41615 - History of Christian Late Antiquity

Learning outcomes

Aim of the discipline is to provide students with the key knowledge for the comprehension of late antique roman empire history in the age of its encounter with Christianity, either in social dynamics, cultural choices, and in religious mentality evolutions.
This knowledge provides basis for a correct preservation and appreciation of the late antique and high middle age city (3rd to 8th c.), cities which lay under the medieval and the modern age ones, as well as of the different structures of monastic settlements in the East and in the West, with their social implications and their sea trades.
In particular, the study of hagiography gives the students support instruments for the comprehension of relationships between Christian society and holy men, i.e. the criteria for defining and representing holiness inside Christian society from Late Antiquity to Modern Age. Holiness is a phenomenon which originated cultural heritage (written, monumental and figurative), by the way of a multiplicity of objects: manuscripts, books, buildings, iconographies. The study of this phenomenon gives the students the capabilities for the critical understanding of questions related to the preservation of cultural heritage necessary for its appreciation.
Special attention will be devoted to Sicily and to the territorial culture expressed by its librarian and monumental patrimony.
At the end of the course the student will be able to correctly understand and frame, in its main elements, the historical processes of Late Antiquity, to critically evaluate their impact on the European evolution, and to apply these elements to the analysis of a written source with the aim of better understanding and preserve the cultural heritage, and of correctly communicate the results of his research. The student will also be able to apply these cultural instrument to new contents and problems.

Course contents

The course will be articulated in two parts: Module I - History of Late Antique Christianiy (7 Credits); Module II - Hagiography with special attention to Sicily (5 credits) - Discussion of the Program with the teacher is strongly suggested.

Aim of the History of Late Antique Christianity is to provide students with the key knowledge for the comprehension of late antique Roman empire, in the age of its encounter with Christianity, either in social dynamics, cultural choices, and in religious mentality evolutions.This knowledge provides basis for a correct preservation and appreciation of the late antique and high middle age city (3rd to 8th c.), cities which lay under the medieval and the modern age ones, as well as of the different structures of monastic settlements in the East and in the West.
With special attention to the peculiarity of origins and early stages of the history of Christianity in Sicily (2nd-8th c.), the course will pay special attention to the main Christian symbols related to the sea and to the navigation.
Aim of Hagiography is to support instruments for the comprehension of relationships between Christian society and holy men, i.e. the criteria for defining and representing holiness inside Christian society from Late Antiquity to Modern Age. Holiness is a phoenomenon which originated cultural heritage (written, monumental and figurative), by the way of a multiplicity of objects: manuscripts, books, buildings, iconographies. Once defined the general frame, the course will focus on the history of holiness in Sicily from Late Antiquity to the Early Modern Age.

I Module (7 Credits - I Semester)
The general dynamics of the spread of Christianity, and the main articulations of the ecclesiastical and monastic stuctures between Late Antiquity and the High Middle Age (III-VIII centuries) will be analysed in relation to the specificity of the origins and the first period of Christianity in Sicily.  
With the help of christian Sicily memories, the following will be analysed:

1. Themes and problems of the diffusion of Christianity: relations with different religious cultures of the Roman Empire.
2. Ecclesiastical institution: the structure of the communities, and the relationship between the churches.
3. Christians and political authority: persecutions, martyrdom, liberalization of christian faith.
4. The Christian Emperor.
5. Christian society and the new elites (3rd-5th c.)
6. Doctrinal and disciplinar tensions between 3rd and 5th centuries.
7. Worship organization.
8. Monasticism.
9. The christianisation of new western and eastern peoples.
10. The end of Late Antiquity.
11. Christian symbols of the sea and of navigation.

II Module (5 Credits - II Semester)

1. Definition of christian holiness, and analysis of its historical shaping from Antiquity to Modern Age
2. The history of Sicilian saints in the frame of Sicilian instituitonal and social histories between Late Antiquity and Early Modern Age.
3. Examples of saints' lives and saints' cults in Western Sicily.

