Isis in a Global Empire: Greek Identity through Egyptian Religion in Roman Greece

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In Isis in a Global Empire, Lindsey Mazurek explores the growing popularity of Egyptian gods and its impact on Greek identity in the Roman Empire. Bringing together archaeological, art historical, and textual evidence, she demonstrates how the diverse devotees of gods such as Isis and Sarapis considered Greek ethnicity in ways that differed significantly from those of the Greek male elites whose opinions have long shaped our understanding of Roman Greece. These ideas were expressed in various ways - sculptures of Egyptian deities rendered in a Greek style, hymns to Isis that grounded her in Greek geography and mythology, funerary portraits that depicted devotees dressed as Isis, and sanctuaries that used natural and artistic features to evoke stereotypes of the Nile. Mazurek's volume offers a fresh, material history of ancient globalization, one that highlights the role that religion played in the self-identification of provincial Romans and their place in the Mediterranean world. Cover Half-title Title page Copyright information Contents List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Chapter One Egyptian Religion and the Problem of Greekness Isis in Greece: Framing the Question Setting the Scene: Greece under Roman Rule Viewership, Objects, and the Search for Ethnicity The Problem of Greekness The Beginnings Hellenistic Greekness: The Case of Ptolemaic Egypt Defining and Contesting Greekness in Roman Greece Chapter Outlines Chapter Two Building Groupness: Isis' Devotees and Their Communities Constructing Groupness: Joining, Belonging, and Agency Apuleius as a Source for Isiac Rituals Rites as Social Structures: Defining Experiences of Time and Place Festivals Cult Associations as Social Groups Regulations as Common Social Action Building and Ordering Belonging Groupness as Event: Initiation as Cultic Paideia Practicing Family and Community at Roman Dion The Anthestii The Herennii Tying the Web: Migration and a Global Greek Isiac Community Human Migrations Textual Migrations Shaping Isiac Groupness Chapter Three Deterritorializing Theology?: Bringing the Egyptian Gods to Greece From the Aegean to the Nile: Knowledge, Stereotype, and Interaction Building Classical Ideals of Egypt After Herodotus: Egypt in the Roman Mind Sarapis as Boundary Crosser From One, Many: Isis in the Greek Aretalogies Plutarch and Apuleius: Isis as a Middle Platonic Deity Epiphanic Expectations in Isiac Texts and Objects Bringing a Global Goddess to Greece Chapter Four Self-understanding: Visualizing Isis in Stone The Nile's Gods in White Marble Sarapis Isis Color and Legibility in Isiac Ideal Images Polysemy on Display: The Sarapeum at Thessaloniki Excavation and Identification Ideal Statues in the Thessaloniki Sarapeum Synnaoi Theoi: Worshiping Egyptian and Greek Gods Together Divinity and Ethnicity: The Materiality of Sculptural Programs Chapter Five Self-fashioning: Dressing the Devotees of Isis in Athenian Portraits Gender and Ethnicity in Provincial Portraiture Women and Men in Palmyrene Portraits Audience and Display Isiac Grave Reliefs for Women Isiac Funerary Reliefs in an Athenian Context Isiac Dress for Men? Looking Outward, Looking Inward Chapter Six Self-location: Isiac Sanctuaries and Nilotic Fictions The Nilotic Aesthetic Greek Nilotica The Sophist's Nile at Marathon: Herodes Atticus' Sanctuary The Egyptian Sanctuary at Marathon: Date and Use Architecture Time and Style in the Ideal Sculpture Gods, Portraits, and Roman Imperial Networks Sensory Reproductions: Water Features as Niles in Greek Sanctuaries Provincializing the Nile Chapter Seven Conclusion: Graecia Capta, Aegypta Capta Mediating a New Greekness: Isis, Egypt, and Fashioning a Greek Identity Lucius and the Statue, Revisited Appendix Notes Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Bibliography Index