BMCR 2025.01.41

Pilgrims in place, pilgrims in motion: sacred travel in the ancient Mediterranean

, , Pilgrims in place, pilgrims in motion: sacred travel in the ancient Mediterranean. Aarhus studies in Mediterranean antiquity, 15. Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 2024. Pp. 287. ISBN 9788771845433.

[Authors and titles are listed at the end of the review]

 

The present volume brings together revised papers presented originally at the 2017 symposium in Aarhus, “Comparativism and the Study of Ancient Mediterranean Pilgrimage.” It is the outcome of a collaborative research project, “The Emergence of Sacred Travel: Experience, Economy and Connectivity in Ancient Mediterranean Pilgrimage” (2013-2017). The contributions in the present volume, the title of which differs from that of the symposium, explore pilgrimage in the ancient Mediterranean from the perspective of the relationship between movement and location, offering a reflective and comparative approach to the tension between sacred places, such as sanctuaries and shrines, and journeys, regardless of length and including the landscapes traversed. The studies of pilgrimage in this volume encourage readers not to focus exclusively on the experiences of the pilgrims or the economies of mobility; these are valid topics but have been well explored in early studies of pilgrimage. Rather, readers are encouraged to approach pilgrimage from a much broader perspective through the institutions, landscapes, stories, and commercial, social, and political factors that fostered regular pilgrimage.

The volume is divided into three parts. Part I consists of chapters with distinct methodological perspectives on pilgrimage, which is an inherently ambiguous concept. The authors embrace the ambiguity in addressing a cluster of themes related to pilgrimage. In the introduction, the editors, Collar and Myrup Kristensen, explain their methodological choice of comparativist studies, particularly those informed by the so-called New Mobilities Paradigm, which has been developed since the early 2000s in response to the processes of globalization and neo-liberalisation. This framework extends the study of pilgrimage from the destinations to the ways in which mobility generates space and offers opportunities to explore how the world is experienced and sensed. By choosing these methodologies, the editors are able to incorporate pilgrimage into a wider landscape that includes sanctuaries and cultic places. Also in this introductory chapter, the editors illustrate their methodology by presenting a case study of place and motion in the immersive spaces at the sanctuary of Asklepios in Epidaurus, particularly those created during the fourth century BCE. David Frankfurter critiques the term “pilgrimage,” helping readers grasp the difficulties that its use entails. In particular, he contests the emphasis put on the journey and the transformations that pilgrims experience as a result of the journey (i.e., its conceptualisation as “a rite of passage”), arguing that “shrine visitation” is a more accurate description of individuals’ experiences of travelling to visit sacred places. Ian Rutherford, who has authored several studies of pilgrimage, offers a methodological discussion of the advantages of adopting comparative approaches, including a global framework and consideration of the near-contemporary Near East, to advance the study of ancient pilgrimage. He argues convincingly for the advantages of a comparative approach to pilgrimage studies as a means to unify the theories of religious movements and to bring together analyses on various scales that are typically discussed in parallel, such as place and motion and the locations and landscapes of sanctuary sites.

Part II of the volume consists of ten chapters presenting case studies of pilgrimage that feature considerable methodological and geographic diversity. Matthew Dillon argues that, although the motivations to take part in pilgrimage were pious, pilgrimage could be disorderly, with pilgrims misbehaving, for example, by jostling to be amongst the first to consult an oracle or receive a response. Through the case study of the sanctuary of Apollo Korope in Magnesia in northern Greece, he provides unique and detailed insights into law enforcement at this pilgrimage site to regulate access to the sanctuary. Panayiotis Christoforou maps places and images associated with the numinous presence of Roman emperors. His exploration of pilgrimage draws attention to the ways in which individuals experienced an emperor’s divinity in places where they could seek asylum. In Anna Collar explores religious responses to limits on mobility through a study of individuals with little control over their ability to move or refuse to move, normally subaltern populations. She discusses aspects of phenomenological engagement with place and emotions as well as material culture theory to show that the process of religious place-making undertaken by Roman soldiers serving far from their home communities, specifically, at Hadrian’s Wall and on the frontiers of the Euphrates, helped them to maintain their sense of belonging to Roman world through the re-enactment of religious practices. Collar thus offers a useful way forward in approaching the lived experiences of migrants in the past and the ways in which religious practices were transmitted from one place to another.

Isabel Köster studies the various motivations to visit a sanctuary, focusing on examples from the Roman period and medieval times, and shows that the removal of sacred objects by pilgrims was not necessarily seen in a negative light since the divine power was thought to be involved in the process. She demonstrates that, although such acts could harm the original community, they could also enable the establishment of cults elsewhere through the transplantation and use of stolen objects to establish new cults. Comparisons are established with Bronze Age Mesopotamia to demonstrate how theft by pilgrims could be seen as a pious act. Matthew R. Anderson focuses on instability in Jerusalem and the emerging Christian community in the mid-first century. Showing that, at the core of Paul’s pilgrimage in this period, were questions such as identity, belonging, connectivity, and transgression, he examines Paul’s understudied final journey to Jerusalem as presented in his letters. He describes Paul’s trip as ingenious in terms of bringing to Jerusalem a small group of believers from a range of economic, social, and religious backgrounds around the Aegean. The network of Jews and non-Jews in the Mediterranean involved in this pilgrimage was caught up in and crushed by larger political events in Judea in the following year. Anderson observes that, centuries later, non-Jewish Christian pilgrims visited Jerusalem to retrace Paul’s steps, and he also touches on the conceptualisation of pilgrimage, proposing a four-part structure consisting of body, terrain, mobility, and narrative to help define the term.

Rebecca Sweetman discusses the Cyclades in Late Antiquity, specifically, the connections that pilgrimages can foster among locations, including places not formally designated as religious. She considers the topography of the Cycladic sanctuaries and describes changes in the places of worship associated with the transition from polytheism to Christianity. Amelia Brown focuses on a group of people who experienced multiple mobilities, looking at the sailors who transported goods and were involved in the dissemination of cults of saints across Byzantine seascapes and the contribution of their pilgrimages to the infrastructure of the Christian imperium. She examines surviving examples of religious practices associated with the sea that were tied to specific saints along the new Christian pilgrimage routes and along Imperial routes to and from Constantinople and the transformation of local saints into pan-Christian saints. She shows that the diffusion of Christianity was shaped by pre-existing pagan maritime cultic practices with respect to nodes and seascapes. Naomi Koltun-Fromm focuses on Jerusalem in the early Islamic period, presenting the case of a Persian named Isma’ili Naser-e-Khosraw, a pilgrim who spent seven years travelling through the Muslin world to visit sacred sites, including Jerusalem, to which he was attracted by its lengthy sacred history, in particular, as the place where God interacted with figures such as David and Solomon. Yana Tchekhanovets analyses the prayers and messages of Armenian and Georgian visitors to Jerusalem, Nazareth, and the Sinai Peninsula in the fifth to eleventh centuries to consider the influence of pilgrimages to the Holy Land on imitations of the architectural elements of churches in the Caucasus as well as the importance of objects acquired during these pilgrimages. Sarah Midford concludes Part II with a study of pilgrimage to two sites of famous battles in western Turkey, the Trojan War and Gallipoli, where immense slaughter occurred during World War I.

Part III consists of two chapters presenting responses and conclusions. Simon Coleman presents responses to pilgrimage from an anthropological perspective, pointing out that the methodological comparativism adopted across the volume serves to relativise pilgrimage by granting it a broader significance as a social phenomenon. Elisa Uusimäki discusses pilgrimage from the perspective of theological issues related to pilgrimage and rites of passage.

This volume offers useful reflections on ancient pilgrimage through an exploration of the ambiguities and multiplicity of meanings of the term over time and across space, and it benefits from coherent dialogue among the various chapters. The New Mobilities Paradigm serves to re-signify approaches to ancient pilgrimage as a framework that takes into account the nature of movement as an experience and kind of space created by people, their stories, and the wider landscape through which they move. The application of contemporary theories to the ancient world results in a nuanced view of pilgrimage that encompasses a wide range of activities and places. The case studies presented in this book suggest the immense possibilities for exploring the dichotomies that interweave mobility and place and will doubtless inspire further research. I conclude by noting that, although the volume focuses on pilgrimage in the ancient Mediterranean, it will be of interest not only to scholars of the ancient world generally but to all with an interest in mobility and traveling.

 

Authors and Titles

PART I. Methodological Dialogues on Pilgrimage

  1. Place and Motion in the Study of Ancient Mediterranean Pilgrimage, Anna Collar and Troels Myrup Kristensen
  2. Getting There: Reframing Pilgrimage from Process to Site, David Frankfurter
  3. The Uses of Comparison in Pilgrimage Studies, Ian Rutherford

PART II. Pilgrims, Place and Motion: Case Studies

  1. Disorderly Pilgrims at the Oracular Sanctuary of Apollo Koropaios, Matthew Dillon
  2. The Emperor as a Place of Pilgrimage, Panayiotis Christoforou
  3. Virtual Pilgrim? Unchosen Mobility and Religious Place-Making in the Roman Army, Anna Collar
  4. Thieving Pilgrims between Rome and the Middle Ages, Isabel Köster
  5. Failed Connectivities: Paul’s Collection and his Final Pilgrimage to Jerusalem, Matthew R. Anderson
  6. Pilgrims, Piety and Pragmatism: Roman Sanctuaries and Late Antique Churches in the Cyclades, Rebecca Sweetman
  7. The Rites of the (Late) Ancient Mariners: Professional and Casual Sailors as Christian Pilgrims in the Late Antique Mediterranean, Amelia R. Brown
  8. Jerusalem Mythologies: Pilgrims and the Dome of the Rock: Naser-e Khosraw’s Reflections on Jerusalem from his Book of Travels, the Safarnama, Naomi Koltun-Fromm
  9. Jerusalem Agents: Armenian and Georgian Pilgrimage to Byzantine Palestine, Yana Tchekhanovets
  10. The Stratification of Memory in the Dardanelles: From Trojan War to First World War Pilgrimage in the Region, Sarah Midford

PART III. Concluding Responses

  1. Pilgrimage: An Unruly Method?, Simon Coleman
  2. Sacred Travel and Transformation Beyond the “Heroic Quest” Paradigm, Elisa Uusimäki