Fitch Wiener Labs Seminar Series Dr. Anna Lagia (Department of Archaeology, Ghent University), “The Other Side of the Athenian Democracy: Laurion Through the Prism of Bioarchaeology” In-person only Contact: For any enquiries, tel.: 213-000-2400 (133), Email: infoWienerLab@ascsa.edu.gr
Annual Bader Archive Lecture Ann French (Whitworth Art Gallery, University of Manchester ), "Embroideries and Archives: A Research Journey" Abstract: In the early twentieth century, a group of BSA students put together significant collections of Greek domestic embroidery. Many of which are now in museum collections across the UK, in particular the V&A and National […]
Artist in residence event Abbie Vickress (University of the Arts London), "Reimagining the Narrative(s) of Contested Cultural Artefacts" Abstract: UAL Research Resident Artist Abbie Vickress will talk about the residency and the ways that this experience has evolved her PhD research on how graphic design influences the interpretation of contested cultural artefacts in museums and […]
BSA Friends Greece lecture George Batzanopoulos (John Craxton Estate), "John Craxton: Painting the Land of the Apollonian and the Dionysian" Abstract: This lecture presents the main findings of George Batzanopoulos’ undergraduate dissertation, John Craxton: Painting the Land of the Apollonian and the Dionysian, completed at The Courtauld Institute of Art. The research examines how the […]
Upper House Seminar James Hua (BSA Macmillan-Rodewald Student/ University of Oxford), "Population Expulsions and Refugee Crises in the Archaic-Hellenistic Greek world: ubiquity, strategies, and exiles’ agency" Abstract: Population expulsions and the refugee crises which followed were a remarkably frequent phenomenon in the ancient Greek world. This talk outlines the phenomenon and argues for the deep […]
Fitch Wiener Labs Seminar Series Dr Artemios Oikonomou (BSA Fitch Laboratory), “Glass Biographies II: Technology and the Afterlife of Glass” In-person only Contact: For any enquiries, tel.: 213-000-2400 (133), Email: infoWienerLab@ascsa.edu.gr
One-day online workshop Byzantium and Bloomsbury This one-day online workshop will focus on the interest of members of the Bloomsbury Group in Byzantium, especially Byzantine art. Both Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant demonstrated an interest in Byzantine art, in terms of their aesthetic concerns and their subject matter; in 1912 Vanessa Bell painted a work […]
Course keynote lecture - History and Philosophy of the Olympic Games Professor George Mavrotas (Secretary General of Sport, Hellenic Ministry of Education, Religious Affairs and Sport), "Modern challenges for sport integrity" From ancient years, in the first Olympic Games, sport was related to ethics and values. After the revival of sport culture and the first […]
Mosaic pavement showing the Horae from a villa in Patras. 2nd – 3rd c. CE. Archaeological Museum of Patras Upper House Seminar Dr Nikki Vellidis (BSA Cary Student), "Recognising ‘Hands’ of Mosaicists through Depictions of Women in the Mosaics of Imperial Era Greece" Abstract: Information about the process of constructing mosaic pavements—the people, the […]
The Cambridge Centre for Greek Studies and the British School at Athens are pleased to announce a Colloquium which will focus on the life and work of Richard M. Dawkins, Director of the British School at Athens (1906 to 1914) and the first occupant of the Bywater and Sotheby Chair of Byzantine and Modern Greek Language and Literature at the University of […]
Fitch Wiener Labs Seminar Series Dr Maria Kaparou (Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (INN), NCSR Demokritos), "Glass Biographies I: Corrosion and material identity" In-person only Contact: For any enquiries, tel.: 213-000-2400 (133), Email: infoWienerLab@ascsa.edu.gr
Image credit: Giulio Lucarini & Toby Wilkinson BSA Friends' lecture Professor Cyprian Broodbank (University of Cambridge), 'The Emergence of Civilisation', and the Maghreb Abstract: The ‘long’ third millennium BC is recognised as a crucial period of social change across much of the Mediterranean. In 1972 Colin Renfrew’s magisterial The Emergence of Civilisation: The Cyclades and […]
Mercy Money-Coutts at Knossos, Crete, 1937, PEN/7/2/6/667, John Pendlebury Family Papers © British School at Athens. Women Archaeologists and War Fourth workshop on Women in the Archaeology of Greece By the École française d’Athènes and the British School at Athens, with the support of the British Embassy in Athens Organisers: Priscilla Ralli, Rachel Phillips, Rebecca […]
Disc with the symbols of the nine Muses and Mnemosyne, wikimedia commons Philosophy Seminar Professor Alex Long (University of St Andrews), "Platonic protreptic and the unity of the Phaedrus" Abstract: Plato's Phaedrus is widely regarded as the first expression in the Greek and Roman traditions of the view that literary compositions should possess 'organic' unity. And […]
Atlantis https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_landscape_of_Atlantis.jpg Philosophy Seminar Professor Alex Long (University of St Andrews), "The city-cosmos contrast in Plato’s Timaeus and Critias" Abstract: Plato’s Timaeus and Critias offer a puzzling combination of cosmology and the political quasi-history of ancient Athens and Atlantis. Previous discussions have taken Plato’s aim to be naturalizing the political theory or likening political lawgivers […]
View of the Staphylos peninsula, Skopelos, credit: ASkoS Project Upper House Seminar Professor Peter Pavúk (Charles University), "Central Greece at the dawn of the Mycenaean Age and the role of contacts to the North" Abstract: The transition from the Middle to the Late Bronze Age in the Argolid is commonly defined by the Shaft Graves […]
Fitch Wiener Labs Seminar Series Dr Claire Zikidi (M. H. Wiener Laboratory, ASCSA and National and Kapodistrian University of Athens), "Facing Mortality, Confronting Death: Mortality Salience and Behavioural Perspectives in Archaeological Interpretation" In-person only Contact: For any enquiries, tel.: 213-000-2400 (133), Email: infoWienerLab@ascsa.edu.gr
Annual Open Lectures 2026 Athens Please join us for the Annual Open Lectures of the British School at Athens on Thursday 19th February 2026 at 7 p.m. which will be held at the Archaeological Society (Lecture Hall), 22 Panepistimiou Street, Athens. The Work of the British School at Athens in 2025 Professor Rebecca Sweetman BSA […]
Annual Open Lectures 2026 Thessaloniki Please join us for the Annual Open Lectures of the British School at Athens on Tuesday 17th February 2026 at 7 p.m. The lecture will take place in the Cast Gallery of the Faculty of Philosophy, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. The Work of the British School at Athens in 2025 […]
Panel discussion Panel 2: Translation and the Magnitude of Historical Figures: Michalis Ganas and Translation Co-hosted with Aiora Press in Athens Chair: David Ricks Panel: John Stathatos, Vassilis Letsios, Joshua Barley Chair: David Ricks Unusually among modern Greek poets Michalis Ganas (1944-2024) was not a translator. Yet his poems have had a second life in many languages, […]
Annual Open Lectures 2026 London Please join us for the Annual Open Lectures of the British School at Athens on Tuesday 3rd February at 6 pm which will be held at the Great Hall, King's College London, Strand, WC2R 2LS. A reception will follow from 7.30pm to 8.30pm. The following lectures will be […]
The translator of Athens Tales with the city in the background, photo credit: Andrew Spyrou Friends of the BSA Greece lecture Joshua Barley, ‘Athens Tales’ Book Presentation Recently published by Oxford University Press, Athens Tales is an anthology of Greek writing about the city, from the late nineteenth century to today. The book brings together […]
Panel discussion Panel 1: Translation and the Magnitude of Historical Figures: Homer, Lorca and Seferis Co-hosted with the Cyprus High Commission in London Chair: Gonda Van Steen Panel: Dimitra Kotoula, Andry Christofidou-Antoniadou, Jennifer Kellogg, Afroditi Athanasopoulou Dimitra Kotoula: ‘The Smile of Astyanax: Working with Homer’ My contribution to this workshop consists of posing questions, rather […]
Philippos Margaritis, A Greek Lady, c.1855, Th. Theodorou Collection Book presentation Victorians and Modern Greece: Literary and Cultural Encounters The event will feature three talks presenting the book Victorians and Modern Greece: Literary and Cultural Encounters recently published by Routledge in the British School at Athens—Modern Greek and Byzantine Studies Series. The volume examines the […]
