Title
Village Life and Family Power in Late Antique Nessana
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2011
Abstract
This article explores social structures and family competition in late antique Nessana. Nessana, a small village in the Negev, is attested through archaeological, papyrological, and epigraphic remains. This evidence shows that the engine of social change was family power. Nessana experienced remarkable growth, including construction of four new churches and two monasteries. The driving forces behind each institution came from distinct local families in ongoing competition with one another. This localizing model of family power challenges the standard models of provincial economy and society in the late antique east, which imagine a world of great estates and powerful aristocrats.
Publication Title
Transactions of the American Philological Association
Repository Citation
Ruffini, Giovanni, "Village Life and Family Power in Late Antique Nessana" (2011). History Faculty Publications. 54.
https://digitalcommons.fairfield.edu/history-facultypubs/54
Published Citation
Ruffini, G. (2011). “Village Life and Family Power in Late Antique Nessana.” Transactions of the American Philological Association 141 (2011): 201-225.
DOI
10.1353/apa.2011.0002
Peer Reviewed
Comments
Copyright 2011 Transactions of the American Philological Association, Johns Hopkins University Press.
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