Sacred Space and Levantine Landscapes: Phoenician Religion on the Ground

he Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations invites you to attend an upcoming public lecture with Dr. Helen Dixon, Assistant Professor of History, East Carolina University, entitled Sacred Space and Levantine Landscapes: Phoenician Religion on the Ground.

Where: William James Hall, Room 105
33 Kirkland St, Cambridge, MA 02138

When:   Monday, November 6^th, 5:00 pm

Abstract: Previous scholarship on Phoenician temples and shrines from the first millennium BCE coastal Levant has, for the most part, taken a typological approach, comparing the archaeological footprints and architectural features of these structures, and often setting them as foils to biblical or classical exemplars. Taking a more wholistic view of sacred landscapes (including caves, other natural features, and tombs) at the city-state or regional level reveals surprising interconnections between contemporaneous cemeteries and places of worship. This study introduces several case studies which suggest an intriguing collective conceptual mapping of salt and fresh waters, sand and stone, light and odors in sacred spaces, as well as diachronic changes in preferences in reaction to shifting centers of power both along the Levantine coast and across the Mediterranean world.

Speaker biography:  Helen Dixon is an interdisciplinary scholar of the ancient Mediterranean world, specializing in Phoenician history and material culture in the first millennium BCE. She teaches Near Eastern, Greek, and Public History at East Carolina University in the University of North Carolina system. She has held previous appointments at Wofford College, the University of Helsinki, and North Carolina State University, following her PhD in Near Eastern Studies at the University of Michigan.

Note: The lecture will be recorded.