revised 2/06/10
GRADUATE GROUP SEMINAR 655
SPOLIA
Semester II, 2010
Instructor: Dale Kinney
Office: Thomas 231
Office hours: M 12-1, Tu 1-2, and by appointment
Tel.: 610-526-5342
E-mail: [email protected]
Syllabus
JAN. 20
Introduction: Theorizing spolia
Reading:
Dale Kinney, “Spolia in se, spolia in re,” paper delivered at the College Art
Association annual meeting, 2005
Dale Kinney, “The Concept of Spolia,” in A Companion to Medieval Art:
Romanesque and Gothic in Northern Europe, ed. Conrad Rudolph (Oxford 2006)
233-252
JAN. 27
Spolia vs. recycling
Reading:
Dale Kinney, “Spoliation in Medieval Rome,” paper written for the Workshop
“Perspektiven der Spolienforschung – Perspectives of Research on Spolia,”
Topoi Haus Berlin-Mitte, November 2009
Transformations. The Art of Recycling (Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford 2000)
William C. Seitz, The Art of Assemblage (New York, MOMA 1961), 46-50, 72-92,
116-119, 123, 132, 136, 143, 149, 150-152 (notes)
Jenifer Neils, Ancient Greece (Ann Arbor 2008) 172-177
FEB.3
ASTRID LINDENLAUF, Bryn Mawr College: Rebuilding Athens after 480 BC
Reading:
Treatment of debris in the Agora of Athens:
H. A. Thompson, "Athens Faces Adversity," Hesperia 50 (1981) 343-355, esp.
343-346 (online through Tripod)
T. L. Shear, "The Persian Destruction of Athens. Evidence from Agora Deposits,"
Hesperia 62 (1993) 383-482 (online through Tripod)
Treatment of debris on the Acropolis of Athens:
Oath of Plataea (Greek Historical Inscriptions. 404-323 BC., ed. P.J. Rhodes
and R. Osborne [Oxford 2003] 440-448 [no. 88])
M. Korres, "On the North Acropolis Wall," in Excavating Classical Culture: Recent
Archaeological Discoveries in Greece, ed. M. Stamatopoulou and M. Yeroulanou
(Oxford 2002) 179-186, esp. 184-186
G. Ferrari, "The Ancient Temple of the Acropolis at Athens," American Journal of
Archaeology 106 (2002) 11-35 (response: J. Pakkanen, "The Erechtheion
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Construction Work Inventory (IG I 474) and the Dörpfeld Temple," American
Journal of Archaeology 110 [2006] 275-281 (both online through Tripod)
J.M. Hurwit, The Acropolis in the Age of Pericles (Cambridge and New York
2004), ch. 2, 49-86
Construction of spolia wall (‘Themistoklean wall’):
Thucydides I.89-93 (available in the Loeb Classical Library)
FEB. 10
The Arch of Constantine
Reading:
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Jaś Elsner, “From the culture of spolia to the cult of relics. The Arch of
Constantine and the genesis of late antique forms”, in Papers of the British
School of Rome 68 (2000) 149-184
Elizabeth Marlowe, “Framing the Sun: The Arch of Constantine and the Roman
Cityscape,” Art Bulletin 88 (2006) 223-242 (online through Tripod)
Paolo Liverani, “Reading Spolia in Late Antiquity and Contemporary Perception”
(2009)
Dale Kinney, “Portraits and the Constantine Arch: Spolia and Reuse,” paper
delivered at the conference “Recycling Rome,” Norwegian Institute in Rome,
September 2009
FEB. 17
FINBARR BARRY FLOOD, New York University: Spolia in Islamic Monuments
Reading:
“Image against Nature: Spolia as Apotropaia in Byzantium and the Dar al-Islam,”
in Mapping the Gaze – Vision and Visuality in Classical Arab Civilisation (The
Medieval History Journal, 9.1 [2006] 143-66) (online through Tripod; search
Medieval History Journal)
“Pillars, Palimpsests and Princely Practices: Translating the Past in Sultanate
Delhi,” Res, 43 (2003) 95-116
“The Medieval Trophy as an Art Historical Trope: Coptic and Byzantine 'Altars' in
Islamic Contexts,” Muqarnas, 18 (2001), 41-72 (online through Tripod)
“An Ambiguous Aesthetic: Crusader Spolia in Ayyubid Jerusalem,” in Ayyubid
Jerusalem: The Holy City in Context, 1187-1250, ed. R. Hillenbrand and S. Auld,
(2009) 202-215.
FEB. 24
ANNABEL WHARTON, Duke University: The Chicago Tribune Tower
Reading:
“The Tribune Tower: Spolia as Despoliation”
MAR. 3
Group reports:
Group A: Maria Fabricius Hansen, The Eloquence of Appropriation: Prolegomena
to an Understanding of Spolia in Early Christian Rome (2003)
Group B: Michael Greenhalgh, Marble Past, Monumental Present: Building with
Antiquities in the Medieval Mediterranean (2009)
Group C: spolia vs. surplus: Lex Bosman, The Power of Tradition: Spolia in the
Architecture of St. Peter’s in the Vatican (2004) and Hugo Brandenburg, Ancient
Churches of Rome from the Fourth to the Seventh Century (2005)
MAR. 10
SPRING BREAK
MAR. 17
Group D: Relics
Suggested starting points:
Patrick Geary, “Sacred Commodities: The Circulation of Medieval Relics,” in The
Social Life of Things. Commodities in Cultural Perspective (1986) 169-191;
Caroline Walker Bynum, The Resurrection of the Body in Western Christianity,
200-1336 (1995) (online through Tripod); Les reliques. Objets, cultes, symboles,
ed. E. Bozóky and A.-M. Helvétius (1999) (not at Bryn Mawr, but at UPenn); Galit
Noga-Banai, The Trophies of the Martyrs: an Art-historical Study of Early
Christian Silver Reliquaries (2008); Michael J. Roberts, The Humblest Sparrow:
the Poetry of Venantius Fortunatus (2009)
Group E: Heirlooms
Suggested starting points:
Jean Baudrillard, The System of Objects [1968], trans. J. Benedict (1996);
George T. Beech, “The Eleanor of Aquitaine Vase, William IX of Aquitaine, and
Muslim Spain,” Gesta 22 (1993) 3-20; Amy G. Remensnyder, “Legendary
Treasure at Conques: Reliquaries and Imaginative Memory,” Speculum 71 (1996)
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884-906 (online through Tripod); Treasure in the Medieval West, ed. Elizabeth M.
Tyler (2000); Carolyn F. Curasi et al., “Ritual Desire and Ritual Development: An
Examination of Family Heirlooms in Contemporary North American Households,”
in Contemporary Consumption Rituals: a Research Anthology, ed. C.C. Otnes
(2004)
MAR. 24
PETER DeSTAEBLER, New York University: Reuse at Aphrodisias
MAR. 31
My project: 3 students
APR. 7
My project: 3 students
APR. 14
My project: 3 students
APR. 21
My project: 4 students
APR. 28
Wrap-up
ASSIGNMENTS
1. Group reports: The reports consist of a written summary (in the nature of a book review for
Groups A, B and C, and an overview of the topic for Groups D and E) and an in-class
presentation. The written component should be posted on Blackboard by noon on the day before
class so that everyone can read it ahead of time. The in-class portion should begin with
questions and comments from the class on the posting, followed by individual accounts by each
team member of what s/he takes away from the assignment.
2. Final project. The project can be a standard paper (ca. 2,000 words, with standard annotation
and bibliography) or it can take another form, like a website. Projects will be previewed in brief
class presentations on March 31 and April 7, 14, and 21.
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