Department of Classical StudiesBelow is a sampling from the titles of Senior Research Papers (earlier: "honors theses") submitted at Penn.
Apologies for the incompleteness of the list: if you have additions, please let us know!
100-word abstracts are also available for most projects completed since 2013; see the student coursework presented at Senior Colloquium.
2022
Brandon Block, "Wealth, Prestige and...Miracle Cures? The Influence of Economic Interests on the Asklepieon at Epidaurus" Supervisor: Ralph Rosen
Sara Chopra, "Translating the Translators: A Comparative Approach to Contemporary Translation of the Priam-Achilles Dialogue in Book 24 of the Iliad." Supervisors: James Ker and Bridget Murnaghan
(Spring 2021) Cecelia Heintzelman, “Cases and Casts: A Diachronic Study of the Mediterranean Section of the Penn Museum.” Supervisor: Brian Rose
Stephen Jagoe, "Virgil’s Universal Prophecy: Judeo-Roman Interaction in Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue." Supervisor: Joe Farrell
Nicky Kotler, "The Rise of the Imperial Cult and the Reception in the City of Rome." Supervisor: Julia Wilker
Spencer Landis, "Platonic Metaphysics and the Non-Discursive: A Glimpse into the Divine.” Supervisor: Peter Struck
Isabelle Schatzker, "Eclectic Identities in the Material Landscape: Reconsidering Decorative Function and Perceptions of Space in the Houses of Pompeii’s Non-Elite." Supervisor: Mantha Zarmakoupi
Elizabeth Vo-Phamhi, "Manumission and Mobility" Supervisor: Kim Bowes
Olivia Wells, "Bringing Conchiclam Apicianam to Life: An Experimental Archaeological Investigation of a Multi-Ingredient Dish from Apicius’ De Re Coquinaria." Supervisor: Kim Bowes
2021
Matan Davis, “The Writing is On the Wall: Dialogic Insults on the Walls of Pompeii.” Supervisors: Kim Bowes, James Ker.
Kathryn Kelly, “Representations of Memnon throughout Antiquity and in Contemporary Classical Studies: An Examination of the Epic Hero’s Ethiopian Ethnicity.” Supervisor: Emily Wilson
Amelia Marion, “Searching for Carthage in Plautus’ Poenulus: An Exploration of Punic Culture in Roman Literature. Supervisor: James Ker.
James Nycz, “Individual Agency and Economic Decision- Making in the Fourth-Century Great Oasis of Roman Egypt.” Supervisor: Cam Grey.
Christina Recto, “Learning My ABCs: A Between Culture Comparison of Ancient and Modern Educational Reform.” Supervisor: James Ker.
Cate Simons, “Martial and the Art of Deflection: Martial’s Use of Mythological References as a Tactic to Divert the Unwanted Gaze.” Supervisor: Cynthia Damon.
Jordan Tayeh, “The Barbarian Doctrine: Reframing Eastern Alienation and the Religion of the Alien God.” Supervisor: Jeremy McInerney.
Christopher Williams, “An Analysis of Transportation Burden Sharing in Roman Egypt as Evidenced through Papyri” Supervisor: Kim Bowes.
Rachel Winicov, “Relationships of Power in the Sixth Century CE Syrian Religious Milieu.” Supervisors: Cam Grey and Reyhan Durmaz (Religious Studies).
