Postgraduate Course: Death and Burial in the Greek World (PGHC11517)
Course Outline
| School | School of History, Classics and Archaeology |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Not available to visiting students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This course offers a holistic exploration of Greek burial customs covering a wide range of case studies (e.g. Argos, Athens, Corinth, Miletos, Vergina) during the Geometric to the early Hellenistic periods. It will familiarise students with the archaeological evidence (contexts incl. grave goods, images, topography) and offer insights into theoretical and methodological approaches and current academic debates. |
| Course description |
This course is designed to familiarise students with a variety of preserved burial contexts as well as the associated material culture (e.g. images, monuments and artefacts). We will examine a representative range of the considerable corpus of archaeological evidence for Greek burial customs from the Geometric to Early Hellenistic periods.
The course will cover not only the way in which humans buried humans but also what this can tell us about the Greek society during different historical periods and in different parts of the Greek World. Students will gain a deeper insight into the variety of grave types, rituals and associated objects and will be encouraged to use this knowledge to discuss theoretical and methodological approaches on how to interpret them. In-class discussion and in-class presentation will further enhance students' ability to evaluate and communicate diverging opinions of academic debates, as well as to develop their own viewpoints.
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Course Delivery Information
| Not being delivered |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate in seminar participation and in their course essay a detailed and critical command of the body of knowledge related to 'Death and Burial in the Greek World' (e.g. case-studies ranging from the Geometric to the Early Hellenistic periods).
- Demonstrate in seminar participation and in their course essay an ability to analyse and critically reflect upon relevant scholarship and primary source material, and conceptual discussions of Greek burial customs through material culture.
- Demonstrate in seminar presentation, discussions, and in their course essay an ability to understand and apply specialised research on different types of source materials (images, monuments, artefacts).
- Demonstrate the ability to develop and sustain original scholarly arguments in oral and written form in seminar discussions, presentations, and their course essay by independently formulating appropriate questions and utilising relevant evidence considered in the course.
- Demonstrate in seminar participation and their course essay originality and independence of mind and initiative; intellectual integrity and maturity; an ability to evaluate the work of others, including peers; and a considerable degree of autonomy.
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Reading List
Dimitriadou, E. M. (2019). Early Athens: Settlements and the cemeteries during the Submycenaean, Geometric and Archaic periods. California: Cotsen Institute of Arts, University of California.
Henry, O., & Kelp, U. (2016). Tumulus as sema: Space, politics, culture and religion in the first millennium BC. Berlin Boston: De Gruyter.
Hermary, A., & Dubois, C. (2012). L'enfant et la mort dans l'Antiquité. Paris Aix-en-Provence: Centre Camille Jullian Errance (incl. articles in engl.)
Kurtz, D. C., & Boardman, J. (1971). Greek burial customs. London: Thames & Hudson.
Mee, C. (2012). Death and burial. The Oxford Handbook of the Bronze Age Aegean. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Tarlow, S., & Nilsson Stutz, L. (2013). The Oxford Handbook of the archaeology of death and burial (First edition.). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Slane, K. W. (2017). Tombs, burials, and commemoration in Corinth's northern cemetery. Princeton, NJ: American School of Classical Studies at Athens.
Sourvinou-Inwood, C. (1996). 'Reading' Greek death: To the end of the classical period. Oxford, England : New York: Clarendon Press ; Oxford University Press.
Sporn, K., Kalogeroudi, E., & Kasubke, E. (2013). Griechische Grabbezirke klassischer Zeit: Normen und Regionalismen ; Akten des Internationalen Kolloquiums am Deutschen Archäologischen Institut, Abteilung Athen, 20. - 21. November 2009. München: Hirmer. (includes articles in english).
Vlachou, V. 2012. Death and Burial in the Greek World, ThesCRA VIII, Add. to vol. VI, 363-384.
Wittke, A.-M. (2018). The Early Mediterranean World, 1200-600 BC. Brill's New Pauly. |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
After successful completion of this course, students will have gained in-depth knowledge of key contexts and objects related to Greek burial customs and the ability to critically evaluate theories and methods used by modern scholarship when analysing archaeological evidence. They will have developed a greater understanding for the diversity of evidence from ancient Greece against the background of Greek religion and history.
Skills such as the analysis and interpretation of archaeological objects and contexts, and the effective use of primary and secondary literature will be developed by means of seminar presentations, group discussions, and guided reading. Students will develop skills to effectively evaluate modern scholarship in oral and written form. |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Anja Slawisch
Tel: (0131 6)50 6693
Email: |
Course secretary | Mr Jonathan Donnelly
Tel: (0131 6)50 3782
Email: |
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