M

Y
T
H
O
S

UNIVERSIT DEGLI STUDI DI PALERMO

DIPARTIMENTO DI BENI CULTURALI
SEZIONE DI STORIA ANTICA

MYTHOS

5
n.s.

ISSN 1972-2516
fondazione ignazio buttitta

In copertina:
Nik sur un char vainqueur la course
disegno tratto da C. Daremberg - E. Saglio - E. Pottier,
Dictionnaire des Antiquits grecques et romaines
V 1 - Paris 1877-1919, p. 849, ig. 7463

ISBN 978-88-8241-398-9

S A LVAT O R E S C I A S C I A E D I T O R E

2011

Rivista di Storia delle Religioni

n.s.
2011
(18 serie continua)

S A LVAT O R E S C I A S C I A E D I T O R E

Rivista di Storia
delle Religioni

MYTHOS

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ISSN 1972-2516

Direzione
Corinne Bonnet cbonnet@univ-tIse2.fr
Nicola Cusumano remocl@libero.it
Segretaria di redazione
Daniela Bonanno daniela_bonanno@hotmail.com
Comitato scientiico
Nicole Belayche (cole Pratique des Hautes tudes Section des sciences religieuses)
David Bouvier (Universit de Lausanne)
Antonino Buttitta (Universit di Palermo)
Claude Calame (cole des Hautes tudes en Sciences
Sociales - Centre AnHiMA)
Giorgio Camassa (Universit di Udine)
Ileana Chirassi Colombo (Universit di Trieste)
Riccardo Di Donato (Universit di Pisa)
Franoise Frontisi-Ducroux (Collge de France - Centre
AnHiMA)
Cornelia Isler-Kernyi (Universitt Zrich)
Emily Kearns (University of Oxford)
Franois Lissarrague (cole des Hautes tudes en
Sciences Sociales - Centre AnHiMA)
Vinciane Pirenne-Delforge (FNRS - Universit de Lige)
Franois de Polignac (cole Pratique des Hautes tudes
- Section des sciences religieuses)
Beate Pongratz-Leisten (New York University)
Sergio Ribichini (CNR - Istituto di Studi sulle Civilt Italiche e del Mediterraneo Antico)
Leonard Rutgers (Universiteit Utrecht)
John Scheid (Collge de France - Centre AnHiMA)
Giulia Sfameni Gasparro (Universit di Messina)
Dirk Steuernagel (Universitt Regensburg)
Paolo Xella (CNR - Istituto di Studi sulle Civilt Italiche e
del Mediterraneo Antico - Universit di Pisa)
Comitato di redazione
Daniela Bonanno (Universit di Palermo)
Corinne Bonnet (Universit de Toulouse - UTM)
Marcello Carastro (cole des Hautes tudes en
Sciences Sociales - Centre AnHiMA)
Maria Vittoria Cerutti (Universit Cattolica - Milano)
Nicola Cusumano (Universit di Palermo)
Ted Kaizer (Durham University)
Francesco Massa (Universit di Pavia)
Gabriella Pironti (Universit di Napoli-Federico II)
Francesca Prescendi (Universit de Genve)

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Universit degli Studi di Palermo

DIPARTIMENTO DI BENI CULTURALI
Sezione di Storia Antica

MYTHOS

Rivista di Storia delle Religioni

numero 5 - 2011
nuova serie
(18 serie continua)

S A LVAT O R E S C I A S C I A E D I T O R E

INDICE
Ricerche
9 C. Calame, I nomi degli di greci. I poteri della denominazione nella riconigurazione di un
pantheon
21 A.J. Meulder, Typhon, un double monstrueux de Promthe ?
45 G. Cuniberti, Solone e la riforma religiosa della polis: il popolo, le donne e gli dei
59 C. Terranova, . Unindagine storico-religiosa tra Rodi ed Oropos
73 U. Mandel, Zwischen Gewaltbereitschaft und Sensibilitt - Die Evidenz des Krpers beim
klassischen Apollon
101 A. Cohen-Skalli - S. De Vido, Diodoro interprete di Evemero. Spazio mitico e geograia del mondo
117 C. Pisano, Satira e contro-storia nel De Syria Dea di Luciano
131 L. Sacco, Nota su alcuni aspetti storico-religiosi dell evocatio
149 B.H. Weaver, Synthesis of Cultic and Mythic Traditions in Firmicus Maternus Stoicizing
Dionysiac Aetiology (De err. 6.5)
Tra passato e presente - Metodologia e storia degli studi
175 E. Franchi, Destini di un paradigma. Il rito iniziatico tra antropologia e scienze dellantichit
191 J. Rpke, Lived Ancient Religion: Questioning Cults and Polis Religion
Recensioni e schede di lettura
207 M.a C. Cardete Del Olmo, Paisaje, identidad y religin: imgenes de la Sicilia antigua, Barcelona
2010 (C. Bonnet)
209 G.A. Cecconi - C. Gabrielli (a cura di), Politiche religiose nel mondo antico e tardoantico. Poteri
e indirizzi, forme del controllo, idee e prassi di tolleranza, Bari 2011 (A. Delli Pizzi)
212 J.A. Jimnez Snchez, Los juegos paganos en la Roma cristiana, Treviso-Roma 2010
(G. Vespignani)
215 J.M.a Nieto Ibez, Cristianismo y profecas de Apolo. Los orculos paganos en la Patrstica
griega (siglos II-V), Madrid 2010 (G. Vespignani)
216 B. Palumbo, Politiche dellinquietudine. Passioni, feste e poteri in Sicilia, Firenze 2009
(D. Di Rosa)
219 C. Prtre - P. Charlier, Maladies humaines, thrapies divines. Analyse pigraphique et
palopathologique de textes de gurison grecs, Lille 2009 (F. Schiariti)
224 V.S. Severino, La religione di questo mondo in Raffaele Pettazzoni, Roma 2010 (P. Angelini)
229
239
243
245

