The Forgotten Deities /Забравените божества - издание на английски език/ - каталог

Throughout the millennia of the rich and dynamic history of human presence in our lands, the religious ideas and beliefs of the people have changed just as dynamically. Old deities and beliefs had been forgotten, but they were replaced by new ones, which were in turn forgotten during the constant battle for human souls, hearts, and minds.

The desire of the team that created the temporary exhibition “The Forgotten Deities” is not only to present this complex and constantly changing process spanning more than six millennia - from the Early Neolithic till the establishment of Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire.

The artifacts chosen for temporary exhibition are part of the National Archaeological Museum's depositories. Many of these objects are not familiar to the general public, and some are even unfamiliar to specialists. The history of the creation of the Museum’s rich collection and the questions related to its preservation and support are not less exciting. Since its establishment as a department of the People’s Library and its later foundation as the first and the largest national museum institution, the People’s Museum is summoned to be not only an original treasury for the most important artifacts, reflecting the millennial history of our lands, but also and an institution with a main concern for the Bulgarian cultural-historical heritage, creating standards for its study, preservation and socialization. The museum’s rich depositories, collected over about 150 years (the first artifacts entered in 1879 - 1880), hold hundreds of thousands of archaeological finds. The care for their condition is a serious challenge, even more so because time has not been merciful to them.

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CONTENTS

Hristo Popov.Foreword

Kaloyan Pramatarov

Temporary Exhibition The Forgotten Deities - a Message Beyond the Image

Kamen Boyadzhiev, Stanimira Taneva The Prehistoric Beliefs

Yana Dimitrova, Petar Minkov, Zheni Vasileva Religion of the Bronze and Early Iron Ages: Archaeological Evidence

Kalina Petkova

Hellas, Thrace and the Divine Realm: the Ancient Greek Pantheon in the Thracian context

Slava Vasileva

Late Classical Painted Vases from Apollonia Pontica: The Realm of Aphrodite and Dionysus

Slava Vasileva

Deities and Their Representations in Thrace

Petya Andreeva

The Sacred Dynamics of Urban Life in Moesia and Thrace under Roman Rule

Philip Kolev

The Imperial Cult in Roman Thrace and Moesia (ist - 3rd centuries AD)

Nikolay Dimitrov

Forgotten Deities According to Numismatic Data

Ivan Voykov

The Forgotten Languages of the Deities in Thrace and Moesia during the Roman Period

Reneta Karamanova-Zlatkova

Restoration Problems and Contemporary Approaches to Interventions on Stone Monuments from the Collection of the National Archaeological Museum

References

Abreviations

Photography copyrights

Museum property of the published artifacts