J. Rasmus Brandt - Death and Changing Rituals: Function and Meaning in Ancient Funerary Practices

Published in the United Kingdom in 2015 by
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Oxbow Books and the individual contributors 2015

Paperback Edition: ISBN 978-1-78297-639-4
Digital Edition: ISBN 978-1-78297-640-0
Kindle Edition: ISBN 978-1-78297-641-7

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Brandt, J. Rasmus.
Death and changing rituals : function and meaning in ancient funerary practices / edited by J. Rasmus
Brandt, Hkon Roland and Marina Prusac.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-78297-639-4
1. Funeral rites and ceremonies, Ancient. I. Roland, Hkon. II. Prusac, Marina. III. Title.
GT3170.B73 2014
393.93093--dc23

2014032027

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system, without permission from the publisher in writing.

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Front cover: Military grave stele, of Quintus Metius. From Salona. Split, Archaeological museum. Courtesy
of the museum. Photo: Tonci eer.
The frieze in the upper band: Tarquinia, Tomba del Barone, rear wall. Courtesy of the Ministero per i Beni e
le Attivit Culturali, Soprintendenza per i beni archeologici dellEtruria Meridionale, Museo di Villa Giulia.
Photo no. MAX 7068 c.

CONTENTS

J. Rasmus Brandt

Liv Nilsson Stutz

Andrea Dolfini

Chris Fowler

Heinrich Hrke & Andrej Belinskij

J. Rasmus Brandt

Sven Ahrens

John Pearce

Marina Prusac

Eric Rebillard

Irina Achim

William Bowden

Terje Oestigaard

Roberta Gilchrist

Sarah Tarlow

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The present publication collects 14 out of 18 papers delivered at the international conference, Ritual Changes, Changing Rituals: Function and Meaning in Ancient Funerary Practices, held 2225 May, 2008 at the Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway. The editors regret the long production time due to unforeseen health problems among two of its members. The final editing of the manuscript was finished by January 2012.

The conference was born out of an exhibition at the Museum of Cultural History, Dead Classic, which had opened just a month earlier. The exhibition was a presentation of artefacts connected with death from the Mediterranean area in the Museums possession and was the largest exhibition of its kind so far in Norway. The idea was to bring together both prehistorical and historical archaeologists to discuss theoretical and methodological issues for the purpose of testing diverging perspectives on different phenomena of change, both of a short and a long time duration, visible in either archaeological or textual material alone, or in combination. The wide approach to the subject encouraged discussions across some of the traditional chronological and material limits, and called the attention to various observances in past societies, such as beliefs, rituals, performances, commemorations, social norms and transitions, behavioural and mental states, identities, treatment of bodies, pollution and purification, taboos, symbols, traditions, and others. The keywords were ritual, change, and transformation processes. The speakers were personally invited and came from Croatia, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Norway, Romania, and Sweden, though not all working in their country of origin.

The conference was made possible thanks to a generous contribution from the Museum of Cultural History and additional support from The Department of Archaeology, Conservation and History, both at the University of Oslo. The same institutions gave further financial support for the copy-editing of the texts delivered for publication. We are very grateful to both institutions and hope that the present publication can be considered as a small, but visible token of money well spent.

We owe special thanks to the former Director, Prof. em. Egil Mikkelsen, from the Museum of Cultural History, for hosting the Ritual Changes-conference and providing financial guarantees that made the conference possible. Furthermore we wish to thank Research Advisor, Arve Monsen for enthusiastic support, Johnny Kreutz for the conference website and the administrative staff at the Museum for practical assistance.

Our thanks are also extended to Dr Alex Chepstow-Lusty, who diligently copy-edited all the papers written by the non-native English speakers, and to Dr Adam Lindhagen for help with the index. For any mistakes which remain the editors take the blame.

The publication was already at an advanced stage of preparation when the first publisher realised that the publication was beyond their capacity and we were suggested to use Oxbow Books instead. Sincere thanks go to the staff of Oxbow Books for their professional handling of this publication from the minute they took over production to the final product. These expressions of thanks are also extended to the anonymous peer-reviewers, who made very valuable suggestions to improve the quality of the publication. In particular, we should like to thank Ms Clare Litt and Julie Blackmore, who patiently has supported this publication project in its final, important stages of production.

The Norwegian Research Council generously covered some of the publication costs, a necessity to see the book safely through to print.

Last, but not least, we should like to thank all the participants, who all contributed in making the seminar a successful event, and in particular to those who found the time and energy to rewrite their papers into what makes up this book. We were very touched by their many expressions of thanks afterwards. We will also use this opportunity to forward an excuse to the authors (and to the readers) for the unexpected vicissitudes of production, which has delayed the publication unnecessarily.

J. Rasmus Brandt, Marina Prusac and Hkon Roland

Oslo, January 2013

CONTRIBUTORS

IRINA ACHIM is Researcher at the Department of Greek and Roman Archaeology and Epigraphy at the Archaeological Institute Vasile Parvan in Bucharest. She has a Doctoral degree in archaeology from the University of Paris 1, Panthon-Sorbonne and is presently in charge of a project on the Crypt Basilica of Histria, Constanta County, Bucharest.

SVEN AHRENS is Senior Curator at the Norwegian Maritime Museum, Oslo. He has a Doctoral degree in Classical Archaeology from Humboldt University in Berlin and is presently leading several archaeological projects in Oslo.

ANDREJ BELINSKIJ is working at the Unitary Government Enterprise Heritage in Russia. He has among other themes published on Neolithic monuments in the Northern Caucasus.

WILL BOWDEN is Lecturer in Roman Archaeology, University of Nottingham. He has a Doctoral degree from the University of East Anglia and has previously been Lecturer at the University of Reading. A large part of his research is based on the archaeologies of Albania.