Ancient History (ANCH)

ANCH 0020 Travel and Ethnography

In this class we will read a broad selection of travel narratives, from Herodotus to Ibn Battuta and from the Jesuit Relations describing New France up to the 20th century writers such as Lawrence Durrell, Robyn Davidson and Rory Stewart. Our focus will be on exploring how travel and travel writing create exotic cultures. The journey also becomes a discovery of self by an encounter with the Other. In the process, entire worlds of wonder open up for the viewer. How material is selected for recording reflects the priorities, anxieties and worldview of the writer, reflecting travel's ability to focus our attention and stimulate thoughtful reflection.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 0020

1 Course Unit

ANCH 0100 Introduction to the Ancient Middle East

The great pyramids and mysterious mummies of Egypt, the fabled Tower of Babel, and the laws of the Babylonian king Hammurabi are some of the things that might come to mind when you think of the ancient Middle East. Yet these are only a very few of the many fascinating -- and at time perplexing -- aspects of the civilizations that flourished there c. 3300-300 BCE. This is where writing first developed, where people thought that the gods wrote down what would happen in the future on the lungs and livers of sacrificed sheep, and where people knew how to determine the length of hypotenuse a thousand years before the Greek Pythagoras was born. During this course, we will learn more about these other matters and discover their place in the cultures and civilizations of that area. This is an interdisciplinary survey of the history, society and culture of the ancient Middle East, in particular Egypt and Mesopotamia, utilizing extensive readings from ancient texts in translation (including the Epic of Gilgamesh, "one of the great masterpieces of world literature"), but also making use of archaeological and art historical materials. The goal of the course is to gain an appreciation of the various societies of the time, to understand some of their great achievements, to become acquainted with some of the fascinating individuals of the time (such as Hatshepsut, "the women pharaoh," and Akhenaten, "the heretic king"), and to appreciate the rich heritage that they have left us.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: HIST 0730, MELC 0001, NELC 0001

1 Course Unit

ANCH 0101 Strife: A History of the Greeks

The Greeks enjoy a special place in the construction of western culture and identity, and yet many of us have only the vaguest notion of what their culture was like. A few Greek myths at bedtime when we are kids, maybe a Greek tragedy like Sophokles' Oidipous when we are at school: these are often the only contact we have with the world of the ancient Mediterranean. The story of the Greeks, however, deserves a wider audience, because so much of what we esteem in our own culture derives from them: democracy, epic poetry, lyric poetry, tragedy, history writing, philosophy, aesthetic taste, all of these and many other features of cultural life enter the West from Greece. The oracle of Apollo at Delphi had inscribed over the temple, "Know Thyself." For us, that also means knowing the Greeks. We will cover the period from the Late Bronze Age, c. 1500 BC, down to the time of Alexander the Great, concentrating on the two hundred year interval from 600-400 BC.

Fall

Also Offered As: CLST 0101, HIST 0720

1 Course Unit

ANCH 0102 Ancient Rome

At its furthest extent during the second century CE, the Roman Empire was truly a "world empire", stretching from northern Britain to North Africa and Egypt, encompassing the whole of Asia Minor, and bordering the Danube in its route from the Black Forest region of Germany to the Black Sea. But in its earliest history it comprised a few small hamlets on a collection of hills adjacent to the Tiber river in central Italy. Over a period of nearly 1500 years, the Roman state transformed from a mythical Kingdom to a Republic dominated by a heterogeneous, competitive aristocracy to an Empire ruled, at least notionally, by one man. It developed complex legal and administrative structures, supported a sophisticated and highly successful military machine, and sustained elaborate systems of economic production and exchange. It was, above all, a society characterized both by a willingness to include newly conquered peoples in the project of empire, and by fundamental, deep-seated practices of social exclusion and domination. This course focuses in particular upon the history of the Roman state between the fifth century BCE and the third century CE, exploring its religious and cultural practices, political, social and economic structures. It also scrutinizes the fundamental tensions and enduring conflicts that characterized this society throughout this 800-year period.

Spring

Also Offered As: CLST 0102, HIST 0721

1 Course Unit

ANCH 1100 Ancient Mediterranean Empires

What constituted an empire in antiquity and how was imperialism legitimized? Which measures were used to maintain and organize imperial power? How did foreign rule affect the daily life of people all over the Mediterranean? In this course we will discuss and compare ancient empires from Achaemenid Persia to Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic kingdoms of his successors to the emergence of Rome as one of the most influential empires in world history. Topics that will be discussed include ancient ideas and concepts of imperial rule, patterns of political, economic and cultural power and their interrelations as well as imperial crises and local resistance. All texts will be discussed in translation. There are no prerequisites.

