Ghent
University, in cooperation with the Université libre de Bruxelles,
plans to organise on the 17th and 18th December 2015 a conference on the
specific problems of Epigraphy on Ceramics. The aim of this conference
is to prepare a synthetic volume on this topic of research. The
contributions should provide a first basis for a collective analysis of
this particular type of inscriptions. The acts of the conference will
thereafter be structured as a single and detailed companion to Epigraphy
on Ceramics.
In all periods
from the Bronze Age to the Late Antiquity, throughout the Mediterranean
Basin, ceramics were frequently used as a material support for
inscriptions. Precise genres of texts used to be written on ceramics,
painted or engraved either before or after firing, as for example
economic or more widely speaking administrative data, religious
dedications, marks of property. These so-called minor genres are well
documented, but, partly because the corresponding texts are short and
often difficult to read, the inscriptions of ceramics have not been as
thoroughly studied in past research as other epigraphic genres,
especially monumental inscriptions.
At
least five kinds of approaches should be followed in the analysis of
inscriptions on ceramics. First of all, the texts whose content can be
broadly classified as administrative provide important data for the
history of ancient economies. Furthermore, as many of these texts were
written on the behalf or within the frame of ancient armies, they are
also a major source for military history with all its components, from
the study of Rangordnung to the analysis of the movements and strategies
of ancient states. A third approach takes into account the inscriptions
found in sanctuaries, mainly religious dedications, as a source for the
history of religion. Two other genres, marks of property and gift
dedications, allows for significant conclusions on the social structures
and relationships in various societies. Last of all, independently from
the epigraphic genre of the texts, inscriptions on ceramics are also an
important source for the linguistic and sociolinguistic study of
ancient societies.
The
conference and the subsequent volume should include synthetic reports on
the main aspects of these topics of research in the geographical and
chronological frame of the Mediterranean Basin in antiquity. Keynote
speakers will read general introductions to each of these five issues.
Scholars who should be interested in any of these five paths of research
are kindly invited to submit an abstract for a synthetic talk, taking
into account either a wide geographical area or a particularly relevant
period or a significant transversal feature shared by all or by many of
the inscriptions in question. As the conference is organised as a
preliminary step to the publication of a collective synthesis, the
participants should send a first version of their paper to the
organisers before the conference itself; this preliminary text should
circulate among the participants, in order to develop further
discussion, before the participants provide a definitive version of the
chapter they have undertaken to write.
Gent, the 6th November 2014
Wim Broekaert (UGent), Alain Delattre (ULB), and Emmanuel Dupraz (ULB)
———-
Deadlines
Submitting of the abstracts: 31th January 2015
Selection of the abstracts: 31th March 2015
Submission of a preliminary text (to be circulated): 30th November 2015
Conference: 17th and 18th December 2015
Definitive version of the papers: before the 31th January 2016