The Hellenistic West
Rethinking the Ancient Mediterranean

Pathbreaking essays challenging the traditional focus on the eastern Mediterranean in the Hellenistic period and on Rome in the West.

Jonathan R. W. Prag (Edited by), Josephine Crawley Quinn (Edited by)

9781107032422, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 24 October 2013

516 pages, 124 b/w illus. 16 colour illus. 9 maps
25.2 x 18 x 2.6 cm, 1.15 kg

'… this valuable volume can be studied by scholar and student alike for its examination of the Hellenistic and Hellenism. With its different methodological approaches, places, and periods examined, [it] could provide a rich and far-reaching foundation for examining and re-examining our notions of the Hellenistic West, perhaps in a graduate course. That would be a course I would want to take.' Barbara Tsakirgis, Bryn Mawr Classical Review

Although the Hellenistic period has become increasingly popular in research and teaching in recent years, the western Mediterranean is rarely considered part of the 'Hellenistic world'; instead the cities, peoples and kingdoms of the West are usually only discussed insofar as they relate to Rome. This book contends that the rift between the 'Greek East' and the 'Roman West' is more a product of the traditional separation of Roman and Greek history than a reflection of the Hellenistic-period Mediterranean, which was a strongly interconnected cultural and economic zone, with the rising Roman republic just one among many powers in the region, east and west. The contributors argue for a dynamic reading of the economy, politics and history of the central and western Mediterranean beyond Rome, and in doing so problematise the concepts of 'East', 'West' and 'Hellenistic' itself.

Introduction Jonathan R. W. Prag and Josephine Crawley Quinn
1. The view from the East Andrew Erskine
2. Hellenistic Pompeii: between Oscan, Greek, Roman, and Punic Andrew Wallace-Hadrill
3. The 'Hellenistics of death' in Adriatic central Italy Ed Bispham
4. Hellenistic Sicily, c.270–100 BC Roger Wilson
5. Trading across the Syrtes: Euesperides and the Punic world Andrew Wilson
6. Strangers in the city: élite communication in the Hellenistic central Mediterranean Elizabeth Fentress
7. Monumental power: 'Numidian royal architecture' in context Josephine Crawley Quinn
8. Representing Hellenistic Numidia, in Africa and at Rome Ann Kuttner
9. Hellenism as subaltern practice: rural cults in the Punic world Peter van Dommelen and Mireia López-Bertran
10. Were the Iberians Hellenized? Simon Keay
11. Epigraphy in the western Mediterranean: a Hellenistic phenomenon? Jonathan R. W. Prag
12. Heracles, coinage, and the West: three Hellenistic case-studies Liv Yarrow
13. On the significance of East and West in today's 'Hellenistic' history Nicholas Purcell.

Subject Areas: Classical Greek & Roman archaeology [HDDK], Social & cultural history [HBTB], Classical history / classical civilisation [HBLA1], Ancient history: to c 500 CE [HBLA]