Corinthian Matters

A Resource for the Study of the Corinthia, Greece

Category: Archaeological Discoveries

Public Monuments in Roman Greece: A New Database

by Leave a comment

A colleague sent me this link to Dr. Christopher Dickenson‘s new database and website devoted to the public monuments of Roman Greece. The platform and the content are still under development, but the website already makes available records for a substantial number of monuments known from Pausanias for three cities of Roman Greece. With its aim to presen all monuments known from text and archaeology, the site has the potential to offer a comprehensive and useful data set of statues, tombs, paintings, and dedications from the major cities of Greece between 200 BC and 200 AD. As Dickenson describes the project at his blog,

The basic premise behind my project is that not enough attention has been paid to the extent to which spatial setting contributed to the meaning of ancient public monuments. I’m interested in questions such as how setting up different types monument in the same space – for example statues of benefactors and gods in a city’s agora – might have had an effect on how such monuments were read and experienced, how different spaces were frequented by different groups of people who would have been the audience for these monuments.

The website home page describes the project in this way

Under the Roman Empire the marketplaces, streets, gymnasia and theatres of the cities of Greece were full of monuments such as tombs, inscribed stelai and – most numerous of all – statues. There were statues of bronze and of marble, portraying gods, heroes, emperors, kings and local dignitaries. Some of these monuments had already stood for centuries; others were fairly recent. Arguably no urban culture in history, with the possible exception of Rome itself, has set up such vast numbers of monuments in its public spaces. The nearest modern analogy for the amount of cultural material on display in the Roman period polis would be the museum. Yet the analogy falls short – the settings where these monuments stood were not places designed primarily for the passive viewing of works of art, they were vibrant public spaces, alive with the tumult and commotion of the city. If we are to understand the society and culture of these cities it is vital that we understand the impact of public monuments on the people who moved about them in their daily lives.

The aim of the project “Monuments of Roman Greece”, funded by a Marie Curie Fellowship from the European Commission is to explore the various ways in which the setting of public monuments contributed to giving them meaning, for instance, by looking at how certain types of monuments were positioned in relation to spaces used for certain activities in order to target particular audiences and at how monuments were positioned in relation to each other to create meaningful connections. This investigation will cast new light on questions such as the nature of power within the polis community and how local identity was defined in the face of imperial rule. The results will be published in a series of articles. At the heart of the project is a database of monuments known from archaeological, epigraphic and literary evidence to have stood in the cities of Greece in Roman times. The database is a work in progress and is still being expanded but has been made available online here as a tool for other researchers.

RomanGreeceMonumentsThe database page of the website notes that the current database contains all the public monuments from Athens, Corinth, and Messene mentioned by the travel writer Pausanias in the second century AD. The database itself includes 340 records for armour, paintings, figures, statues, and monuments. Each record includes a range of content and metadata such as type; find spot, attestation, found in situ; type of public space; spatial setting; specific location; date erected; last date attested in situ; statue size; dimensions; notes; bibliography; and images. You can search for a monument by clicking on “Find” and “Perform Find.” The current web search interface is clunky but functionality should come over time.

 

For more information, see Dickenson’s blog post about the potential of the research database and the problems of categorization, the major issue confronting anyone who dares to create an archaeological gazetteer of sites known from both textual and archaeological evidence. Dickenson is currently seeking recommendations — should you have any.

On the New Investigations at Lechaion

by Leave a comment

The Lechaion Harbour Project made global news again in late December following the press release of their recent season conducting underwater investigations at Corinth’s northern harbor. We briefly covered the new work of the LHP last year at Corinthian Matters, and now we can happily report on the first fruits of their work there. As the press release from the University of Copenhagen notes, the most unexpected discovery was a series of wooden caissons of fifth century AD date, which were submerged to construct the mole (read the full press release here):

The research team has initiated full-scale excavations and a digital and geophysical survey of the seaward side of the harbour using various innovative technologies, including a newly-developed 3D parametric sub-bottom profiler. To date they have uncovered two monumental moles constructed of ashlar blocks, along with a smaller mole, two areas of wooden caissons, a breakwater, and an entrance canal that leads into Lechaion’s three inner harbour basins.

The 2015 excavations focused on two areas. The first is a unique, early Byzantine mole constructed of six well-preserved wooden caissons together stretching 57 meters in length. The second is the stone-lined entrance canal to the little-explored Inner Harbour of Lechaion….

The discovery of well-preserved wooden caissons, however, caught everyone off guard. The wooden caissons acted as single-mission barges, built for the express purpose of being sunk together with their concrete cargoes, all of which were designed to form a solid foundation to hold back the force of the sea along this highly exposed stretch of coast .

