Ancient Greek and Roman Studies (AGRS)

Terms offered: Fall 2024, Summer 2024 First 6 Week Session, Fall 2023
Study of the major developments, achievements, and contradictions in Greek culture from the Bronze Age to the 4th century BCE. Key works of literature, history, and philosophy (read in English translation) will be examined in their political and social context, and in relation both to other ancient Mediterranean cultures and to subsequent developments in Western civilization.
Introduction to Ancient Greece: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2025, Summer 2024 Second 6 Week Session, Spring 2024
Investigation of the main achievements and tensions in Roman culture from Romulus to the High Empire. Key sources for literature, history, and material culture are studied in order to reveal Roman civilization in its political and social context. All materials are read in English.
Introduction Ancient Rome: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2024, Fall 2023, Spring 2023
The physical remains of the Greek world from the Bronze Age to 323 BCE will be studied, with emphasis on its artistic triumphs, as a means of understanding the culture of ancient Greece.
Introduction to the Archaeology of the Greek World: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2025, Spring 2024, Fall 2022
This course provides a broad-based introduction to the archaeology of the ancient Romans from Rome’s origins in the Iron Age down to the disintegration of the Roman empire in the sixth century A.D. It aims to
familiarize students with the more significant archaeological sites, monuments, artifact classes and works of art relating to the Roman world, and to introduce them to the important research questions in Roman archaeology and the methods that archaeologists employ to investigate these.
Introduction to the Archaeology of the Roman World: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2023, Spring 2022, Fall 2021
The Berkeley Seminar Program has been designed to provide new students with the opportunity to explore an intellectual topic with a faculty member in a small-seminar setting. Berkeley Seminars are offered in all campus departments, and topics vary from department to department and semester to semester.
Freshman Seminars: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2025, Spring 2024, Spring 2022
The society, culture, values and outlook on life of the ancient Greeks as expressed in their mythology; their views on life, birth, marriage, death, sex and sexuality; on culture and civilization, the origin and meaning of the world. Their use of myth to think about, and give order to human experience. The course includes some of the most important works of Western literature in English translation (the 'Odyssey', the 'Theogony', twelve plays by leading Greek dramatists (Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides), along with their historical and religious context, as well as drawing on material evidence (vase paintings, sculpture, archaeological sites).
Greek and Roman Myths: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Summer 2024 Second 6 Week Session, Summer 2023 Second 6 Week Session, Summer 2022 Second 6 Week Session
The society, culture, values and outlook on life of the ancient Greeks as expressed in their mythology; their views on life, birth, marriage, death, sex and sexuality; on culture and civilization, the origin and meaning of the world. Their use of myth to think about, and give order to human experience. The course includes some of the most important works of Western literature in English translation (the 'Odyssey', the 'Theogony'), twelve plays by leading Greek dramatists (Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides), along with their historical and religious context, as well as drawing on material evidence (vase paintings, sculpture, archaeological sites).
Greek and Roman Myths: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2024
This course will focus on ideas about magic in the Greek and Roman worlds from about 750 BCE through 400 CE. Topics will include witches, holy men, love spells, necromancy, spirits, and mystery religions. We will examine how magic was represented in high literature (by authors like Homer, Ovid, Apuleius, and Lucian). as well as the more practical evidence of curse tablets and the Greek Magical Papyri. Consideration will be given to analyzing the relationship between magic, religion, and philosophy. Our goal will be to study the common threads that connect different Greek and Roman magical practices, as well as to understand them in their cultural contexts.
Introduction to Greco-Roman Magic: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2021
Greek and Roman epics including the , , .
Epic Poetry: Homer and Vergil: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Greek tragedy with readings of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.
