IMC 2020: Sessions
Session 1513: Claiming the Land, Redrawing the Borders: The Discursive Dimension of Landnahme
Thursday 9 July 2020, 09.00-10.30
Organiser: | Stefan Donecker, Institut für Mittelalterforschung, Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien |
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Paper 1513-a | The Christian Appropriation of Pagan Shrines: A Legal and Archaeological Approach, 4th-6th Centuries (Language: English) Index terms: Archaeology - Sites, Law |
Paper 1513-b | Zona Franca: Ideas of Appropriation and Colonisation of Carolingian Borderlands (Language: English) Index terms: Geography and Settlement Studies, Historiography - Medieval, Political Thought |
Paper 1513-c | The Invention of Landnahme: Conceptualising the Appropriation of Land in the Era of European Expansion (Language: English) Index terms: Historiography - Medieval, Historiography - Modern Scholarship, Political Thought |
Abstract | Since antiquity, any appropriation of land ('Landnahme') - be it through settlement, war, or political annexation - needed to be incorporated into an intellectual matrix through which these events were interpreted, evaluated, and narrated. One well-known example for such a narrative template is the biblical tale of the Chosen People and the Promised Land. Borders had to be established and/or relocated, and their existence justified. In a similar vein, the church extended the margins of its spiritual territory into pagan spaces. The session will explore the ideas underpinning the appropriation of territory (worldly or sacred) and the annexation of areas beyond existing borders, employing case studies from different historical contexts (Late Antiquity, Early Middle Ages, Early Modern Era). |