Collective identities in the eastern provinces of the Roman Empire

The emergence, during the Roman Imperial period, of competing institutional frameworks alongside cities (and koina) as producers of cohesive political identity created fertile ground for the formation of various new forms of collective identity – ethnic, religious, cultural, and others. These processes – reflected, among other things, in phenomena such as the rapid development of religious and/or professional associations in this period, the renewed interest in local and regional history in the provinces of the Empire, or the so-called Second Sophistic and the learned promotion of new cultural identities – are explored especially in the geographical areas of specialization of the Section’s researchers (e.g., Macedonia, Asia Minor).