May 18-June 20, 2006 Archaeological season in Omrit, Israel

Macalester College Classics Department News
Check out the Classics Department offerings for Spring 2006!

EVENTS

Kenchreai Excavation.
   The American School of Classical Studies in Athens (Greece) has recently awarded Prof. Rife a permit to conduct a large-scale excavation at ancient Kenchreai, the eastern port of Corinth on the Aegean Sea, in 2007-2009. This is a rare honor, because only two or three American scholars are awarded permission to dig in Greece each year, and the American School has not in recent decades (or perhaps ever) granted an excavation permit to a liberal arts college. Prof. Rife has worked at Kenchreai since 2002, directing an interdisciplinary study of a major cemetery of Roman date. His excavations will expand beyond the cemetery to include the entire northern district of the ancient port-town, one of the busiest in southeastern Europe during the Roman Empire.
Prior excavations at Kenchreai have proven that this spectacular site, which remains today mostly buried under open fields, is a treasure-trove of well-preserved glass and stone mosaics, monumental architecture, wall-painting, vast quantities of pottery, inscriptions and coins, and even wooden and ivory-sheathed furniture. Apart from its archaeological richness, Kenchreai is significant for the study of economic and maritime history, and it is a crucial site for understanding ancient cultural and religious diversity. The New Testament mentions the port-town several times in relation to St. Paul's establishment of the congregation there and his correspondence with local church members. Kenchreai also figures in the most important scene of pagan conversion in ancient literature, the final chapter of the great Roman novel The Golden Ass, in which the protagonist Lucius enters the mystery-cult of Isis, which was imported to Kenchreai from Egypt.
Prof. Rife's new excavations will target a previously unexplored early Christian basilica, a neighborhood of lavish private residences on the waterfront, and a large square structure overlooking the harbor that might represent the famous lost Temple of Aphrodite at Kenchreai. The Kenchreai Excavations will provide a truly unique opportunity for students, staff and friends to learn about archaeology and ancient history firsthand; to work in the trenches alongside international experts in several fields; and to live in one of Greece's most beautiful regions during the balmy summer months. Prof. Rife will be looking for many participants--40-60 are projected per season--so start considering it now! To learn more about recent work at Kenchreai, see: http://www.macalester.edu/classics/kenchreai/

Twenty-six Classics students traveled with Andy Overman, Nanette Goldman and Michael Nelson in Turkey.
They started in Istanbul and visited many locations, including Pergamum, Sardis, Smyrna, Ephesus, Priene, Miletus, Didyma, Aphrodisias, Hieropolis and Pisidian Antioch.
Click here to read more and see pictures.
Click to see photo albums created by student participant, Zachary Teicher.

Macalester has received a $100,000 Ford Foundation Grant. The project will build upon two initiatives that started in our department, the archaeological work in Israel and the 2002 Mideast Peace Summit. Click here to read more about it.

Mireille Lee is spending the year as a junior fellow at Harvard's Center for Hellenic Studies in Washington, D.C., America's top institute for research on ancient Greece. She is one of 11 fellows from the U.S. and Europe in residence during the 2005-06 academic year. Lee is pursuing her studies on dress and gender in ancient Greece.

Joe Rife has been chosen to be a Member of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J. The institute was founded in 1930 to support advanced scholarship and fundamental research in historical studies, mathematics, natural sciences and social science. Members join an international community of some 180 scholars. Rife has joined 25 other members from around the world in the School for Historical Studies for the academic year 2005-06, where he is researching death, memory, social structure and cultural identity in ancient Greece under Roman rule.

Grants Awarded to support Kenchreai Cemetery Project The Classics Department is pleased to announce that Professor Joseph L. Rife has received two awards to support his interdisciplinary archaeological study of the Roman cemetery at Kenchreai, near ancient Corinth in southern Greece. The Kenchreai Cemetery Project brings 10 to 12 Macalester students to Greece each year, where they join an international team of scholars surveying the cemetery. In this context, they study death, social structure and religion in a major provincial port town during the Roman Empire. Rife was chosen as this year's Shohet Scholar through a grant program of the International Catacomb Society, which supports one scholar each year whose work promotes the preservation, restoration and documentation of the catacombs in Rome and elsewhere that contain paintings, epigraphy and artifacts depicting the cultures and customs of early religions. Rife has also received an award from Harvard's Loeb Classical Library Foundation, which supports projects in all areas of classical studies.

