The Fabric of Hellenism: Hellenic Culture and Civic Identity in the Imperial Greek World / Ewen Bowie, Calum Maciver.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Bowie, Ewen, editor.

Maciver, Calum, editor.

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource (712 p.)

Place of Publication:

Edinburgh Edinburgh University Press, [2026]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Explores the cultural and civic identity of the Imperial Greek city, examining what it meant to be Greek in the Roman EmpireOffers an authoritative and wide-ranging series of essays on how Greeks constructed Hellenic identity in the Roman EmpirePresents key studies on Imperial Greek cities and their careful articulation of their place in the Greek pastEncompasses a broad geographical and chronological range of the Hellenic cities of the Roman EmpireHighlights a multidisciplinary approach, drawing on literary, archaeological and art-historical evidenceThis authoritative series of essays brings together a group of eminent scholars engaged with Imperial Greece in the first work of its kind to address the art-history, archaeology, numismatics and prose literature of Imperial Greek cities in one volume, covering the period from pre-Imperial Hellenistic developments to the late third century CE. The book provides a wide coverage and is organised into thematic sections including: the overall context of Greek cities in the Roman Empire and their Hellenistic roots; festival culture; prominent figures who shaped Hellenic identity; some key prose-writers of the period; Hellenism in action in the Roman Empire; and further perspectives on Hellenic culture outside the learned mainstreams.

Contents:

Frontmatter

CONTENTS

List of illustrations

Preface

Notes on contributors

Abbreviations

PART I: INTRODUCTION

1. Introduction / Ewen Bowie

PART II: THE HELLENISTIC PREQUEL

2. Hellenistic civic identities: evolving intersections of Classical Athens, paideia and democracy / Benjamin Gray

3. Acraephia and its material past in the Ptoia of the Late Hellenistic and Early Imperial Period / Paraskevi Martzavou

PART III: EPHEBES AND FESTIVALS

4. Religious visibility and eusebeia according to ancestral customs / Athena Kavoulaki

5. Gymnasia, ephebates and Hellenic cultural identity in Imperial Achaea / Matthew P. Evans

6. Celebrating Pythian Games: Hellenism and local identity in civic festivals of Asia Minor / Zahra Newby

PART IV: THE CLAUDII ATTICI

7. Claudius Atticus, father of Herodes, and the Spartan agoge: new evidence / Antony Spawforth

8. Bodies, landscape and entanglement: reading Herodes Atticus Marathonian monuments through IG II2 3606 / Alexia Petsalis-Diomidis

PART V: THE PERSPECTIVES OF PHILOSOPHERS, SOPHISTS AND LITTERATEURS

9. Eternal City? Delphi, the civic and Hellenism in Plutarch / Judith Mossman

10. Defining Hellenism: the ideal Greek city according to Dio and Plutarch / Thomas Schmidt

11. The pride of being Hellenic in Prusa ad Olympum and Rhodes / Anne Gangloff

12. The fabric of Hellenism in civic life in Alexandria according to Strabo, Dio of Prusa and Plutarch / Lucia Athanassaki

13. Questioning Greek civic identity at the Imperial symposium: Plutarch and Athenaeus / Katerina Oikonomopoulou

14. Aelius Aristides on Smyrna and Rhodes / Michael Trapp

15. Imperial Cyzicus: Strabo, Tryphaena, Aristides / Janet Downie

16. Festival athletics in the Imagines of the Elder Philostratus / Jas Elsner, Michael Squire

17. Hellenic culture and identity in the Epistles and in other minor works of the Philostratean corpus / Owen Hodkinson

18. Attic landscapes reimagined: Alciphrons Letters and the city-praise tradition / Jason Konig

PART VI: HELLENIC TRADITIONS IN ACTION

19. The tomb and Library of Celsus at Ephesus: converting Roman power into local privilege / R. R. R. Smith

20. Money talks: communicating by coinage / Ewen Bowie

PART VII: GREEK NOVELS

21. Aphrodisias, Latin poetry and the early Greek novels: the case of the Ninus and Chione romances / Daniel Jolowicz

22. The elite, the demos, and the balance of power in the cities of the ancient Greek novels (ca. firstthird centuries ad) / Sophie Lalanne

PART VIII: OUTSIDE THE IVORY TOWERS

23. Seriously pederastic: the pseudo-Lucianic Amores and the sexual politics of Roman Greece / Tim Whitmarsh

24. The fabric of Hellenism and popular culture in the Imperial Greek city: materiality and resistance / Lucy Grig

25. Christian Greek literature in the tradition of Hellenic paideia in the mid-third century / Stephen Mitchell

26. Thinking about the future with Greek cities / Estelle Strazdins

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed April 28 2026)

ISBN:

1-3995-5247-3