CLAS 3220
Race and Ethnicity in Ancient Greece and Rome
Course Description
What does it mean to say that Cleopatra was black, or not? Ancient history comes up often in modern debates about race. We will investigate how people understood racial and ethnic difference in the ancient Greco-Roman Mediterranean, and how interpretations of antiquity historically have shaped modern concepts of race. We will study relevant art and literature from the 8th century BCE through the 3rd century CE, and modern responses to both.