The Swedish Research Institute in Istanbul
12 Jun 09:00 - 13 Jun 17:00
The Connecting Constantinople: Objects, Empire, and Inter-Civic Relationality Workshop will take place at the Swedish Research Institute in Istanbul on 12-13 June 2025.
From Constantine’s transfer of the Palladium from Rome to Constantinople, to Sultan Selim I's symbolic acquisition of the keys to the Ka'aba, objects, both tangible and symbolic, have played a pivotal role in shaping and symbolizing the connectivity between Constantinople and its urban counterparts. These objects can provide us with a unique lens through which to examine Constantinople's development, potentially revealing a kaleidoscope of inter-urban exchanges that contributed to the city’s development and that of others. They enable us to conceptualize the convergence of real and imagined inter-urban connections on Constantinople, highlighting how the accumulation, curation, and distribution of objects intersected with the ambitions of the city's ruling elites, and the inter-civic networks fashioned by means of them. Through the complex history of objects, brought to the city from other cities, and distributed or forcibly taken from it, Constantinople emerges as a relational space, characterized by the movement of objects between cities and the inter-urban relationships maintained by them.
This workshop seeks to explore the profound impact of such objects on the inter-civic relationships between Constantinople and its counterparts, and to offer new insights into the intricate dynamics of urban connectivity from antiquity to the present day. We intend to explore how objects served as key mediators in shaping, imagining, and maintaining inter-urban relationships between Constantinople and other cities. By doing so, our aim is to develop new interdisciplinary perspectives on the dynamic relationship between objects and urban spaces, placing specific focus on the concepts of relationality and mobility. Relationality refers to the interconnectedness between cities, while mobility encompasses the movement, accumulation, curation, and distribution of objects. By investigating how and why objects moved from one city to another and the functions and meanings assigned to this mobility by historical actors, we hope to arrive at a better understanding of the complex network of inter-urban connections that shaped Constantinople’s multifaceted urban development, from its foundation to its modern cityscape today. Furthermore, by focusing on the mobility of these objects and their distribution and acquisition by various historical actors, we aim to deepen our understanding of Constantinople's position within a broader network of cities and scrutinize changes that influenced the organization and maintenance of these networks. The ultimate goal of this workshop is to arrive at a more nuanced understanding of Constantinople as an imperial city that transcends traditional models, such as that between center and periphery, or purely comparative approaches between one city’s development and another. Instead, through the prism of inter-civic mobility, we seek to comprehend how the accumulation and distribution of objects in Constantinople exposes a variety of different inter-civic networks, and to shed light on how historical actors perceived the influence of these movements on the city’s development as a cosmopolitan and imperial space.
09:00 – 09:30
Walk-in
09:30 – 10:00
Opening and Introduction
Kay Boers (Utrecht University / University of Amsterdam) and Rolf Strootman (Utrecht University)
10:00 -11:00
Keynote. Venice and Genoa in late medieval Constantinople: material traces of shifting relations.
Karin Krause (University of Chicago)
11:00 – 11:15
Coffee/Tea Break
Session I: Relics and Martyrs
11:15 – 11:35
Connecting Constantinople and the Black Sea Region to Romeʼs ‘Gloriousʼ Past – Martyria and Mimetic Architectural Sculpture within Urban Mnemoscapes
Julia M. Koch (Istanbul Department of the German Archaeological Institute)
11:35 – 11:55
Communicating with Constantinople: John of Ephesus and the Syriac Naming of Objects in Sixth-Century Imperial Networks
Carlo Emilio Biuzzi (Ghent University)
11:55 – 12:15
Imperial Authority and the collection of relics: Power, Prestige, and Urban Transformation in Late Antiquity.
Thea Ravasi (Newcastle University)
12:15 – 12:45
Panel Discussion
12:45 – 14:00
Lunch
Session II: Sculpture
14:00 – 14:20
Images of power: Connecting Ravenna, Rome, and Constantinople through equestrian statues
Carlo Ferrari (Università degli Studi Roma Tre)
14:20 – 14:40
Serpentine Spolia: The Serpent Column as Spolia, Reattribution, and Imperial Identity in Constantinople
Savannah Bishop (Koç University)
14:40 – 15:00
Civic Relationality and Sculpture in the Tenth-Century Patria
Kay Boers (Utrecht University / University of Amsterdam)
15:00 – 15:30
Panel Discussion
15:30 – 16:00
Coffee/Tea Break
Session III: Icons
16:00 – 16:20
Connecting Polotsk, Constantinople, and Jerusalem in the 12th Century: The Agency of St. Euphrosyne of Polotsk
Dragoş Gh. Năstăsoiu (National Museum of Art of Romania)
16:20 – 16:40
Repurposed Icons of The Zoodochos Pege at Venice’s Basilica di San Marco
Sarah F. Cohen (Columbia University)
16:40 – 17:00
Examining Constantinople's Inter-Civic Connectivity through Marian Icons: A Case Study Analysis of the Galata Icon
Çise İpek Çınar (Sabancı University)
17:00 – 17:30
Panel Discussion
19:00
Workshop Dinner
Session IV: Constantinopolitan Splendor
09:00 – 09:20
A City and its Remains: Bessarion and other Byzantine Émigrés on Beauty and Objects from Constantinople in Fifteenth-Century Rome
Philip Muijtjens (UC Louvain)
09:20– 09:40
Set in Stone: Messages and Meanings of the Santa Maria Draperis Altar (1769-72)
Alper Metin (University of Bologna)
09:40 – 10:00
Exploring the History of the Urban Connections Between Istanbul and Kastoria Through Archival Documents, Wall Paintings, Liturgical Objects and Valuable Gifts
Nuray Ocakli (Istanbul Sabahattin Zaim University)
10:00 – 10:30
Panel Discussion
10:30 – 11:00
Coffee/Tea Break
Session V: Gifts and Pills
11:00 – 11:20
Reassessing the Chios Incident: Diplomacy, Capitulations, and the Politics of Diplomatic Gift-Exchange
Zeynep Naz Simer (Bilkent University)
11:20 – 11:40
From Rebellion to Medallion: Numismatic Contestations and Tanzimat Authority on the Eastern Ottoman Frontier
Jason Rodriguez Vivrette (University of California, Berkeley)
11:40 – 12:00
Dr. Williams' Pink Pills for Pale People: Exploring Mobility, Medicine and Inter-Civic Relationships in Late Ottoman Constantinople
Berrak Burçak (Bilkent University)
12:00 – 12:30
Panel Discussion
12:30 – 14:00
Lunch
Session VI: Restitution
14:00 – 14:20
From Istanbul with Love: the Return of the Corviniani to Budapest in 1877 – Soft Power and Cultural Restitution in the Late Ottoman Period
Philip Rance (Freie Universität Berlin)
14:20 – 14:40
The Lion Returns: Venetian symbolism in the "redemption" of an Italian landmark
Paolo Girardelli (Department of History of Boğaziçi University, Istanbul) & Francesco Trentini (Italian Ministry of Culture / Ca' Foscari University, Venice)
14:40 – 15:10
Panel Discussion
15:10 – 15:30
Coffee/Tea Break
15:30 – 16:30
Book Presentation – Constantinople Through the Ages: The Visible City from Its Foundation to Contemporary Istanbul (Brill)
Diederik Burgersdijk (Utrecht University), Fokke Gerritsen (NIT), Shaun Tougher (Cardiff University)
16:30 – 16:45
Coffee/Tea Break
16:45 – 17:15
Closing Remarks and Discussion
17:15
Reception
Sponsors
The Connecting Constantinople workshop is made possible through the generous support and collaboration of several distinguished institutions. We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Swedish Research Institute in Istanbul (SRII); The Netherlands Institute in Turkey (NIT); Utrecht University (UU), Department of History and Art History; The University of Amsterdam (UvA), Chair Group Ancient History; The National Research School in Classical Studies in the Netherlands (OIKOS), including the OIKOS research groups: Late Antiquity and Byzantine Studies and Cities and Settlements in the Ancient World; and De Gruyter Brill publishing house.