Introductory description

This module provides an orientation for students of diverse backgrounds across the vast and immensely rich panorama of Greek culture. The module combines detailed literary and artistic appreciation with an understanding of the cultural contexts in which Greek art and literature flourished.

Module web page

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

TERM 1

1. Introduction; Greek Culture and Society in a comparative perspective; Varieties of Greekness;
   the Greek polis

2. Greek Religion and Festivals

3. Women and Gender
   3 * Seminar on Women (Aristophanes’ Ecclesiazousae)

4. Skills Session: Essay Writing; Bibliography and Citation; Essay Topics

5. Dining & the Symposium

6. Visit to the Ashmolean Museum

7. Medicine, Magic and Science

8. Performance literature in antiquity from Homer onwards; performance and society in Athens
   8* Seminar on Symposium

9. Athenian Tragedy: Aeschylus’ Persians Part I (Persian wars; Athenian identity and the
   barbarian; empire)

10. Athenian Tragedy: Aeschylus’ Persians Part II (Theatricality and performance; chorus)
    TERM 2

11. Greek Mythology part I

12. Greek Mythology part II – and iconography / Intro to Art

13. Art and the body 3 * Looking at Winners Seminar 4. Art and architecture 5. Homeric worlds I 6. Homeric worlds II 7. Historiography and Herodotus 8. Sport, competitiveness and lyric 8 * Sappho seminar 9. Understanding the world from Homer to the fifth century 10. Radical reassessments of man and the world: the sophists TERM 3 1. Athenian Comedy: Aristophanes’ Clouds 2. Revision 3. Revision The exact topics may vary from year to year.

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• Gained a knowledge of some of the major cultural and social concerns of the Greeks
• Acquired a sense of the changes and developments in Greek culture and society over time
• Developed some ability to discriminate between different types of evidence and critical approaches

Indicative reading list

LITERARY TEXTS: TRANSLATIONS
Homer, The Iliad, trans. R. Lattimore (Chicago 1951)
Homer, The Odyssey, trans. R. Lattimore (Chicago 1965)
Greek Lyric Poetry, trans. M. L. West (Oxford 1994)
Herodotus, The Histories, trans. A. De Sélincourt (Penguin, frequently reprinted)
The Greek Sophists, trans. J. Dillon and T. Gergel (Penguin 2003)
The Homeric Hymn to Demeter, trans. H. Foley (Princeton, 1994)
Aeschylus' Persians, trans. C. Collard (Oxford 2009)
Aristophanes' Clouds, trans. I. Johnston (Virginia 2008)
SECONDARY LITERATURE
General
Beard, M. and Henderson, J. Classics: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford 1995)
Boardman, J., Griffin, J., & Murray, O. The Oxford History of the Classical World (Oxford 1986)
Cartledge, P. The Greeks (Cambridge 1993)
Easterling, P. & Knox, B. The Cambridge History of Classical Literature (Cambridge 1985)
Hall, J. M. A History of the Archaic Greek World c. 1200 - 479 BCE (London 2006)
Murray, O. Early Greece (2nd ed. London 1993)
Neer, R. Art and Archaeology of the Greek world: a new history 2500 BC-150 BC (London 2012)
Osborne, R. Greece in the Making (London 1996)
Vernant, J.-P.The Greeks (Chicago 1995)
Reference
The Oxford Classical Dictionary, 3rd ed. 1996, eds. S. Hornblower and A. Spawforth is a valuable and up-to-date reference tool for all aspects of the ancient world.
Bibliography by Theme

Greece before Homer
Bintliff, J. The Complete Archaeology of Greece (Oxford 2012)
Hall, J. M. A History of the Archaic Greek World: ca. 1200–479 BCE (Oxford 2007)
Mee, C. Greek Archaeology: a thematic approach (Oxford 2011)
Neer, R. Art and Archaeology of the Greek world: a new history 2500 BC-150 BC (London 2012)
Osborne, R. G. Greece in the Making, 1200–479 BC (London 2009)
Palyvou, C. Akrotiri Thera: an architecture of influence 3,500 years old (Philadelphia 2005)
Robinson, A. The man who deciphered Linear B: the story of Michael Ventris (London 2002)
Shapiro, H. A. The Cambridge Companion to Archaic Greece (Cambridge 2007)
Shelmerdine, C. (ed.) The Cambridge companion to the Aegean Bronze Age (Cambridge 2008)
Snodgrass, A. The Dark Age of Greece: an archaeological survey of the eleventh to eighth centuries BC (Edinburgh 1971)
Whitley, J. The Archaeology of Ancient Greece (Cambridge, 2001)
Homer and Homeric Society
Cairns, D. (ed.) Oxford Readings in Homer's Iliad (Oxford 2002)
Cohen, B. The Distaff Side: Representing the Female in Homer's Odyssey (Oxford 1995)
Finkelberg, M. 'Odysseus and the genus "hero"', Greece and Rome 42 (1995) 1–14
Finley, M. The World of Odysseus (1954, Penguin 1962)
Ford, A. Homer: The Poetry of the Past (Ithaca 1992)
Fowler, R. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Homer (Cambridge 2004)
Griffin, J. Homer (Oxford University Press Past Masters series 1980)
Griffin, J. Homer on Life and Death (Oxford 1980)
Griffin, J. Homer: the Odyssey (Cambridge 1987)
Hall, E. Inventing the Barbarian (Oxford 1989) ch. 1
Jong, I de (ed.) Homer: Critical Assessments, 4 vols. (New York 1999)
Kirk, G. Homer and the Epic (Cambridge 1965)
Lord, A. B. The Singer of Tales (Cambridge, Mass. 1960/2000)
McAuslan, I. & Walcot, P. Homer (Greece and Rome Studies Vol.4, Oxford 1998)
Morris, I. & Powell, B. (ed.) A New Companion to Homer (Leiden 1997)
Taplin, O. ‘The spring of the muses: Homer and related poetry’ in O. Taplin (ed.) Literature in the Greek and Roman Worlds: A New Perspective (Oxford 2000)
Page, D. History and the Homeric Iliad (Cambridge 1959)
Segal, C. Singers, Heroes and Gods in the Odyssey (Ithaca/London 1994)
Vernant, J.-P. Mortals and Immortals: Collected Essays, ed. F. Zeitlin (Princeton 1991), esp. chapter 2 'A Beautiful Death and the Disfigured Corpse in Homeric Epic'
Vermeule, E. T. 'The Happy Hero', in Aspects of Death in Early Greek Art & Poetry (Berkeley 1979) 83–116
Homer's Iliad

