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Twenty students from the University of Georgia spent three weeks exploring Croatia and Venice this last Maymester. Led by Profs. Jordan Pickett and Cari Goetcheus, students from a wide range of majors—biology, engineering, business, history and pre-law, as well as the professors’ home departments of Classics and historic preservation— traveled from Zagreb to the Adriatic. Working their way up the Adriatic coast, from Split to Zadar and Pula, the program concluded with several days in Venice (which controlled Croatia’s littoral for the better part of seven centuries, until 1797).
Throughout these weeks, a vast spectrum of history and landscapes confronted our students: traveling and learning to look and study architecture and landscapes carefully in situ, while reading and discussing, is a transformative experience. For the professors, providing this experience was thrilling.
“We can see the difference travel makes in students' curiosity and engagement with the world around them,” said Pickett and Goetcheus.
Moreover, the world is especially complex throughout the Adriatic, with deeply layered urban histories and landscapes. For instance, throughout their journey together, students and faculty visited modern cities known for their wealth of Roman archaeology, such as Split, where the emperor Diocletian’s Palace is remarkably well-preserved and became the nucleus of the medieval and modern town, as well as abandoned sites like the marvelously huge Roman-Byzantine city of Salona, and incredible cultural landscapes like the lunar island of Pag, where the group toured a two thousand-year-old olive grove and a famous cheese factory! Many students ate their first whole (grilled) fish in Dalmatia, and truffles were enjoyed in Istria, too.
Another highlight for students was taking a ferry to the island of Brijuni, where Yugoslav dictator Josep Broz Tito had his summer villa: Tito followed the Romans there, as more than half a dozen ancient villas have been excavated on Brijuni in recent decades. For faculty, perhaps, another highlight was going to the Biennale in Venice where they walked with students there, to the other end of the Rialto and more than a mile from the hotel, and students had to navigate to find their own way home afterwards!
The University of Georgia has been sending students to Croatia for nearly nineteen years, for a tapestry of transformative experiences, and the Classics department looks forward to more years ahead!
UGA in Rome, one of the university’s two founding study away programs, is an experiential learning opportunity that truly transforms and inspires. Students get to walk among the city's storied ruins, winding streets, fountains, palaces, and churches to encounter the history of the world’s most famous emperors, saints, and artists first-hand. Experience the Eternal City to the lens of some of the faculty involved and students who attended UGA in Rome:
Andres Matlock bids a farewell and takes on a new role
Pictured: current UGA in Rome director Andres Matlock (left) and former UGA in Rome director Elena Bianchelli (right)
2025 turned out to be quite a historic year for UGA in Rome. We already knew it was going to be a Jubilee year, with all that it means for the city: the pomp, the crowds of pilgrims and onlookers, and the freshly restored monuments. Then, after the death of Pope Francis just weeks before we were set to depart, the election of Pope Leo added another level of excitement for many of our students, who were especially keen to see the first American pope. But, for the history of UGA in Rome, the most significant event of the year was the retirement of Director Elena Bianchelli. Elena served the program in many capacities over the course of nearly 40 years, including 11 years as the director.
For me, she has been a wonderful guide, thoughtful traveling companion, and dear friend. I know that every student who traveled with her over her long tenure remembers her fondly and appreciates the legacy she leaves behind: her dedication, kindness, and unfailing recommendations for the best “gelaterie” in Rome. We held the final group meal of this summer's program in her honor, and I hope that many of those reading this newsletter will join us in celebrating and congratulating Elena.
UGA in Rome shaped Katie McGehee college experience
Pictured: Kate McGehee (right) and friend, Riley Wilder (left)
My name is Kate McGehee, and I am a third-year English major in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. This past summer, I participated in the UGA in Rome program, and months later, I can still say it was one of the most rewarding experiences during my time at UGA.
This unique four-week program gave me the opportunity to immerse myself in a new culture while exploring the historical connections between ancient and modern Rome. The city itself became our classroom as we spent each day visiting iconic landmarks from the Trevi Fountain to the Colosseum.
The program also provided plenty of free time for me and my classmates to embark on our own adventures, whether that be trying out different Italian restaurants and browsing local shops, or strolling through ancient parks and even attending an Ed Sheeran concert in Rome’s Olympic Stadium!
Above all else, however, my study abroad experience in Rome has brought me lifelong friendships with other UGA students who continue to shape my college experience back in Athens, GA.
