top of page
Welcome to TOPICA, a collaborative blog for the all the graduate students in the Faculty of Classics at the University of Cambridge, UK.
This is the space where we document the thoughts, conversations and questions that have come up during our research and lunch breaks, in order to share them among ourselves and everybody else interested in the classical world.
Click the logo above, or scroll through the banner below for the site sections. Scroll down for the latest blog posts.
Visual and verbal revulsion: Titian and the Younger Philostratus
Visual and verbal revulsion: Titian’s Perseus and Andromeda and the Younger Philostratus’ Hesione and Heracles* Charlie Pemberton,...
TOPICA
Mar 26, 20216 min read
291 views
11 comments
How many circuits?
The name is Orestes On the track, on the track again, on the track, how many times around, how many bloodied laps, how many black rows;...
TOPICA
Nov 17, 20208 min read
112 views
11 comments
Building the classics: the LEGO Colosseum
The worlds of Lego and Classics have collided and now thrive, most conspicuously online in numerous noteworthy corners of the net.
Joe Grimwade
Nov 17, 20204 min read
362 views
5 comments
Perfume and power: Killing Eve and the Roman emperors
Brian Theng Spoiler alert: I refer to a little snippet of episode four in the ongoing third season of Killing Eve and the 2019 film...
TOPICA
May 18, 20205 min read
920 views
8 comments
Ugly modernism?
Sofia Greaves The recent article from the Guardian confronts the dangers of combining neoclassical architecture with white power, ideals...
TOPICA
Feb 29, 20204 min read
255 views
7 comments
Paraklausithyron
Nir Stern The paraklausithyron across time and space: songs and poems of Mediterranean sub-cultures This blog post is meant to offer a...
TOPICA
Feb 7, 202011 min read
305 views
5 comments
Epic Rap, Rapping Epic
Brian Theng I am no music connoisseur. But put a scholarship application and a bar conversation together, and we get a blogpost about...
TOPICA
Jan 19, 20205 min read
155 views
3 comments
Sing, Muse, of the Man Who Once Learnt Something by Rote
Sarah Sheard It happened a few days ago now, and yet the tremendous feat will not leave my Twitter feed. It is even more galling given...
TOPICA
Dec 31, 20194 min read
237 views
5 comments
Classics, Political class, and the MMXIX election
Jesse Hala Pro Iuppiter, efficiamus Brexit. - Jacob Rees-Mogg, 6/12/19. It’s only been a couple of days, but the results of Britain’s...
TOPICA
Dec 14, 20194 min read
303 views
3 comments
Epic without Kleos: a Troy Story for our times
Zach Case A Review of Troy: Myth and Reality, at the British Museum until 8th March 2020. Get yourselves down to the British Museum and...
TOPICA
Dec 8, 20196 min read
272 views
1 comment
My first supper at Pompeii
Brian Theng Earlier this week I managed to sneak away from the autumnal idyll which is the Cam to the dreaming spires of Oxford to visit...
TOPICA
Nov 10, 20195 min read
214 views
1 comment
Peter and Pan: From Ancient Greece to Neverland, via Jerusalem
Nir Stern Modern Israel is dotted with remnants of antiquity, and not only of the biblical kind. From the Hellenistic palace of Herod the...
TOPICA
Jul 16, 20197 min read
223 views
1 comment
The Silence of Time: The Spaces In-Between
Albert Bates The footboard of an old piano is nailed to the wall. A pair of hands offer forth its copper strings like entrails pulled...
TOPICA
Jun 19, 20196 min read
190 views
1 comment
Unthroned: the Politics of Westeros and the Limits of Classical Reception
Zack Case Note: this article contains spoilers Disclaimer: this article is not another complaint about season eight of Game of Thrones...
TOPICA
May 24, 20199 min read
345 views
1 comment
‘I am Ashurbanipal’ – A Retrospective on an Exhibition
Tom Langley Between 8th November 2018 and 24th Feb 2019, the British Museum held an exhibition devoted to the last great Assyrian King,...
TOPICA
May 22, 20196 min read
209 views
1 comment
Poliziano's Nose
Nathaniel Hess Classical scholars are fairly disembodied beings, one might think, withering at lonely desks as they cultivate the...
TOPICA
Mar 22, 20195 min read
160 views
1 comment
Garni Temple: Visiting Armenia’s Ancient Past
Kyriakos Velos Nestled on a plateau overlooking precipitous ravines and ragged mountains in the Armenian Highlands lies Garni....
TOPICA
Mar 11, 20192 min read
96 views
2 comments
Julie Mehretu and 'the classical eye'
Sofia Greaves Julie Mehretu is considered to be among the foremost artists of her generation, and is currently on show at Kettle’s Yard....
TOPICA
Feb 23, 20195 min read
209 views
1 comment
Democracy, Referendums and Brexit: A Classical Perspective
Zack Case “Democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.” Winston...
TOPICA
Feb 7, 20198 min read
214 views
3 comments
BLogeion. 1. Yeet
Krishnan Ram-Prasad Corruption of third person singular of Lat. i ēre, itself a corruption of Gk Ιἔεμαι, borrowed into English via Low...
TOPICA
Jan 30, 20191 min read
47 views
1 comment
Quiddity. n.
Joe Grimwade Quiddity: n. 1. The essence of a thing. 2.a. A quibble. 2.b. An eccentricity; a distinctive feature. Two second-rate...
TOPICA
Jan 21, 20192 min read
47 views
1 comment
Nikandre Kore
Michael Loy The Nikandre Kore is one of the most quietly fantastic pieces of sculpture to survive to us from Greco-Roman antiquity....
TOPICA
Jan 16, 20193 min read
325 views
3 comments
Gellius teaches us to fight against the algorithm
Nir Stern The amount of knowledge in our world is amazing, staggering really. Knowledge of any kind is being developed and expounded by...
TOPICA
Jan 6, 20197 min read
78 views
2 comments
Walls and Empires
Tom Langley Walls and Empires, Ancient and Modern Borders, and particularly border walls, dominate the current news cycle. The United...
TOPICA
Jan 4, 20198 min read
173 views
3 comments
An introduction to... the Platanus:
Nir Stern It was claimed by Marco Polo that out in the vast desert of Persia there grew a single ‘dry tree’ right at spot of the battle...
TOPICA
Nov 29, 20182 min read
44 views
1 comment
Edward Burne-Jones, “The Pre-Raphaelite Visionary”
Sofia Greaves Edward Burne-Jones review – an endless procession of the living dead. So says Laura Cumming, at The Observer. She has a low...
TOPICA
Nov 29, 20184 min read
81 views
1 comment
Ruins of Conimbriga, Hispania Lusitania
Joe Grimwade The ruins of Conimbriga comprise one of the largest and most impressive archaeological sites in Portugal. The majority of...
TOPICA
Nov 29, 20183 min read
54 views
1 comment
Imbricate: v.
Joe Grimwade Imagine: you’re standing at the local bus stop when a man sporting a toga and a proud aquiline nose appears beside you. It...
TOPICA
Nov 23, 20181 min read
43 views
1 comment
bottom of page