[Usyd_Classics_Events] Reminder: Book Launch & Final Classics Research Seminar for 2025: Kit Morrell & Tyler Cascaes

[Ben Brown]

Dear Friends of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Sydney,

We are delighted to invite you to the final presentation for 2025 in our Classics and Ancient History research seminar series.
The event will be preceded at 12pm by a brief book launch so please come early! See below for details.

November 3rd (Mon, 12.15pm UTC+11)

Zoom link: https://uni-sydney.zoom.us/j/83159864939


Kit Morrell and Tyla Cascaes (University of Queensland)


The reception of Pompey's head

Abstract:
When Julius Caesar landed on the shores of Egypt in 48 BCE, he was presented with a gory gift: the severed head of his ally-turned-enemy Pompey. The moment became one of the defining images of the civil war, but with shifting meaning: did Caesar receive the head with grief, with anger, or with crocodile tears? This paper will explore the reception of the reception from the earliest ancient sources to modern film and television and show how this short but poignant scene has been used to encapsulate different characterisations of Caesar.

Kit Morrell is the Susan Blake Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History at the University of Queensland. Her research focuses on the political and legal history of the late Roman republic, including the career of Pompey the Great (with head attached).

Tyla Cascaes is a PhD Candidate at the University of Queensland. Her research explores the role of casting in the creation and repetition of Roman characters in popular cinema.

***BOOK LAUNCH*** 12pm
The Rule of Law in Ancient Rome, <https://url.au.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/psR_CK1DvKTMP3By0CMf1u5-NDl?domain=global.oup.com> edited by Eleanor Cowan, Kit Morrell, Andrew Pettinger, Michael Sevel, Oxford University Press 2025<https://url.au.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/psR_CK1DvKTMP3By0CMf1u5-NDl?domain=global.oup.com> <https://url.au.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/psR_CK1DvKTMP3By0CMf1u5-NDl?domain=global.oup.com>
This volume brings together the study of the rule of law—the idea that the law should protect citizens from arbitrary exercises of power—and the study of ancient Rome. Its chapters apply insights and approaches drawn from modern legal theory in order to understand the ways in which Romans thought about law and the place of law in their community, the extent to which Roman institutions and political norms protected citizens against the arbitrary exercise of power, and how these ideas and practices changed with Rome’s transition from republic to empire. In the years during which we have been thinking and writing about these issues, our world has witnessed increasing attacks on the rule of law, including attacks arising within liberal democracies and their institutions. It is a crucial time to be thinking about the rule of law. Deepening our historical understanding through close study of the rule of law in Rome is both timely and necessary.

All best, Ben



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