Archaic Rome between written sources and archaeology: an ideal meeting place or a methodological/ideological battlefield?

elective courses
general courses

(in Polish) working knowledge of English, high-school level knowledge of Classical Antiquity in general and of early Rome in particular.

The unique abundance of written sources on archaic Rome (without exception dating from much later times, though) and the equally unique possibility of excavating in the City’s historical centre, long made it an apparently ideal meeting place of history and archaeology. However, incessant growth of the archaeological material, interpreted as irreconciable with the import of the written sources, strengthened the hypercritical stance, which denies the latter any value in the study of archaic Rome. Recent archaeological discoveries, largely corresponding with information provided by the written sources, which has been interpreted in turn as the proof of their absolute veracity, led to the outbreak of a veritable war among the specialists, ostensibly methodological, but of intensity clearly revealing its ideological nature.

The study of archaic, i.e. pre-republican Rome (8th-6th c. BC), with its literary dossier surpassing by far those of other ancient cities once an almost exclusive preserve of historians, has progressively become an essentially archaeologists’ field. One reason of the growing neglect of the literary tradition has been the steady growth of archaeological material, made possible by the unique accessibility of Rome’s historical centre (Palatine, Forum Romanum, Sacra Via, Capitol) to archaeological investigation; the other, the alleged lack of correspondence between what we find in the written sources and the interpretations of the material from excavations, which gave fuel to the hypercritical stance which denies any value to the literary texts, dating from much later periods (from late 3rd c. BC onwards) and so dismissed as groundless speculations and downright inventions by late-republican and imperial intellectuals. The U-turn came with the finding in 1988 of the alleged ‘wall of Romulus’, broadly matching its traditional location (the foot of the Palatine) and chronology (mid-8th c. BC), followed by others, also interpreted in the light of information derived from written sources: these discoveries have been hailed as a total rehabilitation of the veracity of the entire literary tradition and the proof of the inadequacy of the methods of source criticism. As a result, the study of archaic Rome, once perceived as the ideal meeting place of history and archaeology, and their respective methodologies, has become a battlefield, with the extremists on both sides incapable and unwilling to communicate, and the moderates being incessantly drawn into the conflict which by now has reached the stage of an ideological war.

A. Grandazzi, La fondation de Rome. Réflexions sur l’histoire, Paris 1991 (English translation: The Foundation of Rome. Myth and History, Ithaca-London 1997); T.J. Cornell, The Beginnings of Rome. Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000-264 BC), London-New York 1995, pp. 1-240; T.P. Wiseman, Remus. A Roman Myth, Cambridge 1995.

On the completion of the course the student:

Is aware of the specificity of the study of archaic Rome and its role in the development of the study of the past in general.

Knows main methodological approaches to the study of archaic Rome and is able to apply this knowledge in studying other heuristically similar historical subject-matters.

Understands dangers resulting (1) from treating written sources and archaeological material as belonging to different heuristic orders which do not meet in the scholarly enquiry, and (2) from squaring them at all costs.

Is able to distinguish between a datum and its interpretation.

The criterion of individual assessment: attendance at lectures.