Arieti J. A., ‘Achilles’ Alienation in ‘Iliad 9’”, The Classical Journal 82 (1986) 1-27
Arthur, M. 'The Divided World of Iliad VI' in H. Foley (ed.) Reflections of Women in Antiquity (New York 1981) 19–44
Austin, N. Archery at the Dark of the Moon (Berkeley 1991)
Benardete, S., ‘Achilles and the Iliad’, Hermes 91 (1963) 1-16
Cairns, D. (ed.), Oxford Readings in Homer's Iliad, Oxford 2001, esp. D. L. Cairns, 'Affronts and quarrels in the Iliad', 203-19
Edwards, M. W. Homer: Poet of the Iliad (Baltimore 1987)
Goldhill, S. The Poet's Voice (Cambridge 1991)
Hardie, P. 'Imago mundi: cosmological and ideological aspects of the shield of Achilles', Journal of Hellenic Studies 105 (1985) 11–32
Jong, I. de Narrators and Focalizers: The Presentation of the Story in the Iliad (Amsterdam 1987)
Lynn-George, M. Epos: Word, Narrative and the Iliad (1987 Basingstoke)
Macleod, C. (ed.), Iliad Book XXIV (Cambridge 1982)
Martin, R. P. The Language of Heroes: Speech and Performance in the Iliad (Ithaca, NY 1989)
Most, G. W. ‘Anger and Pity in Homer's Iliad’, in G. W. Most and S. Braund (eds.) Ancient Anger. Perspectives from Homer to Galen. Yale Classical Studies 32 (Cambridge 2003)
Nagy, G. The Best of the Achaeans (Baltimore 1979)
Nagy, G. Homeric Questions (Texas 1996)
Parry, A. 'The Language of Achilles', Transactions of the American Philological Association 87 (1956) 1–7
Postlethwaite, N. Homer’s Iliad: A Commentary on the Translation of Richmond Lattimore (Exeter 2000)
Pucci, P. The Song of the Sirens. Essays on Homer (Lanham/Boulder/NY/Oxford 1998)
Redfield, J. Nature and Culture in the Iliad (Chicago 1994)
Schein, S. The Mortal Hero: An Introduction to Homer's Iliad (Berkeley/London 1984)
Schofield, M. 'Euboulia in the Iliad', Classical Quarterly 36 (1986) 6–31 (reprinted in Cairns, D. (ed.) Oxford Readings in Homer’s Iliad (Oxford 2001), chapter 7)
Seaford, R. Reciprocity and Ritual: Homer and Tragedy in the Developing City-State (Oxford 1994)
Silk, M. S. Homer: the Iliad (Cambridge 1987)
Slatkin, L. The Power of Thetis: Allusion and Interpretation in the Iliad (Berkeley 1991)
Taplin, O. P. Homeric Soundings: The Shaping of the Iliad (Oxford 1992)
Tsagarakis O. (1971), ‘The Achaean Embassy and the Wrath of Achilles’, Hermes 9: 255-77
Vermeule, E. T. 'The Happy Hero', in Aspects of Death in Early Greek Art & Poetry (Berkeley 1979) 83–116
Greek Lyric Poetry
Bowra, M. Greek Lyric Poetry (2nd ed. Oxford 1961)
Burnett, A. P. Three Archaic Poets (Cambridge MA 1983)
Calame, C. The Poetics of Eros in Ancient Greece (Princeton 1999), chapter 1
Campbell, D. The Golden Lyre (London 1983)
Culler, J. Theory of the Lyric (Cambridge, MA 2015)
Fraenkel, H. Early Greek Poetry and Philosophy (London 1975)
Fearn, D. W. Bacchylides: Politics, Performance, Poetic Tradition (Oxford 2007)
Fearn, D. W. Pindar’s Eyes: Visual and Material Culture in Epinician Poetry (Oxford 2017)
Fearn, D. W. ‘Materialities of political commitment? Textual events, material culture, and metaliterarity in Alcaeus’ in F. Budelmann and T. Phillips (eds.) Textual Events: Performance and the Lyric in Early Greece (Oxford 2018) 93–113

