The Greek and Roman world have fascinated men and women across the world and across the centuries, and has come to embody for some of us values and concepts we hold particularly dear: philosophy, democracy, beauty, and eros. The artefacts we propose today to your attention provide us a gateway across the centuries, and allow us to have a brief glimpse into the daily lives and the political machinations of the ancient world. The number of vessels connected to dining and drinking would have been part of the rituals of socialisation of the elites, while the coins tell us much about the messages that leaders wanted to convey to the people. In particular, we present you two exceptionally rare gold coins struck during the “year of the four Emperors”, the succession crisis following the death of Nero in AD 68, when four men rapidly succeeded to each other on the throne. I am sure that you’ll find interesting looking at how, during a period of deep political and institutional crisis while the Empire was on the verge of civil war, two men sitting on the throne -Galba and Otho-, used their coinage to portray idealised themes of harmony, peace, and triumph.

Ever since humans first started drawing on cave walls, the animal world served as an endless source of fascination. Since humans developed the capacity for sym- bolic thinking, various ancient cultures have felt the need to represent the world surrounding them in an attempt to make sense of all its beauty and variety. The desire to assign symbolism to animals inhabiting landscapes I believe connects human cultures across time. Depictions of animals in art remind us not only of themselves, but also of the qualities and traits we assign to them. Artists depicting animals cast bridges across divides of human vs non-human interaction, enabling humans to reconnect with the landscapes they inhabit. My fascination with animals began at a really young age when I started collecting artefacts representing animals from different times and places. Over the years, I have collected painted pottery, clay sculptures, carved stone, and sculpture in precious metal representing animals. The masterpieces se- lected for this catalogue show the link between understanding our world and the animal world. The terracotta vessels from the Indus Valley Civilisation representing local fauna stand as a testament to man’s bond with his natural environment. Vivid images of stylised animals show the incredible biodiversity of this area and the meaningful relationship between man and nature which I have tried to make sense of in my art and through the artefacts I have collected.

The skull is the universal image of death and the afterlife. It is one of the most powerful images of the transitoriness of our human experience, and at the same time almost mystically embodies the concept of the afterlife. While many of us may today think about death as the ultimate ending of the experience called life, the distinction was not as strong in antiquity. In fact, for many ancient civilisations the concept of death did not signify simply an end, but rather a step that everyone must take to enter the underworld or the afterlife. Accepting the natural cycle of human life, those populations were not afraid to confront the concept of death. Indeed, the idea of life and death is often expressed in their art forms and constantly present in their daily life and rituals. For example, in Meso-American cultures the skull was not intended as a macabre symbol, but as concomitant with life, existing side by side, the one essential to and nurturing the other. The Maya, the Aztecs, and other cultures regarded the ‘other world’ as an integral part of the physical world, and that the barrier separating the two was like a revolving door. Since the afterlife is ‘peopled’ with spirits and deities, they must be honoured and given offerings so as to ensure their favourable help in the material world. Therefore, cults venerating and appeasing death flourished for centuries, and are still a fundamental part of many cultures. Skulls featured heavily in those cults and practices. These magnificent artefacts grab our attention in an instant. They strike deeply into our primordial consciousness. Their unadorned power is elemental, forceful and penetrating.

Edited by Gabriel Zuchtriegel, with contributions by Angelo Bottini, Carlo Rescigno, Andrea Averna, Luigi Gallo, Achille Bonito Oliva, Maria Emanuela Oddo

The purpose of this thesis is to shed light on the socio-political ideology of the warrior-aristocracy of Ruvo di Puglia and the inhabitants of the Greek polis of Metaponto through observation of the motifs on the figured vessels placed in wealthy tombs. By examining the mortuary deposits of the Ruvo tombs alongside those from Metaponto, we will be able to see some similarities between the two cities. While these similarities imply a level of cultural sharing, they more succinctly show that the indigenous inhabitants of Ruvo were quite selective in borrowing from the Greeks. However, the differences provide the best insight into the fascinating practices of the Apulians. I show that the Apulian chieftains coveted a warrior-hero status and were not hesitant to liken themselves to the legendary Achilles or Herakles, while the Greeks saw such practices as a breach of the fundamental principles of their polis-centered egalitarianism. This is significant for the understanding of the cultural environment of Magna Graecia since only little remains in terms of primary sources on the subject.

Ph.D. Dissertation, in English, from the Department of Historical Studies, University of Gothenburg (Box 200, 405 30 Göteborg), Sweden, 2015. As an embodied transgression of binary gender, Hermaphroditus has fascinated and troubled audiences ever since Antiquity. Because of the scarcity of extant literary sources, this mythological figure has primarily survived in the shape of images, often fragmentary and of uncertain provenance. Based on these fragments, the current scholarly consensus maintains that Hermaphroditus was represented as an attractive but erotically disabled figure, whose dual sexual characteristics were intended to provoke surprise and possibly laughter. This dissertation challenges these assumptions by analysing how Hermaphroditus could and could not be portrayed in relation to other figures. The primary source material consists of twenty-four separate group scenes, five of which survive in multiple replicas. The artworks are dated from the 1st century BCE to the 2nd century CE, originating in the Roman era and area. They are analysed using a theoretical framework focusing on materiality and on identity as something constantly re-created through relationships, based on the writings of Sara Ahmed, Donna Haraway and Karen Barad. The first analytical chapter reappraises Hermaphroditus’ unique gender role, concluding that the figure is not portrayed as half man, half woman but, instead, presents an amalgamation of elements from conventional representations of beautiful women and boys. Through thematic analyses of the group scenes, the study further concludes that, firstly, Hermaphroditus enjoys high status among the companions and, secondly, is pursued as a legitimate object of desire by satyrs, Pan and Silenus. It is only in the cases where Hermaphroditus misbehaves by actively initiating contact that the bestial males respond negatively. Hermaphroditus, thus, upsets modern expectations of atypically sexed bodies as unhappy and disabled. Because the figure can be represented as simultaneously desiring and desirable, it also challenges Roman expectations of normative erotic behaviour. Hermaphroditus’ confinement to the world of myth and the artworks’ original contexts of display in spaces devoted to leisure simultaneously suggest that Hermaphroditus’ norm-critical potential was limited. Therefore, the group scenes should be understood as always containing the potential for both destabilisation and reinforcement of normative constructions of gendered bodies. Keywords: Hermaphroditus, Roman art, materiality, gender, relationships, desire, queer, Sara Ahmed, Donna Haraway, Karen Barad Awarded the Per Nyström Award for Outstanding Historical Scholarship 2016 by The Royal Society of Arts and Sciences in Gothenburg