This chapter engages the concept of the numinous and applies it to the material culture of the sacred body in American material culture, with two examples from early American history. It introduces early twentieth-century scholar Rudolph Otto’s idea of the numinous, and it proposes that it can help dispel confusion over the nature of sacred matter, leading to a better grasp of the phenomenological complexity of religious material culture, especially as it relates to the body. The chapter focuses on two bodies, that of nineteenth-century American missionary to Liberia Ann Wilkins and famous eighteenth-century preacher George Whitefield. These bodies are used as case studies to demonstrate the prevalence of numinousness, even among American Protestants who had traditionally eschewed material religion. The author makes the claim that the invisibility of religion is a verdant precondition for its materialization.
Fig. 1 Reliquary in situ, sitting above the coffin detritus in the grave identified as that of Captain Gabriel Archer. Image courtesy of Jamestown Rediscovery (Historic Jamestowne). tions, and the staff at Jamestown Rediscovery for their accommodating hospitality, assistance, and level of access they provided in researching this subject, including James Horne, Michael Lavin and the other conservators and archaeologists on site. I am grateful for the insights, encouragement, and critical feedback of the two anonymous reviewers. Thanks to Emily Floyd and Sally Promey at the Yale Center for the Study of Material and Visual Cultures of Religion for their enthusiasm, John Hanson,
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