Although originally from Australia, I studied for my undergraduate degree in Ancient History in Germany, after which I went to the University of Manchester to do my doctorate in Classics. From 2007-2011 I was in the Classics department at the University of Edinburgh, first as temporary lecturer, then as Leverhulme postdoctoral fellow. In January 2012 I took up a post at the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen in Mannheim, Germany as project manager of the EU project DressID: Clothing and Identities in the Roman Empire which ended in September 2012. I had been involved in the project since 2008 as a Study Group spokesperson and played a key role in the development of the exhibition Die Macht der Toga in Hildesheim. I joined Classical Studies at the Open University as Baron Thyssen Lecturer in October 2012.
Contact: ursula.rothe@open.ac.uk
My research looks mainly at dress in the Roman Empire, especially in the provinces, and the way that clothing and appearance was used to assert and negotiate cultural identities. As the main source for this are the Roman-style portrait gravestones that were adopted by local people in many parts of the empire, I also have an interest in funerary art and epigraphy in general. Related to this work, I am also interested in cultural theory and the way we interpret cultural interaction in the Roman provinces, especially in regions where material culture plays a central role due to a lack of textual sources.
I am also interested in rural settlement in the Roman Near East, and am involved in an excavation project investigating the remains of a Roman and Byzantine-era farmhouse and village on Tall Zira’a in north-western Jordan.
I welcome enquiries from prospective PhD students who would like to work in any of the above areas.
My teaching experience is mainly in Roman history and archaeology, but have also taught a wide range of other subjects such as Greek history and Classical art. At the Open University I am mainly involved in designing the new MA-level subject module, but I also contribute to A330: Myth in the Greek and Roman Worlds and the current MA programme.
Dress and Cultural Identity in the Rhine-Moselle Region of the Roman Empire, Oxford.
‘The “Third Way”: Treveran women’s dress and the “Gallic Ensemble”’ in: American Journal of Archaeology 116 (2012), 235-252
‘Dress and cultural identity in the Roman Empire’ in: M. Harlow (ed.), Dress and Identity (IAA Inter-disciplinary Series, Studies in Archaeology, History, Literature and Art, Volume II), Oxford 2012, 59-68
‘The comparative and interdisciplinary approach and Romanisation studies’ in: H. Schroeder et al. (eds), Crossing Frontiers: The Opportunities and Challenges of Interdisciplinary Approaches to Archaeology. Proceedings of a Conference held at the University of Oxford, 25-26 June 2005, Oxford 2007, 99-110
‘Kleidung und Romanisierung: der Raum Rhein-Mosel’ in: G. Schörner (ed.), Romanisierung - Romanisation. Theoretische Modelle und praktische Fallbeispiele, Oxford 2005, 169-178
‘Die Anfänge der Romanisierungsforschung’ in: G. Schörner (ed.), Romanisierung - Romanisation. Theoretische Modelle und praktische Fallbeispiele, Oxford 2005, 1-13
‘Dress in the middle Danube provinces: the garments, their origins and their distribution’ in: Jahreshefte des Österreichischen Archäologischen Instituts
‘Der Grabstein der Severina Nutrix aus Köln: eine neue Deutung’ in: Germania
‘Whose fashion? Men, women and Roman culture as reflected in dress in the cities of the Roman north-west’ in: E. Hemelrijk/G. Woolf (ed.), Gender and the Roman City, Leiden (Brill)
‘Veiling in Roman Pannonia: a foreign element?’ in: Marie-Louise Nosch, Mary Harlow, Giovanni Fanfani (eds), Interdisciplinary Studies in Textiles and Dress in Antiquity, Oxford (Oxbow)
‘Brooches and ethnicity in the Danube provinces’ in: G. Grabherr/T. Schierl (eds), Relations Abroad? Brooches and Other Elements of Dress as Sources for Reconstructing Interregional Movement and Group Boundaries from the Punic Wars to the Decline of the Western Empire. Proceedings of a Conference held 27th-29th April 2011 in Innsbruck, Innsbruck (Ikarus Press)
‘Chapter 35: Ethnicity in the Roman Empire’ in: J. McInerney (ed.), Blackwell Companion to Ethnicity in the Ancient Mediterranean (Wiley-Blackwell)
‘Defining the Roman villa’ in: G.P.R. Métraux/A. Marzano (eds), Roman Villas in the Mediterranean Basin
‘Selbstdarstellung lokaler Eliten unter römischem Einfluss – das norische Frauengewand’ in: DressCode Exhibition Catalogue, Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, Mannheim (Schnell und Steiner)
‘Romanization’ in: R.S. Bagnall/K. Brodersen/C.B. Champion/A. Erskine/S.R. Huebner (eds), The Encyclopedia of Ancient History (Wiley-Blackwell)
‘Roman Empire, regional cultures’ in: R.S. Bagnall/K. Brodersen/C.B. Champion/A. Erskine/S.R. Huebner (eds), The Encyclopedia of Ancient History (Wiley-Blackwell)
‘Rome, resistance to (cultural)’ in: R.S. Bagnall/K. Brodersen/C.B. Champion/A. Erskine/S.R. Huebner (eds), The Encyclopedia of Ancient History (Wiley-Blackwell)
See also Open Research Online for further details of Ursula Rothe’s research publications.