Lavori in corso (a cura di D. Bonanno)

Gli autori
Pubblicazioni ricevute
Istruzioni per gli autori

CONTENTS
9
21
45
59
73
101
117
131
149

Studies
C. Calame, Greek Gods Names: The Powers of the Name in the Reconiguration of a Pantheon
A.J. Meulder, Typhon, a Monstrous Double of Prometheus ?
C. Cuniberti, Solon and the Religious Reform of the polis: Demos, Women and Gods
C. Terranova, A Religious-Historical Survey between Rodi and Oropos
U. Mandel, Between Propensity for Violence and Sensitivity: The Evidence of the Body of Apollo
in Classical Sculpture
A. Cohen-Skalli - S. De Vido, Diodorus Interpreter of Euhemerus. Spatium mythicum and
Geography of the World
C. Pisano, Satire and Counter-History in Lucians De Dea Syria
L. Sacco, A Note about some Religious-Historical Aspects of evocatio
B.H. Weaver, Synthesis of Cultic and Mythic Traditions in Firmicus Maternus Stoicizing
Dionysiac Aetiology (De err. 6.5)

Between Past and Present - Methodology and Modern Historiography

175 E. Franchi, Destinies of a Paradigm. The initiation Rite between Anthropology and Classics
191 J. Rpke, Lived Ancient Religion: Questioning Cults and Polis Religion
Reviews
207 M.a C. Cardete Del Olmo, Paisaje, identidad y religin: imgenes de la Sicilia antigua, Barcelona,
2010 (C. Bonnet)
209 G.A. Cecconi - C. Gabrielli (a cura di), Politiche religiose nel mondo antico e tardoantico. Poteri
e indirizzi, forme del controllo, idee e prassi di tolleranza, Bari 2011 (A. Delli Pizzi)
212 J.A. Jimnez Snchez, Los juegos paganos en la Roma cristiana, Treviso-Roma 2010
(G. Vespignani)
215 J. M.a Nieto Ibez, Cristianismo y profecas de Apolo. Los orculos paganos en la Patrstica
griega (siglos II-V), Madrid 2010 (G. Vespignani)
216 B. Palumbo, Politiche dellinquietudine. Passioni, feste e poteri in Sicilia, Firenze 2009
(D. Di Rosa)
219 C. Prtre - P. Charlier, Maladies humaines, thrapies divines. Analyse pigraphique et
palopathologique de textes de gurison grecs, Lille 2009 (F. Schiariti)
224 V.S. Severino, La religione di questo mondo in Raffaele Pettazzoni, Roma 2010 (P. Angelini)
229
239
243
245

Work in Progress (a cura di D. Bonanno)

Contributors
Publications Receveid
Instructions for Authors

Lived Ancient Religion: Questioning Cults and Polis Religion.

Jrg Rpke
Riassunto
Questo articolo presenta un programma di ricerca sulla religione antica che si collega alla
nozione di religione vissuta. Il concetto
usato, in relazione allantichit, per indicare un
approccio che si concentra sulle forme di incorporazione, personiicazione e appropriazione
individuale delle tradizioni, sullesperienza religiosa, sulla comunicazione religiosa nei diversi
spazi sociali e sulle modalit con cui linterazione tra i differenti livelli favorita dal personale
religioso. A partire da un gruppo di lavoro internazionale che fa capo al Max Weber Kolleg
dellUniversit di Erfurt, il progetto si propone
di coinvolgere studiosi provenienti dall'Europa
e da altri continenti, per collaborare allelaborazione di nuovi paradigmi di ricerca.

Abstract
This article presents a program of research
on ancient religion that draws on the concept of lived religion. For antiquity, we use
the term to denote an approach which focus
on the individual appropriation of traditions
and embodiment, religious experiences and
communication on religion in different social
spaces and the interaction of different levels
facilitated by religious specialists. Working in
an international core group at the Max Weber
Centre of the University of Erfurt, the program
intends to include specialists from Europe
and beyond in the development of new paradigms of research.

Parole chiave
Religione vissuta
esperienza religiosa embodiment interazione culturale
religione individuale archeologia religiosa
Keywords

lived religion
individual religion

religious experience embodiment culture in interaction

archaeology of religion

or the period from 2012 to 2017 the European Research Council has agreed to fund
the project Lived Ancient Religion. It takes a completely new perspective on the
religious history of Mediterranean antiquity, starting from the individual and lived
religion instead of cities or peoples. Lived religion suggests a set of experiences, of practices
addressed to, and conceptions of the divine, which are appropriated, expressed, and shared
by individuals in diverse social spaces. Within this spatial continuum from the primary space
of the family to the shared space of public institutions and trans-local literary communication four research ields are deined. In each of them a sub-project addresses representative
complexes of evidence in diferent parts of the Mediterranean in the Imperial period. hey are
bound together by the analysis of the interaction of individuals with the agents of traditions
and providers of religious services in the various ields. he methodological approach is deined
through the notions of religious experience, embodiment, and culture in interaction. his
article will briely describe some basic assumptions and strategies.
MYTHOS