Gentili, B. Poetry and its Public in Ancient Greece: From Homer to the Fifth Century (London 1988)
Hutchinson, G. Greek Lyric Poetry (Oxford 2001)
Kurke, L. 'The strangeness of "song culture": Archaic Greek Poetry' in O. Taplin (ed.) Literature in the Greek and Roman Worlds: A New Perspective (Oxford 2000) 58–87
Kurke, L. 'Archaic Greek Poetry', in H. A. Shapiro (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Archaic Greece (Cambridge 2007) 141–69
Lefkowitz, M. The Victory Ode: An Introduction (Park Ridge 1976)
Nisetich, F. Pindar's Victory Songs (Baltimore 1980)
Stehle, E. Performance and Gender in Ancient Greece (Princeton 1997)
Performance Culture and Politics in the Symposium
Herington, C. J. Poetry into drama: early tragedy and the Greek poetic tradition (Berkeley 1985), ch. 1, 'Poetry as Performing Art'
Verity, A. Pindar: The Complete Odes (Oxford World’s Classics translation)
Bowie, E. L. 'Early Greek elegy, symposium and public festival', JHS 106 (1986) 13–35
Davidson, J. Courtesans and Fishcakes: The Consuming Passions of Classical Athens (London 1997) 43–9
Whitmarsh, T. Ancient Greek Literature (Cambridge 2004), chapter 4, 'Symposium'
West, M. L. Greek Lyric Poetry (Oxford World’s Classics)
Ford, A. The Origins of Criticism: Literary Culture and Poetic Theory in Classical Greece (Princeton 2002), chapter 1
Murray, O. (ed.) Sympotica: A Symposium on the Symposion (Oxford 1990)
Slater, W. J. (ed.) Dining in a Classical Context (Ann Arbor 1991)
Hammer, D. 'Ideology, the symposium and archaic politics', American Journal of Philology 125 (2004) 479–512
Williamson, M. 'Eros the blacksmith: performing masculinity in Anakreon's love lyrics' in L. Foxhall and J. Salmon (eds.) Thinking Men: Masculinity and its Self-representation in the Classical Tradition (London 1998) 71–82
see also separate seminar sheet for Greek Vase-Painting and the Symposium
Sport, Festivals, and the Politics of Competitive Display
Brock, R. and Hodkinson, S. ‘Introduction: alternatives to the democratic polis’, in Brock and Hodkinson (eds.) Alternatives to Athens: Varieties of Political Organization and Community in Ancient Greece (Oxford 2002) 1–32
Brown, B. ‘Homer, funeral contests and the origins of the Greek city’, in D. Phillips and D. Pritchard (eds.) Sport and Festival in the Ancient Greek World (London 2003) 123–62
Fearn, D. W. ‘Aeginetan epinician culture: naming, ritual, and politics', in Fearn (ed.), Aegina: Contexts for Choral Lyric Poetry (Oxford 2011) 175–226
Golden, M. Sport and Society in Ancient Greece (Cambridge)
Goldhill, S. 'Programme notes', in S. Goldhill and R. G. Osborne (eds.) Performance Culture and Athenian Democracy (Cambridge 1999) 1–29
Harris, J. P. ‘Revenge of the nerds: Xenophanes, Euripides, and Socrates vs. Olympic victors’, American Journal of Philology 130.2 (2009) 157–94
Hornblower, S. Thucydides and Pindar: Historical Narrative and the World of Epinikian Poetry (Oxford 2004) ch. 1
Hornblower, S. and Morgan, C. (eds.) Pindar’s Poetry, Patrons, and Festivals (Oxford 2007)
Kurke, L. The Traffic in Praise: Pindar and the Poetics of Social Economy (Ithaca, NY 1991)
Kyle, D. G. Sport and Spectacle in the Ancient World (Malden, MA 2007)
Martin, R. P. The Language of Heroes: Speech and Performance in the Iliad (Ithaca, NY 1989)
Miller, S. G. ‘The organization and functioning of the Olympic Games’, in D. Phillips and D. Pritchard (eds.) Sport and Festival in the Ancient Greek World (London 2003) 1–40
Miller, S. G. Ancient Greek Athletics (New Haven CT, 2004)
Newby, Z. Athletics in the Ancient World (Bristol 2006)
Scott, M. C. Delphi and Olympia: The Spatial Politics of Panhellenism in the Archaic and Classical Periods (Cambridge 2010)
Wilson, P. The Athenian Institution of the Khoregia: The Chorus, the City, and the Stage (Cambridge 2000)
Intellectual and Cultural Revolutions:
Herodotus and early Greek historiography

De Sélincourt, A. (Penguin translation)
Gould, J. Herodotus (London, 1989)
Goldhill, S. D. The Invention of Prose (Oxford 2002), sections 1 and 2
Thomas, R. Herodotus in Context: Ethnography, Science, and the Art of Persuasion (Cambridge 2000), ch. 1 and pp. 267–9, on the proem
Pelling, C. B. R. 'East is East and West is West – or are they? National stereotypes in Herodotus', Histos 1 (1997)
Pelling, C. B. R. 'Educating Croesus: Talking and Learning in Herodotus' Lydian Logos', Classical Antiquity 25.1 (2006) 141–77
Redfield, J. 'Herodotus the Tourist', Classical Philology 80 (1985) 97–118
Hall, J. M. Hellenicity: Between Ethnicity and Culture (Chicago, 2002), ch. 6
Dewald, C. 'Narrative Surface and Authorial Voice in Herodotus' Histories', Arethusa 20 (1987) 141-70
Munson, R. V. Telling Wonders: Ethnographic and Political Discourse in the Work of Herodotus (Ann Arbor 2001)
Apfel, L. J. The Advent of Pluralism: Diversity and Conflict in the Age of Sophocles (Oxford 2011) chs. 4 & 5
The Sophists
Guthrie, W. K. C. A History of Greek Philosophy, Volume Three: The Fifth-Century Enlightenment (Cambridge 1969)
Guthrie, W. K. C. The Sophists (Cambridge 1971)
Goldhill, S. The Invention of Prose (Oxford 2002)
Gagarin, M. and Woodruff, P. 'The Sophists', in P. Curd and D. W. Graham (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Presocratic Philosophy (Oxford 2008), ch. 13 [available online via webcat]
Lloyd, G. E. R. The Revolutions of Wisdom: Studies in the Claims and Practice of Ancient Greek Science (Berkeley, CA 1987)
Wardy, R. The Birth of Rhetoric: Gorgias, Plato and their successors (London 1996)
Whitmarsh, T. 'Atheistic Aesthetics: The Sisyphus Fragment, Poetics, and the Creativity of Drama', Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society 60 (2014) 109–26
Apfel, L. J. The Advent of Pluralism: Diversity and Conflict in the Age of Sophocles (Oxford 2011) chs. 2 & 3
Homer's Odyssey
Austin, N. Archery at the Dark of the Moon: Poetic Problems in Homer's Odyssey (Berkeley 1991)
Clayton, B. A Penelopean poetics : reweaving the feminine in Homer's Odyssey (Lanham 2004)
Cohen, B. (ed.), The Distaff Side: representing the female in Homer’s Odyssey (Oxford 1995)
Doherty, L.E. Oxford Readings in Homer's Odyssey. Oxford 2009. This book contains:
Emlyn-Jones, C. 'The Reunion of Penelope and Odysseus', 208-230; [*also in Greece & Rome 31 (1984): 1-18] and A. Kohnken, 'Odysseus' scar: An essay on Homeric Epic Narrative Technique', 44-61.
Edwards, A. Achilles in the Odyssey (Konigsten 1985)
Emlyn-Jones, C. 'True and Lying Tales in the Odyssey', Greece and Rome 33 (1986) 1-10
Felson, N. Regarding Penelope : from character to poetics (Norman 1997)
Foley, H. 'Penelope as Moral Agent', in B. Cohen (ed.), The Distaff Side: representing the female in Homer’s Odyssey (Oxford 1995) 93-116
Goldhill, S. The Poet's Voice (Cambridge 1991)
Griffin, J. Homer: The Odyssey (Cambridge 2004)
Hall, E. The Return of Ulysses: a Cultural History of Homer's Odyssey (London 2008)
Heitman, R. Taking her seriously : Penelope & the plot of Homer's Odyssey, (Ann Arbor 2005)
Murnaghan, S. Disguise and Recognition in the Odyssey (Princeton 1987)
Rutherford, R. 'At home and abroad...' Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society 31 (1985) 133-50
Schein, S. Reading the Odyssey: Selected Interpretive Essays (Princeton 1996)
Schein, S. 'Odysseus and Polyphemus in the Odyssey', Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 11 (1970) 73-83.
Segal, C. Singers, Heroes and Gods in the Odyssey (Cornell 1994)
Vidal-Naquet, P. 'Religious and mythic values of land and sacrifice', in R. Gordon Myth, Religion, Society (Cambridge 1981)
Walsh, G. The Varieties of Enchantment (Chapel Hill 1984)
see also above for other general bibliography on Homer
Transmission of Texts and Libraries in the Ancient World