The press release includes video footage of the team investigating a mole. The project has also released a series of short videos of their work via their Facebook page.

caissons

These findings are most welcome, although we must await the preliminary publication to learn more about the nature and quantity of the radiocarbon samples. Still it’s pretty exciting that the mole is fifth century AD in date, as its discovery adds yet another piece of support to the conclusions of archaeologists and historians of the last three decades that the fifth to early seventh centuries were one of the most vibrant eras of building activity and new investment in the history of the region (see, for the rural view, my summary of the “busy countryside” of Late Roman Corinth). Gone are the days when scholars could dismiss the late antique centuries as uneventful or declining. Rather, these centuries saw the Corinthia develop into an important borderland between eastern and western halves of the Roman empire, which increasingly had different trajectories in the fifth and sixth centuries. The enormous Christian basilica at Lechaion, for example, was, as Bill Caraher has argued, an important statement of Constantinoplitan authority and power in an area traditionally administered and claimed by Roman ecclesiastical authorities. And as I’ve argued in my forthcoming book on the Isthmus, the region’s prominence in this period reflects its important place at the boundary of east and west.

More generally, it is great that the harbor facilities at Lechaion are finally being subject to a systematic treatment. Only two decades ago, Richard Rothaus published his useful preliminary summary of the archaeological and textual evidence for Lechaion in Oxford Journal of Archaeology , which highlighted how little we know about the date of construction and development of the harbor, the date of the origins of the internal basins, the relationship between the archaic and classical harbor and its present form, the developmental relationship between internal basin and external harbor, and the final uses of the harbor in antiquity. In an article published in 1996, S. Stiros and collaborators suggested an archaic or classical construction date for the stone-lined channel connecting the exterior harbor to the inner one based on radiocarbon dates of marine shells attached tot he blocks. Yet, more than one Corinthian archaeologist has suspected later construction. Scholars have sometimes linked the construction of the internal basins to the time of foundation of the Roman colony (44 BC); C.K. Williams II suggested (in “Roman Corinth as a Commercial Center”) a date in the reign of Claudius (mid-first centry AD); and David Romano has proposed major construction during the reigns of Nero or Vespasian when the entire landscape was subject to new division and the emperors were interested in maritime development.

But what we have lacked is some kind of systematic excavation that could inform our knowledge of the development of the harbor. Excavation has been limited to the massive early Christian Lechaion basilica (dug by Dimitrios Pallas in the 1950s and 60s and published, mostly in Greek, in a series of preliminary reports), and Greek Archaeological Service excavations that have occasionally revealed Roman baths, the base of a statue or light house, late Roman private residences, and stoas of Hellenistic to Roman date in the vicinity.

Don’t expect the LHP to answer all of our questions about the harbor anytime soon. Archaeological investigation is slow and tedious, underwater archaeology seemingly more so, and publication takes years. Robert Scranton and his University of Chicago team expected to cover much more ground in their excavations at Kenchreai but were side-tracked and bogged down by their remarkable discovery of opus sectile glass panels of fourth century AD date (now housed at the Isthmia museum). Nonetheless, if future seasons of the LHP can reveal additional surprises like those found in the 2015 season, it should greatly improve our knowledge of the site. For the time, let’s hope for some efficient publication of these preliminary results, a broad systematic study of the underwater remains that can piece together the different parts, and some more happy discoveries.

Archaeological Reports (Journal of Hellenic Studies)

by Leave a comment

The 2014 volume of Archaeological Reports is now out and promises some interesting new studies of the northeast Peloponnese and Greece.

If you’re not familiar with Archaeological Reports, the journal is published by the British School at Athens and offers “the only account of recent archaeological work in Greece published in English.”

Table of Contents:

“Introduction & overview” (Zosia Archibald)

“2013–2014 — a view from Greece” Catherine Morgan

“Newsround” (David M. Smith and Helen Murphy-Smith)

“Method in the archaeology of Greece”(Zosia Archibald)

“The work of the British School at Athens, 2013–2014” (Catherine Morgan)

“The city of Athens” (Robert Pitt)

“The Classical naval installations in the Piraeus” (Chryssanthi Papadopoulou)

“Central Greece and the Peloponnese (Archaic to Roman)” (David M. Smith)

“Recent epigraphic research in central Greece: Boeotia” (Fabienne Marchand)

“Crete (prehistoric to Hellenistic)” (Matthew Haysom)

“Macedonia and Thrace: Iron Age to post-Roman urban centres” (Zosia Archibald)

“Archaeobotany in Greece” (Alexandra Livarda)

“Rural sites in Roman Greece” (Daniel Stewart)

IF you visit the table of of contents online here, you can click on article titles to see an abstract or opening paragraph.

Two articles that caught my attention:

1. Smith, David M. “Central Greece and the Peloponnese (Archaic to Roman).” Archaeological Reports 60 (November 2014): 55–71. doi:10.1017/S0570608414000088.

