Mutilating Pagan art
Via The Cranky Professor, I discovered Towards an Archaeology of Iconoclasm, a blog devoted to early Christian campaign to destroy or at least any earlier art that suggested connection to Pagan thought. The writer is a Danish graduate student in archaeology, Troels Myrup Kristensen. The thesis will attempt to answer questions such as who were the image-breakers? In what contexts does iconoclasm occur? What role did religious violence play in late Roman/early Christian society? What is the larger picture?
The Abrahamic religions’ hostility to art continues–witness the Taliban’s destruction of the giant Buddhist statues in Afghanistan a few years ago.
Discusing a damaged sculptural group of the Three Graces, Kristensen notes,
There were many different motives for Christians to smash pagan sculpture, and one of them was an aversion to nudity. This is clear from a series of sculptures, whose genitalia have been mutilated.
Genital mutilation. What more is there to say?