List of Figures
List of Contributors
Introduction. Bridging Motherhood as Institution and Mothering as Practice
Studying Mothers, Motherhood and Mothering in Antiquity through a Matricentric Epistemological Framework: An Introduction - Florence Pasche Guignard and Giulia Pedrucci
Part I. Mothers in Biological and Medical Contexts
1. Becoming a Mother in Mesopotamia: Biological and Social Aspects - Laura Battini
2. Breastfeeding, Co-breastfeeding, and Weaning in the Greek and Roman Worlds. Literary Sources and Archaeological Evidence in Dialogue - Giulia Pedrucci and Carlo Cocozza
3. Birth Control and Abortion in the Graeco-Roman World, 500 BCE–750 CE - Laurence Totelin
4. Afterbirth and Genius: Beliefs and Symbolism among the Romans and Other Peoples - Attilio Mastrocinque
5. Contraception and Birth Control through Rabbinic Eyes: Ancient Competing Models of Mothering - Avraham Yoskovich
Part II. Mothers in Archaeology: Material Evidence and Practices
6. The Bio-archaeology of Mothers: Approaches to Motherhood and Kinship in European Prehistory - Katharina Rebay-Salisbury
7. Mothers in Bone and Stone in the Bronze Age Aegean - Stephanie L. Budin
8. Representing Motherhood in Archaic Cyprus - Emma de Koning
9. Motherhood and Infancy in Latium Vetus during the Iron Age within Pre-Roman Italy - Francesca Fulminante
10. Invisible Motherhood in Italy before the Roman Conquest - Massimiliano di Fazio
11. Etruscan Mothers: An Archaeological Perspective - Elisabetta Govi and Chiara Pizzirani
12. “ativu sacniśa aturś”: Seeking the Evidence of Mothering in Ancient Etruria - Jean MacIntosh Turfa
13. Mediating Religious Narratives through Small Protecting Items: Archaeological Data from Votive and Funerary Contexts in Archaic Sicily - Gabriella Sciortino
14. Being a Mother: Experiencing Mothering and Motherhood in the Phoenician-Punic World - Meritxell Ferrer Martín and Mireia López-Bertran
15. Between Archaeological and Figurative Evidence of Mothering in Ancient Gaul and Beyond - Fabienne Dugast
Part III. Mothers in Texts: Norms, Myths, Ideals
16. Mothers in Ancient Near Eastern Wisdom Literature - Annunziata Rositani
17. The Mother in Mesopotamian Narratives - Lorenzo Verderame
18. Motherhood in the Hebrew Bible - Marco Pavan
19. Medea, the Murderous Mother - Augusto Cosentino
20. Between Physical and Spiritual Dimensions: Motherhood in Ancient Christianity and Its Implications - Roberta Franchi
21. Emmelia, Her Relationship to Her Many Children, and the Idealised Representations by Gregory of Nyssa and Gregory of Nazianzen (4th c. CE) - Ilaria L. E. Ramelli
22. Spiritual Mothers and Real Mothers: Motherhood in Syriac Sources between Practice and Idealization - Claudia Tavolieri
23. Motherhood in Christian Apocryphal Literature - Gabriella Aragione
24. Writing Motherhood in Early Islam: Religious and Literary Texts - Roberta Denaro
25. Islamic Perspectives on Mothers as Norm Transgressors in Early Islamic Sources - Darai Saddik and Jaouad Agudal
Part IV. Mothers in Political and Legal Contexts
26. Preserving the Patrimony: Mothers as Agents of Their Sons’ Legal Interests in Babylonia - John P. Nielsen
27. Materna Potestas: Maternal Agency and Marriage Decisions in Roman Times - Cristina Soraci
28. Maxentius and Eutropia: An Interdisciplinary Case Study on an Early 4th-Century Syrian Christian Motherhood - Diego Serra and Pedro David Conesa Navarro
29. Seneca’s Mothers: Parenting Strategies, Power, Myth, and Representation at the End of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty - Rosa M.ª Marina Sáez
30. From Goddess to God: The Shift in Religious Authority and Its Impact on Motherhood in Pre-Islamic and Early Islamic Times - Nina Käsehage
Part V. Mothers in Social and Religious Contexts
31. Mothers and Motherhood in the Ancient Near East from Cuneiform Adoptions - Daniel Justel Vicente
32. Tracing Maternal Filiations in Middle Kingdom Stelae: Reaching the Afterlife through Motherhood in Ancient Egypt - Beatriz Noria-Serrano
33. Motherhood and Child-Rearing in Ancient Israel - Kristine Henriksen Garroway
34. Nurses, Weavers, and Myths: Mothering Individuals as Primary Religious Enculturators in the Ancient Southern Levant - Jonathon Riley
35. Motherhood and Mothering in Ancient Greek Religion - Matthew Dillon
36. Mothers, Mother-Figures, and Child Care in Roman Egypt - April Pudsey and Ville Vuolanto
37. Motherhood and Mothering Experiences in the Byzantine World - Despoina Ariantzi
Index
Biography
Giulia Pedrucci is a postdoctoral fellow at Comenius University in Bratislava (Slovakia). Her research explores the religious dimensions of motherhood and mothering Antiquity. She has published, among other works, three monograph, nine edited volumes, and an article in Numen outlining a new subfield between motherhood and religious studies.
