CONVENERS

Prof. Dr. Christian Frevel | christian.frevel@rub.de

Dr. Katharina Pyschny | katharina.pyschny@rub.de

ORGANIZATION

Alexandra Redel, M.A. | | Phone +49 234 32-23341ceres-coordination-office@rub.de

Käte Hamburger Kolleg Dynamics in the History of Religions between Asia and Europe,

Trade Going Up in Smoke? Contact and Exchange in Incense Practices The Southern Levant as Case Study

14 & 15 June 2016 CERES Conference Room Ruhrpott| |

Conveners:

Christian Frevel & Katharina Pyschny

Cover: Incense

Photo taken by Peter Presslein, CC BY-SA 3.0,

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=436381

By Car: The quickest route is via the motorway junction Bochum/Witten, where the autobahns A43 and A44 meet. Simply take the exit Bochum-Querenburg, follow the signs to Bochum Zentrum to the cross-roads of Universitätsstraße and Wasser-straße. Take a u-turn left and continue this road for approx. 200 metres, until you reach Universitätsstraße 90a. Parking is possible in front and behind the building.

DIRECTIONS

Public Transportation: Take the U35 CampusLinie towards Hustadt from the center of Bochum or Hauptbahnhof (central station) and get off at the station Wasserstraße. From there turn right and cross the street, then left cross the crossroads passing by the copy shop at the corner and continue for approx. 200 metres until you reach Universitätsstraße 90a.

U35 station Wasserstrasse

Käte Hamburger Kolleg

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TRADE GOING UP IN SMOKE? -

CONTACT AND EXCHANGE IN INCENSE PRACTICES

THE SOUTHERN LEVANT AS CASE STUDY

Tuesday, 14 June 2016

Incense is one of the most prominent practices related to the senses. Flavour, smell, fumigation, or stimulating incense – the spectrum of functions and uses of incense is very broad in a variety of religions. Incense use in ancient rituals is attested by texts, iconography and material culture. This widespread evidence makes “incense” an appropriate case study in religious studies.

The use of incense was heavily driven by cross-cultural contact: aromas, incense and spices from Southern Arabia on the so called “incense trade route” (“Weihrauchstraße”) to the North and West, or the western trade route which ended up in Gaza. The material culture of incense burners, incense cups, incense altars, shovels, and thymiateria is very rich and shows more than one dimension of mutual influence in terms of types, motives, techniques, and usage contexts. The religious aspect was often neglected in former studies, but the role of incense in trade fosters the question, whether religious influences also shaped rituals, practice, intention etc.

The workshop aims at figuring out the role of incense in religious practice in the Southern Levant in the first millennium B.C.E. and the role of merchants, hubs and “aroma”-emporia. It will address the South Arabian trade route (“Weihrauchstraße”) and its role in religious exchange processes.

Furthermore, it will raise questions of materiality and practice as well as issues of conceptions and terms. It will ask about the place(s) of odor in antiquity (households, industrial zones and cultic places) as well as focus on tools as indicators of trade and exchange (shovels, cups, stands, pans, altars etc.). By doing so the contact dimension of incense, sensory perception, and religion, the material and economic aspects of exchange etc. will be discussed.

Wednesday, 15 June 2016

:

01:00 - 01:45 Contact and Exchange in Incense Practices of the Southern Levant – Introductory Remarks Christian Frevel (Bochum) & Katharina Pyschny (Bochum/Lausanne)

01:45 - 02:45 Trade in Southern Palestine: Conditions for Incense Trade during Changing Periods Wolfgang Zwickel (Mainz)

02:45 - 03:15 Coffee Break

03:15 - 04:15 The Meaning of Burning Incense in the Phoenician Culture Bärbel Morstadt (Bochum)

04:15 - 05:15 The Function of Stone Altars and Tripod Cups Michele Daviau (Toronto)

05:15 - 06:15 The Use of Incense in the Zoroastrian Rituals and Its Eschatological MeaningGötz König (Berlin)

06:30 Dinner

09:00 - 10:00 Incense Practice in the Family and Household Religion of the Levant in the Iron Age Rüdiger Schmitt (Münster)

10:00 - 11:00 Incense in the Rhetoric and Political Economy of the Aaronide DynastiesJames Watts (Syracuse, NY/Bochum)

11:00 - 11:30 Coffee Break

11:30 - 12:30 The Uses of Incense in the Hebrew Bible and Related Traditions Christophe Nihan (Lausanne)

12:30 - 02:00 Lunch

02:00 - 03:00 Incense-Burning-Rituals in the Old Testament Traditions and in the Material Culture of Israel/Palestine Katharina Pyschny (Bochum/Lausanne)

03:00 - 04:00 Concluding Discussion