Living with the Dead: Necropoleis in Roman Asia Minor

How ancient individuals and societies dealt with their dead is, in some regard, quite different from how we handle things nowadays: Ancient necropoleis (cities of the dead) were often situated in direct sight to the city, and equipped with monumental tombs that were visible from afar. Periodical festivities were performed at the gravesites, e.g. at the birthday of the deceased, with the whole family taking part. Additionally, former professional colleagues could be involved in the longterm maintenance of the tomb via the donation of a sum of money by the deceased, thus obliging them to regularly decorate his grave. Many of these tombs were also equipped with inscriptions, that deliver important information on the person who founded the tomb as well as on his plans for the future use of his monument. These inscriptions form the most important chunk of evidence for this project. The main goal here is to investigate into the family structures presented in these texts, as well as into questions regarding the respective societythe living in contrast to the dead, so to speak. Therefore, four model cities in Southwestern Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey) were chosen: Aphrodisias, Hierapolis (better known as Pamukkale today), Termessus and Olympus. Especially the last two cities have been in the focus of research in Austria for more than a century: Already in the 1890s and 1900s, Austrian scientists visited the cities, collecting, copying and finally publishing their inscriptions. Two main criteria led to the selection of these four cities: For one thing, each of them delivers several hundred ancient grave inscriptions, and for another thing, most of these texts may still be studied in their original contextthus delivering invaluable information on how they were perceived, read and maybe even discussed by contemporaries. The projects main targets are a close examination of the ways in which families dealt with death, burial and commemmoration, as well as a tighter grasp around the strategies of how societies participated and contributed to an ancient culture of commemmoration.