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Reading List

Students are expected to read material in addition to the lectures, particularly from the bibliography provided on the handouts each week. You do not need to read everything listed under the bibliography but select according to your interests.*

General overviews

  • Austin, M. 2006. The Hellenistic World from Alexander to the Roman Conquest. A Selection of Ancient Sources in Translation (2nd edition). Wiley.
  • Bugh, G.R. (ed.). 2006. The Cambridge Companion to the Hellenistic World. Cambridge.
  • Errington, M. 2008. A History of the Hellenistic World, 323-30 BC. London.
  • Erskine, A. (ed.). 2003. A Companion to the Hellenistic World. Malden.
  • Green, P. 1993. From Alexander to Actium: The Historical Evolution of the Hellenistic Age. Oakland.
  • Pollitt, J.J. 1986. Art in the Hellenistic Age. Cambridge.
  • Shipley, G. 2000. The Greek World after Alexander 323-30 BC. Routledge.
  • Walbank, F.W. 1992. The Hellenistic World (3rd edition) Fontana Press.
  • Walbank, F.W., A.E. Astin, M.W. Frederiksen and R.M. Ogilivie eds. 1984. Cambridge Ancient History Volume 7.1 The Hellenistic World. Cambridge.
  • Walbank, F.W., A.E. Astin, M.W. Frederiksen and R.M. Ogilivie eds. 1988. Cambridge Ancient History Volume 7.2 The Rise of Roman to 220BC. Cambridge.

Module Reading List

Secondary Literature

  • Acosta-Hughes, B., Lehnus, L and Stephens, S. (eds.) 2011. Brill’s Companion to Callimachus. Leiden
  • Acosta-Hughes, B. and Stephes, S.A. 2015. Callimachus in Context. Cambridge.

  • Adams, W.L. 2006. “The Hellenistic Kingdoms.” The Cambridge Companion to the Hellenistic World. (Ed.) G.R. Bugh: 28-51. Cambridge.
  • Adler, E. 2008. Post 9/11 views of Rome and the nature or “Defensive Imperialism”, International Journal of the Classical Tradition 15: 586-610.
  • Ager, S. 2003. “An Uneasy Balance: from the Death of Seleukos to the Battle of Raphia.” In Erskine, A. (ed.) A Companion to the Hellenistic World. Blackwell. Pp. 35-50.
  • Alcock, S. 1993. Graecia Capta: The Landscapes of Roman Greece. Cambridge.
  • Andrade, N. 2013. Syrian identity in the Greco-Roman world. Cambridge.
  • Andronikos, M. 1984. Vergina: The Royal Tombs and the Ancient City. Athens.
  • Arnold, D. 1999. Temples of the Last Pharaohs. Oxford.
  • Austin, M. 2003. “The Seleukids and Asia.” In Erskine, A. (ed.) A Companion to the Hellenistic World. Blackwell. Pp. 121-133.
  • Austin, M. 2006. The Hellenistic World from Alexander to the Roman Conquest. A Selection of Ancient Sources in Translation (2nd edition). Wiley.
  • Bagnall, R.S. 1976. The Administration of Ptolemaic Possession outside Egypt. Leiden.
  • Baker, H. 2013. “The image of the city in Hellenistic Babylonia.” In Stavrianopoulou, E. Shifting Social Imageries in the Hellenistic Period: Narrations, Practices and Images. Leiden.
  • Bagnall R. 2006. Hellenistic and Roman Egypt: Sources and Approaches.
  • Barringer, J. M. 2015.The Art and Archaeology of Ancient Greece. Cambridge.
  • Bevan E. 1968. The House of Ptolemy: A History of Hellenistic Egypt Under the Ptolemaic Dynasty. Ares.
  • Biblioteca Alexandria Homepage: http://www.bibalex.org/en/default
  • Bieber, M. 1961. The Sculpture of the Hellenistic Age. New York.
  • Bilde, P. et al. 1990. Religion and Religious Practice in the Seleukid Kingdom. Aarhus.
  • Bilde, P. et al. (eds.) 1992. Ethnicity in Hellenistic Egypt. Aarhus.
  • Bilde, P. et al. (eds.) 1996. Aspects of Hellenistic Kingship. Aarhus.
  • Billows, R.A., 1990. Antigonus The One-Eyed and the Creation of the Hellenistic State. California.
  • Billows, R. 1995. Kings and Colonists. Aspects of Macedonian Imperialism. Leiden.
  • Bing, P. 2009. The Scroll and the Marble. Studies in the Reading and Reception of Hellenistic Poetry. Michigan.