Greek Tragedy: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2024, Spring 2022
Introduction to the philosophies of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle.
Greek Philosophy: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2023
Freshman and sophomore seminars offer lower division students the opportunity to explore an intellectual topic with a faculty member and a group of peers in a small-seminar setting. In this seminar we shall scrutinize and discuss representations of the Ptolemaic queen Cleopatra from Antiquity to the present day; our sources will include monuments, literature, art, movies, and advertising. The only prerequisites for the course are interests in this (in)famous monarch and in our engagements with (and refashionings of) her over two millennia.
Freshman/Sophomore Seminar - Cleopatras: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2021
This seminar-style class allows lower division students to explore comic texts from the Greco-Roman world, with special emphasis on the social meanings of comedy. Readings include stage comedy, satire, novels, fables, and other genres, from authors such as Aristophanes, Plautus, Terence, Horace, Petronius, and Apuleius. Students will be introduced to historical and theoretical contexts that will deepen their understanding of the literary readings and support discussions about comedy in other cultures, including our own contemporary experience. Assignments are designed to help students practice their skills in interpretation, argumentation, and written expression.
Freshman/Sophomore Seminar - Greek and Roman Comedy: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Some of the most recognizable images from ancient Greek and Roman literature are the warriors who stride across battlefields in a blaze of glory. But these heroic images tell only a small part of the story. Warfare influenced almost every aspect of life in these cultures, and not just for those who fought on the battlefield or for political leaders. In this class we will read a variety of literary works that illuminate the experience of warfare and its aftermath in ancient Greece and Rome – texts depicting the battlefield, but also the stories of veterans, women at home and in war, enslaved captives and others. While we will focus primarily on literary representations of these experiences, these readings will be placed in broader historical
Fresh/Soph Seminar: Warfare and Community in Greco-Roman Literature: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Freshman and sophomore seminars offer lower division students an opportunity to explore intellectual topics with a faculty member and peers in a seminar setting. In this course we will examine utopian literature from its classical beginnings, in Plato's Republic, and in his Timaeus and Critias (which tell the story of the lost world of Atlantis), as well as in some plays of Aristophanes. We will also consider later developments, in Thomas More's Utopia, and in such works as William Morris' News from Nowhere, and Ursula Le Guin's The Dispossessed. Towards the end of the semester the seminar participants will be divided into groups, each of which will be asked to devise its own utopia on a particular theme, for oral presentation in class.
Utopia, Dystopia: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Examination of how people moved both themselves and objects from one place to another in the ancient Greek and Roman worlds. Drawing on archaeological, literary, and pictorial evidence we consider an array of topics, including transport technology & infrastructure, the organization & costs of travel & transport, routes & travel times, banking, dining & overnighting on the road, packaging, labelling, & handling of cargoes, the roles of both short- and long-distance trade in the economy, reasons why people travelled, extreme travel, and the general travel experience. We also explore new digital technologies that allow us to better recreate and understand the nature and experience of travel and transport in pre-industrial times.
Fresh/Soph Seminar - Travel and Transport in the Ancient World: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2024, Fall 2023, Fall 2022
This course covers Homeric and Classical Greece, Rome in its transition from republic to empire, and the world of the Old Testament. Lectures, discussions, and reading assignments will involve interdisciplinary approaches with an emphasis on the development of skill in writing. Satisfies either half of the Reading and Composition requirement plus one of the following Letters and Science breath requirements: Arts and Literature, Historical Studies, or Social and Behavioral Sciences.
Classics of the Ancient Mediterranean World: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007

