Conques in the Global World: Transferring Knowledge – From Material to Immaterial Heritage

Conques is a unique site of cultural heritage, preserving outstanding visual, material, and ritual cultures from the 9th to the 21st century. The aim of this interdisciplinary project funded by the European Union, in which the Bibliotheca Hertziana is participating, is to make this wealth accessible in its entire geographical and temporal scope. Conques, a small village in Southern France, is annually visited by thousands of tourists and pilgrims attracted by its charm and spirituality, which, however, sharply contrasts with the lack of comprehensive scholarly attention paid to its cultural significance. Its chronology, level of reconstruction, and place in the history of art have all been discussed and disputed, but never studied in a systematic and complex way.
The MSCA-RISE CONQUES project thus aims to carry out the first truly interdisciplinary and integrative research on this site, combining expertise from many different fields (art history, history, anthropology, music and performance studies, archaeology, archaeometry, digital technology, and visual studies), and thus shifting it from its currently marginal role to a more central position in scholarly discourse and public awareness. The research team, consisting of experts from six European and two American institutions, will investigate major stages in the medieval construction of Conques in order to identify crucial elements in the development of European culture and re-write the story of the 19th- and 20th-century ‘re-invention’ of the European Middle Ages. 
This project receives funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 101007770.