// Latest Posts

Incest and Incense: A study session at the Nottingham Contemporary

Thea Lawrence on ancient perfume and the myth of Myrrha at Nottingham Contemporary Art Gallery In conjunction with their most recent exhibition, The House of Fame, the Nottingham Contemporary is running a series of (free!) study sessions, grouped under the alluring title of A Darkened Room: On Feminism, Rituals, Death and the Occult. For the …

How to write a bad essay

Edmund Stewart considers some of the common pitfalls in essay writing in Classics and Archaeology Here at Nottingham, as at most universities, it is essay season. We await with great hope and some trepidation the arrival of our students’ dissertations. In preparing for this moment, both students and staff may wonder what it is that …

Lysistrata returns to the Lakeside

Lynn Fotheringham previews the latest Greek drama production on campus  Five years ago Lakeside Arts and Nottingham New Theatre inaugurated a new collaborative project which gives theatre-loving students the opportunity to work with the Lakeside’s professional team on a production. The first play chosen for production was Aristophanes’ Lysistrata – using the Penguin translation by our …

Latin Now: The Lancaster Cavalry Inscription

Alex Mullen considers bilingualism and violent interactions in the Lancaster Cavalry Inscription I have been thinking again recently about the north-western Roman horse rider reliefs, which are concentrated in the Rhineland and, to a lesser extent, Britain (now boasting over 20), and have a primarily military focus. My favourite is that of Insus, found in …

Russians as Spartans? – or Putin the tyrant?

Edmund Stewart on Boris Johnson’s latest allusions to the ancient world In a recent interview with the Times, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson once again looked to the ancient world in an effort to explain modern Russia and its relations with the West. “I was reading Thucydides’ history of the Peloponnesian War. It was obvious …

Hylas and the Nymphs are back

Edmund Stewart on why the recent removal of Hylas and the Nymphs was not merely clumsy but wrong As has been widely reported in both the national press and this blog, Waterhouse’s masterpiece Hylas and the Nymphs was recently removed from display at Manchester Art Gallery in an attempt to ‘challenge a Victorian fantasy’ of …

Removing Waterhouse: perfect for the Hylas myth

Helen Lovatt reflects on Hylas and the Nymphs A famous Pre-Raphaelite painting by Waterhouse of Hylas and the Nymphs has been removed from its gallery (a gallery entitled In Pursuit of Beauty) by Manchester Art Gallery. According to a recent article in the Guardian the gallery sees ‘the removal itself [as] an artistic act’, designed to …

Harnessing Hobbyists in Classics Research

Gary Fisher Reflects on the Importance of Regional Meetings of the Classical Association I recently had the pleasure of attending a meeting of the Hull & District branch of the Classical Association as a visiting lecturer. The audience comprised the usual sort of individuals that one expects to find at a regional CA meeting: mostly …

Languages, Texts and Society: A New PG Journal

Melanie Fitton-Hayward announces a new post-graduate journal based at the University of Nottingham After publishing its first issue in April 2017, LTS editors are busy preparing for the second issue. There’s submissions to sort through, final articles to be edited, book reviews to be collated, peer reviewers to find, and style templates to be applied. …

Elephant archaeology

Holly Miller discusses her recent work with Sir David Attenborough to investigate the life of a nineteenth-century elephant. “The elephant is the largest of them all, and in intelligence approaches the nearest to man. It understands the language of its country… It is sensible alike of the pleasures of love and glory, and, to a …