Instant Classics

Mary and Charlotte explore the story of Perpetua, a young Christian woman tortured and murdered in the Roman arena in Carthage (modern day Tunisia) for her faith in the 3rd Century CE. Astonishingly, Perpetua kept a diary during her last days - right up until the point she was led into the arena - recording her life, dreams and fearless conviction that death was better than renouncing God. Even more astonishingly, this diary survives, incorporated into a longer account of her martyrdom narrated by another hand..  Perpetua describes the attempts by both her father and the presiding Roman official to convince her to just say the words that will save her life. She describes her inability to do this, even though it means depriving her baby of its mother. She also describes several of her dreams in the days before her death. The narrator takes over to recount what happened next. Perpetua was mauled by animals and finally despatched by a gladiator.  Perpetua’s account is so remarkable, many have questioned its authenticity. The current scholarly verdict is that it is real, providing a rare insight not only into female experience in the Roman Empire - but a woman living through extreme circumstances.  Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: You can find an online translation of Perpetua’s diary here: https://www.ssfp.org/pdf/The_Martyrdom_of_Saints_Perpetua_and_Felicitas.pdf Barbara Gold, Perpetua: Athlete of God (Oxford UP, pb, 2021) and Sarah Ruden, Perpetua: the woman, the martyr (Yale UP, 2025) are accessible introductions to Perpetua (both including translations of the whole or parts of the text) More specialist studies include;  Jan N. Bremmer and Marco Formisano (eds), Perpetua’s Passions (Oxford UP, 2012) Thomas J. Heffernan, The Passion of Perpetua and Felicitas (Oxford UP, 2012) @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

Antigone is one of the most regularly staged Greek tragedies with great actors lining up to play the part. Juliette Binoche, Juliet Stevenson and Gillian Anderson have all had a crack in recent years. In this episode, Mary and Charlotte look at why Antigone is such an enduringly interesting role. She is sometimes framed as a female Hamlet caught between family loyalties and the needs of the state.  Antigone was written by Sophocles in the mid-5th Century BCE. It tells the story of King Creon’s attempts to restore order to the city of Thebes following a civil war. He orders that the body of the defeated rebel Polynices should lie unburied as punishment. Antigone, sister of Polynices, disobeys this order and gives her brother proper burial rites (as the gods demand). Creon sentences her to death for betrayal.  Antigone is often portrayed as a proto-feminist icon - the brave woman standing up to the patriarchy. But is this really what Sophocles intended? King Creon has far more lines and is, like Antigone, caught in an impossible situation. There’s even one way of viewing the play as a parable on what happens when women meddle in the affairs of the state.  It is, of course, precisely these ambiguities that make Antigone so popular. It raises questions that can never be answered and its relevance shifts from generation to generation.  Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: There is a big book by George Steiner on the history of Antigone: Antigones (Oxford UP, pb, 1986), including Hegel and much more. More approachable are sections of Helen Morales, Antigone Rising: the subversive power of Greek myth (Wildfire, pb, 2021) and the video lecture by Simon Goldhill, https://www.cambridgegreekplay.com/talk-wheres-the-tragedy-in-antigone-by-prof-simon-goldhill Nelson Mandela mentions the performance on Robben Island in his Long Walk to Freedom (Back Bay Books, pb, 1995). Mary describes her own changing views of the play in Talking Classics (Profile books, 2026) @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Expressions of love, bawdy jokes, political satire or even just saying so-and-so was here - few things bring us as close to the Romans as their graffiti. In large part, thanks to Vesuvius preserving the streets of Pompeii and Herculaneum under rock and ash. In this episode, Mary and Charlotte look at what graffiti tells us about Roman society - both the relatable aspects and the unfathomable.  Perhaps the biggest difference is the enhanced role graffiti played in a society which did not have forms of mass communication. Roman graffiti is like graffiti today, but also like social media. In both cases, nobody thought anyone would be looking at it 2000 years later. Roman graffiti goes beyond the official documents. It’s a rare glimpse of daily life and opinions that we today weren’t intended to see.  Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: A searchable database of graffiti in Pompeii and Herculaneum: https://ancientgraffiti.org/Graffiti/ Charlotte’s article on the Spanish amphora scratched with a Virgil quote: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jun/24/ancient-roman-pot-virgil-poetry Charlotte discusses the ‘conticuere omnes’ Virgil quote found in Silchester in her book Under Another Sky, Vintage, 2014 Kristina Milnor discusses Pompeian graffiti in detail in Graffiti and the Literary Landscape in Roman Pompeii (Oxford UP, 2014); there’s a chapter devoted to Virgil. For the brothel graffiti, see Sarah Levin-Richardson, The Brothel of Pompeii (Cambridge UP, 2019), chap 3. The classic study of Greek and Roman literacy is W. V. Harris, Ancient Literacy (Harvard UP, pb. 1991), developed in Alan Bowman and Greg Woolf, Literacy and Power in the Ancient World (Cambridge UP, pb, 2008) @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

In 430 BCE, Athens was hit by a terrible plague that ultimately claimed around a third of the population. All the social niceties we associate with Ancient Athens collapsed. Citizens turned on one another. The dead were left unburied. Mary and Charlotte both recount and question the ‘facts’ of the epidemic as told by historian, eyewitness and plague survivor Thucydides.  Thucydides’ account is remarkable in that it aligns with the emerging science of medicine in ancient Athens by focusing on the symptoms and natural causes rather than framing it as  divine retribution from the gods. Yet, for all this, the truth is hard to pin down. We still don’t know what exactly the plague was. And Thucydides’ claims to be an objective historian are undermined by the way he presents the plague as a possible response to Athenian arrogance and hubris.  Yet for all the gaps, we see many of the social characteristics of epidemics that have recurred throughout history. Social collapse, finger pointing, moralising, and arguments about which ‘truth’ to believe.  Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: Thucydides describes the plague in his History 2, 47 - 55  Plutarch describes Pericles’ death from the plague in his Life of Pericles 38. There are plenty of translations of Thucydides available online. But NB one of the most often used (a nineteenth-century version by Richard Crawley) is also one of the least reliable.  Thucydides, Apollo, the Plague and the War, Lisa Kallet, The American Journal of Philology, Fall 2013, Vol. 134, No. 3, pp. 355-382 (an interesting article in which Kallet casts doubt on the purely objective, scientific account Thucydides purports to give of the plague) A Plague Like no Other: Beyond the Buboes in Thucydides' account of the Plague of Athens, by Pere Domingo, Paula Prieto, Lluis Pons, Clinical Microbiology and Infection, May 2025 (a useful round-up of the latest medical thinking on the Athenian plague) J Longrigg, ‘Death and Epidemic Disease in Classical Athens’ in V Hope and E Marshall, Death and Disease in the ancient city (Routledge, 2000) Emily Greenwood: https://yalereview.org/article/thucydides-times-trouble (a classicist reflects on the Athenian plague and Covid) @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

Think Roman food and we imagine extravagant banquets involving rare delicacies. There’s some truth in this, but only for the few. In this episode, Mary and Charlotte ask: what did your average Roman eat?  Cooking at home was only for the very rich - you had to have not only a kitchen, but the staff to manage it. For this reason, most Romans ate on the hoof or at fast food outlets. In Pompeii, for instance, there is surviving evidence of many such establishments: places where citizens could access a pre-cooked meal straight away.  While we know that most Romans ate out, and the sorts of places where they ate, until recently there was very little evidence showing what such establishments served. Modern archaeological techniques are starting to provide answers through the analysis of excrement in Roman lavatories. Comparing the evidence from lavatories in Herculaneum and modern day Scotland, a faeces - sorry, thesis - emerges of people surviving on whatever the local countryside could provide - varying dramatically from region to region - with a few luxury imports for special occasions.    Forget dormice and think cabbage. Lots of it. In myriad ways.  Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: There is a good overview of the Herculaneum cesspit here: https://www.cambridgeamarantus.com/topics/topic-vi/63/63-evidence And detailed scientific analysis here: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11457-018-9218-y  For a brief account of the menu at an ordinary Pompeian bar, see: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/fast-food-joint-pompeii-served-snails-fish-and-wine-new-finds-suggest-180976651/  Cato’s On Agriculture – complete with its praise of cabbage – can be found in English translation here. And some information on the Bearsden latrine analysis @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

