Dear William,

The jacaranda tree here reveals that this photo of CAARI’s street in Nicosia was taken in summer, but we’re in October now, and it’s the season to make fellowship applications. This newsletter is devoted especially to fellowships. It gives the roster of CAARI’s own current fellowship opportunities; other opportunities applicable to Cyprus are listed on the Fellowships page of the CAARI web site.

CAARI is unique in offering research fellowships specifically for Cyprus, and funding these fellowships is among its ongoing missions. As Zuzana Chovanec, chair of CAARI’s Development Committee, explains at the end of his newsletter, we’ve decided to devote the proceeds from our annual Giving Tuesday tradition to fellowships. She presents statements from past recipients about the value of CAARI’s fellowships.

But first, the message from Director Dr. Lindy Crewe will show CAARI’s confident emergence from the long shadow of pandemic and its vitality as a setting for research. And then we offer a truly impressive example of what the opportunity of a research fellowship at CAARI can yield, as Dr. Catherine Keane gives us a view into her eagerly awaited forthcoming book on church and society in early Christian Cyprus, More than a Church: Late Antique Ecclesiastical Complexes in Cyprus.

Apply for CAARI Fellowships!

Encourage your colleagues, students, and friends to apply for CAARI's fellowships. Information about each grant, including application forms, stipends, and expectations, is available at: www.caari.org/fellowships.

CAARI’s fellowships include:

• Three graduate student stipends offering support for travel to Cyprus and lodging at CAARI. Application deadline: December 9, 2022. 

• Two CAARI/CAORC postdoctoral fellowships that fund a month's research in Cyprus: Application deadline: January 9, 2023. 

• The postdoctoral fellowship in honor of Professor Eddie Peltenburg, that can support a full academic year's research time on Cyprus. Application deadline: January 9, 2023.

•  Scholar in Residence: Application deadline: January 9, 2023.

Other relevant fellowship opportunities are listed on the Fellowships page, as well. Browse the possibilities, and apply!

Message from CAARI’s Director

Dear friends and supporters of CAARI,

CAARI is currently bustling with researchers: international graduate students and fellows, as well as researchers resident on Cyprus who visit to use our library and microscopes. The CAARI residence is almost entirely booked for the remainder of the year, so do get in touch if you are planning a visit. Even if you are not planning to come to Cyprus until next summer, we advise booking early as many people are now organizing their 2023 research trips.

This month, we hosted a live lecture in the CAARI library for the first time since March 2020. The event was held Thursday 7^th October in hybrid format and we were happy to welcome twenty guests (albeit masked and socially distanced) in addition to around fifty people joining us online. CAARI-CAORC Fellow Ian Randall gave us a fascinating lecture on his current research project, postponed until this year due to the pandemic, entitled Disaster and Debris: Remaking Society in Post-Earthquake Kourion. The weather is still warm in the evenings so we held a reception in the CAARI courtyard and it was fantastic to be able to chat further with our speaker about his research over a drink and snack. We remain cautious but hopeful for further live elements for our forthcoming lectures but rest assured we will continue to keep our content online and on our YouTube channel, where you can also catch up with lectures if your time zone is not ideal for watching them live. You can find the link to past lectures and see the forthcoming program here: http://caari.org/events/.

Dr. Ian Randall presenting his lecture on Kourion in the CAARI library on the 7^th October.

There have also been other events going on at the local heritage institutions and we’ve been attending or watching online as we can. Former CAARI Director Robert Merrillees gave a great lecture at the Centre for Visual Arts Research on his archival studies into the location of archaeological finds in 19^th century Larnaca, and former CAARI Peltenburg Fellow Anna Spyrou gave a talk at the Cyprus Institute on her meticulous research into distinguishing hares from rabbits in archaeological contexts in Cyprus! The Department of Antiquities are also preparing some exciting exhibitions to be held at the Cyprus Museum. We are all trying to return to our research-active lives and hope we can enjoy a social but safe winter period.

It is also wonderful to read in this newsflash the stories of our current and past fellows. We love to stay in touch and to hear from those who have spent productive and joyful times with us at CAARI over the years. Ian Randall stated in the introduction to his lecture last week, ‘CAARI has been a home away from home for me ever since I started working in Cyprus.’ Many of us feel this way. We'll be very grateful if you are able to help us continue supporting our fellows.

Best wishes to everyone for a healthy and productive fall,

Lindy Crewe, PhD

Director, CAARI



More than a Church: Late Antique Ecclesiastical Complexes in Cyprus



Dr. Catherine Keane

Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich

My forthcoming book, More than a Church, stems from research conducted during my doctorate in the department of late antique archaeology and Byzantine art history at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich. The manuscript is currently under review and will be published in late 2023 or early 2024.

Abstract   

Late antique Cyprus was a prosperous, independent island that was able to build its importance through diverse trade relations. Its socio-economic and cultural development was shaped by invasions and earthquakes, but also by Mediterranean contact and the lively cult of saints from the earliest years of Christianity. As Christianity developed in the eastern Mediterranean, the Church established a great influence over the island, as evidenced by numerous large basilicas and the formation of many bishoprics.

Coastal basilica at Kourion

Within Cypriot localities, both rural and urban, a strong connection between religious and secular buildings can be traced, indicating a strong influence of the church on the local economy. From an archaeological point of view, this phenomenon takes numerous forms and transformations. Both civic and religious monuments have been given archaeological attention in the past. However, the relationships between churches and the production sites and economic structures located close to them have been neglected.

This book is a comprehensive study of ecclesiastical monuments in relation to agricultural and industrial facilities from the 4^th to 9^th centuries. The particular focus is on the dynamics between economic spaces and sacred architecture, and is organized by the type of product or industrial activity. By bringing together the fields of architecture, ceramics, numismatics, and landscape archaeology, combined with a consideration of the island’s late antique history and vitality, the role of the church and its influence before and after the 7^th-century Arab invasions is comprehensively presented here for the first time. The goals of this project are to:

• create a synthesis of all sites with documented or visible evidence of churches and production sites/economic structures.
• suggest reinterpretations of archaeological sites that have been overlooked or misinterpreted in the past.
• provide more precise data on the 4^th-9^th centuries, particularly with regard to administrative and productive activities following the mid-7^th century Arab incursions.
• explore the Christianization of the landscape beyond dichotomies of town/countryside and coasts/mountains.

Context

In the 5^th century, a period of economic prosperity began in the eastern Mediterranean. Land became more densely populated, existing settlements expanded, and agricultural production intensified. Cyprus is an exceptionally good example of this emerging prosperity, in both production and consumption. During the long period of late antiquity, Cyprus is a unique example of a cultural entity that is distinctly different from the surrounding regions. The island's location at the crossroads of eastern Mediterranean trade routes, political activity, and artistic and religious influences resulted in a complex and varied history.

The installation of economic units next to church buildings in late antiquity vividly illustrates the constantly adapting, dynamic links between economy and church. Moreover, this connection between church and economy suggests that the church as an institution played an influential role in economic planning. For example, the church was responsible for regional administration, the distribution of goods, or the organization of harbor access and communal facilities. Bishops managed not only their private property, but also that of the community and the church, thus assuming secular administrative tasks in Byzantine administration. In this capacity, they and other clerics were responsible for the integration of economic processes within the church’s sphere of influence and decisions about regional agricultural use. The establishment of existing production sites by the church in late antiquity was an attempt to expand the assumption of control in uncertain areas. In this book, therefore, I examine the impact of Christian influence on agricultural use and artisanal production in Cyprus in Late Antiquity.

In the scholarly study of Cyprus, there has been a chronological dichotomy in which the Arab invasions in the 7^th century have been perceived as the dividing element. This book’s analysis of agro-processing activity at churches, which often suffered considerable damage during the raids, sheds a new light on the previous reductive understanding of this period in the eastern Mediterranean. At numerous sites, themes of small-scale, individual agency and resilience are relevant both for Cyprus and in broader contexts across other historical fields. The variety of local choices of clergy and communities in connecting productive workshops with religious centers demonstrates a complex reality across the entire island, which is uniquely diverse in other late antique Mediterranean settlements. 

