Ancient World Magazine

Ancient Egypt is often seen as a monolithic entity, something that sprang into being around 3000 BC and then remained virtually unchanged for several millennia. In the popular imagination, Egypt is the land of gold masks and pyramids. And surely, we know all that there is to know about ancient Egypt, don't we?

In this fourth episode of the podcast, we try to show that ancient Egypt was every bit as dynamic as any other region of the world (ancient or modern), with plenty of change over time and a large amount of regional variation. Furthermore, modern research looks beyond the eye-catching treasures and massive monuments to better understand what made ancient Egyptian society tick. Host Josho Brouwers is joined by two Italian researchers who are both writing their PhD theses at Leiden University, Renata Schiavo and Arianna Sacco.

In the episode, Renata references an article by J. Moreno García, "The cursed discipline? The peculiarities of Egyptology at the turn of the twenty-first century", in: W. Carruthers (ed.), Histories of Egyptology: Interdisciplinary Measures (2014), pp. 50-63. The article is available for download on the author's Academia profile.

In this third episode, we discuss the Brad Pitt vehicle Troy, a 2004-movie directed by Wolfgang Petersen. The movie doesn't focus exclusively on the Homeric epics, but draws from the entire Epic Cycle, covering the whole of the Trojan War, from its immediate cause (the abduction of the Spartan queen Helen) to the sack of the city.

The team for this episode consists of archaeologists Matthew Lloyd and Josho Brouwers, and ancient historian Roel Konijnendijk. They talk at length about the film: the choices made in fitting the story within a fairly limited running length (a little over three hours for the Director's Cut); the curious mix of Bronze Age and Archaic/Classical elements in set design, props, and costumes for a movie ostensibly set around 1200 BC; the performances, ranging from amazingly hammy to not so great; why more Sean Bean is the best reason to watch the Director's Cut, and more.

For this second episode, we decided to remain close to home. Since we've all been involved in research concerning ancient Greek warfare, it was natural to get together and talk about that most popular of ancient warriors: the ancient Greek hoplite.

Josho Brouwers, Joshua R. Hall, and Roel Konijnendijk are joined by archaeologist Matthew Lloyd and ancient historian Owen Rees. They focus mostly on issues of definition, as well as socio-economic and cultural aspects of the hoplite, rather than tactics, although they do briefly discuss the phalanx.

In this first episode of the Ancient World Magazine podcast, we talk about why one would study the ancient world. We also discuss the merits of studying ancient history, archaeology, or classics. For this first instalment, archaeologist Josho Brouwers is joined by ancient historians Joshua R. Hall and Roel Konijnendijk.