Books by Christina Williamson
Caeculus X, 2024
In the overlap of space between community, territory, geography and the gods is the landscape of ... more In the overlap of space between community, territory, geography and the gods is the landscape of religion. Rather than an isolated perspective on the interference of the divine in the affairs of humans, this landscape represents a kaleidoscope of intentions, narratives, and practices that coa-lesce into a logic of space unique to its locale. Multiple layers of agencies go into constituting sacred landscapes, including those who occupy it (or desire to occupy it), their cosmologies, beliefs and desires, as well as the morphology of the terrain itself. Equally important are the arteries of these landscapes that allow passage, either en route or as destination, and the circulation of ideas, goods and practices that sacred travellers bring with them. Sacred landscapes are cultural artefacts, rooted in natural phe-nomena, legends and myths from the deep past, and contemporary percep-tions of ancient rituals. They evoke by definition a sense of timelessness, yet at the same time are constantly under construction through local and regional processes, often in response to social pressures. Subject to many influences, these geographies are never the sole product of the local elite or (supra)regional governance, but can appear very different to different viewers under different conditions.
Urban Rituals in Sacred Landscapes in Hellenistic Asia Minor, 2021
In Urban Rituals in Sacred Landscapes in Hellenistic Asia Minor, Christina G. Williamson examines... more In Urban Rituals in Sacred Landscapes in Hellenistic Asia Minor, Christina G. Williamson examines the phenomenon of monumental sanctuaries in the countryside of Asia Minor that accompanied the second rise of the Greek city-state in the Hellenistic period. Moving beyond monolithic categories, Williamson provides a transdisciplinary frame of analysis that takes into account the complex local histories, landscapes, material culture, and social and political dynamics of such shrines in their transition towards becoming prestigious civic sanctuaries.
This frame of analysis is applied to four case studies: the sanctuaries of Zeus Labraundos, Sinuri, Hekate at Lagina, and Zeus Panamaros. All in Karia, these well-documented shrines offer valuable insights for understanding religious strategies adopted by emerging cities as they sought to establish their position in the expanding world.
https://brill.com/view/title/60038
Sacred Thresholds. The Door to the Sanctuary in Late Antiquity offers a far-reaching account of b... more Sacred Thresholds. The Door to the Sanctuary in Late Antiquity offers a far-reaching account of boundaries within pagan and Christian sanctuaries: gateways in a precinct, outer doors of a temple or church, inner doors of a cella. The study of these liminal spaces within Late Antiquity – itself a key period of transition during the spread of Christianity, when cultural paradigms were redefined – demands an approach that is both interdisciplinary and diachronic. Emilie van Opstall brings together both upcoming and noted scholars of Greek and Latin literature and epigraphy, archaeology, art history, philosophy, and religion to discuss the experience of those who crossed from the worldly to the divine, both physically and symbolically. What did this passage from the profane to the sacred mean to them, on a sensory, emotive and intellectual level? Who was excluded, and who was admitted? The articles each offer a unique perspective on pagan and Christian sanctuary doors in the Late Antique Mediterranean.
Contributors: Gianfranco Agosti, Sible de Blaauw, Christian Boudignon, Ildikó Csepregi, Juliette Day, Roald Dijkstra, Gaëlle Herbert de la Portbarré-Viard, Emilie van Opstall, Evelien Roels, Brooke Shilling, Lucia Tissi, Christina Williamson .
Publication Date: 10 July 2018
ISBN: 978-90-04-36900-9
"This volume investigates the complex and diverse developments in the religious cultures of Greek... more "This volume investigates the complex and diverse developments in the religious cultures of Greek cities after the classical age. An international team of scholars considers the continuities of traditional Greek religious practices, and seeks to understand the impact of new influences on those practices, notably the deeper engagement with Judaism and how the emergence of Christianity redefined polis religion. The essays illustrate the inadequacy of 'decline' as a model for understanding Greek religion, exploring how dynamic change in religious life corresponded to the transformations in the Greek city.
The volume explores how the citizens of the Greek city after the classical age used religion to construct their cultural identities and political experiences and how many of the features of traditional polis religion survived into and shaped the religious mentalities of the Christian era."