Cyprus is an exceptionally profitable field of study because a great deal of diverse information is available, but has never been comprehensively brought together. For example, due to many old archaeological excavations, architectural remains are accessible in situ and can be used scientifically, even if the information has not been published. The production sites of oil, copper, bread, and ceramics are particularly suitable for an overarching study because they are easily traceable. This book therefore places special emphasis on these materials.

Ruins at Agia Varvara, with cat

Methodology

More than a Church is a meticulous synthesis of many sources, including excavated sites (for which I created relative phasing), an artifactual study of the complete collections of two sites, landscape surveys showing the topographical distribution of churches in copper regions, and archival excavation photographs. My strengths in late antique archaeology and Byzantine art history pertain to architectural analysis of both ecclesiastical and industrial archaeological contexts. I provide a compendium of Cyprus’ products and industries, but also reinterpret phasing and functions of church complexes. 

The treatment of Cyprus as a single region benefits the study, as it allows for a closer look at a limited area with a variety of communities and diachronic shifts. The various links between the church and the economy demonstrate the diversity of ecclesiastical control over society. Although larger historical developments affected all of Cyprus equally, individual settlements deal with these events very differently. This also includes a multi-layered discussion of various spheres of influence, such as investment in the renovation of basilicas, the maintenance of a coherent economic system, and the complexity of coexisting populations. By focusing on the changing period between the 4^th and 9^th centuries, this work contributes fundamentally to the study of late antique Cyprus and its place and importance within the Byzantine Mediterranean.

The book combines a thematic approach with a chronological approach, with each chapter focusing on one type of production or specific theme: olive oil production, flour production and breadmaking, ceramic manufacture, and copper mining and metalworking. Each chapter describes one or more church complexes where economic installations are well-preserved. The relationship between the industrially used spaces and the other structures of the complex are closely examined and re-evaluated. On-site analysis, excavation photographs and field notes are used to interpret the structures, and information from archaeologists and other artifactual specialists is also included. Based on this comprehensive analysis, new dating and phasing plans are proposed in some cases, and reinterpretations of the entire complexes in others.

In five chapters, the relationship between the church and the economy in late antique Cyprus is addressed through products, workshops, and historical events. The church played a major role in all aspects of human life: it overlooked oil production, grain extraction, and pottery production. It also controlled topographical developments, offered farmland for cultivation, and was of importance to the socioeconomic, environmental, and religious development of Cyprus in all events between continuity and upheaval from the 4^th to the 9^th century. Currently, the chapters are organized as follows:

1. Olive oil presses: Beyond local sustenance
2. Flour and bread industry: Post-destruction activity?
3. Ceramic kilns: Reinterpreting a lime kiln at a port basilica
4. Copper mining in the Troodos Mountains: Christianizing the landscape
5. Church and economy beyond late antiquity

Significance

The goal of the book’s methodological approach is to produce a more holistic, comprehensive understanding of these relationships in late antiquity in Cyprus, but it can be useful as a foundational study for other regions and time periods. For example, the divine protection and association between temples and olive oil is present also in Bronze Age and Archaic periods. 

Other areas of study in which this work will be useful include the long late antiquity, environmental and sacred landscapes, and the opportunistic interaction with pan-Mediterranean trade and micro-regional trade. Themes of power, agency, resilience, and innovation are discussed here in relation to religious institutions and economic structures.

More than a Church is not just an archaeological addition to the historical approaches on this topic, but a contribution to rectify earlier scholarship’s interpretations:

"But whereas some historians of religion have investigated what has been termed the spiritual economy (a concept which tends to privilege the spiritual rather than the economic), most economic historians have paid scant attention to religion. […] I would argue that the early medieval economy cannot be understood without paying proper attention to the Church as an institution in its own right, nor indeed can the Church be understood without recognition of its economic infrastructure." Wood, I. (2022) The Christian Economy in the Early Medieval West: Toward a Temple Society, pg. 17.

I am immensely grateful for the generosity and assistance of CAARI and the Department of Antiquities, in providing numerous resources, stimulating academic environments, and facilitating access to sites, archives, and museum collections.



