Seen on the Classicists list:

3rd CSPS INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

SACRED LANDSCAPES IN THE PELOPONNESE
FROM PREHISTORY TO POST-BYZANTINE TIMES
Sparti, 30 March – 1 April 2012

in collaboration with the 5th Ephorate of Byzantine Studies (EBA) under the auspices of the Municipality of Sparti.

First Circular – Call for Papers

The sacred in all its expressions – religious architecture, holy places,
sacred art, creed, myth and legend, etc. – has throughout history been located in and responded to the natural and cultural landscape. The aim of the 3rd CSPS International Conference is to bring together scholars to discuss sacred landscapes in the Peloponnese from prehistory to post- Byzantine times with a focus on the following themes:

1. Sacred landscapes, identity/ethnicity
2. The Sacred in the natural landscape and seascape
3. ‘Sacred’ economies and the ownership of land
4. Setting of the sacred in art, literature, folklore and mythology
5. Pollution and purity and their spatial configuration
6. Ritual performance in its setting
7. Pilgrimage and movement through the landscape

Papers should not exceed 20 minutes. The official languages of the
Conference will be Greek and English.

To register for the conference or to submit an abstract for consideration, please request a registration form by e-mail from csps AT nottingham.ac.uk or, alternatively, by post from Dr Chrysanthi Gallou, Centre for Spartan & Peloponnesian Studies, Department of Archaeology, School of Humanities, University of Nottingham, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD, United Kingdom, no later than November 30th, 2011. Incomplete or belated registration forms will not be considered by the Scientific Committee of the Conference.

Seen on Aegeanet:

The Department of Classical, Near Eastern and Religious Studies (CNERS)
at the University of British Columbia-Vancouver campus invites
applications for a tenure-track appointment, effective July 1, 2012, at
the rank of Assistant Professor. The primary research focus of the
position is in Greek literature, particularly poetry, but we also
welcome applications from candidates working on intersections between
Greek and Roman literature and culture. The person appointed will be
willing and able to teach Greek language and literature at every level
including graduate level; the ability to teach Latin too will be an
advantage.

The successful applicant must hold a PhD (or expect to have successfully
defended prior to 1 July 2012) and must have demonstrated
accomplishments in scholarship along with enthusiasm for teaching in a
department with the unique combination of fields present in CNERS. The
successful candidate will be expected to maintain an active program of
research and teaching and to participate fully in graduate supervision,
departmental service, events and initiatives.

The programs, faculty research interests and general activities of CNERS
are found at www.cnrs.ubc.ca.

The position is subject to final budgetary approval. Salary will be
commensurate with qualifications and experience.

Applicants should submit a letter of application, an example of their
published research, a current CV containing full contact information,
and evidence of teaching effectiveness. They should arrange for three
confidential letters of reference to be sent to Dr Susanna Braund,
Acting Head, Department of Classical, Near Eastern and Religious
Studies, University of British Columbia, Buchanan C227, 1866 Main Mall,
Vancouver, BC, V6T 1Z1, Canada, email susanna.braund AT ubc.ca by the deadline of November 15th 2011.

Application materials must be submitted by 15 November 2011, as noted
above.

UBC hires on the basis of merit and is committed to employment equity.
All qualified persons are encouraged to apply. We especially welcome
applications from members of visible minority groups, women, Aboriginal
persons, persons with disabilities, persons of minority sexual
orientations and gender identities, and others with the skills and
knowledge to engage productively with diverse communities. Canadians and
permanent residents of Canada will be given priority.

There has long been an assumption — seen in many, many textbooks — that the Greeks and Romans used amphorae mostly for shipping wine (and possibly garum). A new study suggests the contents were rather more diverse. Here’s the coverage from Science:

Ceramic jugs known as amphorae were the cardboard boxes of ancient Greece. Produced in the millions, they contained goods that were shipped across the Mediterranean and beyond. But what was in them? In a new study that uses a DNA-based method inspired by crime-scene protocols, scientists say they’ve uncovered a cornucopia of cargoes, but other researchers are skeptical of the technique.

