Richard Alston
Biographic Data
| ID | 1087802 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Richard Alston |
| GIVEN NAMES | Richard |
| FAMILY NAME | Alston |
| SIGNATURE | ALSTON R |
| AFFILIATIONS | Royal Holloway University of London |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0843-9555 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 21 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 7 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 19 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1920 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2022 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Spaces of Desire: Houses, Households and Social Reproduction in the Roman World
This chapter uses the spatial theory of Henri Lefebvre to examine the way in which the Roman house operated as a ‘space of desire’ and to illuminate the processes of house and household formation and social reproduction. It draws on a variety of Roman examples, including Pliny’s villas, the luxury villas of the Roman imperial period and late antiquity, and the small houses of Roman Egypt. Spatial theory focuses attention on the processes of socia…
The Utopian City in Tacitus’ Agricola
This chapter explores Tacitus’ reading of the question of the relationship of the individual to empire in the Agricola . Tacitus constructed an understanding of Rome’s empire as a total system to which there was no spatial or temporal outside. Although it was impossible to imagine Rome without empire, Tacitean ambivalence constructed a third space, neither imperial nor barbarian, in which Tacitus could refuse assimilation into the discourses of e…
Foucault’s Empire of the Free
This essay argues that the engagement with Greece and Rome after The Will to Knowledge allowed Foucault to bring clarity to his conception of limited freedom in complex societies. The Classical fulfilled this function paradoxically by being jarringly different from and integral to the discourses of modern sexuality. Foucault’s engagement with the Classical in The Use of Pleasure and The Care of the Self continued his established method of uncover…
Introduction: Foucault’s Rome
This introductory chapter situates the Classical within Foucault’s philosophical work and summarizes the complex reaction of Classical scholars to Foucault’s work. To do so, it considers the issue of freedom of the self in society as explored by Foucault. This issue is, we suggest, the axis around which the Classical works operate: we argue that Foucault’s Classical turn was an encounter with the problematics and possibilities of freedom for and …
Augustan Imperialism
The masculinity of the Hellenistic king
In many Western societies, the male is seen as powerful, sometimes all-powerful, and is defined by his ability to wield power. In many cases, the power that is wielded is violent. Violence has been seen as a particularly male attribute and the usually legitimated violence offered by the soldier has often meant that soldiers have been represented as ideals of manhood. In modern Western society the role of the soldier has been somewhat marginalized…
Aspects of Roman History 31 BC-AD 117
This new edition of Aspects of Roman History 31 BC- AD 117 provides an easily accessible guide to the history of the early Roman Empire. Taking the reader through the major political events of the crucial first 150 years of Roman imperial history, from the Empire’s foundation under Augustus to the height of its power under Trajan, the book examines the emperors and key events that shaped Rome’s institutions and political form. Blending social and…
Class cities: Classics, utopianism and urban planning in early twentieth-century Britain
Ancient Slavery and Abolition: From Hobbes to Hollywood
1. Introduction: 'A Valuable Lesson' 2. The Good Master: Pliny, Hobbes, and the Nature of Freedom 3. Appropriations of Spartan Helotage in British Antislavery Debates of the 1790s 4. The Influence of Classical Ideas on the Anti-Slavery Debate at the Cape of Good Hope, South Africa (1795-1834) 5. A Stronger Muse: Classical Influences on Eighteenth-Century Abolitionist Poetry 6. The Politics of Classicism in the Poetry of Phillis Wheatley 7. Betwee…
Seeing Caesar in ruins: Towards a Radical Aesthetic of Ruins
This paper considers two ancient instances of engagement with the ruin: resonant descriptions of Troy in the second-century historian Tacitus and in the Neronian poet Lucan. Both represent the encounter with the ruin as alienating, which provokes interpretations corresponding to those of modern engagements with ruins. These instances undermine the particularity of the modern experience of ruins and instead introduce a dialectic between the ruin a…