 Funding CAARI’s Fellowships: Our Giving Tuesday Initiative

Dr. Zuzana Chovanec

Chair, CAARI Development Committee

Last year CAARI initiated a new fund-raising effort in which our annual focus on Giving Tuesday would be dedicated to our ellowship programs. This year we will feature stories from a series of former fellows that highlight where they are now and the role that CAARI and its programs had in getting them there. We see no better time than Giving Tuesday to emphasize their accomplishments. We encourage you to join this international day of giving by supporting the Institute’s impactful fellowship program. You may choose to provide support where it is needed by donating to fellowships in general – or choose to support a specific fellowship fund that speaks to you. We hope that these stories will inspire you this giving season and we welcome you to share your own stories.

Catherine Olien

George Mason University

I am a previous recipient of the Helena Wylde Swiny and Stuart Swiny Fellowship, which allowed me to spend two wonderful weeks at CAARI in the summer of 2017. During this time, I was able to conduct research at local institutions, visit local museums, meet researchers (from around the world) to get critical advice about my dissertation project, and get a sense of Cyprus as a place, both ancient and contemporary. Realizing just how much CAARI, Cyprus, and the local community had to offer, I returned to CAARI for two more weeks in the fall of 2017.

I subsequently completed my PhD in Art History at Northwestern University in 2018 with a dissertation entitled "Between Classicism and Orientalism: The Reception of Ancient Cypriot Sculpture, 1860-1900." My last years of research and writing were supported by a Fulbright Research Grant to Berlin, Germany (where I was affiliated with the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin and Technische Universität) and a Kress Institutional Fellowship at the Institut national d'histoire de l'art in Paris, France.

Since then, I have continued to participate in conferences dedicated to Cypriot art and archaeology, and will have two articles coming out in 2023. I have also held two wonderful jobs that are adjacent to academia. The first of these was as a public programs manager at the American Library in Paris, where I worked from 2018-2021.

My current position, which I have held since March 2021, is associate director of the Center for Humanities Research at George Mason University, where I am also an affiliate faculty member in the department of history and art history. This role has allowed me to embrace my broad interest in the humanities, to gain project management and grant writing experience, and—importantly—to remain an active scholar in my academic field.

I am grateful for CAARI's support at a critical time in my graduate studies, and for the wonderful network of scholars I belong to as a result of my time there. My experiences at CAARI were richly rewarding, both personally and professionally, and the impact of holding a Helena Wylde Swiny and Stuart Swiny Fellowship will be lifelong.



Young Richard Kim

University of Illinois Chicago

It’s not an exaggeration when I say that CAARI has changed my life, both professionally and personally. I first came to CAARI in 2001, when I was a graduate student, and little did I know then that a short research trip to work on my dissertation would lead me back to Cyprus. In the 2012-13 academic year, I was the senior Fulbright research fellow at CAARI, during which time I wrote my first monograph during many an hour spent in the old and then new CAARI library. My family was with me that year, and my wife and two sons found our time in Cyprus a transformative experience, and we left with precious memories and lifelong friendships. In 2015, I was a CAARI/CAORC fellow, and I spent a month at CAARI, traveling and exploring the island with my colleague and friend Tom Landvatter. During each experience, CAARI was my home away from home, and the directors, Tom, Andrew, Lindy, and the staff, Vathoulla, Photoulla, and Katerina, were invaluable resources.

This is what stands out to me a world-class research center that attracts scholars and students from near and far, and on the other hand, it is a warm and welcoming home, the embodiment of philoxenia. CAARI is a national and international treasure, and your support will ensure that others will have life-changing experiences like mine.

