In the last few years Palmyra has come to the world's attention because of its destruction during the Civil War. Just before the conflict broke out, the Palmyra Portrait Project funded by the Carlsberg Foundation and headed by Rubina Raja, was initiated. This anthology is one of the results that have emerged from the project.
The contributions are written by leading scholars who focus on Palmyra, portraiture in the Roman Empire, art and writing in Palmyra and the cultures of the Near East in general. Issues of how status and professions were communicated through self-representation stand at the centre of the volume. Through these contributions, it becomes clear that there was a dichotomy between the funerary sphere and the public sphere. In the funerary sphere the family alone took centre stage, whereas the public sphere was a space for civic status to be communicated. These differences inform us about the choices made by the Palmyrenes according to the meaning of the spaces in which self-representations were displayed. The Palmyrenes were world citizens, who saw themselves as central players within the broader imperial context.
This book gives the basis for assessing some of the mechanisms at play within Palmyrene society, both in family contexts as well as broader societal contexts.
