ART H 347 A: Pompeii: A Time Capsule of Ancient Life

ARTH/CLAR 347: Pompeii: A Time Capsule of Ancient Life

Winter 2025

T TH 9:30-11:20am

DEN 259

Prof. Levin-Richardson (you can call me Professor Levin-Richardson, Professor L-R, or just Professor)

Pronouns: she/her/hers

sarahlr@uw.edu

Office Hours: Wednesdays and Thursdays 2:30-3:30pm (I wear a mask when holding office hours in my office) or by Zoom (please email me in advance so I can send you the link)

Office: Denny 227; enter the main doors of Denny, pass the water fountain and elevator, and it’s the first office on the left

Description:

This class explores the power differentials among individuals of different genders, legal statuses, and citizenship in the cultural melting pot of ancient Pompeii, which was preserved by a volcanic eruption in 79 CE. Graffiti, skeletal remains, everyday objects, humble and world-class art and monuments will be analyzed.

Learning Objectives:

• Be able to discuss and analyze a range of evidence (art, architecture, graffiti, objects) from Pompeii

• Be able to situate Pompeian material culture within its broader historical and social/cultural context
• Be able to discuss and analyze the constraints and opportunities offered to different types of individuals (women, children, enslaved individuals, formerly enslaved individuals, foreigners, and elite men) at Pompeii

Supporting your learning and well being:

I will post powerpoints and record all lectures for accessibility. If you know of something that might affect your learning (technology problems; health or family crisis; religious observance) please contact me as soon as possible, ideally at the beginning of the quarter, so that I can make appropriate accommodations. Below you can find further resources:

• UW Academic Support: http://www.academicsupport.washington.edu/
• UW Counseling Center: http://www.washington.edu/counseling/
• Husky Health and Well-Being: http://wellbeing.uw.edu

• Student Technology Loan Program: https://stlp.uw.edu/

• UW Food Pantry: https://www.washington.edu/anyhungryhusky/the-uw-food-pantry/
• Department of Classics Undergraduate Textbook fund (for majors and minors in Classics): https://classics.washington.edu/undergraduate-textbook-fund
• Disability Resources for Students: http://depts.washington.edu/uwdrs/
  • If you have already established accommodations with Disability Resources for Students (DRS), please communicate your approved accommodations to me at your earliest convenience so we can discuss your needs in this course.
  • If you have not yet established services through DRS, but have a temporary health condition or permanent disability that requires accommodations (conditions include but not limited to: mental health, attention-related, learning, vision, hearing, physical or health impacts), you are welcome to contact DRS at uwdrs@uw.edu or uw.edu. DRS offers resources and coordinates reasonable accommodations for students with disabilities and/or temporary health conditions.  Reasonable accommodations are established through an interactive process between you, your instructor(s) and DRS.  It is the policy and practice of the University of Washington to create inclusive and accessible learning environments consistent with federal and state law.
• Religious Accommodations:
  • Washington state law requires that UW develop a policy for accommodation of student absences or significant hardship due to reasons of faith or conscience, or for organized religious activities. The UW’s policy, including more information about how to request an accommodation, is available at Religious Accommodations Policy . Accommodations must be requested within the first two weeks of this course using the Religious Accommodations Request form .

Required Readings:

The required text for this class is listed below and can be found in the University bookstore (as well as other sites) for under $25, and one copy will be available via course reserves in Odegaard. Other required readings can be found on Canvas. The Undergraduate Textbook Fund is designed to defray the cost of textbooks for Classics majors and minors; more information can be found here.

Each meeting in the schedule below has one or more readings to be read for that class session. For the Thursday of Week 1, for example, please come to class having read: 1) the sections on “Life Interrupted” and “A city of surprises” in the course textbook (which I refer to as Beard on the schedule); 2) pages 27-33 of the Haley article (in the week 1 folder on Canvas), and 3) the online HuffPost article. These readings are a starting point for in-class lecture and discussion, which often expand upon the assigned readings and/or present new material. Thus, I strongly recommend careful reading of the assigned material as well as attending class.

Beard, Mary. 2008 [there have been multiple reprints, so the year doesn’t matter]. The Fires of Vesuvius: Pompeii Lost and Found. Belknap Press.

Grading:

AI/Chat GPT is not allowed for any assignment, including studying for quizzes/exams/assignments. Use of AI/Chat GPT will be considered an academic integrity violation and be reported to the Office of Student Conduct.

• Quizzes: 40% (to be completed on Canvas before each class during weeks 2-9)
  • Quiz on the assigned readings to be completed on Canvas before each class. You may consult only the readings and your own notes; you may not work with other individuals on the quizzes. The lowest three quizzes will be dropped.
• Object writing assignment: 20% (due Tuesday Feb. 4 at the beginning of class via Canvas)
  • 4-5 page double-spaced essay on objects related to various types of individuals (men, women, children, freedmen and freedwomen, enslaved individuals). See guidelines on Canvas for more details (including your assigned category).
• Final exam: 40% (Wednesday March 19 10:30am-12:20pm)
  • Essays; covers material from the entire course. A study guide will be posted on Canvas in advance of the exam.

Your final course grade is calculated from these assignments in the proportions given. Please prepare carefully for these assignments, and please come see me in advance if you have any questions about how to best prepare. There is no extra credit.

Further Expectations:

• Illness (including COVID)
  • Keep yourself and the rest of our community healthy! If you are feeling unwell, please stay home until you are better (no need to email me unless you are missing an assignment)!
  • UW’s current mask recommendations are as follows:
    • Masks are strongly recommended when resuming normal activities after having COVID-19 or another respiratory illness, indoors when around others, for the next five days.
    • Masks are strongly recommended after COVID-19 exposure,indoors when around others, until five days have passed from when you were exposed. In addition, follow the Public Health Flowchart for COVID-19 and Respiratory Virus Symptoms.
  • Free masks are available on campus in these locations.
• No recording, photographing, posting, or distributing of course materials of any kind is permitted without my written authorization.
• Getting in touch with each other
  • Please check Canvas and your UW email daily; this is how I will communicate with you about pertinent information. You are responsible for all information disseminated over email and through the course website, in addition to information discussed in class.
  • I’m available in office hours for you! If you are anxious about assignments, please set up a time well in advance of the assignment or exam so we can discuss strategies. I’m also happy to chat about any other class-related concerns you have, or study abroad opportunities, how to follow your interest in archaeology or ancient history, etc. I am happy to answer questions over email, but please check the syllabus first to see whether the answer is there.
  • I will respond to emails by the end of the next working day (which means that if you email me on Friday afternoon, I may not respond until Monday afternoon).
• Grading
  • Students are expected to adhere to ethical behavior in their work, including following guidelines posted for each assignment concerning group work, plagiarism/cheating, and the use of AI/Chat GPT. Failure to adhere to these policies will be considered an academic integrity violation and can be reported to the Office of Student Conduct, and you might receive a zero on the assignment. If you have any questions about what is or is not allowable for an assignment, I’d be more than happy to clarify!
  • I’d be happy to discuss any of your graded work with you, but I ask that you wait twenty-four hours after receiving your assignment back in order to begin to process my feedback. After the twenty-four-hour period, please feel free to email me to set up a time for a meeting. Due to University policy, I cannot discuss grades over email.

Schedule of Topics and Required Readings:

Week 1: Introduction

T Jan 7: Introduction

Th Jan 9: People

• Beard 1-9, 23-25 (“Life Interrupted” “A city of surprises”)
• Haley, Shelley. 2009. “Be Not Afraid of the Dark: Critical Race Theory and Classical Studies,” in Prejudice and Christian beginnings: investigating race, gender, and ethnicity in Early Christian Studies, ed. L. Nasrallah and E. Schüssler Fiorenza. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Pp. 27-50. [Week 1 folder; read only pp. 27-33, stopping before "As I noted before" on p. 33]
• Ungar, Laura. “New DNA Evidence Rewrites Long-Told Stories of People in Ancient Pompeii:” HuffPost November 7 2024: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/pompeii-ancient-dna_n_672d8c01e4b01e5999fca2dd

Week 2: Infrastructure; Development of Pompeii

T Jan 14: Access to Resources: Managing Streets, Water, and Waste

• Beard 53-65 (“Beneath your feet” “What were streets for?” “Boulevards and back alleys” “Water features”), 70-72 (“Pavements [=sidewalks]: public and private”), 78-80 (“The city that never sleeps”)

Th Jan 16: Multiculturalism and the Development of Pompeii

• Beard 26-43 (“Glimpses of the past” “Before Rome” “Becoming Roman”)

Week 3: The Economy

T Jan 21: Commerce

• Beard 152-153 (“Profit margins”), 162-169 (“City trades”), 177-185 (“A banker”)

• Cheung, Caroline, 2024. Dolia: the Containers That Made Rome an Empire of Wine, Princeton: Princeton University Press. [available online through UW libraries; read pp. 40-43, 122-130, 161-163]

Th Jan 23:  Occupations

• Beard 170-177 (“A baker”), 185-187 (“the garum maker”)
• Clarke, John. 2003. Art in the Lives of Ordinary Romans: Visual Representation and Non-Elite Viewers in Italy, 100 B.C.-A.D. 315. Berkeley:  University of California Press. [week 3 folder; read pages 105-118 (start at the section “Verecundus and his wife”; end before the section “Worker Reliefs”)]

Week 4: Politics; Religion

T Jan 28: Politics and the Forum

• Beard 188-195 (“Vote, vote vote”), 203-215 (“The face of success” “Beyond the male elite”)

Th Jan 30: Religious Practices

• Beard 276-281 (“Those other inhabitants” “A religion without the book”), 290-301 (“Celebrating the gods: in public and private” “Politics and religion: emperors, attendants and priests”)
• Excerpts from Snowden, Frank M., Jr. 2010 [1976]. “Iconographical Evidence on the Black Populations in Greco-Roman Antiquity.” In The Image of the Black in Western Art: From the Pharaohs to the Fall of the Roman Empire, ed. David Bindman and Henry Louis Gates Jr. New Edition. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press. [week 4 folder; Cat no. 288, 289]
• https://archaeology.org/news/2023/04/25/230426-italy-nabataean-temple/
• Terpstra, Taco. 2015. “Roman Trade with the Far East: Evidence for Nabataean Middlemen in Puteoli” In Across the Ocean: Nine Essays on Indo-Mediterranean Trade, eds. Federico De Romanis and Marco Maiuro. Leiden: Brill. Pp. 73-94. [week 4 folder; Read pp. 81 (starting with paragraph beginning “A Nabataean grave inscription…”-84]

Week 5: Objects and Identity; Housing

T Feb 4: Objects and Identity

• No Quiz; Object writing assignment due at the beginning of class

Th Feb 6: Housing and Identity: From Work Lofts to Villas

• Beard 88-110 (“The art of reconstruction” “Upstairs, downstairs” “Show houses” “For richer for poorer: not ‘the Pompeian house’”; stop before the paragraph beginning “But it was not only the poorer…”); 118-119 (“79 CE: all change”)

Week 6: Housing

T Feb 11: Frescoes

• Beard 126-130 (“Pompeian colours”; stop at the bottom of page 130), 134-151 (“What went where” “Myths do furnish a room” “A room with a view?”)
• Molkova, Diana. 2023. The Lived Experience of Short-Statured People in the Early Roman Empire. PhD Dissertation, University of Washington. [week 6 folder; read pp. 1-3 [note--look at the page number at the bottom of each page, so p. 1 beings on page 6 of the PDF], 8-10, 14-16, 18-22, 41-42, 51-53]

Th Feb 13: Women and Houses

• Wallace-Hadrill, Andrew. 1996. “Engendering the Roman House,” in I Claudia: Women in Ancient Rome, eds. Diana Kleiner and Susan Matheson. Austin: University of Texas Press. 104-115. [week 6 folder; read only to page 112 [page 5 of the PDF], stopping before the section on “Roman Archaeology and Gender”]
• Allison, Penelope. 2009. “Domestic Spaces and Activities,” in The World of Pompeii, eds. John J. Dobbins and Pedar W. Foss. New York: Routledge. 269-278. [week 6 folder]