Anderson, C. A. and Dix, K. T. (2014), ‘Λάβε τὸ βυβλίον: Orality and Literacy in Aristophanes’, in Scodel, R. (ed.), Between Orality and LIteracy: Communication and Adaptation in Antiquity. Leiden, 77-86 [e-book].
El-Abbadi, M. (1992), The Life and Fate of the Ancient Library of Alexandria. Paris.
Erskine, A. (1995), ‘Culture and Power in Ptolemaic Egypt: The Museum and Library at Alexandria’, Greece and Rome 42.1, 38-48 [e-journal].
Ford, A. (2003), ‘From Letters to Literature: Reading the Song Culture of Classical Greece’, in Yunis, H. (ed.), Written Texts and the Rise of Literate Culture in Ancient Greece. Cambridge, 15-37 [e-book].
Fraser, P. M. (1972), Ptolemaic Alexandria. Oxford: ch. 6 ‘Ptolemaic Patronage: The Museum and the Library’.
Handis, M. W. (2013), ‘Myth and History: Galen and the Alexandrian Library’, in König, J., Oikonomopoulou, K. and Woolf, G. (eds), Ancient Libraries. Cambridge, 364-76 [e-book].
Immerwahr, H. R. (1964), ‘Book Rolls on Attic Vases’, in Henderson, C. (ed.), Classical, Medieval and Renaissance Studies in Honor of Berthold Louis Ullman. Vol. 1. Rome, 17-48.
Jacob, C. (2013), ‘Fragments of a History of Ancient Libraries’, in König, J., Oikonomopoulou, K. and Woolf, G. (eds), Ancient Libraries, Cambridge, 57-81 [e-book].
Johnstone, S. (2014), ‘A New History of Libraries and Books in the Hellenistic Period’, Classical Philology 33.2: 347-93 [e-journal].
Keith Dix, T. (2004), ‘Aristotle’s Peripatetic Library’, in Raven, J. (ed.), Lost Libraries: The Destruction of Great Book Collections since Antiquity. New York, 58-74 [e-book]
Kenyon, F. G. (1951), Books and Readers in Ancient Greece and Rome. Oxford.
Lowe, N. J. (1993), ‘Aristophanes’ books’, Annals of Scholarship 10.1, 63-84.
MacLeod, R. (2000), The Library of Alexandria. Centre of Learning in the Ancient World. London: ‘Introduction: Alexandria in History and Myth’.
Nagy, G. (2009), ‘Performance and Text in Ancient Greece’, in Boys-Stones, G. R., Graziosi, B. and Vasunia, Ph. (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Hellenic Studies. Oxford, 417-31.
Pinto, P. M. (2013), ‘Men and books in Fourth-century BC Athens’, in König, J., Oikonomopoulou, K. and Woolf, G. (eds), Ancient Libraries. Cambridge, 85-95 [e-book].
Platthy, J. (1968), Sources of the Earliest Greek Libraries with the Testimonia. Amsterdam.
Reynolds, L.D. and Wilson, N. (2013), Scribes and Scholars: A Guide to the Transmission of Greek and Latin Literature. 4th edn. Oxford: ch. 1 ‘Antiquity’.
Rösler, W. (2009), ‘Books and Literacy’, in Boys-Stones, G. R., Graziosi, B. and Vasunia, Ph. (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Hellenic Studies. Oxford, 432-41.
Sandys, J. E. (2014), A History of Classical Scholarship: From the End of the Sixth Century B.C. to the End of the Middle Ages. Volume 1. Online publication year. Cambridge: book 1, ch. 8. ‘The School of Alexandria’ [e-book].
Thomas, R. (2003), ‘Prose Performance Texts: Epideixis and Written Publication in the Late Fifth and Early Fourth Centuries’, in Yunis, H. (ed.), Written Texts and the Rise of Literate Culture in Ancient Greece. Cambridge, 162-88 [e-book].
Too, Y. L. (2010), The Idea of the Library in the Ancient World. Oxford: ‘Introduction’ and ch. 1 ‘The Birth of a Library’ [e-book].
Turner, E.G. (1952), Athenian Books in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC. An inaugural lecture delivered at University College, London, 22 May 1951. London.
Yunis, H. (2003), ‘Introduction: Why Written Texts?’, in Yunis, H. (ed.), Written Texts and the Rise of Literate Culture in Ancient Greece. Cambridge, 1-14 [e-book].

