Coptic-Ethiopian Artistic Interactions: The Issues of the Nursing Virgin and St George Slaying the Dragon (original) (raw)

A whole World: Reading Global Byzantium through Coptic Art

This paper explores the influence of the global culture of Byzantium on the social life of Egyptians in the Early Byzantine period, focusing on the appearance of common women on Coptic artefacts as one of the implications of this influence. The communication between Egypt and other parts of the empire secured its economic and cultural integration into the broader Byzantine culture, which viewed the Mediterranean provinces as parts of a whole world. To common women in Egypt, imperial women were the most significant manifestation of this global culture. They were presented by the imperial house, and perceived by locals, as paradigms of feminine power because of their reputed wealth, virtue, nobility and wisdom. Therefore, visual representations of women on Coptic artefacts display signs of feminine power that were inspired by the appearance of imperial women. This feature underlines the significance of Coptic art as a supplementary source for women’s histories, which have been neglected, biased or omitted in contemporary literary sources.

Coptic Culture: Past, Present, and Future

"In May 2008, the Coptic Orthodox Centre in Stevenage, UK organized a conference on Coptic Culture: Past, Present, and Future. The conference aimed to highlight the contributions and achievements of one of the most obscure periods of Egyptian history: the Coptic Period. The importance of this period lies in its valuable contributions to some of the most formative theological debates of Christianity. Strictly defined as a Late Antique culture, spanning only the third to the seventh centuries AD, the heritage of the Coptic Period still survives today in the artistic expression, liturgical services, and heritage of millions of Egyptian Christians who live in Egypt and abroad. This period’s lasting contributions, however, remain underappreciated, and many of its aspects remain unclear, or unknown to the general public. For the first time, the conference at the Coptic Centre brought together, specialists working on all aspects of Coptic Culture, from its earliest phases to the present day. One of the aims of the conference was to highlight new research on Coptic art, writings, and archaeology. By bringing together specialists, academics, and Coptic clergy, the conference fostered an active discussion of what defined Coptic identity in centuries past, and what it means to be Coptic in contemporary culture, both in Egypt and abroad. It is important that we draw on, understand, and appreciate the rich cultural heritage of this period as we look to our past to inform our present and define our future. The conference drew scholars from Australia, Canada, Egypt, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the USA. Their papers were organized along 5 general thematic blocks that dealt with (1) The Egyptian roots of Coptic culture; (2) How do we know what we know: Archaeological Sites and Museum Collections; (3) Aspects of Early and Medieval Coptic Culture: Case Studies; (4) Current Trends in Coptic Studies; and (5) Coptic Culture Today and where it’s heading. This volume contains their contributions."

A note on two unpublished Coptic textiles from Belgrade, Zograf 41 (2017), 19-25.

This text presents to the academic public two so-far unpublished pieces from the collection of Coptic textiles housed at the Museum of Applied Art in Belgrade. The aim of this text is to identify the motifs represented on them, as well as to propose a possible iconographic and iconological reading of their imagery. Both pieces of Coptic textile presented here display a number of iconographic subjects typical of Late Antique Egypt such as the Dionysiac thiasus and other subjects related to Dionysos – vines, lions, panthers and other animals, as well as the so-called Coptic horseman. They are typical of the visual idiom which survived from the classical period into Late Antique Coptic Egypt and was taking on new meanings in the context of religious and cultural syncretism.