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| Oxford Centre for Late Antiquity | |
|---|---|
| Name | Oxford Centre for Late Antiquity |
| Formation | 2006 |
| Type | Research centre |
| Headquarters | Oxford |
| Location | University of Oxford |
| Leader title | Director |
Oxford Centre for Late Antiquity. The Oxford Centre for Late Antiquity is an interdisciplinary research centre at the University of Oxford devoted to the study of the late antique Mediterranean and Near East. It brings together scholars working on the Roman Empire, Byzantine Empire, Sasanian Empire, early medieval kingdoms, and early Islamic polities to address questions about religion, law, society, material culture, and literature. The centre hosts seminars, conferences, publications, and postgraduate training that connect classical studies, medieval studies, theology, archaeology, and art history.
Founded in 2006, the centre emerged amid growing interest in the transitional period between the classical world and medieval polities, attracting scholars from University of Oxford, Oxford University Museum of Natural History, Ashmolean Museum, Bodleian Libraries, and external institutions. Early collaborators included faculty from King's College London, University College London, University of Cambridge, Princeton University, Yale University, and Columbia University. Its programming has featured speakers associated with projects at the British Museum, Vatican Library, Leiden University, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Università di Bologna, University of Toronto, Harvard University, Stanford University, and Heidelberg University. The centre’s conferences have convened specialists working on figures such as Augustine of Hippo, Ammianus Marcellinus, Procopius of Caesarea, Victor of Vita, John Chrysostom, and topics including the Council of Nicaea, Battle of Adrianople (378), Sack of Rome (410), Arab–Byzantine wars, and the Revolt of the Isaurians. Funding support has come from bodies including the Leverhulme Trust, Arts and Humanities Research Council, British Academy, European Research Council, and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
The centre’s mission emphasizes comparative studies linking late antique Christianity, late antique Judaism, late antique Islam, and late antique Zoroastrianism across the Mediterranean and Near East. Research projects examine legal texts such as the Codex Theodosianus, liturgical developments tied to Gregory the Great, administrative reforms associated with Diocletian, and historiography exemplified by Gibbon and Edward Gibbon-era reception. It foregrounds material culture examined through excavations at sites like Hippodrome of Constantinople, Sergiopolis, Antioch on the Orontes, Leptis Magna, and Carthage. Comparative strands bring in scholarship on the Sasanian Empire, Umayyad Caliphate, Abbasid Caliphate, Visigothic Kingdom, Ostrogothic Kingdom, and Vandals.
The centre runs postgraduate seminars linked to Oxford degrees such as the MSt in Classical Archaeology, DPhil in Ancient History, MPhil in Ancient History, and intercollegiate reading groups drawing on specialists in Papyrology, Epigraphy, Numismatics, and Codicology. Its calendar includes lecture series named after figures like Averroes, Boethius, and Cassiodorus, plus workshops on subjects such as Latin paleography, Greek palaeography, Coptic studies, and Syriac studies. Public-facing events have featured partnerships with the Royal Historical Society, Society for Medieval Archaeology, International Medieval Congress, and the Islamic Manuscripts Association. Training modules engage curators from the British Library, conservators from the Courtauld Institute of Art, and specialists from the Institute of Archaeology, Oxford.
The centre supports monograph series and edited volumes published by presses including Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, Brill, Routledge, Bloomsbury, and Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. Major research projects have addressed topics such as late antique prosopography linking to the Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire, digital initiatives interoperating with Pelagios, and cataloguing endeavours for manuscripts from the Monastery of St Catherine, Sinai. Collaborations have produced editions and translations of texts by Procopius, Theodoret of Cyrus, John of Ephesus, Sophronius of Jerusalem, and law codes like the Corpus Juris Civilis. The centre has hosted archaeological publication projects from excavations at Timgad, Baelo Claudia, Qasr Ibrim, and survey reports on Wadi al-Jarf and Tell es-Sweyhat.
International partnerships include research networks with Dumbarton Oaks, Institut français d'archéologie orientale, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, German Archaeological Institute, British School at Rome, British School at Athens, American School of Classical Studies at Athens, École normale supérieure, Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa, and the National Library of Greece. The centre collaborates with museums such as the Victoria and Albert Museum, Museo Nazionale Romano, Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Gemeentemuseum Den Haag on loans, exhibitions, and catalogues. Funding and project partners have included Historic England, English Heritage, Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, and the Wellcome Trust.
Based in central Oxford, the centre benefits from proximity to the Bodleian Library, the Radcliffe Camera, St Antony's College, Oxford, All Souls College, Oxford, and the School of Archaeology, Oxford. Facilities for seminars and workshops are available in college lecture rooms, the Taylor Institution, and the Bodleian Libraries Weston Library. It accesses collections at the Ashmolean Museum, Pitt Rivers Museum, Museum of the History of Science, Oxford, and nearby archival holdings at the National Archives (United Kingdom), Gennadius Library, and the Royal Asiatic Society.
Affiliated scholars and visiting fellows have included experts associated with Peter Brown (historian), Averil Cameron, Henriette Harich-Schwarzbauer, A. H. M. Jones, Michael McCormick, Richard Burgess, James Howard-Johnston, Hugh Elton, Walter Goffart, and Irene Scarborough. Postdoctoral fellows have come from institutions such as Princeton Theological Seminary, Yeshiva University, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, University of Edinburgh, University of Birmingham, University of St Andrews, Trinity College Dublin, University of Manchester, Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society, University of Vienna, and University of Zurich.
Category:Research institutes in Oxford Category:Classical studies