Myth and Religion
Bremmer, J.Greek Religion (Oxford 1994)
Burkert, W. Greek Religion (Oxford 1985)
Buxton, R. Imaginary Greece: the Contexts of Mythology (Cambridge 1994)
Buxton, R. Oxford Readings in Greek Religion (Oxford 2000)
Clay, J. S. Hesiod's Cosmos (Cambridge 2003)
Csapo, E. Theories of Mythology (Oxford 2005)
Dowden, K. The Uses of Greek Mythology (London 1992)
Easterling, P. & Muir, J. Greek Religion and Society (Cambridge 1985)
Edmunds, L. Approaches to Greek Myth (Baltimore 1990)
Harrison, T. Greek Religion: Belief and Experience (London 2001)
Price, S. Religions of the Ancient Greeks (Cambridge 1999)
Murray, O. Early Greece (1993)
Davies, J. K. Democracy and Classical Greece (1993)
Bruit Zaidman, L. & Schmitt Pantel P. Religion in the Ancient Greek City (1992)
Ogden, D. (ed.), A Companion to Greek Religion (2007)
Parker, R. C. T. Polytheism and Society at Athens (Oxford 2007)
Parker, R. C. T. Athenian Religion: A History (Oxford 1996)
The Homeric Hymn to Demeter

The Homeric Hymn to Demeter
Faulkner, A. The Homeric Hymns: Interpretative Essays (Oxford 2011)
Foley, H. P. The Homeric Hymn to Demeter: translation, commentary, and interpretive essays, (Princeton 1994), especially pp. 97-118 'Variants of the myth and the importance of the version in the Hymn to Demeter'; 'Female experience in the Hymn to Demeter', 'Marriage'; 'Gender conflict and the cosmological tradition'
Clay, J. S. The politics of Olympus: form and meaning in the major Homeric hymns, (London 1989)
Segal, Ch. ‘Orality in the Hymn to Demeter’, in Brillante et al. (eds.) I poemi rapsodici non Omerici e la traditione orale (Padova 1981) 128-60
Sowa, C. A. Traditional themes and the Homeric hymns, (Chicago 1984)
Suter, A. The Narcissus and the pomegranate: an archaeology of the Homeric Hymn to Demeter (Ann Arbor 2002)
Sanctuaries
Pedley, J. Sanctuaries and the sacred in the ancient Greek world (2005)
Whitley, J. The Archaeology of Ancient Greece (2001), esp. chap. 7 and 12
Marinatos, N. and Hägg, R. Greek Sanctuaries: New Approaches (1993)
Architecture
Burford, A. The Greek temple builders at Epidauros (Liverpool 1969)
Camp, J. The archaeology of Athens (New Haven 2001)
Coulton, J. Ancient Greek architects at work: problems of structure and design (Oxford 1995)
Dinsmoor, W. The architecture of ancient Greece: an account of its historic development (Batsford 1950)
Lawrence, A. Greek Architecture (Yale 1996)
Neer, R. Art and Archaeology of the Greek world: a new history 2500 BC-150 BC (Thames and Hudson 2012)
Nevett, L. Domestic Space in Classical Antiquity (Cambridge 2010)
Scully, V. The earth, the temple and the gods: Greek Sacred Architecture (Yale 1979)
Spawforth, A. The Complete Greek temples (London 2006)
Tomlinson, R. Greek Architecture (Bristol 1989)
Tomlinson, R. Greek Sanctuaries (London 1976)
The Parthenon and its Decoration
Pollitt, J. J. Art and Experience in Classical Greece (1972) chaps. 3–4
Ashmole, D. Architect and Sculptor in Classical Greece (1972) chaps 4–5
Castriota, D. Myth, Ethos and Actuality. Official Art in Fifth-century Athens (1992) chaps 4–5
Ridgway, B. S. Fifth-century Styles in Greek sculpture (1982)
Brommer, F. The Sculptures of the Parthenon: metopes, frieze, pediments, cult-statue (1979)
Loraux, N. The children of Athena: Athenian ideas about citizenship and the division between the sexes (1981) (trans, 1991)
Stehle, E. and Day, A. ‘Women Looking at Women. Women’s ritual and temple sculpture’ in N. Kampen (ed.) Sexuality in Ancient Art (1996) 101–16
Harrison, E. ‘The Composition of the Amazonomachy on the Shield of Athena Parthenos’, Hesperia 35.2 (Apr.–Jun. 1966) 107–33 [available on JSTOR]
Osborne, R. G. ‘The viewing and obscuring of the Parthenon frieze’, Journal of Hellenic Studies 107 (1987) 98–105 [available on JSTOR]
Connelly, J. ‘Parthenon and Parthenoi: A Mythological Interpretation of the Parthenon Frieze’, American Journal of Archaeology 100.1 (1996) 53–80 [available on JSTOR]
Osborne, R. G. ‘Framing the Centaur: Reading Fifth-century Architectural Sculpture’, in S. Goldhill and R. Osborne (eds.) Art and Text in Ancient Greek Culture (Cambridge 1994) 52–84
Osborne, R. G. ‘Democracy and imperialism in the Panathenaic Procession: The Parthenon frieze in its context’, in W. D. E. Coulson et al. (eds.) The Archaeology of Athens and Attica under the Democracy (1994) 143–50
Niels, J. The Parthenon Frieze (2001)
Women on Greek Vases
Bérard, C. (ed.) A City of Images: Iconography and Society in Ancient Greece (1989), ch. 6
Matheson, S. B. Polygnotus and Vase-Painting in Classical Athens (1995) ch.9
Reeder, E. D. (ed.) Pandora: Women in Classical Greece (1995)
Sabetai, V. ‘Aspects of nuptial and genre imagery in fifth century Athens: issues of interpretation and methodology’, in J. Oakley, J. Coulson and O. Palagia (eds.) Athenian Potters and Painters (1997) 319–35
Webster, T. B. L. Potter and Patron in Classical Athens (1972) chs. 7, 16 and 17, esp. 241–3
Williams, D. ‘Women on Athenian Vases Problems of Interpretation,’ in A. Cameron and A. Kuhrt (eds.) Images of Women in Antiquity (1983)
Naturalistic Art
Gombrich, E. Art and Illusion: a study in the psychology of pictorial representation (1959), ch 4: ‘Reflections on the Greek Revolution’
Stewart, A. Greek Sculpture: An Exploration (1990), chs. 11–13
Spivey, N. Understanding Greek sculpture: ancient meanings, modern readings (1996), ch. 2
Robertson, M. History of Greek Art (1975), chs. 4–5
Ashmole, B. Architect and Sculptor in Classical Greece (1972), chs. 2–5
Hurwit, J. M. The Art and Culture of Early Greece (1985) 179–202, 253–61, 336–55
Pollitt, J. J. Art and Experience in Classical Greece (1972), chs. 1–3
Lullies, R. Greek Sculpture, (1957), translation (1960)
Boardman, J. Greek Sculpture: The Archaic Period (1974)
Boardman, J. Greek Sculpture: The Classical Period (1985)
Hyman, J. The Imitation of Nature (1989), ch. 5
Living in the Polis
The archaeology of Democracy
Camp, J. The archaeology of Athens (New Haven 2001)
Coulson, W. The archaeology of Athens and Attica under the democracy (Oxford 1994)
Keesling, C. The votive statues of the Athenian acropolis (Cambridge 2003)
Millett, P. 'Encounters in the agora', in Cartledge, P., Millett, P. and Von Reden, S., eds., Kosmos: Essays in Order, Conflict and Community in Classical Athens 203–28 (Cambridge 1998)
Morris, I. 'Beyond democracy and empire: Athenian art in context', in Boedeker, D. and Raaflaub, K., eds. Democracy, Empire and the Arts in Fifth-Century Athens 59–86 (Cambridge MA 1998)
Neils, J. Goddess and Polis: the Panathenaic festival in Ancient Athens (Princeton 1992)
Osborne, R. Athens and Athenian democracy (Cambridge 2010)
Osborne, R. and Hornblower, S. (eds.) Ritual, Finance, Politics: Athenian democratic accounts presented to David Lewis (Oxford 1994) Ebook
Rhodes, R. Architecture and meaning on the Athenian Acropolis (Cambridge 1995)
Thompson, H. and Wycherley, R. E. The Agora of Athens: The History, Shape and Use of an Ancient City Centre (Princeton 1972) Ebook
Vlassopoulos, K. (2007) 'Free spaces: identity, experience and democracy in classical Athens', Classical Quarterly 57: 33–52
Wycherley, R. E. The Stones of Athens (Princeton 1978)
Medicine and Science
Dickie, M..Magic and magicians in the Graeco-Roman world. London. 2001
Faraone, C.. Ancient Greek love magic. Cambridge, MA. 1999
Faraone, Christopher A., and Dirk. Obbink. Magika Hiera : Ancient Greek Magic and Religion. New York 1991
Flint, V., Luck, G., Gordon, R., and Ogden, D.., Athlone history of witchcraft and magic in Europe. Vol. 2. London. 1999
Gager, J.. Curse tablets and binding spells from the ancient world. New York. 1992
Graf, F.. Magic in the ancient world. Cambridge, MA 1997
Ogden, D.. Magic, Witchcraft and Ghosts in the Greek and Roman Worlds. A Sourcebook. Second edition. Oxford, 2009
G.E.R. Lloyd, Magic, Reason, and Experience: Studies in the origins and development of Greek science (Cambridge, 1979).
Vivian Nutton, Ancient Medicine (London, 2004)
T. Rihll, Greek science. Oxford (1999)
C.J.Tuplin and T.E.Rihll (Ed.), Science and mathematics in ancient Greek culture. (Oxford 2002)

