Sexuality and Gender in Greece and Rome

This is chronologically the widest-ranging of all the Ancient History topics. The specimen paper begins with a question on misogyny in archaic Greek poetry, and ends with one on the difference made to women's lives by the rise of Christianity. The first of those questions is about images of women in literary texts, the second about women's lives 'out there': the aim is to tackle both sets of issues (which are not easily separable), and if you take the option, you will have many dealings with literary (and iconographic) evidence, but will also consider, for instance, laws regulating property rights, marriage, adultery. This is not just a paper about women: men too are viewed as sexual objects, and topics such as ideas of masculinity or the social significance of Greek male homosexuality are fair game. Few areas of classical studies have seen quite such a transformation in the last 30 years as this one, and you will have the chance to study, not just an extremely diverse range of ancient texts, but also some very lively secondary literature. The texts prescribed for study in translation are listed in the Examination Regulations. (Convenor: T. Morgan, Oriel).