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PSCO Presentation: 20 February, 2020

Tales from the Crypt: Interactions between the Living and the Dead in the Ancient Mediterranean

Dr. Liana Brent (Wolf Humanities Center) and Dr. Melissa S. Cradic (Katz Center)

Presentation

Ancient Mediterranean societies practiced various customs for the removal of the dead from the world of the living. Once the dead were established in their new ‘homes,’ the boundaries between the living and the dead were far from fixed. Drawing on archaeological evidence from the Bronze Age and Roman worlds, this presentation compares approaches to the excavation and interpretation of ancient burial practices. How do we make sense of disturbed, damaged, and fragmentary bodies and burials? What do we learn about the living based on how they treated the dead? A comparative approach to ancient funerary practices sheds light on how the same mortuary activities can vary between regions and cultures, and it challenges us to reflect on the methods that we use to write narratives of the past.

Speakers

Dr. Liana Brent is a Mellon Post-doctoral fellow in the Wolf Humanities Center (Penn).

Dr. Melissa S. Cradic is a fellow at the Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies (Penn).

Meeting and Dining

All members of the university and broader academic community are welcome to attend!

The seminar will run from 7:00-8:30 PM in Cohen 204 (across the hall from the 2nd floor lounge of Claudia Cohen Hall, where we normally meet), with an informal dinner in Houston Hall beforehand at 6:00 pm. Please RSVP to Theodora Naqvi (tnaqvi@sas) or Jill Stinchcomb (jstin@sas).