Athenian Drama in Contexts:

Greek Tragedy
Easterling P. E. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Greek Tragedy (Cambridge 1997)
Goldhill S. and R. Osborne (eds.), Performance, Culture and Athenian Democracy, (Cambridge 1999)
Goldhill, S. Reading Greek Tragedy (Cambridge 1986).
Gregory J. (ed.), A Companion to Greek Tragedy, Blackwell 2005 [see chapters 14-16 on the three main tragedians].
Hall, E. Greek Tragedy: Suffering Under the Sun (Oxford 2010)
Sommerstein, A. H. Greek Drama and Dramatists (London 2002)
Padel, R. In and out of the Mind: Greek images of the tragic self (Princeton 1992)
Rehm, R. The play of space: spatial transformation in Greek tragedy (Princeton 2002)
Taplin, O. Greek Tragedy in Action (London 1978)
Wiles, D. Greek Theatre Performance: An Introduction (Cambridge 2000)
Wiles, D. Tragedy in Athens: Performance space and theatrical meaning (Cambridge 1997)
Aeschylus’ Persians
Bakola, E. 'Interiority, the 'deep earth', and the spatial symbolism of Darius' apparition in the Persians of Aeschylus' CCJ 60, 2014, 1-36
Hall, E. Aeschylus Persians (Warminster 1997) 1-28
Hall, E. Inventing the Barbarian (Oxford, 1989) 62-100
Hall, E. “Asia unmanned: Images of Victory in Classical Athens”. In: J. Rich & G. Shipley (eds), War and Society in the Greek World (New York & Oxford 1993) 108-33.
Pelling, C.B.R. “Aeschylus’ Persae and history”, in Pelling (ed.) Greek Tragedy and the Historian (Oxford 1997) 1-20
Rosenbloom, D. Aeschylus Persians, (London 2006)
Saïd, S. "Tragedy and Reversal: The Example of the Persians”. In: Μ. Lloyd (ed.), Aeschylus. Oxford Readings in Classical Studies (Oxford 2007), 71-92.
Saϊd, S. “Herodotus and Tragedy”, in E.J. Bakker et al. Brill’s Companion to Herodotus, (Leiden 2002), 117-147
Thalmann G. W. “Xerxes’ Rags: Some Problems in Aeschylus’ Persians”, Τhe American Journal of Philology, 101 (1980) 260-282.
Tragedy and Politics