International Symposium Celebrating 200 Years of Mary Shelley’s The Last Man Mary Shelley’s third published novel, The Last Man (1826), tells of a great plague which exterminates the human race at the end of the twenty-first century, just as the Greek Revolution reaches its long-postponed conclusion with the conquest of Constantinople. In what many critics […]
Delphi © Prof. Lin Foxhall. UK Friends' lecture Professor Lin Foxhall (University of Liverpool), "Re-imagining ancient Greek landscapes" Abstract: Ancient Greek landscapes were both like and unlike those we see today. Landscapes are dynamic and change over time, sometimes very rapidly. The human relationships within local communities linked together a variety of urban and rural spaces […]
The west pediment of the Parthenon after Cyriac of Ancona Visiting Fellow Lecture Dr Lorenzo Calvelli (Ca' Foscari University of Venice), "A View from Athens. Reassessing Cyriac of Ancona’s Vita and Commentaria" Abstract: This lecture will explore the manuscript tradition and the discoveries of Cyriac of Ancona, the fifteenth-century Italian humanist, merchant and traveller who […]
Fitch-Wiener Seminar Dr. Richard Thér (Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Hradec Králové, CZ), "Structural and Surface Analysis as a Key to Pottery Forming Techniques" Abstract: The aim of the lecture is to present the current developments in the possibilities of qualitative and quantitative analysis of ceramic body structure as well as vessel […]
Rhamnous, photo: E. Harris UK Friends' lecture Professor Edward Harris (Durham University), "A New Approach to the Attic Countryside: Markets in the Demes" Abstract: In Aristophanes’ Acharnians (33-36), Dikaiopolis expresses his nostalgia for the good old days in the Attic countryside when no one ever used the word ‘buy’ and the land produced everything he […]
William Barlett, Rhodes, with the channel between the Islands and Asia Minor (1836), Wikimedia Commons Panel discussion Archaeology in the Ottoman Aegean: Consuls – Culture – Commerce How did local communities contribute to archaeology in the 19th and early 20th centuries? What were the connections between Ottoman officials, international diplomats, and competing curators? And what […]
BSA/SPBS lecture Dr Vicky Manolopoulou (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice), "A Landscape of Fear and Hope: Perceptions and Responses to Environmental change in Byzantine Constantinople" How did the environment shape landscape experience in Byzantine Constantinople? This talk explores aspects of the environmental history of the city by focusing on environmental emotion; it discusses how the […]
Votive relief with Pluto, Persephone and Demeter (4th-3rd cent. B.C.) in the National Archaeological Museum of Athens on 22 July 2018, courtesy of B. Cassell Upper House Seminar Ben Cassell (BSA/King’s College London), "The Aiora and Thesmophoria: Cognitve, embodied and psychological approaches" Abstract: Recent years have seen an increasing application of models derived from the […]
The British School at Athens as a member of the Committee for the Support of Libraries (CSL) co-organizes the International Conference “Designing Belonging: Libraries as Inclusive and Open Public Spaces” which will take place on 1 and 2 December 2025 at the National Library of Greece premises at Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center. The detailed […]
Ilenia Cipollari performing with Musarc, photo by Yiannis Katsaris Artist Researcher in Residence event Ilenia Cipollari (BSA/University of the Arts London), "Sounding the Archive: Fragments in Emily Penrose’s Own Voice. British School at Athens, 1887–2025" Sounding the Archive is an intimate hybrid performance-lecture inspired by the travel diaries of historian Emily Penrose during her time […]
Remembering Colin Renfrew: a life’s work on the Cyclades and beyond Friday 21 November 2025, 19:00 Location: Archaeological Society at Athens, 22 Panepistimiou Str, 106 72 Athens, Greece This event will be recorded but will not take place as a live hybrid presentation. A video recording will be released in due course on the BSA […]
Fitch-Wiener Seminar Dr. Marek Verčík (Institute of Classical Archaeology, Faculty of Arts, Charles University in Prague), "Collapse – Transformation – Rise? Dynamics of Environmental Changes between the Balkans and the Aegean in the Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages" In-person only Contact: For any enquiries, tel.: 213-000-2400 (133), Email: infoWienerLab@ascsa.edu.gr
