scholarly journals Garments and Shrouds of Egyptian and Nubian Pilgrims from Qasr el-Yahud, Ninth Century CE

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Orit Shamir
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
Jordan River ◽  
The West ◽  
Balanites Aegyptiaca ◽  
Burial Practices ◽  
Islamic Period ◽  
Facial Disfigurement ◽  
John The Baptist ◽  
Burial Customs ◽  
Special Power

Qasr el-Yahud, situated on the west bank of the Jordan River nearby Jericho, features the Monastery of Saint John the Baptist, believed to be the traditional site of the Baptism of Jesus1 and has a centuries-long tradition of ‘washing of the lepers’. Byzantine and Medieval authors attributed the waters of the Jordan river a special power to heal lepers who bathed in them, especially at the spot where Jesus was baptized.After the site became sacred, traditions developed that were associated with the holy features of the water and its curative properties. When the emperor Constantius became ill, he asked to bath in the Jordan. In 1983 a rescue excavation at the site revealed thirty-four skeletons, probably representing a hospital population with cases of tuberculosis, leprosy and facial disfigurement. Such individuals travelled enormous distances, attracted to the site in the hope of washing away their illness. Anthropological evidence indicates that the individuals were probably Egyptian in origin, while structural analysis of the skulls proved that some were Nubian. They were buried in a Christian manner, lying on their backs, facing the rising sun. Some of the burial customs at this site, such as placing seeds from the Egyptian Balsam tree (Balanites Aegyptiaca) in the hands of the deceased, conform to Egyptian traditions.The arid climate of the Judean Desert helped to preserve 250 textiles, among them many examples comprising two different textiles or more sewn together or patched one on another. Radiocarbon dating of the textiles placed the date in the eighth to ninth centuries (787–877 CE).  The textiles are made of linen and cotton, sometimes decorated with wool tapestry, brocade and selfbands. They include many cut-to-shape tunics except one which is woven-to-shape, head coverings, bandages and shrouds. This research combines historic sources, anthropological and botanic evidence, burial practices with the textiles. The material is of great importance because it gives us idea about the burial costumes used by Christians at the late Islamic period. In addition, those are the only textiles from this period found in Israel.

Assyrian sacred trees in the Brooklyn Museum

Iraq ◽  
1994 ◽  
Vol 56 ◽  
pp. 123-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pauline Albenda
Keyword(s):  
Present Author ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Palm Tree ◽  
The West ◽  
Individual Tree ◽  
Sacred Tree ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Trees ◽  
Brooklyn Museum ◽  
Tree Type

The Brooklyn Museum houses twelve stone slabs with carved decoration from the Northwest Palace of Ashurnasirpal II. The motif of a stylized tree — the so-called Sacred Tree (see Figs. 1, 4, 6) — appears on seven of those slabs which come from rooms F, I, L, S, T of the ninth century palace at Nimrud. These tree renderings are representative of the sacred tree-type found in ten rooms of the royal residence and the west wing. Approximately 96 sacred trees, in two-register arrangement, appeared on the pictorial decorations in room I; the same motif occurred about 75 times in one-register arrangement on the reliefs of the other rooms. The abundance of the sacred tree motif on the wall decorations of the Northwest Palace attests to the significance of this plant. Its design deserves investigation; in Layard's words, “the tree, evidently a sacred symbol, is elaborately and tastefully formed.”In his study of the Ashurnasirpal II reliefs in American collections, Stearns did not attempt to list the sacred trees, because “variations in the sacred tree occur only in minor details,” and “the tree in itself is rarely useful in identifying the location of the reliefs.” These statements make clear Stearns' belief that the sacred trees were nearly alike. Other scholars, notably Weidner and Reade, have pointed out that on a number of slabs now in American and European museums are carvings of matching half trees, therefore indicating that when paired, these trees belonged to adjoining slabs originally. In trying to match half trees, one finds that individual sacred trees do differ in the rendering of specific details. Bleibtreu, in her analysis of the sacred tree-type, lists three variants of the flower found on the palmette-garland framing the individual tree on three sides. The present author, after examining the sacred trees carved on the slabs in The Brooklyn Museum, concludes that the design of the tree-type is more varied than heretofore presumed, and that its construction is more complex than indicated in previous descriptions of the subjects. An analysis of the Assyrian sacred tree-type may lead to possible conclusions regarding its intended image: a stylized palm tree, a cult object, an emblem of vegetation or “tree of life”, an imperial symbol, or a combination of those forms. In addition, one may consider to what extent the rendering of individual trees was the consequence of artistic inventiveness.

Alfred et al.

