David J. Mattingly – författare

This book presents a challenge to the long held view that the predominantly agricultural economies of ancient Greece and Rome were underdeveloped. It shows that the exploitation of natural resources, manufacturing and the building trade all made significant contributions to classical economies. It will be an indispensable resource for those interested in the period.

This book presents a challenge to the long held view that the predominantly agricultural economies of ancient Greece and Rome were underdeveloped. It shows that the exploitation of natural resources, manufacturing and the building trade all made significant contributions to classical economies. It will be an indispensable resource for those interested in the period.

"[T]his handsomely-produced volume performs admirably as a series of introductions to sources, approaches, and the state of scholarship on major topics in Roman social history . . . Collections of essays come and go, but this one will stay in wide use. Each essay can stand alone but, tied together by the theme of dominance, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts."---Donald Kyle, Bryn Mawr Classical Review"This collection of essays is intended to serve as a coursebook for introductory lecture series on Roman civilization; the essays are concentrated on fundamental aspects of Roman society, and no prior knowledge of antiquity on the reader's part is assumed. . . . The book as a whole is entirely successful in its projected aim: an immense range of detailed information about antiquity is presented in readable and largely sophisticated discussion. . . . Increasingly we need to be able to suggest to our students reading that is introductory but also in-depth and challenging, and this book is one possible reading that we can offer."---Ellen O'Gorman, Classical ReviewLife, Death, and Entertainment gives those with a general interest in Roman antiquity a starting point, informed by the latest developments in scholarship, for understanding the extraordinary range of Roman society. Family structure, slavery, gender identity, food supply, religion, and entertainment---all crucial parts of the Roman world---are discussed here, in a single volume that offers an approachable guide for readers of all backgrounds. The collection unites a series of general introductions on each of these topics, bringing readers in touch with a broad range of evidence, as well as with a wide variety of approaches to basic questions about the Roman world.The newly expanded edition includes historian Keith Hopkins' pathbreaking article on Roman slaves. Volume editor David Potter has contributed two new translations of documents from emperors Hadrian and Marcus Aurelius. Hadrian's letters document a reorganization of the festival cycle in the Empire and reassert the importance of the Olympic Games; the letter to Marcus provides the most important surviving evidence for how gladiatorial games were actually organized. Contributors to the volume include Greg S. Aldrete, Hazel Dodge, Bruce W. Frier, Maud W. Gleason, Ann E. Hanson, Keith Hopkins, David J. Mattingly, and David S. Potter.D.S. Potter is Professor of Classics and Arthur F. Thurnau Professor, University of Michigan.D.J. Mattingly is Professor of Roman Archaeology, University of Leicester, and a Fellow of the British Academy.Cover illustrations: top left, Karanis Excavation, courtesy Kelsey Museum; bottom right, Monte Testacchio, courtesy David J. Mattingly; center, Pollice Verso by Jean-Léon Gérôme, courtesy Phoenix Art Museum, Museum Purchase.

Winner of the 2024 Association of American Publishers PROSE Award for ClassicsWinner of the 2025 Vinson Sutlive Book Prize and LectureBetween Sahara and Sea: Africa in the Roman Empire challenges orthodox views of the story of Africa under Roman domination. It presents a new framework for understanding this and other territories incorporated in the Roman Empire. Based on decades of research in North Africa, David Mattingly’s book is a cleverly constructed and innovative account of the history and archaeology of ancient North Africa (roughly equivalent to Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya) from the first century BCE to the third century CE. He charts a new path toward a bottom-up understanding of North African archaeology, exploring in turn the differing material cultures and experiences of the Roman communities of the military and the urban and rural areas. Regional and societal differences emerge as significant and of long duration in the fascinating story of one of the most important sectors of the Roman Empire. This important book is the most comprehensive in English on Roman North Africa. It is remarkably rich, with up-to-date references and a host of new ideas and perspectives. Well written and illustrated, with a plethora of maps, it will be required reading for anyone interested in the subject. Rather than emphasizing the role of external actors, as studies of “Roman Africa” have traditionally done, Between Sahara and Sea focuses on local contributions to the making of Africa in the Roman Empire. The author demonstrates that the multiple populations encountered by Rome were not an indistinct bloc, but had different identities and cultures.

Despite what history has taught us about imperialism's destructive effects on colonial societies, many classicists continue to emphasize disproportionately the civilizing and assimilative nature of the Roman Empire and to hold a generally favorable view of Rome's impact on its subject peoples. Imperialism, Power, and Identity boldly challenges this view using insights from postcolonial studies of modern empires to offer a more nuanced understanding of Roman imperialism. Rejecting outdated notions about Romanization, David Mattingly focuses instead on the concept of identity to reveal a Roman society made up of far-flung populations whose experience of empire varied enormously. He examines the nature of power in Rome and the means by which the Roman state exploited the natural, mercantile, and human resources within its frontiers. Mattingly draws on his own archaeological work in Britain, Jordan, and North Africa and covers a broad range of topics, including sexual relations and violence; census-taking and taxation; mining and pollution; land and labor; and art and iconography.He shows how the lives of those under Rome's dominion were challenged, enhanced, or destroyed by the empire's power, and in doing so he redefines the meaning and significance of Rome in today's debates about globalization, power, and empire. Imperialism, Power, and Identity advances a new agenda for classical studies, one that views Roman rule from the perspective of the ruled and not just the rulers. In a new preface, Mattingly reflects on some of the reactions prompted by the initial publication of the book.