Sinclair Hood as BSA Director (1954-62). © BSA Visiting Fellow Lecture Professor Nicoletta Momigliano (University of Bristol), "Mal d’Archive/Archive Fever (some reflections on Sinclair Hood’s archive at the British School at Athens)" This lecture presents some reflections stemming from current research on the Royal Road excavations that were carried out by Sinclair Hood at Knossos […]
The Portara Gate, Palatia islet, Naxos, photo: R Levitan UK Friends' lecture Dr Rebecca Levitan (King's College London), "The Naxos Quarry Project: New Insights on the Archaic Marble Quarries and Monuments of Naxos, Greece" Abstract: In the early history of marble working in the Mediterranean, few locations have been more influential than Naxos, an island […]
NHRF/ICS/BSA Lectures in Classics series Professor Polly Low (Durham University), "Towards a new history of ancient Greek empire(s)" Abstract: Can we talk of 'empire' when studying the behaviour of Greek states in the fifth and fourth centuries BCE? Does using this terminology clarify or obscure our understanding of how states and individuals behaved, and how […]
Greek Friends' lecture Dr Angela Paine, "Healing Plants of Greek Myth" There are numerous references to plants used by goddesses and gods to heal or enchant, within Greek Myth, and the names of many of these plants have been incorporated into the Latin binomials that are used to identify them. The first physicians began to […]
*PLEASE NOTE* the conference is now fully booked for in-person attendance. Please register to attend online via webinar. The programme is subject to change - please refer to this webpage for the most up to date version. Conference Mountains of Greece: Heritage narratives from the past for a sustainable future This special two-day conference at the British […]
In-conversation Writing Greece: An evening with Sofka Zinovieff and Julian Hoffman Neither Julian Hoffman nor Sofka Zinovieff are originally from Greece and yet they've both devoted a large part of their careers to writing and thinking about this country. Between them, they've explored it in novels, nonfiction, short stories, podcasts and essays. One lives in […]
Join us for the first Fitch Wiener Lab Seminar Series of the academic year. Magda Giannakopoulou (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens & National Center for Scientific Research Demokritos) will give a talk: "Copper and lead-silver production on EBA Sifnos: an archeometallurgical and archaeological approach"
BSA Fundraising Event Lecture and Wine-tasting The Friends' Committee of the British School at Athens is pleased to share the details of the wine-tasting fundraising event taking place on Tuesday 21 October 2025 at 5.30pm, at Westminster Cathedral Hall, Ambrosden Avenue, London, SW1P 1QW. Please refer to the attached Information leaflet. The event cost is £76 per […]
Athens Archaeology Festival 2025 Join us on the 18th October 2025, between 11:00 and 16:00 in the beautiful grounds of the British School at Athens for a FREE day of exploration, creativity, and hands-on learning. This year’s theme is Myths & Mysteries! Step into the past through interactive activities, live screenings, and inspiring workshops. A wide range of organisations will […]
Christina Nakou: creating a mosaic, courtesy of the artist In-conversation Mosaics: an enduring imprint of materiality. Christina Nakou in conversation with Rebecca Sweetman Based on the ancient technique of mosaics, the conversation between the Director of the BSA Prof Rebecca Sweetman (expert on ancient mosaics) and Visual Artist Christina Nakou approaches concepts such as making, […]
Poetry Readings: Michael Marks Awards Ben Verinder (Environmental Poet of the Year 2024) and Professor Paul O’Prey (winner of the Publisher Award 2024 - Dare Gale press) The BSA is delighted to host the Michael Marks Awards and its winning poets who stay at the BSA for a week as part of the programme. This […]
Temple of Athena Nike on the Athenian Acropolis, reconstruction © John Goodinson UK Friends' Lecture Professor David Gill (University of Kent), "Cleon’s Victory at Sphacteria and the Temple of Athena Nike on the Athenian Acropolis" Cleon’s dramatic victory at Sphacteria in 425 – with its unprecedented capture of 292 Spartan hoplites – was a transformative […]