Goldhill, S. 'The Great Dionysia and civic ideology', Journal of Hellenic Studies 107 (1987) 56–76, revised in Winkler and Zeitlin (eds.) Nothing to do with Dionysos?
Goldhill, S. 'Civic ideology and the problem of difference: the politics of Aeschylean tragedy, once again', Journal of Hellenic Studies 120 (2000) 34–56
Pelling, C. B. R. (ed.) Greek Tragedy and the Historian (Oxford 1997)
Foley, H. 'Tragedy and Democratic Ideology: The Case of Sophocles' Antigone' in Goff, B. (ed.) History, Tragedy, Theory: Dialogues on Athenian Drama (Austin, TX 1995)
Goldhill, S. 'The Great Dionysia and civic ideology', Journal of Hellenic Studies 107 (1987) 56–76, revised in Winkler and Zeitlin (eds.) Nothing to do with Dionysos?
Griffin, J. 'The social function of Attic tragedy', Classical Quarterly 48 (1998) 39–61
Rhodes, P. J. 'Nothing to do with democracy: Athenian drama and the polis', Journal of Hellenic Studies 123 (2003) 104–19
Sourvinou-Inwood, C. 'Something to do with Athens: Tragedy and Ritual' in Osborne, R. and Hornblower, S. (eds.) Ritual, Finance, Politics (Oxford 1994) 269–89
Winkler, J. J. 'The ephebes' song: Tragôidia and Polis' in Winkler and Zeitlin (eds.) Nothing to do with Dionysos?
Comedy
Bakola, E. ‘The Drunk, the Reformer and the Teacher: Agonistic Poetics and the Construction of Persona in the Comic Poets of the Fifth Century', Cambridge Classical Journal 54 (2008) 1-29
Carey, C. ‘Comic ridicule and democracy’, in R.G. Osborne and S. Hornblower ed., Ritual, Finance, Politics: Athenian democratic accounts presented to David Lewis (Oxford 1994) 69-83
Foley, H. ‘Generic Boundaries in late fifth-century Athens’ in Revermann and Wilson (eds.) Performance, iconography, reception: studies in honour of Oliver Taplin (Oxford 2008) 15-36
Hughes, A. Performing Greek Comedy (Cambridge 2011)
Konstan, D. Greek Comedy and Ideology (Oxford 1995)
Lowe, N. “Aristophanic Spacecraft”, in L. Kozak and J. Rich (eds.) Playing Around Aristophanes (Oxford 2006) 48-64 (I have this one scanned, too)
Lowe, N. Comedy, Greece and Rome New Surveys in the Classics (Cambridge 2007)
Robson, J. Aristophanes: An Introduction (London 2009)
Pelling, C. B. R. Literary Texts and the Greek Historian (London 2000), chs. 7, 8 and 10
Bowie, A. Aristophanes: Myth, Ritual and Comedy (Cambridge 1996)
Revermann, M. Comic Business: Theatricality, Dramatic Technique, and Performance Contexts of Aristophanic Comedy(Oxford 2006)
Revermann, M. (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Greek Comedy (Cambridge 2014)
Wilkins, J. and Harvey. D. (eds.) The Rivals of Aristophanes (London 2000)
Silk, M. S. 'The People of Aristophanes', in Pelling, C. B. R. (ed.) Characterization and Individuality in Greek Literature(Oxford 1990) 150–73
Halliwell, S. 'Comic satire and freedom of speech in Classical Athens', Journal of Hellenic Studies 111 (1991) 48–70
Henderson, J. 'Attic Comedy, Frank Speech, and Democracy' in Boedeker, D. and Rauflaub, K. (eds.) Democracy, Empire and the Arts in Fifth-Century Athens (Cambridge, MA 1998)
Silk, M. S. Aristophanes and the Definition of Comedy (Oxford 2000)
Aristophanes’ Clouds
Dover, K. J. (ed.) Aristophanes: Clouds (with intro. & commentary), (Oxford 1968)
Hubbard, T. K. ‘Parabatic Self-Criticism and the Two Versions of Aristophanes' Clouds’ Classical Antiquity 5 (1986) 182-97
Neumann, H. ‘Socrates in Plato and Aristophanes’ American Journal of Philology 90 (1969) 201-14.
Nussbaum, M. ‘Aristophanes and Socrates on Learning Practical Wisdom’, Yale Classical Studies 26 (1980) 43-97
Platter, C., Aristophanes and the Carnival of Genres Chs. 2 and 3 (Baltimore 2007)
Reckford, K. J. ‘Aristophanes' Old-and-New Comedy: Clouds’ in Aristophanes' Old-and-New Comedy, 388-402, (Chapel Hill 1987)
Revermann, M. ‘ Clouds’ in Comic Business (Oxford 2006), 179-235
Rosen, R. ‘Performance and Textuality in Aristophanes' Clouds’, The Yale Journal of Criticism 10 (1997) 397-421
Segal, C. (1969) ‘Aristophanes’ Cloud-Chorus,’ Arethusa 2, 143-161 = Oxford Readings in Aristophanes pp.
Silk, M. S. ‘Aristophanic Paratragedy’ in Sommerstein, A.H. et al. (ed), Tragedy, Comedy and the Polis (Bari 1993) 477-504, reworked in Silk, M. S., Aristophanes and the Definition of Comedy (Oxford 2000)
Woodbury, L. ‘Strepsiades’ Understanding’, Phoenix 34 (1980) 108-27
Women in classical Greece
Blondell, R. et al. (eds.) Women on the edge: four plays by Euripides (London 1999)
Cameron, A. and Kuhrt, A. Images of women in antiquity (London 1993)
Cartledge, P. The Greeks (London, 1990) - chapter on "Engendering History"
Davidson, J. Courtesans and Fishcakes (London, 1996)
Goldhill S. Reading Greek Tragedy (Cambridge, 1984) - chapter on "Sexuality and Difference"
Gould, J. 'Law, Custom and Myth: Aspects of the Social Position of Women in Classical Athens' Journal of Hellenic Studies 100 (1980) 38–59
Just, R. Women in Athenian Law and Life (London 1999)
Keuls. E. The Reign of the Phallus (Blatimore, 1985)
Lefkowitz, M. and M. Fant Women's Lives in Greece and Rome [useful sourcebook]
McClure, L. Courtesans at Table: Gender and Ancient Greek Literary Culture (London 2003)
R. Padel, ‘Women: Model for Possession by Greek Daemons’ in A. Cameron and A. Kuhrt (eds.) Images of Women in Antiquity (London 1983), 3-19
Pomeroy, S. Goddess, Whores, Wives and Slaves (New York, 1974)

Sparta

Cartledge, P. Sparta and Lakonia: a regional history 1300–362 BC (Routledge 2002 (2nd ed))
Cartledge, P. Agesilaos and the Crisis of Sparta (Duckworth 1986)
Cartledge, P. Spartan Reflections (Duckworth 2001)
Hodkinson, S. & Morris, I (eds). Sparta in modern thought (Cardiff 2012)
Hodkinson, S. & Powell, A. (eds) Sparta: beyond the mirage (Duckworth 2002)
Hodkinson, S. Property and Wealth in Classical Sparta (Duckworth 2002)
Kennell, N. The Gymnasium of Virtue: education and virtue in ancient Sparta (North Carolina 1995)
Powell, A. Classical Sparta: techniques behind her success (London 1989)
Todd, S. Athens and Sparta (Bristol 1996)
Whitby, M. (ed.) Sparta (Edinburgh 2002)

