996009 The uses and communication of the past in late antiquity and the middle ages. (S) (SoSe 2017)

The seminar will start with an introductory lecture on the reception and reuse of history in the early middle ages. This, will serve to illustrate, with a variety of text examples, different methods and related theoretical issues concerning the uses of the past in the early middle ages. For the seminar I should like to invite the participants to contribute short discussion papers in the course of the seminar from their own work, whatever their field (the more interdisciplinary the better - history, art history, palaeography and manuscript studies, law, theology, music, philosophy, literary studies - ) which present examples and analysis in 10-minute case studies of the implications of the great diversity of ways in which the past was used and communicated in the middle ages. Contemporary writers, scribes, artists, thinkers and composers often presented the past, incorporated precedents into their own work, or invoked great events or examples from the past to make particular points to their own contemporaries and contribute to the construction identity, of memory, commemoration, political arguments, and intellectual debates. I ask the paper givers to think about how such examples were communicated, what was being communicated and in what contexts, and how effective such examples might have been. Please propose the topics in advance with a short descriptive paragraph so that I can devise a suitable sequence of the presentations.

Reading for contexualisation of the seminar theme will be circulated in advance. The second day of the seminar will include a further lecture: ‘The damnatio memoriae of Pope Constantine II (768-9)’ which will exemplify some of the things we shall all have been talking about during the seminar.

Day I

Session 1: 11:00 am–12:30 (introductory lecture): The reception and reuse of history in the early middle ages

An illustration, with a variety of text examples, different methods and theoretical issues concerning the uses of the past in the early middle ages.

Discussion: The expectation is that those working in other periods will be able to extrapolate these methods and theoretical issues in their own context, and also draw on the preparatory reading .

Lunch Break

Session 2: 1:30–3:00 pm: case studies and discussion

Coffee Break

Session 3: 3:15–4:45 pm: case studies and discussion Coffee Break
Session 4: 5pm-6pm: (Discussion/Presentations/Case Studies)

Day II

Session 5: 9:15 am–10:45 (2nd lecture): The damnatio memoriae of Pope Constantine II (768-9))

The intention of this lecture is to exemplify some of the issues and methods discussed during the seminar a a whole

Coffee Break

Session 6: 11:00 am–12:30: case studies and discussion

Lunch Break

Session 7: 13:30 pm–15:00: case studies and discussion

Coffee Break

Session 8: 15:15 pm–16:00: Final Discussion