Tag: Online Resource

AGAPE Launch: Mapping Greek Patristics in the Early Modern Book World

14 October 2022 marked the official launch of AGAPE, a new open-access database which maps the reception of the Greek Church Fathers in print throughout early modern Europe. AGAPE represents the main outcome of the four-year FNS Ambizione project The Greek Imprint on Europe: Patristics and Publishing in the Early Swiss Reformation, based at the Institut d’histoire de la Réformation, University of Geneva.

agapepatristics.net

In contrast to the Renaissance interest in the pagan Antiquity and classical literature, the highly significant rediscovery of the Greek Fathers remains untold and largely understudied. The number of inaccuracies in the regional, national and collective online repertoires available at present turns bibliographical research into a time-consuming and little-rewarding exercise, severely affecting the development of the subject.

To tackle this issue, AGAPE records any edition of Greek patristic works printed in Europe from 1465 to 1600 in the original language, as well as in Latin and vernacular translations. AGAPE refines the available data and substantially improves their level of detail: not only does it link each work to the ID of the Clavis Patrum Graecorum (CPG), the standard authority in the field, but also thoroughly describes all contents (text as well as paratext) and strictly relies on the analysis of at least one copy of each edition.

AGAPE currently provides access to all editions printed in the fifteenth century (c. 310). Data related to the sixteenth century will be disclosed decade by decade (1501-1510, 1511-1520, 1521-1530 etc.) to ensure reliability.

Users are encouraged to give their feedback and suggestions through the AGAPE email address available in the colophon of the website homepage.

Dumbarton Oaks

More than 9,700 photographs of Late Roman and Byzantine monuments in Syria are being uploaded to Wikimedia Commons, in keeping with our Access Initiative to make Dumbarton Oaks collections and scholarship more broadly available. In 2016, retired historian Frank Kidner donated photographs he had taken of Syrian sites in the 1980s and 1990s to Dumbarton Oaks. Emphasizing ancient villages in the modern-day province Idlib, west of Aleppo along the border with Turkey, the Frank Kidner Photographs collection documents sites of historical and archaeological significance while capturing scenes of daily life. His poignant photographs of children playing among the nearly 2,000-year-old ruins stand in stark contrast to familiar images of the ongoing refugee and displacement crisis stemming from the Syrian Civil War. Kidner created a comprehensive resource—drawing together topography, evidence of communities that once lived in the region, and architectural details—that is useful for researchers and scholars across a breadth of fields.

Dumbarton Oaks

Experience the vibrant colors and array of textures that enlivened interior spaces in early medieval Egypt. Recent exhibition Woven Interiors—a collaboration with The George Washington University Museum and The Textile Museum—presented rare and fragile masterpieces from major American institutions, including many textiles that had never before been exhibited or had remained in storage for decades. Now, download the digital catalogue free of charge to explore some sixty remarkable pieces. Essays from curators Gudrun Bühl, Sumru Belger Krody, and Dumbarton Oaks Assistant Curator of the Byzantine Collection Elizabeth Dospěl Williams highlight major themes of the exhibition, including aesthetics, sacred imagery, comfort at home, and continuity and change. To purchase a hard copy of the catalogue, contact our Museum Shop.

A message from the organisers (note that, if you are too late for this session, the group will contiue to meet on subsequent Sundays):

Dear Colleagues,

In light of all the cancelled talks, conferences, etc. because of the current pandemic, we, Scott Kennedy and Ugo Mondini, have created the International Byzantinist Reading Group for graduate students, post-docs, and faculty as a digital space for discussion among scholars currently scattered around the world. We aim to build solidarity among academics interested in late antique and Byzantine culture as well as to lay the foundation for future exchanges and collaboration.

The Group is now in its fourth meeting. Meetings are held on Sundays at 8 pm (Rome time) via the video-conferencing platform Zoom. Based on the number of participants, we do two kinds of discussion groups during a meeting: (1) small group discussion and (2) large group discussion. Through Zoom, we can breakup meeting participants into groups of 5-6. For the first 30 minutes of the meeting, we break participants up into these small groups, so that everyone has the opportunity to speak and discuss the reading with their group. Then for the last 20-30 minutes of the meeting, we discuss the reading altogether. We use the raise your hand feature on Zoom to moderate discussion for the larger group.

For our next reading session (Sunday, 26th April 2020), we will be moving back to late antiquity with the following reading

A. Kaldellis, “How perilous was it to write political history in late antiquity?”, Studies in Late Antiquity 1 (2017) 38-64

You can find the paper on Kaldellis’ academia.edu account:

If you are interested in participating in this week’s meeting or future meetings of the group, please email Ugo Mondini (ugo.mondini@unimi.it). All participants will be sent an invitation to join the meeting on Sunday via email.

See you next Sunday
Scott Kennedy (scott.kennedy@bilkent.edu.tr)
Ugo Mondini (ugo.mondini@unimi.it)

North of Byzantium (NoB) is a new initiative organized by Maria Alessia Rossi (The Index of Medieval Art) and Alice Isabella Sullivan (Getty/ACLS), and primarily sponsored by the Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture. Through its annual events, NoB explores the rich history, art, and culture of the northern frontiers of the Byzantine Empire in Eastern Europe between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries, and aims to connect students, scholars, teachers, artists, and curators to resources related to the medieval and early modern artistic production of Eastern Europe.

Visit the NoB website and subscribe to receive news and updates.

We are in the process of developing this platform and we would be grateful for any further details and relevant information that we could add under “Resources” and “Related Events” – send us a note at northofbyzantium@gmail.com.