First-year master’s student, Eli Peacock is still inspired by UGA in Rome
Pictured: Eli Peacock
For a month, I woke up next to the Colosseum, a wonder of the ancient world and our modern metro stop. This summer, I was lucky enough to go on the UGA in Rome program with Director Matlock and Director Bianchelli.
As we experienced the Eternal City, our professors encouraged us to consider the layers of history shaped over thousands of years. I went expecting the ancient world but found myself enthralled by everything between now and then.
We learned about Renaissance palazzi and Grand Tour collections and modern rediscoveries. Our professors taught us to critically examine the context of creation but also the contexts of preservation that allow us to see slices of the ancient world today. Though any trip to Rome would certainly contain great wonder, there was so very much to gain from the brilliant professors and peers I was able to learn from.
From ascending Athens’ Akropolis on our first morning to visiting Rome’s Trevi on our last, this program was truly inspiring, and I cannot more highly recommend it.
Professor Christian Langer was quoted in an article regarding a Chinese team that is working on investigating the origins of Egyptian writing.
Professor Jordan Pickett will be presenting this week at Indiana University's "Macedonia in the Mediterrranean Context: Ports, Connections, and Culture" conference, alongside speakers from across the US, UK, and Greece. Dr Pickett's paper "Via illa nostra…militaris: A Brief Longue-Durée History of the Via Egnatia" considers archaeological and textual evidence for Bronze and Iron Age predecessor routes to the Roman Via Egnatia, which connected the Adriatic coast to Byzantium. Those interested can register to attend via Zoom with this link: https://www.lindseyamazurek.com/
Application deadline April 1st
In the Second Summer Short Session Dr. Mark Abbe will teach “Approaches to Greek and Roman Visual Culture” (CLAS 4/6300). This course will offer a critical (re)introduction to the visual arts, particularly sculpture, painting, and architecture of the Greek and Roman worlds from the so-called “Homeric Age” (c. 1050 BC) to the beginnings of Late Antiquity (c. AD 330). A key intent is to improve the uses of images in Classics education. While images are central to the larger Classics project, how and when are they to be engaged most productively so as not merely to illustrate, but to expand, enrich, and complicate our understanding of ancient culture? In this course providing a solid chronological survey of the visual cultures of Classical antiquity, particular emphases will be paid to rethinking seemingly familiar, well-known if not iconic works of art and architecture, and the complex and often complementary relationships between images and textual sources (literary, epigraphic, etc.). The importance of context in the reception of ancient images, static and portable, will be explored. New archaeological discoveries and on-going debates will be highlighted. We will explore the experiential aspects of works of art through critical engagement with virtual computer-based reconstructions of Roman architecture and sculpture.
Image: An inspiration to Virgil or an illustration of the Aeneid (2.199-233)? The Trojan priest Laocoön and his sons attacked at the altar by a great serpent. Marble sculpture carved by three Rhodian sculptors, 1st c. BC/AD. From Rome, Oppian Hill. Vatican Museum.
In the first short session of the 2021 summer institute, Dr. O’Connell will be teaching Petronius’ Satyricon (LATN 8010), a tale of sex, food, and money set in first-century Campania. Often identified as a precursor of the picaresque novel, the Satyricon recounts the adventures of Encolpius and his disreputable friends. Much of the work is lost. In the longest surviving section, the wealthy former slave Trimalchio hosts a sensational dinner party where birds fly out of a cooked boar, guests tell stories of witches and werewolves, and Trimalchio acts out his own funeral. We will be reading the entire Cena Trimalchionis, as well as selections from the other fragments of the Satyricon. This plunge into the world of Petronius will improve your Latin, teach you about fiction and narrative technique, and give you a new perspective on Roman culture in the early empire. You will also learn ways to improve your own teaching. Petronius’s Latin features occasionally unusual vocabulary but relatively straightforward grammar, and intermediate Latin students often read adaptations of the Satyricon.
UGA senior Emeline McClellan of Good Hope will continue her studies in Classics this fall as one of 24 Americans selected as a Gates Cambridge Scholar. The scholarship fully funds postgraduate study and research in any subject at the University of Cambridge in England.
https://franklin.uga.edu/news/stories/2021/classics-student-named-gates-cambridge-scholar
The show will feature 56 objects dating from the 3rd to the 8th century CE and examine the cultural exchange that took place in late antique Egypt.
