Instant Classics

Few elements of ancient Rome have inspired quite such lurid speculation – by the Romans as well as ourselves – as the vestal virgins. Mary and Charlotte enter the (imaginary) temple of Vesta to separate fact from myth.  The Vestal Virgins were six (at any given time) priestesses who tended the eternal flame at the Temple of Vesta - goddess of hearth, home and family. As their name suggests, they weren’t allowed to have sex, although could retire from duties (and marry) at the age of 30. Maintaining chastity was evidently a challenge of the job - or perceived as one - because several vestals were put to death for breaking their vows over the centuries. In exchange for this life of piety, they enjoyed certain privileges - such as being able to sit in the front row of the colosseum - and were power-brokers in Rome, even looking after Julius Caesar’s will (for any Dune fans, think Bene Gesserit!) Charlotte grills Mary about an early article she wrote on the Vestals in 1980, in which she argued that the role of the virgins wasn’t to adhere to traditional notions of female purity, but actually to challenge them - the vestals shared privileges unique to married women, unmarried women and men. They were both gendered and ungendered, which is what makes them so compelling. Fifteen years later, Mary wrote another article which took (slight) issue with her earlier one, questioning to what extent the Romans even had ‘traditional notions’ of gender. Further reading  Mary’s landmark (this is Charlotte’s editorialising!) article on the Vestal Virgins (“The sexual status of Vestal Virgins”) was published in the Journal of Roman Studies 1980; her reassessment is in R Hawley and B Levick (eds), Women in Antiquity: New Assessments (Routledge, pb, 1995) Booklength studies of  the Vestals include: Robin Wildfang, Rome’s Vestal Virgins (Routledge, pb, 2006) S. A. Takacs, Vestal Virgins, Sibyls and Matrons (UTexas Press, pb, 2008) Ariadne Staples, From Good Goddess to Vestal Virgins (Routledge, pb, 2012) For their portraits: Molly Lindner, Portraits of the Vestal Virgins (UMichigan Press, 2015) At the time she wrote her first article on the Vestals, Mary was very influenced by Mary Douglas, Purity and Danger (Routledge, pb, reissued 2002; originally published 1966) @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube@insta_classics for Xemail: [email protected] Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Of all the Roman Emperors, Augustus has the reputation of being the most… well… august. That is to say, competent, level-headed and judicious. Not to mention one of the few who died of natural causes. But, according to Mary and Charlotte, the main reason Augustus got anything done is because he had a secret weapon in the form of Marcus Agrippa.  We don’t know much about Marcus Agrippa’s early life, because he didn’t come from the aristocracy, but by the time he was thirty Augustus couldn’t do much without him. There is evidence that Agrippa managed the battles for which Augustus is famous, including the Battle of Actium, while Augustus pulled another sickie. When not defeating Rome’s enemies, Agrippa put a great deal of energy into building works. He constructed baths, temples (including the original Pantheon) and aqueducts. There are even stories of him getting onto a boat and rowing amidst the faeces of the Cloaca Maxima - Rome’s sewage system - to oversee improvements.  While Agrippa did not come from the upper classes, he ended up there. He is buried with the imperial family in the mausoleum of Augustus (which you can still visit) and his great-grandson Nero became emperor. Perhaps, when we call some great figure ‘august’, we should call them ‘agrippan’ instead!  Further reading:  Lindsay Powell, Marcus Agrippa: Right-hand man of Caesar Augustus (Pen and Sword, pb, 2023) is the fullest recent biography of Agrippa (otherwise, in English, you have to go back to the 1930s) For the archaeology, the Pantheon in Rome remains Agrippa’s greatest and most visible monument, with his name prominently displayed (albeit rebuilt by the emperor Hadrian, probably to a new plan). The probable residence of Agrippa and Julia in Rome lies underneath the later, Renaissance, Villa Farnesina near the Tiber bank. Both were exquisitely decorated. You can still see Raphael's designs in the later villa. Most of the major ancient paintings from Agrippa’s property have been removed to the Palazzo Massimo museum. The archaeology is briefly discussed here: https://www.digitalaugustanrome.org/records/villa-farnesina/ Paintings from another villa owned by Agrippa, at Boscotrecase outside Pompeii, can be seen in the Met Museum in New York.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Mary talks to Charlotte about her book Ukrainian Lessons: Art in a Time of War. For the last four years, Charlotte has returned repeatedly to Ukraine to report on the cultural life of the nation as it defends itself against Russia. Part of Putin’s attempts to legitimise the war lies in an age-old argument that Ukraine is simply an extension, or part of, Russia itself. Art and culture have always played a critical role in Ukraine’s identity and self-determinism –and never more so than now.  Charlotte talks about what first took her to Ukraine in 2022, some of what she has learned over the last four years, and how reading the classics, especially Homer and Greek tragedy, have helped her make sense of the current situation. And Mary and Charlotte discuss Ukraine’s classical past: histories of Ukraine often start with Herodotus and his account of the Scythians of the steppe; and the Black Sea coast, and Crimea, are dotted with some of the earliest Greek “colonies” or trading emporia. Further reading  Charlotte’s book Ukrainian Lessons: Art in a Time of War (Cape) is published on 20 August. Charlotte and Mary also mentioned Oleksandr Mykhed’s book The Language of War (Penguin, paperback, 2026), and Cassandra by Lesia Ukrainka (HURI, 2023) On the classical connections of Ukraine, there is a good introduction to the ruins of Olbia. Euripides’ fifth-century play, Iphigeneia in Tauris (Iphigeneia among the Taurians) is set in the Crimean peninsula (English translations widely available in Oxford World’s Classics, Penguin Classics etc).  A BBC news article about the return of Scythian artefacts to Kyiv after a decade of court hearings. @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Summer is here (in the northern hemisphere at least) and with many listeners eyeing trips to the beach, Mary and Charlotte are here with some cracking beach read suggestions. Move over Carley Fortune, Ann Patchett, and Tana French and make way for Herodotus, Lucian and Longus. Charlotte does a hard sell for Herodotus’ Histories (all 700 pages) and Ovid’s (mercifully shorter) Heroides. Mary pushes the science-fiction humour of Lucian’s Selected Dialogues (while acknowledging it could do with a better title) and Longus’ Daphnis and Chloe. Turning to modern books set in the ancient world, Charlotte champions Colm Tóibín’s House of Names, while Mary chooses Samuel Butler’s The Authoress of the Odyssey - which, published in 1897, pushes the definition of ‘modern’ a little, but we don’t expect anything less from a Cambridge don!  Finally, something for the kids… Mary is a fan of Caroline Lawrence’s Roman Mysteries and Charlotte feels equally enthusiastic about Percy Jackson.  Charlotte’s recommendations: Herodotus, The Histories comes in many translations – Robin Waterfield for Oxford World’s Classics, and Tom Holland for Penguin Classics Ovid, Heroides, also has translations in the World’s Classics and Penguin Classics series Colm Tóibín, House of Names, Penguin, 2018 Rick Riordan, Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, Puffin, 2013 Mary’s recommendations: For Lucian’s Dialogues, the handiest translation is a selection of some of the best of his satire in Oxford World’s Classics. Peter Thonemann is producing a new translation of the whole lot in the Loeb Classical Library (Harvard UP), including the original Greek text too. Two volumes have appeared so far. Longus, Daphnis and Chloe is also published in World’s Classics, and in Penguin Classics (with other works of ancient Greek fiction), and on its own in the Penguin Little Black Classics series. Samuel Butler’s Authoress of the Odyssey is available in various modern reprints (often independently published) listed in online bookstores Caroline Lawrence’s series of Roman Mysteries is published by Orion. @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Last week, actor Tom Hiddleston launched his new series - not the further adventures of Loki (at least, not yet), but Pompeii: Out of Time with Tom Hiddleston. Mary and Charlotte talk to Tom who reveals his life-long fascination with the ancient world, including a degree in Classics at Cambridge where he attended the lectures of one Professor Mary Beard.  Tom talks about the impact Mary’s teaching had on him and how that fascination for the Classics has never gone away. His new series, available to watch on Disney+ and National Geographic, focuses on several real people and the decisions they made in the hours before the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79. It draws on new research and technology to uncover the hidden lives of some of those who survived - and some who didn’t.  Further reading  Mary Beard’s book Pompeii is strongly recommended by Charlotte! And there is a recent book by Jess Venner, The Lost Voices of Pompeii (Harper Collins, 2026), which picks up and develops some of the same themes. In one of his first roles, Tom appeared in the Cambridge Greek play. You can find out more about this marvellous institution here: https://www.classics.cam.ac.uk/prospective/undergraduate/greek-play and here: https://www.cambridgegreekplay.classics.cam.ac.uk/  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices