The volumes of The Family in Antiquity series bring together scholars investigating the ancient family across the spectrum of classical ancient history – from ancient Greece, to the Hellenistic Mediterranean, to the Roman Empire through to early Christian Europe. All the writers have an interest in what could be described as the nature of the oikos in Greece and the familia of the Roman Empire and early Medieval Europe. The terms oikos and familia as used in antiquity are difficult to define and any translation into a European language is quickly found to be wanting and inadequate. Moreover, the cultural production and reproduction of these linguistic terms occurred in very different societies across the wide chronological span of antiquity – over 1,600 years (from c.800 BC through to c.800 AD). This diversity of usage and cultural context was one of the attractions of these terms for an investigation that was first considered in 2008 at a meeting to discuss collaboration of research between the present editors of the volumes. Our intention was to extend the discussion of the family in antiquity both in terms of chronological range, but also in terms of the interaction of academics working on different periods of antiquity. After all, we can all observe in our university libraries the range of publications on the Roman Family and then find an absence of a similar scale of writing on the family in Archaic, Classical or Hellenistic Greece; or, for that matter, books on the family in Late Antiquity. To address this issue, we decided to hold a conference entitled From Oikos to the Familia: Framing the Discipline for the twenty-first century with the proviso that we would include all who wished to deliver a paper on this subject. We met in Gothenburg over 3 days in November 2009 with 60 speakers from across the globe, arranged, for the most part, in three parallel sessions.
Subsequently, as organizers, we were faced with the difficult choice of which papers to select for inclusion in the volumes. There were many good papers that simply could not be fitted in and here we wish to acknowledge the importance of these unpublished papers that were delivered at the conference. All the papers given in Gothenburg have shaped how authors in these volumes have thought about their shared subject – the ancient family. All the abstracts from the conference can be found at: http://www.iaa.bham.ac.uk/news/conferences/oikosfamilia/index.shtml
In addition, we wish to express our profound gratitude to both Mark Golden and Natalie Kampen in providing a lead in opening the conference and setting an agenda that was explicitly self-critical and questioning of received wisdom. Both have kindly agreed to comment on the papers published in these volumes in final chapters to each volume and to share with us their views of the future of the subject.
The volumes of The Family in Antiquity do not seek to definitively define oikos or familia: instead they contain different perspectives to those found published previously, either in terms of subject matter (for example osteological analysis from the Veneto and Roman Britain), or methodologies and perspectives drawn from outside the classical disciplines (for example in the study of demography and kinship). One of our principle aims in these volumes is to include a sense of the excitement and vibrancy of the ideas expressed at the conference in Gothenburg as participants met, often for the first time, and discussed new understandings and new thoughts about a common interest in the family in antiquity.
These volumes are not the end of this project, but one of its outputs. To enable younger researchers undertaking doctoral research to interact, students from the Universities of Birmingham and Gothenburg set up a website to enable the discussion of the life course in antiquity. It is important for this next generation of academics to be able to interact and develop contacts in ways that were unimaginable when we ourselves were students; and, given the current uncertainty of the future in the present economic climate, there is a need for us to ensure that we do not lose a generation of researchers (as occurred, for example, in the UK in the 1980s). With this in mind, an initiative has been set up to promote the study of the family in antiquity in Swedish Higher Education that will involve the participation of other European scholars.
The production of these volumes has consistently reminded us of the joy, professionalism, and enthusiasm that the participants brought with them to Gothenburg in 2009. These qualities carried this project forward to publication. We hope readers will see these qualities in the written versions produced by the authors in a timely fashion for each volume. Here, we need to thank Céline Murphy for her invaluable help in editing both volumes – she has been meticulous in her work, we the editors take responsibility for any errors. Finally, we must acknowledge that none of this would have been possible without the support of the following sponsors of the conference:
Professor Göran Malmstedt and the Department of Historical Studies, University of Gothenburg for hosting the conference
The Swedish Research Council
The Swedish Foundation for the Cooperation in Research and Higher Education
The Institute of Archaeology and Antiquity and the College of Arts and Law, University of Birmingham
The Classical Association (UK)
The Institute of Classical Studies, University of London
Stiftelsen Harald och Tonny Hagendahls Minnesfond
The Wenner Gren Foundation
Berg Publishers (UK)
The Society for the Study of Childhood in the Past
The University of Kent, Faculty of Humanities (for funding the invaluable Céline Murphy)
Michael Greenwood at Continuum
The editors recognize the contribution that all the above have made to both volumes.
Mary Harlow (University of Birmingham), Lena Larsson Lovén (University of Gothenburg), Ray Laurence (University of Kent), Agneta Strömberg (University of Gothenburg)