A Cultural History of Objects in Antiquity

by Robin Osborne (Editor), Dan Hicks (Editor), William Whyte (Editor)

Overview

A Cultural History of Objects in Antiquity covers the period 500 BCE to 500 CE, examining ancient objects from machines and buildings to furniture and fashion. Many of our current attitudes to the world of things are shaped by ideas forged in classical antiquity. We now understand that we do not merely do things to objects, they do things to us. Reinterpreting objects in Greece and Rome casts new light on our understanding of ourselves and turns the ancient world upside down.

The 6 volume set of the Cultural History of Objects examines how objects have been created, used, interpreted and set loose in the world over the last 2500 years. Over this time, the West has developed particular attitudes to the material world, at the centre of which is the idea of the object. The themes covered in each volume are objecthood; technology; economic objects; everyday objects; art; architecture; bodily objects; object worlds.

Robin Osborne is Professor of Ancient History at the University of Cambridge, UK.
Volume 1 in the Cultural History of Objects set.
General Editors: Dan Hicks and William Whyte

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781474298650
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	08/31/2022
Series:	The Cultural Histories Series
Pages:	280
Product dimensions:	6.60(w) x 9.70(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

ROBIN OSBORNE is Professor of Ancient History at the University of Cambridge, and a Fellow of King's College Cambridge and of the British Academy. His work spreads over the archaeology, art history and history of Greece, particularly between 800 and 300 BCE. His most recent books are The Transformation of Athens: Painted Pottery and the Creation of Classical Greece (Princeton, 2018) and, with P.J. Rhodes, Greek Historical Inscriptions 478–404B.C. (Oxford, 2017).

Dan Hicks is Associate Professor of Archaeology and Curator at the Pitt Rivers Museum at the University of Oxford, UK. He has published five books including The Oxford Handbook of Material Culture Studies (2010) and The Cambridge Companion to Historical Archaeology (2006).

William Whyte is Professor of Social and Architectural History, University of Oxford, UK. His most recent book is Unlocking the Church: The Lost Secrets of Victorian Sacred Space (2018).

Table of Contents

1. Objecthood, Robin Osborne
2. Technology, Courtney Ann Roby
3. Economic Objects, Jennifer Gates
4. Everyday Objects, Lin Foxhall
5. Art, Miguel John Versluys
6. Architecture, Rabun Taylor
7. Bodily Objects, Caroline Vout
8. Object Worlds, Ann Kuttner