Overview

In the ancient world, letter-writing not only forged connections between individuals, but also helped to construct and cultivate group-identities and communities. This volume establishes the interface of epistolary discourse and group formation as a vital but hitherto neglected area of research and explores the interrelation of letters and communities in case studies covering four key cultural configurations: Greece, Rome, Judaism, and Christianity. Drawing on the expertise of a wide range of scholars across a variety of fields, it offers a multi-disciplinary approach to the socio-political dimensions of letter-writing in the ancient world.

Full Product Details

Author:   Paola Ceccarelli (University College London) ,  Lutz Doering (University of Haifa Israel) ,  Thorsten Fogen (Durham University) ,  Ingo Gildenhard (University of Cambridge Fellow King's College Cambridge)
Publisher:   Oxford University Press
Imprint:   Oxford University Press
Dimensions:   Width: 16.30cm , Height: 2.80cm , Length: 24.10cm
Weight:   0.736kg
ISBN:  

9780198804208

ISBN 10:   0198804202
Pages:   384
Publication Date:   30 August 2018
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly ,  Undergraduate
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   To order  
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Table of Contents

Frontmatter List of Contributors 0: Paola Ceccarelli, Lutz Doering, Thorsten Foegen, and Ingo Gildenhard: Introduction A: Theory and Practice of Epistolary Communication 1: Thorsten Foegen: Ancient Approaches to Letter-Writing and the Configuration of Communities through Epistles 2: Bianca-Jeanette Schroeder: Couriers and Conventions in Cicero's Epistolary Network B: Configurations of Power and Epistolary Communication: From Greece to Rome 3: Sian Lewis: Tyrants, Letters, and Legitimacy 4: Manuela Mari: Powers in Dialogue: The Letters and diagrammata of Macedonian Kings to Local Communities 5: Paola Ceccarelli: Letters and Decrees: Diplomatic Protocols in the Hellenistic Period 6: Robin Osborne: Letters, Diplomacy, and the Roman Conquest of Greece 7: Ingo Gildenhard: A Republic in Letters: Epistolary Communities in Cicero s Correspondence, 49-43 BCE C: Letters and Communities in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity 8: Sebastian Gratz: The Literary and Ideological Character of the Letters in Ezra 4-7 9: Philip Alexander: 'From me, Jerusalem, the Holy City, to you Alexandria in Egypt, my Sister ....' (Bavli Sanhedrin 107b): The Role of Letters in Power Relations between 'Centre' and 'Periphery' in Judaism in the Hellenistic, Roman, and Early Islamic Periods 10: Lutz Doering: Configuring Addressee Communities in Ancient Jewish Letters: The Case of the Epistle of Baruch (2 Baruch 78-86) 11: John M. G. Barclay: The Letters of Paul and the Construction of Early Christian Networks 12: Karl-Wilhelm Niebuhr: The Communities Configured in the Letter of James D: Envoi 13: Catharine Edwards: Conversing with the Absent, Corresponding with the Dead: Friendship and Philosophical Community in Seneca's Letters Endmatter General Index Index locorum Index of Authors

Reviews

This is a rich collection that offers new insights into an important strand of historical evidence for the creation and maintenance of communities within the ancient societies of the Mediterranean world, and exposition of the ways in which letters can reveal history. * Carol Atack, Classics for all * Students and scholars of various types of ancient letters will find much that is useful in this volume ... this exciting new volume nicely illuminates issues of major historiographical significance which will no doubt stimulate fascinating interdisciplinary conversations about the sociological and communal character of ancient letters. * Elizabeth Mattingly Conner, N/A, Bryn Mawr Classical Review *

This is a rich collection that offers new insights into an important strand of historical evidence for the creation and maintenance of communities within the ancient societies of the Mediterranean world, and exposition of the ways in which letters can reveal history. * Carol Atack, Classics for all *

Author Information

Paola Ceccarelli is Lecturer in Classical Greek History at University College London. Before joining UCL in 2015, she held university posts in Switzerland (Lausanne, 1991-93), Italy (L'Aquila, 1994-2006), and England (Durham, 2006-12), as well as research fellowships in France (EHESS, 2009), the United States (Center for Hellenic Studies, 1998-99), Germany (Konstanz, 2009; Heidelberg, 2011), and Cambridge (2013-2015). Her main areas of interest include concepts of space and identity in the ancient world, ancient performance culture, and Greek historiography, and she is currently working on an edition, including translation and commentary, of the Seleukid Royal Correspondence. Lutz Doering is Professor of New Testament and Ancient Judaism at the University of Munster and heads the Institutum Judaicum Delitzschianum, an institute dedicated to research on Judaism in antiquity and Christian-Jewish relations. Previously, he taught at the University of Jena (1999-2003), King's College London (2004-2009), and Durham University (2009-2014); in 2011/12, he held an AHRC Research Fellowship and in 2014/15 he was a Fellow at the Israel Institute for Advanced Studies, Jerusalem. Since 2014, he has led a project within the Munster Cluster of Excellence, 'Religion and Politics', on integration and diversification in Palestinian Judaism during the Hellenistic-Roman period, focusing both on the Dead Sea Scrolls and on the early history of the synagogue. Thorsten Foegen is Associate Professor (Reader) in Classics at Durham University. Previously he taught at the Humboldt University of Berlin (2002-09. He held research fellowships at the Center for Hellenic Studies in Washington, D.C. (2005/06), the University of California, Los Angeles (2007/08), the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study (2015/16), and the 'Internationales Kolleg Morphomata' at the University of Cologne (2016/17). His research focuses on Latin literature, especially from the late Republic until the early Empire, with particular interests in ancient technical texts, epistolography, animals in antiquity, and the history of linguistic ideas. Ingo Gildenhard is Reader in Classics and the Classical Tradition at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of King's College. Before taking up his current post he also taught at King's College London (1999-2006) and Durham University (2006-2012), and held research fellowships at Clare Hall, Cambridge (2006) and the University of Konstanz (2009); from 2009-12, he was the recipient of a major research fellowship of the Leverhulme Trust. His research interests cover the fields of Latin literature (especially Cicero, Virgil, and Ovid), Roman culture, and the classical tradition, on which he has (co-)authored and edited several volumes and articles.

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