Volume 39 : Articles

The Civilian's View of Late Roman Soldiers

By: Hugh Elton

When historians discuss the Roman army, they usually talk about the administration of the army or about the army at war. I shall do neither. Instead, I try to show how civilians saw the army when it was away from the battlefield. In many ways their view was very different from the “sharp end,” the […]

Insights from the Severan Plan and the Regionary Catalogues

By: David West Reynolds

Much of the urban fabric of ancient Rome is lost to us. The famous monuments offer a powerful testament to the grandeur of the imper­ial capital, and Rome’s surviving architectural legacy is rich indeed. However, it was in dwellings, shops, work­rooms, and other minor structures that most of the pop­ulation spent most of their lives. […]

By: Michael Vickers

Collectors and scholars have communicated, through exhibits and auction house sales catalogues, that during the time of the Roman Empire glass was a luxury material highly sought after. We assume that glass in antiquity might represent the acme of human acquisitiveness, and suppose that glass was an autonomous craft with its own traditions. So when […]

By: Denise Schmandt-Besserat

Animal figurines are a familiar find on Near Eastern sites from the 9th to the 3rd millenni­um BC and from the Levant to Iran. Their function, however, is still enigmatic. Excavations at the Neolithic site of ‘Ain Ghazal (ca. 8300-6000 BC, calibrated dates), located near Amman, Jordan, have produced an impres­sive assemblage of clay artifacts […]

Behind the Scenes

By: Adria H. Katz and Jennifer L. White

From the east coast of Africa through South and Southeast Asia to the islands of Melanesia, wherever the areca palm (Area catechu) and the betel pepper vine (Per betle) grow, the fruit of the palm and the leaf of the vine are combined with slaked lime to form an astringent, mildly stimulating quid. According to […]

By: David R. Starbuck

Health care in 18th-century America was radically different from today, and one of the greatest contrasts is in the role played by hospitals. The 18th-century hospital was a rar­ity, except in urban settings such as New York and Philadelphia where the poor needed inexpen­sive, readily accessible health care and could not afford to get it at home. […]

By: Paul Yule

In 1870, while tending cattle, two young boys in the village of Ghangaria in central India noticed a long metal object poking out of the ground. Grubbing at the spot revealed many more such pieces, and soon word of the find reached local officials. The discovery of this hoard, with over five hundred copper and […]

By: Patrick E. McGovern and Ulrich Hartung and Virginia R. Badler and Donald L. Glusker and Lawrence J. Exner

The origins of winemaking and viniculture are shrouded in the mists of human prehistory. Scenarios of how wine might have been discovered, however, are easily conjured up. One can imagine a group of early humans foraging in a river valley, dense with vegetation. They are captivated by brightly colored berries hanging in large clusters from […]

By: Helen Schenck

Once hundred years ago, the University of Pennsylvania Museum put out its first periodical, entitled The Bulletin of the Free Museum of Science and Art (that being the original name of the Museum). Over the next 60 years the Museum suc­cessively launched and retired various serial publications (see below). As Expedition nears the end of […]