The much shorter Archaiologikon Deltion for the single year of 2005 invariably offers far fewer reports on the work of the Archaeological Service than the four-year volume with which we were presented last year. This, in itself, is no bad thing, although the geographical and chronological balance generated by such a large dataset is notable by its absence. This unevenness is, as ever, partially offset by the publication of fieldwork, although certain areas maintain a far more visible archaeological presence than others. This is particularly true for the northeastern Peloponnese, which has, in recent years, been the recipient of an almost unparalleled focus of both research and rescue excavation; a fact reflected in the significant contribution made to this year’s report by the edited proceedings of the conference The Corinthia and the Northeast Peloponnese: Topography and History from Prehistoric Times until the End of Antiquity (Kissas and Niemeier 2013). A total of 56 individual papers provide details on sites that range in date from the Neolithic to the Byzantine period. A great strength of this collection lies in the contribution of so many current and former staff of the Archaeological Service, and, of the numerous papers that engage directly or indirectly with the archaeology of the Archaic to Roman period, several are discussed in greater depth in the course of this report. A complementary Hesperia supplement detailing the current state of prehistoric and historic research on the Corinthian Isthmus is due to appear before the end of the year (Gebhard and Gregory forthcoming), as is a study of material from Henry Robinson’s 1961–1962 excavation in the North Cemetery (Slane forthcoming). The study of religious practice during the Classical period benefits from the publication of the first volume of material from excavations conducted by the Canadian Institute in Greece between 1994 and 2001 in the Sanctuary of Athena at Stymphalos (Schaus 2014a), while the consolidation of synthetic regional studies and individual site reports within Villae Rusticae: Family and Market-oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule (Rizakis and Touratsoglou 2013) will no doubt ensure that it becomes a standard text for the study of the rural economy of Roman Greece (see Stewart, this volume).

2. Stewart, Daniel. “Rural Sites in Roman Greece.” Archaeological Reports 60 (November 2014): 117–32. doi:10.1017/S0570608414000131.

[W]hile pretending to throw some light upon classical authors by careful observation of the manners of the present day, romantic travellers succeeded in fact in accommodating reality to their dreams … by creating for themselves and for their readers carefully edited portraits of modern Greece that transformed the present into the living image of the past (Saïd 2005: 291).

Thirty years ago archaeological field survey promised to reshape radically our understanding of the countryside (Keller and Rupp 1983: 1–5). Traditional archaeological approaches to cities and monuments were increasingly seen to be extensions of textual research, and research on the rural landscape was envisaged as a way to access the other side of the traditional urban-rural dichotomy (though see the comments in Alcock 2007: 671–72). Some scholars estimated that, in the Classical period, the vast majority of Greek poleis had populations of less than 3,000 and territories no more than a few hours” walk from the urban core. Given that, they asked, does it make sense to divide elements of Greek life into “city” and “country”? In a sense, the study of landscapes was seen as a way to redress perceived imbalances between this urban-rural division and the picture painted by the ancient sources of Roman Greece as a pale reflection of its Classical brilliance. In the years since, landscape studies have grown to include much more than archaeological field survey, but this tension between textual and archaeological narratives remains at the heart of understandings of rural Roman Greece.

Zigzags (and Technology) in Early Corinth

by Leave a comment

Live Science seems to have made something of the most recent Hesperia article on the Panayia Field by Guy Sanders, Sarah James, Ioulia Tzonou-Herbst, and James Herbst. The Hesperia piece from early 2014 offers an important synthetic overview of remains in the Panayia field dating from the Neolithic age to the Hellenistic period excavated in 1995-2007.

The short piece from Live Science, which was published online yesterday, focuses on the “Zigzag Art”  on Geometric vessels from a sarcophagus of Corinth dating to the early 8th century BC. It suggests that the discovery was recent, but those tombs were dug almost a decade ago now. Here’s a bit from the article:

“Archaeologists working at the ancient city of Corinth, Greece, have discovered a tomb dating back around 2,800 years that has pottery decorated with zigzagging designs.

The tomb was built sometime between 800 B.C. and 760 B.C., a time when Corinth was emerging as a major power and Greeks were colonizing the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea.

The tomb itself consists of a shaft and burial pit, the pit having a limestone sarcophagus that is about 5.8 feet (1.76 meters) long, 2.8 feet (0.86 m) wide and 2.1 feet (0.63 m) high. When researchers opened the sarcophagus, they found a single individual had been buried inside, with only fragments of bones surviving…..

[Break to zigzags]

….The vessels were decorated with a variety of designs, including wavy, zigzagging lines and meandering patterns that look like a maze. This style of pottery was popular at the time, and archaeologists often refer to this as Greece’s “Geometric” period.

You can read the rest of the piece here. There are plenty of zigzags in the Hesperia article, of course, but, as the author himself notes, there’s nothing really exceptional about them on Geometric vases. The author missed the real story here, which is about the early technological achievement of the population of Corinth.  These limestone sarcophagi are absolutely massive — they include the longest and largest found to date — and indicate major displays of wealth in burial and status differentiation. Especially important are their early date, which pushes stonecutting back to 950-900 BC, and weight (1.5-2.5 tons), which indicates sophisticated technological capabilities to transfer the monolithic pieces out of the quarry below the Temple of Apollo and lower into a trench cut for burial in the Panayia field. I was at Panayia field when several workmen pried open the lid from one of these sarcophagi. The lid itself is massive.

It’s great to see the Panayia field excavations get some press, and the half dozen photos presented from the excavations are fun. But for the implications of these discoveries, look at the Hesperia article.

Corinthian Scholarship Monthly (December-February). Part 2

by Leave a comment

Here is the second part to last week’s post about new scholarship in the last three months.

You can find the full collection of articles and books related to Corinthian studies at the Corinthian Studies Zotero Page. If you don’t see URLs for articles and books below (they sometimes don’t transfer in the copy), visit the Zotero group page. The new entries are tagged according to master categories .ARCHAEOLOGY AND HISTORY or .NEW TESTAMENT AND EARLY CHRISTIAN.

As I noted previously, Version 2 of the library in RIS format is scheduled to be released by summer. I am always looking for reviewers of articles or books listed in the CSM posts. If you can write and are qualified, drop me a line.

********************************************************

Adams, Edward. The Earliest Christian Meeting Places: Almost Exclusively Houses? A&C Black, 2014. http://books.google.com/books?id=FNBBAgAAQBAJ.

Angeli Bernardini, Paola, ed. Corinto: luogo di azione e luogo di racconto : atti del convengo internazionale, Urbino, 23-25 settembre 2009. Pisa [etc.]: F. Serra, 2013. http://www.libraweb.net/result1.php?dettagliononpdf=1&chiave=2848&valore=sku&name=Luogo.jpg&h=870&w=600.

Balzat, Jean-Sébastien, and Benjamin W. Millis. “M. Antonius Aristocrates: Provincial Involvement with Roman Power in the Late 1st Century B.C.” Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens 82, no. 4 (December 2013): 651–72. doi:10.2972/hesperia.82.4.0651.

Batchvarov, Kroum N. “Clay Pipes and Smoking Paraphernalia from the Kitten Shipwreck, an Early Nineteenth-Century Black Sea Merchantman.” International Journal of Historical Archaeology 18, no. 1 (March 1, 2014): 1–19. doi:10.1007/s10761-013-0244-z.

Bradshaw, Paul F. Rites of Ordination: Their History and Theology. Liturgical Press, 2013. http://books.google.com/books?id=shQpnQEACAAJ.

Çakırlar, C., S. Ikram, and M-H. Gates. “New Evidence for Fish Processing in the Ancient Eastern Mediterranean: Formalised Epinephelus Butchery in Fifth Century Bc Kinet Höyük, Turkey.” International Journal of Osteoarchaeology, January 1, 2014, n/a–n/a. doi:10.1002/oa.2388.

Docter, Roald, and Babette Bechtold. “Two Forgotten Amphorae from the Hamburg Excavations at Carthage (Cyprus, and the Iberian Peninsula) and Their Contexts.” Carthage Studies 5 (2011) (2013): 91–128.

Forbes, Hamish A. “Off-Site Scatters and the Manuring Hypothesis in Greek Survey Archaeology: An Ethnographic Approach.” Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens 82, no. 4 (December 2013): 551–94. doi:10.2972/hesperia.82.4.0551.

Hall, Jonathan M. Artifact and Artifice: Classical Archaeology and the Ancient Historian. University of Chicago Press, 2014.

Heil, Andreas, and Gregor Damschen, eds. Brill’s Companion to Seneca: Philosopher and Dramatist. Leiden: Brill, 2013. http://books.google.com/books?id=9jqOAgAAQBAJ.

Jones, Catherine M. “Theatre of Shame: The Impact of Paul’s Manual Labour on His Apostleship in Corinth.” PhD Thesis, University of St. Michael’s College, 2013. https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/handle/1807/43420.

Laios, K., G. Tsoucalas, M. Karamanou, and G. Androutsos. “The Medical–Religious Practice of Votive Offerings and the Representation of a Unique Pathognomonic One Inside the Asclepieion of Corinth.” Journal of Religion and Health, 2013, 1–6. doi:10.1007/s10943-013-9811-1.

Lambert, Craig. “Norman Naval Operations in the Mediterranean.” Journal for Maritime Research 15, no. 2 (2013): 241–43. doi:10.1080/21533369.2013.852314.

Last, Richard. “Money, Meals and Honour: The Economic and Honorific Organization of the Corinthian Ekklesia.” PhD Thesis, University of Toronto, 2013.

Nichols, Aidan. Figuring out the Church: Her Marks, and Her Masters. Ignatius Press, 2013.

Polinskaya, Irene. A Local History of Greek Polytheism: Gods, People and the Land of Aigina, 800-400 BCE. Leiden: Brill, 2013. http://books.google.com/books?id=8FqNAgAAQBAJ.

Punt, Jeremy. “Framing Human Dignity through Domination and Submission? Negotiating Borders and Loyalties (of Power) in the New Testament.” Scriptura 112 (2013): 1–17. doi:10.7833/112-0-82.

Reed, David Alan. “Paul on Marriage and Singleness:  Reading 1 Corinthians with the Augustan Marriage Laws.” PhD Thesis, University of St. Michael’s College, 2013. https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/bitstream/1807/43426/1/Reed_David_A_201311_PhD_thesis.pdf.

Rowan, Clare. “Coinage as Commodity and Bullion in the Western Mediterranean, Ca. 550–100 BCE.” Mediterranean Historical Review 28, no. 2 (2013): 105–27. doi:10.1080/09518967.2013.837638.

Saliari, Konstantina, and Erich Draganits. “Early Bronze Age Bone Tubes from the Aegean: Archaeological Context, Use and Distribution.” Archeometriai Műhely [Archaeometry Workshop], 2013, 179–92.

Schoenborn, Christoph Cardinal. The Source of Life: Exploring the Mystery of the Eucharist. Ignatius Press, 2013. http://books.google.com/books?id=oydLAgAAQBAJ.

Spinks, Bryan D. Do This in Remembrance of Me: The Eucharist from the Early Church to the Present Day. SCM Press, 2013. http://books.google.com/books?id=-309AgAAQBAJ.

Stoneman, Richard. Pindar. I.B.Tauris, 2013. http://books.google.com/books?id=jwlgAgAAQBAJ.

Thiessen, Matthew. “‘The Rock Was Christ’: The Fluidity of Christ’s Body in 1 Corinthians 10.4.” Journal for the Study of the New Testament 36, no. 2 (December 1, 2013): 103–26. doi:10.1177/0142064X13506171.

Toffolo, Michael B., Alexander Fantalkin, Irene S. Lemos, Rainer C. S. Felsch, Wolf-Dietrich Niemeier, Guy D. R. Sanders, Israel Finkelstein, and Elisabetta Boaretto. “Towards an Absolute Chronology for the Aegean Iron Age: New Radiocarbon Dates from Lefkandi, Kalapodi and Corinth.” PLoS ONE 8, no. 12 (December 26, 2013): e83117. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0083117.

Wallace, Christopher. “Ager Publicus in the Greek East: I. Priene 111 and Other Examples of Resistance to the Publicani.” Historia 63, no. 1 (2014): 38–73.

———. “Ager Publicus in the Greek East: I. Priene 111 and Other Examples of Resistance to the Publicani.” Historia 63, no. 1 (2014): 38–73.

Walsh, Justin St P. Consumerism in the Ancient World: Imports and Identity Construction. Routledge, 2013. http://books.google.com/books?id=XU83AgAAQBAJ.

The Corinthia Zotero Library: New Organization

by Leave a comment

Yesterday I discovered batch tagging in Zotero. Instead of manually changing tags one at a time (an incredibly time-consuming process), one can batch tag by dragging a selection of multiple items onto any tag in the tag selector box in the Standalone version of Zotero.

This feature effectively allowed me to tackle the tags in the library. I recategorize all 1,927 items in the Corinthia (Zotero) Bibliography Library in a couple of hours. Manually tagging those items would take days.

The tag categories I’ve created are neither perfect nor complete, but there is now a little more order to the collection than it previously had. Every item has been assigned to one of two major tag categories: .ARCHAEOLOGY AND HISTORY or .NEW TESTAMENT. These show up as the first two tags in the Tags area to the lower left of the Zotero Library (see below). The following image shows the items that appear when one selects on the master tag category .ARCHAEOLOGY AND HISTORY

Zotero_1

An item may belong to both categories in the case of – for example — archaeological and historical scholarship that is directed to or clearly relevant to New Testament studies, or New Testament scholarship that informs the history and archaeology of Corinth. In the following example, I’ve selected both master tag categories and another subcategory “Periods, Hellenistic.”

Zotero_2

I’ve also slid created subfolders for browsing called “New Testament” and “Archaeology and History” for two principal audiences of Corinthian studies. Whether one browses by main tag category or by folder, the results should be the same. Note that all 1,927 individual bibliographic items can be found in the master Library folder. An item in the sub-folder collections also exists in the master folder.

Zotero_3

NB: At the time of this update, the items are still in need of a more thorough tagging, and this will require some manual input. Where I have added tags are for main places in the Corinthia: “Corinth”, “Corinthia” (for territory), “Kenchreai”, “Lechaion”, “Isthmus of Corinth” and “Isthmia”. I’ve also added periods for many (but not all) items, e.g., “Period, Roman.” These period tags parallel the chronological designations used on this website.

For now, the visitor using the server version of the library (and not the stand-alone) should experiment with a combination of direct searches in the search box, tagging, and browsing by subfolder.

One area other that I spent cleaning up this morning was the section on New Testament studies. I’ll write more about this tomorrow.

Corinthian Scholarship Monthly (December-February). Part 1

by 1 Comment

With the end of last semester, holidays, and deadlines, I fell a bit behind on the Corinthian Scholarship Monthly posts. Yesterday I started to dig out, sift through emails, and find the gems in the bunch. This will be the first of two posts on new scholarship that went live in December to February. I’ll try to get the second part of CSM Dec-Feb by the middle of the month.

And kudos to the google bots for doing such a good job. While we’ve been sleeping, playing, teaching, and resting, those bots have been working non-stop to bring all sorts of little nuggets to our network. As always, I’ve included a broader range of articles and essays that mention the Corinthia without focusing on the region — on the assumption that you will be as interested as I am in a broader Mediterranean context. There are also a few entries from past years that the bots have just brought to my attention.

You can find the full collection of articles and books related to Corinthian studies at the Corinthian Studies Zotero Page. The new entries are tagged according to basic categories. Version 2 of the library in RIS format is scheduled to be released by summer.

Finally, I am always looking for reviewers of articles or books listed in the CSM posts. If you can write and are qualified, drop me a line.

********************************************************

Ambraseys, N. N. “Ottoman Archives and the Assessment of the Seismicity of Greece 1456–1833.” Bulletin of Earthquake Engineering 12, no. 1 (February 1, 2014): 5–43. doi:10.1007/s10518-013-9541-5.

Angeli Bernardini, Paola, ed. Corinto: luogo di azione e luogo di racconto : atti del convengo internazionale, Urbino, 23-25 settembre 2009. Pisa [etc.]: F. Serra, 2013.

Baika, Kalliopi. “The Topography of Shipshed Complexes and Naval Dockyards.” In Shipsheds of the Ancient Mediterranean, edited by David Blackman and Boris Rankov, 185–209. Cambridge University Press, 2013. 

Balzat, Jean-Sébastien, and Benjamin W. Millis. “M. Antonius Aristocrates: Provincial Involvement with Roman Power in the Late 1st Century B.C.” Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens 82, no. 4 (December 2013): 651–672. doi:10.2972/hesperia.82.4.0651.

Blackman, David, and Boris Rankov. Shipsheds of the Ancient Mediterranean. Cambridge University Press, 2013. 

Borbonus, Dorian. Columbarium Tombs and Collective Identity in Augustan Rome. Cambridge University Press, 2014. 

Boyle, A. J., ed. Seneca: Medea: Edited with Introduction, Translation, and Commentary. Oxford University Press, 2014.

Collins, John J., ed. The Oxford Handbook of Apocalyptic Literature. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.

Docter, Roald, and Babette Bechtold. “Two Forgotten Amphorae from the Hamburg Excavations at Carthage (Cyprus, and the Iberian Peninsula) and Their Contexts.” Carthage Studies 5 (2011) (2013): 91–128.

Forbes, Hamish A. “Off-Site Scatters and the Manuring Hypothesis in Greek Survey Archaeology: An Ethnographic Approach.” Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens 82, no. 4 (December 2013): 551–594. doi:10.2972/hesperia.82.4.0551.

Frangoulidis, Stavros. “Reception of Strangers in Apuleius’ Metamorphoses: The Examples of Hypata and Cenchreae.” In A Companion to the Ancient Novel, edited by Edmund P. Cueva and Shannon N. Byrne, 275–287. Malden, MA: John Wiley & Sons, 2014.

Hall, Jonathan M. Artifact and Artifice: Classical Archaeology and the Ancient Historian. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014. 

Hawthorn, Geoffrey. Thucydides on Politics: Back to the Present. Cambridge University Press, 2014.

Heil, Andreas, and Gregor Damschen, eds. Brill’s Companion to Seneca: Philosopher and Dramatist. Leiden: Brill, 2013. 

Hollander, William den. Josephus, the Emperors, and the City of Rome: From Hostage to Historian. Leiden: Brill, 2014. 

James, Paula. “Apuleius’ Metamorphoses: A Hybrid Text?” In A Companion to the Ancient Novel, edited by Edmund P. Cueva and Shannon N. Byrne, 317–329. Malden, MA: John Wiley & Sons, 2014.

Jeffreys, Elizabeth. “We Need to Talk about Byzantium: Or, Byzantium, Its Reception of the Classical World as Discussed in Current Scholarship, and Should Classicists Pay Attention?” Classical Receptions Journal 6, no. 1 (January 1, 2014): 158–174. doi:10.1093/crj/clt032.

