The path of Rome from a small village in Latium vetus, to an emerging power in Italy during the first millennium BC, and finally the heart of an empire that sprawled throughout the Mediterranean and much of Europe until the 5th century CE is well known. Its rise is often presented as inevitable and unstoppable. Yet the factors that contributed to Rome’s rise to power are not well understood. By illustrating domestic, funerary, religious, and ideological dimensions of the different urbanscapes and rural landscapes of Rome, we will follow the dominance of the city within regional and peninsular networks up to the pinnacle of Roman imperialism and its ultimate decline. We will also discuss and consider if it was indeed ecological factors, such as the key position on the Tiber ford at the middle way of the Italian Peninsula in the centre of the Mediterranean, or rather political and ideological factors such as the capacity of integrating foreign citizens, or more likely a combination there of, that determined such an incredible and formidable trajectory.
The Rise and Fall of Rome
This is an In-person course which requires your attendance to the weekly meetings which take place in Oxford.
Overview
Programme details
Courses starts: 30 Sep 2024
Week 1: Italy before Rome: Etruscans and the other italic Iron Age Populations
Week 2: Rome the Eternal city from the origin to the end of the regal period (1700-509 BC)
Week 3: The rise of Rome in Italy during the Republican Period
Week 4: Republican and Imperial Rome
Week 5: Urbanscapes from the East to the West peripheries in the Roman world
Week 6: Villas, villages, and farms: landscapes of the Roman world
Week 7: Religion, cult activity and Sanctuaries from Pre-Roman Italy to the peripheries of the Roman Empire
Week 8: Burials and funerary rituals from Pre-Roman Italy to the peripheries of the Roman Empire
Week 9: Households, families, women and children: the study of Roman domestic life
Week 10: The end of Rome and the fall of classical civilizations
Recommended reading
All weekly class students may become borrowing members of the Rewley House Continuing Education Library for the duration of their course. Prospective students whose courses have not yet started are welcome to use the Library for reference. More information can be found on the Library website.
There is a Guide for Weekly Class students which will give you further information.
Availability of titles on the reading list (below) can be checked on SOLO, the library catalogue.
Preparatory reading
- Classical Archaeology. Oxford: Blackwell / Alcock, S.E. & R. Osborne (eds.) 2007
Digital Certification
To complete the course and receive a certificate, you will be required to attend at least 80% of the classes on the course and pass your final assignment. Upon successful completion, you will receive a link to download a University of Oxford digital certificate. Information on how to access this digital certificate will be emailed to you after the end of the course. The certificate will show your name, the course title and the dates of the course you attended. You will be able to download your certificate or share it on social media if you choose to do so.
Fees
| Description | Costs |
|---|---|
| Course Fee | £285.00 |
| Take this course for CATS points | £30.00 |
Funding
If you are in receipt of a UK state benefit, you are a full-time student in the UK or a student on a low income, you may be eligible for a reduction of 50% of tuition fees. Please see the below link for full details:
Tutor
Dr Francesca Fulminante
After a PhD from Cambridge University (2008) and post-doctoral positions at excellent Universities and Institutes across Europe, including a Marie Curie Sklodowska Fellowship at the University of Roma Tre (2014-2016), Francesca Fulminante is now Senior Researcher and Lecturer both in the UK (University of Bristol and UCL) and Italy (University Roma Tre). Her research investigates Mediterranean urbanization during the first Millennium BCE with a focus on central Italy (Le Sepolture Principesche, L’Erma di Bretschneider 2003 and The Urbanization of Rome, CUP 2014). She has contributed to many excavations (Rome, Veii, Pompeii, Crustumerium, Colle di Marzo). She published extensively on macro-economic, social, and productive aspects of urbanization such as social stratification, reflected in burial practices, settlement centralization, transportation networks and political agency or community practices in smelting techniques. She has also investigated and published on more intimate and individual subjects such as breastfeeding/child-rearing practices and gender issues in first millennium BCE Italy and more widely in the Mediterranean. In 2020-21, at the Max Weber Kollegium, she has worked with the Urbanity and Religion cluster, led by Jörg Rüpke and Susanne Rau, to investigate the complex relationship between religious agency and urban settings in Early Iron Age central Italy to teas out if and how, paraphrasing a famous sentence of Francois de Polignac, “the city contributed to the rise of the sanctuary, or the sanctuary contributed to the rise of the city?"
Course aims
To Introduce students to the study of Roman civilization since the origin of Rome as a small village to the head of an Empire and its subsequent collapse.
Course objectives:
- Provide a general overview of the most important developments of Roman civilization from the Etruscan origin of Rome, its emergence in Italy, the conquest of the Mediterranean and most of continental Europe and the collapse of the empire.
- Understand daily life in Pre-Roman Italy and the Roman Empire by closely examining themes such as landscapes, burial, religion, household, gender and infancy.
- Discuss and understand the ecological and environmental factors and the socio-political contingencies that underpin the rise and fall of Rome.
- Show how we can understand the ancient world practices through their manifestation in the archaeological record (material culture remains).
Teaching methods
The module is taught through a mix of lectures and student-led discussions. Students will be encouraged to undertake set readings, complete pre-class activities and make (non-examined) short presentations of case study material in order to be able to actively participate in the discussion. Each class will focus upon a theme that the lecture covers more widely, and seminar discussions will be structured around one or two (non-compulsory) readings.
Learning outcomes
By the end of the course students will be expected to:
- Demonstrate the ability to analyse material culture and associate it with major ideas, principles and steps of the path of Rome from a small village to a large metropolis dominating an Empire.
- Show, through written work, how archaeological material is used to suggest interpretations about Roman society from its origin to collapse.
- Develop, through written work, how and why the Roman world has contributed to ideas, perceptions, and aesthetics in the modern (western) world.
- Demonstrate an understanding of change over time, the characteristics and development of aesthetic, chronological, socio-political and daily practices of the ancient Roman world from beginning to end.
Assessment methods
The module is assessed through a formative and summative assignment. The formative assignment is an opportunity to get feedback on a piece of work and does not contribute to your final grade. Summative assessment contributes to 100 % of the final grade. There is no examination element to the module.
Formative assignment: A short essay or object description (500 words)
Summative assignment: An essay (1,500 words) or a pre-recorded PowerPoint presentation on a subject to be agreed with the tutor.
Students must submit a completed Declaration of Authorship form at the end of term when submitting your final piece of work. CATS points cannot be awarded without the aforementioned form - Declaration of Authorship form
Application
To earn credit (CATS points) for your course you will need to register and pay an additional £30 fee per course. You can do this by ticking the relevant box at the bottom of the enrolment form or when enrolling online.
Please use the 'Book' or 'Apply' button on this page. Alternatively, please complete an Enrolment Form (Word) or Enrolment Form (Pdf)
Level and demands
The Department's Weekly Classes are taught at FHEQ Level 4, i.e. first year undergraduate level, and you will be expected to engage in a significant amount of private study in preparation for the classes. This may take the form, for instance, of reading and analysing set texts, responding to questions or tasks, or preparing work to present in class.
Credit Accumulation and Transfer Scheme (CATS)
To earn credit (CATS points) you will need to register and pay an additional £30 fee per course. You can do this by ticking the relevant box at the bottom of the enrolment form or when enrolling online. Students who register for CATS points will receive a Record of CATS points on successful completion of their course assessment.
Students who do not register for CATS points during the enrolment process can either register for CATS points prior to the start of their course or retrospectively from the January 1st after the current full academic year has been completed. If you are enrolled on the Certificate of Higher Education you need to indicate this on the enrolment form but there is no additional registration fee.