Poverty in Ancient Greece and Rome - Realities and Discourses

This volume presents an innovative picture of the ancient Mediterranean world. Approaching poverty as a multifaceted condition, it examines how different groups were affected by the lack of access to symbolic, cultural and social - as well as economic - capital.

Collecting a wide range of studies by an international team of experts, it presents a diverse and complex analysis of life in antiquity, from the archaic to the late antique period. The sections on Greece, Rome, and Late Antiquity offer in-depth studies of ancient life, integrating analysis of socio-economic dynamics and cultural and discursive strategies that shaped this crucial element of ancient (and modern) societies. Themes like social cohesion and control, exclusion, gender, agency, and identity are explored through the combination of archaeological, epigraphic, and literary evidence, presenting a rich panorama of Greco-Roman societies and a stimulating collection of new approaches and methodologies for their und