Reading Greek and Hellenistic-Roman Spolia

Irene J.F. de Jong, Ph.D (1987), University of Amsterdam, is professor emeritus of Ancient Greek. She has published widely on Homer, tragedy, Herodotus, and ancient narrative. Recent publications include Narratology and Classics: a Practical Guide (OUP 2014) and (with M. de Bakker) Speech in Ancient Greek Literature (Brill 2022). Miguel John Versluys, Ph.D. (2001), is Professor of Classical & Mediterranean Archaeology at Leiden University and PI within the Gravity Grant program Anchoring Innovation. His research focuses on the cultural dynamics that characterise the global ancient world. Recent publications include Visual style and constructing identity in the Hellenistic world. Nemrud Dağ and Commagene under Antiochos I (Cambridge 2017) and the edited volume Canonisation as innovation. Anchoring cultural formation in the first millennium BCE (Leiden 2022).

Foreword


Preface


List of Figures


Notes on Contributors





Part 1: Introduction


1 Innovating Objects? Spolia and the Question of Appropriation


 Irene J.F. de Jong and Miguel John Versluys





2 How to Deal with ‘Things from Outside’: An Anthropological Perspective


 Pieter ter Keurs





3 Triumphus and the Taming of Objects: Spoliation and the Process of Appropriation in Late Republican Rome


 Miguel John Versluys





4 Spolia as Exempla / Exempla as Spolia: Two Case Studies on Historical (Dis)Continuity and Morality


 Christoph Pieper





Part 2: Case Studies


5 Herodotus’ Framing of the Persian Spolia at Plataea


 Irene J.F. de Jong





6 Herodotus and the Persian Spolia on the Acropolis of Athens


 J.Z. van Rookhuijzen





7 ‘A City Is Not Adorned by What Comes from Outside, but by the Virtue of Its Inhabitants’: Polybius on the Pragmatics of Spoliation


 Rutger J. Allan





8 Spoils of Sicily and Their Impact on Late Republican Rome: An Archaeological Perspective


 Suzan van de Velde





9 Luxuria peregrina (Livy 39.6): Spolia and Rome’s Gastronomic Revolution


 Lidewij van Gils and Rebecca Henzel





10 Showing and Telling Spolia: The Triumphal Procession of Aemilius Paullus in Plutarch and Diodorus Siculus


 Michel Buijs





11 ‘The Glory of Alexander and Philip Made Spoil by Roman Arms’: The Triumph of Aemilius Paullus in 167 BCE


 Rolf Strootman





12 Between Triumph and Tragedy: Josephus, Bellum Judaicum 7.121–157


 Luuk Huitink





13 Judaea at the Tiber: Sacred Objects from Judaea and Their New Function in Imperial Rome


 Eric M. Moormann





Part 3: Conclusion


14 ‘Spolia’ as Category: Greek and Roman Perspectives


Index