Staff in Classics
Professor Alastair Small
Honorary Professorial Fellow
- Email: aandcsmall@tiscali.co.uk
- School of History, Classics and Archaeology, William Robertson Wing, Teviot Place, Edinburgh EH8 9AG
Biography
I studied Literae Humaniores (“Greats”) at the University of Oxford (Worcester College) where I completed the BA degree in 1964. I then began working on the archaeology of South Italy in the 1st millennium BC as a postgraduate at Oxford and was awarded the degree of D.Phil in 1971 for a thesis on Apulian Wares and Greek Influences. I was Rome scholar in Classical Studies at the British School at Rome in 1965‑7, and Sir James Knott Research Fellow at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1967‑8. I was then appointed Assistant Lecturer in the Department of Classics at the University of Alberta in 1968 where I was promoted to Associate Professor in 1973, and full Professor in 1980. I was seconded from the University of Alberta as first Director of the Canadian Academic Centre in Italy from January 1979 to June 1980. I was a McCalla Research Professor at the University of Alberta in 1983, a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada Leave Fellow in 1986, Treccani Lecturer of the Archaeological Institute of America in 1990/1, and Visiting Scholar at Wolfson College, Oxford in 1994/5. I took early retirement from the University of Alberta in 1998 and returned to Scotland where I was appointed to an Honorary Fellowship in Classics at the University of Edinburgh. In 1999, 2000 and 2001 I was Cary Fellow at the British School at Rome which involved teaching the School’s post-graduate course in the City of Rome for 2 months each year. For my work in South Italian archaeology, I was awarded the Premio Jean Renoir by the Regione di Puglia in 1992, the honorary citizenship of Gravina in Puglia in 1994, the Premio Internazionale Satyrion per l’Archeologia in 2010, and the honorary citizenship of Ruoti in 2018. I am currently a member of the Council of the Istituto di Studi sulla Magna Grecia. I have been a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland since 1969, and Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London since 1976. I am currently a Professor emeritus of the University of Alberta, and Honorary Professorial Fellow in Classics at the University of Edinburgh.
Research interests
My principal research interests are in the history and archaeology of Italy, and especially of Apulia and Lucania in the Iron Age and Roman periods, and in the transition to the Early Middle Ages. Much of my work is concerned with the dynamics of change in settlement patterns and land use. I was involved as a graduate student in the 1960s in excavations of the British School at Rome in the Iron Age sites of Botromagno (Gravina in Puglia) and Cozzo Presepe, with special responsibility for recording and classifying the indigenous pottery. After my appointment at the University of Alberta I directed Canadian excavations in the Iron Age and Hellenistic settlements at Monte Irsi near Irsina (1971-1972), and Botromagno (1990-1995), and in the Roman Imperial and Late Antique villa at San Giovanni di Ruoti in Basilicata (1977-1984). Between 2000 and 2010 I organized and directed an international programme of excavation and research in a Roman village (vicus) at Vagnari near Gravina which formed part of an estate of the Roman emperor. The programme was centred on the University of Edinburgh, and involved fruitful collaboration with the Universities of Bari and Foggia in Italy and, McMaster University and Mount Allison University in Canada. Together with my wife Carola Small I directed an intensive field survey in the Basentello valley which links the sites of Vagnari, Botromagno and Monte Irsi (1996-2007). We have just finished a monograph which draws together the results of this field survey and those from other largely unpublished field surveys carried out by several scholars in the area around Gravina in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and puts them into the broader context of the development of settlement and land-use on the border between Apulia and Lucania from the Neolithic period down to the Middle Ages. I am also working on the 4th volume in the series The Excavations of San Giovanni di Ruoti which will contain specialist studies of the pottery and glass vessels. I also have ongoing interests in Roman art history and in the Classical Tradition on which I have published several articles.
Publications
Edited books
Small, A. M. (ed.) (1977). Monte Irsi, Southern Italy. The Canadian Excavations in the Iron Age and Roman Sites, 1971–1972, Oxford: British Archaeological Reports.
Gualtieri, M., M. Salvatore & A. M. Small (eds.). Lo Scavo di S. Giovanni di Ruoti ed il periodo tardoantico in Basilicata, Atti della Tavola Rotonda - Roma 4 luglio 1981, Bari: Adriatica.
Small, A. M. (ed.) (1992). Gravina. An Iron Age and Roman Republican Settlement on Botromagno, Gravina di Puglia. Excavations of 1965–1974. Vol. 1, The Site; vol. 2, The Artifacts, London: British School at Rome.
Small, A. M. & R. J. Buck, 1994. The Excavations of San Giovanni di Ruoti. Volume I. The villas and their environment, Toronto – Buffalo – London: University of Toronto Press.
Small, A. M. (ed.) (1996). Subject and Ruler: The Cult of the Ruling Power in Classical Antiquity. Papers in honour of the 65th birthday of Duncan Fishwick: Journal of Roman Archaeology, Supplementary Series 17.
Small, A. M. (ed.) (2011). “Vagnari. Il villaggio, l’artigianato, la proprietà imperiale / Vagnari. The village, the industries, the imperial property” (Bari: Edipuglia).
Small, A. M. (ed.) (2014). Beyond Vagnari. New Themes in the Study of Roman South Italy (Bari: Edipuglia).
Co-authored book
Small, A. M. & F. Tarlano, 2016. La villa romana e tardoantica di San Giovanni di Ruoti (Basilicata). Una sintesi, Avigliano: Pisani.
Articles
Brooks, R. T., A. M. Small & J. B. Ward-Perkins, 1966. “Trial excavations on the site of Botromagno, Gravina di Puglia”, Papers of the British School at Rome, 34, 131-50.
Ward-Perkins, J. B., M. A. Cotton, H. B. Vander Poel, E. Macnamara, J. du Plat Taylor, A. Carter, A. J. N. W. Prag & A. M. Small, 1969. “Excavations at Botromagno, Gravina di Puglia: Second Interim Report, 1967-68”, Papers of the British School at Rome, 37, 100-57. (Iron Age pottery by A.M.S.).
Small, A. M., 1976. “The Iron Age pottery, Sites A and F”, in J. du Plat Taylor, P.G. Dorrell and A.M. Small, ‘Gravina-di-Puglia III (Part One). Houses and a cemetery of the Iron Age and Classical periods’, Papers of the British School at Rome, 44, 76-132.
Small, A. M., 1977. “The Iron Age geometric pottery”, in E. Macnamara, J. Ward-Perkins, J. du Plat Taylor, A.M. Small, A. J. N. W. Prag, M. Aylwin Cotton, J. Watson, and others, ‘The Excavations at Cozzo Presepe (1969-1972)’, Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Notizie degli Scavi Serie Ottava no. 31 Supplemento [1983], 285-311.
Small, A. M., 1978. “The villa rustica of the Hellenistic period in South Italy”, in Papers in Italian archaeology I, eds. H. M. Blake, T. W. Potter & D. B. Whitehouse (Oxford: British Archaeological Reports), 175-91.
Small, A. M., 1980. “San Giovanni di Ruoti: some problems in the interpretation of the structures”, in Roman Villas in Italy, ed. K. S. Painter (London: British Museum), 151-60.
Small, A. M., 1983. “Gli edifici del periodo tardo-antico a San Giovanni”, in Lo Scavo di S. Giovanni di Ruoti ed il periodo tardoantico in Basilicata, Atti della Tavola Rotonda - Roma 4 luglio 1981, eds. M. Gualtieri, M. Salvatore & A. M. Small (Bari: Adriatica), 21-46.
Small, A. M., 1985. “The early villa at San Giovanni”, in Papers in Italian Archaeology IV, The Cambridge Conference, part iv, Classical and Medieval Archaeology, eds. C. Malone & S. Stoddart (Oxford: British Archaeological Reports), 165-77.
Small, A. M., 1985. “The Area around Francolise in the Roman Period”, in The San Rocco Villa at Francolise, eds. M. A. Cotton & G. P. R. Metraux (London: British School at Rome Supplementary Publication), xix-xxxiv.
Roberto, C., J. A. Plambeck & A. M. Small, 1985. “The chronology of the sites of the Roman period around San Giovanni: methods of analysis and conclusions”, in Archaeological Field Survey in Britain and Abroad, eds. S. Macready & F. H. Thompson (London: The Society of Antiquaries of London, Occasional Paper),136-45.
Buck, R. J. & A. M. Small, 1985. “Inscriptions from near San Giovanni di Ruoti (Potenza)”, Epigraphica. Rivista Italiana di Epigrafia, 47, 98-109.
Small, A. M., 1986. “S. Giovanni di Ruoti (Basilicata). Il contesto della villa tardo-romana I. La villa e la sua storia”, in Società Romana ed Impero Tardoantico. Le Merci, gli Insediamenti III (Rome/Bari: Laterza), 97-113.
Small, A. M., 1986. “Some notes on the Daunian pots in the British Museum”, in Italian Iron Age Artefacts in the British Museum, ed. J. Swaddling (London: British Museum Publications), 309-19.
Small, A. M., 1986. “A spouted vase from Central Apulia”, in Italian Iron Age Artefacts in the British Museum, ed. J. Swaddling (London: British Museum Publications), 321-2.
Small, A. M., 1990. “A new head of Antonia Minor and its significance”, Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Römische Abteilung, 97, 217-34.
Small, A. M., 1991. “Late Roman rural settlement in Basilicata and Western Apulia”, in Roman Landscapes: Archaeological Survey in the Mediterranean Region, eds. G. Barker & J. Lloyd (London: British School at Rome), 204-22.
Small, A. M., R. J. Buck, S. G. Monckton & C. J. Simpson, 1993. “Excavations on Botromagno, Gravina di Puglia, 1992: Interim Report”. Echos du Monde Classique/Classical Views, 37, 339-47.
Small, A. M., 1994. “Grain from Apulia. The changing fortunes of Apulia as a grain-producing area in the Hellenistic and Roman periods”, in Tranquillitas. Mélanges en l'honneur de Tran tam Tinh, eds. M. O. Jentel & G. Deschênes-Wagner (Québec: Université Laval), 543-55.
Small, A. M., R. J. Buck, S. G. Monckton & C. J. Simpson, 1994. “Excavations at Botromagno, Gravina di Puglia, 1993: interim report”. Echos du Monde Classique/Classical Views, 38, n.s.13, 247-59.
Small, A. M., B. Roe, J. W. Hayes, C. J. Simpson, G. Guzzetta, M. MacKinnon & S. G. Monckton, 1994. “A pit group of c.80–70 BC from Gravina di Puglia”, Papers of the British School at Rome, 62, 197-260.
Small, A. M., 1996. “The shrine of the imperial family in the macellum at Pompeii”, in Subject and Ruler: The Cult of the Ruling Power in Classical Antiquity. Papers in honour of the 65th birthday of Duncan Fishwick, ed. A. M. Small, Journal of Roman Archaeology, Supplementary Series 17, 115-36.
Small, C. M. & A. M. Small, 1997. “John Evelyn and the Garden of Epicurus”, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 60, 194-214.
Small, A. M., C. Small, I. Campbell, M. MacKinnon, T. Prowse & C. Sipe, 1998. “Field survey in the Basentello valley on the Basilicata-Puglia border”, Echos du Monde Classique / Classical Views, 42, 337-71.
Small, A. M., 1999. “L'occupazione del territorio in età romana”, in Storia della Basilicata. 1. L'antichità, ed. D. Adamestean Rome (Bari: Latera), 559-600.
Small, A. M. & C. M. Small, 1999. “South Italy, England and Elysium in the 18th century”, Antiquaries Journal, 79, 301-45.
Small, A. M., 2000. “La Basilicata nell'età tardo-antica: ricerche archeologiche nella valle del Basentello e a San Giovanni di Ruoti”, in L'Italia meridionale in età tardo antica, Atti del XXXVIII Convegno di Studi sulla Magna Grecia, Taranto 1998 (Taranto: Istituto di Studi sulla Magna Grecia), 331-42.
Small, A. M., 2000. “Lucien Bonaparte's Excavations at Tusculum and the history of a female portrait head in the National Gallery of Scotland”, in Periplous. Papers on Classical Art and Archaeology Presented to Sir John Boardman, eds. G. R. Tsetskhladze, A. N. W. Prag & A. M. Snodgrass (London: Thames and Hudson), 291-7
Small, A.M. 2000. Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World (ed. R.J.A. Talbert). Sheets 45 (Tarentum) and 46 (Ager Bruttius) with directories: co-compiler with I. Edlund (Princeton: Princeton University Press).
Small, A. M., 2000. “The use of javelins in central and south Italy in the 4th century BC”, in Ancient Italy in its Mediterranean Setting. Studies in honour of Ellen Macnamara, eds. D. Ridgway, F. R. Serra Ridgway, P. Mark, E. Herring, R. D. Whitehouse & J. B. Wilkins (London: Accordia Research Institute, University of London), 221-34.
Small, A. M., 2001. “Changes in the pattern of settlement and land use around Gravina and Monte Irsi (4th century BC–6th century AD)”, in Modalità insediative e strutture agrarie nell'Italia meridionale in età romana, eds. E. Lo Cascio & A. Storchi Marino (Bari: Edipuglia), 36-53.
Small, A. M. & C. M. Small, 2002. “The Basentello Valley survey (Apulia, Basilicata)”, in New Developments in Italian Landscape Archaeology. Theory and methodology of field survey; Land evaluation and landscape perception; Pottery production and distribution, eds. P. Attema, G.-J. Burgers, E. van Joolen, M. van Leusen & B. Mater (Oxford: British Archaeological Reports), 83-6.
Small, A. M., 2003. “Some Greek inscriptions on native vases from South East Italy”, in Greek Identity in the Western Mediterranean. Papers in Honour of Brian Shefton, ed. K. Lomas (Leiden: Brill), 267-85.
Small, A. M., V. Volterra & R. G. V. Hancock, 2003. “New evidence from tile-stamps for imperial properties near Gravina, and the topography of imperial estates in SE Italy”, Journal of Roman Archaeology, 16, 178-99.
Small, A. M., 2005. “Le analisi al radiocorbonio e la fine della villa di San Giovanni di Ruoti”, in Paesaggi e insediamenti rurali in Italia meridionale fra Tardoantico e Altomedioevo, eds. G. Volpe & M. Turchiano (Bari: Edipuglia), 127-31.
Small, A. M., 2005. T”he Production and distribution of bricks and tiles in South Italy: the evidence of Vagnari”, in Noctes Campanae. Studi di storia antica ed archeologia preromana e romana: testimonianze e modelli, eds. W. V. Harris & E. Lo Cascio (Napoli: Luciano), 191-211.
Small, A. M., 2006. “Impressions of ethnic identity: Hellenistic tile stamps in South Italy”, in Across frontiers: Etruscans, Greeks, Phoenicians and Cypriots. Studies in honour of David Ridgway and Francesca Romana Serra Ridgway, eds. E. Herring, I. Lemos, F. Lo Schiavo, L. Vagnetti, R. Whitehouse & J. Wilkins (London: Accordia Research Institute, University of London), 327-37.
Small, A. M., 2007. “Urban, suburban and rural religion in the Roman period”, in The World of Pompeii, eds. J. J. Dobbins & P. Foss (London: Routledge), 184-211.
Small, A. M. & C. M. Small, 2007. “Excavation in the Roman cemetery at Vagnari in the territory of Gravina in Puglia 2002”. Papers of the British School at Rome, 75, 123-229.
Small, A. M., (2008). “La villa romana di San Giovanni di Ruoti”, in Felicitas Temporum. Dalla terra alle genti: la Basilicata settentrionale tra archeologia e storia, eds. A. Russo & H. Di Giuseppe Soprintendenza per i beni archeologici della Basilicata / Istituto nazionale di archeologia e storia dell'arte, 425-69.
Small, A. M., (2008). “L'instrumentum della villa di San Giovanni di Ruoti”, in Felicitas Temporum. Dalla terra alle genti: la Basilicata settentrionale tra archeologia e storia, eds. A. Russo & H. Di Giuseppe (Potenza: Soprintendenza per i beni archeologici della Basilicata / Istituto nazionale di archeologia e storia dell'arte), 572-94.
Small, A. M. & C. M. Small, 2010. “The black-gloss pottery from the Iron Age site of San Felice, South Italy”, Mouseion, ser. 3, vol. 10 no. 2, 243-80.
Small, A. M., (2011). “Vino e acculturazione nella Magna Grecia nel periodo ellenistico-romano”, in La vigna di Dioniso: vite, vino e culti in Magna Grecia, Atti del XLIX Convegno di Studi sulla Magna Grecia, Taranto, 24 - 28 settembre 2009 (Taranto: Scorpione), 395-420.
Small, A. M., 2013. “David Ridgway”, Oebalus, 8, 53-65.
Small, A. M., 2013. “Robert J. Buck 1926-2012”, Bulletin of the Canadian Institute in Greece, 31.
Small, A.M., (2013). “Southern Italy”, in The Cambridge Ancient History. Plates to volumes VII part 2 and VIII. The rise of Rome to 133 BC. New edition., ed. C. Smith (Cambridge: Cambridge UP), 117-55.
Small, A. M., (2014). “From Silvium to Vagnari: sheep, wool and weaving on the saltus”, in Beyond Vagnari. New Themes in the Study of Roman South Italy, ed. A. M. Small (Bari: Edipuglia), 53-63.
