Book contents
- Religion and the Making of Roman Africa
- Religion and the Making of Roman Africa
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- Part I Colonial Histories
- Part II Themes in the Making of Hegemony
- 3 Making Africa with Punic Signs
- 4 Making a God
- 5 Making Sanctuary Communities
- 6 Making Children Subjects of Empire
- 7 Making Offerings
- 8 Remaking Spaces and Societies
- 9 Making Empire
- Book part
- References
- Index
3 - Making Africa with Punic Signs
from Part II - Themes in the Making of Hegemony
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 October 2024
- Religion and the Making of Roman Africa
- Religion and the Making of Roman Africa
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- Part I Colonial Histories
- Part II Themes in the Making of Hegemony
- 3 Making Africa with Punic Signs
- 4 Making a God
- 5 Making Sanctuary Communities
- 6 Making Children Subjects of Empire
- 7 Making Offerings
- 8 Remaking Spaces and Societies
- 9 Making Empire
- Book part
- References
- Index
Summary
Chapter 3 focuses on some of the signifiers that have long been argued to provide proof for how Punic culture survived and persisted through molk-style rites, especially the “sign of Tanit,” the crescent, and terms like sufete. Instead of continuities, these signs were appropriated and visibly transformed by the new elite of the first century BCE. It was not meanings, significances, or interpretations that bound togther these worshippers from Mauretania to Tripolitania, but rather the signs themselves. Rather than veneers that can be dismissed as epiphenomena, signifiers had the power to create imagined communities, and they did so within a Third Space distinct from the markers of prestige embraced by Numidian kings and Roman authorities.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Religion and the Making of Roman AfricaVotive Stelae, Traditions, and Empire, pp. 83 - 114Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024