Past Events

2008 events

The annual H. W. Allen Memorial Lecture:
Erotes on the Euphrates: redecorating the wall of a Hellenistic house in North Syria

Heather Jackson
ARC Postdoctoral Fellow, Centre for Classics and Archaeology, University of Melbourne

Recently-discovered fragments of a stucco figured frieze from the wall of a house at Jebel Khalid, in North Syria, stimulated this attempt to reconstruct the appearance of the original wall, which dates from the Hellenistic period and was contemporary with the famous tomb paintings of Macedonian sites and the highly decorated walls in rich houses on Delos. Examples of Hellenistic wall decoration from the Near East are very rare and this figured frieze is unique. The discovery raises questions about the prosperity of the inhabitants of the house, their cultural heritage, their use of the Greek tetrachrome palette and adherence to a Greek mythical motif.

Since 1995, Dr. Heather M. Jackson has been Field Director of an excavation of a whole insula of houses at Jebel Khalid on the Euphrates in North Syria and Co-Director, with Professor Graeme Clarke of ANU, Canberra, of the on-going Jebel Khalid campaigns. She is co-author of Greek Vases in the University of Melbourne (1999), the National Gallery of Victoria's Handbook of Antiquities (2003), and author of Jebel Khalid on the Euphrates, Volume Two: the Terracotta Figurines (2006).

Date: Wednesday, 9 April 2008
Time: 8:15pm
Location: Kaye Scott Room, Ormond College, University of Melbourne

Feeling the pain: empathy in Greek tragedy

Eric Dugdale
Gustavus Adolphus College, USA

In the ideal city-state, drama would be carefully censored, Plato's Athenian argues in the Republic. For Aristotle, on the other hand, tragedy offers a valuable service to society: by inciting fear and pity, it achieves the katharsis of these emotions. All agree, however, that at Athens theatre mattered and that it had a profound effect on audience and actors alike. Ancient audiences felt a strong emotional response to the plays they watched, and actors drew close connections between the characters they played and their own lives. This lecture considers factors that may have contributed to the strong personal response of ancient theatre-goers, and actors’ conditions of performance, such as the spatial configuration of the theatre and masked acting as well as strategies within the plays themselves. Taking Euripides' Trojan Woman as a case-study, the lecture will seek to show how the play systematically breaks down categories of ‘us’ and ‘them’ and invites involvement by the viewer. The paper will argue the continued role of the performance arts in developing within the citizen body the capacity for empathy, and will suggest ways to retrieve the emotive content of Athenian tragedy in modern performance.

Eric Dugdale is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Classics at Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter, Minnesota in the USA. He is the author of a new translation and commentary on Sophocles’ Electra, to be published by Cambridge in 2008, and writes extensively on the role of Greek tragedy in ancient Athens. He has also taught at the Intercollegiate Center for Classical Studies in Rome, and chaired the Committee for Ancient and Modern Performance for the American Philological Association. He is a MacGeorge Honorary Fellow during his visit to the University of Melbourne, with the support of the MacGeorge Bequest. This lecture is sponsored by the School of Historical Studies at the University of Melbourne.

Date: Thursday, 3 April 2008
Time: 6:30pm
Location: Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, University of Melbourne

From feasting to the social archaeology of eating and drinking

Yannis Hamilakis
Archaeology, University of Southampton, U.K.

In the last few years, archaeological research in the prehistoric Aegean has turned its attention to feasting, as witnessed by the number of conferences, theses, and publications on the topic. This echoes developments in archaeology overall, but it also signifies a dramatic change from the situation until the middle nineties, when most research on food was either simply data-gathering or fell within the paradigms of "subsistence," and "survival" the discourse of animal and plant husbandry, and the logic of formalist economics. This lecture will review the developments in the field in the last 15 years, and will propose some interpretative avenues for its future.

This public lecture is the opening keynote address for the “DAIS: Aegean Feast” conference.

Dr Yannis Hamilakis is Senior Lecturer in Archaeology in the School of Humanities at the University of Southampton. Author of The Nation and its Ruins: Antiquity, Archaeology and National Imagination in Greece (Oxford, 2007), his research interests include the socio-politics of archaeology (including the politics of pedagogy), the archaeology of the human body (including the consuming body), bodily senses and bodily memory, social zooarchaeology, and prehistoric Greece.

