150 Years of Oriental Studies at Ca’ Foscari

150 Years of Oriental Studies at Ca’ Foscari

Federico Greselin, Laura De Giorgi (eds.) 

 

 Since its establishment in 1868, Ca’ Foscari University’s educational vocation has been marked by its attention to the study and teaching of Oriental languages. Inheriting the legacy of Venice as a commercial and cultural gateway to the East, the development of Oriental studies has been envisioned as one of the most important and peculiar missions of this University as a national educational institution. This volume revisits the history of the teaching and research on Middle, Central, South-Asian and East Asian languages and civilisations at Ca’ Foscari, and of this University’s relationships with the East, offering some insights and information about the evolution of these disciplines, the main protagonists and the multiple connections that have tied and still tie Ca’ Foscari with the Oriental world.

DOI	https://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-252-9
Landing page	https://edizionicafoscari.it/en/edizioni4/libri/978-88-6969-253-6/
License	https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Copyright	Federico Greselin, Laura De Giorgi
Publisher	Edizioni Ca’ Foscari – Venice University Press
Publication place	Venice, Italy
Published on	2018-10-21
Series	I libri di Ca’ Foscari vol. 8 ISSN Print: 2610-9506 ISSN Digital: 2610-9506

Sappho: ]fragments

Sappho: ]fragments

Jonathan Goldberg

 

In Sappho, Jonathan Goldberg takes as his model the fragmentary state in which this sublime poet’s writing survives, a set of compositional and theoretical resources for living and thinking in more fully erotic ways in the present and the future. This book thus offers fragmentary commentary on disparate (Sapphic) works, such as the comics of Alison Bechdel, the paintings and cartoons of Leonardo da Vinci, Robert Reid-Pharr’s “Living as a Lesbian,” Madeleine de Scudéry’s Histoire de Sapho, John Donne’s “Sapho to Philaenis,” Todd Haynes and Patricia Highsmith’s Carol, Virginia Woolf’s Orlando, writings by Willa Cather, and the paintings and writings of Simeon Solomon, among other works. Goldberg challenges readers to imagine and experience what Sarah Orne Jewett named the “country of our friendship,” a love both exceedingly strange and compellingly familiar. Just as Sappho’s coinage “bitter-sweet” describes eros as inextricably contradictory — two things at once, one thing after another, each interrupting, complicating, each other — the juxtapositions in this book mean to continually call into question categories of identity and identification in the wake of a quintessential woman writer from Lesbos. Over and over again, Goldberg’s Sappho: ]fragments inquires into how race, sexuality, and gender cross each other. The theoretical genius of Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick presides over this set of meditations and mediations on likeness and desire. Rather than homogenizing its many subjects, it invites the reader to explore and inhabit new transits within and through what Audre Lorde called “the very house of difference.”

DOI	https://doi.org/10.21983/P3.0238.1.00
Landing page	https://punctumbooks.com/titles/sappho-fragments/
License	https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/
Copyright	Goldberg, Jonathan
Publisher	punctum books
Publication place	Earth, Milky Way
Published on	2018-12-31
ISBN	978-1-947447-97-4 (Paperback)
	978-1-947447-98-1 (PDF)

 

La legatura dei libri antichi: Storia e conservazione

La legatura dei libri antichi: Storia e conservazione

Melania Zanetti (editor)

 

Bookbinding has always been a fundamental component of the book in codex form, a system for assembling the sheets containing the text and protecting them from the wounds of time and the manipulations associated with book use. In addition to their functionality, historical bookbindings can be considered mines of non-textual information. In their multi-materiality, they reveal the complexity of craftsmanship, technological advancement, usage, trade, and even the faith of the human community that produced them. However, the interest in more than just decorating the covers in these objects is quite recent and it is related to the gradual understanding that books are artefacts to be safeguarded in their entirety as material historical evidence and part of our cultural heritage. The essays collected in this volume reflect different approaches to the study of historical bookbindings in the Western Mediterranean basin as well as in the Byzantine and Islamic worlds, including projects for the census of bindings, the study of written sources, the direct examination of book collections and the application of the methods of the archaeology of the book to analyse materials and structures involved in bookbinding manufacture. Terminologycal issues in their description are also addressed. Many different approaches help to place the book artefact in the historical context in which it was produced and to learn in detail about the technical characteristics of its production. 

