page_title: Christianization
section_title: Myths and imagery
hierarchical_section_title: Christianization / Myths and imagery
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Feuillet d'un diptyque des Nicomaques et des Symmaques&#160;: prêtresse de Cérès accomplissant un rite en l'honneur de Cybèle. Ivoire, œuvre italienne (de Rome&#160;?), vers 400 ap. J.-C. Provenance&#160;: puits de l'abbaye de Montier-en-Der, diocèse de Langres (Haute-Marne). L'autre feuillet est conservé au Victoria and Albert Museum de Londres.
context_page_description: Christianization is the conversion of individuals to Christianity or the conversion of entire groups at once. Various strategies and techniques were employed in Christianization campaigns from Late Antiquity and throughout the Middle Ages. Often the conversion of the ruler was followed by the compulsory baptism of his subjects, often resulting in genocide and ethnic cleansing of whole nations such as the Old Prussians. Some were evangelization by monks or priests, organic growth within an already partly Christianized society, or by campaigns against paganism such as the conversion of pagan temples into Christian churches or the condemnation of pagan gods and practices. There is a long history of connecting Christianization and colonialism. A strategy for Christianization was Interpretatio Christiana – the practice of converting native pagan practices and culture, pagan religious imagery, pagan sites and the pagan calendar to Christian uses, due to the Christian efforts at proselytism based on the Great Commission.
context_section_description: The historicity of several saints has often been treated sceptically by most academics, either because there is a paucity of historical evidence for them, or due to striking resemblances that they have to pre-Christian deities. In 1969 the Roman Catholic Church removed some Christian Saints from its universal calendar and pronounced the historicity of others to be dubious. Though highly popular in the Middle Ages, many of these saints have since been largely forgotten, and their names may now seem quite unfamiliar. The most prominent amongst these is Saint Eustace, who was extremely popular in earlier times, but whom Laura Hibberd sees as a chimera composed from details of several other Saints. Many of these figures of dubious historicity appear to be based on figures from pre-Christian myth and legend, Saint Sarah, for example, also known as Sarah-la-Kali, is thought by Ronald Lee to be a Christianization of Kali, a Hindu deity.
caption: Ivory diptych of a priestess of Ceres, defaced and damaged by Christians
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