#  Alexander to Caesar: The Transformation of the Ancient World 

 





 Semester:   Spring 

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 Year offered:  2014 

 

 

 

 In the two centuries after Alexander the Great, Graeco-Macedonian political rule was extended from the Aegean to the Hindu Kush. This course will investigate the nature of the new imperialism that emerged and the modes of cross-cultural encounter it generated. Our first unit, **Top-Down: The State**, will explore the founding of urban centers, the reconfiguration of the economy, and the development of new religious ideas by the Graeco-Macedonian royal courts. **Interfaces** will examine the transformations of indigenous societies, especially their understandings of their pasts and themselves, brought about by the wider horizons of the Hellenistic state. The final unit, **Bottom-Up: Resistance** will treat different forms of indigenous rejection of the imperial state, from apocalyptic literature to violent revolution.

 The class will focus on discussion and presentation of a range of ancient sources (all in English translation) and archaeological sites as well as contemporary scholarship engaging with some of the key historical and theoretical debates in the fields of colonialism, diaspora, and ethnicity.