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Ancient Mediterranean religion is traditionally viewed through the lens of public religion, i.e. consisting of the religions of political units (usually city-states) that are part and
parcel of civic identity. Such analyses of ancient polytheistic religions, whether they refer
to embedded religion1 or polis religion2, work on the assumption that all members of
ancient societies were in principle equally religious. From this point of view, religion (and
this also applies to Judaism) is a taken-for-granted part of every biography: rites de passage
structure the life of each individual, while ritual acts within the domestic cult, family cult or
burial and death rites facilitate change of status. his basic assumption of a homo religiosus
is bound up with the political interpretation of ancient religion: since religion is an unquestioned given, religion is thought to be particularly well-suited to cultivate collective identities and to act as instrument for the justiication of power. Paradigmatic of this approach
is the claim, now historically disproved, that only citizens were entitled to take part in the
rituals of the polis. Here the religious actions of individuals take place solely in those niches
and predeined spaces permitted by the civic religion, which is in turn created and inanced
by the dominant social groups.
Modern totalising claims on its behalf notwithstanding, polis religion is also understood as
supplemented by or in the end even in competition with cults. Being elective in nature,
these cults ofered options for more intensive social interaction and in particular soteriological
perspectives, starting with Orphism in classical Greece3. Interest is focused on the so-called
oriental cults or religions such as those of Isis, Mithras or the Syrian deities. Recently, however, the category has encountered severe criticism4 (C. Bonnet - J. Rpke), since it provides
not a stable criterion either as regards content (mysteries) or geography. Furthermore, among
such cults, so it was claimed, Christianity alone ofered a fundamental alternative to polis religion. On this understanding, Christianity (even more than Judaism) marked a rupture with
the truly ancient, the polis religions, due to its emphasis on individual promises of salvation
and faith rather than ritual practices. As with oriental cults, so with Christianity, a principle
revision has been its recent reinterpretation as ancient religion5.
he paradigms of cults and polis religion leave a major gap. Religious phenomena of
the ancient Mediterranean societies have been analysed far beyond what has been described
so far. Ten thousands of votives in sanctuaries have been collected, documented, and studied.
hey are pointing to a votive religion that copes well with individual crises6. Magic, ranging from amulets and curse tablets to elaborate rituals and discursive methods manipulated
by ancient specialists,7 has been analysed as a cultural resource that might even be opposed to
religion. Divination makes up another ield of instrumental religion, provided not only by
and for state oicials (and hence described as part of public religion), but also by a broad range
of male and female practitioners. Technical studies have failed to take into account the venues
of such practices in ancient religion as stressed by ancient philosophy (Stoicism, Cicero) and

1
2
3
4
5
6
7

Beard - North - Price 1998.

Sourvinou-Inwood 1990.
Burkert 20112.
Bonnet - Rpke 2009.
Markus 1990.
van Straten 1981; Bouma 1996.
Faraone Obbink, 1991; Gordon 2010; Bohak 2009.

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Tra passato e presente

the Judaeo-Christian concept of revelation8. Finally, funerary rites and the cult of the dead
are a further area that abounds with evidence, yet occupies a marginal position (if any) in
the polis religion paradigm. To sum up, vast areas of evidence and excellent research done on
these phenomena have not managed to open up a new, broader framework within the study
of ancient religion. As a consequence, with a few exceptions, the ield has assumed a marginal
position in global religious studies and comparative religion, i.e. for todays understanding of
contemporary and historical religion, and has not adequately contributed to our understanding of ancient Mediterranean cultures in general.
To question the cults-and-polis religion-perspective, it is not suicient to merely point to
these ields. he challenge is to integrate all these ields into a new theoretical framework. It
is the audacious aim of Lived Ancient Religion to provide such a framework and adequate
methodological tools. In order to achieve this aim, LAR will develop key-concepts and tools
beyond the present state of the art that will tackle three methodological problems of current
research:
(1) the individual, who has been much underrated as a religious agent;
(2) cults and religions, which have been essentialised as the decisive religious agents and
frames of individual action; and
(3) the archaeology of religion, often reduced to an archaeology of belief systems.
(1) he place of the individual. It is a fact that non-Christian antiquity also knew individual religious practices. Ancient conceptualisations gave such sacra privata precedence even over
the state, with respect to military conscription for example (Gellius). Ciceros religious legislation explicitly excluded the sacra privata from any kind of interference. In contrast to this
ancient perception, if we survey the history of scholarship, the realm of individual religious
practice emerges as a marginal phenomenon, discussed solely in exceptional cases of religious
deviance such as the reckless monolatry of Hippolytus9 or explicit atheism. Attention is drawn
to rituals of birth and mourning and the notions of the soul and the hereafter.10 he work
of those authors (such as C. Calame11) who have managed to go beyond family cult mainly
with respect to life cycle rituals is dominated again by political interpretations. In the case
of domestic cult, an antiquarian perspective predominates, which at best includes economic
history12 and seeks no further historical contextualisation13. Domestic cult has not been
properly integrated into the complex topography of individual religious action that involves
various sites house, garden, family tombs14, neighbourhoods15, selected shrines and healing
sanctuaries as much as centralised public festivals16 and diverse social contexts. In a series of
conferences, the applicant has demonstrated the fruitfulness of taking up research on subjec-

8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16

Belayche 2001; Rpke 2008.

Gladigow 1975.
Veyne 2008; Bremmer 1983.
Calame 1997.
Bakker 1994.
Bassani 2008.
Duval 1988.
Scheid 2005; Flower (in preparation).
Chaniotis.

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Jrg Rpke, Lived Ancient Religion: Questioning Cults and Polis Religion

