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IMC 2017: Sessions

Session 203: Relics at the Interface between Textuality and Materiality, c. 400-c. 1200, II: Inscribing the Relics

Monday 3 July 2017, 14.15-15.45

Sponsor:NWO-VIDI Project: Mind over Matter - Debates about Relics as Sacred Objects, c. 350-c. 1150
Organisers:Elisa Pallottini, Dipartimento di Storia, Culture, Religioni, Università degli Studi di Roma 'La Sapienza'
Janneke Raaijmakers, Afdeling Middeleeuwse Geschiedenis, Universiteit Utrecht
Julia M. H. Smith, Faculty of History, University of Oxford
Moderator/Chair:Bryan Ward-Perkins, Faculty of History, University of Oxford
Paper 203-aOssa loquuntur: Labelling Reliquaries and the Transmission of the Communal Memory of Martyrs in Late Antique Anatolia and the Near East
(Language: English)
Paweł Nowakowski, Faculty of History, University of Oxford
Index terms: Byzantine Studies, Epigraphy, Literacy and Orality
Paper 203-bScales, Sizes, and the Legibility of Medieval Relics Inscriptions
(Language: English)
Vincent Debiais, Centre d'Études Supérieures de Civilisation Médiévale (CESCM), Université de Poitiers / Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris
Index terms: Art History - Decorative Arts, Epigraphy, Literacy and Orality
Paper 203-cPoetry and Materiality: The Inscription on the Reliquary of Saint Savinianus by Odorannus of Sens
(Language: English)
Estelle Ingrand-Varenne, Centre d'Études Supérieures de Civilisation Médiévale (CESCM), Université de Poitiers / Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris
Index terms: Art History - Decorative Arts, Epigraphy, Liturgy, Literacy and Orality
Abstract

Concentrating on inscriptions on late antique reliquaries from the eastern Mediterranean and on early medieval reliquaries from Western Europe, this panel explores how epigraphic texts participated in the presentation of the relics in their cult sites and how they contributed to explaining the relics' or the reliquaries' significance to the intended audience. The proposed papers approach the relations between textual contents, material characteristics of writing, supports and contexts via questions of visibility, legibility, and function of inscriptions.