In this volume, thirteen contributors from nine diferent countries address the question of how lo... more In this volume, thirteen contributors from nine diferent countries address the question of how local identitties were created and maintained in Northern Anatolia from the fall of Mithradates VI to the Middle Byzantine period. The papers were originally presented at an international conference at the University of Southern Denmark, Kolding, in October 2012. The volume is edited by Tønnes Bekker-Nielsen, director of the research project "Where East meets West".
Edited by P. Guldager Bilde, P.A.J. Attema & K. Winther-Jacobsen, with contributions by P.A.J. At... more Edited by P. Guldager Bilde, P.A.J. Attema & K. Winther-Jacobsen, with contributions by P.A.J. Attema, P. Guldager Bilde, J. Delvigne, T. de Haas, S. Handberg, M. van Kruining, S.B. Lancov, C. Meyer, W. de Neef, M.J.L.T. Niekus, D. Pilz, T.V. Sapelko, T. Smekalova, D.A. Subetto, V.F. Stolba, C. Williamson & K. Winther-Jacobsen
This book is a publication of the Danish-Dutch-Ukrainian survey project carried out in 2007 and 2008 on both sides of Lake Dzarylgac - that is, in the hinterland of the ancient Greek settlement of Panskoe I on the Tarchankut Peninsula (Northwestern Crimea). The project was the first systematic, intensive survey in the region, and its aim was to investigate the landscape from prehistory until early modern times. The publication concludes that the region was most intensively settled in the Late Classical and Early Hellenistic period. The results were spectacular: a large number of undisturbed Greek and indigenous sites were identified, which have completely changed our understanding of ancient settlement patterns in the region.
Papers by Christina Williamson
Z. Newby, The Material Dynamics of Festivals in the Graeco-Roman East, Oxford: OUP, 250-288, 2023
In the Hellenistic period, cities increasingly organized major festivals in honour of their princ... more In the Hellenistic period, cities increasingly organized major festivals in honour of their principal gods, often as an ‘echo’ of the great Panhellenic games, sending out invitations to cities and kings for support and participation. Cities thus opened up their prime sanctuaries to the Greek world through their festivals. At the same time, there was a growing tendency to enclose these sacred spaces within peristyle architecture. As the political borders of cities were temporarily suspended, so the edges of their great civic shrines were hardened, creating a paradox of simultaneous inclusion and exclusion. This chapter examines this phenomenon through the lens of the ‘sacred circle’, a special ritualized place cut out of the urban fabric of time and space that in this case also fostered connectivity across the Greek world. Three case studies from Asia Minor serve to highlight local strategies in effectuating festival connectivity through sacred space: Magnesia on the Maeander and the sanctuary of Artemis Leukophryene, Stratonikeia and the sanctuary of Hekate at Lagina, and Pisidian Antioch and the sanctuary of Men Askaenos.
A. Collar (ed.) Networks and the spread of ideas in the past, London: Routledge, 139-173, 2022
Panhellenic festivals, such as at Olympia, have long been understood as a unifying factor in the ... more Panhellenic festivals, such as at Olympia, have long been understood as a unifying factor in the Greek world as it expanded during the archaic and classical periods. In the Hellenistic period, this took a new turn as individual cities began organizing interurban festivals of their own, modelled on the great panhellenic games. Delegates, athletes, and performers travelled across the Mediterranean, leaving behind a trail of honorific monuments, victory lists, and civic decrees – data that lends itself for analysing degrees of connectivity. Standard network models ascribe innovation to random (‘weak-tie’) contacts, yet these inter-urban connections were anything but random. Participation was predicated on a common view of the past and a sense of connectivity in deep time, such as mythical kinships. Time plays a role in lending authenticity and prestige to the festival – cities often used the past as reason to connect in the present, while the record of their actions in stone reified their strong ties for future generations. This chapter examines some of the innovative strategies of cities in reactivating ‘old’ bonds while seeking out new ones, and the powerful role of ritual in generating common knowledge, linking together this ‘portable community’ (Gardner 2004) in profound ways.
Antike Welt 'Götter machen Städte' 3/2023, 2023
Festivals create communities. Today we might associate them with subaltern groups or alternative ... more Festivals create communities. Today we might associate them with subaltern groups or alternative lifestyles, but in the ancient world they were the main channels of social and political integration, and interurban diplomacy. Through their networks of cities, festivals transmitted like-mindedness across the Mediterranean and beyond. Cities typically had special places reserved in their topographies for these transregional events, ritual spaces that were shaped to foster this cooperative and cosmopolitan mentality.
