scholarly journals Museum Representations of Roman Britain and Roman London: A Post-colonial Perspective

Britannia ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 47 ◽  
pp. 209-241 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martijn Polm
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
British Museum ◽  
Archaeological Remains ◽  
Roman Britain ◽  
Roman Archaeology ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Roman Imperialism ◽  
History Of ◽  
Roman Military

ABSTRACTThis paper offers a post-colonial analysis of past and present representations of the archaeological remains of Roman Britain and Roman London in the British Museum and Museum of London respectively. Since post-colonial criticism of Romano-British archaeology is highly relevant to such an analysis, a brief description is provided at the outset. Thereafter follows a series of six case studies — three for each museum. The first four focus on the history of the Romano-British collections at both museums and sometimes draw on post-colonial insights to explain the development of these collections and the ways in which they were exhibited. The last two case studies investigate how British post-colonial criticism of Roman archaeology has (or has not) impacted on the current displays of the Romano-British collections at both museums. Finally, some recommendations will be offered based on the outcomes of these two case studies. Recurring themes are the representation of: the Roman military; Roman imperialism; the (material) culture of Roman Britain and Roman London.

Developing a New Perspective on Dura’s Military Base

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon James
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Final Report ◽  
Chemical Weapon ◽  
Military Base ◽  
Military Equipment ◽  
History Of ◽  
Roman Military ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
Military Archaeology

This research project arose, as many do, from an intersection of personal research interests and fieldwork opportunity. At its inception, I had already been working on material from Dura for twenty years, principally writing my PhD on the remarkable finds of (mostly Roman) arms and military equipment from the site, resulting in Final Report 7. I originally came to Dura as a Roman military archaeology specialist, but was acutely aware of my limited grounding in the specifics of the archaeology and history of the region. However, it is also clear that study of so huge and complex a data set as that from Dura must be a team effort involving many specialists from a wide array of disciplines and backgrounds, all of whom may bring outside perspectives potentially illuminating to the whole. My collaboration with MFSED began with an invitation from Pierre Leriche to examine some newly found items of military equipment. Spending time at Dura permitted an extended examination of the city, the Sasanian siege works, and Roman countermeasures (resulting in a publication on the Tower 19 complex, and indications of use of a ‘chemical weapon’ in the fighting: James 2011b), and especially of the military base where the soldiers whose equipment I had studied through artefacts and iconography had mostly lived. As previously mentioned, the base was not a primary research objective of MFSED. However, a project on the fixed infrastructure of the garrison would form a logical follow-on to my study of its martial material culture in FR 7. Contributing to MFSED’s general aims of recording and publishing the city’s remains, and to wider Dura scholarship, it also offered the chance to publish arguably the most important revealed but incompletely studied Roman military site in the empire. Further, this intra-urban military base constituted an ideal opportunity to pursue my own wider research interest, in how the Roman military interacted with civilian populations. At an early stage in my research career, I had come to believe that the Roman military could only be understood in context, of Roman society as a whole, and of the peoples it fought, conquered, and settled amongst.

Gath of the Philistines

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Pioske
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Early Iron Age ◽  
Archaeological Remains ◽  
The Creation ◽  
A Site ◽  
The City

Chapter 2 begins a series of case studies that are devoted to exploring what knowledge was drawn on by the biblical scribes to develop stories about the early Iron Age period. This chapter’s investigation is devoted to the Philistine city of Gath, one of the largest cities of its time and a site that was destroyed ca. 830 BCE. Significant about Gath, consequently, is that it flourished as an inhabited location before the emergence of a mature Hebrew prose writing tradition, meaning that the information recounted about the city was predicated primarily on older cultural memories of the location. Comparing the biblical references to the site with Gath’s archaeological remains reveals moments of resonance between these stories and the material culture unearthed from the location. Accordingly, what comes to light through this chapter’s analysis is one mode of remembering that informed the creation of these biblical stories: that of resilience.

Changing Materialities

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Gardner
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Material Culture ◽  
Theoretical Work ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
Roman Britain ◽  
Roman Imperialism ◽  
General Terms ◽  
The Face ◽  
Messy Reality

The material signature of the Roman period in Britain is undeniably distinctive, marked as it is not only by a whole series of changes and additions to the formal repertoire of artefacts but also by a great proliferation of the sheer numbers of things. The traditional explanation for the changing contours of materiality in Roman Britain has been the over-simplistic narrative of ‘Romanization’. While it is certainly the case that there is a connection between Roman imperialism and material change, this traditional picture cannot be sustained in the face of new understandings of the material patterning in Roman Britain, and of the ways in which people interact with material culture in more general terms. In this chapter, I will review this recent empirical and theoretical work to demonstrate how this is gradually giving us a fuller picture of the complicated and messy reality of life in the Roman empire.

