Lost in the World: Protachos from Oxyrhynchos
Can a few words capture an entire life? We might perhaps entertain an answer as we contemplate the character and contents of funerary epigrams. Their elegant compositions inscribed on ancient stones have an uncanny power to stimulate our imagination and summon intimate portraits of individuals long gone. One such epigram introduces us to a certain…
Moving the Ancient Greek world
A conference on migration as a catalyst for change in the Ancient Greek world. Copenhagen 24-25 June 2022.
“Have You Heard the News?”: Information Flow in the Ancient Mediterranean
Ancient Greece is often thought of as a fragmented and parochial world, where communication was slow and knowledge about what was going on was scarce. But if we take a closer look at the Mediterranean Sea that linked Greek, Phoenician, Italiote, African and Iberian communities in the ancient world, we get quite a different picture…
What’s a Membership Regime?
The rules, beliefs and resources that guide the settlement and integration of migrants.
Foreigners at Hellenistic Rhodes
The metic or free foreign resident of a Greek city is often though of as someone who left a life behind to start again in a new city. But how far did they actually go?
Activities
Papers, Talks and Lectures 2021 Neumann, S. Moving Material Culture – The ‘Social Capital’ of Migrants in Membership Regimes of the Hellenistic World. SCS Annual Meeting 2021. Thomsen, C.A. The Citizen Non-Citizen: Hellenistic Metics and Their Home Poleis (c. 400-31 BCE). SCS Annual Meeting 2021. Vadan, P. The Migrant Body and State-Sanctioned Violence. SCS Annual…
Paul Vădan, Post-Doctoral Researcher
For ancient historian Paul Vadan migration is more than a subject of study – it’s a personal experience. He is interested in the fragile legal position of foreigners in the Greek cities and wants us to think about the what the marginalization of foreigners might mean for society and humanity.
A Greek Egyptian ‘Priest’ in Copenhagen
The marble face of an old man peeks from a corner in a Copenhagen museum. Archaeologist Sabine Neumann identifies him as an Egyptian religious specialist serving both a Greek community and his native gods.
Migrants and Membership Regimes in the Ancient Greek World
For a substantial number of the inhabitants of the ancient Greek world migration in some form or another played a vital part in shaping aspirations, opportunities, behaviour, beliefs and outcomes.
Sabine Neumann, Assistant Professor of Archaeology
Archaeologist Sabine Neumann wants to challenge assumptions about migration as something out of the ordinary. People, the ancients included, have always been on the move. Sabine will focus on migrant women who often tend to get overlooked and trace them and their agency – especially in cultic matters – in the material record.
Researchers
Christian A. Thomsen is associate professor of ancient Greek history at the University of Copenhagen. He is the author of the book The Politics of Association in Hellenistic Rhodes (Edinburgh, 2020) and has published on various aspects of social and political organization in the Classical and Hellenistic world, especially private associations, and is co-editor of Private Associations in the Public Sphere (Copenhagen, 2015). Since 2018,…
Partners
Sapere Aude Migrants and Membership Regimes in the Ancient Greek World (400 BCE – 100 CE) is funded through the Sapere Aude instrument by the Independent Research Fund Denmark (DFF). ‘Sapere Aude’ is Latin for ‘dare to know’, and the grant is aimed at providing young and talented researchers with the means to develop research competencies…
Status Assimilation of Free Foreigners
Wealthy metics constitute a conspicuous group among foreign residents in many Greek cities. In spite of their economic means, which dwarfed those of most citizens of their host communities, they were, as non-citizens, excluded from sharing directly in the political life of their adopted cities. As inhabitants, however, they were free to participate in social…
There and Back Again
Eraton from the Cretan town of Axos leaves home to find work as a soldier. His family is captured, sold into slavery and sent on a journey across the seas, but eventually see freedom and citizen rights restored.
Bound Labour Unbound
Slavery was endemic to the ancient Greek world and in popular discourse the enslaved were predominantly foreigners. This case study examines the integration and impact of formerly enslaved on the social, political and religious life of the Greek city-states.
Foreign Cult and Female Agency
This study on foreign religious cults in the multi-ethnic society of Hellenistic Cities in Greece will address issues of interaction between different religious groups in shaping the cultic landscapes of Greek cities – an important aspect of their membership regimes – with a focus on women’s agency in establishing and participating in new cults. Our understanding…
Fragile Foreigners
The democratic polis prided itself with the stalwart equality of its citizen members, codified in the laws of the city to guarantee the integrity and dignity of the political bodies of its members. But the inviolability of the citizen body was conceptualized through a hierarchy of status that necessarily viewed foreign residents and travelers as more vulnerable.…
Migrants and Membership Regimes in the Ancient Greek World 