tivity and the religious self17 and applying the perspectives of (biographical) individuation and
(institutional) individualisation to ancient religions.
(2) Cults and religions. he essentialising of the rituals of a city or polity controlled by legitimate oicials as the religion of XX (or Athenian, Roman, Egyptian, Etruscan religion)
has given the plural religions currency. Given the local roots and immobility of such public
political religion, a movable element had been conceptualised on the patterns of modern religions, but termed cult for its organisational deicits and openness to pluralism. hese cults
were centred upon a deity, whose essence (Wesen, Natur) or personality deined the character
and function of the cult on a trans-regional scale. Much of twentieth century scholarship on ancient religion has been invested in locating, identifying, and classifying evidence into such cults
and religions. he systematic concentration on these topics has overlooked two facts. First,
the importance of cult activities or (though much less frequent) membership for an individual
biography and for religious activities beyond that speciic context of a local group or sanctuary
seems to be limited18. We can hardly know how such an involvement informed other types
and areas of religious action in a religiously pluralistic world. Secondly, the intellectual dimension of ancient religions has not managed to capture the interests of the polis religion model19.
Ancient writers on religion tended to direct their attention to ritual on a normative, descriptive and exegetical basis20. hese texts are now being slowly recovered for our conception of
ancient religion21. It is only speciic circumstances that made individuals think of a speciic,
mostly ethnographically deined religion. Following these exceptions modern research has
separated the evidence into the classes of religions and has broken down the continuum of
ancient intellectual discourse on religion into pagan, Jewish, and Christian texts. However, the
underlying conceptualisation is far from adequate. In the absence of a concept of religion that
allows the drawing of hard boundaries between imagined communities22, religions cannot
be thought of in plural before late antiquity23. Lived Ancient Religion proposes to view the
formation and reproduction of such institutions not only as a framework for, but also as an
outcome of individual decisions about the formation of coalition and the appropriation of
group styles.
(3) Archaeology of religion. It is a fact that archaeology of religion lourishes. On the one
hand, methodological developments in archaeology (processual, new) have led to new
interests and possibilities to use (and construct) archaeological indings in order to reconstruct
rituals and enquire about the belief systems underlying social action. Religion has come to the
foreground of archaeological research in international conferences as in many studies. On the
other hand, history of religion has become increasingly interested in practices of quotidian
religion, in sanctuaries rather than gods. Hence, archaeological sources have gained in importance. Recently, monographs aiming at a history of religion of individual localities that are not
based on literary or primarily epigraphic sources have been published for Ostia and Pompeii24.
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24

Brakke et alii 2005; Gill 2008.

Bendlin 2000; Kloppenborg, Wilson 1996.
Ando 2008.
Beard 1987; Scheid 2005; Rpke 2007.
Feeney 1998.
Anderson 1993.
Rpke 2007.
Steuernagel 2004; van Andringa 2009.

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A few books titled archaeology of religion have been published recently, but their value and
innovativity is limited. Some adopt a classical approach and limit their scope to pre-literate
societies25. Others attempt to ofer concise general accounts of religion and give certain prominence to archaeological sources26. Moreover, some representatives of the cognitive approach
towards religions (rather supericially) try to adapt archaeological material to their argumentation27. he cutting edge of research is clearly located in approaches to very speciic areas such
as archaeology of ritual, sacriice, and death. hese research trends in archaeology, however,
easily lead to reifying religion, instead of understanding the role of objects in cultural practices
of constructing religion and encountering that religion as objectiied representation of the
sacred. Here, the project ofers a framework for developing the methodology as outlined below
through close collaboration between archaeologists and historians of religion.
Lived Ancient Religion is audacious in the sense that it intends to develop a new and integrative perspective on religion in the Ancient Mediterranean and an adequate methodology.
his approach sets out to replace the concepts of cults and polis religion(s) as integrative
frameworks in the description of a ield that could usefully be conceptualised as religion. By
refocusing on the individual and the situational, i.e., on the intrinsic determinants of lived
religion, it aims to recover the importance of Altertumswissenschaft and the study of ancient
Euro-Mediterranean religion within global History of Religion, thereby ofering an approach,
which can comprise the local and global trajectories of the multi-dimensional pluralistic religions of antiquity. In more detail, the overarching objectives of the project can be summoned
as follows:
* Developing and establishing lived religion as a new framework for the description and
analysis of ancient Mediterranean religion. Such a framework will allow integration of the
wealth of material and textual evidence of individual and collective behaviour, of popular and
intellectual culture on a new organisational basis. Far beyond the evidence subject to scrutiny
in the project, such a framework would open up possibilities to restructure the wealth of evidence for ancient religions that is documented, published in large collections, and digitalised.
Classiicatory principles so far employed in documentation limit the degree of accessibility.
he evidence is fragmented by the separation of cults and religions that deine the limits
of books and corpora, thematic collections of evidence. his makes it hard to assemble locally speciied evidence, the usual criterion for publication. It is the objective of this large-scale
project to analyse, interpret, and make accessible this wealth of evidence with regard to comparative research on lived religion in other cultures and epochs, and thus re-introduce ancient
religion into the research community of global history within a framework which relects its
signiicance beyond its merely political functions.
* Re-evaluating the history of religion in the Imperial period. he inclusion of new types of
evidence and the focus on new types of religious action and conduct enable the identiication
of new areas and criteria of religious change. Far from denying the importance of processes of
institutionalisation, the focus on lived religion and ancient individual perspectives of change
from such points of view will historicise the traditional unit of description, that is, cult or
religion, and shift the latters position in narratives of religious change. It is the objective of
25 Renfrew 1994; Steadman 2009.
26 Insoll 2004.
27 Whitehouse 2009.

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Jrg Rpke, Lived Ancient Religion: Questioning Cults and Polis Religion

the project to develop historical narratives that are neither purely additive with regard to different religious traditions nor dominated by a history of competition and prohibiting syncretistic boundary transgressions. Instead, the question that has to be addressed is how and under
which conditions boundaries arose and where they are appropriated by individual religious
agents.
* Opening Altertumswissenschaft. From the Renaissance onwards, ancient religions
Greek, and Roman, but also the ritual-dominated Jewish religion as described in the Old
Testament and (late) Egyptian religion as treated in Greek or Latin texts have been a
major instrument for the European understanding of contemporary pagan, heretical, or
foreign religion.28 Due to the wealth of diferent types of sources, and a long tradition of
intensive research at international level, these enquiries have produced important models
and stimulated by comparisons research in many ields, epochs and areas of religion29:
mythology, rituals (in the Myth-and-Ritual School), sacriice,30 mysteries, to name just a
few. By its concentration on the model of public, civic religion, research in the last decades
has indeed added to this development, but, at the same time, signiicantly reduced the scope
of relevance of antiquity in dealing with extra-European and contemporary religion. By
addressing ancient religion as lived religion and by shifting the accent from sign systems
and other normative concepts of culture to a more naturalised individual agent31, new perspectives for interdisciplinary cooperation even beyond the humanities (e.g. with afective
sciences or cognitive studies) open up.

