"Second only to Rome in the ancient world, Alexandria was home to many of late antiquity’s most brilliant writers, philosophers, and theologians—among them Philo, Origen, Arius, Athanasius, Hypatia, Cyril, and John Philoponus. Now, in Alexandria in Late Antiquity, Christopher Haas places these figures within the physical and social context of Alexandria’s bustling urban milieu.
Haas explores the broad avenues and back alleys of Alexandria’s neighborhoods, its suburbs and waterfront, and aspects of material culture that underlay Alexandrian social and intellectual life. Moving between the city’s Jewish, pagan, and Christian blocs, he details the fiercely competitive nature of Alexandrian social dynamics. In contrast to the notion that Alexandria’s diverse communities coexisted peaceably, Haas finds that struggles for social dominance and cultural hegemony often resulted in violence and bloodshed.
Haas concludes that Alexandrian society achieved a certain stability and reintegration—a process that resulted in the transformation of Alexandrian civic identity during the crucial centuries between antiquity and the Middle Ages". From The Publisher
Ancient Times Work
An Autodatic Selection
The Publisher's description is quite accurate. I would observe this work assumes one has a significant knowledge of the period. I was put off by his referring to anyone neither a Jew or a Christian as a "pagan".
vllanova history professor of ancient history
1 comment:
What a scholarly choice. I can imagine you finishing a film and deciding, well, now let's get serious.
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