Hanan Charaf

Lebanese University

My first stay at CAARI was in 2002 as a recipient of The Anita Cecil O’Donovan Grant to research the Cypriot material from Tell Arqa in North Lebanon. I was at the beginning of research work for my PhD and I was thrilled to benefit from a CAARI grant because not only the institute had a wonderful research library but it was also a hostel. This meant that I could stay for longer hours at the library without worrying about hours of operation or commute. And what a wonderful stay I had! I was coming from Paris where I was enrolled in the PhD program at the University of Paris I, Sorbonne, and was going afterward to Beirut, Lebanon to prepare for my wedding scheduled in October of that year. I came to CAARI with my suitcase and laptop, but I did carry from Paris a garment bag that held my wedding dress purchased in the City of Lights. I slept in Room 7 for one month, with my wedding dress hanging behind the door. I was studying the largest collection of Cypriot pottery found in excavations and the countless days and half nights I spent in the library allowed me to finish the research on an entire chapter of my dissertation. As a novice in Cypriot ceramics back then, I was eager to learn as much as I can and talk to as many people as I can. The proximity of CAARI to museums was essential since I could easily visually verify in a matter of minutes the material I was reading about in books. I also had the chance to connect with many specialists who graciously offered their expertise in identifying my material. Robert Merrillees, Vathoulla Moustoukki and the late Diane Constantinides provided countless help and advice during my stay.

Gathering of CAARI staff and scholars after lecture given by Nicholas Stanley-Price on September 27, 2018. From L to R: Katerina Mavromichalou, Cristina Stalteri, Hanan Charaf, Lindy Crewe, Vathoulla Moustoukki, Francesca Meneghetti, and the late Christian Vonhoff.

Since 2002, I became closely connected with CAARI and came back to stay at the institute regularly. CAARI offered me the venue and means to become a specialist in Cypriot Bronze Age pottery found in Lebanon. Because of this first grant, I was able to obtain two CAORC grants in 2013 and 2014 to work on this topic and I was also chosen for the Apollo Visiting Post-Doctoral Fellowship at Sydney University, Australia in 2014.

Today, twenty years after my first visit to CAARI, I appreciate the major influence that CAARI had on my professional trajectory: I have now published extensively on the Bronze Age Cypriot pottery found in Lebanon and the interconnections that Lebanon and Cyprus enjoyed during the second millennium BCE; I have lectured on this type of pottery in Europe, the Middle East, the United States, and Australia; I built lasting friendship and collegial connections during my residencies at CAARI….And all of this, I owe to February 1, 2002, the day I stepped over the entrance threshold at CAARI.  



Matthew Spigelman

ACME Heritage Consultants

I was a CAARI fellow in 2009–2010 on a Fulbright fellowship, which facilitated my dissertation research on Red-on-Black style ceramics from the Middle Bronze Age. Since completing my PhD in 2015 I have worked in cultural resource management (CRM) in the New York City area. As a consulting archaeologist I work with land developers as they negotiate permitting processes that include archaeological review. I also work with local non-profit organizations and governments who are responsible for the management of historic sites, such as cemeteries and historic house museums. I currently manage a small CRM firm, where I work with a smart and talented team of archaeologists on projects that cover the great chronological depth and cultural diversity of the Northeastern United States. I am also proud to be a CAARI board member and to contribute to the continued success of the institution however I can.

My connection to CAARI began as a field school student over twenty years ago with the Athienou Archaeological Project, which was then, and remains today, committed to training and scholarly exchange. My year at CAARI on the Fulbright fellowship cemented my relationship to the institution and marked the beginning of my shift from a student to a professional archaeologist. during this year I learned how to interact with the Cyprus Department of Antiquities, requesting access to collections for study and scientific testing. I was aided in these requests by then Director of CAARI Dr. Tom Davis, who himself had recently left a career in CRM.

The most important thing I have gained, and have continued to gain, from time spent at CAARI are connections to a community of practicing archaeologists. These colleagues, while all grounded in the study of the antiquity of Cyprus, are now practicing archaeology on a global scale. They have roles in government regulatory agencies, as professors, as principal investigators in CRM, and as technical specialists who move between all of these worlds. Archaeology has long been, and continues to become, a global community and as I move through my professional life it is the connections I made, and continue to make, at CAARI that I continually draw upon.

Let the stories of CAARI fellows inspire you on November 29!

CAARI needs your help.  Consider donating to us at:

WWW.CAARI.ORG/SUPPORT

or

We extend our sincerest thanks to all who help us realize CAARI’s mission of supporting new and seriously innovative research on Cyprus itself and its eastern Mediterranean context.