Religion in Rural Late-Antique Iberia

This volume examines the dynamism and complexity of religious expressions in rural settings across Late Antique Iberia. Chapters demonstrate that the rural world was a dynamic space which formed an integral part of the multi-directional process of religious exchange on the Iberian Peninsula in Late Antiquity, thus refuting the idea that rural spaces, and in turn rural religious practices, were static and unchanging, anchored in tradition and resistant to any process of religious change. The chapters present a series of case studies that examine phenomena such as the multi-locality of certain religious groups that moved periodically between the city and the countryside, the strategies that local agents used to shape religious expressions in rural areas (significantly marked by the permeability between the urban and rural worlds), the creation of religious landscapes as spaces imbued with cultural meanings by religious authorities that conceive the rural world as a place of refuge and spiritual experience, or the analysis of trans-local religious networks that connected rural and urban settings, facilitating the transmission of rituals and practices between these two spheres. Finally, both the introduction and the final chapter discuss the concept of "rural religion" and its applicability to the sphere of Late Antiquity. This volume provides a much-needed resource for students and scholars of religion in Late Antique Iberia, and in the post-Roman world more broadly, as well as anyone working on rural religion in the ancient, Late Antique and Medieval worlds.

José Carlos López-Gómez is a research fellow at the University of Málaga and a member of the research group DINORAMA -Dynamism and Religious Innovation in the Ancient World-. His research focuses on the study of Roman polytheism and Christianization processes in the Iberian Peninsula during Late Antiquity. Antón Alvar Nuño is associate professor at the University of Málaga and a member of the research group DINORAMA -Dynamism and Religious Innovation in the Ancient World-. He has specialized in the study of ancient magic and subaltern religion in the late antique west from a bottom-up perspective.

1. Religion in Rural in Late Antique Iberia. An Introduction - José Carlos López-Gómez and Antón Alvar Nuño; 2. Spontaneous Worship or Control of Piety: Pilgrims of Proximity in Late Antique Hispania - Pablo C. Díaz Martínez; 3. Transhumance and Devotions: Shepherds and their Saints in a Rural Territory. A Case Study from Southern Italy (Gargano) - Laura Carnevale; 4. Servitude and Salvation: The Church in Rural Hispania - David Addison; 5. Christian Worship in Rural Hispania: Re-evaluating Archaeological Evidence on Oratories, Mausolea and Churches in Late Antique Villas - Alexandra Chavarría; 6. Cemeteries, Churches and other Religious Manifestations in the Late Roman and Visigothic Rural Environment of the Middle Ebro Valley: An Archaeological Approach - Pilar Diarte Blasco and Marta Pérez-Polo; 7. Sacrarium nullo paratu extrinsecus: The Slow Arrival of Christianity in the Lusitanian Countryside - André Carneiro, Mónica Rolo and Pedro Trapero Fernández; 8. Managing Death in Visigothic Iberia (6th-7th Centuries): Religious and Institutional Issues - Pablo Poveda-Arias; 9. The Ecclesiastical Criticism of Rural Priests in Hispania during Late Antiquity - Juan Antonio Jiménez Sánchez; 10. Pimenius and his Network: The Glocal Dimension of Rural Iberian Churches - Antón Alvar Nuño and José Carlos López-Gómez; 11. The Agenda of Saintmakers. The Case of the Vita Aemiliani in Visigothic Hispania - Santiago Castellanos; 12. Metaphorical Landscapes in Rural Hispania. The Transformation of religious Geographies in Visigothic Hagiography - Clelia Martínez Maza and Rocío Suárez Vallejo; 13. Exploring the Genealogy of "Rural Religion" between the Cult of "Nature" and Subaltern Religion. A History of Religions Perspective - Chiara Cremonesi.