The fiction of History: Recalling the past and imagining the future with Caesar at Troy
This essay considers the nature of historical discourse through a consideration of the historical narrative of Lucan’s Pharsalia. The focus is on the manner in which Lucan depicts history as capable of being fictionalised, especially through the operation of political power. The discourses of history make a historical account, but those discourses are not, in Lucan's view, true, but are fictionalised. The key study comes from Caesar at Troy, when…
Chapter 3: Dialogues in Imperialism: Rome, Britain, and India
Journal Article CHAPTER 3: DIALOGUES IN IMPERIALISM: ROME, BRITAIN, AND INDIA Get access Richard Alston Richard Alston Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, Volume 53, Issue Supplement_108, June 2010, Pages 51–77, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2041-5370.2010.tb00028.x Published: 24 March 2015
Maximum Volume
Aspects of the Roman East. Volume I: Papers in Honour of Professor Fergus Millar FBA
This is the first of two volumes of papers by scholars actively engaged in the study of the Roman East in honour of Professor Fergus Millar FBA, formerly Camden Professor of Ancient History at the University of Oxford and the leading scholar of Roman History of his generation. The first volume mainly from contributors based in the Northern Hemisphere contains studies on the Roman Near East, Egypt and early Byzantium. A second volume containing pa…
Aspects of the Roman East: Papers in Honour of Professor Fergus Millar Fba (Studia Antiqua Australiensia)
Rome’s Eastern Trade: International Commerce and Imperial Policy, 31 BC–AD 305
Soldier and Society in Roman Egypt: A Social History
The province of Egypt provides unique archaeological and documentary evidence for the study of the Roman army. In this fascinating social history Richard Alston examines the economic, cultural, social and legal aspects of a military career, illuminating the life and role of the individual soldier in the army.Soldier and Society in Roman Eygpt provides a complete reassessment of the impact of the Roman army on local societies, and convincingly cha…
Soldier and Society in Roman Egypt
Urbanism and the Urban Community in Roman Egypt
Roman Military Pay from Caesar to Diocletian
In a recent issue of this Journal, M. Alexander Speidel published a new document concerning Roman military pay, a receipt from Vindonissa dating to A.D. 38. This document, he claims, provides the missing link, which allows him to present a table of pay rates for legionaries and auxiliaries from Caesar to Diocletian and prove finally the proposition resurrected by M. P. Speidel that soldiers of the auxiliary cohorts were paid five sixths of the an…
Warfare and the state
The extant literature of the Roman world of the late Republic and Principate has occasional brief references to soldiers' pay, preparations for particular campaigns and the burden of military expenses. The four centuries of the late Republic and Principate are supposed to have seen two major changes in Roman military provisioning: introduction of a civil administration supplying the dispersed units of the army of the Principate; and the abandonme…
Seeing Caesar in ruins: Towards a Radical Aesthetic of Ruins
This paper considers two ancient instances of engagement with the ruin: resonant descriptions of Troy in the second-century historian Tacitus and in the Neronian poet Lucan. Both represent the encounter with the ruin as alienating, which provokes interpretations corresponding to those of modern engagements with ruins. These instances undermine the particularity of the modern experience of ruins and instead introduce a dialectic between the ruin a…
The Utopian City in Tacitus’ Agricola
This chapter explores Tacitus’ reading of the question of the relationship of the individual to empire in the Agricola . Tacitus constructed an understanding of Rome’s empire as a total system to which there was no spatial or temporal outside. Although it was impossible to imagine Rome without empire, Tacitean ambivalence constructed a third space, neither imperial nor barbarian, in which Tacitus could refuse assimilation into the discourses of e…
Foucault’s Empire of the Free