Take-down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing... more Take-down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.
Background Cataract is the leading cause of blindness and impaired vision worldwide; however, cat... more Background Cataract is the leading cause of blindness and impaired vision worldwide; however, cataract surgery rate in China (1300 cases per million people per year) is lower than in Europe, America, and India (greater than 5000 cases per million people per year). In the past 10 years, a public health screening system has been established for early diagnosis and intervention of chronic diseases such as diabetes and hypertension by the Disease Control and Prevention Centers (CDC) of China. The aim of this study was to investigate the eff ect of screening for cataract on surgery rates in Guangdong, China.
Carlson patiently guided me through the complexities of viewsheds and visual analyses in ArcGIS; ... more Carlson patiently guided me through the complexities of viewsheds and visual analyses in ArcGIS; the maps and viewsheds in this volume were generated by myself using ArcGIS 10.5.1.
Want or need Open Access? Brill Open offers you the choice to make your research freely accessibl... more Want or need Open Access? Brill Open offers you the choice to make your research freely accessible online in exchange for a publication charge. Review your various options on brill.com/brill-open. Typeface for the Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic scripts: "Brill". See and download: brill.com/brill-typeface.
Pharos: Journal of the …
THE CHURCH OF AYIOS NIKOLAOS (VOUNENIS) AT KARATSADAGLIALMIROU (THESSALY, GREECE)* Reinder Reinde... more THE CHURCH OF AYIOS NIKOLAOS (VOUNENIS) AT KARATSADAGLIALMIROU (THESSALY, GREECE)* Reinder Reinders, Christina Williamson, Wob Jansen and Paulien de Roever Introduction The church of Ayios Nikolaos Vounenis was one of the'sites' ...
What was the impact of oracles on the post-Classical city? To what extent could and did mantic re... more What was the impact of oracles on the post-Classical city? To what extent could and did mantic revelation contribute to the construction of civic identity? Th is article will examine the oracular cults in Roman Asia Minor in their relation to the polis, and focus on the role played by the key participants in oracular activity, that is to say the pilgrims as well as the priests. The decline of traditional oracles? Oracular activity in post-Classical Greece is known principally through the existence of the so-called 'theological oracles' 1 like the divine revelation quoted by Lactantius, which was attributed to the Apollo of Klaros: 2 Apollo is seen as divine, and especially as oracular, more than all other gods; when he spoke at Kolophon (where he went from Delphi because, I suppose, of the charm of Asia Minor), upon being asked who or what god really was, he replied in twenty-one verses. Here are the fi rst three: 'He is self-born, untaught, unmothered, unaff ectable, unnameable by any word, dwelling in fi re, god thus, and we his messengers are a little fraction of him.'
Panhellenic festivals were central to the ancient Greek world since archaic times, with places su... more Panhellenic festivals were central to the ancient Greek world since archaic times, with places such as Delphi and Olympia defining the essence of a Greek ‘imagined community’. In the Hellenistic period, several Greek cities began to organize large-scale festivals of their own at their main sanctuaries, gradually linking the expanded Greek world together through increasingly stronger ties. As Rome became dominant in the eastern Mediterranean, it was able to use these existing festival connections to anchor its hegemony, making them thereby even stronger. Through case studies of festivals at Magnesia on the Maeander, Stratonikeia, and Oropos we explore ways that network theory can help interpret this phenomenon.
Uploads
Books by Christina Williamson
This frame of analysis is applied to four case studies: the sanctuaries of Zeus Labraundos, Sinuri, Hekate at Lagina, and Zeus Panamaros. All in Karia, these well-documented shrines offer valuable insights for understanding religious strategies adopted by emerging cities as they sought to establish their position in the expanding world.
https://brill.com/view/title/60038
Contributors: Gianfranco Agosti, Sible de Blaauw, Christian Boudignon, Ildikó Csepregi, Juliette Day, Roald Dijkstra, Gaëlle Herbert de la Portbarré-Viard, Emilie van Opstall, Evelien Roels, Brooke Shilling, Lucia Tissi, Christina Williamson .
