Worn out with walking: movement, age, and exertion in ancient Rome

[forthcoming] in J. Bjørnebye, S. Malmberg, and I. Ostenberg (eds.) The Moving City: Processions, Passages, and Promenades in Ancient Rome. Proceedings of the Colloquium at L'Istituto Svedese di Studi Classici a Roma and the Istituto di Norvegia in Roma, May 2011 (Leiden, Brill).

Philippus, active and strong, and famed for pleading causes, while returning from his employment about the eighth hour, and now of a great age, complained that the Carinae was too far from the forum.
(Hor. Ep. 1.7.46-9)

An examination of pedestrian movement as it is associated with physical decline in old age. This paper sheds light on the marginalisation of the elderly from the cityscape and enables new interpretations of scale and displacement: transforming the concept of ‘movement’ from an undifferentiated flow, and asserting the nuances of speed, rhythm and (in)action in the Roman city.

Movement, rhythms, and the (re)production of written space

[Submitted in January 2012 for publication in] R. Laurence, G.M. Sears, P. Keegan (eds.), Written Space in the Latin West: 200 BC to AD 300 (London: Continuum, 2012/13)

Che: I think that you should write on the wall [...] where Architeles takes his daily walk
Dro: But how will we be able to write without being seen?
Che: At night, Drosis, with a piece of charcoal that we shall pick up on the way
(Lucian Dial. meret. 10.4)

Movement and Fora in Rome (the Late Republic to the First Century CE)

in R. Laurence & D.J. Newsome (eds.), Rome, Ostia, Pompeii: Movement and Space (Oxford University Press, 2011), 290-311

Since his search had taken him out of his way along a winding path, he decided to shorten his journey on the way back, and go straight through the forum
(Phaedr. Fab. 3.19.5–7)

An examination of movement to and through the Forum Romanum and imperial fora, this paper considers the location of the forum within the 'natural movement' of the city of Rome, before detailing the gradual enclosure of space and restrictions on access (both of the forum and of individual sites within it). It begins by looking at different representations of the fora and the role of the Forum Romanum as a short cut in urban journeys. It then looks at the use of ropes and cancelli to restrict movement, and looks at the ways a new 'urban disposition' of restricted accessibility influences the through-movement potential of the later imperial fora.

Introduction: Making Movement Meaningful

R. Laurence & D.J. Newsome (eds.), Rome, Ostia, Pompeii: Movement and Space (Oxford University Press, 2011), 1-54

This extensive introduction sets the context of the volume as a whole. It reviews approaches to urban space and our evidence - both archaeological and textual - for movement and traffic as both physical behaviours and as they are represented in Roman culture. Following a detailed engagement with the theory and evidence behind the study of ancient movement and space, each of the chapters is discussed.

The introduction is divided into the following sections: recent studies of movement and the Roman city; evidence of movement (archaeology and texts); wheel-ruts; traffic legislation; movement and place - the locus celeberrimus; streets, gates and people: the movement economy of the Porta Capena; between Rome and the RD909; outline of the present volume.

Copies can be viewed on OUP's website and on Amazon's "look inside" feature.

Traffic, Space and Legal Change around the Casa del Marinaio at Pompeii (VII 15.1-2)

BABesch 84, 127-148 (2009)

(This paper won the BABesch-Byvanck Award)
The Casa del Marinaio at Pompeii was a large and  distinguished property framed by three streets west of the forum - streets noted for their ‘oddities’. This article explains these oddities by reference to patterns of urban traffic over the first centuries BC and AD. Changes made elsewhere in Regio VII diverted wheeled traffic around insula VII 15, forcing the owners of the Casa del Marinaio to make several modifications outside of their property. The legal frameworks that regulated changes to roads and pavements may suggest that the owner(s) of the Casa del Marinaio were actively involved in Pompeii’s magistracy. (Available to download from journal website. Offprints available from me)

Centrality in its Place: Defining Urban Space in the City of Rome

M. Driessen, S. Heeren, J. Hendriks, F. Kemmers &  R. Visser (eds.) TRAC 2008: Proceedings of the Eighteenth Annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference, Amsterdam 2008. Oxford: Oxbow: 25-38. (2009)

This paper is a look at the concept of centrality as developed in the work of spatial theorist Henri Lefebvre, with particular attention to his discussions of ancient Rome. It considers where Lefebvre might be a useful guide and, more importantly, where his theories conflict with ancient testimony. (Offprints available from me)

[REVIEW] "Traffic" and "congestion" in Rome's empire

Journal of Roman Archaeology 21, 442-446 (2008)

Review of C.R. Van Tilburg (2007) Traffic and Congestion in the Roman Empire, London: Routledge. (PDF available from journal website. Offprints available from me)

[REVIEW] R. Meneghini and R. Santangeli Valenzani, I Fori Imperiali: Gli scavi del Comune di Roma (1991-2007).

Rosetta 6 (2009)

Contributions to The Encyclopaedia of Ancient History

[forthcoming] R. Bagnall, K. Brodersen, C. Champion, A. Erskine & S. Huebner (Wiley-Blackwell, 2011)

Architects [300 words]; Architecture (civic, Roman Empire) [2000 words]; Argei [150 words]; Negotium [700 words].

Mircea Eliade and Filippo Coarelli, Dialoghi di archaeologia 1976–77

Accepted for publication and awaiting resubmission [vol. 18, 2011], The European Review of History - Revue Européenne d'Histoire

An examination of the influence of the historian of religion Mircea Eliade on the work of Roman archaeologist Filippo Coarelli, particularly his interpretation of the umbilicus Romae and the Mundus in the Forum Romanum, as published in Dialoghi di archaeologia (1976–77), Il Foro Romano: periodo arcaico (1983) and in the Lexicon Topographicum Urbis Romae (1996).