Have you wondered what ancient Greek and Latin were like and how they relate to other languages, including English? Have you heard people say learning Latin made them understand English better and improved their writing skills? Do you want some background in ancient languages that might help you understand terminology in law, science or other fields? This class is an opportunity to learn more about the history, structure, and influence of both Latin and Greek. Topics covered include the place of these languages in the Indo-European family, an overview of their structure and vocabulary, their history from classical antiquity to the present, their relation to later languages and and their influence on the Western intellectual tradition.
Latin and Greek in Antiquity and After: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007

Directed Group Study for Freshmen and Sophomores: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007

Supervised Independent Study and Research: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
The ancient Mediterranean world was a world full of gods: from the poems of Homer to the small towns of the Roman empire, we can find people constantly interacting with and thinking about the gods. Myth, ritual, oracles, mystery cults, magic, philosophy: these were all ways that Greeks and Romans engaged with the divine. War, peace, health, sickness, hope, fear: these were some of the reasons for these engagements. This course explores the polytheism of ancient Greece and Rome (c.800 BCE to c.200 CE), with close attention to both the ancient literary evidence and the archaeological material from the period. We will seek to understand both the long-term continuities and the important changes in religious life during Mediterranean antiquity.
Ancient Religion: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2025
Study of a selection (in English translation) of the most important works of classical antiquity that theorize about literature and of the works of some post-classical authors who wrote on similar themes under the influence of their classical predecessors. Authors studied may include Plato, Aristotle, Horace, Longinus, Augustine, Sidney, Pope, and Lessing.
Classical Poetics: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2024
Topic to vary from year to year. No knowledge of Greek or Latin required; but provision will be made for students who wish to study some of the readings in the original language. Enrollment limited.
Topics in Ancient Greek and Roman Culture: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
This course presents a comparative overview of epics and sagas from Greco-Roman antiquity and medieval north-west Europe (England, Iceland, and Ireland). No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
Epic and Saga: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2023
This course examines the origins of Rome, the quintessential city in the Western experience. It considers both the literary and archaeological evidence for the earliest periods of the city’s occupation, and the challenges involved in using and combining these two quite different forms of evidence. Particular attention will be given to recent archaeological discoveries and the ways in which these are transforming our understanding of early Rome. The course also examines the ways in which people in later periods – both in antiquity and in more recent times - have drawn on their knowledge of early Rome for a variety of different purposes, ranging from politics, to scholarship, to the arts. No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
The Origins of Rome: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
In this course we will investigate the political thought of ancient Greece by discussing some of its most important and influential texts. All texts are to be read in translation.
Ancient Greek Political Thought: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2023, Fall 2021
This course is designed to provide advanced undergraduates with a broad overview of the economy of the Roman Empire. It is organized around a series of weekly topics that will be explored through readings selected to provide students with exposure to the theory, evidence, and methods currently being employed by historians and archaeologists to investigate that particular aspect of the Roman economy. No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
The Roman Economy: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
This course will explore the evidence for the Trojan War, one of the greatest stories ever told: literary, historical, visual and archaeological. The history of the search for the reality behind Homer's epic and its scholarship will be examined as well as detailed analyses of the theories currently in play. Through reading, visual analysis, discussion and writing - students will discover for themselves the ancient world of the heroes and their legends. Was there ever an actual war between two powerful Bronze Age Aegean cultures? Did Hektor and Achilles ever really clash on the battlefield? Was Helen really "a face that launched 1000 ships?" No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
The Trojan War: History or Myth?: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2024, Spring 2024, Spring 2023
In this course we will examine the history of ideas about the soul’s postmortem fate in the ancient Mediterranean world. We will focus on epic poets and philosophers from ancient Greece and Rome, but also
read comparative material from the ancient Near East, the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, and medieval Christendom. Our goal will be to study the common threads that connect depictions of hell / the underworld in their respective cultural contexts. No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
The History of Hell: Eschatology in Ancient Mediterranean Cultures: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Classical literature is full of mythological plots involving gods and monsters, heroes and kings. Less prominent are the kind of plots we are used to from modern literature, especially novels: plots that revolve around fictional characters invented to look like people in the street. Although these latter forms of literature are distanced from the prestigious genres of epic and tragedy, they still constitute an important
part of ancient literature. In this class we will not only read a variety of texts that aim to depict "everyday life" (including novels, satire, letters, comedy and more), but we will also consider the underlying principles of such literature. No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
The Literature of Everyday Life: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Religion and literature are two conceptual systems through which people and societies organize disparate experiences into meaningful wholes. In the ancient pagan societies of Greece and Rome, where a shared experience of both religion and literature was a defining element of the community, these two systems were particularly interdependent. In this course we will read a variety of texts (e.g. epic, philosophy, tragedy) and examine the complex ways that literary concepts such as plot, character, closure and genre interact with religious concepts such as causation, moral justice, divine power, cosmology. No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