Kamen, Deborah. “Sale for the Purpose of Freedom: Slave-Prostitutes and Manumission in Ancient Greece.” The Classical Journal 109, no. 3 (March 2014): 281–307. doi:10.5184/classicalj.109.3.0281.

Kampbell, Sarah Marie. “The Economy of Conflict: How East Mediterranean Trade Adapted to Changing Rules, Allegiances and Demographics in the  10th – 12th Centuries AD.” PhD Thesis, Princeton University, 2014. 

Klapaki. “The Journey to Greece in the American and the Greek Modernist Literary Imagination: Henry Miller and George Seferis.” In Travel, Discovery, Transformation: Culture and Civilization, Volume 6, edited by Gabriel R. Ricci, 59–78. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2014.

Kolluoğlu, Biray, and Meltem Toksöz, eds. Cities of the Mediterranean: From the Ottomans to the Present Day. I.B.Tauris, 2010. 

Korner, Ralph J. “Before ‘Church’: Political, Ethno-Religious, and Theological Implications of the Collective Designation of Pauline Christ Followers as Ekklēsiai.” PhD Thesis, McMaster University, 2014. 

Kreitzer, L.J. “Hadrian as Nero Redivivus: Some Supporting Evidence from Corinth.” In Judaea and Rome in Coins 65 BCE-135 CE: Papers Presented at the International Conference Hosted by Spink, 13th-14th September 2010, edited by David M Jacobson and Nikos Kokkinos, 229–242. London: Spink, 2012. 

Legarreta-Castillo, Felipe De Jesus. The Figure of Adam in Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15: The New Creation and Its Ethical and Social Reconfigurations. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2014.

Matz, Brian J. “Early Christian Philanthropy as a ‘Marketplace’ and the Moral Responsibility of Market Participants.” In Distant Markets, Distant Harms: Economic Complicity and Christian Ethics, edited by Daniel Finn, 115–145? New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.

Mitski, Efterpi. “Commodifying Antiquity in Mary Nisbet’s Journey to the Ottoman Empire.” In Travel, Discovery, Transformation: Culture and Civilization, Volume 6, edited by Gabriel R. Ricci, 45–58. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2014. 

Morhange, Christophe, Amos Salamon, Guénaelle Bony, Clément Flaux, Ehud Galili, Jean-Philippe Goiran, and Dov Zviely. “Geoarchaeology of Tsunamis and the Revival of Neo-Catastrophism in the Eastern Mediterranean.” Rome “La Sapienza” Studies on the Archaeology of Palestine & Transjordan 11 (2014): 61–81.

Ong, H. T. “Paul’s Personal Relation with Earliest Christianity: A Critical Survey.” Currents in Biblical Research 12, no. 2 (February 7, 2014): 146–172. doi:10.1177/1476993X12467114.

Pachis, Panayotis. “Data from Dead Minds?  Dream and Healing in the Isis / Sarapis Cult During the Graeco-Roman Age.” Journal of Cognitive Historiography 1, no. 1 (January 23, 2014): 52–71.

Pallis, Georgios. “Inscriptions on Middle Byzantine Marble Templon Screens.” Byzantinische Zeitschrift 106, no. 2 (January 2013): 761–810. doi:10.1515/bz-2013-0026.

Polinskaya, Irene. A Local History of Greek Polytheism: Gods, People and the Land of Aigina, 800-400 BCE. Leiden: Brill, 2013. 

Priestley, Jessica. Herodotus and Hellenistic Culture: Literary Studies in the Reception of the Histories. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. 

Punt, Jeremy. “Framing Human Dignity through Domination and Submission? Negotiating Borders and Loyalties (of Power) in the New Testament.” Scriptura 112 (2013): 1–17. doi:10.7833/112-0-82.

Rankov, Boris. “Slipping and Launching.” In Shipsheds of the Ancient Mediterranean, edited by David Blackman and Boris Rankov, 102–123. Cambridge University Press, 2013.

Reed, David Alan. “Paul on Marriage and Singleness:  Reading 1 Corinthians with the Augustan Marriage Laws.” PhD Thesis. University of St. Michael’s College, 2013. 

Saliari, Konstantina, and Erich Draganits. “Early Bronze Age Bone Tubes from the Aegean: Archaeological Context, Use and Distribution.” Archeometriai Műhely [Archaeometry Workshop] (2013): 179–192.

Shpuza, Ermanl. “Allometry in the Syntax of Street Networks: Evolution of Adriatic and Ionian Coastal Cities 1800–2010.” Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design (2014). doi:doi:10.1068/b39109.

Siek, Thomas James. “A Study in Paleo-Oncology: On the Identification of Neoplastic Disease in Archaeological Bone.” Master of Arts Thesis, University of Waterloo, 2014. 