 

DOI	https://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-820-0
Landing page	https://edizionicafoscari.it/en/edizioni4/libri/978-88-6969-820-0/
License	https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Copyright	Melania Zanetti
Publisher	Edizioni Ca’ Foscari – Venice University Press
Publication place	Venice, Italy
Published on	2024-10-29
Series	Studi di archivistica, bibliografia, paleografia vol. 7 ISSN Print: 2610-9093 ISSN Digital: 2610-9093
ISBN	978-88-6969-820-0 (Paperback)

Christian Palestinian Aramaic: New Perspectives on Language and Texts

Christian Palestinian Aramaic: New Perspectives on Language and Texts

Emiliano Fiori (editor)

Mara Nicosia (editor)

 At the time of its discovery, Christian Palestinian Aramaic suffered from its proximity to Syriac and from the fact that its literary production encompassed mostly translations from Greek. Spanning inscriptions, magical texts, and many literary genres, the Christian Palestinian Aramaic corpus has recently gained scholarly attention and is now recognised for its historical value. This shift has fostered a deeper understanding of the linguistic, textual, and cultural history of Melkite Christians in Syria and Sinai. This volume presents a selection of studies in Christian Palestinian Aramaic linguistics, epigraphy, and literature, complemented by a comprehensive bibliography of the field.

DOI	https://doi.org/10.30687/979-12-5742-018-5
Landing page	https://edizionicafoscari.it/en/edizioni4/libri/979-12-5742-018-5/
License	https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Publisher	Edizioni Ca’ Foscari – Venice University Press
Published on	2026-05-13
Series	Syriaca vol. 1 ISSN Print: ISSN Digital:
ISBN	979-12-5742-018-5 (PDF)

 

Cassius Dio and the Principate

Cassius Dio and the Principate

Christopher Burden-Strevens (editor)

Jesper Majbom Madsen (editor)

Antonio Pistellato

 

In the Imperial books of his Roman History, Cassius Dio focuses on individual emperors and imperial institutions to promote a political framework for the ideal monarchy, and to theorise autocracy’s typical problems and their solutions. The distinctive narrative structure of Dio’s work creates a unique sense of the past and allows us to see Roman history through a specific lens: that of a man who witnessed the Principate from the Antonines to the Severans. When Dio was writing, the Principate was a full-fledged historical fact, having experienced more than two hundred years of history, good and bad emperors, and three major civil wars. This collection of seven essays sets out to address these issues, and to see Dio not as an ‘adherent’ to or ‘advocate’ of monarchy, but rather as a theorist of its development and execution. 

Publisher	Edizioni Ca’ Foscari – Venice University Press
Publication place	Venice, Italy
Published on	2020-12-21
Series	Lexis Supplements vol. 2 ISSN Print: 2724-3362 ISSN Digital: 2724-3362
ISBN	978-88-6969-472-1 (Paperback)
	978-88-6969-472-1 (PDF)

 

The Unwound Yarn: Birth and Development of Textile Tools Between Levant and Egypt

The Unwound Yarn: Birth and Development of Textile Tools Between Levant and Egypt

Chiara Spinazzi-Lucchesi

 

This book reviews certain of the most important archaeological finds of textile tools, in order to draw a picture of the spinning and weaving technologies adopted in the Levant and Egypt from the Neolithic to the Persian period. A brief description of the objects found at several sites is provided to highlight differences of materials and tool design in order to better understand developments in weaving technology across this region. Textile tools housed in the Museo Egizio di Torino are also examined here for the first time. These include spindles and spindle whorls, bone spatulae and needles, which for the most part originate from Schiaparelli’s excavations at the Workers’ village of Deir el-Medina. A general analysis is provided, which compares these objects to the tools known from other sites in Egypt, as well as a catalogue, which provides further description and exact measurements for each object of the collection. 