Methodology

s the title indicates, the project is breaking new ground from a methodological point
of view by employing the concept of lived religion that has been developed for the
description and analysis of contemporary religion32. his is the very irst attempt to
employ this concept within the ield of ancient religion. In its application to contemporary
social analysis, the concept of lived religion does not address how individuals replicate a set
of religious practices and beliefs preconigured by an institutionalised oicial religion within
their biography or, conversely, opt out of adhering to tradition. Of course, considering the
relationship of individuals to tradition, such an assumption could in principle work in a religiously pluralistic and a mono-confessional society. Instead, lived ancient religion focuses on
the actual everyday experience, on practices, expressions, and interactions that could be related
to religion. Such religion is understood as a spectrum of experiences, actions, and beliefs
and communications hinging on human communication with super-human or even transcendent agent(s), for the ancient Mediterranean usually conceptualised as gods. Ritualisation
and elaborate forms of representation are called upon for the success of communication with
these addressees.
28
29
30
31
32

Mulsow 2001.
Borgeaud 2005; Spineto 2009.
Burkert 1972; Girard 1998.
Martin - Barresi 2000.
McGuire 2008.

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It is important to keep in mind that such practices are not entirely subjective. For the
purposes of historical research, the existence of religious norms, of exemplary oicial practices, of control mechanisms and enforcement should be taken into account even more than
in McGuires sketch. It is precisely such institutions and norms that tend to predominate in
the surviving evidence. he term appropriation plays a key-role here.33 he speciic forms
of religion-as-lived are barely comprehensible in the absence of speciic modes of individual
appropriation (to the point of radical asceticism and martyrdom), cultural techniques such
as the reading and interpretation of mythical or philosophical texts, rituals, pilgrimages and
prayer, and the various media of representation of deities in and out of sanctuaries. he notion
of agency implicit in the notion of appropriation far more so than with reception is not
free of problems. In view of the normative tagging of teachings, traditions, narratives etc. in
the ield of religion, the description of how ideas are taken up and the speciication of processes
of reception are of particular importance: Cultural-theoretical and historical-anthropological
conceptions of appropriation often clash with models found in religious symbolic systems,
where transcendent entities are acknowledged as norm-setting agents. he methodology of
the project ofers a frame for a description of the formative inluence of professional providers,
of philosophical thinking and intellectual relections in literary or reconstructed oral form, of
social networks and socialisation, of lavish performances in public spaces (or performances run
by associations) with recourse to individual conduct in rituals and religious context.
However, the analysis does not merely describe the contrast between norms and practices
or the inluence of one on the other. What is more, even the intersubjective dimension of
religious communication can be accessed through the records of the individuals by enquiring
into their communication, their juxtaposition, their sharing of experiences and meaning, their
speciic usage and selection of culturally available concepts and vocabulary.34 hus, meanings
constructed by situations rather than coherent individual worldviews should and will be identiied. Logical coherence is secondary to the efectiveness of religious practices for the purposes
desired (practical coherence pace McGuire).
his constitutes a programme that conforms to the scattered evidence available. When
concentrating on practices, one should accept and account for incoherence rather than coherence (even in research into contemporary religion), the stressed role of mediality35 and
the importance given to knowledge and biographical coherence. Ancient religions are only
partially receptive of techniques established in social studies so as to create new data by means
of empirical or experimental procedures. It cannot be hoped that extensive descriptions of
rituals stem from people whom we know to have practiced them, or that people whose relection on religion is preserved in the literary tradition left other evidence of personal practices.
he generalisation of the individual instance (hardly ever representative in a methodologically
plausible way) is just as problematic as the reliability of elite descriptions of mass behaviour
this is, of course, the overall situation in the historical critique of sources. By drawing on the
model of lived religion, scattered evidence will be contextualised and interpreted by relating
it to individual agents, their use of space and time, their forming of social coalitions, their
negotiation with religious specialists or providers, and their attempts to make sense of reli33 De Certeau 1980; Ldtke 1989.
34 Ammerman 2007.
35 Rpke 2011.

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gion in a situational manner and thus render it efective. his is not a material statement about
any logical priority of the individual, but a methodological option, which provides a radical
alternative to cults and polis religion and a way to overcome the latters deicits.

Corollaries

he lived religion approach induces methodological modiications in the process of

selecting and interpreting the evidence. 1) Focus on experience rather than symbols.
Experience has occupied a pivotal position in religious studies since the end of the
eighteenth century. However, despite the eforts undertaken in some recent books36, the concept of experience has not yet been brought to bear on ancient religion outside Judaism and
Christianity. he very subjective nature of experience (pathos, unlike the ancient notion of
experientia, that is, learning by practising) seems to be in conlict with the dearth of ancient
sources. However, recent analyses of the phenomena related to experience have produced a
concept of experience that takes into account the connection between personal experience and
communicated meaning, and opens up to a historical use of the concept in relation to the lived
religion approach: personal, lived experience in its qualitative-emotional dimension remains
dumb and has no power to transform behaviour as long as it is not articulated symbolically
and any system of convictions and practices, that from the irst-person point of view is no
longer seen as expressive of qualitative experience, becomes increasingly obsolete.37 Experience, thus, could stress the role of the viewer and user of images, of sacred and domestic space,
and movement towards and into sacred space within the context of pilgrimage38. For material
culture, the term archaeology of religious experience (which avoids an all too constructivist
approach) seems to address this perspective and stresses individual experience both indoors
and in the use of public religious infrastructure. By continuing a co-operation with specialists
a new ield of research can be developed to enhance the objectives of Lived Ancient Religion.
2) Focus on embodiment rather than ritual. Embodiment is a notion conjoining materiality and corporeal experience and as such occupies a central position in contemporary epistemology39 and anthropology of religion. Twentieth century pioneer blending of phenomenology and cognitive science has marked the powerful impact of embodied cognition upon
scholarly discourse on culture and religion. he concept stems from M. Merleau-Pontys
phenomenology-driven musings on embodiment that advocate the crucial priority of movement and gestures over mind and the principal role of the body in perceiving environments
and structuring the world. he performance of gestures, even though they do not cover the
whole range of bodily experiences, contextualises natural entities and their bodies by conveying mental dispositions and enacting emotions, and shapes culturally informed meanings. he
human body along with the conditions of perception it entails is what nuances subjectivity and
places the individual self within culture and society, thus turning it to an embodied self 40.
36
37
38
39
40