When we think about Roman food, most of us imagine wealthy citizens stuffing their faces with rare delicacies while reclining on their sides and taking occasional breaks to use the vomitorium (urban myth alert). In this two-part special, Mary and Charlotte cut through the fermented fish sauce to look at what the Romans really ate. And no, the vomitorium was not a place where they made themselves vomit.  In this first episode, Mary and Charlotte look at posh food, beginning right at the top - in the imperial palace. Happily, there are some stories of jaw-dropping extravagance, including Elagabalus (a fave of the show) hiding pearls in the rice as a surprise for his guests. And the favourite dish of the Emperor Vitellius involved pike liver, peacock brain, flamingo tongue and lamprey sperm - all mixed together. But just as many emperors favoured a martial diet and household economy. Augustus - a snack guy - boasted about his ascetic preference for with cheese, figs and bread. Tiberius was criticised by the elite for serving leftovers.  You can never trust anecdotes about the emperors, but most of the stories have a plausibility when you read them alongside a surviving cookbook - Apicius’ De re culinaria. Here we find out about garum - or fermented fish sauce (which Mary thinks is less disgusting than it sounds), animal wombs, dormice as well as a lot of vegetarian dishes (more to Charlotte’s taste).  Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: Emperors’ reported eating habits are discussed in Mary’s Emperor of Rome (Profile pb, 2024)  You can find a complete (rather lumpy) translation of Apicius online here: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/29728/29728-h/29728-h.htm Several modern writers collect some of Apicius’ recipes and adapt them for “the modern kitchen”: eg John Edwards (Rider pb, 2009),  Sally Grainger (Prospect pb, 2015) and Andrew Dalby (British Museum pb, 2012) @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 and Charlotte talk to Tom Holland, co-host of the Rest is History. As well as being a podcasting megastar, Tom is a brilliant historian of Ancient Rome. His books include Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic,  Pax: War and Peace in Rome’s Golden Age and his recent translation of Suetonius’ The Lives of the Caesars.  In the first half of this episode, Tom talks about why Suetonius, with his interest in court gossip and trivia, is the historian for the current age. In the second half, he talks about his lifelong fascination with the Romans - from discovering the Asterix books as a boy, the poetry of Catullus as a teenager, and how writing a series of novels about vampires led him to write Rubicon.  @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

If you were to go back in time to 15 February in Ancient Rome, you might see marauding packs of naked men surging through the streets. If you were particularly unlucky one of them might whip you with a piece of goat skin. This was the Roman festival of Lupercalia. In this episode, Mary and Charlotte ask: what on earth was all this about? What did Lupercalia mean to the Romans? And what was the real purpose of any festival to the Romans?  Despite its mind-boggling oddness, Lupercalia is better documented than many other Roman festivals. This is partly because the Romans themselves didn’t know really what it was about. Lupercalia was something that seemed to have always been celebrated, but opinions varied - then as now - as to what it meant. The wolfiness of lupercalia, and the suggestion the ritual began in the cave where Romulus and Remus were believed to have been suckled, implies it may have been a way for the Romans to connect with their murky origins - an example of the city performing its own past. But even this is contested.  One thing is clear: despite the date, Lupercalia had nothing to do with modern Valentine’s Day - unless, of course, your idea of romance is running naked through the streets flailing a piece of animal skin… @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: The Lupercalia is one of Roman religious festivals discussed in Mary’s book, with John North and Simon Price, Religions of Rome (Cambridge UP pb, 1998) volume 2 (with translation of the main ancient texts, including a section of Pope Gelasius’ pamphlet). Mary also discusses how to understand Roman festivals more widely in her chapter in C. Ando (ed.), Roman Religion, Edinburgh Readings in the Ancient World  (Edinburgh UP, pb, 2003). Shakespeare’s Lupercalia is in his Julius Caesar Act 1, scene 2 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

Greece gave way to Rome and the Roman Empire too declined, but Helen of Troy survived. Forever young and relevant, she has been reimagined by generation after generation. In the last episode of this mini-series, Mary and Charlotte look at Helen’s enduring appeal in the modern age.  They show how she appeared in the poetry of medieval bards, inspired playwright Christopher Marlowe to create one of the most famous lines in English literature (the face that launched a thousand ships) - and how Shakespeare, not wanting to be outdone by Marlowe, said her face launched ‘over’ a thousand ships.  Mary describes some of her favourite 19th century paintings of Helen - and discusses the problem of how you paint a face that, by definition, is more beautiful than the face of any artist model. Charlotte talks about how that problem continues in cinema (with a side anecdote about asking Brad Pitt the wrong question at the launch of the film Troy).  Finally, Charlotte and Mary compare some of their favourite Helens in modern literature, including Margaret Atwood’s Penelopiad (2005), Pat Barker’s The Silence of the Girls (2018) and Natalia Haynes’ A Thousand Ships (2019) @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Paintings referred to:  G Moreau, Helen at the Scaean Gates https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Helene_a_la_porte_scee_-_gustave_moreau_-_2.jpg F. A Sandys, Helen of Troy https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/artifact/helen-of-troy (The original magazine illustration from which the painting is excerpted: https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O783702/illustration-to-helen-and-cassandra-print-sandys-frederick/ ) E de Morgan, Helen of Troy: https://www.demorgan.org.uk/collection/helen-of-troy/ 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

What happened to Helen after the Trojan War? Mary and Charlotte pick up the trail of mythology’s most famous femme fatale as she makes the long journey home from Troy. The big question at the end of the previous episode was whether her husband Menelaus would kill her as revenge for betraying him with Paris.  Needless to say, her charms win out and, after a long stop in Egypt, where she acquires some amazing accessories, they return home to Sparta. Just in time for Telemachus, son of Odysseus, to arrive and ask them if he knows where his father is? The Helen of The Odyssey Book 4 takes us by surprise. She and Menelaus have settled into a rather humdrum domestic companionship. And it raises the question: was all that fighting and bloodshed worth it? For this?  Just as fascinating as Homer’s surprise depiction is a theory embedded in Greek texts that Helen never actually went to Troy, but sat out the whole affair in relative safety in Egypt. The Helen people saw on the ramparts of Troy was simply an eidolon - an image.  Mary and Charlotte show how the true nature of Helen - villain, victim or double agent? - provided an endless source of debate, and opportunities for creative flights of fancy, in the ancient world. Finally, they look at a few of the different accounts of her final years.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: In addition to the reading recommended for the earlier episodes: The whole tradition of the phantom of Helen is discussed in detail by Norman Austin in Helen of Troy and her Shameless Phantom (Cornell UP, 2018) Helen and Menelaus in Sparta feature in Book 4 of the Odyssey (with a detailed recent discussion by J Burgess in The Oxford Critical Guide to Homer’s Odyssey, ed Christensen (Oxford UP, pb, 2025)) Herodotus’ account is at his Histories 2, 112 ff Euripides’ play Helen is available online here https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0100 though it is a rather old-fashioned translation (be warned!)  and there is a full performance (by students) on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MVyAZbRaK0 Emily Wilson translated Euripides’ Helen as part of a recommended (if you want to go for it) fat selection of Greek plays in recent translation: The Greek Plays: Sixteen Plays by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides (Modern Library Classics, pbck, 2017) edited by Mary Lefkowitz and James Romm 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

Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey is set to be the blockbuster event of the summer. With the first trailers now coming online, Mary and Charlotte take a look to get a sense if the hype is worth it.  Have your say at… @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

When Paris, a Trojan prince, abducted Helen of Sparta, the Greeks came in hot pursuit and besieged Troy for ten years. But what was Helen’s role in all this? Was she really kidnapped, or did she elope? And whose side was she really on during the ensuing war? Mary and Charlotte turn to a variety of ancient texts to explore these questions.  In Homer’s The Iliad - the longest and greatest account of the war - Helen isn’t even one of the main characters. She watches Paris and Menelaus fight a duel in her name, draws the admiration of old men, and spends some sexy time with Paris. In The Odyssey, we find out about her role in the final episode of the war - the Trojan Horse. Here she appears more of a double agent: secretly communicating with Odysseus, but also tormenting his soldiers.   In Virgil’s Aeneid, she is a hate figure and a focus of murderous fantasies for the hero Aeneas. Finally, Mary and Charlotte look at The Trojan Women by Euripides, where Helen defends herself as a victim of the gods and her own beauty. Menelaus plans to slaughter her, but we know by the end of this play that is unlikely. What happens next is the focus of the next episode! @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: The key sections of the Iliad that feature Helen are Book 3 (where she appears 4 times), Book 6, 342 ff and towards the very end of Book 24. Helen herself and Menelaus tell her story of the war in Odyssey Book 4, esp. 220ff. Aeneas’s outburst against Helen is in Virgil Aeneid Book 2,  567 ff.  Key modern works on Helen and her role in myth and literature are: Ruby Blondell, Helen of Troy: Beauty, Myth, Devastation (Oxford UP, pb, 2015) Bettany Hughes, Helen of Troy: Goddess, Princess, Whore (Pimlico, pb, 2013) 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

