The Lived Ancient Religion project has radically changed perspectives on ancient religions and their supposedly personal or public character. This volume applies and further develops these methodological tools, new perspectives and new questions. The religious transformations of the Roman Imperial period appear in new light and more nuances by comparative confrontation and the integration of many disciplines. The contributions are written by specialists from a variety of disciplinary contexts (Jewish Studies, Theology, Classics, Early Christian Studies) dealing with the history of religion of the Mediterranean, West-Asian, and European area from the (late) Hellenistic period to the (early) Middle Ages and shaped by their intensive exchange. From the point of view of their respective fields of research, the contributors engage with discourses on agency, embodiment, appropriation and experience. They present innovative research in four fields also of theoretical debate, which are "Experiencing the Religious", "Switching the Code", "A Thing Called Body" and "Commemorating the Moment".

Urban Religion is an emerging research field cutting across various social science disciplines, all of them dealing with "lived religion" in contemporary and (mainly) global cities. It describes the reciprocal formation and mutual influence of religion and urbanity in both their material and ideational dimensions. However, this approach, if duly historicized, can be also fruitfully applied to antiquity. Aim of the volume is the analysis of the entanglement of religious communication and city life during an arc of time that is characterised by dramatic and even contradicting developments. Bringing together textual analyses and archaelogical case studies in a comparative perspective, the volume zooms in on the historical context of the advanced imperial and late antique Mediterranean space (2nd-8th centuries CE).

Palmyra has long attracted the attention of the world. Well before its rediscovery in the seventeenth century, the ancient city gained legendary status because of its Queen Zenobia, who in the third century CE rebelled against Rome and expanded Palmyra's territory into what is now modern Turkey and Egypt. Even though Zenobia's empire was a fairly short interlude and the Romans struck back hard, devastating the city, her path to imperial power was one which tells us much about Palmyrene identity in the period before the defeat. While Zenobia has gained renewed interest among both scholars and the press, and while she has served as a political symbol for Syria's president Assad-a statue of her was recently erected in Damascus-the time leading up to her reign still remains underexplored. Pearl of the Desert is the most comprehensive history of this fabled ancient city in English. Assimilating the rich archaeological and literary evidence, Rubina Raja unfolds the story chronologically, from the earliest evidence of settlement in the Bronze Age to Palmyra's rise as an urban center in the late Hellenistic and Roman periods, its destruction by Rome in 273 CE, and its survival in the Byzantine and medieval Islamic periods. The book ends with a discussion of Palmyra's modern rediscovery and, more recently, its chaotic misfortunes during the Syrian civil war when it was used as a symbol of, alternately, the resistance of the rebels, the power of ISIS, and the supremacy of the Syrian state. After several years of destruction and looting, securing of the site has begun as well as planning for its restoration. At this turning point in Palmyra's long history, there is no better time to assess the past, present, and future of this remarkable city.

Providing a comparative treatment of four cities of the eastern Roman empire in the period 50 BC-AD 250 -- Aphrodisias and Ephesos in Turkey, Athens in Greece and Gerasa in Jordan -- this carefully researched study examines the instrumental factors behind regional and local urban developments and what these tell us about regional identity in the areas. It is argued that local communities were responsible for the organisation and development of public space and buildings and took upon themselves this responsibility with a profound understanding of self-representation of urban communities within the framework of the Roman empire, but also with great knowledge of their own local and regional history and traditions. The development of an urban landscape can therefore provide useful information about many aspects of regional identity of a particular society. The book also discusses the influence which the wealth of imperial freedmen had on the development of their native towns once they returned home, arguing that this phenomenon, characteristic of the early imperial period, is more widespread than previously assumed. Furthermore, the impact of individuals benefactions on the urban landscape and how these played into the general local and regional identity is also examined. Through an investigation of the interaction between architectural developments, historical and regional factors, The book provides important insight into the processes nurturing the interactions between the built environment and the social and political culture and urban identity of individual towns in the eastern Roman empire.