Bispham - Smith 2000; Cole 2004

Jung 2006.
Elsner - Rutherford 2005
Weiss - Haber - Overton et al. 1999.
Noland 2009.

198

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he notion of embodied agency grounded in diverse somatised impulses unfolds the social
implications of the embodied self41. Particularly intriguing here is the extent of alterity issuing
from individual operations of embodiment, that is, the set of diferentiating, even self-deining
processes that are being activated by the emotional as well as gestural modes of an individuals
body (J. Reynolds). Recent theorising on the anthropology of religion has gone so far as to
identify in embodied alterity the phenomenological kernel of religion, itself a correlate of
individual experience, perception and expression42.
Ritual studies, even when concentrated on individual involvement and performance,43 tend
to focus analysis on rules and actual or imagined repetition of sequences of action as well as on
wider societal, economic or power contexts. he concept of embodiment has shifted interest
to individual involvement and meaning beyond the cognitive level in religious studies and has
identiied new evidence even in historical studies.44 Regarding communication with invisible gods or spiritual beings in antiquity, ordinary religious action is frequently much more
encoded in bodily movements. Given that memory is inextricably intertwined with sensorial
mechanisms, feelings arising out of sensory input in diverse social contexts are embedded in
bodily experience. hus, religious experience was stimulated by and registered in the form of
sensations and movements as well as in postures taken, for instance, in prayer or in processions. Religious experience is shared by the intersubjective coordination of bodily movements
and reactions. Religious practices in the epoch under analysis were only rarely taught through
formal religious instruction. Much more frequently it was acquired through appropriation and
imitation of movements stored in and enhanced by memory. hus images of rituals or gods in
corresponding gestures could evoke embodied knowledge.45 Garments, paraphernalia as well
as wreaths, the use of incense and the touch of amulets change bodily status for an extended
period of time gender diferences demanding attention. Lived religion will identify and
trace the continuation or repetition of such experiences in order to relocate diferentiation of
public and private (domestic) ritual.
3) Focus on culture in interaction rather than habitus, organisation or culture as text. Everyday religion is not to be grasped in terms of individual isolation, but is characterised by diverse social contexts that are appropriated, reproduced and informed by the agent on relevant
occasions. he concept of culture in interaction46 can enrich the lived religion approach.
he concept has been developed in the ethnographic analysis of contemporary societies as a
complement to the sociology of emotion. Focusing on situational communication in groups,
the concept aims to identify speciic group styles, which modify the use of linguistic as
well as behavioural register within cultural contexts. Anew, gender will provide an important
perspective for analysis and description. For the most thoroughly deined and stabilised social
contexts of ritual interaction namely the nuclear and wider family (including slaves), clans,
neighbourhoods and voluntary associations (limited to one per person by later law) the concept helps theorise situational diferences in reproducing cultural religious representations as
well as in evoking less widely shared knowledge and practices. Ancient ethnographic evidence
41
42
43
44
45
46

Lyon - Barbalet 1994.

Csordas 1994.
Rappaport 1999; Bell 1992; Grimes 2011.
Coakley 1997; Bynum 1996.
Gordon 1979.
Eliasoph - Lichterman 2003.

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Jrg Rpke, Lived Ancient Religion: Questioning Cults and Polis Religion

and provisions and exceptions made by public norms (laws) could form important evidence
as can archaeological remains that attest to micro-topographically diferent practices without
corresponding attestations of variances in explicit norms. his has important corollaries. Public religion, then, as seen from below, is the attempt to create order and boundaries rather
than a normative system only imperfectly reproduced by the citizens. Such boundaries would
include the notions of sacred and profane, pure and impure, public and private, but also gendered conceptions of deities. Institutionalisations such as professionalised priesthoods and the
reformulation of religion as knowledge that is kept and elaborated by such professionals would
constitute further features of crucial importance for sketching a history of Roman public religion from the late republic onwards. Finally, elaborated imagined communities would attain
an important place in such forms of civic religion.
Lived religion is just as interested in observing and deining the material conditions of everyday life that pertain to religious experience, practice and belief as in the way ordinary people
make use of these conditions in order to functionalise the interdependency of everyday experience and lived belief. he utilisation of learning and memory in sketching the biography of
subjectivity in religious contexts along with the emotive factor constitutes a major desideratum
in the study of lived religion exceeding the concerns of Alltagsgeschichte. hat said a crucial
point of diferentiation lies in the way religion integrates certain explicitly secular structures of
everyday experience and individual symbolisation through material culture in order to render
itself lived.
In order to bring Lived Ancient Religion to bear on the available evidence, research will
concentrate on individual appraisal and interaction in diverse social spaces: the primary space
of the house and familial interaction (including familial funeral space), the secondary space of
religious experience and interaction in voluntary or professional associations, the spaces shared
by many individuals or groups in the public sites of sanctuaries or festival routes, and inally
the virtual space of literary communication and the intellectual discourses formed therein. To
analyse the whole continuum of social interaction ranging from domestic cult to public spaces
and professionals is of particular importance for the far-reaching goals set by the project. In
order to achieve an integrated framework, the use and construction of these social spaces by
individual agents have to be indexed topographically, for instance, by domestic or coemeterial,
urban, and extra-urban, open or architecturally deined sites. his form of indexing enables the
contextualisation of religion in everyday life. At the end of the analysis, the use of these spaces
has to be indexed also temporally, for instance, by time, calendar date or frequency of events
clearly, the permanent use of an amulet difers from a one-time ritual (that might, however, be
remembered time and again). Religious traditions form part of such an environment; therefore
they should not be studied as if they are an independent variable, but rather as a product of
providers of religious knowledge and services, priests or professionals. Most of the evidence
at our disposal is best to be interpreted neither as authentic individual expression nor as institutional survival, but as media, as the results of a culture created in interaction.
Lived ancient religion aims to address this matrix by launching sub-projects on each of
the social spaces deined as ields of research. In order to transgress the usual research boundaries of cults and religions the bodies of evidence brought together within the sub-projects
cover ancient Mediterranean religion geographically in an extended manner, focusing on
Egypt and Italy, Syria and Greece, but also including evidence from the Western and Danubian provinces as well as from North Africa. In order to facilitate comparison and the historical

