ACOR Proudly Presents:
Tuesday, December 10, 6pm at ACOR
Reception to follow
About the Lecture:
In the first centuries AD, everybody in the area of Jordan south of the Wadi Mujib were devotees of some Nabataean or Roman religion or another. Christians first appear in the early fourth century and grew in numbers as the pagans largely disappeared by the early fifth century. The Christians formed the overwhelming majority of the population throughout the fifth, sixth and early seventh centuries and continued to thrive for a few generations after the Muslim Conquests of the 630s. As the Muslim population grew and became the majority, the Christians declined and largely faded from view by the ninth and tenth centuries, leaving a Christian population attested in only a few places in the Crusader period. After the Crusades, the Christians dwindled into the minority population found today. This talk seeks to investigate this two-fold change in religious affiliation from paganism to Christianity to Islam within some five hundred years through the analysis of historical sources and archaeological evidence.
About the Lecturer:
Dr. Robert Schick has been working in Jordan since 1980 as an archaeologist and historian, with a focus on the Byzantine and Islamic periods. He has also researched the Islamic sites and monuments in Jerusalem for many years and taught archaeology courses at al-Quds University and Bir Zeit University between 1995 and 1998. He taught Islamic Studies in Hyderabad, India between 2000–2006. Since 2014, he has been based in Germany at the University of Mainz, researching early Christianity in southern Jordan, the topic of this lecture.
Books on Sale
Please note that attendees of this event are eligible to purchase the 2001 ACOR Publication The Petra Church by Z.T. Fiema, C. Kanellopoulos, T. Waliszewski, and R. Schick at a special discounted price of 70JD (100 USD). For more information about this and other titles, please click here.
Further Information: Facebook
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Please note that construction on University Street may require you to leave extra time to arrive to ACOR.Â