Readings/Bibliography

I Modulo

• da Cristianesimo , a cura di G.Filoramo, Bari 2000:       
  1) G. Jossa, Dalle origini al Concilio di Nicea, pp. 1-53;     
  2) S. Pricoco, Dal Concilio di Nicea a Gregorio Magno, pp. 55-103.
• Il Cristianesimo in Sicilia dalle origini a Gregorio Magno, a cura di V. Messana e S. Pricoco, Caltanissetta, Edizioni del Seminario, 1987, pp. 5-125.
• R.M. Carra Bonacasa,  Aspetti della cristianizzazione in Sicilia nell'età bizantina, in Bizantino-Sicula IV. Atti del I Congresso Internazionale di Archeologia della Sicilia bizantina (Coleone 28 luglio-2 agosto 1998), Palermo 2002 (Istituto Siciliano di Studi bizantini e neoellenici, Quaderni, 159), pp. 105-117.
• G. Mammino, Gregorio Magno e la riforma della Chiesa in Sicilia , Catania, Edizioni Arca, 2004.
• F. P. Rizzo, Sicilia Cristiana dal I al V secolo, vol. I, Roma, Giorgio Bretschneider editore, 2005, e  voll. II/1-2, Roma, Giorgio Bretschneider editore, 2006 (Supplementi a Kokalos, 17; Testimonia Siciliae Antiqua I,14).
• R. Rizzo, La cristianizzazione della Sicilia attraverso il “Registrum epistolarum” di gregorio Magno, in Bizantino-Sicula IV. Atti del I Congresso Internazionale di Archeologia della Sicilia bizantina (Coleone 28 luglio-2 agosto 1998), Palermo 2002 (Istituto Siciliano di Studi bizantini e neoellenici, Quaderni, 159), pp. 119-146.
• La Sicilia nella tarda antichità e nell'alto medioevo. Religione e società. Atti del Convegno di studi (Catania-Paternò 24-27 settembre 1997), a cura di R. Barcellona e S. Pricoco, Soveria Mannelli, Rubbettino, 1999
• P. Siniscalco, Il cammino di Cristo nell'Impero Romano, Bari, Laterza, 2000, IV edizione.

II Modulo

• S. Boesch Gajano, La santità, Roma Bari, Laterza, 1999.
• S. Cabibbo, Il Paradiso del Magnifico Regno. Agiografi, santi e culti nella Sicilia spagnola, Roma, Viella, 1996.
• S. Cabibbo, Santa Rosalia tra terra e cielo. Storia, rituali, linguaggi di un culto barocco, Palermo, Sellerio, 2004.
• Euplo e Lucia, 304-2004. Agiografia e tradizioni cultuali in Sicilia. Atti del convegno di studi Catania-Siracusa, 1-2 ottobre 2004, a cura di T. Sardella e G. Zito, Catania - Firenze, Giunti, 2006 (Quaderni di Synaxis 18).
• V. Milazzo, Santuari e storia religiosa: la Sicilia orientale. Dati e spunti di riflessione, in Per una storia dei santuari cristiani d'Italia: approcci regionali, a cura di G. Cracco, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2002, pp. 411-439.
• D. Motta, Percorsi dell'agiografia: societa e cultura nella Sicilia tardoantica e bizantina, Catania 2004.
• S. Pricoco, Un esempio di agiografia regionale:la Sicilia, in Santi e demoni nell'Alto Medioevo occidentale (Secoli V-XI), Spoleto, 1989 (Settimane CISAM, XXXVI), pp. 319-376.
• San Benedetto il Moro: santità, agiografia e primi processi di canonizzazione, a cura di G. Fiume e M. Modica, Palermo 1998.
• Il santo patrono e la città: San Benedetto il Moro: culti, devozioni, strategie di età moderna, a cura di G. Fiume, Venezia 2000.
• M. Stelladoro, Agata la martire: dalla tradizione greca manoscritta, Milano 2005.
• Storia della Sicilia e tradizione agiografica nella Tarda Antichità, a cura di S. Pricoco, Soveria Mannelli, Rubettino, 1988.

Teaching methods

Lectures with readings, presentations and discussions of written and visual sources, and of up-to-date bibliography.

Assessment methods

Oral examinations. It is possible for the students to present and discuss during oral examination a written paper (on arguments agreed with the professor).

Non attending students.
Module I: students are requested to study the assigned pages from the book edited by Messana and Pricoco; and a choice, agreed with the professor, of chapters from "P. Siniscalco, Il cammino di Cristo nell'Impero Romano " or from "Cristianesimo ", up to 50 pages for credit.
Module II: students are requested to study "S. Boesch Gajano, La santità, Roma Bari, Laterza, 1999" and some of the papers listed in bibliography, up to 50 pages for credit.

Teaching tools

Presentation of collection of written sources and specific databases. Display of iconographic sources

Office hours

See the website of Alba Orselli