200

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contextualisation necessary for fruitful comparison, the chronological range is restricted to and
concentrated on the Imperial period. Together with comparative elements, a transversal analysis, addressing all social spaces through the lenses of religious providers, will account for the
mutual interdependence of the sub-projects and will thereby advance lived ancient religion
to a coherent new paradigm. Colleagues from diferent disciplines and ields are invited to join
in this enterprise.47
Jrg Rpke
Max-Weber-Kolleg
Nordhauser Str. 63,
D-99089 Erfurt
joerg.ruepke@uni-erfurt.de

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Gli autori
Claude Calame
Directeur dtudes presso lcole des
Hautes tudes en Sciences Sociales (Parigi), insegna Antropologia storica della
poesia greca. Ha recentemente pubblicato Masques dautorit dans la Grce
antique. Fiction et pragmatique dans la
potique grecque antique (Paris 2005);
Pratiques potiques de la mmoire.
Reprsentations de lespace-temps en
Grce ancienne (Paris 2006); Sentiers
transversaux. Entre potiques grecques
et politiques contemporaines (Grenoble
2008). Una nuova edizione italiana della
sua monograia sulla poetica dei miti greci
stata appena pubblicata Poetiche dei
miti nella Grecia antica (Lecce 2011);
cos come la seconda edizione di Mythe
et histoire dans lAntiquit grecque. La
narration symbolique dune colonie (Paris
2011). Membro della Ligue des Droits
de lHomme, del Nouveau parti anticapitaliste e del Consiglio scientiico dellAssociation pour la taxation des transactions
inancires et pour laction citoyenne
(ATTAC). Inoltre presso lcole des Hautes
tudes en Sciences Sociales anima il collettivo di sostegno ai sans papiers e agli
immigrati.
Aude Cohen-Skalli
Ha conseguito il dottorato di ricerca in cotutela presso lUniversit Paris IVSorbonne e la Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa
discutendo una tesi sui frammenti dei libri VI-X di Diodoro Siculo (Belles Lettres,
2012). Dal 2010 insegna allUniversit
di NiceSophia Antipolis come Attache
Temporaire dEnseignement et de Recherche e dal 2011 membro a Nizza del
centro di ricerca CEPAM (Centre dtudes
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6130). Ha curato l'edizione dei libri VI-X
della Biblioteca per Les Belles Lettres e
pubblicato vari articoli sullopera di Diodoro Siculo e la sua ricezione nella tarda
antichit e a Bisanzio, sulla storia della Sicilia greca e romana, sugli storici greci su
Roma, e su questioni di storiograia frammentaria.
Gianluca Cuniberti
ricercatore presso lUniversit degli Studi di Torino dove insegna Storia sociale ed
economica della Grecia antica ed Esegesi
delle fonti. I suoi interessi di ricerca vertono intorno alla democrazia ateniese,
esplorata in indagini prosopograiche,
storiograiche, istituzionali e sociali. Tra le
sue pubblicazioni: Iperbolo ateniese infame (Bologna 2000), La polis dimezzata.
Immagini storiograiche di Atene ellenistica (Alessandria 2006).
Stefania De Vido
Ricercatrice di Storia Greca presso lUniversit Ca Foscari di Venezia, si occupa
della storia della Sicilia greca (forme di
contatto tra Greci ed Elimi in Sicilia occidentale; esperienze tiranniche di IV secolo), di colonizzazione arcaica, di aspetti
istituzionali e ideologici di et classica (la
nozione di nobilt), di storiograia (Erodoto e Diodoro Siculo). Partecipa a un
progetto di ricerca di interesse nazionale
su Grecia occidentale e Grecia dOccidente (coordinatore nazionale: Giovanna De
Sensi); segretaria di redazione della collana Diabaseis (ETS, Pisa).
Elena Franchi
Si laureata a Trento (2003) ed ha conse-

