This focus of research documents and interprets material culture of the classical world. Research goes beyond identifying and describing artefacts from the past. The things – artefacts and objects - that make up the material culture of the classical past are placed in to their cultural and archaeological contexts and studied as active forces shaping the societies, economies and cultures of the ancient Mediterranean.
Investigations have covered a wide range of topics including mosaic pavements from Antioch, children on Roman funerary monuments, the display of status and identity on Roman funerary monuments, Etruscan bucchero ceramics in the British Museum, distribution of African Red Slip Ware, Etruscan coarse wares, amphorae and settlement patterns in the Albegna Valley.
Current work includes the study of the material culture of northern Etruria (700-500BC), strigillated sarcophagi 3rd-4th centuries AD and Roman funerary practices and mourning rituals.
Janet Huskinson's interests lie in the private art of the mid and later Roman empire, and in particular in its relationship to its social and cultural context. She has published on imagery related to childhood and the family, on cultural identity and the decoration of houses in Antioch on the Orontes, but above all on sarcophagi from the city of Rome. She is currently writing a book on the decoration of strigillated sarcophagi (for publication by Oxford University Press 2009). These were made from the mid second to the early fifth century AD and survive in large numbers, but have not as yet been studied as a group. With Valerie Hope she has organised several seminars on aspects of Roman death and mourning.
Janet's research also overlaps with the classical reception cluster. She retired from her full-time post in September 2008.
Valerie Hope’s research is centred on Roman funerary monuments and funerary rituals. She has examined the display of status and construction of identity in the Roman cemetery, focusing in particular on the funerary monuments of Roman soldiers and gladiators. She has recently published a sourcebook on Roman death, including material and literary evidence, which covers everything from the deathbed to the afterlife. This interdisciplinary approach is now being employed with research on Roman mourning rituals. With Janet Huskinson she has organised several seminars on Roman death, commemoration and mourning.
Ardle MacMahon’s research deals with the social history, and the material and visual culture of the Roman World. It is focused around the major themes of urbanisation, and society and life of the non-elite in the Roman Empire. His main interest is the study of retail and distribution at the micro level throughout the empire which began with an in depth study of shops and workshops in Roman Britain.
Most of Phil Perkins’ research centres on Classical Italy. He has worked for many years on the Etruscans. Publications have included: the rediscovery of a lost Etruscan city at Doganella; the only Etruscan farm to be fully excavated, and the detailed study of the material culture and settlement of the Albegna Valley in Tuscany. In December 2007 he published the results of five years of research into Etruscan Bucchero ceramics in the British Museum. The book provides a history of the study of bucchero and the formation of the Museum's collection. The largest part contains detailed discussion of over 300 ceramic objects, that are contextualized within the past 75 years of scholarship and study of bucchero. All the objects are illustrated. Some of this research was supported Arts and Humanities Research Board, and the book presents a complete catalogue of this distinctive type of pottery in the Greek and Roman Department of the British Museum. He also researches Roman Sicily and Roman pottery, especially African Red Slip ware. In a departure from home territory he has also excavated a Baroque villa in Rome designed by Pietro da Cortona.
Irene Schrüfer-Kolb’s research focuses on the Roman economy, ancient technology and its social impact in North Africa and Britain. In addition to ongoing research on iron production sites in Roman Britain, she is investigating Garamantian non-agricultural industrial processes around Germa in the Wadi al-Hayat, Fazzan, SW Libya. Using Open University funded scientific analytical methods for the characterisation of metal and salt or glass production residues she works on identifying the production processes carried out at some sites and isolating zones of production, manufacture and consumption in the area. This helps to show differences between Roman and Garamantian industries, cultural interactions through trade and mutual influence. Publications include a monograph on Roman iron production in the East Midlands of England, as well as a number of book chapters and journal articles on industrial landscapes in SW Libya and Roman Britain.
Colin Andrews, ‘Roman seal boxes’
Christine Bagnall, ‘The Social Significance of the Vestal Virgins’
‘Memory and mourning: death in ancient Rome’: two one day conferences held in November 2007 and February 2008
Etruscans Now Conference, 2002, a major international conference held at the British Museum, and attended by 143 scholars from 13 countries
Strigillated sarcophagus with portrait of married couple, Vatican Museums
Flagon from Monreale
Bar counter of the inn on the via di Diana (I.ii.5), Ostia
Etruscan bucchero amphora
Furnace, Old Germa, Libya