Mutilated and Re-Used Inscriptions in Gerasa

I have previously mentioned a couple of inscriptions that were desecrated by early Christians. A recent article in Journal of Early Christian Studies by Jason Moralee now presents some further examples from Gerasa (modern Jerash in Jordan – where a Danish-Jordanian project has been excavating an early mosque for a couple of years), especifically the […]

Scythopolis II: A Mutilated Statue of Bacchus

Excavations in 1990 in the Eastern Bathhouse at Scythopolis, introduced in yesterday’s post, revealed a statue of Dionysos. It was found in the same layer as the mutilated and discarded statue of Venus. Here it is again the genitalia that have been attacked, whereas the damage to the head is more characteristic of that of […]

The Erechtheion and the Process of Christianization

I have previously talked about the Parthenon and the possibility that its metopes were damaged by early Christians. Just this week Bill Caraher (thanks!) put me on to the work of Alexandra Lesk, whose PhD dissertation was on the Erechteion and its reception over 2500 years. I was, of course, especially happy to read her […]

Statue Bases and Mutilated Inscriptions

Congratulations to Jakob (Munk Højte), whose PhD dissertation “Roman Imperial Statue Bases from Augustus to Commodus” now finally is available from Aarhus University Press in the new-format Aarhus Studies in Mediterranean Antiquity (ASMA) vol. 7. As Philip (Harland) has shown in a series of recent posts epigraphy is an incredibly valuable source to the ancient […]