Date: Tuesday, 25 March 2008
Time: 9:15am
Location: Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, University of Melbourne

The Earliest Temples on Earth: new perspectives on life in the Neolithic

Tony Sagona
Professor, Centre for Classics and Archaeology, University of Melbourne

With the waning of the Glacial Period, from about 11,000 BC, the world was fundamentally transformed in several ways. The magnitude of these episodes did not escape V. G. Childe, who, some seventy years ago, summed them up in the enduring metaphor — the Neolithic Revolution. While these days there is far less talk of a ‘revolution’, few would disagree that these events were indeed momentous. This lecture will focus on recent discoveries in Turkey that have dazzled the discipline of archaeology with their preservation and rich finds, causing a major re-thinking of Neolithic ritual and belief systems.

Antonio (Tony) Sagona has over 20 years’ experience in archaeological fieldwork. Tony is Editor of the journal Ancient Near Eastern Studies, and its monograph series, published by Peeters Press, in Leuven. He is an elected Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities. This lecture is part of the 2008 Lecture Series of the School of Historical Studies at the University of Melbourne.

Date: Wednesday, 19 March 2008
Time: 6:30pm
Location: Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, University of Melbourne

25 - 29 March 2008
“DAIS: The Aegean Feast.” 12th International Aegean Conference
University of Melbourne, Parkville campus
Website: www.ulg.ac.be/archgrec/dais.html

Teachers’ Wing In-Service Day

Thursday 6th March 2008, 9:00am – 3:30pm
National Gallery of Victoria, 180 St Kilda Road (entry via Schools’ Entrance on side)

Download programme and registration info (Word doc 80kb)

Public lectures 2007

The Secret History: the official position of Caesar Octavianus at the time of the Restitutio Rei Publicae (31-27 BCE)

This event will be preceded (a 6:20 pm) by the announcement of the annual Leeper Prize (for the highest achieving honours students in Classics in Victoria), and a brief General Meeting of the Classical Association of Victoria.

Sleeping with the (Roman) Emperor: sex, power, and promotion in Suetonius’ 'Lives of the Caesars'

Fake and Fantasy Jewish Coins

New light on the Greek 'Dark Age': cult continuity in sanctuaries at Miletus and Kalapodi

The Kouros of the Sacred Gate: new finds of archaic marble sculptures in the Kerameikos at Athens

Art, Religion and Amnesia

From the Colosseum to the Baths of Diocletian: What Concrete Can Tell Us About Social Change in Imperial Rome

Gallipoli: Archaeology in Battle: How soldiers at Gallipoli discovered the legacy of war in ancient artefacts

"Scythians: from nomads to sedentary"

"What An Historian Knows"

"Lead Pipes and Lavatories in Pompeii"

Teacher's Wing In-Service Day

Melbourne Girls Grammar,
82 Anderson Street, South Yarra

This in-service day for secondary school teachers featured lectures on the year's texts (Aeschylus' Persians, Catullus); a discussion of the implications of VELS on Latin; examiner's reports for Classical Societies and Cultures, and Latin; and more.

Classical Societies and Cultures Revision Day - An event for schools.

Saturday, 9 September, 2006 - 1.00 pm
University of Melbourne campus.

This Saturday afternoon event helps school students revise and prepare for the VCE Classical Societies and Cultures exam. Staff from the University of Melbourne will give revision lectures on Homer’s Iliad, Vergil’s Aeneid, Seneca’s Trojan Women, and Greek and Roman art. There will also be a session on how to construct an essay.

Latin Night - An event for schools

Thursday, 24 August, 2006 - 5.30 pm.
Elisabeth Murdoch Building Courtyard, University of Melbourne.

Latin Night is an evening for school students to revise and prepare for the VCE Latin exam. Pizza and soda will be served at 5.30 in the Elisabeth Murdoch Building Courtyard, with lectures from 6.15 onwards in Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A. Staff from the University of Melbourne will give talks about poetic techniques and general themes in this year's set text (Vergil's Aeneid 2), as well as about the Latin unseen paper.

Public Lectures - 2006

The Annual H. W. Allen Memorial Lecture

Tuesday, 19 September, 2006 – 8.00 pm.
Kaye Scott Room, Ormand College, University of Melbourne.

‘Shakespeare's Iliad: Homeric themes in Troilus and Cressida’.

Mr John Penwill
Convenor of Arts, LaTrobe University (Bendigo)
President of the Australasian Society for Classical Studies (ASCS).

The annual H. W. Allen Memorial lecture will be accompanied by the awarding of the annual Leeper prize for the most outstanding undergraduate student who completed B.A. honours in classics in Victoria in 2005.

The Classical Association of Victoria also participates in the vigorous public lecture program run by The School of Art History, Cinema, Classics & Archaeology.