This essay argues that the engagement with Greece and Rome after The Will to Knowledge allowed Foucault to bring clarity to his conception of limited freedom in complex societies. The Classical fulfilled this function paradoxically by being jarringly different from and integral to the discourses of modern sexuality. Foucault’s engagement with the Classical in The Use of Pleasure and The Care of the Self continued his established method of uncover…
Aspects of Roman History 31 BC-AD 117
This new edition of Aspects of Roman History 31 BC- AD 117 provides an easily accessible guide to the history of the early Roman Empire. Taking the reader through the major political events of the crucial first 150 years of Roman imperial history, from the Empire’s foundation under Augustus to the height of its power under Trajan, the book examines the emperors and key events that shaped Rome’s institutions and political form. Blending social and…
Class cities: Classics, utopianism and urban planning in early twentieth-century Britain
Ancient Slavery and Abolition: From Hobbes to Hollywood
1. Introduction: 'A Valuable Lesson' 2. The Good Master: Pliny, Hobbes, and the Nature of Freedom 3. Appropriations of Spartan Helotage in British Antislavery Debates of the 1790s 4. The Influence of Classical Ideas on the Anti-Slavery Debate at the Cape of Good Hope, South Africa (1795-1834) 5. A Stronger Muse: Classical Influences on Eighteenth-Century Abolitionist Poetry 6. The Politics of Classicism in the Poetry of Phillis Wheatley 7. Betwee…
Warfare and the state
The extant literature of the Roman world of the late Republic and Principate has occasional brief references to soldiers' pay, preparations for particular campaigns and the burden of military expenses. The four centuries of the late Republic and Principate are supposed to have seen two major changes in Roman military provisioning: introduction of a civil administration supplying the dispersed units of the army of the Principate; and the abandonme…
Roman Military Pay from Caesar to Diocletian
In a recent issue of this Journal, M. Alexander Speidel published a new document concerning Roman military pay, a receipt from Vindonissa dating to A.D. 38. This document, he claims, provides the missing link, which allows him to present a table of pay rates for legionaries and auxiliaries from Caesar to Diocletian and prove finally the proposition resurrected by M. P. Speidel that soldiers of the auxiliary cohorts were paid five sixths of the an…
Urbanism and the Urban Community in Roman Egypt
Soldier and Society in Roman Egypt
Rome’s Eastern Trade: International Commerce and Imperial Policy, 31 BC–AD 305
Soldier and Society in Roman Egypt: A Social History
The province of Egypt provides unique archaeological and documentary evidence for the study of the Roman army. In this fascinating social history Richard Alston examines the economic, cultural, social and legal aspects of a military career, illuminating the life and role of the individual soldier in the army.Soldier and Society in Roman Eygpt provides a complete reassessment of the impact of the Roman army on local societies, and convincingly cha…
Aspects of the Roman East. Volume I: Papers in Honour of Professor Fergus Millar FBA
This is the first of two volumes of papers by scholars actively engaged in the study of the Roman East in honour of Professor Fergus Millar FBA, formerly Camden Professor of Ancient History at the University of Oxford and the leading scholar of Roman History of his generation. The first volume mainly from contributors based in the Northern Hemisphere contains studies on the Roman Near East, Egypt and early Byzantium. A second volume containing pa…
Aspects of the Roman East: Papers in Honour of Professor Fergus Millar Fba (Studia Antiqua Australiensia)
Maximum Volume
The fiction of History: Recalling the past and imagining the future with Caesar at Troy
This essay considers the nature of historical discourse through a consideration of the historical narrative of Lucan’s Pharsalia. The focus is on the manner in which Lucan depicts history as capable of being fictionalised, especially through the operation of political power. The discourses of history make a historical account, but those discourses are not, in Lucan's view, true, but are fictionalised. The key study comes from Caesar at Troy, when…
Chapter 3: Dialogues in Imperialism: Rome, Britain, and India