Religion and Literature in the Greco-Roman World: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
This course aims to explore the development of classical Greek rhetoric from the fifth century through the end of the fourth century BCE. In light of Plato’s and Aristotle’s analyses of the subject, we tend to view rhetoric as an art (technê) consisting of a set of methodically organized principles or norms for the production of persuasive speech. The use of rhetorical techniques, however, was widespread in the Greek speaking world well before Plato and Aristotle began to reflect on its norms. No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
Classical Greek Rhetoric: Evolution or Revolution?: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2025
Egypt: No other region of the Graeco-Roman world provides us with as much information about the daily lives of its inhabitants, and no body of ancient evidence is more inclusive in its coverage. In this course, we will read selections from this corpus of evidence closely, focusing on documentary papyri, but also looking at literature, inscriptions, and other cultural objects (as well as some later comparative material). We will discuss what this material contributes to our understanding of Graeco-Roman Egypt’s society and economy (law and status, gender, labor systems, education, religious practice, etc.), the limitations of the evidence, and its applicability to other regions of the ancient Mediterranean. All readings will be in English.
Graeco-Roman Egypt: Society and Economy: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
In this course, we will look at ancient Greek ideas and practices concerning the nature, sources, psychological effects, and social functions of music (including singing, instrumental music, and dance), during the Archaic and Classical periods (ca. 800-350 BCE). Taking an ethnomusicological approach, we will examine Greek musical culture as a whole, focusing especially on differences of gender, ethnicity, regionalism, class/status (e.g., free vs. slave), and even species – since the Greeks recognized that some animals are very musical, as of course are several of the gods and goddesses – to see what different kinds of music were played by the various performers, and at what kinds of occasions. No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
Music and Difference in Ancient Greece: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2022
This course will focus on ideas about magic in the Greek and Roman worlds from about 750 BCE through 400 CE. Topics will include witches, holy men, love spells, necromancy, spirits, and mystery religions.We will examine how magic was represented in high literature (by authors like Homer, Ovid, Apuleius and Lucian) as well as the more practical evidence of curse tablets and the Greek Magical Papyri. Consideration will be given to analyzing the relationship between magic, religion, and philosophy. Our goal will be to study the common threads that connect different Greek and Roman magical practices, as well as to understand them in their cultural contexts. No knowledge of Greek or Latin required.
Introduction to Greco-Roman Magic: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Slavery was one of the central institutions of life in classical Greece and Rome and had a profound affect on the ways these societies represented themselves and their world. In this course we will first spend some time learning about the historical condition of slavery in these two societies, then read a variety of works that show some of the ways that slaves and slavery operated in the intellectual and imaginative life of ancient authors. The three genres we will focus on are philosophy, drama (both tragedy and comedy) and the novel. There will be a variety of writing assignments of differing lengths and a final exam.
Slavery and Literature in the Greco-Roman World: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2021
Important individuals in Greek and Roman society were commemorated both in honorific portraits and in biographies written to record for posterity their lives and achievements. In this class we will be reading a selection of Greek and Latin biographical texts (in translation) and comparing them with statuary monuments that represent the same individuals. We will be seeking to elicit the points of contact between the two commemorative traditions, visual and literary, and to understand the sometimes similar functions they serve. But we will also be attempting to bring out the differences in the way that biographical texts and portrait images operate, and the consequences that this has for the way we, as historians, must approach them.
Ancient Portraiture & Biography: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
What time is it? How old is the earth? Where are we located in history? For us these questions may have simple answers: we can look at a watch or a calendar or a timeline. But ancient people thought very differently about these questions. The aim of this class is to see how. We will look at a variety of ancient evidence, including literature (in translation) and archaeology, to discover how Greeks and Romans thought about the deep past (mythic time), how they understood the direction and order of history, and how they organized and calculated time in their communities. We will also consider how ancient Jews and Christians came to reject classical conceptions of time and how this rejection still informs modern ideas about time and history.
Ancient Times: Myth, History, Measurement: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2022
Augustus, the first emperor of Rome, inaugurated an enormous building program during
his long reign that completely transformed the empire’s capital city. In this seminar we
will consider some of the most famous of his constructions—his Mausoleum (the tumulus
of the Julii), the temple of Palatine Apollo, the Ara Pacis Augustae (Altar of the
Augustan Peace), the Augustan Forum—and we will examine the ways in which these
new monuments helped shape popular perceptions of the new system of government that
Augustus established (—a veiled monarchy).
The Art and Monuments of Augustan Rome: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2023
In this course we will investigate the conceptions of divinity put forward by the principal philosophers
and philosophic schools of thought in ancient Greece. We will investigate their ideas both in relation
to the religious background of the time and as an exercise in abstract philosophic thinking. All texts
are to be read in translation.
The God of the Philosophers in Ancient Greece: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2024, Spring 2023
Study of topics in gender, feminism, and sexuality in ancient cultures. Topics vary from year to year.
Gender, Sexuality, and Culture in the Ancient World: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
The course is designed to deal with a single topic or selection of topics in Greek philosophy studied in translation. Possible topics are: the close study of one or more of Plato's or Aristotle's texts, Hellenistic philosophy, neo-Platonism.
Topics in Greek Philosophy: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007