Wednesday, 5 April, 2006, 6:30 pm

Dr Alan Greaves
University of Liverpool (UK)

''The Pearl of Ionia: Excavations and Research at Miletos'
Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, The University of Melbourne.

In this illustrated lecture, Dr Alan Greaves will present his latest research into the history and archaeology of this most important and overlooked of Greek cities and examine the social and economic foundations of its reputation as a mighty trading state, prodigious coloniser and the birthplace of western philosophy. This lecture is part of the Public Lecture Series of the School of AHCCA (Art History, Cinema, Classics and Archaeology) at the University of Melbourne.

Thursday, April 6, 2006, 6:30 pm

Prof Andrew Wallace-Hadrill
University of Reading, U.K.; Director of the British School at Rome

''Saving Herculaneum'' Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, The University of Melbourne

Herculaneum, destroyed in the same eruption as Pompeii, is less well known but in many ways preserves a more vivid image of Roman life. A conservation crisis puts both sites in imminent danger of a second destruction. This lecture describes the attempts of the Herculaneum Conservation Project to rescue the site and some important new discoveries it has made. Professor Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, director of the project, is Director of the British School at Rome, author of books and articles on a wide range of themes of Roman social and cultural history, including "Houses and Society in Pompeii and Herculaneum," and broadcaster of many programmes on the Roman world.

This lecture is sponsored by the Fine Arts Network (FAN) in collaboration with the School of AHCCA, University of Melbourne

Tuesday, 21 March, 2006 - 6.30 PM

Professor Richard Seaford
Department of Classics and Ancient History, University of Exeter ( U.K. )
'The Invention of Money by the Greeks: How it Happened and the Difference it Made'
Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, The University of Melbourne.

Money is central to lives, but is a comparatively recent invention in the history of humankind. How was it invented and what differences did it make? The answers are to be found in the Greek city-states of the sixth century BC, the first monetised society in history.

This lecture is part of the Public Lecture Series of the School of AHCCA (Art History, Cinema, Classics and Archaeology) at the University of Melbourne.

Conferences

19-23 September, 2006

Close Relations: The ‘Spaces’ of Greek and Roman Theatre

A conference held on the University of Melbourne campus The Classical Association of Victoria and the Melbourne Friends of the AAIA have given financial support to this joint initiative by the University of Melbourne and Monash University. 'Close Relations' is an international, multi-disciplinary conference linking theatre and performance studies, archaeology, classical studies and reception studies.

Teachers In-Service Day (for secondary school teachers of Classics)

Friday, 24 February, 2006 9.00 am – 3.00 pm
cost: $50

• talks on VCE texts (including Aeneid II)

• a theatrical presentation by Omniprop Productions (a student theatre group that performs ancient Greek and Roman drama)

• a demonstration of a computer simulation of sites in Italy and Greece , called 'Proxima Veritati'

• notes on travel to classical sites in Libya

Melbourne Girls Grammar, 82 Anderson Street, South Yarra

Public Lectures- 2005

Wednesday, 5 October, 2005 - 8.00 pm Kaye Scott Room, ORMOND COLLEGE, University of Melbourne. H.W. Allen Memorial Lecture
Professor Julian Henderson, Professor of Archaeology, University of Nottingham
'Of Satellites and Caliphs: an early Islamic landscape revealed' ..with supper to follow in the JM Young Room next door. The Leeper award for the top honours classics student in 2004 will also be presented.

ALSO on 5 October: if you can handle two lectures on one night, feel free to attend this lecture immediately before the Allen Memorial lecture at Ormond:

Wednesday, 5 October, 6:30pm Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, University of Melbourne
Alison V.G. Betts, University of Sydney

'Adventures on the Silk Road: the work of the Karakalpak-Australian Expedition'

The Karakalpak-Australian Expedition is a collaborative project to study ancient Chorasmia from the 7th century BC to the 1st century AD. Ancient Chorasmia lay in the delta region of the Amu-dar'ya River, the ancient Oxus, where it flows into the Aral Sea, today in modern Uzbekistan. The region was briefly part of the Achaemenid-Persian Empire but broke away in the 5th century BC to form its own rich independent culture. The talk will introduce the background to this fascinating and little-known Central Asian region and show some of the spectacular results of the excavations. Dr. Alison Betts has been working on archaeological excavations for over 30 years in the Middle East and Central Asia. She is a specialist in the archaeology of nomadic peoples and director of the University of Sydney Central Asian Programme.