Thein, Alexander. “Reflecting on Sulla’s Clemency.” Historia 63, no. 2 (April 1, 2014): 166–186.

Toffolo, Michael B., Alexander Fantalkin, Irene S. Lemos, Rainer C. S. Felsch, Wolf-Dietrich Niemeier, Guy D. R. Sanders, Israel Finkelstein, and Elisabetta Boaretto. “Towards an Absolute Chronology for the Aegean Iron Age: New Radiocarbon Dates from Lefkandi, Kalapodi and Corinth.” PLoS ONE 8, no. 12 (December 26, 2013): e83117. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0083117.

Waterfield, Robin. Taken at the Flood: The Roman Conquest of Greece. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.

Williams, Drake, and H. H. “‘Imitate Me’: Interpreting Imitation In 1 Corinthians in Relation to Ignatius of Antioch.” Perichoresis 11, no. 1 (June 1, 2013): 77–95.

Wright, Christopher. The Gattilusio Lordships and the Aegean World 1355-1462. Leiden: Brill, 2014.

Excavations at Corinth 2013: Annual Report

by 1 Comment

The annual report of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens has recently been released. Plenty of Corinthiaka inside, including a report on the 2013 field season at Corinth, and wider work in the region. Here is a snippet:

“Excavations at Corinth during 2012–13 continued under the direction of Guy D.R. Sanders, with Ioulia Tzonou­ Herbst serving as Assistant Director and James Herbst as Architect.

Excavations again concentrated im­mediately south of the South Stoa, where early ­sixth­ century a.d. levels of distur­bance may be a consequence of the earth­quake of ca. 525 a.d. In another area, a small votive deposit of the fourth century b.c. included an Early Archaic iron object embellished with gold and silver. A third area provided valuable evidence of
eleventh­ century a.d. occupation.

In June, work on the conservation and consolidation of the Frankish Area south of the Corinth Museum continued with completion of the work on Unit 1, con­sisting of 14 architectural spaces covering an area of 825 m2. Conservation of the tile floors will be done at a later stage. Work also began on Unit 2, the monastic complex…”

Read the rest here (see pp. 8-10).

The Corinthia and the Northeast Peloponnese

by 3 Comments

Thanks to Jeremy Ott in notifying the Corinthian Studies FB group that the long-awaited publication of the Loutraki 2007 conference is now available in print:

W.-D. Niemeier and N Kissas, eds., The Corinthia and the Northeast Peloponnese: Topography and history from prehistoric times until the end of antiquity. 2013: Hirmer Verlag GmbH.

81TnpDrT73L._SL1400_

I’m guessing these will be in limited supply, and there certainly won’t be a paperback version, so I ordered myself a copy.

Here’s a description of the book at Amazon:

In March 2009 the international conference for which this volume is named was held in Loutraki by the 37th Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities in collaboration with the Greek Ministry of Culture’s Directorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities, and the German Archaeological Institute of Athens. The results of research carried out by international research institutes and individual researchers working in Corinthia, and first and foremost by the Greek Antiquities Service, were presented at the conference.

I’ll give it a fuller overview when my copy arrives.

Two Recent Finds from the Corinthia

by 1 Comment

The Googlebots are proving less reliable than they once were. Here are two news stories from the last week or so that I just learned about via FB. These should be of obvious interest to Roman history and archaeology folk.

First, another Roman chamber tomb has been found in Corinth. This tomb, like the Roman tomb found last year, comes from the plain north of the urban center which was always a principal area of burial for the Greek and Roman cities of Corinth.  Initial reports evidently suggest a slightly earlier date (1st-2nd AD or earlier) than the 3rd century tomb discovered last year. An excerpt from the article (“Roman chamber tomb found in Ancient Corinth”, Nov. 14, 2013) via the Archaeology News Network:

Measuring 3.30m by 2.63m., the tomb has been initially dated to between the 1st and 2nd centuries AD, but may be earlier. It was entered from the south through a staircase decorated on either side with two ceramic tiles in deep relief, one showing a quadriga (four-horse chariot), and the other depicting a chariot pulled by dolphins next to a sea creature.  Inside, there were vaults over niches where ash urns were placed, and three larnaces (terracotta coffins) containing bones, oil lamps, bronze coins and pottery shards. One of the coffins was painted to depict bed covers. The interior of the tomb also contained very well-preserved wall paintings, depicting garlants, fruit and three figures, two men and a woman.

The second news piece from the Greek Report is the discovery of an “Ancient Roman Villa and SPA Discovered by Archaeologists in Greece” (Nov. 12, 2013) near the neighborhood known as Katounistra in Loutraki on the western side of the Isthmus. Not sure where this is and what relation it has to another important Late Roman villa excavated by the Greek Archaeological Service in Katounistra in the 1990s.