Rock art as a source of the history of prehistory (An account to promote the understanding of prehistoric rock art)

Abgadiyat ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-35
Author(s):  
Hamdi Abbas Ahmed Abd-EI-Moniem
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Rock Art ◽  
Archaeological Remains ◽  
Archaeological Material ◽  
The Third ◽  
History Of ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Source Of Information ◽  
Remote Past

Abstract Some may believe that the history of mankind begins with the appearance of writing only a few several thousands of years ago (cf. 4000-3000 BCE). Our history, however, extends beyond that date millions of years. The history of mankind, indeed, is deeply rooted in the remote past which is called 'prehistory'. With the lacking of any form of writing, this 'prehistoric' period can be examined directly solely by recourse to the study of archaeological remains. The purpose of this account is to introduce rock art to the readers and show the significant role of this sort of archaeological material in studying the history of mankind before the appearance of written records. The current work, therefore, is divided into three main sections: the first deals with definition of rock art and its nature; the second section is devoted to showing the significance of this aspect of material culture in exploring a long and mysterious period of the early history of man characterized by the complete absence of written records or historical documents; the third and last section, which is a vital and integral part of this work, comprises an explanatory pictorial record to promote the understanding of prehistoric rock art as a source of information needed for writing the history of prehistory.

scholarly journals Thinking about Roman Imperialism: Postcolonialism, Globalisation and Beyond?

Britannia ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 44 ◽  
pp. 1-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Gardner
Keyword(s):  
Roman Britain ◽  
Turn Point ◽  
Roman Archaeology ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Roman Imperialism ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Interdisciplinary Dialogue

AbstractFor the last twenty years or so, archaeologists of Roman Britain, among other provinces, have been seeking ways of moving beyond the concept of ‘Romanisation’ as a framework for thinking about Roman imperialism. Many of the ideas proposed have been drawn from two related bodies of thought which have emerged as ways of understanding the contemporary world: postcolonialism and globalisation theory. While achieving significant success in transforming interpretations of the Roman world, applications of these approaches present some fresh problems of theoretical and practical coherence. These in turn point to important issues to do with the role of theory in Roman archaeology, issues which have rarely been tackled head-on but which present obstacles to interdisciplinary dialogue. The aim of this paper is to evaluate and compare the perspectives of postcolonial and globalisation theories, assess their strengths and weaknesses, and suggest some possibilities for linking the insights of these and other approaches to define a more holistic agenda for Roman archaeology.

Archaeological Remains, Supposedly Navaho, from Chaco Canyon, New Mexico

1939 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roy L. Malcolm
Keyword(s):  
New Mexico ◽  
Material Culture ◽  
Early History ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Chaco Canyon ◽  
Archaeological Remains ◽  
History Of ◽  
Made In

Until recently there has been little attempt to trace the early history of the Navaho in the Southwest through their archaeological remains. While some investigators were studying Pueblo archaeology, they did record certain discoveries which tend to throw some light here and there on the earlier history of the Navaho. In the summer of 1937 a reconnaisance of archaeological sites, putatively Navaho, was made in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. The sites were mainly on, or at the base of western Chacra Mesa, some eight miles east of Pueblo Bonito. Interesting information was gathered, particularly in regard to house types, pottery, burials, textiles, and certain other items of material culture which may be correlated with ethnological data on the Navaho.

Understanding objects in motion. Anarchaeologicaldialogue on Romanization

2014 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miguel John Versluys
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Culture Studies ◽  
Roman Archaeology ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Theoretical Position ◽  
Material Culture Studies ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Near Future ◽  
Globalization Theory

AbstractThis essay argues that Romanization revolves around understanding objects in motion and that Roman archaeologists should therefore focus on (1) globalization theory and (2) material-culture studies as important theoretical directions for the (near) future. The present state and scope of the Romanization debate, however, seem to prevent a fruitful development in that direction. The first part of this paper therefore briefly analyses the Romanization debate and argues that large parts of ‘Anglo-Saxon Roman archaeology’ have never been really post-colonial, but in fact from the mid-1990s onwards developed a theoretical position that should be characterized as anti-colonial. This ideologically motivated development has resulted in several unhealthy divides within the field, as well as in an uncomfortable ending of the Romanization debate. The present consensus within English-speaking Roman archaeology ‘to do away with Romanization’ does not seem to get us at all ‘beyond Romans and Natives’, and, moreover, has effectively halted most of the discussion about how to understand and conceptualize ‘Rome’. The second part of the article presents two propositions outlining how to move forward: globalization theory and material-culture studies. Through this focus we will be able to better understand ‘Rome’ as (indicating) objects in motion and the human–thing entanglements resulting from a remarkable punctuation of connectivity. This focus is important as an alternative perspective to all existing narratives about Romanization because these remain fundamentally historical, in the sense that they reduce objects to expressions (of identity) alone. It is time for our discussions about ‘Rome’ to move ‘beyond representation’ and to become genuinely archaeological at last, by making material culture, with its agency and materiality, central to the analyses.

Collecting, curating and exhibiting cross-cultural material histories in a post-settler society

Curatopia ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 244-261
Author(s):  
Bronwyn Labrum
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Social History ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Aotearoa New Zealand ◽  
Majority Culture ◽  
History Of ◽  
Material History ◽  
Settler Society

This chapter considers social history in a post-colonial contest. It specifically examines how the history of the majority culture in a post-settler society has and might be curated. Using Aotearoa New Zealand as its case study, it considers the figure of the Pakeha (non-indigenous) curator in relation to, and also in contrast with, indigenous collections and displays. What does a history curator look like in a post-settler society? Does the history curator continue the mutual asymmetry that has characterised relations and curatorial endeavours? Or is there a way to recognise cross-cultural material histories? In considering the development of history, and specifically social history, it suggests that a more useful concept is material history, rather than historical material cultures studies. The rest of the chapter ranges across a broad range of material history, including fashion and clothing, and design, to consider how contemporary museums deal with everyday life and its material aspects in museums, which are still to a large extent focussed on discrete objects and forms of material culture, and which carry the burden of the historical development of their collections into a post-settler world.

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