 502 S., ISBN 978-2-503-57544-5, € 110,–.
- Anthony Briggman:God and Christ in Irenaeus, Oxford Early Christian Studies, Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2019, XIII + 233 S., ISBN 978-0-19-879256-7, £ 65,–.
- Irmgard Männlein-Robert, ed.:Die Christen als Bedrohung? Text, Kontext und Wirkung von Porphyrios, Roma Aeterna, Beiträge zu Spätantike und Frühmittelalter 5, Stuttgart (Franz Steiner) 2017, 348 pp., ISBN 978-3-515-11537-7, € 56,–.
- Mark S. Smith: The Idea of Nicaea in the Early Church Councils, AD 431–451, Oxford Early Christian Studies, Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2018, XIII + 256 pp., ISBN 978-0-19-883527-1, £ 65,–.
- Michal Bar-Asher Siegal:Jewish-Christian Dialogues on Scripture in Late Antiquity: Heretic Narratives of the Babylonian Talmud, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2019, VII + 228 S., ISBN 978-1-107-19536-3, £ 75,–.
- Jesse A. Hoover:The Donatist Church in an Apocalyptic Age, Oxford Early Christian Studies, Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2018, 264 pp., ISBN 978-0-1988-2551-7, £ 70,–.
- Tim Denecker:Ideas on Language in Early Latin Christianity: From Tertullian to Isidore of Seville, Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae 142, Leiden (Brill) 2017, XV + 497 S., ISBN 978-90-04-34987-2, € 25,– / $ 30, –.
- Pascal H.E. Bertrand und Lois Gandt, Hgg.:Vitae Antonii Versiones latinae. Vita beati Antonii abbatis Euagrio interprete. Versio uetustissima, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 170, Turnhout (Brepols) 2018, CCXLII + 363 S., ISBN 978-2-503-57748-7, € 335,–.
