Ex Voto: Votive Giving Across Cultures (Bard Graduate Center - Cultural Histories of the Material World)

Derived from Latin ex voto suscepto in pursuance of a vow, an ex voto embodies the hopes, dreams, and anxieties of the person who deposits it. Almost anything, regardless of size, weight, form, or original function, can become a votive object. Ultimately, the category refers to a subset of the material world in which a thing is not necessarily made to be a votive, but instead becomes charged with votive meaning once dedicated to a deity or deities. This volume, one of the first collections devoted exclusively to the subject, builds on the assumption that a shared conceptual framework underpins votive objects, and that by merit of their consecration they have become a category representing a special stage in the life of a material. The contributors to this comparative study examine ex votos across a range of locations and time periods, including the classical Mediterranean world, medieval Europe, the period of the Catholic Reform, and on to Mexico, Shinto and Buddhist Japan, and Muslim Iran. Voluminous and diverse, Ex Voto will appeal in a wide range of fields, including history, religion, and anthropology. -- Amazon.com Introduction : ex-voto as material culture / Ittai Weinryb -- Fractured narratives : writing the biography of a votive offering / Jessica Hughes -- Between the body and the divine : healing votives from classical and hellenistic Greece / Alexia Petsalis-Diomidis -- Italian ex-votos and "pro-anima" images in the late middle ages / Michele Bacci -- Renaissance perspectives on classical antique votive practices / Megan Holmes -- Humble offerings : votive panel paintings in renaissance Italy / Fredrika Jacobs -- Donated before the gods : popular display of Edo-period 'Ema' Tablets / Hilary K. Snow -- Presence and narrative in the ex-votos of New Spain / Clara Bargellini -- Vows on water : ship ex-votos as things, metaphors, and mediators of communality / Hannah Baader -- 'Nazr' necessities : votive practices and objects in Iranian Muharram ceremonies / Christiane Gruber -- Procreative giving : votive wombs and the study of ex-votos / Ittai Weinryb.