Popular Culture in the Ancient World

Lucy Grig is Senior Lecturer in Roman History in the Department of Classics at the University of Edinburgh where she also directs the MSc in Late Antique, Islamic and Byzantine Studies. She is the author of Making Martyrs in Late Antiquity (2004) and co-editor, with Gavin Kelly, of Two Romes: Rome and Constantinople in Late Antiquity (2012). She has also written a number of articles and book chapters on the cultural and religious history of late antiquity.

1. Introduction: approaching popular culture in the ancient world Lucy Grig; Part I. Classical Greece: 2. The popular culture of the Athenian institutions: 'authorized' popular culture and 'unauthorized' elite culture in classical Athens Mirko Canevaro; 3. Humouring the masses: the theatre audience and highs and lows of Aristophanic comedy James Robson; Part II. Rome: 4. Popular public opinion in a nutshell: nicknames and non-elite political culture in the Late Republic Cristina Rosillo-López; 5. Plebeian culture in the city of Rome, from the Late Republic to the Early Empire Cyril Courrier; 6. Pollio's paradox: popular invective and the transition to Empire Tom Hawkins; 7. The music of power and the power of music: studying popular auditory culture in ancient Rome Alexandre Vincent; Part III. The Roman Empire: Greece, Rome and Beyond: 8. The intellectual life of the Roman non-elite Jerry Toner; 9. Divination and popular culture Victoria Jennings; 10. Children's cultures in Roman Egypt April Pudsey; Part IV. Late Antiquity: 11. Interpreting the Kalends of January in late antiquity: a case study for late antique popular culture? Lucy Grig; 12. Popular Christianity and lived religion in late antique Rome: seeing magic in the catacombs Nicola Denzey Lewis; 13. Popular theology in late antiquity Jaclyn Maxwell; 14. Communication and plebeian sociability in late antiquity: the view from North Africa in the age of Augustine Julio Cesar Magalhães de Oliveira.