CfP: Archaeological indicators for the identification of medieval Jewish Populations

Call for papers:

Archaeological indicators for the identification of medieval Jewish Populations

Organisers: Jorge A. Eiroa (Univ. Murcia) and Marco Milanese (Univ. degli Studi di Sassari)

European Association of Archaeologists Conference, Barcelona (5-8 September 2018)

This session is part of the Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologist (EAA) which will take place at Barcelona, from 5 to 8 September 2018.

Please, submit abstracts (250 words aprox.) via the official EAA-website https://www.e-a-a.org/EAA2018/ The deadline is 15th February 2018

In recent years, the study of medieval Jewish communities from the archaeological record has changed significatly. In the past, all the studies have been focuses almost exclusively on epigraphy, cemeteries and religious buildings (synagogues and ritual baths or mikva'ot), but in the last decade new strategies of research are making it possible to identify the presence of Jewish population in medieval archaeological contexts (distinct from religious or funeraru). An innovative research line aims to an archaeological identification of Jewish presence with intensive topographic use of written sources in relation to stratigraphic contexts. In the other hand, despite the difficulties in characterizing the material culture of Jewish communities (if that were possible), the identification of ceramic Hanukkah oil lamps in domestic contexts of the development of zooarchaeological analysis (that enables the identification of diets in alimentary practices typical of Jewish populations, Sechita and Kashrut) are giving successful results in some Spanish, Frech or Italian archaeological sites. This session will deal with the results of the application of these research strategies and any other that allows the identification of the presence of Jewish populations in domestic contexts, through the study of concrete cases related to archaeological sites of any European country as well as the North of Africa

Please submit paper abstract to session #551 by February 15th 2018 (https://www.e-a-a.org/EAA2018/)