Book contents
- The Death of Myth on Roman Sarcophagi
- Greek Culture in the Roman World
- The Death of Myth on Roman Sarcophagi
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Acknowledgments
- Note on the Text
- Introduction
- One Myth a Casualty of Christianity
- Two Bucolic Sarcophagi and Elite Retreat
- Three Refuge from the Third-Century Crisis
- Four Culture, Status, and Rising Populism
- Five Myth Abstracted
- Six Distinguishing the Mythological
- Seven Conclusion
- Eight Coda
- Works Cited
- Index of Objects by City/Museum
- General Index
One - Myth a Casualty of Christianity
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 January 2023
- The Death of Myth on Roman Sarcophagi
- Greek Culture in the Roman World
- The Death of Myth on Roman Sarcophagi
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Acknowledgments
- Note on the Text
- Introduction
- One Myth a Casualty of Christianity
- Two Bucolic Sarcophagi and Elite Retreat
- Three Refuge from the Third-Century Crisis
- Four Culture, Status, and Rising Populism
- Five Myth Abstracted
- Six Distinguishing the Mythological
- Seven Conclusion
- Eight Coda
- Works Cited
- Index of Objects by City/Museum
- General Index
Summary
Was the demythologization of Roman sarcophagus reliefs driven by a burgeoning Christian faith? To put it more succinctly, was myth a casualty of Christianity? This long-standing theory proposes that sarcophagi featuring mythless imagery – seasons, shepherds, philosophers, and hunters – gained in popularity because such imagery was religiously neutral and thus capable of appealing to both traditional “pagan” and new Christian clientele alike, a flexibility that the old mythological sarcophagi did not have. Testing this hypothesis requires that we consider Christian numbers and purchasing power in the city of Rome in the third century, as well as the question of who, exactly, was carving early Christian sarcophagi.
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- The Death of Myth on Roman SarcophagiAllegory and Visual Narrative in the Late Empire, pp. 50 - 73Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2022