Elena Augusta. A journey between western and eastern traditions from the 4th to the 14th century · The paper aims to investigate the different narratives portraying Elena Augusta as their protagonist through an analysis of the ancient sources dating from the 4th to the 14th century. Starting from the 5th/6th century, Elena began to travel through time and space, taking on different connotations and peculiarities. Despite several studies addressing the different traditions one at a time, this article wants to provide a unified framework for this topic : the purpose is to highlight analogies and differences between the “various” Helena – the one from Britannia, the Byzantine one and the one that appears in the Italian context at a later period – and, above all, to underline how the different readings are subject to very specific functions that the Augusta is called upon to perform in the contexts in which she is evoked. Finally, in spite of a literature that has often provided a subordinate vision of Helena – as the mother of Constantine – this work, analyzing the long tradition in which she played a protagonist role, proposes an opposite perspective : the historiographically winning model is actually Helena and not her son.
Elena Augusta. Un viaggio tra tradizione orientale e occidentale tra IV e XIV secolo
Maria G. Castello
2024-01-01
Abstract
Elena Augusta. A journey between western and eastern traditions from the 4th to the 14th century · The paper aims to investigate the different narratives portraying Elena Augusta as their protagonist through an analysis of the ancient sources dating from the 4th to the 14th century. Starting from the 5th/6th century, Elena began to travel through time and space, taking on different connotations and peculiarities. Despite several studies addressing the different traditions one at a time, this article wants to provide a unified framework for this topic : the purpose is to highlight analogies and differences between the “various” Helena – the one from Britannia, the Byzantine one and the one that appears in the Italian context at a later period – and, above all, to underline how the different readings are subject to very specific functions that the Augusta is called upon to perform in the contexts in which she is evoked. Finally, in spite of a literature that has often provided a subordinate vision of Helena – as the mother of Constantine – this work, analyzing the long tradition in which she played a protagonist role, proposes an opposite perspective : the historiographically winning model is actually Helena and not her son.
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