Week 7: Housing; Public Leisure and Entertainment

T Feb 18: Children and Slaves in Houses

• Huntley, Katherine. 2011. “Identifying Children’s Graffiti in Roman Campania,” in Ancient Graffiti in Context, J.A. Baird and Claire Taylor, Routledge. 69-89. [week 7 folder; read pages 69-70 (stop before “Studying Childhood or Studying Children”); 73-83 (starting with “A Developmental Psychological approach…”)]
• Joshel, Sandra and Lauren Hackworth Petersen. 2014. The Material Life of Roman Slaves. New York: Cambridge. [week 7 folder; read pp. 27-30 (starting at “Yet slaves figured as part…”); 40-46 (start at “slaves on the move”; stop before “This architectural pattern”); 59-63 (start at “slave tactics”; stop before “At the house of the Ceii”)]

Th Feb 20: Baths and Theaters

• Beard 241-243 (“A Good Bath”; stop before the paragraph beginning “The variety of opportunities” on p. 243), 253-259 (“Starstruck?”)
• Edmondson, Jonathan. 2002. “Public Spectacles and Roman Social Relations,” in Ludi Romani: Espectáculos en Hispania Romana, ed. T. Nogales Basarrate. Madrid. 8-27. [week 7 folder; read pages 9, 11-15 (starting with “Augustus and the Regulation of Seating at Public Spectacles”; stop before “Gladiatorial Presentations”)]

Week 8: Public Entertainment and Private Leisure

T Feb 25: Amphitheaters and Gladiators

• Beard 259-260 (“Bloody Games”; stop before paragraph beginning “the Amphitheater”), 264 (starting with the paragraph beginning “Advertisements”)-275 (the rest of “Bloody Games” and “Heartthrobs of the girls”)
• Edwards, Catharine. 1997. “Unspeakable Professions: Public Performance and Prostitution in Ancient Rome,” in Roman Sexualities, ed. M. Skinner. Princeton: Princeton University Press. 66-95. [week 8 folder; read pp. 66-68]

Th Feb 27: Sex, Sexuality, and Desire

• Milnor, Kristina. 2014. Graffiti and the Literary Landscape in Roman Pompeii. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [week 8 folder; read pp. 196 [start with section “No place for a Woman…”]-200 [skip paragraph beginning “On the surface” on pages 198-199], and stop on p. 200 before paragraph beginning “It is notoriously difficult”]
• Haley, Shelley. 2009. “Be Not Afraid of the Dark: Critical Race Theory and Classical Studies,” in Prejudice and Christian beginnings: investigating race, gender, and ethnicity in Early Christian Studies, ed. L. Nasrallah and E. Schüssler Fiorenza. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Pp. 27-50. [week 8 folder; read only pp. 46-48]

• Åshede, Linnea. 2020. “Neutrumque et Utrumque Videntur: Reappraising the Gender Role(s) of Hermaphroditus in Ancient Art.” In Exploring Gender Diversity in the Ancient World, ed. Allison Surtees and Jennifer Dyer. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Pp. 81-94. [week 8 folder]

Week 9: Private Leisure; Modern Receptions

T March 4: Sex, Sexuality, and Desire

• Clarke, John. 1998. Looking at Lovemaking: Constructions of Sexuality in Roman Art 100 B.C.-A.D. 250. Berkeley: University of California Press. [week 9 folder; read pages 212 (starting with the section on "Sex and Laughter in the Suburban Baths")-240].

Th March 6: Modern Reception

• Singh Dhindsa, Hardeep. 2024. “‘Strange and Uncouth’: Exoticism and Orientalism in British Responses to the Eighteenth-Century Excavations at Pompeii and Herculaneum.” Res Difficiles2: 8-29. [week 9 folder]

Week 10: Death and Destruction

T March 11: Death

• Berry, Joanne. 2007. The Complete Pompeii. London: Thames and Hudson. [week 10 folder; read pages 92-101]
• Lazer, Estelle. 2007. “Victims of Cataclysm,” in World of Pompeii, eds. J.J. Dobbins and Peder Foss. Routledge. 607-619. [week 10 folder]

Th March 13: Destruction; Review

• Cooley, Alison and M. G. L. Cooley. 2004. Pompeii: A Sourcebook. Routledge. [week 10 folder; read intro on page 27, and entries C9 (with short introduction before it) and C12]

Final Exam: Wednesday March 19 10:30am-12:20pm in Denny 259

The grading scale used in this class is as follows: