Exiles, Refugees and the Ancient World

Our Exiles, Refugees and the Ancient World short course allows you to study the complex history of displacement and displaced people in the ancient world as well as the broader historical trends and contemporary debates. You will study:

• processes of expulsion from city-states, kingdoms and other communities, for example through the courts, feuding, civil war, or interstate war
• the lives, communities and writings of exiles and refugees
• processes of reintegration of exiles and commemoration of displacement.

We will pay close attention to problems and gaps in the evidence. We will consider how the voices and perspectives of the displaced, and other outsiders, from the ancient world can be reconstructed. On this course we focus especially on the ancient Greek-speaking eastern Mediterranean, but we also draw on evidence for exile in Rome and other ancient civilisations.

You will be given the opportunity to make informed comparisons with other periods of history - and interpret the history of ancient displacement within a broader global history of refugees up to the present day. You will also study how ancient exiles, and the ancient world more generally, have provided a focus for identity and reflection among displaced people of other periods, especially in the modern and contemporary world.

Join us as we ask: what role have modern exiles played in shaping how we understand the ancient world itself?

This course is suitable for anyone with an interest in the topic, including those working in the fields of immigration and asylum.

Assessment is via an 800-word formative exercise (20%) and 3200-word essay (80%).