Digging Up the Past introduces students to the fascinating field of anthropological archaeology in Florence--a living museum. The course will lay the foundations for understanding what anthropological archaeology is, how it’s done, how it can help us interpret the human past, and how it can help us navigate the current politics of cultural heritage. Analyzing different case studies, across the Ancient Near East, Eurasia and the Mediterranean, from Prehistory to Late Antiquity, several types of methodologies, techniques and types of evidence will be explored through lectures, hands-on lab activities and field trips to archaeological sites, museums and environmentally important locations in Florence.

The course provides a survey of the European “Dark Ages” by following the long transition that transformed the Western Roman Empire into a turmoil of barbarian kingdoms. This “Age of Barbarians” (4th -7th centuries CE; from Constantine to Charles the Great), also known as “Late Antiquity,” witnessed important political, religious and socio-economic changes, which effectively shaped Western Europe: during the process, several Roman institutions and traditions were granted continuity, while many others were forever obliterated. The available and often fragmentary sources – the most significant of which will be analyzed in class – paint a complex scenario, oscillating between aborted legacies, political upheavals and attempted revivals of an unsurpassable ancient glory; the former imperial unity slowly dissolves in a plurality of different new national and cultural identities. Respective focuses on each specific context involved (Italy, France, Spain, Britain, Germany, North Africa) will encompass most of the classes. Instability, delusional hopes and the lack of an imperial authority in the West, will last until the Christmas Night of 800 CE, when the Pope will crown a new Emperor of Rome, who will be defined “Roman,” although being a “barbarian.”

The Old Testament (i.e., the Hebrew Bible) has been used as a source for understanding how people inhabited the Near East and the eastern Mediterranean basin in ancient times. However, archaeological research has demonstrated how some of these interpretations are biased because of the religious beliefs connected to the Bible. Thus, how can we critically read the Bible and combine its historical and religious elements with the data yielded by archaeological investigations? What does the daily life of the people described in the Bible involve? And why has the Bible been used by biblical scholars without taking into consideration these prejudices? Following this

critical perspective, the course focuses on the Old Testament episodes as an expression of the religious life and thought of ancient Israel. The objective of the course is to contextualize the biblical story within its history, as well as in contemporary society, by using the available historical / archaeological data of the biblical civilizations. The course is a valuable approach to the historical dimension of the Bible, useful for all students interested not only in religious studies, but also anthropology, archaeology and history.

Prerequisites: None; a fair interest in ancient history is strongly recommended.

Wine, the Nectar of the Gods! Was wine as important in Italy in the ancient past as in today’s culture? Who drank wine in ancient times? Was wine only used for individual gratification and private banquets, or were there other social implications? Why is wine closely tied to “mysteries” and “bacchanals,” and what were the “symposia”? These are among the main questions that this course intends to analyze and connect to our modern consumption and cultural use of wine. In the Ancient World, viticulture, wine, and then “drinking Greek style” spread throughout the Mediterranean in succeeding waves of acculturation that involved Greeks, Etruscans, and Romans. Since wine played a major role in social cohesion, identity construction, and symbolic boundary-making, the course provides a privileged point of observation on different aspects of the Classical civilizations. The first half of this course offers a diachronic and interdisciplinary profile of wine production, trade and consumption in ancient Italy from the 9th century BCE to the end of the Roman Empire, through a variety of primary sources: artifacts, artworks, and ancient texts. In the second part of the course students explore and discuss with a synchronic and anthropological perspective topics such as wine in Greek myth/religion, gender implications in the polis and in Etruria, wine abuse, and the consumption of wine as status symbol, in order to link the Classical past to our world.

This course looks at the supernatural (i.e. spirits, ghosts, afterlife, netherworld etc.) and at the different practices through which humans – in ancient cultures – got in touch with, and represented it. A large part of the course will be dedicated to the various aspects of magic and sorcery, along with shamanism, divination, necromancy (evocation of the dead) and curses (namely binding and love curses). Several classes will also be focused on restless dead and ghosts, a privileged medium through which ancient people were believed to get in touch with the beyond. Documentary material, such as reproductions of ancient magical papyri and cursed tablets will be shown, and comparisons will be drawn – when relevant – with modern cultures and folklore.