Alumni News
Alumni! We want to hear from you. What are you up to? Have news to share with your fellow Classicists? Send us an email at pitman@macalester.edu and we will happily include you in this section.

Jason Schlude, '03: wrote in June 2004 that he passed his MA exam at Berkeley. He said, "As for what's next, I continue on here in the doctoral program this coming
fall". He assures us that, "I have not yet, to my knowledge anyway, completely stained the reputation of Macalester here at Berkeley. Then again, I still have plenty of time for that next year and perhaps in the years thereafter".

Tim Wallace, '02: "I am in England now, Southampton, doing a MA in Maritime Archaeology. The course (Maritime Archaeology MA/MSc - University of Southampton) has really started to pick up now that we are in our second semester. I am taking courses on conservation of underwater cultural materials, maritime geoarchaeology, conservation of the maritime cultural zone and a class on methods in underwater archaeology. The conservation of underwater cultural materials class is based in Portsmouth, at the Mary Rose Trust. [The Mary Rose was a 16th century English warship and favorite of Henry VIII - it was excavated and raised in the late 70's and early 80's - one of the largest (famous, expensive, etc.) maritime archaeological investigations of our time] We will be working primarily with artifacts from the Mary Rose. My dissertation is due in September, which will more than likely involve a GIS investigation of a European port-city and its changes through time through the use of historic maps, archaeological remains and survey, etc. It's still in its 'convoluted' stage, as what I am going to write is not too clear just yet. After my program here, I plan to (eventually, but I don't know when - could be next spring, or the following fall) pursue a masters in GIS. I suppose the most important thing to say is that the course here is really great. I was a little down on it last semester, but now that things have gotten a little more interdisciplinary (chemistry, geology, geography, etc.) I am really loving it."

Ben Rubin, '01::" I am currently finishing up my second year of grad school at the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor) in the Interdepartmental Program in Classical Art and Archaeology and I'm having a great time. The classes I have taken thus far have been challenging, enlightening and extremely varied, ranging from basic language classes like Herodotus to more exotic seminars on topics such as Iranian Art and Archaeology, Power and Ideology and Survey Methodology. The wide range of material covered in these classes has helped me to approach my main research interests (i.e. the Roman Imperial cult,Greek/Jewish identity under the Roman empire) in new ways. In addition to my PHD, I am working on obtaining a certificate in Greek and Roman History, as well as masters degree in the Greek language. This summer I will be working at the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology (Ann Arbor) doing research in connection with a show entitled "Individual and Society in Ancient Egypt" (March 7-August 9 if anyone's in town). I hope to finish an article on Egyptian bronze votive dedication from the late New Kingdom to the Hellenistic Period."

Rebecca Blom Carle, '98: "I am living in rural Salisbury, NH, and enjoying the thrill of being a new mom to my son born in January 2004. I continue to work part-time as Collections Manager at the Mt. Kearsarge Indian Museum and am really enjoying the opportunity to mentor those who are just beginning their museum careers. I am fortunate to work at a family-friendly place that allows me to continue pursuing my career goals while caring for my son, something I was not certain I would be able to do when I was dreaming about my future when I was still at Mac. I guess all things are possible if you look hard enough.
It is great to hear about all the exciting activities going on at Mac Classics. Best of luck to all."

Chris Dayton, '98 "I'm in my third year of study in the Archaeology Department at Boston University. I will be focusing on the central Andean region of South America in my dissertation work, but my technical experience (oddly enough) brings me back to classics now and then. For instance, last summer I worked briefly
at a site on the Spanish island of Menorca, carrying out ground-penetrating radar surveys for the Boston University field school there. Most of my other fieldwork since I participated in the Macalester Black Sea Project in 1998 has been in Peru and Bolivia. I'll be getting married this coming summer, so further fieldwork will have to wait, but eventually I'll be using ground-penetrating radar and other geophysical methods to map buried structures at several South American sites."

Did we forget something? Have alumni news to share? Contact pitman@macalester.edu

Page last updated 03/09//2006