Fall

Also Offered As: CLST 1100

1 Course Unit

ANCH 1102 The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire?

The Roman Empire, teetering under the weight of its bureaucracy, oppressed by the demands of its soldiers, weakened by wave after wave of barbarian invasions, and, with the rise of Christianity, confronted by its own immorality, finally fell when the last Roman emperor, Romulus Augustulus, was sent into exile in 476 CE. That, at least, is one version of the story. In truth, there are many stories that can be told of the period between the apogee of the Roman empire in the 2nd c. AD and the rise of Christianity and Islam and origins of the so-called Barbarian Kingdoms in the 7th and 8th centuries AD. This course will explore this period of 600 years, using methodologies from history, archaeology, social science and the sciences to understand the complex problem of empire and its evolutions. No previous knowledge of ancient or medieval history required.

Also Offered As: CLST 1102

1 Course Unit

ANCH 1103 Ancient Iranian Empires

Iran - as a landmass and a political entity - was central to the ancient world in a variety of ways. Ancient Iranian Empires were of central importance to - and centrally located in - the ancient world. It was the successor kingdom to the Assyrians and Babylonians; the power against which Greece and Rome defined themselves; and the crucible in which various communities and models of rule developed. This course offers a survey of the history of the ancient Persianate world, focusing in particular on the political and imperial entities that rose to power, the cultural, political, mercantile, and other contacts they shared with their neighbors to the East and West, and the communities and religious groups that arose and flourished within their lands. Ancient Iranian empires rivaled the Greek and Roman Empires to their West, and the central and eastern Asian Empires to their east, and the ongoing history of diplomacy, cultural contact, and war between these regions was formative to each and to the ancient world as a whole. Iran was home to and similarly formative for a variety of religions, including Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, Manichaeism, and Islam, and a central question Ancient Iranian political powers sought to address was how to negotiate and address the variety of populations under their control. The course will conclude by studying how, rather than a simplistic story of decline, the strategies, policies, institutions, and memory of the Iranian Empires continued to shape early Islam, medieval imagination, and modern political regimes.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: MELC 2040, NELC 2040, RELS 2040

1 Course Unit

ANCH 1202 The Ancient Economy

This class presents an introduction to economies before economics, a study of economic activity in the Greco-Roman world. Ancient Greece and Rome have been called some of the first "global" economies - they engaged in long-distance trade, introduced the first coinage systems, and built and manufactured at large scales. At the same time, they remained agrarian societies, with majority peasant populations, high levels of inequality and social systems that often placed social capital ahead of profit. Using textual sources, archaeology and techniques from the natural and social sciences, this class will not only look at basic elements of economic activity in the ancient world - demographics, trade, monetization, industry - but also ask critical questions about how - or if -modern economic methods can be applied to the distant past. No previous knowledge of the ancient world or economics is necessary.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CLST 1202

1 Course Unit

ANCH 1203 Myths and Religions of the Ancient World

This course will survey the religions of the ancient Middle East, situating each in its historical and socio-cultural context and focusing on the key issues of concern to humanity: creation, birth, the place of humans in the order of the universe, death, and destruction. The course will cover not only the better-known cultures from the area, such as Egypt and Mesopotamia, but also some lesser-known traditions, such as those of the Hittites, or of the ancient Mediterranean town of Ugarit. Religion will not be viewed merely as a separate, sealed-off element of the ancient societies, but rather as an element in various cultural contexts, for example, the relationship between religion and magic and the role of religion in politics will be recurring topics in the survey. Background readings for the lectures will be drawn not only from the modern scholarly literature, but also from the words of the ancients themselves in the form of their myths, rituals, and liturgies.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: MELC 0004, RELS 0004

1 Course Unit

ANCH 1205 Race and Ethnicity in the Ancient World

Modern political and artistic movements often appeal to an ancient past in order to construct their own social and racial identities. But how did ancient peoples understand themselves and others? How should we understand race and ethnicity in the ancient past? And how are perceptions of the past used today to construct or dismantle structures of power? This course explores both ancient and modern representations of race and ethnicity in antiquity. We will investigate both how ancient peoples around or near the Mediterranean (e.g. Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, Persians, and Nubians) understood difference and also how modern eras have appropriated ancient identities. Our dialogues will include ancient ethnographies, literature, and visual arts as well as modern theories and media, with an emphasis on active learning and collaboration. Students will be encouraged to produce both analytical and creative responses to our materials.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 1205

