have figured prominently in the evaluation of Jesus’ entry by Luke’s first readers. Numerous extant sources, including literary, epigraphic, numismatic and archaeological materials, provide information about celebratory welcomes (here παρουσία) in the ancient world, and from these data basic patterns of behavior emerge.7 It is hard to overestimate the importance of the breadth of these data, for they indicate the extent to which society at large would have been aware of the phenomena associated