Dr. Isabelle Mossong
April 2023 - March 2024
Research Project: Le nord-ouest de la péninsule ibérique comme zone de contact intégrative (IIe s. av. – Ve s. ap. J.C.)
Throughout my stay at the RomanIslam Center, I will work on a sociocultural study about the north-western corner of the Iberian Peninsula. This territory was conquered relatively late by the Romans, but during the principate it rapidly developed into an important economic, military and administrative region. This process inevitably raises the question of the essential conditions for this development and their possible correlation with the Roman presence. Other factors rather point towards a continuity of the indigenous culture. Thus, the Roman way of life and the indigenous habits coexisted over centuries, but there were also new creations that emerged which could be described as cultural amalgams. These simultaneously existing phenomena seem to be particularly promising when analysed with regard to their mutual influences and differences in the context of a regional case study. This project aims to weigh up these seemingly dichotomous predispositions and to explore them for the three north-western conventus (Asturum, Lucensis and Bracaraugustanus). What is more, it is desirable to verify how the degree of assimilation developed over time in this region and what the proliferating factors were. For this purpose, I will take into account a large base of historical testimonies: by bringing together and interpreting literary, epigraphical and numismatic sources, I hope to offer results that may not only be interesting for Spain, but that may also be fruitful for further comparative studies.
Profile
Dr. Isabelle Mossong is an historian specialized in Roman antiquity and epigraphy. She studied in Strasbourg and Freiburg i. Br. and wrote a dissertation on the epigraphic legacy of the Italian clergy in Late Antiquity, which she carried out in a German-French cotutelle (FU Berlin/Université de Strasbourg) under the supervision of Prof. H.-J. Gehrke and E. Wirbelauer. After a biennial research stay at the École française de Rome (financed by the Fonds national de la Recherche of Luxembourg), she got appointed at her current institute, the Commission for Ancient History and Epigraphy of the German Archaeological Institute in Munich. Besides being responsible for the monographical series “Vestigia”, she dedicates herself to two main scientific projects: together with prof. J. M. Abascal (Universidad de Alicante), she currently prepares a new edition of the inscriptions from the conventus Asturum (Hispania citerior) for CIL II2. On this behalf, she is also the codirector of the Centro CIL II at the University of Alcalá de Henares. The other project is her habilitation thesis, which is on the social, administrative and cultural transformations that are to be observed in the north-western corner of the Iberian Peninsula when the Romans, after a long struggle, took control of this territory. Her main interests lie in the following topics: epigraphic habit, formation of cultural identities, organization of early Christianity. Besides her scientific interests, she also gained a strong teaching experience by offering several courses on different levels at the Universities of Strasbourg, Augsburg and LMU Munich.
CV
Selected Publications
Mossong, Isabelle (2023), “Italy’s Late Antique Bishops in Exile (3rd–beginning of 7th c.): The Epigraphic Point of View”, in: Sabine Panzram / P.ablo Poveda Arias, eds., Bishops under Threat. Contexts and Episcopal Strategies in the Late Antique and Early Medieval West (Arbeiten zur Kirchengeschichte 150), Berlin / New York: De Gruyter, 247–266.
Mossong, Isabelle (2022), Der Klerus des spätantiken Italiens im Spiegel epigraphischer Zeugnisse – eine soziohistorische Studie (Klio Beihefte N.F. 36), Berlin / New York: De Gruyter.
Mossong, Isabelle / Errington, R. Malcolm (2020a), Die Staatsverträge des Altertums, Bd. IV: Die Verträge der griechisch-römischen Welt von ca. 200 v. Chr. bis zum Beginn der Kaiserzeit, München: C. H. Beck.
Mossong, Isabelle (2020b), “Der Nordwesten der Iberischen Halbinsel als integrative Kontaktzone indigener und römischer Bevölkerung. Die Arbeiten des Jahres 2019”, eDAI-F 2020-3, 1–9.
Mossong, Isabelle (2020c), “Le clergé tardo-antique de la péninsule italienne dans les épigrammes inscrites: Lieux – acteurs – usages“, in: Luciana Furbetta / Céline Urlacher-Becht, eds., Les „lieux“ de l’épigramme latine tardive: vers un élargissement du genre (Revue des Études Tardo-antiques. Supplément 8), 97–113.
Mossong, Isabelle / Abascal, Juan Manuel (2019), “Dos damnationes memoriae de Commodo en Asturica Augusta (Astorga, León, Hispania citerior)”, Chiron 49, 363–381.
Mossong, Isabelle (2016), “Une crise religieuse de l’élite ? Le règne de Julien l’Apostat et sa signification pour la communauté chrétienne”, in: Lennart Gilhaus / Stephanie Kirsch / Isabelle Mossong / Franziska Reich / Sebastian Wirz, eds., Elite und Krise in Antiken Gesellschaften / Élites et crises dans les sociétés antiques (Collegium Beatus Rhenanus 5), Stuttgart: Steiner Verlag, 135–144