2005 ◽  
Author(s):  
David A. Hinton
Keyword(s):  
Fixed Point ◽  
Precious Metal ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Eighth Century ◽  
Perceived Similarity ◽  
Criterion A ◽  
John The Baptist

A distinguishing feature of the ninth century is the amount of precious metal that has survived from it. Some of this comes from hoards, for in contrast to the eighth century there are several with both coins and objects, as well as some only with coins and some only with objects. The latest coin in a hoard provides no more than the earliest possible date at which it could have been deposited, but at least that is a fixed point in one direction, and its owner was unlikely to keep a store of coins for long without occasionally taking some out or putting others in. Objects in hoards, of course, may always include some treasured heirlooms, as may furnished graves, but at least perceived similarity to works in other media is not their only dating criterion. A few objects can be dated because they have an identifiable name on them. A gold and niello ring inscribed Ethelwulf R[e]x at the bottom of the bezel associates it with King Aethelwulf, ruler of Wessex from 839 to 858 (Fig. 4.1, right). The ring was not necessarily made for him to wear himself, but for him to give to a follower as a permanent reminder of the service owed to its donor, though a Beowulf seeking a ‘generous ring-giver’ might not have thought its inscription sufficient compensation for its modest weight. Alternatively, it could have acted like a seal, to accompany a royal messenger and validate that his news or instructions came from the king; or have been used as a guarantee of a land donation and a physical reminder of the event at which the grant had been made. That might have been the reason why the name of Queen Aethelswith was added to the back of another gold ring, thus associating it with Aethelwulf’s daughter, who was queen of Mercia from 853 to 874 (Fig. 4.1, left). The inscription may have been an afterthought, needed when the ring was used for an unanticipated purpose. A third explanation is that both rings were baptismal; above Aethelwulf’s name are two birds at the Fountain of Life, and the bezel of Aethelswith’s ring has the Lamb of St John the Baptist.

The Cult of Relics in the Letters and ‘Dialogues’ of Pope Gregory the Great: A Lexicographical Study

Traditio ◽  
1976 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 145-184 ◽  
Author(s):  
John M. McCulloh
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Human Remains ◽  
The West ◽  
Early Middle Ages ◽  
Gregory The Great

Late antiquity and the early Middle Ages witnessed a change in the Christian attitude toward the remains of the saints. Holy bodies came to be treated less and less as normal corpses, worthy of special veneration but still subject to many of the laws and customs which had regulated the treatment of human remains in pagan Antiquity. They came rather to be viewed as cult objects which could be moved or even divided up according to the demands of religion with little regard for earlier prohibitions of these practices. This change occurred relatively early in the Greek, eastern portion of the Roman Empire. In the mid-fourth century the Caesar Gallus translated a saint's body from one tomb to another, and less than two centuries later Justinian asked Pope Hormisdas for portions of the bodies of the apostles. Despite some outstanding exceptions such as the translations performed by St. Ambrose, the Christians of the West were more conservative in these matters. Nevertheless, by the ninth century at the very latest, western Christians had followed the lead of the eastern church in both translating and dismembering holy bodies.

The Ethical Significance of National Settlement

2005 ◽  
Vol 35 (4) ◽  
pp. 501-520 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tamar Meisels
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
North America ◽  
Middle East ◽  
First Century ◽  
Jordan River ◽  
The West ◽  
Central Tenet ◽  
Practical Tool ◽  
National Settlement ◽  
Ethical Significance

As an Israeli writing at the turn of the twenty-first Century, I have become accustomed to hearing the word ‘settlement’ used by liberals almost invariably as a derogatory term. The Jewish settlements to the west of the Jordan river, now populated by close to a quarter of a million Jews, are often said to be a central obstacle to peace in the Middle East, as well as being immoral in and of themselves. Consistent liberals realize that this attitude poses a problem for the endorsement of the Zionist effort altogether, since settlement has been a central tenet of this doctrine from the start and the main practical tool for achieving its goals within contested territories. It was also the primary apparatus for achieving Western control over North America, Australia, and New Zealand, wholly at the expense of the aboriginal inhabitants of those places. This, too, is the source of a great deal of contemporary liberal breast-beating.

The armies of the Ṣaffārids

1968 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 534-554 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. E. Bosworth
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
The South ◽  
The West ◽  
Islamic World ◽  
North West ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Core ◽  
The North ◽  
Frontier Region ◽  
Short Time

It is not too much to describe the Ṣaffārids of S‚stān as an archetypal military dynasty. In the later years of the third/ninth century, their empire covered the greater part of the non-Arab eastern Islamic world. In the west, Ya'qūb. al-Laith's army was only halted at Dair al-'Āqūl, 50 miles from Baghdad; in the north, Ya'qūb and his brother 'Arm campaigned in the Caspian coastlands against the local 'Alids, and 'Amr made serious attempts to extend his power into Khwārazm and Transoxania; in the east, the two brothers pushed forward the frontiers of the Dār al-Islām into the pagan borderlands of what are now eastern Afghanistan and the North-West Frontier region of West Pakistan; and in the south, Ṣaffārid authority was acknowledged even across the persion Gulf in ‘Umān. This impressive achievement was the work of two soldiers of genius, Ya'qūub and 'Amr, and lasted for little more than a quarter of a century. It began to crumble when in 287/900 the Sāmānid Amīr Ismā'īl b. Aḥmad defeated arid captured ‘Amr b. al-Laith, and 11 years later, the core of the empire, Sīstān itself, was in Sāmānid hands. Yet such was the effect in Sīstān of the Ṣaffārid brothers’ achievement, and the stimulus to local pride and feeling which resulted from it, that the Ṣaffārids returned to power there in a very short time. For several more centuries they endured and survived successive waves of invaders of Sīstān—the Ghaznavids, the Seljūqs, the Mongols—and persisted down to the establishment of the Ṣafavid state in Persia.

THE CAROLINGIAN CUP FROM THE VALE OF YORK VIKING HOARD: ORIGINS OF ITS FORM AND DECORATIVE FEATURES

2020 ◽  
Vol 100 ◽  
pp. 86-108
Author(s):  
Barry Ager
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
The West ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
Viking Period

In 2007, near Harrogate, in North Yorkshire, a Viking-period hoard was discovered with a Carolingian silver-gilt cup. This article examines this cup, highlighting Oriental, Central Asian and classical parallels in both metal and pottery for the cup’s form and decoration. The overall significance of the cup’s iconography has already been thoroughly discussed by Professor Egon Wamers, who proposed that the scenes on the cup are paralleled in the early ninth-century Stuttgart Psalter. This article proposes that Oriental forms and decorative elements in metalwork were channelled to the West through diplomatic contacts and trade by way of a complex of routes by land and sea, as well as possibly by refugees from Islamic conquests.

The Ninth-Century Polychrome Decoration at St Mary's Church, Deerhurst

2008 ◽  
Vol 88 ◽  
pp. 109-164 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Gem ◽  
Emily Howe ◽  
Richard Bryant
Keyword(s):  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Technical Analysis ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
The West ◽  
Special Regard ◽  
Original Scheme ◽  
The Church ◽  
Contemporary Context

This paper presents the results of a detailed analysis of surviving paintwork on the chancel arch, the carved animal heads and the figurative panel in the west porch at the Anglo-Saxon church of St Mary, Deerhurst, Gloucestershire, UK. The context of the polychromy in relation to the ninth-century fabric of the church is assessed. The detailed results of the technical analysis are presented. The original scheme of painted decoration is described, including the newly discovered plant scroll painted on the arch. The results of the examination are evaluated, setting the polychrome decoration of the ninth-century church into its contemporary context in England and on the Continent, with special regard to both the technical and the artistic aspects.

Chinese Neolithic Burial Patterns: Problems of Method and Interpretation

Early China ◽  
1988 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 1-45 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Pearson
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Pilot Project ◽  
The West ◽  
Burial Practices ◽  
Archaeological Data ◽  
Ceramic Vessels ◽  
The Bronze Age

This paper reviews the interpretation of Chinese Neolithic burials by Chinese archaeologists, comparing their approaches to those of some processual and symbolic archaeologists of the West and also of western Marxist anthropologists. Descriptions of recent Chinese burial practices provide ethnoarchaeological comparison. The author concludes that there may have been a shift from “matrilineal” to “patrilineal” organization, but that this shift cannot be documented from archaeological data alone. Exploration of the spatial and symbolic aspects of the burials is advocated. The paper concludes with a pilot project devoted to the statistical discovery of sets of ceramic vessels used in rituals ancestral to those of the Bronze Age.

The Face Relics of John the Baptist in Byzantium and the West

Gesta ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 159-177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Annemarie Weyl Carr
Keyword(s):  
The West ◽  
John The Baptist ◽  
The Face

scholarly journals The Clay Paw Burial Rite of the Åland Islands and Central Russia: A Symbol in Action

1994 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-46
Author(s):  
Johan Callmer
Keyword(s):  
Religious Beliefs ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Population Group ◽  
Seventh Century ◽  
Historical Sources ◽  
Cultural Changes ◽  
Central Russia ◽  
Burial Customs ◽  
Middle Volga ◽  
Burial Rite

The clay paw burial rite is a special feature of the Åland Islands. It is introduced already in the seventh century shortly after a marked settlement expansion and considerable cultural changes. The rite may be connected with groups involved in beaver hunting since the clay paws in many cases can be zoologically classified as paws of beavers. On the Åland Islands only minor parts of the population belong to this group. Other groups specialized in contacts with the Finnish mainland. The clay paw group became involved in hunting expeditions further and further east and in the ninth century some of the members established themselves in three or four settlements on the middle Volga. There is a later expansion into the area between the Volga and the Kljaz'ma. The clay paw burial rite gives us an unique possibility to identify a specific Scandinavian population group in European Russia in the ninth and tenth centuries. With the introduction of Christian and semi-Christian burial customs ca. A.D. 1000 we cannot archaeologically distinguish this group any more but some historical sources could indicate its existence throughout the eleventh cetury in Russia. The clay paw burial rite brings to the fore questions about local variations and special elements in the Pre-Christian Scandinavian religion. Possibly elements of Finno-ugric religious beliefs had a connection with the development of this rite.

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