Encounters with Greek Art : Image, Text, and the Invention of Identities in Rome and Roman Italy, 146 BCE-117 CE

Encounters with Greek Art sheds new light on the invention of ancient identities by focusing on encounters between viewers and artworks swept to Italy on the tides of Roman imperialism between 146 BCE and 117 CE.

Bringing globalization theory to bear on a wide range texts and images, MacDonald traces the construction and contestation of a critical nexus of categories: ‘Greek’ versus ‘Roman’, and ‘high’ culture versus ‘low’. As the book moves from text to image, from monumental to domestic space, and from the imperial capital to the towns of Italy, readers will discover how ‘Greekness’ and ‘Romanness’ were imagined and reimagined as contingent but powerful devices for grappling with the flux of images, objects, and individuals around the globalized world of the Roman empire.

This book is intended for scholars, graduate students, and advanced undergraduates interested in Greek and Latin literature, Roman visual culture, identity in antiquity, and histories of globalization.