  • Braund, D. 2005. “After Alexander: The Emergence of the Hellenistic World, A Companion to the Hellenistic World. (Ed.) A. Erskine: 17-34. Oxford.
  • Burn, L. 2004. Hellenistic Art: from Alexander the Great to Augustus. British Museum Press.
  • Bilde, P et al. (eds). 1996 Aspects of Hellenistic Kingship
  • Bosworth, A.B. 1988. Conquest and Empire: the Reign of Alexander the Great Cambridge.
  • Bowman A. (1986) Egypt after the Pharaohs. California.
  • Braund, D. 1983. Royal wills and Rome. Papers of the British School at Rome 51: 16-57.
  • Bugh, G.R. (ed.). 2006. The Cambridge Companion to the Hellenistic World. Cambridge.
  • Burn, L. 2004. Hellenistic Art: From Alexander the Great to Augustus. London.
  • Cameron, A. 1995. Callimachus and his Critics. Princeton.
  • Carney, E.D. 2013. Arsinoe of Egypt and Macedon: A Royal Life. Oxford.
  • Cartledge, P. 2004. Alexander the Great. The Hunt for a New Past. London.
  • Champion, C. 2007. “Empire by Invitation: Greek Political Strategies and Roman Imperial Interventions in the Second Century BC.” Transactions of the American Philosophical Association 137: 255-275.
  • Champion, C. 2014. Antigonus the One-Eyed: Greatest of the Successors. London.
  • Chaniotis, A. 2003. ‘The divinity of Hellenistic Rulers’ in A. Erskine (ed.) Blackwell Companion to the Hellenistic World: 431-46.
  • Chaniotis, A. 2018. The Age of Conquests: The Greek World from Alexander to Hadrian. Profile Books.
  • Cohen, G. 1978. The Seleukid Colonies: Studies in Founding, Administration and Organization. Weisbaden.
  • Cohen, C. 2002. “Egypt Opens New Library of Alexandria” National Geographic News (October 16 2002) http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/10/1016_021016_alexandria.html
  • Coqueugniot, G. 2013. 'Where was the Royal library of Pergamum? An institution found and lost again.' Ancient Libraries. ed. J. König, K. Oikonomopoulos, & G. Woolf. Cambridge, 109-123.
  • de Grummond, T. & Ridgway, B.S. 2000. From Pergamon to Sperlonga: Sculpture and Context. Berkeley.
  • Depuydt, L. 1995. “Murder in Memphis: The Story of Cambyse’s Mortal Wounding of the Apis Bull (ca. 523 B.C.E.)”, Journal of Near Easterns Studies, vol. 54: 119-126.
  • Eckstein, A. 2006. Mediterranean Anarchy, Interstate War, and the Rise of Rome. Berkeley.
  • Eckstein, A. 2013. “What is an Empire and how do you know when you have one?” Rome and the Greek states after 188BC. Antichthon 47: 173-190.
  • Errington, M.R. 1990. A History of Macedonia, Trans. C. Errington. Berkeley.
  • Errington, M. 2008. A History of the Hellenistic World, 323-30 BC. London.
  • Erskine, A. 1995. “Culture and power in Ptolemaic Egypt: the museum and library of
  • "Alexandria”, Greece & Rome 42 (1995): 38-48.
  • Erskine, A. (ed.). 2003. A Companion to the Hellenistic World. Malden.
  • Ferguson, W.S. 1991. Hellenistic Athens: An Historical Essay. New York.
  • Gabbert, J.J. 1997. Antigonus II Gonatas: A Political Biography. Routledge.
  • Geus, K. 2003. ‘Space and Geography’ in A.Erskine (ed.) A Companion to the Hellenistic World. London, 232-246.

  • Gotter, U. 2008. “Cultural Differences and Cross-Cultural Contact: Greek and Roman Concepts of Power.” Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 104: 179-230.
  • Green, P. 1991. Alexander of Macedon, 356‐323 B.C.: A Historical Biography. Berkeley.
  • Green, P. (ed) 1993. Hellenistic History and Culture. Los Angeles.
  • Green, P. 1993. From Alexander to Actium: The Historical Evolution of the Hellenistic Age. Oakland.
  • Grainger, J. D. 1990b. Seleukos Nikator. Constructing a Hellenistic Kingdom. London.
  • Gruen, E.S. 1986. The Hellenistic World and the Coming of Rome. Berkeley.
  • Habicht, C. 1997. Athens from Alexander to Anthony, Trans. Debra Lucas Schneider, Harvard.
  • Hamilakis, Y. 2007. The Nation and its Ruins: Antiquity, Archaeology, and National Imagination in Greece: Chapters 1 and 4. New York.
  • Hammond, N.G.L. 1972. A History of Macedonia I: Historical Geography and Prehistory. Oxford.
  • Hammond, N.G.L. & Griffith, G.T. 1979. A History of Macedonia II: 550-336. Oxford.
  • Hammond, N.G.L. & Walbank, F.W. 1988. A History of Macedonia III: 336-167. Oxford.
  • Hansen, E. V. 1971. The Attalids of Pergamum. 2nd edn. Ithaca.
  • Hansen, M. 1987. The Athenian Assembly in the Age of Demosthenes. Oxford.
  • Harder, A. 2003. ‘The invention of past, present and future in Callimachus’ AetiaHermes 131: 290-306 (on JSTOR)

  • Harder, A. 2015. Callimachus – Aetia. Oxford.
  • Harris, W. 1979. War and Imperialism in Republican Rome. Oxford.
  • Hatzopoulos, M. B. 1996. Macedonian Institutions under the Kings. 2 vols. Athens.
  • Havelock, C. 1981. Hellenistic Art: The Art of the Classical World from the Death of Alexander the Great to the Battle of Actium. London.
  • Hemingway, S and C. Hemmingway. 2007. “Art of the Hellenistic Age and the Hellenistic Tradition.” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/haht/hd_haht.htm (April 2007)
  • Howard, S. 1983. 'The dying Gaul, Aigina Warriors, and Pergamene Academicism', American Journal of Archaeology 87, 483-7.
  • Heckel, W. and Tritle, L. (eds.). 2009. Alexander the Great: A New History. Oxford.
  • Hoelbl, G. 2001. A History of the Ptolemaic Empire. London.
  • Hunter, R. 2006. The Shadow of Callimachus. Studies in the Reception of Hellenistic Poetry at Rome. Cambridge.

  • Hutchinson, G.O. 2003 ‘The Aetia: Callimachus’ Poem of Knowledge’ Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 145: 47-59 (on JSTOR).

  • Kallet-Marx, R. 1995. Hegemony to Empire: the Development of Roman Imperialism in the East from 148 to 62 BC. Berkeley.
  • Koenen L. 1993. ‘The Ptolemaic king as a religious figure’ in A. Bulloch (ed.) Images and Ideologies: Self-Definition in the Hellenistic World. Berkeley: 25-115
  • Kosmetatou, E. 2003. The Attalids of Pergamon. A Companion to the Hellenistic World, ed. A. Erskine, Oxford: 159-74.
  • Kosmin, P. 2014. The Land of the elephant kings: Space, Territory, and Ideology in the Seleukid Empire. Cambridge, Massachusetts.
  • Kotsakis, K. 1998. “The past is ours. Images of Greek Macedonia.” In L. Meskell (ed.) Archaeology Under Fire. Nationalism, Politics and Heritage in the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East. London and New York: 44-67.
  • Kuhrt, A. and Sherwin-White, S. (eds.) (1987), Hellenism in the East. The Interaction of Greek and non-Greek Civilisations from Syria to Central Asia after Alexander London.
  • Kroll, J. and A. Walker. 1993. The Athenian Agora vol. 26. The Greek Coins (1993). Princeton.
  • Lane Fox, R. 1974. Alexander the Great. London.
  • Lane Fox, R. 2011. Brill’s Companion to Ancient Macedon. Brill.
  • Le Bohec, S. 1993. Antigone Dôsôn. Nancy.
  • Le Bohec-Bouket, S. 2002. ‘The Kings of Macedon and the cult of Zeus in the Hellenistic period’ in D. Ogden (ed) The Hellenistic World: New Perspectives. Duckworth:41-58
  • Ma, J. 2013. Antiochos III and the Cities of Western Asia Minor. Oxford.
  • Ma, J. 2005. “Kings”, in A. Erskine, A Companion to the Hellenistic World. (Ed.) A. Erskine: 177-195. Oxford.
  • Manning, J. G. 2003. Land and Power in Ptolemaic Egypt. Cambridge.
  • Manning J.G. 2010. The Last Pharaohs: Egypt under the Ptolemies 305-30 BC. Princeton.
  • Masséglia, J. 2015. Body Language in Hellenistic Art and Society. Oxford.
  • McKechnie, P. and P. Guillame (eds). 2008. Ptolemy II Philadelphus and his world. Leiden.
  • Mikalson, J. 1998. Religion in Hellenistic Athens. Berkeley.
  • Mikalson, J. 1983. Athenian Popular Religion. Chapel Hill.
  • Millis, B. 2010. “Corinthians in Exile 146 – 44 B.C,” in: Catling, R. and F. Marchand (eds.) Onomatologos. Studies in Greek Personal Names Presented to Elaine Matthews. Oxford: 244 – 258.
  • Moyer, I.S. 2011. Egypt and the limits of Hellenism. Cambridge.
  • Newby, Z. 2016. Greek myths in Roman Art and Culture: Imagery, Values and Identity in Italy, 50 BC-AD. Cambridge.
  • Newson, J. and L. Luxner. 1994. “Rebuilding and Ancient Glory,” ARAMCO World 45.2 (March/April 1994) http://archive.aramcoworld.com/issue/199402/rebuilding.an.ancient.glory.htm
  • O’Neil. J.L. 2000. “The creation of new dynasties after the death of Alexander the Great”, Prudentia 32: 118-37.
  • Pollitt, J.J. 1986. Art in the Hellenistic Age. Cambridge.
  • Potter, D. 2003. ‘Hellenistic Religion’ in A. Erskine (ed.) Blackwell Companion to the Hellenistic World: 407-30
  • Prag, J. 1997. Making Faces: Using Forensic and Archaeological Evidence. London: Chap. 4
  • Price, S. 1985. Rituals and Power: The Roman Imperial Cult in Asia Minor. Cambridge.
  • Roisman, J. (ed.). 2003. Brill’s Companion to Alexander the Great. Leiden.
  • Roisman, J. & Worthington, I., 2010. A Companion to Ancient Macedonia. Malden.
  • Ridgway, B. 2000-2002. Hellenistic Sculpture. Three Vols. Madison.
  • Rowlandson, J. 2003. Town and Country in Ptolemaic Egypt. In A. Erskine (ed.) A Companion to the Hellenistic World. Oxford: 247-263.
  • Rhodes, P. 1993. Commentary on Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia. Oxford.
  • Rice E. 1983. The Grand Procession of Ptolemy Philadelphus. Oxford.
  • Rowan, C. 2013. “The profits of war and cultural capital: silver and society in Republican Rome. Historia 62.3: 361-386.
  • Samuel A. 1993. ‘The Ptolemies and the ideology of Kingship', in P. Green (ed.) Hellenistic History and Culture. Berkeley.
  • Schmitz, T.A. 1999. ‘ “I hate all common things”: The reader’s role in Callimachus’ Aetia prologue’ Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 99: 151-78. (on JSTOR)

  • Sherk, K. 1984. Rome and the Greek East to the Death of Augustus. Cambridge.
  • Sherwin-White, S., Kuhrt, A. 1993. From Samarkhand to Sardis: a new approach to the Seleukid empire. London.
  • Shipley, G. 2000. The Greek World after Alexander 323-30 BC. Routledge.
  • Smith, C and L. Yarrow. 2014. “Understanding objects in motion: An archaeological dialogue on Romanization.” Archaeological Dialogues 21: 1-20.
  • Smith, R.R.R. 1991. Hellenistic Sculpture: A Handbook. London.
  • Smucker, P. 2001. “Censorship fears as Alexandria library is rebuilt,” The Telegraph (May 3 2001) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1328964/Censorship-fears-as-Alexandria-library-is-rebuilt.html
  • Stansbury O’Donnell, M. D. 2015. A History of Greek Art. Wiley-Blackwell.
  • Steel, J. 1992. Hellenistic Architecture in Asia Minor. London.
  • Stevens, K. 2014. “The Antiochos Cylinder, Babylonian scholarship and Seleukid imperial ideology.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 143: 66-68.
  • Stewart, A. 2003. “Hellenistic Art, AD 1500-2000,” in Erskine, A. (ed) A Companion to the Hellenistic World. Blackwell: 494-514.
  • Stewart, A. 2004. Attalos, Athens, and the Akropolis. Cambridge.
  • Stewart, A. 2014. Art in the Hellenistic World: an introduction. Berkeley
  • Strootman, R. 2014. Courts and Elites in the Hellenistic Empires. The Near East After the Achaemenids, c.330 to 30 BCE. Edinburgh: 233-46.
  • Tarn, W.W. 1913. Antigonus Gonatas. Oxford.
  • Thompson, D.J. 2003. “The Ptolemies and Egypt”. In A. Erskine (ed.) A Companion to the Hellenistic World. Oxford: 102-120.
  • Thonemann P. ed. 2013. Attalid Asia Minor: Money, International Relations, and the State. Oxford.
  • Thonemann, P. 2016. The Hellenistic World - Using Coins as Sources. Cambridge.
  • Thonemann, P. 2016. ‘The Hellenistic Age.' Oxford.
  • Tracy, S. 1995. Athenian Democracy in Transistion. Attic Letter Cutters of 340 to 290 BC. Berkeley.
  • Trainor, C. and P. Stone. 2016. “Winners, Losers and Survivors of Roman Imperialism.” in: Gauss, W., G. Klebinder-Gauss and C. von Rüden (eds.) The Distribution of Technological Knowledge in the Production of Ancient Mediterranean Pottery. Vienna: 97–113.
  • Travlos, I. 1971. Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Athens (London 1971).
  • Triandafyllidou, A., M. Calloni and A. Mikrakis. 1997. “New Greek Nationalism” Sociological Research Online, Vol. 2.1. http://www.socresonline.org.uk/socresonline/2/1/7.html
  • Turner, E. 1984. “Ptolemaic Egypt” in Walbank, F.W. et al. (eds). Cambridge Ancient History Volume 7.1 The Hellenistic World. Cambridge: 118-174.
  • Walbank, F.W. 1933. Aratos of Sikyon. Cambridge.
  • Walbank, F.W. 1992. The Hellenistic World (3rd edition) Fontana Press.
  • Walbank, F.W., A.E. Austin, M.W. Frederiksen and R.M. Ogilivie eds. 1984. Cambridge Ancient History Volume 7.1 The Hellenistic World. Cambridge.
  • Walbank, F.W., A.E. Astin, M.W. Frederiksen and R.M. Ogilivie eds. 1988. Cambridge Ancient History Volume 7.2 The Rise of Roman to 220BC. Cambridge.
  • Waterfield, R. 2011. Dividing the Spoils. The War for Alexander’s Empire. Oxford.
  • Worthington, I. (ed.). 2003. Alexander the Great: A Reader. London.
  • Worthington, I., 2004. Alexander the Great: Man and God. Suffolk.

Key Ancient Sources

  • Diodorus Siculus.
  • Polybius.
  • Plutarch, Phokion, Demosthenes, Alexander, Eumenes, Demetrius, Pyrrhus, Aratus, Agis & Cleomenes, Philopoemen, Flamininus, Aemilius Paullus [in Plutarch’s Hellenistic Lives within Oxford World’s Classics]

*Specific Bibliographies will be distributed with each lecture.