Small, A. M., (2014). “Tile stamps of privati from the Basentello valley field survey”, in Beyond Vagnari. New Themes in the Study of Roman South Italy, ed. A. M. Small (Bari: Edipuglia), 73-7.
Small, A. M., (2014). “Pots, peoples and places in fourth-century B.C.E. Apulia”, in The Italic People of Ancient Apulia. New evidence from pottery for workshops, markets, and customs”, eds. T. H. Carpenter, K. M. Lynch & E. G. D. Robinson (Cambridge: Cambridge UP), 13-35.
Small, A. M., (2016). “The provenance of the inscription of Susus magister .... gregarius”, in Epigrafia e Territorio. Politica e Società. Temi di Antichità Romane, eds. M. Chelotti & M. Silvestrini (Bari: Edipuglia), 375-83.
Small, C. M. & A. M. Small, (2017). “Surface collection on San Felice 2006–2008”, in Il paesaggio storico ricostruito. L'insediamento di Piana San Felice a Gravina in Puglia, eds. L. Cossalter & M. R. Depalo (Bari: Edipuglia), 9-17
Small, A. M., (2019). “Il percorso della Via Appia tra Palazzo San Gervasio e Gravina”, in Via Appia Regina Viarum. Ricerche, Contesti, Valorizzazione. Atti del Convegno Melfi- Venosa 3-4 maggio 2017, ed. M. L. Marchi (Venosa: Osanna), 223-43.
Small, A. M., (2020). “Botromagno / Silvium in the 2nd century BC”, in Tra Ionio e Tirreno: orizzonti d'archeologia. Omaggio a Elena Lattanzi, eds. R. Spadea, F. Lo Schiavo & M. L. Lazzarini Roma: Scienze e Lettere, 659-69.
Schinco, G. & A. M. Small, 2020. “A previously unknown siege of Botromagno / Silvium: the evidence of slingshots from Gravina in Puglia (provincia di Bari, regione di Puglia)”, Papers of the British School at Rome, 88, 67-118.
Book reviews
Small, A. M., 1986. Review of J. M. Frayn, Sheep-rearing and the Wool Trade in Italy during the Roman Period in EMC, 30, 184-91.
Small, A. M., 1989. Potter's Roman Italy. review of T.W. Potter, Roman Italy in Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2, 214-8.
Small, A. M., 1990. Review of L. Richardson, Pompeii: an architectural history in Echos du Monde Classique/Classical Views, 34, 311-7.
Small, A. M., 2006. Review of H. Jones, ed. Samnium. Settlement and Cultural Change in Phoenix, 40, 168-73.
Small, A. M., 2007. “The identity of the Lucanians”: review of E. Isayev, Inside Ancient Lucania in Journal of Roman Archaeology, 20, 399-402.
Small, A.M., 2009. Review of M. Castoldi, La ceramica geometrica bicroma dell’Incoronata di Metaponto (scavi 1974-1995, 2006 in Ancient West & East, 8, 337-9.
Small, A. M., 2013. “A major conference on Central Apulia and Peucetia and a new synthesis on rural settlement”. Review of L. Todisco (ed.), La Puglia centrale dall'età del bronzo al medioevo (2010), and of A. Mangiatordi, Insediamenti rurali e strutture agrarie nella Puglia centrale in età romana (2011) in Journal of Roman Archaeology, 26, 741-9.
Small, A. M., 2014. “A major study of imperial estates in Italy”. Review of M. Maiuro, Res Caesaris, ricerche sulla proprietà imperiale nel principato in Journal of Roman Archaeology, 27, 645-52.
Small, A. M., 2018. “The cities of central Apulia: evidence and the lack thereof”. Reviews of C.S. Fioriello, ‘Poediculorum Oppida’. Spazi urbani della Puglia centrale in età romana, and Luigi Todisco (ed.), Bari Romana in Journal of Roman Archaeology, 31, 769-73.
Small, A. M., 2018. “Two rural settlements in the territory of Metapontum”. Reviews of E. Lanza Catti & K. Swift (eds.), The Chora of Metaponto 5. A Greek farmhouse at Ponte Fabrizio, and F. Silvestrelli & I. E. M. Edlund-Berry (eds.), The Chora of Metaponto 6. A Greek settlement at Sant’Angelo Vecchio in Journal of Roman Archaeology, 31, 584-9.
Small, A. M., 2019. “Sacred rites in the Metapontine chora”. Review of J. C. Carter and K. Swift, The chora of Metaponto 7. The Greek sanctuary at Pantanello in Journal of Roman Archaeology, 32, 574-83.