This book situates discussions of Christian monasticism in Egypt and Palestine within the socio-economic world of the long Late Antiquity, from the golden age of monasticism into and well beyond the Arab conquest (fifth to tenth century). Its thirteen chapters present new research into the rich corpus of textual sources and archaeological remains and move beyond traditional studies that have treated monastic communities as religious entities in physical seclusion from society. The volume brings together scholars working across traditional boundaries of subject and geography and explores a diverse range of topics from the production of food and wine to networks of scribes, patronage, and monastic visitation. As such, it paints a vivid picture of busy monastic lives dependent on and led in tandem with the non-monastic world.
This book situates discussions of Christian monasticism in Egypt and Palestine within the socio-economic world of the long Late Antiquity, from the golden age of monasticism into and well beyond the Arab conquest (fifth to tenth century). Its thirteen chapters present new research into the rich corpus of textual sources and archaeological remains and move beyond traditional studies that have treated monastic communities as religious entities in physical seclusion from society. The volume brings together scholars working across traditional boundaries of subject and geography and explores a diverse range of topics from the production of food and wine to networks of scribes, patronage, and monastic visitation. As such, it paints a vivid picture of busy monastic lives dependent on and led in tandem with the non-monastic world.
"Reveals that Late Antique monasteries in Egypt and Palestine were actively engaged in regional societies, contradictory to the traditional understanding of monastic life as 'isolated'. Draws on the rich corpus of textual sources and archaeological remains and brings together scholars from across traditional disciplinary divides"--
Monasticism, in all of its variations, was a feature of almost every landscape in the medieval West. So ubiquitous were religious women and men throughout the Middle Ages that all medievalists encounter monasticism in their intellectual worlds. While there is enormous interest in medieval monasticism among Anglophone scholars, language is often a barrier to accessing some of the most important and groundbreaking research emerging from Europe. The Cambridge History of Medieval Monasticism in the Latin West offers a comprehensive treatment of medieval monasticism, from Late Antiquity to the end of the Middle Ages. The essays, specially commissioned for this volume and written by an international team of scholars, with contributors from Australia, Belgium, Canada, England, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, and the United States, cover a range of topics and themes and represent the most up-to-date discoveries on this topic.
This is the first book-length study of children in one of the birthplaces of early Christian monasticism, Egypt. Although comprised of men and women who had renounced sex and family, the monasteries of late antiquity raised children, educated them, and expected them to carry on their monastic lineage and legacies into the future. Children within monasteries existed in a liminal space, simultaneously vulnerable to the whims and abuses of adults and also cherished as potential future monastic prodigies. Caroline T. Schroeder examines diverse sources - letters, rules, saints' lives, art, and documentary evidence - to probe these paradoxes. In doing so, she demonstrates how early Egyptian monasteries provided an intergenerational continuity of social, cultural, and economic capital while also contesting the traditional family's claims to these forms of social continuity.
The book presents the results of my in-depth researches on late antique Egyptian monasticism. In fact, it is my third book dealing with this fascinating phenomenon. Here, like in my two earlier books on the subject, I have reworked some of the previously published ideas or texts of mine and in effect my own understanding of the topic has evolved and changed owing to the discoveries of both textual and archaeological sources and to new interpretations of the already known data. The first book, Moines et communautés monastiques en Égypte (ive-viiie siècles), was published in 2009 and focused primarily on the physical aspects of monastic life, the geographical conditions of monastic communities and on their economic activity. In it, I dedicated ample space to the questions of terminology, particularly to the terms referred to monastic groupings, their leaders and members responsible for performing specific duties. While writing that book, I perused a vast number of literary texts available in various languages, but pride of place was given to documentary evidence preserved in the form of papyri, ostraca, and limestone or wooden writing tablets. My intention was also to provide readers with information on places with surviving remnants of monasteries or hermitages and thus expand the ''database'' (for want of a better word) of Egyptian monasticism by taking into account this particular category of archaeological evidence. The second book owes its origin to the request I received from the publishing house of the Benedictine Abbey of Tyniec to write a volume on Egyptian monasticism in Polish. It was partly based on chapters contained in the French book, but a substantial portion of the Polish book consisted of new material dealing in a greater detail with the foundational monastic texts such as the apophthegms, the Life of Antony by Athanasius of Alexandria, Historia Lausiaca by Palladius, the writings of John Cassian, the invaluable and extensive dossier of the Pachomian congregation, and the works written by Shenoute. The book includes a presentation of ascetic doctrines, a topic which was only tangentially addressed in Moines et communautés monastiques. Heedful of the usual rigours of research work, I nevertheless reduced the reference apparatus (the footnotes specifically) so as not to discourage the non-specialist readers interested in the topic. It was released in 2014 with the title Drugi dar Nilu, czyli o mnichach i klasztorach w późnoantycznym Egipcie (''The Second Gift of the Nile: Monks and Monasteries in Late Antique Egypt''; the first part of the title was proposed by the Benedictines, while the other was added, slightly pedantically, by myself). Once the work on that book was completed, I was more happy with the result than was the case with its predecessor: it seemed to me that the Polish book provided the reader with a greater wealth of information interpreted in a much more mature manner, even