 

Publisher	Edizioni Ca’ Foscari – Venice University Press
Publication place	Venice, Italy
Published on	2018-07-04
Series	Antiquity Studies vol. 18 ISSN Print: 2610-9344 ISSN Digital: 2610-9344
ISBN	978-88-6969-232-1 (Paperback)
	978-88-6969-232-1 (PDF)

 

À la porte des mondes: Histoire de l'Ibérie du Caucase, IIIe siècle a.C. - VIIe siècle p.C.

 À la porte des mondes: Histoire de l'Ibérie du Caucase, III^e siècle a.C. - VII^e siècle p.C.

Nicolas J. Preud'homme

  

An ancient kingdom established at the exit of the Darial Gorge, where the Roman Empire, Iran and the nomads of the northern steppes all met, played a pivotal role in the history of Southern Caucasia from the Hellenistic period until the 6th century CE. This country amalgamated various peoples and communities around the middle course of the Kura River. Juggling with dynastic rivalries, ethnic fragmentation, multiple languages and diverse cultures, the kings and princes of Caucasian Iberia demonstrated remarkable powers of adaptation to ensure their territorial influence, assert their legitimacy and occupy a place of choice in transnational alliance networks. The Iberian political system struck a balance between the aristocracy and the court through a diarchy which associated the king and his pitiaxēs. Entering Rome’s orbit after Pompey’s invasion in 65 BCE, the Iberians forged a partnership with the Roman leaders until the late-ancient period which was, however, not free from ambivalence. The 260s CE marked a momentous turning point in the evolution of Iberian royal power, when the growing influence of the Sasanians instigated a dynastic change for the benefit of the Mihranids. In a context of spiritual ferment bringing various religions into competition, Iberian leaders gradually decided to reform the sacred bases of their power. At the beginning of the 5th century CE, the invention of a first official form of Georgian writing illustrated this new political and religious consensus around a kingship that had become Christian—a crucial step in the process of ethnogenesis. From the Hellenistic period to the advent of Islam, ancient Iberian society, shaped on an Iranian model with a strong aristocratic component, highlighted certain charismatic women who occupied leading functions in religious and social life. The adaptability to circumstances demonstrated by the Iberians provides a remarkable example of a country of modest size evolving through the age of the great empires of Antiquity. In their epigraphy and Georgian chronicles, the Iberians have also left us their own vision of History over these thousand years of existence.
 

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Publisher: Ausonius Éditions

Place of publication: Bordeaux

Published on OpenEdition Books: September 11, 2026

Digital ISBN: 978-2-35613-767-8

DOI: 10.4000/16rge

Series: Scripta Antiqua | 181

Year of publication: 2024

ISBN (Print version): 978-2-35613-608-4

Number of pages: 564

 

Avant-propos

Introduction

Chapitre 1

La genèse du peuple des “Hommes”

Chapitre 2

L’Ibérie à l’école des rois et des imperatores (69 a.C. - 72 p.C.)

Chapitre 3

L’apogée d’une puissance régionale ibère (72 p.C.-260 p.C.)

Chapitre 4

L’intégration économique des territoires ibères

Chapitre 5

La topographie du pouvoir en Ibérie

Chapitre 6

Les institutions et l’organisation de la société ibère

Chapitre 7

La révolution mihranide et les mutations du iii^e siècle

Chapitre 8

De Mirian à Bacurius : les Ibères au iv^e siècle

Chapitre 9

Les dynamiques religieuses dans l’Ibérie ancienne

Chapitre 10

Langues et signes du pouvoir en Ibérie

Chapitre 11

De l’ère des rois à l’âge des princes (v^e-vii^e siècle)

Chapitre 12

Écrire et réécrire la mémoire et l’histoire de l’Ibérie

Conclusion

Annexes

Bibliographie

Index des noms