Workshop: "Temporality of Sacred Spaces in Antiquity"
November 2, 2022 – November 4, 2022
Organizers: Prof. Dr. Monika Trümper (Freie Universität Berlin), Dr. Chiara Blasetti Fantauzzi (Freie Universität Berlin / Einstein Center Chronoi), Dr. Cinzia Pappi (Freie Universität Berlin / Einstein Center Chronoi)
Venue: Einstein Center Chronoi
Sacred spaces are defined by each society according to their cultural processes, as well as by their
political and social environment. They are characterized by location and temporality, combining both
the perception of a sacred place, as a human built environment, and the temporality of ritual activities.
Ritually defined spaces are strictly related to temporal units, of different extension, related either to
the developments of local cultic calendars or to wider socio-political contexts. Temporally fixed ritual
performances involve both spatial shifts and coexistence or, sometimes, exclusion of sacred spaces,
e.g. seasonal function of specific sacred spaces, such as extra-muros cultic places, palatial areas,
combined with temporally limited or unlimited fruition of sacred spaces, e.g. persistence or changes
in the fruition of cultic centers, driven by changes of the cultural landscape.
Cultic places, e.g. single temples, palatial chapels, or templar complexes, combined with the
complexity of religious activities in which they are performed, served not only as places of
communication with gods, but also as places of social and political relevance, shaped mainly by the
political developments and by several socio-economic factors. Investigations of such a complexity of
aspects under the perspective of the long durée contributed to the development of several models of cultural resilience, defined not only by temporal continuity, expressed in different ways of
appropriation and adaptation, but also marked by states of temporal or definitive abandonment.
At the same time, the concept of temporality encompasses that of synchronicity and asynchronicity.
The (a)synchronous fruition of sacred places by different ethnic groups, as reflected in cyclic ritual
activities, votive offerings, and epigraphic evidence, as well as the (a)synchronous development of
cultic mobility and spatial displacement of cults.
The workshop aims to focus on different aspects of temporality of sacred spaces and attempts to
compare a selection of case-studies from different contexts of the Mediterranean Area and the Middle East.
The program will be available soon, please check back for updates.