Browsing by Subject "Pilgrimage"
Now showing 1 - 3 of 3
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item A Short Walk from Paradise: Initial Excavations at the Ruins of Kaxil Uinic, Belize(2013-05) Harris, Matthew C; Houk, Brett A.; Walter, Tamra L.The summer of 2012 marked the first field season of excavations at the ruins of Kaxil Uinic in northwestern Belize. The goal of the investigation was to understand the site and its relationships to the nearby site of Chan Chich, the historic Maya village/chicle camp, and a nearby aguada. In the course of the investigations, the original map of the site was modified and two previously unidentified structures were added. The stela and altar at the site were also targeted for investigation to better understand the chronology of the site. Some structures were also investigated for this purpose. This thesis discusses what was found during excavation at the site and provides possible explanations for the nature of certain concentrations of artifacts found.Item Agent of touch and transformation : a pilgrimage token of Saint Symeon the Younger in the Menil collection(2011-05) Steiner, Shannon P.; Peers, Glenn; Papalexandrou, AmyWhen considering early Byzantine pilgrimage tokens, questions of touch and tactility arise almost instantly. Tokens lack cords or mountings, and so touch is implicit in such objects. Even gazing at them was a form of touching for the pilgrim. Hagiographies tell of pilgrims crowding to holy sites with the express intent to access sanctity through touch. Touch then, whether visual or manual, mediated the desire for connection between a pilgrim, a site, and a body. This requires an examination of a token’s touch as well as a pilgrim’s. In my thesis, I focus on a surviving token of the stylite saint Symeon the Younger, housed in the Menil Collection. This particular token bears iconography associated with physically and spiritually transformative events. Images of veneration, baptism, and healing appear together on the token’s obverse, while a human handprint on its reverse demands a multifaceted discussion of the implications of touching this object. I propose that in a pilgrim’s interaction with this token both object and viewer had agency. The token encapsulates a comprehensive pilgrimage experience. As a contact relic, the token makes present the saint’s body. Representation of baptism and the token’s backwards inscription enact sphragis – a figurative and literal stamping that pilgrims frequently described. I call attention to the experiential, memorial, and physical impressions made on the lives of early Byzantine pilgrims through the simultaneous touching of both viewer and object.Item Kurukshetra : bending the narrative into place(2013-05) McCarter, Elliott Craver; Brereton, Joel P., 1948-This dissertation explores the connection among place, narrative, and ritual in a survey of Kurukshetra and its meaning to different communities across time. Kurukshetra, a region of central Haryana, is currently identified predominantly as a tīrtha and the site of the central battle of the Mahābhārata epic. I ask, "How did this area come to be known as Kurukshetra and how did it become so strongly associated with the Mahābhārata?" I argue that there is a constructive dynamic tension among place, narrative, and ritual that connects Kurukshetra, the Mahābhārata, and tīrthayātrā, leading to the current situation. I begin by examining pre-epic constructions of Kurukshetra to discover shifts and continuities in the terrain that Kurukshetra inhabits and the narrative themes ascribed to it. Following, I trace these themes into the epic period, and explore how a new ritual paradigm, tīrthayātrā, continues to modify the physical and narrative landscape. Next, I observe that the ritual, narrative, and terrain begin to coalesce in the post-epic period. I argue that even as the ritual begins to become more stable, the narrative and ritual geographies remain in flux. By the sixteenth century, the Mahābhārata begins to dominate the narrative identity of Kurukshetra and the region around the city of Thanesar becomes the primary locus of ritual activity and narrative reproduction.