Religion in Roman Egypt

by David Frankfurter

This exploration of cultural resilience examines the complex fate of classical Egyptian religion during the centuries from the period when Christianity first made its appearance in Egypt to when it became the region's dominant religion (roughly 100 to 600 C.E.). Taking into account the full range of witnesses to continuing native piety - from papyri and saints' lives to archaeology and terra-cotta figurines - and drawing on anthropological studies of folk religion, David Frankfurter argues that the religion of Pharaonic Egypt did not die out as early as has been supposed but was instead relegated from political centers to village and home, where it continued a vigorous existence for centuries.