Journal Article CHAPTER 3: DIALOGUES IN IMPERIALISM: ROME, BRITAIN, AND INDIA Get access Richard Alston Richard Alston Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, Volume 53, Issue Supplement_108, June 2010, Pages 51–77, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2041-5370.2010.tb00028.x Published: 24 March 2015
Ancient Slavery and Abolition: From Hobbes to Hollywood
1. Introduction: 'A Valuable Lesson' 2. The Good Master: Pliny, Hobbes, and the Nature of Freedom 3. Appropriations of Spartan Helotage in British Antislavery Debates of the 1790s 4. The Influence of Classical Ideas on the Anti-Slavery Debate at the Cape of Good Hope, South Africa (1795-1834) 5. A Stronger Muse: Classical Influences on Eighteenth-Century Abolitionist Poetry 6. The Politics of Classicism in the Poetry of Phillis Wheatley 7. Betwee…
Seeing Caesar in ruins: Towards a Radical Aesthetic of Ruins
This paper considers two ancient instances of engagement with the ruin: resonant descriptions of Troy in the second-century historian Tacitus and in the Neronian poet Lucan. Both represent the encounter with the ruin as alienating, which provokes interpretations corresponding to those of modern engagements with ruins. These instances undermine the particularity of the modern experience of ruins and instead introduce a dialectic between the ruin a…
Class cities: Classics, utopianism and urban planning in early twentieth-century Britain
Augustan Imperialism
The masculinity of the Hellenistic king
In many Western societies, the male is seen as powerful, sometimes all-powerful, and is defined by his ability to wield power. In many cases, the power that is wielded is violent. Violence has been seen as a particularly male attribute and the usually legitimated violence offered by the soldier has often meant that soldiers have been represented as ideals of manhood. In modern Western society the role of the soldier has been somewhat marginalized…
Aspects of Roman History 31 BC-AD 117
This new edition of Aspects of Roman History 31 BC- AD 117 provides an easily accessible guide to the history of the early Roman Empire. Taking the reader through the major political events of the crucial first 150 years of Roman imperial history, from the Empire’s foundation under Augustus to the height of its power under Trajan, the book examines the emperors and key events that shaped Rome’s institutions and political form. Blending social and…
Foucault’s Empire of the Free
This essay argues that the engagement with Greece and Rome after The Will to Knowledge allowed Foucault to bring clarity to his conception of limited freedom in complex societies. The Classical fulfilled this function paradoxically by being jarringly different from and integral to the discourses of modern sexuality. Foucault’s engagement with the Classical in The Use of Pleasure and The Care of the Self continued his established method of uncover…
Introduction: Foucault’s Rome
This introductory chapter situates the Classical within Foucault’s philosophical work and summarizes the complex reaction of Classical scholars to Foucault’s work. To do so, it considers the issue of freedom of the self in society as explored by Foucault. This issue is, we suggest, the axis around which the Classical works operate: we argue that Foucault’s Classical turn was an encounter with the problematics and possibilities of freedom for and …
The Utopian City in Tacitus’ Agricola
This chapter explores Tacitus’ reading of the question of the relationship of the individual to empire in the Agricola . Tacitus constructed an understanding of Rome’s empire as a total system to which there was no spatial or temporal outside. Although it was impossible to imagine Rome without empire, Tacitean ambivalence constructed a third space, neither imperial nor barbarian, in which Tacitus could refuse assimilation into the discourses of e…
Spaces of Desire: Houses, Households and Social Reproduction in the Roman World
This chapter uses the spatial theory of Henri Lefebvre to examine the way in which the Roman house operated as a ‘space of desire’ and to illuminate the processes of house and household formation and social reproduction. It draws on a variety of Roman examples, including Pliny’s villas, the luxury villas of the Roman imperial period and late antiquity, and the small houses of Roman Egypt. Spatial theory focuses attention on the processes of socia…
History (17 works) · Classical Antiquity Studies (11 works) · Political science (9 works) · Ancient history (8 works) · History (8 works) · Law (8 works) · Art (7 works) · Philosophy (7 works) · Politics (7 works) · Sociology (7 works)