Tuesday, 18 October, 2005 - 6.30 p.m. Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, University of Melbourne
Professor Julian Henderson, Professor of Archaeology, University of Nottingham
'The Dawn of Glassmaking: Plants, Soap & Alchemy in the Ancient Middle East'

The magical properties that semi-precious stones were believed to have had was a leading factor in the manufacture of man's first glass in the late 3rd millennium BC. Select materials produced blue and turquoise colours imitating lapis-lazuli and turquoise. The production methods were not mere technology: but rather a form of alchemy, a link more clearly seen when examining plant ash glass production in the Islamic period. Scientific analysis of glass, and the plants from which it was made, provides insights into how ancient glass production was organized. Julian Henderson is Professor of Archaeological Science at Nottingham University and Director of the Raqqa Ancient Industry Project. His research interests include ancient technologies in society. He has published 180 articles and 6 books. He is currently on a 2 year research leave funded by the British Academy, is Principal Fellow with AHCCA, a Macgeorge Fellow and an International Visiting Scholar.

Thursday, 27 October, 2005 - 6:30 p.m. Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, UNIVERSITY OF MELBOURNE
JANE MONTGOMERY-GRIFFITHS Convener of the Classical Studies Program, Monash University
'On Not (K)no(w)ing Greek'

In her essay 'On Not Knowing Greek', Virginia Woolf talked about the reader of Greek being 'as ignorant as schoolboys'. However much we try, we cannot bridge the cultural gap between our world and that of those ancient queens and princesses of Sophocles, who stand outside hurling insults at each other like screaming fishwives. This lecture examines how that 'cultural gap' operates in contemporary productions of Greek tragedy, and how, in the 'imaginary puissance' of the theatre, the ignorance that so concerns Woolf, can, in fact, turn in to bliss?a theatrical tabula rasa where anything is possible.

Jane Montgomery Griffiths, Convener of the Classical Studies Program at Monash University, began as an actor and director, winning the Manchester Evening News Best Actress award for Sophocles' <<Electra>>. Her performance experience led her to research performance theory and Classical philology. Jane has lectured at St John's University, York, La Trobe University, and was the Judith E Wilson Visiting Lecturer in Drama and the Leventis Visiting Fellow in Greek Drama at Cambridge University.

Other Events

General Meeting of the Classical Association of Victoria Thursday, 27 October, 2005 - 6.15 pm Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre (preceding Jane Montgomery-Griffiths' lecture)
We are seeking nominations for President, Secretary, Treasurer, and Council Members of the CAV. Nominations should be signed by the nominator, seconder, and nominee (all being financial members of the CAV), and sent no later than one week before the General Meeting to Dr K.O. Chong-Gossard.

Euripedes' Helen and Orestes (the Weird Plays) Wednesday 19 to Saturday 22 OCTOBER, 2005, at 8pm The Guild Theatre, 1st floor Union House, University of Melbourne Tickets $12 ($8 conc) Bookings: 8344 7447 Omniprop Productions (affiliated with the Melbourne University Classics and Archaeology Student Society, MUCASS) presents these two Greek tragedies, in English translations by Don Taylor and Kenneth McLeish. For more info, see http://www.union.unimelb.edu.au/?theatre/uht_03.html

Teacher and Student Events:

Saturday, 10 September - VCE Classical Societies Revision Day. Faculty of Architecture, Building & Planning, University of Melbourne. This day's event will present lectures (some by Melbourne Uni academic staff) to help school students prepare for the VCE Classics test.
RSVP: September 5th Nick Vlahogiannis n.vlahogiannis@unimelb.edu.au or Victoria Fritze VICTORIA@cae.edu.au

Access the Schedule for the Day in pdf. form

Tuesday, 30 August - VCE LATIN NIGHT.
University of Melbourne. This evening's event will present lectures (some by Melbourne Uni academic staff) to help school students prepare for the VCE Latin test. Lectures begin at 6.30pm; there will be pizza in the coutyard beforehand.

Teachers' Wing In-Service Day: an annual event for teachers of classics in Victoria's schools.

Friday, 4 March, 2005, 9.00 AM - 3.00 PM
Melbourne Girls Grammar, 82 Anderson Street, South Yarra

The cost is $40; checks should be made out to The Classical Association of Victoria.

Please reply by Monday, 28th February if you are able to attend. Contact Mr. John Tuckfield, at:
* c/o Camberwell Grammar School, PO Box 151, Deepdene Delivery Centre, Victoria 3103
PH: 9835 1777 fax 9830 5318
email jwt@cgs.vic.edu.au

Link to Registration Form (pdf doc)

The newest issue of IRIS Volume 16-17 (2003-2004) was distributed in January 2005. Click the link to the left to find out more information on the contents.