239

Gli autori

guito il titolo di Dottore di ricerca in Scienze dellantichit a Genova (2008) con una
tesi su Il problema storico dei conlitti
rituali in Grecia antica. Documentazione e analisi. Il caso delle guerre tra Argo
e Sparta (direttore di tesi Prof. Maurizio
Giangiulio, cotutor: Prof. Marco Bettalli).
Ha studiato a Freiburg i. Breisgau con H.-J.
Gehrke (2007, 2011-) ed stata collaboratrice a progetto del Dipartimento di Filosoia, Storia e Beni culturali dellUniversit degli Studi di Trento, dove dal 2008
anche docente a contratto di Storia greca.
Nel 2011 ha ottenuto una borsa post-doc
Von Humboldt grazie alla quale studia a
Freiburg sotto la direzione di Gehrke la
conlittualit tessalo-focidese.
Ursula Mandel
Akademische Rtin e Kustodin presso
lInstitut fr Archologische Wissenschaften der Goethe-Universitt Frankfurt am
Main. Si occupa di ceramica a rilievo in
area microasiatica. Ha recentemente pubblicato: Bemerkungen zur Tragodia von
Pergamon, in H. v. Steuben H. Kotsidu
G. Lahusen, . Beitrge zur antiken Plastik. Festschrift zu Ehren von P.
C. Bol (Mhnesee 2007) 347-355; Rumlichkeit und Bewegungserleben Krperschicksale im Hochhellenismus (240-190
v. Chr.), in P.C. Bol (Hrsg.), Geschichte der
antiken Bildhauerkunst III. Hellenistische
Plastik (Mainz 2007) 103-187 Abb. 129173.
Marcel Meulder
stato Professore di lingue antiche presso lUniversit Libre de Bruxelles. Collabora con la rivista Latomus ed e autore
di numerosi saggi. Tra i pi recenti : Un
monstre platonicien : le tyran (2008) ;
Minos commet les trois fautes fonctionnelles (2008) ; Auguste et Othon face au
prsage du Tibre (2009) ; Le futur empe-

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reur Tibre et le xvarnah (2009) ; Marcus Furius Scribonianus, guerrier impie ;

un ultime exemple (2009) ; Varron dAtax,
Virgile et les Argonautes (2009) ; Lenfant
de la 4e Bucolique : un autre Zarathustra ? (2009) ; Prsence de Callimaque
dans la IVe Bucolique de Virgile ? (2010) ;
Pacatumque reget patriis uirtutibus orbem (Virg. Buc. IV, 17) (2011) ; Horace, archgte de la posie grco-latine (2011) ;
Platon et les gnalogistes (2011) ; Marc
Aurle ou le paradoxe des ges (2011).
Carmine Pisano
Dottore di ricerca in Storia antica presso
lUniversit degli Studi di Napoli Federico
II. I suoi interessi di ricerca si concentrano sul politeismo greco, le conigurazioni
della regalit, le igure della comunicazione nel mondo antico, il linguaggio delle
immagini, i fenomeni di traduzione e interpretazione. Tra le sue pubblicazioni
pi recenti: Gesti e immagini: una forma
iconograica del menadismo, in I Quaderni del Ramo doro on line 3 (2010), 148163; Hermes dio dellalbero tra documentazione micenea e tradizione greca,
in Studi e Materiali di Storia delle Religioni 77/1 (2011), 187-203; Hermes, il lupo,
il silenzio, in Quaderni Urbinati di Cultura
Classica 98/2 (2011), 87-100.
Chiara Terranova
Dottore di ricerca in Studi Storico-Religiosi presso il Dipartimento di Studi Tardoantichi, Medievali e Umanistici dellUniversit degli Studi di Messina. Si occupa
da diversi anni del culto di Amphiaraos
nel Mediterraneo antico e della mantica
nel mondo classico ed ellenistico-romano.
Suoi sono i contributi Gli oracoli e il Mythos nella Grecia di IV e III sec. a.C. Studi
sullantico culto di Amphiaraos ad Oropos
(SMSR 74, 2008, 159-192) e La religione
come elemento uniicante nei rapporti tra

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Gli autori

popoli e culture. Per la deinizione del ruolo storico-religioso del culto di Aniarao (in
corso di stampa).
Jrg Rpke
Co-direttore del gruppo di ricerca Religious Individualization in Historical Perspective e membro del Max Weber Kolleg
dellUniversit di Erfurt (sezione: Religious
Studies). Tra le sue ultime pubblicazioni:
Domi Militiae (Stuttgart 1990); La religione dei Romani (Torino 2004) (ed. or.:
The Religions of the Romans, Cambridge
Ma 2007); A Companion to Roman Religion (Malden Ma 2007); Fasti sacerdotum
(Oxford/New York 2008); The Roman Calendar from Numa to Constantine: Time,
History, and the Fasti (Malden Ma 2011);
Religion in Republican Rome: Rationalization and Ritual Change (Philadephia
2012); De Jupiter a Cristo (Villa Maria
2012).
Leonardo Sacco
Laureato in Giurisprudenza e in Scienze
storico-religiose, studioso di area giuridica e storico-antropologica caratterizzato
dalla formazione metodologica storicista
ricevuta dalla Scuola romana di storia del-

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n.s. 2011

le religioni interessato alle culture mediterranee e orientali. Tra i suoi lavori: Devotio, in Studi Romani (2004); Kamikaze e
shahd (Roma 2005); Neo-sciamanesimo
& New Age. Il contributo di Mircea Eliade, in Archaeus (2007-2008); Osservazioni comparative sulla sepoltura della Vestale a Roma, in Mediterraneo Antico (2009
o 2010); Devotio. Aspetti storico-religiosi
di un rito militare romano; prefazione di A.
Mastrocinque (Roma 2011).
Benjamin Weaver
Ricercatore presso lUniversit di Oxford,
ha lavorato sotto la direzione di Heinrich
von Staden, a una dissertazione dal titolo:
Sparagmos: Dismemberment as Myth and
Metaphor in Ancient Greek Literature che
ora in corso di pubblicazione. Tra i suoi
ultimi lavori: Euripides Bacchae and Classical Typologies of PentheusSparagmos,
510-406 BC, in BICS 52 (2009); Aeschylus Xantriai: Resistance Myth and reconstruction of a Dionysiac trilogy, in
Raising the Fragment to the Status of a
Whole?, ed. D. Obbink, et al., in c.d.s. e
Plato, Laches 180 E(?), 182 B-C (More of
LII 3671), in The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, in
c.d.s.

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