Publication Date: 10 July 2018
ISBN: 978-90-04-36900-9
The volume explores how the citizens of the Greek city after the classical age used religion to construct their cultural identities and political experiences and how many of the features of traditional polis religion survived into and shaped the religious mentalities of the Christian era."
This book is a publication of the Danish-Dutch-Ukrainian survey project carried out in 2007 and 2008 on both sides of Lake Dzarylgac - that is, in the hinterland of the ancient Greek settlement of Panskoe I on the Tarchankut Peninsula (Northwestern Crimea). The project was the first systematic, intensive survey in the region, and its aim was to investigate the landscape from prehistory until early modern times. The publication concludes that the region was most intensively settled in the Late Classical and Early Hellenistic period. The results were spectacular: a large number of undisturbed Greek and indigenous sites were identified, which have completely changed our understanding of ancient settlement patterns in the region.
Papers by Christina Williamson
This frame of analysis is applied to four case studies: the sanctuaries of Zeus Labraundos, Sinuri, Hekate at Lagina, and Zeus Panamaros. All in Karia, these well-documented shrines offer valuable insights for understanding religious strategies adopted by emerging cities as they sought to establish their position in the expanding world.
https://brill.com/view/title/60038
Contributors: Gianfranco Agosti, Sible de Blaauw, Christian Boudignon, Ildikó Csepregi, Juliette Day, Roald Dijkstra, Gaëlle Herbert de la Portbarré-Viard, Emilie van Opstall, Evelien Roels, Brooke Shilling, Lucia Tissi, Christina Williamson .
Publication Date: 10 July 2018
ISBN: 978-90-04-36900-9
The volume explores how the citizens of the Greek city after the classical age used religion to construct their cultural identities and political experiences and how many of the features of traditional polis religion survived into and shaped the religious mentalities of the Christian era."
This book is a publication of the Danish-Dutch-Ukrainian survey project carried out in 2007 and 2008 on both sides of Lake Dzarylgac - that is, in the hinterland of the ancient Greek settlement of Panskoe I on the Tarchankut Peninsula (Northwestern Crimea). The project was the first systematic, intensive survey in the region, and its aim was to investigate the landscape from prehistory until early modern times. The publication concludes that the region was most intensively settled in the Late Classical and Early Hellenistic period. The results were spectacular: a large number of undisturbed Greek and indigenous sites were identified, which have completely changed our understanding of ancient settlement patterns in the region.
Panhellenic festivals are such an intrinsic part of Greek culture that we often forget the tremendous effort that went into organizing them at the local level, as well as those who were attracted to them -from organizer, delegate, athlete, to spectactor, or entrepreneur- and their own reasons for participating in them. In each case there were both reasons and rationales, from local epiphanies to Delphic oracles to marketing strategies, that were part of the decision-making process in founding or participating in these festivals.
This paper (work-in-progress) draws on the Groningen Connected Contests database as it sketches a line of inquiry into complex networks of motivations represented by such festivals as the Lykaia and the motives of the Lykaonikai. As it does so it addresses theoretical approaches to agency in an attempt to understand the strands of motivation at local, regional and panhellenic scales that came together through festivals, an increasing phenomenon in the Hellenistic era.
- compile a detailed database of individual athletes;
- prepare this data for use in network and spatial analyses;
- make this database accessible via internet.
The data is largely drawn from recondite documentary texts, available mainly to specialists. The aim of this project is to turn a wide set of specialist data into an accessible and public tool for further studies and
network analyses of athletes and their role in connecting the Mediterranean.
We have received a one year grant from the Digital Humanities Initiative at the University of Groningen for a pilot. In collaboration with data scientists we are developing a robust yet flexible core database that
allows for remote entering of the data, as well as an attractive a user-friendly web interface that allows users to retrieve prosopographical and geographical information about athletes and festivals, and is compatible with online prosopographical and geo-databases in the field of classical studies.
See connectedcontests.org
In our project, Connected Contests, we investigate this phenomenon at various scales, interpreting network dynamics at global, regional and local levels. In the first place our focus lies on prosopographic data drawn from epigraphy, but successive phases will include spatial and material culture as well. Clearly these festivals created networks at different resolutions, as we see in the social, civic, interstate, and oikoumene and imperial spheres. But how can we go beyond ‘network thinking’ and integrate inherently different types of sources, of varying quality, to fully analyze the complexities of multiscalar festival networks? This paper discusses some of the issues that we have encountered in our project with tentative suggestions for ways forward.
Pergamon’s rapid rise to power is marked by skillful diplomacy and outright manipulation, as its rulers, the Attalids, often shifted allegiances in their quest for territory and internal stability. Many territorial boundaries remain unclear, yet we do know that the area of the Kaikos valley towards the sea became more and more a focal point of Attalid power, culminating in Elaia, a coastal town that was selected to be the principle harbor for the Pergamene fleet. Since 2006 the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut (DAI) has sought to understand Pergamon in its topographical context (PIRSON 2012). Recent archaeological surveys in the landscape have revealed numerous monuments –shrines, tumuli, legendary sites, and strongholds– that can give us a clue as to how the Residenzstadt accumulated power locally, and whether it was by force or by persuasion. Besides the shifting patterns in occupation, what can these places tell us about the development of a sense of authority, allegiance, or domination? How do sightlines, or interacting fields of vision between these places, help create a sense of value in the territory?
In this paper I will primarily focus on the visual role of Teuthrania, an isolated mountain, located roughly midway in the Kaikos valley, which may well have played an important role in contributing to this new alignment of power and territory. Teuthrania is home of the mythical hero Telephos who appears on the inner frieze of the Great Altar – in the version selected by the Attalids (SCHEER 1993) But it is also a prominent feature in the landscape between Pergamon and the sea. Visibility analyses will show the extent to which Teuthrania acted as a visual connector in bringing remote places ‘closer’ to Pergamon, and how mythology was implemented to turn natural landmarks into signposts of power and authority. "
See http://cityfullofgods.weebly.com/
See http://bluenetworks.weebly.com/
Sponsored by NWO (2014-2015) and in cooperation with the German Archaeological Institute in Istanbul.
Hosted at the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World, Brown University, and by the University of Groningen, Faculty of Arts.
One outcome of the project will be a complete prosopographical database of all athletes and other competitors as well as organisers and officials who were responsible for the ancient festival culture that will be made available online via a website
www.connectedcontests.org
The article (in Dutch) discusses the fieldwork in 2008 as a part of the Džarylgač Survey Project (DSP). This project studies the long-term settlement history of a coastal landscape on the western Crimea (Ukrain). During the 2008 campaign, a landscape classification was devised that divides the landscape into five zones: Lowland Ridge/Coastal Cliff, the Pediment, the Hillsides and the Upland/Plateaus. Intensive gridded surveys (in ploughed fields on the Lowland Ridge/Coastal Cliff and Pediment) and extensive surveys on the Hillsides and Upland/Plateaus continued. In this second area a windmill park will be built in the near future, and geophysic prospections were done on a large scale to map any archaeological remains that will be destroyed. Unfortunately, after the 2008 campaign the Crimean partners withdrew the research permit and the third planned field season will not take place. At the moment, the GIA and CBSS are preparing the data of the 2007 and 2008 seasons for publication.
This article is the third and final part of the series on the Džarylgač Survey Project (DSP), the landscape archaeology project in north-west Crimea that was conducted from 2006 to 2008 by the GIA and the Centre for Black Sea Studies (CBSS) at the University of Aarhus in Denmark. The objective of this project was to comprehend the wider agricultural colonisation of this area that took place in the Late Classical and Early Hellenistic period. The first article (2008) gave an introduction to this research with preliminary results and the second (2009) discussed the landscape classification. This final article focuses on site classification based on the results of the survey in relation with the landscape classification, and according to the primary periods of activity in the Bronze Age, the Late Classical and Early Hellenistic period, and the Early Modern era. The types of sites range from settlements, small and large, simple or complex, and individual features either connected with settlements or in isolation. Such a classification of sites is a heuristic device which, when used with the landscape classification, helps to understand the varying use of the landscape and the balance between cultivation and pastoralism across the lowlands and the hillsides. Ultimately, however, the patterns observed here can only properly be interpreted when brought into relation with the wider study of northwestern Crimea – this will be the focus of the final publication.