The Athenian Empire

Boedeker, D. and Raaflaub, K. eds. Democracy, Empire and the Arts in Fifth-Century Athens (Cambridge MA 1998) 59–86 Constantakopoulou, C. The dance of the islands: insularity, networks, the Athenian Empire and the Aegean world (Oxford 2007)
Deacy, S. and Villing, A. eds. Athens in the Classical World (Leiden 2001)
LACTOR The Athenian Empire (London 1984)
Low, P. The Athenian Empire (Edinburgh 2008)
Meiggs, R. The Athenian Empire (Oxford 1972)
Rhodes, P. The Athenian Empire (Oxford 1985)
Samons, L (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Pericles (Cambridge 2007)

Inter-polis Rivalry

Brock, R. and Hodkinson, S. eds. Alternatives to Athens: Varieties of Political Organization and Community in Ancient Greece (Oxford 2000)
Hornblower, S. The Greek World 479–323 BC (Routledge 2002)
Kagan, D. The Peloponnesian war: Athens and Sparta in savage conflict (London 2003)
Pomeroy, S et al. eds. Ancient Greece: a political, cultural and social history (New York 2012)
Pritchard, D. War, Democracy and Culture in Classical Athens (Cambridge 2010)
Rhodes, P. A history of the Classical world 478–323 BC (Wiley-Blackwell 2010)
Snodgrass, A. M. 'Interaction by design: the Greek city-state', in Renfrew, C. and Cherry, J. F., eds. Peer-Polity Interaction and Socio-Political Change (Cambridge 1986) 47–58
Scott, M. Delphi and Olympia: the spatial politics of panhellenism (Cambridge 2010)
Tritle, L. A new history of the Peloponnesian War (Wiley-Blackwell 2010)
Tritle, L. The Greek world in the 4th century: from the fall of the Athenian Empire to the successors of Alexander (London 1997)
Van Wees, H. Greek Warfare: myths and realities (London 2004)

Greeks & Others: Greece and Persia
Adams, C. & Roy, J. Travel, Geography and Culture in Ancient Greece, Egypt and the Near East (London 2007)
Alcock, S. & Osborne, R. Classical Archaeology (Wiley-Blackwell 2012)
Cartledge, P. The Greeks: a portrait of self and others (Oxford 1993)
Cohen, B. ed. Not the Classical Ideal: Athens and the Construction of the Other in Greek Art (Leiden 2000)
Hall, E. Inventing the Barbarian: Greek self-definition through tragedy (Oxford 1989)
Hall, J. Ethnic identity in Greek Antiquity (Cambridge 1997)
Isaac, B. The invention of Racism in Classical Antiquity (Princeton 2004)
Karageorghis, V., ed. The Greeks Beyond the Aegean: From Marseilles to Bactria (Athens 2002)
Koromela, M. The Greeks in the Black Sea from the Bronze Age to the Early Twentieth Century (Athens 2002)
Miller, M. Athens and Persia in the Fifth Century BC (Cambridge 1997)
Tritle, L & Heckel, W. eds. Alexander the Great: a new history (London 2009)
Coins
General:
Burnett, A. Interpreting the Past: Coins (London 1991)
Jenkins, G.K. Ancient Greek Coins (London 1990)
Howgego, C. Ancient History from Coins (London 1995) ebook
Kraay, C. M. Archaic and Classical Greek Coins (London 1976)
Mørkholm, O. and (ed.) Grierson, P. & Westermark, U. Early Hellenistic Coinage from the Accession of Alexander to the Peace of Apameia (336-188 B.C.) (Cambridge 1991)
Iconography, politics, spread:
Arnold-Biucchi, C. Alexander’s Coins and Alexander’s Image (Cambridge MA 2006)
Dahmen, K. The Legend of Alexander the Great on Greek and Roman Coins (London 2007)
Howgego, D., Heuchert, V. and Burnett, A. eds. Coinage and Identity in the Roman Provinces (Oxford 2005)
Schaps, D. The Invention of Coinage and the Monetization of Ancient Greece (Michigan 2004)
Trevett, J. 'Coinage and Democracy at Athens', in Howgego, D., Heuchert, V. and Burnett, A. eds. Coinage and Identity in the Roman Provinces (Oxford 2005) 23–34
Greece under Rome
Alcock, S. Graecia Capta: The Landscapes of Roman Greece (Cambridge 1993)
Alcock, S., Cherry, J. F. and Elsner, J. eds. Pausanias: Travel and Memory in Roman Greece (Oxford 2001)
Arafat, K. Pausanias’ Greece: ancient artists and Roman rulers (Cambridge 1996)
Beard, M. & Henderson, J. Classical Art: from Greece to Rome (Oxford 2001)
Bispham, E, Harrison, T. & Sparkes, B. The Edinburgh Companion to Ancient Greece and Rome (Edinburgh 2006)
Dmitriev, S. The Greek Slogan of Freedom and Early Roman Politics in Greece (Oxford 2011) ebook
Erskine, A. Troy between Greece and Rome: local tradition and imperial power (Oxford 2001)
Hornblower, S. & Morgan, C. eds. Pindar's Poetry, Patrons and Festivals: from Archaic Greece to the Roman Empire (Oxford 2007)
Spawforth, A. Greece and the Augustan Cultural Revolution (Cambridge 2012)
Whitmarsh, T. The Second Sophistic (Oxford 2005)
Whitmarsh, T. Greek literature and the Roman Empire: the politics of imitation (Oxford 2001)

View reading list on Talis Aspire

Subject specific skills

By the end of the module students should have:

• gained a knowledge of some of the major cultural and social concerns of the Greeks
• acquired a sense of the changes and developments in Greek culture and society over time
• developed some ability to discriminate between different types of evidence and critical approaches

Transferable skills

• Critical thinking
• Problem solving
• Active lifelong learning
• Communication
• Information Literacy
• ICT skills
• Professionalism