Parker Curator of Russian Art Asen Kirin organized the exhibition. Kirin said, “What is so fascinating about the art from late antique Egypt is that it details, in a very profound way, the mixture of the different cultural traditions in the Mediterranean region.” An example of this mixture of cultures can be seen in the stone relief of Leda and the swan. The relief depicts a pagan, Greco-Roman, mythological subject interpreted in a nonclassical style intended for the tomb of an Egyptian Christian woman.
Image: Lions and antelope, 6th or 7th century CE. Limestone relief fragment; architectural element, 12 × 29 1/4 × 2 1/8 inches. Possibly from El Minya. The Nadler Collection.
Athens, GA – If you think of Egyptian art as just pharaohs and pyramids, you’re missing a big part of the picture. The Georgia Museum of Art at the University of Georgia will present the exhibition “Modernism Foretold: The Nadler Collection of Late Antique Art from Egypt” from November 5, 2020, opening at 5 p.m., to September 26, 2021. The show will feature 56 objects dating from the 3rd to the 8th century CE and examine the cultural exchange that took place in late antique Egypt.
All works in the exhibition are from the collection of Emanuel and Anna Nadler and will be on display to the public for the first time in nearly 40 years. The Nadler family has long been one of the most important collectors of Coptic art. Emanuel’s father, Maurice Nadler, a prominent industrialist from Alexandria who made art acquisitions in Egypt and Germany, originally put this collection together between 1920 and 1941, fueled by the profits from his candy factory.
Defining Coptic art can be difficult. The Copts are ethnic Egyptians who spoke the native language and practiced Christianity, writing in the Greek alphabet. For a long period of history, native Egyptians were under the rule of others – Persians, Hellenistic Greeks, Romans, the Byzantine Empire and Islamic Arabs. Today, instead of using the term Coptic art, scholars prefer to say “late antique art from Egypt,” thus emphasizing the fact that this art was made by and for native Egyptians, Greeks and Romans who favored both classical pagan and Christian themes. This mixture of cultures defines late antique art from Egypt. Parker Curator of Russian Art Asen Kirin organized the exhibition. Kirin said, “What is so fascinating about the art from late antique Egypt is that it details, in a very profound way, the mixture of the different cultural traditions in the Mediterranean region.” An example of this mixture of cultures can be seen in the stone relief of Leda and the swan. The relief depicts a pagan, Greco-Roman, mythological subject interpreted in a nonclassical style intended for the tomb of an Egyptian Christian woman. The exhibition will include other funerary objects like sculptures as well as works from the realm of everyday life, like miniature bone and ivory carvings, textiles and small chests to store precious items. Tapestries and remnants of tapestries that would have adorned the walls of churches will also be on display. The extraordinary works of art being displayed are as expressive as they are innovative. They tell a story of what was yet to come. Kirin adds, “That’s why we say ‘Modernism Foretold’ because at the turn of the century, Coptic art was viewed as a historical precursor to modernism.” The museum is also publishing a fully illustrated catalogue of the exhibition, with entries by Katherine Marsengill that illuminate the importance and context of each object, and an essay by Kirin that discusses the history of the Nadler Collection. Upcoming events related to the exhibition include:
The Georgia Museum of Art is located in the Performing and Visual Arts Complex on the East Campus of the University of Georgia. The address is 90 Carlton Street, University of Georgia, Athens, Ga. 30602-1502. For more information, including hours, see georgiamuseum.org or call 706.542.4662.
Dr. Jordan Pickett spoke last week about the archaeology of epidemics -- past and present, including CoVid19 and the Justinianic Plague -- on the Infectious Historians podcast, produced by colleagues Lee Mordechai and Merle Eisenberg from the Princeton Climate Change and History Research Initiative. Give it a listen! Topics addressed include mass burials, paleogenetics, osteoarchaeology, and the material culture of cities as windows into epidemic events from the past.
Apple Podcast link ; Podcast weblink, with open-access bibliography
IMAGE: View from late antique fortifications at Sardis, Western Turkey. Photo credit: Jordan Pickett
UGA Classics explores Greek and Roman culture (material; intellectual; religious) from Troy to Augustine; Classical languages and literatures (Greek, Latin, and in English translation); and the reception of Classical Antiquity with A.B. and M.A. Classics degrees with multiple areas of emphasis. Double Dawgs degrees focus on careers in Historic Preservation and World Language Education. Minor degrees in Classical Culture and Classics and Comparative Cultures complement degree programs across campus. New to Classics? Take a course with us on campus or in Europe and acquire future-ready skills.
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