Classical Archaeology: Greek Vase Painting: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007

Classical Archaeology: Greek Architecture: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007

Classical Archaeology: Roman Art and Architecture: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2023
Introductory overview of the art and archaeology of ancient civilizations of the Bronze Age (3000-1100 BCE) Aegean: Crete, Cyclades, Mainland Greece, and Western Anatolia. Intended to expose to the sites, monuments, art, and artifacts of these cultures and understand the way a variety of evidence is used to reconstruct history. Emphasis also is placed on comparison of enigmatic and evocative cultures and material evidence to see how each evolved and to define similarities and differences.
Art and Archaeology of the Aegean Bronze Age: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Summer 2022 Second 6 Week Session
Through this field school students will participate in archaeological excavation and museum study in Greece at the site of Nemea and the Classical Sanctuary of Zeus. Through extensive travel and hands-on work, students will learn all major elements of methodology and analysis currently used in classical archaeology. The goal is to teach practical skills in a real research environment and an understanding of the material culture of Greece throughout various periods of its prehistory and history. Students will participate in a variety of field techniques and research methodologies.
Archaeological Field School in Nemea, Greece: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Through this field school students will participate in archaeological excavation and museum study in Greece at the Bronze Age site of Mycenae (Petsas House). Through extensive travel and hands-on work, students will learn all major elements of methodology and analysis currently used in classical archaeology. The goal is to teach practical skills in a real research environment and an understanding of the material culture of Greece throughout various periods of its prehistory and history. Students will participate in a variety of field techniques and research methodologies.
Archaeological Field School in Mycenae, Greece: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007

Topography and Monuments: Athens: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2022

Topography and Monuments: Pompeii and Herculaneum: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007

Topography and Monuments: Roman Wall Painting: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007

Topography and Monuments: Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2017
This course presents surviving evidence of pictorial representation in the Roman world. Including the earliest remains from the city of Rome; the suites of painted rooms in the houses of Pompeii and Herculaneum on the Bay of Naples; and Roman mosaics from Italy, North Africa, and the eastern Mediterranean.
Topics: ‘four styles’ of Pompeian interior decoration; the architect Vitruvius’ denunciation of contemporary painting in the early Augustan period; the reproduction of Greek ‘old master’ paintings from pattern books; the surviving paintings of the Domus Aurea, the emperor Nero’s ‘Golden House’ in Rome; the painting of marble statues and reliefs; and the colored mummy portraits preserved by the sands of the Egyptian desert.

Pictorial Representation in the Roman World: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Study of ancient athletics and athletes including athletic training, facilities, competitions, and the role of athletics in Greek and Roman society.
Ancient Athletics: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2024, Fall 2022
This is a two-semester Honors course [H195A-B]. The work for the Honors course may either build on work in a previous upper division course used in fulfillment of the Classical Languages or Classical Civilizations major or may be a newly conceived project. The work will result in the writing of a thesis, to be evaluated by an Honors committee of three members. Written thesis due the Monday of the 13th week of the semester in which the course is taken./>
Honors Course in Classics: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Fall 2022
This is a two-semester Honors course [H195A-B]. The work for the Honors course may either build on work in a previous upper division course used in fulfillment of the Classical Civilizations or Classical Languages major or may be a newly conceived project. The work will result in the writing of a thesis, to be evaluated by an Honors committee of three members. Written thesis due the Monday of the 13th week of the semester in which the course is taken.
Honors Course in Classics: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2025, Fall 2024, Spring 2024

Directed Group Study for Advanced Undergraduates: Read More [+]

Terms offered: Spring 2025, Fall 2024, Spring 2024

Supervised Independent Study and Research: Read More [+]