Bevölkerungsgeschichte - Gallien - Siedlungsgeschichte - Tempel - Ritus - Religion - Götter.

Large state temples in ancient Egypt were vast agricultural estates, with interests in mining, trading, and other economic activities. The temple itself served as the mansion or palace of the deity to whom the estate belonged, and much of the ritual in temples was devoted to offering a representative sample of goods to the gods. After ritual performances, produce was paid as wages to priests and temple staff and presented as offerings to private mortuary establishments. This redistribution became a daily ritual in which many basic necessities of life for elite Egyptians were produced. This book evaluates the influence of common temple rituals not only on the day to day lives of ancient Egyptians, but also on their special events, economics, and politics. Author Katherine Eaton argues that a study of these daily rites ought to be the first step in analyzing the structure of more complex societal processes.

This study offers a new interpretation for the construction of new temples in Rome. By emphasizing the role of the Roman Senate, it offers a reassessment of the relationship between the individual and the community. This publication has also been published in paperback, please click here for details.

Understanding Rituals explores how ritual can be understood within the framework of contemporary social anthropology, and shows that ritual is now one of the most fertile fields of anthropological research. The contributors demonstrate how rituals create and maintain - or transform - a society's cultural identity and social relations. By examining specific rituals from various theoretical viewpoints, they reveal the ultimate and contradictory values to which each society as a whole is attached.

Everlasting Egypt: Kemetic Rituals for the Gods continues Richard Reidys groundbreaking work and collects more temple rituals from Egypt. The author presents rites for personal and group use, augmenting and updating those in his first volume, Eternal Egypt: Ancient Rituals for the Modern World. The guidebook: Presents over 37 rituals for Gods, Goddesses, and Annual and Lunar Festivals in a form designed to assist practitioners in restoring the ancient rites of Egypt; Provides for modern usage, with key ritual texts coming from authenticated ancient sources, as well as commentaries and background information; Includes a comprehensive Introduction with a model for organizing a modern Kemetic Temple or Group; Includes updated Egyptian vocalizations and a pronunciation key; Offers practical information for conducting these rituals in todays world. These ritual texts reveal once more the deeply spiritual understanding of humanitys relationship to divinity that characterized the ancient Egyptian sense of the sacred. Cover Image: Ritual scene from the Temple of Hathor at Deir el Medina. Ptolemaic Period. Matthew Whealton, 2018.

This book is a vivid reconstruction of ancient Egyptian religious rituals that were enacted in temples, tombs, and private homes.

In this groundbreaking study, Michael Willis examines how the gods of early Hinduism came to be established in temples, how their cults were organized, and how the ruling elite supported their worship. Examining the emergence of these key historical developments in the fourth and fifth centuries, Willis combines Sanskrit textual evidence with archaeological data from inscriptions, sculptures, temples, and sacred sites. The centre-piece of this study is Udayagiri in central India, the only surviving imperial site of the Gupta dynasty. Through a judicious use of landscape archaeology and archaeo-astronomy, Willis reconstructs how Udayagiri was connected to the Festival of the Rainy Season and the Royal Consecration. Under Gupta patronage, these rituals were integrated into the cult of Vishnu, a deity regarded as the source of creation and of cosmic time. As special devotees of Vishnu, the Gupta kings used Udayagiri to advertise their unique devotional relationship with him. Through his meticulous study of the site, its sculptures and its inscriptions, Willis shows how the Guptas presented themselves as universal sovereigns and how they advanced new systems of religious patronage that shaped the world of medieval India.

In this book, Lauren Ristvet rethinks the narratives of state formation by investigating the interconnections between ritual, performance, and politics in the ancient Near East. She draws on a wide range of archaeological, iconographic, and cuneiform sources to show how ritual performance was not set apart from the real practice of politics; it was politics. Rituals provided an opportunity for elites and ordinary people to negotiate political authority. Descriptions of rituals from three periods explore the networks of signification that informed different societies. From circa 2600 to 2200 BC, pilgrimage made kingdoms out of previously isolated villages. Similarly, from circa 1900 to 1700 BC, commemorative ceremonies legitimated new political dynasties by connecting them to a shared past. Finally, in the Hellenistic period, the traditional Babylonian Akitu festival was an occasion for Greek-speaking kings to show that they were Babylonian and for Babylonian priests to gain significant power.

This book reorients the study of sacrifice, examining the locus of ritual action - the altars of Republican Rome and Latium.

First published in 2001. This is a vivid account of what their gods meant to the Romans from archaic times to late antiquity, and an exploration of the rites and rituals connected to them. After an extensive introduction into the nature of classical religion, the book is divided into three pain main parts: religions of the family and land; religions of the city; and religions of the empire. The book ends with the rise and impact Christianity. Using archaeological and epigraphic evidence, and drawling extensively on a wide range of relevant literary material, this book is ideally suited for undergraduate courses in the history of Rome and its religions. Its urbane style and lightly worn scholarship will broaden its appeal to the large number of non-academic readers with a serious interest in the classical world.