The Topography of Violence in the Greco-Roman World

8vo, br. ed. 416pp. What soldiers do on the battlefield or boxers do in the ring would be treated as criminal acts if carried out in an everyday setting. Perpetrators of violence in the classical world knew this and chose their venues and targets with care: killing Julius Caesar at a meeting of the Senate was deliberate. That location asserted Senatorial superiority over a perceived tyrant, and so proclaimed the pure republican principles of the assassins. The contributors to The Topography of Violence in the Greco-Roman World take on a task not yet addressed in classical scholarship: they examine how topography shaped the perception and interpretation of violence in Greek and Roman antiquity. After an introduction explaining the ìspatial turnî in the theoretical study of violence, ìpairedî chapters review political assassination, the battlefield, violence against women and slaves, and violence at Greek and Roman dinner parties. No other book either adopts the spatial theoretical framework or pairs the examination of different classes of violence in classical antiquity in this way. Table of Contents: Introduction Part 1. The Greek World 1. Xenophon and the Muleteer: Hubris, Retaliation, and the Purposes of Shame 2. The Spartan Krypteia 3. Where to Kill in Classical Athens: Assassinations, Executions, and the Athenian Public Space 4. The Crime That Dare Not Speak Its Name: Violence against Women in the Athenian Courts 5. Violence against Slaves in Classical Greece 6. The Greek Battlefield: Classical Sparta and the Spectacle of Hoplite Warfare 7. Violence at the Symposion Part 2. The Roman World 8. The Topography of Roman Assassination, 133 BCE-222 CE 9. Urban Violence: Street, Forum, Bath, Circus, and Theater 10. Violence against Women in Ancient Rome: Ideology versus Reality 11. Violence and the Roman Slave 12. The Roman Battlefield: Individual Exploits in Warfare of the Roman Republic 13. War as Theater, from Tacitus to Dexippus 14. Manipulating Space at the Roman Arena 15. Party Hard: Violence in the Context of Roman Cenae Contributors Index