Macrohistorical Aspects of the Constantinian Shift : Climatic Change, Pandemics, and the Rise of Christianity

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F00216224%3A14210%2F24%3A00137266" target="_blank" >RIV/00216224:14210/24:00137266 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/studying-religion-past-and-present-9781350340015/" target="_blank" >https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/studying-religion-past-and-present-9781350340015/</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

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Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Macrohistorical Aspects of the Constantinian Shift : Climatic Change, Pandemics, and the Rise of Christianity

Original language description

The chapter presents an innovative view of the circumstances leading to the gradual Christianization of the Roman Empire. The scenario presented incorporates in the historical narrative the influence of macro-historical factors such as: a) the deteriorated epidemic situation caused by the Antonine plague and the Plague of Cyprian; b) the gradual climatic change unfavourable for agricultural production, which began to manifest themselves in the Ancient Mediterranean during the 2nd and especially the 3rd century CE. These factors led to a deterioration in food security, a demographic decline, and increasing social pressure, which caused considerable erosion of the prestige of pagan religion and confidence in the Roman political system. From the perspective of Spereber’s epidemiology of representations and Sørensen’s immunology of representations, the “crisis of the third century” also led to a weakening of the “cultural immunity” of the inhabitants of the Roman Empire and to the emergence of new conditions relevant to the acceptance of new cultural ideas. This situation enabled a wider dissemination and acceptance of previously only modestly successful cultural representations in the form of Christian ideas about God, the world, and man’s role in it, which gradually began to increase their popularity in the changed conditions of the Roman world.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

C - Chapter in a specialist book

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

60304 - Religious studies

Project

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Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2024

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Book/collection name

Studying Religion, Past and Present : Essays in Honor of Panayotis Pachis

ISBN

9781350339996

Number of pages of the result

13

Pages from-to

135-147

Number of pages of the book

280

Publisher name

Bloomsbury Academics

Place of publication

London

UT code for WoS chapter

001387066500011