Unfinished Christians: Ritual Objects and Silent Subjects in Late Antiquity
Georgia Frank, "Unfinished Christians: Ritual Objects and Silent Subjects in Late Antiquity"
English | ISBN: 1512823953 | 2023 | 208 pages | PDF | 963 KB
English | ISBN: 1512823953 | 2023 | 208 pages | PDF | 963 KB
What can we know about the everyday experiences of Christians during the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries? How did non-elite men and women, enslaved, freed, and free persons, who did not renounce sex or choose voluntary poverty become Christian? They neither led a religious community nor did they live in entirely Christian settings. In this period, an age marked by “extraordinary” Christians―wonderworking saints, household ascetics, hermits, monks, nuns, pious aristocrats, pilgrims, and bishops―ordinary Christians went about their daily lives, in various occupations, raising families, sharing households, kitchens, and baths in religiously diverse cities. Occasionally they attended church liturgies, sought out local healers, and visited martyrs’ shrines. Barely and rarely mentioned in ancient texts, common Christians remain nameless and undifferentiated.
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