Shipwrecks and other sites have yielded plenty of intact amphorae. Maddeningly, nearly all are empty, devoid of obvious clues to what they once held. Researchers have scraped bits of ceramic from the vessel’s interior to look for leftover genetic material. In the new study, however, they also turned to a less destructive method straight from television’s CSI: swiping the amphorae with a swab. The idea came from the Massachusetts State Police, whom the investigators called for leads.

A team led by maritime archaeologist Brendan Foley of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution tested the new protocol on nine 5th to 3rd century B.C.E. amphorae that had been languishing in a government storage room in Athens for more than a decade. All had been hauled up in fishermen’s nets before being handed over to the Greek government in the 1990s.

To reveal what the vessels once held, the researchers collected DNA from the amphorae and mixed it with snippets of DNA from a selection of plants. When amphora DNA stuck to one of these genetic probes, the investigators knew they’d found a match. The scientists also sequenced amphora DNA, then searched a DNA database for the same sequences.

The results, published online last week by the Journal of Archaeological Science, suggest that swabbing works better than shaving the ceramic. And the data seem to show something less surprising as well: The ancient Greeks really liked olive oil. The team found that olive oil, olives, or some combination of the two were even more common in the amphorae than grape products such as wine. Many of the amphorae also had traces of DNA from oregano, thyme, or mint, which may have been used to flavor and preserve foods. Most common of all was DNA from the juniper bush, “not something you typically think of in the ancient Greek diet,” Foley says. “Maybe a whole lot of juniper berries were added to food and drink in the ancient world.”

Eight of the nine amphorae bore DNA from a complex mixture of foods, leading Foley to support the argument made by some scholars that amphorae were reused for maritime trade rather than being discarded after one voyage. He also argues that the findings show that rather than shipping single commodities, Greek merchants were trading in “value added” items, the ancient Greek version of the prepared-food aisle in the supermarket. The findings “open up a whole series of questions about the way the first economies, the first markets actually worked,” he says.

Although Foley’s team took careful steps to avoid contamination, one scientist is dubious that the technique worked as advertised. It is “remarkable” that the amphora “should release endogenous DNA by simply swabbing the surface,” Oliver Craig of the University of York in the United Kingdom said via e-mail. Craig, who specializes in recovering DNA and other molecules from ancient artifacts, would need to see more control tests to be convinced.

But if the technique is validated, it would be a valuable tool, say archaeologists not connected with the study. “If that [analysis] can be done on just any old jar lying around a store room for a long time, that’s great,” says Mark Lawall, an amphora specialist at the University of Manitoba in Canada. It could allow researchers to pin down the contents of amphorae found on a specific shipwreck, for instance, and then calculate the value of the ship’s cargo-offering deeper insight into ancient economies.

• via: Will DNA Swabs Launch CSI: Cargo Scene Investigation?(Science)

See also: Ancient Greek ships carried more than just wine (Nature)

The study itself is in the Journal of Archaeological Science with a rather high price (31.50!!):

Brendan P. Foley, Maria C. Hanssonb, Dimitris P. Kourkoumelis, Theotokis A. Theodoulou, Aspects of Ancient Greek trade re-evaluated with amphora DNA evidence

… and here’s the official abstract:

Ancient DNA trapped in the matrices of ceramic transport jars from Mediterranean shipwrecks can reveal the goods traded in the earliest markets. Scholars generally assume that the amphora cargoes of 5th-3rd century B.C. Greek shipwrecks contained wine, or to a much lesser extent olive oil. Remnant DNA inside empty amphoras allows us to test that assumption. We show that short ∼100 nucleotides of ancient DNA can be isolated and analyzed from inside the empty jars from either small amounts of physical scrapings or material captured with non-destructive swabs. Our study material is previously inaccessible Classical/Hellenistic Greek shipwreck amphoras archived at the Ministry of Culture and Tourism Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities in Athens, Greece. Collected DNA samples reveal various combinations of olive, grape, Lamiaceae herbs (mint, rosemary, thyme, oregano, sage), juniper, and terebinth/mastic (genus Pistacia). General DNA targeting analyses also reveal the presence of pine (Pinus), and DNA from Fabaceae (Legume family); Zingiberaceae (Ginger family); and Juglandaceae (Walnut family). Our results demonstrate that amphoras were much more than wine containers. DNA shows that these transport jars contained a wide range of goods, bringing into question long-standing assumptions about amphora use in ancient Greece. Ancient DNA investigations open new research avenues, and will allow accurate reconstruction of ancient diet, medicinal compounds, value-added products, goods brought to market, and food preservation methods.

