Strangers on the way: Hospitalité, identité et défis lors des voyages à la fin de l’Antiquité

A wide range of sources reports about journeys undertaken by leading intellectuals, high-rank members of the Imperial administration and eminent churchmen. A series of elements can be collected to describe not only the practical aspects of the transfer but also some clues about the nature of the relationship established between the traveller and the host(s) and the conditions of welcoming. This relationship was mainly modulated on social convention and in most cases implied an interaction between “peers”. However, considering the peculiar status of the traveller, a stranger suspended in the condition of no longer being in his environment and not having reached his destination yet, several factors would play a decisive role in the construction of the identities of the guest and of the host. Furthermore, given the eminence of most of these travellers, the journey was undertaken with a support of a large entourage. Somehow, then, these transfers turned into confrontations of groups, raising the issue of otherness and acceptance, and the challenge of forced proximity to each other.