In Ancient Marbles to American Shores, Stephen L. Dyson uncovers the history of classical archaeology in the United States by exploring the people and programs that gave birth to archaeology as a discipline in this country. He puts aside the common formula of chronicling great digs, great discoveries, and great men in favor of a cultural, ideological, and institutional history of the subject. The book explores the ways American contact with the monuments of Greece and Rome affected the national consciousness. It discusses how the spread of classical style laid the groundwork for the development of the discipline after the Civil War and examines the period before World War I, when most of the institutions that led to the establishment of the discipline, as well as the first generation of American classical archaeologists, were created. It looks at the role classical archaeology played in the development of the American art museum since the later nineteenth century and considers changes in American classical archaeology from World War II to the mid-1970s. Filling the void of information on the history of classical archaeology in the United States, this lively book is a valuable contribution to literature on a subject which is enjoying ever-increasing interest and attention.

divThe stories behind the acquisition of ancient antiquities are often as important as those that tell of their creation. This fascinating book provides a comprehensive account of the history and development of classical archaeology, explaining how and why artifacts have moved from foreign soil to collections around the world. As archaeologist Stephen Dyson shows, Greek and Roman archaeological study was closely intertwined with ideas about class and social structure; the rise of nationalism and later political ideologies such as fascism; and the physical and cultural development of most of the important art museums in Europe and the United States, whose prestige depended on their creation of collections of classical art. Accompanied by a discussion of the history of each of the major national traditions and their significant figures, this lively book shows how classical archaeology has influenced attitudes about areas as wide-ranging as tourism, nationalism, the role of the museum, and historicism in nineteenth- and twentieth-century art./DIV

Essays on the historical Greco-Roman influence on the evolving architectural landscape of New York City. During its rise from capital of an upstart nation to global metropolis, the visual language of Greek and Roman antiquity played a formative role in the development of New York’s art and architecture. This compilation of essays offers a survey of diverse reinterpretations of classical forms in some of the city’s most iconic buildings, public monuments, and civic spaces. Classical New York examines the influence of Greco-Roman thought and design from the Greek Revival of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries through the late-nineteenth-century American Renaissance and Beaux Arts period and into the twentieth century’s Art Deco. At every juncture, New Yorkers looked to the classical past for knowledge and inspiration in seeking out new ways to cultivate a civic identity and to structure their public and private spaces. Specialists from a range of disciplines—archaeology, architectural history, art history, classics, and history— focus on how classical art and architecture are repurposed to help shape many of New York City’s most evocative buildings and works of art. Federal Hall evoked the Parthenon as an architectural and democratic model; the Pantheon served as a model for the creation of libraries at New York University and Columbia University; Pennsylvania Station derived its form from the Baths of Caracalla; and Atlas and Prometheus of Rockefeller Center recast ancient myths in a new light during the Great Depression. This examination of post-Revolutionary art, politics, and philosophy enriches the conversation about how we shape space—be it civic, religious, academic, theatrical, or domestic—and how we make use of that space and the objects in it.

If Indiana Jones had relied on trains . . .

This new edition provides a summary of these new archival discoveries and assesses their impact on our understanding of the decisions Ellingson and Robinson made.

Winner of the New Scholars Book Award from the American Educational Research Association Debates continue to rage over whether American university students should be required to master a common core of knowledge. In The Culture of Classicism: Ancient Greece and Rome in American Intellectual Life, 1780–1910, Caroline Winterer traces the emergence of the classical model that became standard in the American curriculum in the nineteenth century and now lies at the core of contemporary controversies. By closely examining university curricula and the writings of classical scholars, Winterer demonstrates how classics was transformed from a narrow, language-based subject to a broader study of civilization, persuasively arguing that we cannot understand both the rise of the American university and modern notions of selfhood and knowledge without an appreciation for the role of classicism in their creation.

A detailed history of the Boston Athenaeum's historic role in the founding of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston