Multiple Antiquities Multiple Modernities

"Antiquity, as the term has been understood and used over the centuries by scholars, political and religious figures, and ordinary citizens, is far from a single, monolithic concept. Rather than reflecting a stable, shared understanding about the past and its meaning, the idea of antiquity is instead varying and multiple, taking on different meanings and deployed to different effects in those context in which it is being considered. In this volume, historians and archaeologists from a wide range of specialties offer a comparative assessment of the multiple perceptions of antiquity that have shaped modern European cultures and national identities, using a new methodological approach, histoire croisée, which considers these questions in the light of cultural diversity across Europe."--Page 4 of cover.