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Maritime Viewscapes and the Material Religion of Levantine Seafarers
Friends of ñ present the next webinar in the 2023-2024 season on October 5 2023, at 3:00 pm EDT, presented by Professor Aaron Brody moderated by Dr. Caroline Sauvage. Ancient seafarers faced dangers and fears posed by the sea and hazards of sailing. Accordingly, specialized sacred beliefs and ritual practices developed among Levantine mariners, who are the focus of this study, which were a subset of terrestrial religion. Sailors honored deities whose maritime, celestial, or meteorological attributes could either benefit or devastate a voyage. While on land, these divine patrons were worshipped in harbor temples and promontory shrines, sometimes with maritime votives. While at sea, divine protection came from the ships themselves, which were considered to be imbued with the spirit of a deity; the vessels also contained sacred spaces that allowed for continued contact with their divine patrons.
Mariners performed religious ceremonies to enlist and ensure sacred safeguarding and success for their voyages. Maritime features were also part of the funerary practices and mortuary rituals of seafarers. These specialized sacred beliefs and ritual practices were generated by the liminality of the deep and the unique uncertainties and perils at sea, and aided in Levantine maritime exploration, commercial exchanges, and Phoenician settlement that eventually spread throughout the Mediterranean basin and beyond to the Atlantic coasts of Iberia and Morocco.
The webinar will conclude with a live Q&A session led by Dr. Caroline Sauvage of Loyola Marymount University.
Aaron Brody is the Robert and Kathryn Riddell Professor of Bible and Archaeology and Director of the Badè Museum at Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, California. He has excavated primarily at harbor sites in Israel, including Tel Nami, Ashkelon, Dor, and Tel Akko; and participated in projects in the Negev and Akko Plain and with the Ohlone-Muwekma at sites in northern California. He has held fellowships at the Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem and the American Center of Research in Amman. Recent publications have focused on the topics of household religion, metallurgy, and interregional trade and economy at Tell en-Nasbeh, from holdings in the Badè and Rockefeller Museums.Professor Brody has longstanding research interests on Levantine seafarers, women’s religion and the sea, and underwater, deep-water, and harbor archaeology. He is a co-editor of a new volume, No Place Like Home: Ancient Near Eastern Houses and Households, recently published by Archaeopress. The research he is presenting today is from a chapter he authored in the Handbook of Material Religion in the Ancient Near East, edited by Nicola Laneri and Sharon Steadman, published earlier this year by Bloomsbury Academic press. That chapter and today’s talk are entitled “Maritime Viewscapes and the Material Religion of Levantine Seafarers”.
This webinar will be recorded and all paid registrants will be sent a link to view the recording.
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