Research interests
My current project is Mobile Gods. Syrian Migration, Social Networks and Syrian Cults in the Graeco-Roman World. The Syrian refugee crisis is prompting broader political and religious conversations about European identity and the capacity of Europe to respond to new groups of people with new religious beliefs and cultural values. This book aims to provide a long-term perspective on the current situation through a bottom-up exploration of Syrian migration in the Graeco-Roman world: examining the evidence for communities of Syrians across the Roman world, the religious beliefs they took with them; and the relationships that were built up between different ethnic groups that enabled Syrian religions to pass across ethnic frontiers to find a place among non-Syrians in the Roman Empire.
With the coming of the Roman Empire to the ancient Middle East around 2000 years ago, people from Syria underwent migrations: some were active choices connected to economic opportunity, continuing a longer-term trend among the seafaring nations of the Syrian coastline; some were passive dispersals enacted through enslavement or conscription to the Roman army; and some were desperate acts of abandoning a homeland that had been taken hostage by new and hated invaders. How did these multiple migratory practices and events contribute to the dissemination of new Syrian religious cults in Europe, and what is the long-term impact that these religious ideas, once termed ‘Oriental cults’, have on the global Roman world?
I approach the question using different theoretical frameworks, drawn from various disciplines, including the New Mobilities Paradigm, Network Theory, Sensory Archaeology, Material Agency, Cognitive Theories of Religion, Place Attachment and Landscape Phenomenology. This framing of the evidence in different ways enables me to explore the multiple sacred landscapes in Syria, to draw out different aspects of Syrian mobility and migration; to interrogate the social networks operating between different religious groups and across geographical space; and shed new light on migrant community practices related to religious identity construction and boundary demarcation and dissolution.
In related current and future research, I am exploring social emotion, memory and migration through epigraphy, material culture, landscape and deep mapping (particularly in relation to Commagene); the texturing of sacred spaces through memory, emotion and experience, and ways of accessing and representing this to heritage audiences; and sacred mountains and walking as part of sacred expression, sacred work, and pilgrimage practice.
Previously, I have looked at the cult of the Romanised Near Eastern storm god Jupiter Dolichenus and abstracted, (potentially) monotheistic cult of the highest god, Theos Hypsistos; and also at the spread of ideas in Diaspora Judaism. My book on this subject, Religious Networks in the Roman Empire: The Spread of New Ideas, was published by Cambridge University Press in December 2013.
PhD supervision
I am happy to supervise postgraduate research on topics relating to Greek and Roman history and archaeology across the Mediterranean world, ancient Mediterranean religion and spiritual practices, mountains, Social Network Analysis and connectivity in the Classical world, Commagene, ancient Syria and the Near East, migration, mobility and pilgrimage in the ancient world.
Geographically I am particularly interested in the East Mediterranean, to include Anatolia, Syria, Armenia, the Levant, Crete, and Greece.
Research projects
Between 2014-2018 I was part of the Emergence of Sacred Travel project, based in Aarhus, Denmark, which aimed to explore the extent to which Greece and Rome constituted the cultural and religious background to the development of early Christian and Islamic pilgrimage.
My main current fieldwork project is the Taşeli ve Karaman Projesi (TKAP) which is an extensive survey project in ancient Cilicia, Turkey.
Research group
Classical and historical archaeology
Affiliate research group
Classical Empires
Dr Anna C. F. CollarFaculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Southampton
Avenue Campus, Highfield
Southampton
SO17 1BF
United Kingdom
Room Number : 65A/3025
