Reviews
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J.R.R. Tolkien’s Utopianism and the Classics
6–9 minutesHamish Williams, J.R.R. Tolkien’s Utopianism and the Classics, Classical Receptions in Twentieth-Century Writing (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2023). ISBN 9781350241459. Reviewer by Martha Shillaker, University of St Andrews, Martha.M.Shillaker@gmail.com. Hamish Williams’s monograph J.R.R. Tolkien’s Utopianism and the Classics explores how the Classical past is (re)used by Tolkien in the creation and development of his literary utopianism. Williams argues that Tolkien’s use of Classical utopian narratives, and their implied ethics and ideals, creates a world that is…
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Rival Praises: Ovid and the Metamorphosis of the Hymnic Tradition
10–15 minutesCelia M. Campbell, Rival Praises: Ovid and the Metamorphosis of the Hymnic Tradition (Madison, WI: The University of Wisconsin Press, 2024). 9780299348748. Reviewed by Daniel Libatique, Fairfield University, dlibatique@fairfield.edu. Ovid’s experiments with genre have provided fruitful material not only for scholars but also for Ovid himself. From the recusatio of Amores 1.1.1–4 where Cupid steals a metrical foot from Ovid’s martial epic and turns it into amatory elegy to Metamorphoses 1.2’s fake-out caesura mimicking the…
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Athenian Power in the Fifth Century BC
7–11 minutesLeah Lazar, Athenian Power in the Fifth Century BC (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2024). 9780198896265. Reviewed by Christine Downton, University of Leicester, cad38@leicester.ac.uk. The overall aim of this monograph is to re-examine the concept of Athenian power in the fifth century BCE. Whilst Athenian power has been the subject of considerable scholarship in the past, Leah Lazar presents a more nuanced view, arguing that Athenian power was flexible, negotiated, and engaged in two-way dialogue through…
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Adoption, Adaption, and Innovation in Pre-Roman Italy
14–20 minutesJeremy Armstrong and Aaron Rhodes-Schroder (eds.), Adoption, Adaption, and Innovation in Pre-Roman Italy: Paradigms for Cultural Change, Archaeology of the Mediterranean World 3 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2023). 9782503602325. Reviewed by Ulla Rajala, Stockholm University, Sweden, rajalaullam@gmail.com. This volume originates from the conference “Exchanging Ideas: Trade, Technology, and Connectivity in Pre-Roman Italy,” held in Auckland, New Zealand, in 2020, and I previously reviewed its sister volume Production, Trade, and Connectivity in Pre-Roman Italy for Rhea Classical Reviews.1…
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Roman Imperial Artillery: Outranging the Enemies of the Empire
10–15 minutesAlan Wilkins, Roman Imperial Artillery: Outranging the Enemies of the Empire, 3rd ed. (Oxford: Archaeopress, 2024). 9781803277837. Reviewed by Evan Schultheis, independent scholar, flavivsaetivs@gmail.com. Alan Wilkins’s Roman Imperial Artillery is written as a standard reference text for specialists and non-specialists alike, designed as an introduction to the study of Roman artillery. While it is often difficult to capture such a broad audience and effectively guide them through such an introduction to a field, Wilkins is…
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Christ the Emperor: Christian Theology and the Roman Emperor in the Fourth Century AD
17–25 minutesNathan Israel Smolin, Christ the Emperor: Christian Theology and the Roman Emperor in the Fourth Century AD, Oxford Studies in Late Antiquity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2024). 9780197689547. Reviewed by Leslie Ivings, independent scholar, ivingsl188@gmail.com. The transformation of the Roman Empire in the fourth century CE was not merely institutional or territorial, it was intellectual, symbolic, and theological. As emperors from Constantine to Theodosius I grappled with the implications of Christianity’s new role in imperial…
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Il Mundus Muliebris a Pompei
9–13 minutesRia Berg, Il Mundus Muliebris a Pompei: Specchi e oggetti da toletta in contesti domestici (Rome: L’Erma di Bretschneider, 2023). 9788891327406. Reviewed by A. Everett Beek, Case Western Reserve University, aeb222@case.edu. Ria Berg’s book Il Mundus Muliebris a Pompei is an archaeological study focused around the material culture of mundus muliebris, or feminine personal grooming and hygiene. Principally, the book catalogues and analyzes Pompeian artifacts associated with grooming: mirrors, unguent bottles, hairpins, tweezers, water basins,…
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Egypt, Ethiopia, and the Gre
8–11 minutesRobert Cioffi, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the Greek Novel (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2024). 9780192870537. Reviewed by Khadija Saigol, University of Victoria, ksaigol@uvic.ca. Cioffi’s monograph,Egypt, Ethiopia, and the Greek Novel: Between Resistance and Representation explores how Egypt, Ethiopia (modern Sudan), and Nubia function as thematic loci for the ancient Greek romance novels written between the first and the third or fourth century CE. Cioffi outlines the geographic importance of the Nile River Valley and showcases how…
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Critical Archaeology in the Digital Age: Proceedings of the 12th IEMA Visiting Scholar’s Conference
12–17 minutesKevin Garstki, ed., Critical Archaeology in the Digital Age: Proceedings of the 12th IEMA Visiting Scholar’s Conference (Los Angeles: The Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press, 2022). 9781950446261. Reviewed by David M. Wheeler, University of California, Davis, dmwheeler@ucdavis.edu. Critical Archaeology in the Digital Age is the second installment in the Cotsen Digital Archaeology Series and the result of the 12th annual Institute for European and Mediterranean Archaeology (IEMA) Visiting Scholar Conference, which was held April 2019 at…
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The Body of the Combatant in the Ancient Mediterranean
14–21 minutesHannah-Marie Chidwick, ed. The Body of the Combatant in the Ancient Mediterranean. London: Bloomsbury, 2024. 9781350240872. Reviewed by Allyson Blanck, Institute for the Study of the Ancient World, NYU, ab10542@nyu.edu. The Body of the Combatant in the Ancient Mediterranean, edited by Hannah-Marie Chidwick, expands a recently growing movement towards an embodied military history. Responding to a conversation evolving from the work of scholars such as Elaine Scarry, Kevin McSorley, and Joanna Tidy, who have identified…
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