EARTH WATER FIRE 2025 The Thrapsano Cultural Association, the Centre for the Study of Modern Ceramics and the British School at Athens are organizing in co-organization with the Region of Crete, with the collaboration of PLOYGOS and under the auspices of the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and the Municipality of Minoa Pediada the four-day cultural festival EARTH WATER […]
Women Transcending Boundaries: Over a century of scholarship, fieldwork and friendship across the British International Research Institutes - at the British Academy Summer Showcase 2025 Look out for our digital history of women archaeologists, ‘Women Transcending Boundaries: Over a century of scholarship, fieldwork and friendship across the British International Research Institutes’, on display at The […]
Reconstructing the 1936 British School at Athens (BSA) exhibition: A Workshop on the Study of Pre-World War II Archaeological Exhibitions using Archival Materials Organisers: Andrew Shapland, Renée Trepagnier, Amalia Kakissis, and Charlotte Townsend With the growth of the museum studies discipline and the interest in archival and archaeological collections in museums and heritage organisations, the […]
Daskalio Cave, Kalymnos, Photograph © Stathis Klimis Online Friends' Lecture Dr Maria Mina (University of the Aegean), “Sacred caves outside Crete: Daskalio Cave on Kalymnos and its connections to Minoan ritual practices” Abstract: We know from archaeological studies that occupied caves diachronically held prominent positions as visible landmarks or as nodal points in exchange networks […]
source: ekathimerini "The role of the Diaspora in Greek American relations, 1974-2024” Chaired by: Professor Eirini Karamouzi (American College of Greece/University of Sheffield), Dr Lamprini Rori (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens) Discussants: Professor Alexander Kitroeff (Haverford College) & Professor Constantinos Arvanitopoulos (Panteion University) Abstract: The paper will explore the diaspora as an actor seeking […]
Michael Frede Annual Michael Frede Memorial Lecture Professor Eyjólfur Kjalar Emilsson (University of Oslo), “Idealist, dualist or something else? Plotinus on the status of the sensible world” Abstract: In this paper I shall discuss Plotinus’ views on causation of and in the sensible sphere—by “the sensible sphere” I mean the physical world around us. The […]
August Schörgendorfer’s photos of Villa Ariadne and the excavations at Knossos. Source: © A. Schörgendorfer’s photo album Annual Bader Archive Lecture Dr Georgia Flouda (Archaeological Museum of Heraklion), “Adventures in the Archives: Reconstructing archaeology in Nazi-Occupied Crete” Abstract: This presentation explores the institutional and political context of the Wehrmacht’s Kunstschutz (‘Art Protection’), established in 1941 […]
Upper House Seminar Dr Alessandra Ricci (Koç University), “How did it begin?: The Institutionalization of Byzantine Studies in Turkey and Sir Steven Runciman” Abstract: It was probably sometime in 1941 or early 1942 when İzmet İnönü, the second president of the Turkish Republic, summoned the minister of national education, Hasan Ali Yücel who confirmed - […]
Pottery from the Cyclades: an interdisciplinary approach Dr. Edyta Marzec, British School at Athens In-person only
image: German gun-emplacement at Thessaloniki with its communication trench lined with Jewish gravestones. Photographed by the British Army in November 1944. Author’s archive. Upper House Seminar Dr Roderick Bailey (University of Oxford), "Anglo-American attitudes to the protection of Jewish cultural heritage in Thessaloniki, 1943-46" Abstract: During the Second World War, more than four-fifths of Greece’s […]
image: The Mani Promontory in the Southern Peloponnese. CORONELLI, Vincenzo. Description géographique et historique de la Morée ... , Paris, Nicolas Langlois, MDCLXXXVII Online Friends' lecture Elias Kolovos (National Hellenic Research Foundation), "How the Ottoman traveller Evliya Çelebi set foot on the Mani Peninsula, but left in a hurry... Ottoman imperial administration in the […]
image: Funerary inscription for Domitia Saturnina Apollonis (Corinth 8.1.134), source: American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Corinth Excavations Upper House Seminar Dr Laura Nastasi (BSA), "Language Set in Stone: Graeco-Latin Bilingualism and Writing Culture in Roman Corinth" Abstract: The commonly accepted view about Corinth in the Roman period is that the foundation of a […]
