The Lycurgus Cup – A Roman Nanotechnology
The Lycurgus Cup represents one of the outstanding achievements of the ancient glass industry. This late Roman cut glass vessel is extraordinary in several respects, firstly in the method of fabrication and the exceptional workmanship involved and secondly in terms of the unusual optical effects displayed by the glass.
Commercial Amphoras: The Earliest Consumer Packages?
This article presents the hypothesis that the ancient commercial amphora was not only a very well-designed shipping container, but it may have been the first “consumer package” as well.
Kapeleion: casual and commercial wine consumption in classical Greece
The symposion is consistently referred to as the framework around which all studies of Classical Greek drinking are built, regardless of a body of archaeological and literary evidence to suggest that this type of drinking was enjoyed primarily by a small minority of the elite male, and perhaps predominantly Athenian, population (although various forms of ritualised drinking were widespread throughout the Greek world).
The Enculturative Function of Toys and Games in Ancient Greece and Rome
The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the enculturative function of children’s toys and games in ancient Greece and Rome.
Sexual virtue on display I: the cults of pudicitia and honours for women
This book begins with a chapter about pudicitia as publicly celebrated and rewarded in Roman society. A striking aspect of pudicitia was its association with public and visual display by married women to rhe community, both through their appearance and demeanour and through their cultivation of pudicitia as a goddess.
A Lady of York: migration, ethnicity and identity in Roman Britain
Here, the authors of a multidisciplinary project use a combination of scientific techniques to illuminate Roman York, and later Roman history in general, with their image of a glamorous mixed-race woman, in touch with Africa, Christianity, Rome and Yorkshire.
Incest Laws and Absent Taboos in Roman Egypt
For at least two hundred and fifty years, many men in the Roman province of Egypt married their full sisters and raised families with them…
The bare necessities? a comparative study of the material evidence for Roman medical practice in urban domestic and army spheres
The aim of this thesis is not to reproduce that research but to examine the material evidence for medicine and medical practice used in it, in particular the instruments and buildings where medicine might have been practiced and, through comparison of the data, to see what similarities and differences there were between medicine in the domestic and army spheres.
There's Something Rotten in the State…Bad Smells in Antiquity
Abstract: Smells are extremely important in everyday life. They provide information concerning our environment and evoke associations. In archaeology, however, similarly to other aspects of life in the past, smells can be studied only indirectly.
Bad Boys: Circumcellions and Fictive Violence
The circumcellions were roving bands of violent men and women found in late Roman Africa. The problem is that far more of them have been produced by literary fictions, ancient and modern, than once existed.