1 Course Unit

ANCH 1206 Citizenship, Belonging and Exclusion in the Roman World

What did it mean to be a citizen in the Roman world? What did citizens do in order to support their claims to belong in the civic community? Conversely, what about those members of the community who were judged not to belong? What limitations acted upon them, and what were the terms of their exclusion? This course will begin by exploring practices of citizenship in the Roman Republic and Empire: voting, serving in the military, running for office, and so on. It will then examine the experiences of those who, for some reason, were excluded from one or more of these roles. Fundamentally, our question is: “To what extent was Roman society diverse and inclusive?” No prior knowledge of Roman History is required. Texts will be discussed in translation.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 1206

1 Course Unit

ANCH 1207 Greek Parties, Speech, and Identity

The ancient Greek symposium existed as a stylized elite drinking party from the Archaic period until the end of the Roman Empire a millennium later, inspiring many works of literature and philosophical debates. Conversation and correct behavior were key at these parties to form social bonds and indicate one’s belonging to Greek elite society while simultaneously excluding certain demographics from the group. In this course we will learn about the ancient Greek world through the institution of the symposium and will complicate our understanding of the ancient world by putting it in dialog with our modern cultural expectations. We will read from a selection of authors in translation including Plato, Plutarch, and Athenaeus, focusing on the conversational and presentational aspects of the texts. Students will also develop personalized techniques for public speaking and will practice several varieties of public speaking inspired by the symposium. This course is a CWiC Critical Speaking Seminar, in which most of the course grade will be based on oral assignments. No prior experience with the ancient world or with public speaking is required.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 1207

1 Course Unit

ANCH 1305 Art and Architecture in Ancient Egypt

This course will be an introduction to the art, architecture and minor arts that were produced during the three thousand years of ancient Egyptian history. This material will be presented in its cultural and historical contexts through illustrated lectures and will include visits to the collection of the University Museum.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: ARTH 2180, MELC 0210

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3101 Periclean Athens

Athens in the 5th Century BCE is often viewed as a high point of human civilization. We will assess this claim by looking at the period's cultural achievements (in such areas as drama, architecture, and oratory) within their social and political contexts. Topics for discussion include: the structure and workings of the Athenian democracy; the interplay between pro-democratic and anti-democratic positions in Athenian political life; the connections between democracy and imperialism; conceptions of citizenship and relations between citizens and non-citizens (women, slaves, and resident foreigners); the role of the law courts in both dispute resolution and elite competition; sexual politics; and the civic significance of religious ritual.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 3101

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3102 The Rise and Decline of Macedonia

In this course, we will study the rise and development of Macedonia from a tiny kingdom on the northern fringes of the Greek world to one of the major powers of the region and beyond. Regarded by the Greeks as an at least semi-barbarian culture on the periphery, Macedonia became the dominant power in the Greek world during the fourth century BC and its king Alexander the Great set out to conquer the world. After his death, Macedonia was one of the Hellenistic kingdoms competing for power and influence in the Mediterranean until it finally came under Roman control. Topics that will be discussed include questions of ethnicity and identity, Macedonian kingship, culture and society (including the role of women) and the role of Macedonian traditions in the Hellenistic era in general. Special emphasis will therefore be laid on critical reading and interpretation of ancient literary texts, documentary evidence and archaeological material. that will be discussed include questions of ethnicity and identity, Macedonian kingship, culture and society (including the role of women) and the role of Macedonian traditions in the Hellenistic era in general.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 3102

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3103 The Hellenistic and Roman Near East

In this course we will study the history of the Hellenistic and Roman period from a Near Eastern perspective. From the conquests of Alexander the Great to the end of Roman rule in late antiquity, this region was the scene of conflicts, but also of peaceful and fruitful interactions between Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, Jews, Syrians, Arabs and many other societies. What was the impact of Greek and Roman rule and how did the peoples of the region react to these fundamental changes? On the other hand, how did they influence the culture and worldview of their conquerors? We will use historical texts, documents and archaeological evidence to discuss these political, cultural and religious encounters that made the Near East to a key region of Greco-Roman history. All texts will be discussed in translation. No prerequisites, although it would be useful to have some background in Hellenistic and/or Roman history.

Also Offered As: CLST 3103, MELC 3060, NELC 3060

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3104 Greek World After Alexander the Great

This class is designed as a detailed investigation of the world created by Alexander the Great. We will cover the three hundred year period known as the Hellenistic Age from the career of Alexander the Great (354-323 BC) until the defeat of Antony and Cleopatra at the Battle of Actium (31 BC). This was a period during which the world of the Greeks underwent extraordinary and far-reaching changes, as Greek culture was established as far afield as northwestern India, central Asia and Egypt. In the same period kingdoms controlled by Alexanders's Successors used Greek culture to define their rule, establishing a Greek culture of the elite in regions which previously had been dominated by the Persians. As Greek and non-Greek worlds collided, a new interpretation of Greek culture emerged, giving rise, among other things, to universities and professional schools, state subsidized health care, triumphalist architecture, the heroization of the noble savage, coinage with royal portraits, the deification of men and a multitude of other social, artistic and political forms familiar to us. It was an age of radical change, dislocation, as Greek populations colonized regions previously unkown to them.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 3104

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3107 Age of Caesar

A course on Roman culture and society in a period of tumultuous political change, the lifetime of Julius Caesar (100-44BCE). Focuses on the interplay between shifting political and military realities and developments in social organization and literary production at Rome and in the wider Mediterranean world. The reception of Caesar in later ages will also be considered. Readings (all in translation) will include Catullus, Cicero, Lucretius, Plutarach, Sallust, Suetonius, and, of course, Caesar himself.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 3107

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3109 Living and Dying in Ancient Athens

This class is designed to explore the experience of daily life in ancient Athens, with special attention to the values and practices that constitute the habits of life in the classical period. Methodologically the class will attempt a bottom-up reconstruction of lived experience by focusing on those features of ordinary life that were taken for granted by the Greeks but which strike us as either alien, odd or hard to understand.Topics covered include: settlement and resource extraction; crops and risk mitigation; trade and manufacturing; slavery; sex work; the symposium; military service; and burial.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 3109

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3201 Disasters in the Ancient Mediterranean World

Natural disasters occupy a powerful place in our imagination. Stories of floods plagues, earthquakes and storms excite and horrify us, and communities mobilize their resources quickly in response to these events. In the ancient Mediterranean world, natural disasters could take on potent meaning, indicating the anger or disfavor of the gods, acting as warnings against certain courses of action, or confirmations of individuals' fears or suspicions about the world in which they lived. In this course, we explore the evidence for some disasters in the ancient Mediterranean world, the ways in which contemporaries reacted to those disasters and interpreted their causes. This project is, of necessity, multidisciplinary, involving textual, archaeological, geological, and comparative materials and drawing on methodologies from history, political and archaeological science, and the emerging field of disaster studies. In the process, we will gain an appreciation of the social structures of communities in the period, the thought-world in which they operated, and the challenges and opportunities that attend a project of this sort. No prior knowledge of Ancient History is required, although it would be useful to have taken an introductory survey course such as ANCH 0100, ANCH 0101, or ANCH 0102. Texts will be discussed in translation.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: ANTH 3101, CLST 3201

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3203 Power and Peril: The Paradox of Monarchy among Ancient Greeks, Romans, and Jews

We imagine ancient Greece and Rome as the cradles of democracy and republicanism, early Judea as a pious theocracy, but monarchy was the most common and prevalent form of government in antiquity (and the premodern world in general). In this class, we will take a special look at kinship among the Jews, Greeks, and Romans to assess and discuss similarities, differences, and mutual influences. In all these cultures, the king was a polarizing figure in reality and in conception. On the one hand, some revered the monarch as ideal leader, and monarchy provided the language with which to describe and even imagine the very gods. On the other, monarchs were widely reviled in both theory and practice, from the Greek tyrants to biblical Saul. The Emperor Augustus loudly denied his own affinity to the office of king, even as he ruled alone and was revered as a god. In other words, kings stood both for the ideal and the worst form of government. This class confronts the paradox of monarchical rule and will, through the lens of the king, explore ideas of god, government, human frailty, and utopianism.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 3203, JWST 3203, RELS 3203

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3204 Lies My Ancient History Teacher Told Me

The neat, comforting narratives that we construct of the histories of ancient Greece and Rome cover up a collection of controversies and debates that continue to rage in contemporary scholarship. Can we use the Homeric epics as sources of early Greek history? Who was responsible for the Peloponnesian War? How can we best explain Rome's acquisition of empire? How new was the political revolution of Augustus? What were the main reasons for the rise of Christianity? In this course, we explore these and other controversies, focusing on both modern scholarship and the ancient sources. All texts will be discussed in translation. No prior knowledge of Ancient History is required, although it would be useful to have taken ANCH 0101 and/or ANCH 0102.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 3204

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3205 Religion and the Polis

This class is designed to introduce students to the study of Greek religion with particular attention to the notion of polis religion, a recent model used to understand the function and structure of Greek religion. In this class we will look at the major institutions of Greek religion, notably sacrifice, festivals, and processions, but will also examine the importance of sanctuaries and temples in the heart of the city, on the edges of its territory and in the countryside. We will also examine religion as a system of belief and action, and will consider the intersection of local, state and international religious institutions.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 3205

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3206 Jewish Diaspora in the Roman Empire

Under the Roman Empire, Jewish communities developed and flourished especially in the cities of the Eastern Mediterranean, in Egypt, Syria, Asia Minor, Greece, Northern Africa, and Italy proper. In many of these cities, the Jews formed a considerable part of the population; they influenced the cultural, social, and political communal life and developed an identity that was distinctively different from that in Judea. In this seminar, we will trace Jewish life in the Diaspora under Roman rule. How did Jews and non-Jews interact? What was the legal status of Jewish communities under the Roman Empire? What caused conflicts and how were they solved? What can the history of Jewish Diaspora communities tell us about minorities in the Roman Empire in general? We will use literary texts, inscriptions, papyri, and archaeological material to answer these questions and many more.

Also Offered As: CLST 3206, JWST 3206

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3207 Cleopatra

Cleopatra VII (70/69 30 BCE) is one of the most famous women in world history. She has been remembered, admired, and reproached as a power-hungry Hellenistic queen, as the last pharaoh of Egypt, as a self-confident female ruler, and as the vicious seductress of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony. Her supposedly extravagant lifestyle, her political schemes, but also her integrity in choosing suicide over submission have inspired poets, artists, and historians from her own time to the modern world. In this seminar, we will take a closer look at some of the common perceptions and stereotypes that have shaped the image of Cleopatra for more than 2000 years. The main focus, however, will be on the historical queen, her biography, and the political and cultural contexts of her life. We will use ancient literary texts, papyri, inscriptions, coins, and archaeological evidence to analyze Cleopatra's rise to power, how she presented herself to her subjects, and how she was perceived by others, as well as her role in the tumultuous events that led to the end of the Hellenistic period and the rise of imperial Rome under the rule of Augustus. No prerequisites, but some background in Hellenistic and/or Roman history will be helpful.

Not Offered Every Year

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3209 Foreigners in Rome

According to the stories the Romans told about the origins of their city, Rome began as a community of immigrants. As a growing metropolis and, eventually, the center of an empire, the city remained a magnet for people from other parts of the Empire and beyond. Foreigners came to the city as merchants and travelers, they settled here seeking a different and better life, pursuing a career, or escaping hardships in their home communities. Others were brought to Rome against their will, as prisoners or slaves. In this seminar, we will explore the different communities of foreigners and immigrants that shaped Rome. How and why did they move to the city? How did they experience their new home? How did they adapt to life in Rome and how, in turn, did they influence what we define as "Roman" today? Finally, what can the legal, social, political, and social status of immigrants tell us about Roman society in general? To answer these questions (and more), we will look at a wide array of primary sources, including literary texts, inscriptions, and material culture.

Also Offered As: CLST 3209

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3210 Classicism in the Black Atlantic, 1776-1968

During the eighteenth century, Britain, France, and the other imperial powers embraced the classical aesthetic to broadcast their genealogical connections with ancient Greece and Rome. As they expanded across the Atlantic, they brought with them an aesthetic of white marble, symmetry, restraint, and cultivated 'taste' that served to aestheticize the dependence of the imperial system on enslaved labor. This course explores how freed slaves and their descendants negotiated with the ideology of classicism during the long battle for civil rights in the Atlantic world. Beginning with the work of Phillis Wheatley, Olaudah Equiano, Ignatius Sancho, and Ottobah Cugoano, we will investigate how participants in the world of what Paul Gilroy called "the Black Atlantic" embraced, questioned, or rejected the classical aesthetic up to the final collapse of the colonial system in the late 1960s. Along the way, we will ask important questions including: who 'owns' ancient Greece and Rome? Can an aesthetic be inherently political? And was the Black classicism of the 18th-20th centuries effective in fulfilling an agenda of liberation?

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: HIST 0875

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3602 Writing History in Greece and Rome

What constituted history in ancient Greece and Rome? What claims to knowledge did history make, and how did these differ from other forms of knowledge? How did historians envision their task, and how did they go about performing it? We will read the works of the major Greek and Roman historians in translation in an attempt to answer those questions. Other issues to consider include the origins and development of historical writing, the place of history within the ancient literary tradition, and the similarities and differences between the ancient and modern practice of history.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CLST 3602

1 Course Unit

ANCH 3999 Independent Study

This course is taken by students doing independent work with a faculty advisor, equivalent to work in regular 3000-level courses.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: LATN 0000

1 Course Unit

ANCH 4998 Senior Research Paper (Honors Thesis)

This course is taken in the senior year by students approved to write a Senior Research Paper for the Ancient History major. For policies see the Classical Studies department website.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: LATN 4998

1 Course Unit

ANCH 5800 MLA Proseminar: Ancient Economies

Spring

1 Course Unit

ANCH 6080 Worlds of Late Antiquity

The period between the third and eighth centuries - from the Tetrarchy led by Diocletian to the rise of Umayyad Caliphate - is characteristically regarded as a period of ferment and change, whether that be on the still-influential model of Decline and Fall first proposed by Edward Gibbon in the eighteenth century or the somewhat less deterministic account of transformation favored by Peter Brown in the late twentieth. These narratives tend to emphasize the large-scale processes that played out over these centuries, such as the florescence and fragmentation of two world empires; the emergence of two highly influential monotheistic religions of the book; and the codification of legal systems that continue to dominate contemporary practices and theories of law. Equally, what characterizes these centuries is the particular granularity and character of the textual and archaeological evidence that exists for the functioning of this world at the micro-scale, as against the periods that preceded and followed. This course traces the social, economic, cultural, and religious institutions and processes that make this period distinctive, explores the nature of the evidence for those institutions and processes, and exposes to scrutiny the assumptions and preconceptions that underpin the scholarly narratives that have been constructed about them.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: MELC 6080, NELC 6080, RELS 6080

1 Course Unit

ANCH 6101 Problems in Greek History

This course will explore some of the pressing and problematic scholarly debates in the historiography of the Greek archaic and classical periods.

Not Offered Every Year

1 Course Unit

ANCH 6102 Problems in Hellenistic History

This course will explore seminal trends and debates that have shaped modern inquiries in the period between the campaigns of Alexander and the Battle of Actium. The purpose of the seminar is to gain familiarity with the field of Hellenistic studies broadly defined as well as specific approaches. Special emphasis will be laid on the debate of whether terms such as “Hellenism” or “Hellenization” adequately describe the complex political, social, and cultural dynamics of the period and the new frameworks of interaction, confluence, and power structures that shaped it.

Fall or Spring

1 Course Unit

ANCH 6103 Problems in Roman History: Roman Empire

This course will explore some of the pressing and problematic scholarly debates in the historiography of the Roman imperial period, from the accession of the first emperor, Augustus, to the reign of Justinian (ruled 527-363 CE). Students will gain a familiarity with both the broad historical narratives of the Roman empire and the details of specific scholarly disagreements in the intellectual, political, socio-economic, and cultural history of the period.

Fall or Spring

1 Course Unit

ANCH 7202 Greek Epigraphy

An introduction to the principles and practices of Greek Epigraphy. Study of selected Greek inscriptions.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: GREK 7802

1 Course Unit

ANCH 7203 Ancient Economies

Scholars have long debated the nature of the ancient economy, the terms in which it can best be approached, and the decision-making processes that underpinned economic behavior in antiquity. In particular, controversy has surrounded the extent to which the economies of Greco-Roman antiquity can be modeled using contemporary tools of analysis. In recent scholarship, many of the tenets laid down by Moses Finley in his The Ancient Economy have been re-evaluated, with the result that the field is currently in a state of intellectual ferment. It is the purpose of this course to explore the terms in which contemporary debates over ancient economic systems are formulated, with reference to a variety of societies and periods, from the palace economies of the Mycenaean period to the system of taxation introduced in the early fourth century by the emperor Diocletian and his colleagues in the Tetrarchy.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CLST 7203

1 Course Unit

ANCH 7204 Provincial Perspectives

Most of the primary sources available to us are commonly taken to reflect the ideology, concepts, and realities of Roman imperial rule through the lenses of the central power. However, a number of sources provide insights into how provincials and imperial subjects perceived the empire and their own status within its political, cultural, and social frameworks. In this seminar, we will focus on how ethnic, religious, cultural, and regional identities were developed, maintained, adapted, and interpreted within and in reaction to the empire in concept and reality. Historiographical and auto-ethnographic works, orations, philosophical, and religious texts reflect different attitudes towards the imperial center, ranging from open hostility and frustrated acceptance to praise and identification. Texts to be discussed include canonical works (Polybius, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Second Sophistic) as well as lesser-known texts and authors. Special emphasis will be laid on scholarly approaches, including concepts of identity, hybridization and cultural change, the dynamics of imperial integration, and the (de-)construction of modern narratives of Romanization.

Not Offered Every Year

1 Course Unit

ANCH 7205 Greek Sanctuaries

Sanctuaries remain an important focal point for the study of Greek religion. Both as sites for worship, dedication, oracular activity and other cult activity and as sites for the mediation of elite and state competition sanctuaries are, along with the polis, the most essential structuring institutions of Greek life. This seminar takes a selection of larger and smaller extra-urban sanctuaries and examines their growth, articulation and function.

Not Offered Every Year

1 Course Unit

ANCH 7208 Biographical Approaches to Antiquity

Biographical approaches, long used and despised as a genre that reduces history to the actions of a few protagonists, have been fruitfully repurposed in recent scholarship. Rather than focusing the historical analysis on the usual suspects (from emperors to canonical authors), recent applications of biographical approaches have deliberately decentered the narrative, employed the perspective of those whose position has been marginalized, and revealed influences and patterns that otherwise would remain unnoticed. This course will explore the potential, variations, and pitfalls of approaches that focus on individuals, from biographies that follow a traditional format yet have shaped the field of ancient studies to approaches such as microhistory, group and collective biographies, prosopographical studies, and social network analysis. Using examples from the Hellenistic period to the High Empire, we will discuss methods for reconstructing an individual life despite the general scarcity of sources, how such an approach can transform our understanding of the respective cultural, political, and social circumstances, and what insights into the broader historical processes and dynamics such a focus offers or obscures.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 7208

1 Course Unit

ANCH 7209 Fragmentary Historians

This is research seminar in which students will be expected to prepare translations of and commentaries on a wide range of lesser-known and fragmentary historians of the Hellenistic and Imperial periods, ranging from Duris of Samos to Dexippos of Athens. Students will use the model of Jacoby's Die Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker for the presentation of their work and will report on the major genres of later Greek historiography: ethnography, regional history, universal history, genealogy ands horography. The semester will consist of three units. In the first part, the emphasis will be on acquiring familiarity with and confidence in working with Jacoby’s brilliant but idiosyncratic masterwork. Students will be assigned short entries from FGrH in order to practice translation, writing commentaries and mastering the format of the genre. In addition, students will be reading a wide range of contemporary historians on the general subject of Greek historiography and will be expected to acquire a broad grasp of the development of Greek history writing in the Hellenistic and Imperial periods. Topics to be discussed will include the development of Universal histories, geographic and periegetic literature, local histories, genealogy, mythography and Greek writing by non-Greeks. In the second unit we will work on longer entries in Jacoby. Each student will have responsibility for an historian for whom we have approximately 20-30 pages of testimonia and fragments. Each week each student will present a portion of the overall FGrH entry and will be receive comments and help from the other seminar participants. Students will be free to choose which historian they wish to work on and will be encouraged to find authors whose interests intersect with the students’ proposed course of research. In the third unit the entire seminar will work collaboratively on a single, lengthy entry in Brill’s New Jacoby. Each student will be assigned a portion of the text and commentary and will produce a segment of approximately eight pages of translation and commentary.

Not Offered Every Year

1 Course Unit

ANCH 7210 The Principate under Pressure: Gaius Caligula

Hactenus quasi de principe, reliqua ut de monstro narranda sunt (Suet. Cal. 22.1). Suetonius here captures the view of ancient sources (and some modern scholarship) that the principate of Gaius, which began with great expectations, degenerated into a crisis with a madman as the head of state. Revisionist scholarship has argued, however, that the empire functioned according to design during the brief but disconcerting principate of Gaius. In this seminar, we will look at the contemporary literary, documentary, and material sources for Gaius' principate (and slightly beyond, both before and after), with a focus not on the biography of the princeps but on the institutions constitutive of the principate. Sessions will be devoted to: the provinces and cities of the empire, Italy, literary and material cultural productions and spectacle, the army and praetorian guard, social groups and social mobility, the senate, client rulers, the ruler cult, the fiscus and imperial holdings, the treasury and taxation, the courts, the domus Augusta. Readings will be drawn from Suetonius, Philo of Alexandria, Josephus, Seneca, the Garland of Philip, Tacitus, and others. The documentary and material record for this period is richly varied, so we will be looking at papyri, inscriptions, coins, and archaeological discoveries.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: LATN 7210

1 Course Unit

ANCH 7310 Ancient Greek Colonies

This seminar examines the archaeology of Greek colonization from the Late Bronze Age to ca. 500 B.C. These colonies were highly diverse in their motivations, physical settings, and political and social structures, as well as in their relationships with mother cities and the new worlds they inhabited. Emphasis is placed on the colonial experience as a cross-cultural and negotiated process; several streams of the changing theoretical and conceptual approaches to Greek colonization are explored. In addition to archaeological and epigraphic evidence, literary and historical traditions are examined. Colonies from the southern Balkan peninsula, Black Sea, Ionia, northern Africa, and Magna Graecia will be the focus of reading and reports. Seminar meetings will consist of oral reports and discussion of these reports and other topics. Depending on the number of participants, each person will be responsible for two or three reports of approximately 30-45 minutes length. Accompanying the oral report will be a PowerPoint document (in most cases), a synopsis/summary of one to two pages, and a bibliography. These will all be posted on the course Canvas site. No later than one week before an oral presentation, the presenter will identify one or two key readings for all to read, in consultation with the instructor. These will be posted, in PDF format, on the Canvas site. One or more visits to the Penn Museum may be built into the course.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: AAMW 5190, CLST 7310

1 Course Unit

ANCH 7403 Borderlines: Art and Artifact in the Roman Empire

What made art and artifacts `Roman', or not, in a Roman world? `Roman provincial art` is an active scholarly category. This seminar reframes it, to test productive models to understand visual culture outside the empire’s Italian heartland from the Late Republic into Late Antiquity, in the Roman polity’s interactions with many peoples in situations of diaspora, colonization, hegemony, conflict, economic exchange, and religious interaction. As `Rome’ expanded, cultural relations across many borderlines – social, ethnic, territorial - potentially became cultural politics. A traditional topic for that has been Roman interaction with Greek culture. This seminar extends that range, while tackling `Hellenization’, as we reflect on models of `Romanization’, globalism and identity formation within the imperium’s boundaries in its provinces and client kingdoms, and also at its frontier zones. Various disciplines apply: art history, archaeology, history, and more. Case studies, evolved with students, may range from Britain to Iran, northern Africa to the Black Sea in space and, in time, from interactions with the Hellenistic East and West and with Iron Age Europe, to the age of Germanic, Sasanian and Ummayad conquests of Roman terrain, ca 3rd c. BCE-7th c. CE. The market in art and artifact, the nature and status of makers, and conditions of patronage and viewing are key considerations. Private and public objects, images, architecture and urbanism, and landscapes can all concern us, as we try out disciplinary approaches that take in eg cultural appropriation, translation and hybrity, creolization, discrepant experience, object agency, and communities of taste and style. `Ethnicity’ is a loaded concept in ancient Mediterranean studies, as is `race;’ our course must engage those, and the ways in which things and styles have been made to serve those terms. And who owns, is heir to, the cultural legacies we look at, and how to name them, are problems that tangle with current national identity formation, and academic and museum practice. Our own Museum's holdings can make topics. Students are welcome to bring in interests in language and text cultures, in disciplines outside art history and archaeology, and in other world cultures and epochs.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: AAMW 5250, ARTH 5250, CLST 7403

1 Course Unit

ANCH 9000 Dissertation Prospectus Workshop

Designed to prepare graduates in any aspect of study in the ancient world to prepare for the dissertation prospectus. Course will be centered around individual presentations and group critique of prospectus' in process, as well the fundamentals of large-project research design and presentation.

Spring

Also Offered As: CLST 9000

1 Course Unit

ANCH 9999 Independent Study

This course is taken by graduate students doing independent work with a faculty advisor.

Fall or Spring

1 Course Unit

Ancient History (ANCH)

Print Options