"Lepcis Magna", one of the greatest of the Roman cities of North Africa and one of the most famous archaeological sites in the Mediterranean, was situated in the region of Tripolitania. Birthplace of the Emperor Septimius Severus, the city has yielded many well-preserved monuments from its Roman past. Mattingly presents valuable information on the pre-Roman tribal background, the urban centres, the military frontier and the regional economy. He reinterprets many aspects of the settlement history of this marginal arid zone that was once made prosperous, and considers the wider themes of Romanization, frontier military strategy, and economic links between provinces and sources of elite wealth.

The themes of sedentarisation, urbanisation and state formation are fundamental ones in the archaeology of many diverse parts of the world but have been little explored in relation to early societies of the Saharan zone. Moreover, the possibility has rarely been considered that the precocious civilisations bordering this vast desert were interconnected by long-range contacts and knowledge networks. The orthodox opinion of many of the key oasis zones within the Sahara is that they were not created before the early medieval period and the Islamic conquest of Mediterranean North Africa. Major claims of this volume are that the ultimate origins of oasis settlements in many parts of the Sahara were considerably earlier, that by the first millennium AD some of these oasis settlements were of a size and complexity to merit the categorisation 'towns' and that a few exceptional examples were focal centres within proto-states or early state-level societies.

The themes of sedentarisation, urbanisation and state formation are fundamental ones in the archaeology of many diverse parts of the world but have been little explored in relation to early societies of the Saharan zone. Moreover, the possibility has rarely been considered that the precocious civilisations bordering this vast desert were interconnected by long-range contacts and knowledge networks. The orthodox opinion of many of the key oasis zones within the Sahara is that they were not created before the early medieval period and the Islamic conquest of Mediterranean North Africa. Major claims of this volume are that the ultimate origins of oasis settlements in many parts of the Sahara were considerably earlier, that by the first millennium AD some of these oasis settlements were of a size and complexity to merit the categorisation ''towns'' and that a few exceptional examples were focal centres within proto-states or early state-level societies.

The themes of sedentarisation, urbanisation and state formation are fundamental ones in the archaeology of many diverse parts of the world but have been little explored in relation to early societies of the Saharan zone. Moreover, the possibility has rarely been considered that the precocious civilisations bordering this vast desert were interconnected by long-range contacts and knowledge networks. The orthodox opinion of many of the key oasis zones within the Sahara is that they were not created before the early medieval period and the Islamic conquest of Mediterranean North Africa. Major claims of this volume are that the ultimate origins of oasis settlements in many parts of the Sahara were considerably earlier, that by the first millennium AD some of these oasis settlements were of a size and complexity to merit the categorisation ''towns'' and that a few exceptional examples were focal centres within proto-states or early state-level societies.

This book presents a challenge to the long held view that the predominantly agricultural economies of ancient Greece and Rome were underdeveloped. It shows that the exploitation of natural resources, manufacturing and the building trade all made significant contributions to classical economies. It will be an indispensable resource for those interested in the period.

This book presents a challenge to the long held view that the predominantly agricultural economies of ancient Greece and Rome were underdeveloped. It shows that the exploitation of natural resources, manufacturing and the building trade all made significant contributions to classical economies. It will be an indispensable resource for those interested in the period.

"Lepcis Magna", one of the greatest of the Roman cities of North Africa and one of the most famous archaeological sites in the Mediterranean, was situated in the region of Tripolitania. Birthplace of the Emperor Septimius Severus, the city has yielded many well-preserved monuments from its Roman past. Mattingly presents valuable information on the pre-Roman tribal background, the urban centres, the military frontier and the regional economy. He reinterprets many aspects of the settlement history of this marginal arid zone that was once made prosperous, and considers the wider themes of Romanization, frontier military strategy, and economic links between provinces and sources of elite wealth.

"Lepcis Magna", one of the greatest of the Roman cities of North Africa and one of the most famous archaeological sites in the Mediterranean, was situated in the region of Tripolitania. Birthplace of the Emperor Septimius Severus, the city has yielded many well-preserved monuments from its Roman past. Mattingly presents valuable information on the pre-Roman tribal background, the urban centres, the military frontier and the regional economy. He reinterprets many aspects of the settlement history of this marginal arid zone that was once made prosperous, and considers the wider themes of Romanization, frontier military strategy, and economic links between provinces and sources of elite wealth.