Sex goddess. Whore. Temptress. Adulteress. Victim. Helen of Troy has been called many things. In the run-up to Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey later this year, amidst swirling rumours about who is playing Helen, Mary and Charlotte look beyond the labels and ask: who was Helen really and what role does she play in myth?  This isn’t an easy question to answer. Accounts of Helen’s character and life come from myriad sources - many of which contradict one another. In the first episode of our four-part series, Mary and Charlotte look at Helen’s early years. She was born of a rape, when Zeus, disguised as a swan, forced himself upon Leda, Queen of Sparta. The young Helen was married to Menelaus, brother of Agamemnon, and became queen of Sparta. The trouble began hundreds of miles away and the so-called Judgement of Paris.  Paris was the son of King Priam of Troy. In a high-stakes wedding game (think opening scene of The Godfather), he was asked to choose which of the goddesses Hera, Athena and Aphrodite was most beautiful. Aphrodite bribed him by promising he could have the most beautiful mortal woman in the world, conveniently forgetting that Helen was already married. Paris went to Sparta to collect his prize. He waited for Menelaus to depart the scene, then took Helen to Troy. Whether she eloped or was abducted has been debated ever since. And so… the Trojan War. @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: There are many ancient accounts of the Judgement of Paris and the events leading up to it. You can find the parody of Lucian here (it’s the last of his Dialogues of the Gods): https://www.theoi.com/Text/LucianDialoguesGods1.html A more standard ancient account of Helen’s back story, her marriage and the judgement of Paris is given by Apollodorus (or Pseudo-Apollodorus!), writing during the Roman empire, see esp. 3. 10. 7 ff and Epitome 3: https://www.theoi.com/Text/Apollodorus3.html#10 and https://www.theoi.com/Text/ApollodorusE.html#3  For modern discussions of Helen (relevant to this and our later episodes): Ruby Blondell, Helen of Troy: Beauty, Myth, Devastation (Oxford UP, pb, 2015) Bettany Hughes, Helen of Troy: Goddess, Princess, Whore (Pimlico, pb, 2013) 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

We may think of Ancient Greek warfare as scantily dressed musclemen thrashing it out on the desert plain (and there may have been an element of that), but there was a whole other side of spy work too. Much of this was the result of its fraught relationship with the vast Persian empire to the east - a centuries long rivalry which makes the Cold War look like a hot skirmish. Mary and Charlotte share some of the surviving stories of Ancient Greek espionage, including secret messages concealed in women’s earrings and even tattooed onto an enslaved person’s head. Most of these stories focus on writing and it’s a reminder that in the Ancient World, writing was as innovative and inherently suspicious as drones are to us today. Societies with advanced written culture had the technological upperhand on their rivals, so it’s little surprise that the surviving stories about spies reveal an anxiety about this new form of communication.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: The story of Bellerophon is told in Book 6 of the Iliad (the “dangerous signs” line 165) The stories of Gorgo can be found in Herodotus, Histories Book 5, 49 and Book 7, 239 (she is described as one of the first cryptanalysts by David Kahn in The Codebreakers (Scribners, 1996)). She is one of the women who features in Sarah B Pomeroy, Spartan Women (OUP, pb, 2002). Herodotus Histories Book 5 (chaps 35 ff) describes the message tattooed into the slaves head. Aeneas Tacticus: the relevant passage is at section 31.20 The revolutionary effects in general of early literacy (and different technologies of writing) are discussed by Walter Ong, Orality and Literacy (Routledge pb, new ed. 2012). For Greece, in particular, Oswyn Murray’s Early Greece (Fontana pb, 2nd ed, 2010) stresses the importance of the beginnings of writing.  Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Naomi Alderman is an author and games designer. Her books include Disobedience (adapted into a film starring Rachel Weisz), The Power (also an Amazon Prime series) and most recently The Future. She’s also an emerging classicist and reached out to Instant Classics after our episode on the toga came happily close to her MA thesis on the same subject.  In this episode, Naomi sets the record straight about when and why women in Ancient Rome may have worn the toga, talks about her interest in the classical world and why studying it gives her solace. Finally, she asks the big question - which Mary and Charlotte answer too - if you could rescue one lost work of literature from the past, what would it be?  This episode was recorded in a moment of immense jeopardy as Naomi waited to discover if she had passed her Classics MA or not. The next day we had our answer. Yes - and with distinction. Which is not surprising based on the evidence of her conversation in this episode.  Content warning: this episode contains mildly explicit comments about sex in the ancient world. @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: all Naomi’s books, games, broadcasts and myriad other activities can be found on her website, naomialderman.com The question of Roman women (and which Roman women) wearing the toga has been discussed in intricate detail for decades. Naomi’s dissertation clearly disposes of the idea that adulteresses were forced to wear it. But if you want a flavour of the arguments, one of the clearest discussions, yes clearest (!), try Thomas A J McGinn,  Prostitution, Sexuality and the Law in Ancient Rome (OUP pb, 1998), esp chap 5. Mary chose the autobiography of Nero’s mother, Agrippina, as her favourite “lost work” of the ancient world. There is more on this in A. A. Barrett’s Agrippina, Mother of Nero (Routledge pb, 1999). Charlotte made a reference to a 19th century science fiction novel whose name she couldn’t remember – it was After London by Richard Jefferies Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Since Instant Classics launched, we’ve loved getting your questions and ideas for topics. So for our New Year’s Day episode, Mary and Charlotte respond to some of those which have tickled their curiosity too.  Where did the Romans stash their cash? What was a trip to the doctor like for women? Why do some people still try to speak (rather than just read) Latin? Was there a Jewish community in Roman Britain? And are there any feminist role models in the pantheon of ancient gods?  While it is easier to answer some of these questions than others, each gives an insight to an area of the classical world we haven’t yet examined - and reminds us that however close we think we are to the ancient Romans or Greeks, huge parts of their lives and the way they thought about the world are lost to us. Just when we think we have a handle on them, they elude our grasp once again.  Charlotte and Mary’s reading suggestions Jean Andreau, Banking and Business in the Roman World (Cambridge UP, 1999) is a short guide to what Roman “bankers” got up to. For valuables stored in the Temple of Castor, see Juvenal, Satires 14, 260ff  The Mildenhall Treasure, now in the British Museum:  For a translation of Soranus’ On Gynecology (the qualities of a midwife are discussed near the start of Book1) Hippocrates’ words of wisdom on midwives Hippocrates on the medical dangers of being a virgin For a good online article of Roman midwives, with images of their tombstones:  An article on learning to speak Latin via the Oxford Latinitas Project For teaching Latin in the 1920s by the so-call “Direct Method” Article on a possible Jewish tombstone in Roman Scotland (Warren, M., 2023, Invisibility, erasure, and a Jewish tombstone in Roman Britain. Journal for Ancient Judaism, 14 (1). pp. 1-20.) Plus – the tombstone in question with its decoration of palm fronds (or menorahs?) Mary discusses kosher garum in her book Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town (Profile, 2009) @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube@insta_classics for Xemail: [email protected] Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Every December, the Ancient Romans took part in a festival of feasting, drinking, gift-giving and awkward office parties. So far, so Christmas. But, in this episode, Mary and Charlotte ask what really went on during the Roman festival of Saturnalia and whether the comparisons to Christmas really hold?  As is so often the case, we discover a people and culture similar to us in some ways, yet also completely alien. The records show that socks were sometimes Saturnalia presents – but, disturbingly, so too were enslaved people. Jokes about the boss were acceptable at Christmas parties, unless - as we discover in one macabre story - the boss happens to be the emperor Nero.  The brutal side of Saturnalia becomes really apparent when you consider the differences between Santa and Saturn. One likes to spoil children, the other has a horrid habit of eating them. So if you do decide to celebrate Saturnalia, no laughing at the boss, and keep those chimneys blocked!  Charlotte and Mary’s reading suggestions The best guides to the Saturnalia are the ancient sources themselves. Martial’s “gift tags” are Books 13 and 14 of his Epigrams (rather stilted translations here: https://www.ccel.org/ccel/pearse/morefathers/files/martial_epigrams_book13.htm and https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/martial_epigrams_book14.htm The Saturnalia of Nero and Britannicus is described at Tacitus Annals 13, 15. Macrobius’ Saturnalia  (c 400 CE) is a long, multi-book, learned discussion (set at a Saturnalian festival), which speculates on the origins of the festival among much else. Mary discusses the chilling Roman practice of giving enslaved people as presents in her Emperor of Rome (Profile, pb, 2024) @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Ancient Greeks, it’s often said, invented theatre - and the plays they wrote are still big box office today, particularly when you have a Hollywood star in the main part. In this episode, Mary and Charlotte wonder what a day at the theatre in Ancient Athens was actually like. Did it bear any resemblance to theatre-going experience in the West End or Broadway today?  The more one gets into the nitty-gritty of Greek theatre festivals - the military parades, hymn singing, displays of war booty, processions of unmarried girls, orphans, and large phalluses - the more alien it seems. The fact that it took place in the open air and the actors wore masks is the least of it.  So what was really going on when the Athenians got together to watch a play? Why was the state so involved? And would Mary and Charlotte, as women, have even been allowed in?  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] On Greek theatre, the context and the practicalities… Good accessible introductions are:  The Cambridge Companion to Greek and Roman Theatre, ed. McDonald and Walton (Cambridge UP pb, 2011) The Cambridge Companion to Greek Tragedy, ed. Easterling (Cambridge UP pb, 1997) There is a crucial academic article on the pre-performance ceremonies by Simon Goldhill: 'The Great Dionysia and Civic Ideology', reprinted in Nothing to Do with Dionysos? Athenian Drama in Its Social Context, ed. Winkler and Zeitlin (Princeton UP, pb 1992) Greek Tragedy: Suffering Under the Sun by Edith Hall Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From Asterix to Up Pompeii to Life of Brian, there are lots of modern comedies about the Romans, but what did the Romans themselves find funny? In this episode, Mary and Charlotte share their favourite Roman jokes and ask the bigger questions: what can Roman humour tell us about the world of ancient Rome itself? Can we still ‘get’ Roman jokes and do any of them still have the power to make us laugh now?  Fortunately, there’s a surprising number of Roman jokes that survive today - whether graffiti, on papyrus and an actual joke book called Philogelos. Despite the contemporary image of Rome as an autocratic, relentlessly bloodthirsty society, their jokes tell a different story. Works like Apocolocyntosis (The Pumpkinification of the divine Claudius) by Seneca show a huge irreverence to imperial grandeur, while the surviving jokes we have very rarely exhibit the cruelty we associate with a society hooked on slavery and gladiatorial games. They also suggest a widespread anxiety around self-identity - jokes about people who don’t know who they are really or how they fit into society.  Finally, Mary reveals her favourite Roman joke of all time. But will Charlotte laugh? The stakes are high. Listen to find out.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: Charlotte recommends Laughter in Ancient Rome: On Joking, Tickling, and Cracking Up (UCal press pb, new ed. 2024) by one Mary Beard as ‘the’ book on Roman humour.  Mary got a lot out of: J, Bremmer and H. Roodenburg, A cultural history of humour (Polity pb, 1997)  J. Clarke, Looking at Laughter: Humour, Power and Transgression in Roman visual culture (UCal press, 2007). It includes the wonderful images of the philosophers on the lavatory. S Critchley, On Humour (Routledge pb, 2002) Though she warns that books on laughter are often quite serious!  Available online – a translation of Seneca’s Apocolocyntosis …and of the Philogelos And there are other selections from that collection, usually omitting the ones we don’t get! Try https://diotima-doctafemina.org/translations/greek/45-jokes-from-the-laughter-lover/ The jokes of the Emperor Augustus are collected in Macrobius, Saturnalia Book 2 (you can find a translation in the Loeb Classical Library, Harvard UP) Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Recorded live in an actual Roman amphitheatre underneath the Guildhall Art Gallery in London, Mary and Charlotte uncover the (Roman) origins of one of the world’s great cities.  London’s Roman amphitheatre may not be the Colosseum, but it’s thought it could hold up to 7,000 spectators, which is not nothing in the ancient world. London was founded soon after the invasion by the Romans in 43 CE as a port city, on the lowest bridgeable part of the Thames, and it quickly became a hub of trade and commerce. By the 60s CE, it was significant enough for Boudica to have a crack at burning it to the ground (and the archaeology suggests she was successful).  But what was the city like – and does it bear any relation to its modern counterpart? Evidence suggests, then as now, London was a multicultural city, and part of an administrative and trade network that connected it to the opposite edges of the empire and beyond. From London we have tombstones of men born in Antioch and Athens. And evidence of several religions with origins in far-flung parts of the empire, including the cult of Mithras, which developed in Iran; Isis, originally from Egypt; and Cybele, with its roots in Asia Minor.  Finally, Mary and Charlotte come back to the ground beneath their feet. Who would have come to this amphitheatre back in the day? And what took place? In all honesty it’s best not to think of Russell Crowe and lions. Rather some local pot-bellied thugs and wild boar from the local forests. But there’s space for both, right?  Our thanks to the Guildhall Art Gallery, the City of London Corporation and the Cultural Mile Business Improvement District for hosting us. And do visit London’s Roman Amphitheatre. It’s open Monday to Sunday 10am-5pm. It is very much worth a visit and it is FREE.  Content warning: Mary and Charlotte have a squeamish conversation about a Roman instrument now in the British Museum which may or may not have been used for castration.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: Mary recommends Charlotte’s Under Another Sky (Vintage pb, 2014), showing how the remains of the city still have an impact now. Roman Britain, by Richard Hobbs and Ralph Jackson, is a beautifully illustrated and concise guide to the province – with a photo of the infamous castration tool (British Museum Press, pb, 2010) A recent survey of the whole history of Roman London is: Richard Hingley, Londinium: A biography (Bloomsbury pb, 2018) For more information on Roman shoes: https://www.londonmuseum.org.uk/blog/these-boots-were-made-for-romans/ For a visit to the temple of Mithras: https://www.londonmithraeum.com/  The full text of the document of the sale of Fortunata is here: https://romaninscriptionsofbritain.org/inscriptions/Brit.34.22 Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford DoP:Jéromo Monnot Camera Operator 1 and Photgrapher: Guillaume Valli Camera Operator 2: Vera Novikova Sound Engineer: Nathan Cucharo Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Athena: goddess, shape-shifter, helper of heroes, fashion guru, patron deity of Athens and a bit of a daddy’s girl. She’s also one of the most elusive and puzzling characters in Greek mythology. In this episode, Mary and Charlotte ask who exactly is Athena? Is she a female role model for feminine power? More importantly, what exactly is a god in Greek mythology?  Part of Athena’s appeal is that she bucks the perception of Ancient Greece as inflexibly misogynistic. For Charlotte, discovering Athena as a girl was part of what drew her to the classical world. And, as Mary’s mother once said (to the young Mary): “If Athens was the kind of society you tell me it was in which women had no power,I don't understand why their patron deity was a goddess.” Many years later, Mary - and Charlotte - still struggle to answer this question, which is part of what makes her so enduringly fascinating.  In uncovering Athena’s story and contradictions, they also reveal the origins of the phrase ‘under the aegis’, where Nike shoes got their name from, and why - if Athena were around today - she’d probably be Mark Zuckerberg’s corporate guru.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: For the Greek texts and myths to which we refer: Homer, The Odyssey, tr Emily Wilson, Norton, 2018 Homer, The Iliad, tr Emily Wilson, Norton, 2023 Aeschylus, Oresteia, in James Romm and Mary Lefkovitz, eds The Greek Plays, 2017 (a really useful anthology of 16 translations of Greek plays). The Eumenides which we discuss is the third play in Aeschylus’ trilogy on the murder of Agamemnon and its upshot. The title means ‘Kindly Ones’, a euphemism for the Furies who are pursuing Orestes for the mudder of his mother. Timothy Gantz, Early Greek Myths, Johns Hopkins, 1996 (a mighty two-volume tome, for the serious student) Charlotte Higgins, Greek Myths, Vintage, 2022 Susan Deacy, Athena, Routledge, 2008 discusses the overall character of the goddess. On polytheism generally, L Bruit Zaidmann and P Schmitt Pantel, Religion in the Ancient Greek City, Cambridge 1992, is one of the clearest introductions (the full text is available online).  Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the second of this two-part special, Mary and Charlotte rejoin Boudica as she marches on London, continues her path of destruction, and finally meets the Roman army on the battlefield.  It’s a dramatic story, complete with Boudica’s rousing speeches to her troops and her death by suicide when she realises the battle is lost. The Roman historians who tell this story depict her as a brutal perpetrator of war crimes, but… they also present her as a victim, brave warrior and inspiring speech-giver, able to skewer the injustice of Roman imperialism.  The question is: why? Why do Roman historians, who had sole control of the narrative, portray Boudica as the agent of a just cause? Today, we rarely treat our enemies with such sympathy. The presentation of Boudica’s story gives fascinating insights into how the Romans not only tolerated but, to a certain extent, even encouraged criticism.  Finally, Mary and Charlotte investigate the after-life of Boudica’s legend, ending with her status as a hero in Colchester - the very town she razed to the ground. And if you fancy driving round the Boudica roundabout a few times, it’s on Turner Road near Colchester North Station! @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: The main ancient texts are: Tacitus, Agricola 14-16; Annals 14, 29-39; Dio Cassius, Histories of Rome 62, 1-2, all conveniently collected at https://www.roman-britain.co.uk/roman-conquest-and-occupation-of-britain/boudica-the-iceni-warrior-queen/boudica-classical-references/ Richard Hingley and Christina Unwin, Boudica: Iron Age Queen (Hambledon Continuum pb, 2006) is an accessible account of Boudica from the Iron Age to her modern representations. Hingley reviews the evidence and some of the books on the subject, including his own, at https://fivebooks.com/best-books/boudica-richard-hingley/  Charlotte tells the story of Boudica, and discusses some of the ways she has been represented, in her book Under Another Sky: Journeys In Roman Britain (Vintage, 2014) You can find a detailed history of Thornycroft’s statue in Martha Vandrei, ‘A Victorian Invention? Thomas Thornycroft’s ‘Boadicea Group’, Historical Journal 57 (2014). The verses on the plinth are taken from William Cowper’s poem Boadicea.  The Roman tombstone of the official who blew the whistle on Suetonius’ reprisals against the British, Julius Classicianus, can be seen in the British Museum. Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Boudica. Britain’s original badass. A warrior queen who almost defeated the Romans, gave voice to the oppressed and inspired countless school children ever since. But what do we really know about her? Mary and Charlotte trace her story, asking how much of the myth is true and whether we should really celebrate her today.  History is told by the victors - and everything we know about Boudica comes from the Romans. It’s almost certain that there really was a woman called something like Boudica who drove terror into the hearts of the Roman colony in Britain. Archeological evidence also suggests the scale of the devastation she wrought. But beyond that, we cannot be certain.  In this first episode of a two-part special, Mary and Charlotte look at the backdrop to her story - the Roman ‘conquest’ of a few patches of Britain, the delicate network of truces and bargains they forged with local leaders, and the emergence of Boudica as queen of a tribe called the Iceni. The episode ends with Boudica burning the Roman stronghold in (what is now) Colchester to the ground and marching towards London.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: The main ancient texts are: Tacitus, Agricola 14-16; Annals 14, 29-39; Dio Cassius, Histories of Rome 62, 1-2, all conveniently collected at https://www.roman-britain.co.uk/roman-conquest-and-occupation-of-britain/boudica-the-iceni-warrior-queen/boudica-classical-references/ Richard Hingley and Christina Unwin, Boudica: Iron Age Queen (Hambledon Continuum pb, 2006) is an accessible account of Boudica from the Iron Age to her modern representations. Hingley reviews the evidence and some of the books on the subject, including his own, at https://fivebooks.com/best-books/boudica-richard-hingley/  The archaeological evidence for the revolt is very clear but can be difficult to interpret in detail. Some fascinating recent discoveries at Colchester are described and well illustrated at https://the-past.com/feature/the-fenwick-treasure-colchester-during-the-boudiccan-war-of-independence/ Charlotte tells the story of Boudica, and discusses some of the ways she has been represented, in her book Under Another Sky: Journeys In Roman Britain (Vintage, 2014) Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Production intern: Amelia Reichert   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Any Greek hero worth their salt makes a trip to the Underworld at some point during their adventures. Mary and Charlotte follow in their footsteps, crossing the River Styx to ask: what exactly was the Underworld? How was it different to the Judeo-Christian ‘Heaven’? And why has the idea of it proven so enduring even though nobody believes in it?  The Underworld can’t be mapped (although some scholars have tried) because it didn’t exist, but there are consistent features in the many myths in which it features: the River Styx, Charon the Ferryman, the god Hades, his wife Persephone, and the numberless dead like autumn leaves. Orpheus and Theseus visited. Hercules - hard man that he was - went twice. A human princess called Psyche also went in search of her lover.  Mary and Charlotte dwell on the longish accounts in Homer’s Odyssey and Virgil’s Aeneid. Through these stories they get some sense of what the Underworld really meant to the Ancient Greeks and Romans - and what it still means to us.   @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading: We focus on Odysseus’ encounter with the dead in Homer, Odyssey Book 11, and on Aeneas’ visit to the underworld in Virgil, Aeneid Book 6. But there are more! https://www.thecollector.com/mortals-underworld-katabasis-greek-roman-mythology/ is an online, well-illustrated, article detailing 14 ancient visits to the underworld. Modern fictions of the underworld based on the Odyssey are the theme of one chapter of Edith Hall’s Return of Ulysses (available free at https://edithhall.co.uk/)  Some of our very recent favourites are Carol Ann Duffy’s poem, “Eurydice”, from her collection, The World’s Wife (1999) and R. F. Kuang’s novel Katabasis (2025) Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Production intern: Amelia Reichert   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As the Halloween season hits, Mary and Charlotte turn to the wealth of ghost stories from the ancient world to ask: did the Greeks and Romans really believe in ghosts and why are their stories so similar to ours when many of our beliefs are so different?  Mary and Charlotte recount a ghost story recounted by Pliny the Younger about a haunted house in Athens and the successful attempt by a philosopher to both encounter the ghost and lay its spirit to rest. They also tell the story, written down in Greece in the 3rd century CE, about a young man who is seduced by a vampire. And they discover the Roman methods of exorcism, which involves chewing on some beans and throwing them behind you. When it came to ghostbusting, then as now, don’t cross the beans!  Some Romans even believed that the city itself was haunted by the restless spirit of Remus who - in one telling of Rome’s favourite origin story - was murdered by his brother Romulus to take sole control of the new city.    @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Exciting News! Vespucci, in collaboration with the City of London Corporation and the Culture Mile Business Improvement District, is thrilled to present the very first live recording of Instant Classics on November 26th, 2025.   Join hosts Mary Beard and Charlotte Higgins as they journey back nearly two millennia to uncover what life was really like in Roman London. What did a typical night out look like for a Londoner in the first century CE? Were they cheering on gladiators, swapping gossip in the baths, or making offerings to mysterious gods? We’ll explore all this and more right where history happened, within the atmospheric remains of London’s Roman Amphitheatre at the Guildhall Art Gallery, dating back to the first century CE. Book Club Members: Check your inbox today for an exclusive early-access link to purchase tickets before the general release on Friday, October 31st. For those wanting to gain early access, you can join our Book Club at www.instantclassicspod.com. Spaces are limited, and this intimate setting promises an unforgettable evening. Have any questions? Drop us a line at [email protected]. We can’t wait to see you there and meet you in person (how novel). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

‘Fiddling while Rome burns’ is an accusation flung at every political leader at some point in their career. In this episode, Mary and Charlotte uncover the origins of this phrase and ask: why has it proved so resonant that it has carried through the centuries and right around the world?  In 64 CE, a huge fire broke out in Rome. It lasted for over a week and devastated much of the city. Today, what is more famous than the fire itself is what the emperor Nero did while it was going on. He watched - and played his lyre.  This story, perhaps more than any other, has given Nero a bad rap, but ancient writers also say that he supervised rescue efforts, gave free food to the people, introduced sensible planning regulations and was visionary in rebuilding the devastated areas. So why has the fiddling image won out and why is it used so often in contemporary political discourse?  Mary and Charlotte explore these questions, pointing out in the process that fiddles hadn’t been invented at the time Nero is meant to have played one, that the Colosseum gets its name from a colossal statue of Nero, and that it’s the forgotten parts of the fiddling legend that make the modern use of the term so powerful.  Finally, they ask: all things considered, did Nero REALLY fiddle while Rome burned? And they give an answer.  Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading The ancient sources are collected and analysed in detail here: https://dcc.dickinson.edu/tacitus-annals/introduction/annals-outline/annals-38-41-outline Nero has always attracted a LOT of academic interest.  E. Champlin, Nero (Harvard UP, pb, 2005) is an accessible biography (rather favourable to Nero) For a focus on the fire itself, and its wider context, see: A. Barrett, Rome is Burning: Nero and the Fire that Ended a Dynasty (Princeton UP, pb, 2020)  The history of modern cartoons of political leaders fiddling while Rome burned is explored by Ginna Closs here: https://eidolon.pub/x-fiddled-while-y-burned-80abf13e7c08?gi=5d659c5e2688 @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Can it really have taken seven episodes of Instant Classics to get to everyone’s favourite Roman meme: the toga party? Mary and Charlotte grasp the thistle - or rather the sinus (fold at the front of a toga) - and ask what exactly is a toga? Who wore them and when? And how do you make one?  In this fact-filled episode, we discover that - despite the antics of students around the world today - a toga wasn’t a bed-sheet turned into a sort of cheap tunic for getting blind drunk in, but an elaborate, woollen garment more like a cloak or robe that signified power. We find out how many kilometres of woollen thread were necessary to make a toga, where the word ‘candidate’ (as in political candidate) comes from and which Roman emperor wore platform shoes to make himself look taller.  As they go deeper into the folds of the toga, Mary and Charlotte reveal how wearing one was about much more than looking smart but got to the very essence of what it meant to be Roman.  And… in case you’re wondering… one of our hosts has been to a toga party. But can you guess whether it’s Mary or Charlotte?  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading Roman dress has been a bit of a boom area of study recently. Mary Harlow explains many of the practical aspects (including a fun video showing how to actually put one on) here: https://romanleicester.com/2020/06/30/dress-to-impress/ There is good, accessible stuff on the rights and wrongs of toga-wearing here: https://pressbooks.bccampus.ca/unromantest/chapter/the-roman-man-and-the-toga/ More specialised:  Camilla Ebert, Sidsel Frisch, Mary Harlow, Eva Andersson Strand and Lena Bjerregaard (eds), Traditional Textile Craft: An Intangible Cultural Heritage? (Centre for Textile Research, University of Copenhagen, 2016) Judith Lynn Sebasta and Larissa Bonfante (eds), The World of Roman Costume (Wisconsin UP, pb, 1994)  Jonathan Edmondson and Alison Keith (eds), Roman Dress and the Fabrics of Roman Culture (University of Toronto Press, 2008)  If you want to follow up some ancient writers:  the phrase ‘the race that wears the toga’ is from Virgil, Aeneid 1, 282;  Augustus’ rules on wearing togas in the forum are mentioned at Suetonius, Augustus 40; Augustus keeping a handy toga at home at Suetonius, Augustus 73; Claudius’ rules in the court case at Suetonius, Claudius 15. There is a full translation of Tertullian’s (baffling) On the Pallium online here: https://www.tertullian.org/articles/hunink_de_pallio.htm Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Who was the mythical Cassandra and why have pop stars started singing about her? Mary and Charlotte turn sleuth and track the elusive Trojan princess through the pages of ancient texts - from Homer’s Iliad to Virgil’s Aeneid.  Today, Cassandra is most famous as a prophetess who could predict the future, but was cursed to never be believed. As a result, Troy burned and Agamemnon and Cassandra herself were murdered. Generally, that disbelieving was done by men. No wonder people talk of Greta Thunberg as a modern day Cassandra, or that Taylor Swift and Florence Welch have positioned her as a pin-up girl for misunderstood (female) celebrities.  But, with the greatest respect to Taylor and Florence, Mary and Charlotte think Cassandra is rather more interesting than that. From her warnings about the Trojan Horse right through to her very nasty end at the gates of Mycenae, Cassandra’s story tells us about the limitations of human communication and language more generally. That, not just because she said ‘I told you so’, is why she stays with us, meaning different things at different times.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading We focus on Cassandra’s role in Aeschylus’ play Agamemnon in the moments leading up to her death (easily available in translation in eg Penguin Classics or Oxford World’s Classics series). Euripides’ Trojan Women (likewise easily available in translation) takes the women who appear at the end of the Iliad – Hecuba, Helen, Andromache and Cassandra – and asks: “What happened to these women after Troy fell?” Lesya Ukrainka’s 1908 dramatic poem Cassandra, translated by Nina Murray (Harvard Library of Ukrainian Literature, 2024), a classic of Ukrainian literature now available in English, brilliantly puts Cassandra at the centre of her own story. A philosophically rich and very moving text. Emily Hauser, Mythica (Doubleday, 2025; Penelope’s Bones in the USA) explores the figure of Cassandra from “real” early Greek women prophets to Ukrainka’s version. The rape of Cassandra at the end of the Trojan War was a “favourite” subject for Greek artists. Try: https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/G_1824-0501-35 Or https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/G_1873-0820-366 Or (from the walls of Pompeii) https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b4/Ajax_drags_Cassandra_from_Palladium.jpg/960px-Ajax_drags_Cassandra_from_Palladium.jpg Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We all know what Rome became - largest empire of the ancient world, public bathing, gladiators, aqueducts, excellent roads and all that - but how did it begin? Who founded it? When? And why? Mary and Charlotte sift through the various myths that give some insight to these questions.  Peel back the layers of history and Rome’s origins are lost in the bog on which it was built. Archaeology offers us evidence of Bronze Age huts, burial practice and trade with neighbouring (and far-flung) lands, but leaves many of the big questions unanswered. This is a problem not only for classicists, but the countless men who apparently think of the Roman Empire several times a day. The Romans themselves struggled with their murky history. Even for them, the question of why they had risen to such extraordinary power was puzzling. The thought of humble origins sat uneasily with the grandeur and pomp of the imperial capital. So they did what many other cultures do and made up stories that explained their path to greatness.  If you’ve heard of outcast babies Romulus and Remus being suckled by a wolf, that’s just the icing on the cake. Accounts of the Romulus myth vary wildly. In some versions, he eventually ascends to heaven as a god. In others, he is hacked to death by his disgruntled subjects.  Other myths point elsewhere. The “Roman race” in Italy was founded by a Trojan exile called Aeneas, although he didn’t actually found the city of Rome itself. Maybe, that was a Greek called Evander, long before Romulus.  It’s easy to dismiss these stories, but Mary and Charlotte argue that they tell us a great deal about how the Romans understood themselves and their city (whether there is some grain of literal truth in them, who knows?). Most of all they point to the way that, at some deep level, they considered themselves to be an immigrant culture - outcasts, exiles and opportunists - searching for a better life.   @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] To join the Instant Classics Book Club and share our trip into Homer’s Odyssey, go to  https://instantclassics.supportingcast.fm/ Mary and Charlotte’s recommended reads: There are many ancient accounts of the origins of Rome. Best known is Book 1 of Livy’s History of Rome which tells the story from Romulus to the last of the seven early kings (translations in Penguin Classics or Oxford World Classics, as The Early History of Rome and The Rise of Rome).  For Aeneas, try Virgil Aeneid Books 2 and 8. Book 2 takes us to Aeneas’ flight from Troy. Book 8 pictures Evander, who is then living there, showing Aeneas around the future site of Rome).  The beginning of Mary’s SPQR, written for non specialists, busts a few myths about the origins of the city. The Italian archaeologist Andrea Carandini takes a completely different approach. Try his (short) Rome: Day One. Interesting, but rather more specialist, books are: Catharine Edwards, Writing Rome (she is very good on the “Hut of Romulus” which supposedly was authentically preserved in Rome for hundreds of years); T. P. Wiseman, Remus (which has an off-beat line about the role of Remus in Roman history, but gives an eye-opening account of all the very different Roman traditions about the world and twins). Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Parthenon is one of the most celebrated and recognisable buildings in the world, but what did it mean to the Ancient Greeks? What role did it play in Greek society? And what did it look like in its heyday? Together, Mary and Charlotte decode the Parthenon.  By happy coincidence, Mary is not just co-host of Instant Classics, but author of Charlotte’s favourite book on the subject: The Parthenon (Profile/Harvard University Press, 2002). In this episode, Mary and Charlotte pick their way through the stones of Parthenon, beginning with its construction in the middle of the 5th century BCE. The building work only took fifteen years (significantly faster than medieval cathedrals), but demanded a huge amount of labour, both enslaved and free.  Today, the Parthenon looks austere, pale and hardly decorated. A simple monument from a simpler age, perhaps. But what we see bears little relation to what the Greeks saw - and the building, its function and decoration retain many mysteries. For instance…  It was built as a temple to the city’s patron goddess Athena, but who was Athena and what exactly went on in a ‘temple’?  We know that it was painted and covered in sculptures - some of which survive - but whether the painting was subtle or gaudy is hard to say, while the significance of some of the sculptures continues to elude us – some of it was hardly even visible from the ground.  Inside, there were two rooms: one housed a giant, golden statue of Athena; the other was a treasury filled with riches. But where did all this loot come from and how was it guarded?   Finally, if you are lucky enough to visit, what is the best time of day to go and – is it really worth it – or are you better off going to the beach?  Find out the answer - or possible answers - to these questions in Decoding the Parthenon.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] To join the Instant Classics Book Club and share our trip into Homer’s Odyssey, go to  https://instantclassics.supportingcast.fm/ Mary and Charlotte’s recommended reads: Sorry to repeat the recommendation for Mary’s book, The Parthenon. But there’s more. You can find Pausanias’ second-century CE description of the temple in his Description of Greece I, 24, 5 ff (online here: https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0160:book=1:chapter=24) And various criticisms of the project are noted (again in the second century CE) by Plutarch in his Life of Pericles chap. 31 (online here: https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0055%3Achapter%3D31) Even introductions to Greek religion for general readers can get pretty technical. There is a reasonably accessible discussion of the idea of the temple, in Simon Price, Religions of the Ancient Greeks (Cambridge, 1999). Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the wake of recent conflicts over free speech and acts of political violence, Mary and Charlotte discuss how - then as now - free speech dominated the political agenda in the ancient world, with wildly different interpretations about what it meant and who got to decide.  They discuss two distinct, yet complimentary principles in Ancient Athenian democracy: Parrhesia (free or frank speech) and isegoria (the equal right to speak). In theory, parrhesia preserved the right to speak truth to power, including the scandalous sexual jokes about public figures which pepper the comedies of the Greek stage. Tolerance of these plays suggested the Athenians generally recognised the validity of frank speech - and one of the state warships was even named parrhesia.  Isegoria embodied the principle that any free man had an equal right to participate in public discourse, although in practice this was rarely the case. Polished public speaking came with a good education and those who lacked it could be physically silenced.  The principles of free speech and equality are deceptively simple, and - as with today - interpretation and implementation varied wildly, depending on who held power. The life and death of the philosopher Socrates provides an interesting case study. He is often celebrated as a martyr of free speech, dying in its name, but on closer examination this isn’t exactly what happened.  They also look at free speech in Ancient Rome and the sobering story of Cicero’s final hours, in which his tongue - allegedly - was stitched into silence.  Join the Instant Classics Book Club here: https://instantclassics.supportingcast.fm/ Mary and Charlotte recommend some further reading Plato’s version of Socrates’ response to the charges against him is found in his Apology of Socrates (this, like all ancient works we mention here, is widely available in translation in print and online). NB in Greek apologia means “defence” not “sorry”.  An important debate in the Athenian assembly that we reference in our discussion (on how to punish the people on Mytilene) is described by Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War  Book 3, 36ff. The story of Cremutius Cordus is told in Tacitus Annals Book 3, 34-5; that of the tongue of Cicero by Cassius Dio, History of Rome Book 47, 8. Emily Wilson, The Death of Socrates (Profile/Harvard UP, 2008) is a good introduction to the issues of free speech in 399 BCE and their legacy. Content warning: references to political violence both in the ancient world and in the past week, and mild sexual innuendo.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] [To join the Instant Classics Book Club and share our trip into Homer’s Odyssey, go to  https://instantclassics.supportingcast.fm/ New episodes will be published every other Tuesday, and available exclusively for members beginning 30th September. Sign up now with the promo code EARLYBIRD25 to receive a 25% discount on membership.]  Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tell me about a complicated man, muse… In this episode of Instant Classics Book Club, Mary and Charlotte dwell on the first ten lines of The Odyssey (as translated by Emily Wilson) and show how it contains not only a summary of the story that follows, but introduces the themes, the subject, and the way the story will be told. Whoever Homer was, they were not a blind sage belting out rudimentary lyrics to listeners round a camp fire, but a sophisticated story-teller/s working and re-working their text to technical brilliance.  In particular, Mary and Charlotte introduce us to an ancient Greek word in the first line which is the key to everything that follows. Polytropos (πολῠ́τροπος) is almost untranslatable, but it is the secret to not only Odysseus’ character, but the story itself. Deciding how to interpret this word is amongst the biggest decisions a translator takes.  Our aim in this episode is to get everyone thinking about polytropos - and how you might interpret it over the course of this story. Is it a good thing to be polytropos? Who in your life is polytropos? Try dropping the word into conversation with your boss. Or maybe don’t.  Send your thoughts to [email protected]  And don’t worry - the pace will pick up from here on!  Mary and Charlotte’s recommended reads: You can find Emily Wilson’s discussion of “polytropos” (and her own debates about how to translate it) here: https://emily613.substack.com/p/on-complicated  Consistency alert: In the episode we sometimes refer to polytropos, sometimes to polytropon. That is because the main form of the word is polytropos, but it appears in these lines as polytropon (we’ll explain if you want!). Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Jo Meek  Senior Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In Ancient Greece, the Iliad was the poem above all other poems - an epic full of war and bloodshed that tells of the great heroes who fought and died for Troy.  But not so long after the supposed composition of the Iliad, a woman on the Mediterranean island of Lesbos, close to the coast of modern-day Turkey, introduced a new and enduring note to poetry: desire.  Her name was Sappho. She was revered through the Ancient World, but today only one work survives in its entirety: a poem usually known as the Hymn to Aphrodite. The rest is fragments - only about 600 lines of the 10,000 lines the Romans were still reading seven centuries after her death.  Sappho lived in the 7th Century BCE, long before the rise of Athens as the dominant city-state in Ancient Greece. It was before democracy, before the Parthenon and, arguably, before the extreme subjugation of women common in the later “classical” period. Women weren’t exactly liberated in seventh century Lesbos, but it looks like they were a lot freer than in fifth-century Athens.  From her poetry, we can tell she was an aristocrat, a singer, a lover, and a mother.  Sappho, famously, loved women. And in this episode, Charlotte and Mary explain why they also love Sappho. Not only is she the great poet of desire, but she also writes about nature, motherhood, middle-age, bad knees, and why war - despite what her brothers might say - is boring.  Charlotte and Mary recreate what they can of Sappho’s life and art. And they ask the big question: why is it that so little of her work survives compared to many male writers of the ancient world? Are medieval monks to blame? Was she, as Otis Redding sang, just too hot to handle?  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] To join the Instant Classics Book Club and share our trip into Homer’s Odyssey, go to  https://instantclassics.supportingcast.fm/ New episodes will be published every other Tuesday, and available exclusively for members beginning 30th September. Sign up now with the promo code EARLYBIRD25 to receive a 25% discount on membership.  Mary and Charlotte’s recommended reads: There are hundreds of translations and adaptations of Sappho. Two of Mary and Charlotte’s recent favourites are: Anne Carson: If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho and Stanley Lombardo: Sappho, Poems and Fragments In her book, Eros, the Bittersweet, Carson also asks what makes Sappho the great poet of desire.  The world behind the poetry is the subject of Rosalind Thomas’s “Sappho’s Lesbos”, in The Cambridge Companion to Sappho. This is a fairly specialist collection of essays, but takes the story of Sappho’s influence right up to the present, from the USA to India, China and Latin America. For the controversies around the new discoveries of Sappho’s poetry made a decade ago, start with Roberta Mazza, Stolen Fragments (extraordinary detective work on the world of the illegal  trade in ancient papyri). Three articles by Charlotte also discuss that “new” Sappho and lift the lid on the problems: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/29/sappho-ancient-greek-poet-unknown-works-discovered  https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/jan/09/a-scandal-in-oxford-the-curious-case-of-the-stolen-gospel  https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/mar/25/doubts-cast-over-provenance-of-unearthed-sappho-poems Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Jo Meek  Senior Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Think ‘Roman sport’ and images of Kirk Douglas, Russell Crowe, Paul Mescal and other Hollywood gladiators may come to mind. But while the Romans were partial to blood-sports, chariot-racing was the really big thing.  The archaeological remains of chariot-racing tracks have been found all over the Roman Empire, but none suggest a scale or grandeur close to the Circus Maximus in Rome. At full capacity, we think it could take a quarter of a million people - that’s twice the largest football stadium today.  In this episode, Mary and Charlotte recreate what a day at the races was actually like for the Romans. They describe how chariot-racing worked as a sport, what the experience may have been like for the spectators (courtesy of the poet Ovid), although remain stumped by the not insignificant issue of how a quarter of a million people went to the loo when archeological labour has - so far - only discovered one, solitary toilet.  They also describe how the chariot-racing industry worked, and the phenomenal wealth that prize charioteers acquired (Cristiano Ronaldo looks underpaid in comparison).  Ultimately, it is impossible to draw comparisons with sporting events today because chariot-racing at the Circus Maximus was far more than entertainment. It played a hugely important role in the political life of the empire as one of the few places where the people in large numbers could encounter the emperor . As a consequence, it was not only a site for chariot-racing but for mass public protest. How the emperor behaved, before the gaze of the city, was critical to his popularity. While no emperor was ever unseated at the Circus Maximus, it gave his enemies a chance to see whether the people would mind if something unpleasant happened to him later.  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] To join the Instant Classics Book Club and share our trip into Homer’s Odyssey, go to  https://instantclassics.supportingcast.fm/ New episodes will be published every other Tuesday, and available exclusively for members beginning 30th September. Sign up now with the promo code EARLYBIRD25 to receive a 25% discount on membership.  Mary and Charlotte’s recommended reads: For good introductions to the “sport”, try: F. Meijer, Chariot Racing in the Roman Empire (Johns Hopkins, 2010) J. Toner, The Day Commodus Killed a Rhino: understanding the Roman Games (Johns Hopkins pb, 2015) The career of the super successful Diocles is the theme of an online article by Peter Struck: https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/greatest-all-time Mary discusses the problems that emperors had at the races  in her book Emperor of Rome (Profile pb, 2024) Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Jo Meek  Senior Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

(We hope you enjoy this introduction to The Odyssey. To continue the journey, please join the Instant Classics Book Club at https://instantclassics.supportingcast.fm/ New episodes will be published every other Tuesday, and available exclusively for members beginning 30th September. Sign up now with the promo code EARLYBIRD25 to receive a 25% discount on membership). The Odyssey, along with its sister text, The Iliad, is often considered the bedrock of western literature. In it are the seeds of the road movie, the family drama, fantasy fiction, the Western, and any number of genres. It’s also being adapted in a soon to be released film starring Matt Damon as the wily hero, Odysseus. So what better choice of text for the inaugural Instant Classics Book Club?  The Odyssey tells the story of Odysseus, King of Ithaca, and his (literally) epic journey home after the Greek war againstTroy. He encounters the man-eating cyclops, the dangerously alluring sirens (the original femmes fatales) – and he stops in the land of the lotus eaters, the land of blissful forgetfulness. But there is so much more to the story than a series of adventures. It’s also a story of what’s going on at home while he is away: his wife Penelope is trying to avoid being married off to one of a horde of ghastly “suitors” and his young son Telemachus learns how to be a man. The end is both happy and a grisly bloodbath.  Over the coming months, Mary and Charlotte are taking a deep dive into this greatest of all stories - and inviting you to read along with them. They’ll be sharing their lifetime’s enjoyment of it, putting it in context, and unpicking some occasionally tricky bits!  In this first episode, they set the scene, explaining why The Odyssey is such a pleasure, as well as historically significant, and providing the basic facts necessary to get going.  Pick a translation - any translation - and get going. And send your thoughts to [email protected]  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X +email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte’s recommended reads: The translation we will be quoting from is that of Emily Wilson. But really any will do (there is another even more recent version by Daniel Mendelsohn, which we will be keeping an eye on too). There are also plenty available free online. Most of those are rather old (and sometimes sound a bit stilted), but you can find a more up to date version here: https://johnstoniatexts.x10host.com/homer/odysseytofc.html Both Wilson and Mendelsohn start with very useful introductions to the poem. But try also: Barbara Graziosi, Homer: a very short introduction (OUP paperback, 2016) Edith Hall, The Return of Ulysses (IB Tauris paperback, 2012)  (you can download the whole book here: https://edithhall.co.uk/product/the-return-of-ulysses-a-cultural-history-of-homers-odyssey/) The Open University has a useful website (“free course”) on the Odyssey, with links all kinds of articles (including one by Charlotte on the theme of “warrior home-comings”): https://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/exploring-homers-odyssey/content-section-3    Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Jo Meek  Senior Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dropping tomorrow, and every other Tuesday, the Instant Classics Book Club. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For a long time being a classicist didn’t exactly make you a hit at a party. Then along came Donald Trump and suddenly everybody wants to know: Which Roman emperor is he most like?  In this inaugural episode of Instant Classics, Mary Beard and Charlotte Higgins confront the question they are asked the most. And, as ever when Mary Beard is involved, the answer isn’t always as simple as you might think.  Mary and Charlotte explain how most of what we know about the emperors is unreliable. We do get some extraordinary glimpses behind the palace walls (Suetonius, the biographer of the first “12 Caesars” was a real insider – having worked as palace archivist and librarian). But almost all our accounts of them come from after their reign and are part of “posthumous reputation making”. Often, the way to keep bloke in power pleased was to trash his predecessors. Did Caligula really have all his soldiers pick up every shell on a beach or plan to make his favourite horse a consul?  These stories may be fanciful, but they are hugely important nevertheless and were repeated for generations. They are some of the best evidence for Romans thought of their emperors, about their fears of imperial power and how it falls.  So one to one, real life comparisons are always misleading (insists Mary!). But the wider patterns of political power can be similar then and now. Donald Trump plays many of the tunes that you find in the emperors’ playbook: capriciousness as a political tactic (they’re always changing their mind); Julius Caesar was one who made a point of speaking directly to the people to bypass political institutions (Trump does it through social media); wanton cruelty mixed with sudden acts of generosity.  Charlotte doesn’t let Mary off the hook. Yes, it’s hard to draw direct comparisons, but - come on Mary! - which emperor is Trump most like?  Answers are given!  @instaclassicpod for Insta, TikTok and YouTube @insta_classics for X email: [email protected] Mary and Charlotte’s recommended reads: Suetonius, Lives of the Caesars. Written in the second century CE. There’s a new translation by Tom Holland, but plenty of others are available. It was written to be read from start to finish, but new readers might choose to start with the lives of Caligula, Nero or Domitian. The Lives of the Later Caesars (available in Penguin translation: its Latin title is the rather more opaque Historia Augusta). Much less well known, this is a series of ancient biographies of emperors after Hadrian that make Suetonius look very “proper”, with lurid anecdotes that no one has ever thought were true. If you want a good start, go to the life of Elagabalus (also called Heliogabalus). For those wanting to explore Elagabalus, there’s an awful lot of modern gossip-mongering masquerading as history. For a more reliable start, try Martijn Icks, The Crimes of Elagabalus (this is great on how he was represented in later art and culture), or Harry Sidebottom, The Mad Emperor. Advert alert: Mary discusses the stories told about Roman emperors, and how we can understand them in her book, Emperor of Rome.  Instant Classics handmade by Vespucci Producer: Jonty Claypole  Executive Producer: Jo Meek  Senior Producer: Natalia Rodriguez Ford Video Editor: Jak Ford Theme music: Casey Gibson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A new podcast hosted by Mary Beard and Charlotte Higgins. Ancient stories, modern twists… and no degree in Classics required. Episode 1 Available on Thursday, August 28th, 2025. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices