Framing Power in Visigothic Society : Discourses, Devices, and Artifacts

"This volume examines how power was framed in Visigothic society and how a diverse population with a complex and often conflicting cultural inheritance was thereby held together as a single kingdom. Indeed, through this dynamic process a new, early medieval society emerged. Understanding this transformation is no simple matter, as it involved the deployment of an array of political and cultural resources: the production of knowledge, the appropriation of Patristic literature, controlling and administering rural populations, reconceptualizing the sacred, capital punishment and exile, controlling the manufacture of currency, and defining Visigothic society in relation to other polities such as the neighbouring Byzantine state. In order to achieve an analysis of these different phenomena, this volume brings together researchers from a variety of disciplines. This interdisciplinary approach therefore expands the available sources and reformulates topics of traditional scholarship in order to engage with a renewal of Visigothic Studies and reformulate the paradigm of study itself. As a result, this volume rethinks frameworks of power in the Peninsula along not only historical and archaeological but also anthropological terms, presenting the reader with a new understanding of Iberian society as a whole."--Quatrième de couverture Cover 1 Table of Contents 6 1. Texts, Discourses, and Devices: Reading Visigothic Society Today 10 Eleonora Dell’ Elicine and Céline Martin 10 2. Presence of Augustine of Hippo in Isidore of Seville: Some Provisional Remarks 24 Jacques Elfassi 24 3. The Bishop and the Word. Isidore of Seville and the Production of Meaning 52 Dolores Castro 52 4. Unearthing Peasant Societies: Historiography and Recent Contributions in the Archaeology of the Rural World during Visigothic Times 76 Carlos Tejerizo 76 5. Excolentes sacra fontium vel arborum. Pagan Cults, Kinship, and Regimes of Sacralization in the Visigothic Kingdom of Toledo 110 Eleonora Dell’ Elicine 110 6. Ervig and Capital Penalties: The Way of Exile 134 Céline Martin 134 7. ‘Put All Your Trust in Ansemundus’. A Look at Distrust in Visigothic-Byzantine Diplomatic Relations 160 Margarita Vallejo 160 8. Visigothic Currency: Recent Developments and Data for Its Study 182 Ruth Pliego 182 Index 218 List of Illustrations 7 Plates 7 Pl. 1. Julio Martínez Santa Olalla, pictured with a snake. Originally from the Museo Arqueológico Nacional. 83 Pl. 2. Distribution map of ‘Visigothic’ funerary context (Palol, 1966). 84 Pl. 3. Cuarto de las Hoyas (Fabián, et al., 1985). 86 Pl. 4. Extensive excavations at Ladera de los Prados (Strato, 2002a). 88 Pl. 5. Silos at the site of Carratejera (Strato, 2003). 91 Pl. 6. Distribution of rural sites in the valley of the Eresma and the Voltoya (province of Segovia). 92 Pl. 7. Spatial distribution of features in Ladera de los Prados. 94 Pl. 8. Metal tools from the context of La Mata del Palomar (Strato, 2002b). 97 Pl. 9. Tremissis issued by Liuvigild with Victoria-cicada type on the reverse and mention of the Toleto mint. 186 Pl. 10. New tremissis issued by Hermenegild. 188 Pl. 11. Tremissis issued by Reccared I in Arofre. 189 Pl. 12. Tremissis issued by Gundemar in Inceio. 190 Pl. 13. Tremissis issued by Wittiza in Eliberri. 191 Pl. 14. Tremissis issued by Egica in Tarracona. 191 Pl. 15. Tremissis issued by Wittiza in Egitania. 192 Pl. 16. Tremissis issued by Wittiza in Emerita. 192 Pl. 17. Tremissis issued by Chintila in Tarracona. 193 Pl. 18. Tremissis issued by Tulga in Tucci. 193 Pl. 19. Tremissis issued by Recesswinth in Bracara. 194 Figures 7 Fig. 1. Graphic Graphic representation of the number of coins in each hoard (sometimes the figure is only approximate), and the number of coins registered in the corpus. 201 Fig. 2. Comparison of the number of isolated finds published and the number represented in the corpus. 202 Fig. 3. Isolated finds, hoard-related finds, and total number of known coins, grouped by monarch. 203 Fig. 4. Known Visigothic coins according to monarch and province. 206 Fig. 5. Number of hoards and isolated finds by province. 207 Fig. 6. Number of specimens found in relation to hoards and isolated finds. 208 Tables 8 Table 1. Synoptic table of Visigothic coinage issued by Liuvigild and Hermenegild. 187 Table 2. Quantitative representation of Visigothic kings in the monetary corpus. 197 Table 3. Visigothic monetary hoards. 199 Table 4. Isolated finds by reign. 202 Table 5. Visigothic monetary finds (hoards and isolated finds) and their impact on the monetary corpus. 204 Backcover 226 Edited By Céline Martin And Eleonora Dell'elicine. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. Electronic Reproduction. Baltimore, Md Available Via World Wide Web.