What lectures took place in 2005?

Tuesday, 22 March, 2005 6.30 PM
Dr Selina Stewart
University of Alberta, Canada
"Gender and Rationality in the Great Age of Archaeological Decipherment."
Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, University of Melbourne

Tuesday, 12 April, 2005 6.30 PM
Dr Heather M Jackson
ARC Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Melbourne
"'The Terracotta People of Jebel Khalid in Syria: the Evidence of the Figurines"

Wednesday, 25 May, 2005 6.30 PM
Dr Gocha Tsetskhladze
Lecturer in Archaeology, University of Melbourne
"Gold-Rich Colchis: Myth and Reality"
Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A, University of Melbourne

Wednesday, 14 September, 2005 - 6:30 p.m. Elizabeth Murdoch Theatre A, University of Melbourne
Prof. Martha Joukowsky, Professor of Archaeology at Brown University Director of the Brown University
'The Great Petra Temple:Thirteen Years of Brown University Excavations'

This lecture explores the three major sections of the Great Temple. The Great Temple represents one of the major archaeological and architectural components of metropolitan Petra, Jordan. It is the largest freestanding building yet excavated in the city. This 7560 sq/m precinct is comprised of a Propylaeum (monumental entryway), a Lower Temenos, and monumental east and west stairways which in turn lead to the Upper Temenos, the sacred enclosure for the Temple proper.

2003-2004 Past Events

In case you missed the CAV/ Melbourne Friends of the AAIA lecture series, here's a reminder of what went on:

Tuesday, 12 October, 2004
Prof. Marc Waelken (Professor of Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium)
Australian Archaeological Institute in Athens Visiting Scholar
The Romanisation of Pisidia

Wednesday, 15 September, 2004
Prof. Ronald Ridley (Professor of History, University of Melbourne)
H.W. Allen Memorial Lecture
The Monuments of Rome in the 18th century and the Grand Tourist (illustrated)

Tuesday, 9 August 2004
Dr. K.O. Chong-Gossard (Lecturer, Centre for Classics and Archaeology, University of Melbourne)
A Sphinx Named Jocasta: Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannus and the monstrous feminine

Tuesday, 25 May, 2004
Dr. David Pritchard (Research Fellow, Department of Ancient History, University of Macquarie, Sudney)
Athletics, Warfare and Democracy in Classical Athens

18 May, 2004
Dr Louise Hitchcock, University of Melbourne 'Understanding the Minoan Palaces'

24 March, 2004
Dr Rhiannon Evans, University of Melbourne: 'Blonde Barbarian, Boadicea, Nero, and the problem of flighting women'

Monday 3 November, 2003
Prof. Ezra ZubrowDepartment of Anthropology, University of Buffalo)
The Original Music: The Archaeology of Melody, Rhythm and Other Precarious Things

Thursday 16 October, 2003
Dr. Kathryn O Eriksson
The Nature of Contact Between the Minoan World and Egypt Prior to the Euruption of the Thera Volcano

Wednesday 8 October, 2003
Dr. K.O. Chong-Gossard (Lecturer, Centre for Classics and Archaeology, University of Melbourne)
Swollen-Foot the Usurper: Reviewing Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannus

Wednesday 17 September, 2003
H.W. Allen Memorial Lecture
Dr. Jenny Webb (Research Fellow at La Trobe University)
From the Cradle to the Grave: Excavating Settlements and Cemeteries in Bronze-Age Cyprus

Thursday 7 August, 2003
Dr. Heather M. Jackson (Fellow in Classics and Archaeology, University of Melbourne)
Who are the Women of Shash Hamdan in Syria?

Thursday 24 July, 2003
Dr. Ken McKay (Senior Fellow in Classics and Archaeology, University of Melbourne)
150 Years of Classical Staff (as part of the Uni Melbourne Sesquicentennial celebrations)

Thursday 15 May, 2003
Dr. Ken McKay (Senior Fellow in Classics and Archaeology, University of Melbourne)
150 Years of Classical Students (as part of the Uni Melbourne Sesquicentennial celebrations)

Friday 4 April, 2003
Prof, Everett Ferguson (Abilene Christian University)
Christians Living in a Pagan World

Tuesday March 11, 2003
Prof. Mary M. Voigt (Chancellor Professor of Anthropology at William and Mary College, Virginia)
Celtic Gordion: Migration and Ethnicity in Hellenistic Anatolia