Around the Classical Blogosphere:

• Corinthian Matters: What was shipped in Greek amphoras? A reevaluation through DNA analysis.

From the Sunday Mercury:

WHEN metal detectorist Terry Herbert discovered the Staffordshire Hoard, it was described as a once in a lifetime find.

But now a fellow treasure hunter may also have struck gold – after discovering a ‘huge haul’ of Roman coins near the historic Bredon Hill in Worcestershire.

Details of the find remained hush-hush last night and the identity of the lucky new metal detectorist has not been revealed.

But it is understood Worcestershire County Council and the county coroner have been informed because of the potential archaeological significance.

The Bredon treasure is already being compared with the Staffordshire Hoard, the country’s biggest ever find of Anglo Saxon gold.

It netted lucky Terry and local farmer Fred Johnson a whopping £1.6 million each after being unearthed in a muddy field at Hammerwich, near Brownhills.

One metal detectorist told the Sunday Mercury: ‘‘Very few people know about this find at Bredon Hill, even in the metal detecting community.

‘‘But the rumours are that this could be a really huge haul of Roman coins and there could be an official announcement about it soon.’’

Archaeology experts are excited by the prospect of a major new discovery at Bredon Hill, once the site of an Iron Age fort.

Nearby Worcester is a hotspot for Roman artefacts and evidence of settlements from the period has been discovered in villages scattered around the area.

Last night Dr Roger White, an expert in Roman archaeology from the University of Birmingham, described the possibility of a new find in Bredon as “exciting”.

“As well as potentially valuable pieces, these coins are historic documents, and they can tell a story on their own,” he said.

Intriguing

“Bredon Hill is not a major hub of Roman activity, but it does sit between the settled areas of two tribes, while Worcester has a Roman foundation, and was a major focus of iron production.

“Hoards like this potential one in Bredon are always intriguing and the whole buried treasure thing captures the imagination.

‘‘And from an historical point of view, it is exciting. This could give us enormous amounts of information.”

Dr White said there could be a wide variety of reasons why the coins were buried at Bredon Hill.

“Sometimes large burials of coins are evidence of a religious ritual, an offering to the gods,” he explained.

“In other cases, someone who was under threat could have buried them because they wanted to hide their wealth.

“Another regular occurrence was coins being recalled, so they could be melted down to produce more currency. When that happened, Romans would head into the garden, and bury their money to keep it safe for the future.

“It will be fascinating to find out what is there in terms of coins, but also why, and how, it came to be buried there.

“Every hoard is different, and the bigger the number of coins, the more we can find out about the history of the area.”

A spokeswoman for Worcestershire County Council refused to comment, but it is understood that the coin find has been reported to the coroner.

Metal detectorists have been hunting for the next big Midland find since the Staffordshire Hoard was uncovered in 2009.

The treasure, which included hundreds of bejewelled battlefield items, added up to 5kg of the purest gold and 2.5kg of silver.

• via: Roman coins found by metal detectorist at Bredon Hill in Worcestershire (Mercury)

The Telegraph coverage — which is virtually identical — includes a photo of some of the objects from the Staffordshire Hoard … a bit misleading, even with the caption. I’m sure we’ll be hearing more about this one in the next week. I’ll be adding links below …

Nuntii Latini:

• #nuntiilatini ~ Iuvenes Graeci patriam relinquunt (YLE) October 16, 2011
• #nuntiilatini ~ Nuntii Latini Septimanales 14. Oktober 2011 (Radio Bremen) October 15, 2011

Akropolis World News:

• #greeknews ~ Increase of taxes in Turkey / Israeli soldier to be released / Did they really capture Gadafi’s son?

Ephemeris:

• De Coptorum exsequiis Lydia Ariminensis