Religious Agency and Time Regimes in the Roman Empire: The Cult of Anubis as a Case Study
Abstract This article analyzes three different case studies related to the Graeco-Roman cult of Anubis, located in different historical periods (Early, Middle, and Late Roman Empire) and approached by the study of different types of material (namely literary, epigraphic/archaeological, and iconograp...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2021
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| In: |
Numen
Year: 2021, Volume: 68, Issue: 1, Pages: 39-76 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Roman Empire
/ Religion
/ Anubis
/ Cult
|
| IxTheo Classification: | AD Sociology of religion; religious policy AG Religious life; material religion BC Ancient Orient; religion BE Greco-Roman religions |
| Further subjects: | B
religious agency
B projectivity B Lived Ancient Religion B Time B presentification B Iteration B Anubis B Isiac cults |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (Resolving-System) Volltext (Verlag) |
| Summary: | Abstract This article analyzes three different case studies related to the Graeco-Roman cult of Anubis, located in different historical periods (Early, Middle, and Late Roman Empire) and approached by the study of different types of material (namely literary, epigraphic/archaeological, and iconographic sources). The goal of this study is to explore the social dimension of religious practice, stressing its variety, creativity, multiplicity, fluidity, and flexibility of identities, changes in forms of individuality, and spaces for individual distinction. By means of a detailed inquiry of Mustafa Emirbayer and Ann Mische’s schema of “disaggregation” of agency into three component elements ( iteration, projectivity , and presentification ), this analysis will stress the historical variability of religious agency and will show how, across time, emerging situations forced religious actors to select among alternative possibilities of action by recovering patterns belonging to past routines and creating new future options that responded to present hopes and fears. The results of this investigation will then be conceptualized according to the methodological framework of the Lived Ancient Religion paradigm. |
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| ISSN: | 1568-5276 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Numen
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1163/15685276-12341611 |