Religious pilgrimages are ritual journeys made individually or collectively to sacred places in order to gain the goodwill and help of the divinity, to improve your own spiritual life, to express the respect, devotion for holy figures (saints, apostles, and martyrs) and to practically live your religion. These pilgrimages together with the expressive ritual and ceremonial practices performed by pilgrims and the beliefs associated with the shrines reflect the forms of touching the sacred by parishioners. Such manifestations show us the collective memory and spiritual experience, the changes and permutations during the time into the spiritual and religious life of the society.

The monasteries from Mount Athos, Meteora Monastic Complex and Agios Ioannis Theologos Monastery, the Church of Panayia Evangelistria (Greece), Rila and Bachkovo monasteries (Bulgaria), the relics of St. Paraskeva, Nicula and Şumuleu Ciuc monasteries (Romania), Djunis and Celije (Serbia), Medjugorje (Bosnia and Herzegovina), Serbian monasteries in Kosovo, Ostrog (Montenegro), Shrine of St. Mary – Marija Bistrica (Croatia), Hîncu and Saharna (Moldova) etc., became significant sacred places for the Balkan region and tell us not just about the history of Christianity in this cultural space, but about the religious thinking of the community also. Being a complex phenomenon, the religious pilgrimages of the Balkan Orthodox and Catholic community become more interesting due to their association with sacred topography. Thus, the pilgrimage reflects the folk view of religion, cultural behaviors, and the spiritual connection of people with the creation of God.

The objective of the volume is to reflect mainly a social and cultural anthropological overview of the pilgrimage in Christian community of the Balkan. The chapters and articles will include theoretical approaches combined with case studies and visual materials. As follows, these studies will fill a gap in the research of the subject and will open new perspectives for analysis. Topics little studied will be characterized, critically analyzed and evaluated. Local features on pilgrimages, which reflect the originality of the phenomenon and not yet included in the scientific network, will be published.

The Balkan History Association invites academics, scholars from the following fields of research: history, cultural anthropology, ethnology, theology, social anthropology, and history of religions to submit original studies. The following themes and topics are encouraged:

 The history of the phenomenon, agents, factors and the forms of manifestation during the time, etc.
 Believes, costumes, ceremonial and ritual practices, offerings, behavior and gestures, symbols, rites, etc.
 Religious folklore, Divine Interventions stories, etc.
 Social implications, religious and ethnic identity cohesion, social category of the pilgrims, etc.
 Sacred places, Miracle Working Icons, Relics, etc.



Submission procedure

Please submit your proposal, including the title of your manuscript, an abstract (400 words) and an author biography (up to 100 words) to all editors and to contact@balkan-history.com. The abstracts should include the research question and purpose, the approach and main ideas, and results. No figures, tables, footnotes, or endnotes should be included in the abstract. The studies should be written in English; length: up to 12 000 words, including bibliography, figures, tables; keywords: up to 7; body of paper: Font Times New Roman, Size 12, Normal, Justified, Line Spacing 1,15. All submitted studies will be peer reviewed. The revision process will be released immediately after the deadline.

Deadlines
December 31, 2020: Submit proposals to editors
January 10, 2021: Notification of accepted studies’ proposals
May 2, 2021: Receipt of full studies for review
June 2, 2021: Revised studies re-submitted to editors
July 2021: Approved studies delivered to publisher

Editors
Dorina ONICA (National Museum of Ethnography and Natural History, Chișinău), dorinaonica@yahoo.com
Petko HRISTOV (Institute of Ethnology and Folklore Studies with Ethnographic Museum, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences), hristov_p@yahoo.com
Emmanouil VARVOUNIS (Democritus University of Thrace), mvarv@otenet.gr
Goran-Pavel ŠANTEK (University of Zagreb), gpsantek@ffzg.hr
Biljana SIKIMIĆ (Institute for Balkan Studies, Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts), biljana.sikimic@bi.sanu.ac.rs
John EADE (University of Roehampton, London), J.Eade@roehampton.ac.uk
Evelyn REUTER (Friedrich-Schiller-Universität, Jena), evelynareuter@gmail.com