in spite of the fact that I had to leave out some material (especially my discussions of archaeological sources, as this time I could not include any illustrations). This particular book has emanated from the Tyniec book, much in the same way as the Tyniec one did from the volume written in French. It is largely composed of English translations of rearranged, reworked, revised and enriched individual chapters of its Polish predecessor. More attention is given here to the first congregation of Pachomian monasteries and the federation of three monastic establishments governed by Shenoute. The part on monastic economy has been expanded, which reflects my belief that this aspect of the phenomenon in question can usher us into the ''real reality'' of the communities as opposed to the reality depicted in monastic literature or in theoretical writings on asceticism. It goes without saying that I have also added references to newly published studies on the subject, all the while respecting the principle of keeping the bibliography selective and resisting the temptation of excessively expanding the footnotes. The chronological scope of the book extends to the mid-eighth century or thereabouts. The Arab conquest had an immense impact on life in Egypt in a multitude of aspects, but on the whole its monastic circles were not significantly affected. One cannot escape this impression while reading the letters written in Coptic in the first half of the eighth century found in Western Thebes, particularly the dossier of Frange. In my view at least, the image of life in Egyptian monasteries which emerges from those documents is not significantly different from what can be inferred from texts written a hundred years earlier. (from the Author''s Foreword)
Egypt played a crucial role in the Roman Empire for seven centuries. It was wealthy and occupied a strategic position between the Mediterranean and Indian Ocean worlds, while its uniquely fertile lands helped to feed the imperial capitals at Rome and then Constantinople. The cultural and religious landscape of Egypt today owes much to developments during the Roman period, including in particular the forms taken by Egyptian Christianity. Moreover, we have an abundance of sources for its history during this time, especially because of the recovery of vast numbers of written texts giving an almost uniquely detailed picture of its society, economy, government, and culture. This book, the work of six historians and archaeologists from Egypt, the US, and the UK, provides students and a general audience with a readable new history of the period and includes many illustrations of art, archaeological sites, and documents, and quotations from primary sources.
Byzantium lasted a thousand years, ruled to the end by self-styled 'emperors of the Romans'. It underwent kaleidoscopic territorial and structural changes, yet recovered repeatedly from disaster: even after the near-impregnable Constantinople fell in 1204, variant forms of the empire reconstituted themselves. The Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c.500-1492 tells the story, tracing political and military events, religious controversies and economic change. It offers clear, authoritative chapters on the main events and periods, with more detailed chapters on outlying regions and neighbouring societies and powers of Byzantium. With aids such as maps, a glossary, an alternative place-name table and references to English translations of sources, it will be valuable as an introduction. However, it also offers stimulating new approaches and important findings, making it essential reading for postgraduates and for specialists. The revised paperback edition contains a new preface by the editor and will offer an invaluable companion to survey courses in Byzantine history.
An apostolic lifestyle characterized by total material renunciation, homelessness, and begging was practiced by monks throughout the Roman Empire in the fourth and fifth centuries. Such monks often served as spiritual advisors to urban aristocrats whose patronage gave them considerable authority and independence from episcopal control. This book is the first comprehensive study of this type of Christian poverty and the challenge it posed for episcopal authority and the promotion of monasticism in late antiquity. Focusing on devotional practices, Daniel Caner draws together diverse testimony from Egypt, Syria, Asia Minor, and elsewhere—including the Pseudo-Clementine Letters to Virgins, Augustine's On the Work of Monks, John Chrysostom's homilies, legal codes—to reveal gospel-inspired patterns of ascetic dependency and teaching from the third to the fifth centuries. Throughout, his point of departure is social and cultural history, especially the urban social history of the late Roman empire. He also introduces many charismatic individuals whose struggle to persist against church suppression of their chosen way of imitating Christ was fought with defiant conviction, and the book includes the first annotated English translation of the biography of Alexander Akoimetos (Alexander the Sleepless). Wandering, Begging Monks allows us to understand these fascinating figures of early Christianity in the full context of late Roman society.
The metaphor of the palimpsest has been increasingly invoked to conceptualize cities with deep, living pasts. This volume seeks to think through, and beyond, the logic of the palimpsest, asking whether this fashionable trope slyly forces us to see contradiction where local inhabitants saw (and see) none, to impose distinctions that satisfy our own assumptions about historical periodization and cultural practice, but which bear little relation to the experience of ancient, medieval or early modern persons. Spanning the period from Constantine’s foundation of a New Rome in the fourth century to the contemporary aftermath of the Lebanese civil war, this book integrates perspectives from scholars typically separated by the disciplinary boundaries of late antique, Islamic, medieval, Byzantine, Ottoman and modern Middle Eastern studies, but whose work is united by their study of a region characterized by resilience rather than rupture. The volume includes an introduction and eighteen contributions from historians, archaeologists and art historians who explore the historical and cultural complexity of eastern Mediterranean cities. The authors highlight the effects of the multiple antiquities imagined and experienced by persons and groups who for generations made these cities home, and also by travelers and other observers who passed through them. The independent case studies are bound together by a shared concern to understand the many ways in which the cities’ pasts live on in their presents.
