Purity and impurity in the ancient cultures of the Mediterranean world

• Applicant: Dr. Bernadette Descharmes
• Subject Area: Ancient History
• Term: since 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 520760855

Purity and impurity have been investigated in classical scholarship almost exclusively in the context of religious ideas and ritual practices. The interdisciplinary and inter-epochal network aims to broaden the perspective to a considerable extent. In addition to the ritual and religious aspects of the phenomenon, it will examine the material, natural and spatial, cultural and anthropological, political and moral dimensions of purity and impurity. With the participation of various disciplines (ancient history, classical philology, classical archaeology, theology), it aims to explore (A) contexts and discourses, in which ideas and attributions of purity and impurity occurred, and examine, (B) whether purity and pollution continuously worked as structuring categories throughout the cultures of the ancient Mediterranean world. The research period spans from classical Greece to the later Roman Empire. The network represents the plurality of research approaches and perspectives on im/purity in four key areas: 1. body and personal hygiene 2. environment and environmental pollution 3. morality, society and politics 4. ritual and religion. These key issues organise the framework of the network and groups the participating researchers into four clusters. The different dimensions of the phenomenon permanently intertwine and relate to each other. This can be illustrated, for example, by the fact that ritual purity always has a physical or spatial dimension. It is important to point out such connections between the clusters. The central questions within the individual clusters relate to a) specific cultural conceptions, terms and spaces of purity and impurity, b) practices of purification/cleansing and pollution, c) cultural regulations and their underlying values, d) transgressions as well as the unwinding of disturbances within the categorical system of purity and impurity. The network promotes the development of new perspectives and research associations through the critical reflection and discussion of the research findings of individual members and clusters. Furthermore, the interdisciplinary and inter-epochal structure of the network stimulates innovative impulses for the participating research areas and disciplines. Finally, the special structure of the network enables to survey and to reveal the complex interrelationships and particularities of ancient ideas of purity and impurity regarding period and culture. E.

• DFG Programme: Scientific Networks