2020
Anthony Ciro, "The Iliad: Far from Political Treatise, Far from Political Neutrality" (supervisors: Sheila Murnaghan and Julia Wilker)
Margaret Danaher, "The Role of Punishment in Petronius’s Satyricon: Resemblances between the 'Quartilla' and the 'Ship of Lichas' Episodes" (supervisor: James Ker)
Catherine de Luna, "Matriarch, Mother, Mouthpiece: Examining Televisual Representations of Livia Drusilla" (advisor: Brian Rose)
Max Frantz, "The Introduction and Presence of 'Exotic' Foodstuffs in Late Iron Age and Early Roman Britain: an archaeobotanical analysis (supervisor: Kimberly Bowes)
Max Jokelson, "Peace and Alliance in Xenophon’s Hellenica" (supervisor: Julia Wilker)
Clare Kearns, "Ἀμήχανος Ἡρωίς: Gender and Power in Apollonius’ Argonautica" (supervisor: Joseph Farrell)
David Kestenbaum, "The Classical Greek Perception of the Trojan War"
S. Maddy Moore, "Art from Archaeology: Reconstructive Illustrations and Historical Empathy at the Saronic Harbor site of Kalamianos" (supervisor: Thomas Tartaron)
Louis Morledge, "Roman Citizenship & Political Community" (supervisor: John Mulhern)
Breyasia Scott, "Medea’s Symposium" (supervisor: Emily Wilson)
Sydney Shiffman, "An Analysis of the Cross-Contextual Supplication Sequence in Book 22 of the Odyssey" (supervisor: Peter Struck)
2019
Vassilios Fassas, "The Fourth Century Athenian Economic Miracle and the World's First Credit Market" (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Victoria Greene, "Recovering Lost Voices: The Experiences of Women during the Peloponnesian War" (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Catherine Sophia McNally, "The Evolution of an Allegorical Masterpiece: Peter Paul Rubens and the Judgment of Paris" (supervisor: James Ker)
Rachel Zachian, "From Ancient to Modern Medicine: Hippocrates and Galen in 19th-Century U.S. Medical School Curricula" (supervisor: Ralph Rosen)
2018
Anuj Amin, “A Case for Egyptian Influence in Early Greek Religion Hesiod on Chaos, Creation and Death” (supervisor: Peter Struck)
Braden Cordivari, “The Beyceğiz Tumulus: A Phrygian Monument and its Social Significance” (supervisor: Brian Rose)
Claudia E. Epley, “Baltic Amber on Faliscan Fibulae: Economic Mechanisms and Interpretive Perspectives” (supervisors: Cam Grey and Dr. Jean MacIntosh Turfa)
Mileidy Gonzalez-Negreira, “Rethinking the Brontoscopic Calendar: Epidemiology, Climate, and Trade in Iron Age Etruria” (supervisor: Dr. Jean MacIntosh Turfa)
Adam J. Ireland, “Paradoxes of Rhetoric: Socrates the Philosopher-King and Johnnie Cochran the Attic” (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Claudia Kassner,“ἐλευθέρα εἶμεν καὶ ἀνέφαπτος: An Examination of the Manumission Inscriptions at Delphi” (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
David Kinnaird, “The Real Catiline: How and Why Catiline Has Been Misrepresented” (supervisor: Cynthia Damon)
Kristen Rye Pearson, “Tangled Motivations: Community, Mobility, and Frugality in a 10th Century Textile Assemblage from the Mongolian Altai” (supervisor: Dr. Katherine Moore)
Samantha Warrick, “The Eruption of Thera: A Disaster Studies Perspective” (Cam Grey)
Sam Wert, “Authorial Games of Ancient Rome A Study of Gaming and Gambling in Roman Literature” (supervisor: Dr. Ann Kuttner)
Rachel Nevada Wood, “Doing Gender” and Myths of Sex Change in Ovid’s Metamorphoses” (supervisor: Joseph Farrell)
2017
Claire C. Beamish, “Health Care Revolution or Evolution? A Comparative Analysis of the Theoretical and Structural Components of Health Care in Hellenistic Greece and Under The Affordable Care Act” (supervisor: Ralph Rosen)
Mia Chalhoub, “Perspectives of Carthage: The Counter-Roman Argument Exists” (supervisor: Joseph Farrell)
Jeremy T. Cohen, “Lion Within: Plato’s Republic in Roman Upper Egypt” (supervisor: Peter Struck)
Michael Freeman, “Pendant and Papyri: An Intertextual Analysis of Magical Inschriftenfiguren Gemstones” (supervisor: Peter Struck)
Catharine Hopkins, “When Republics Fall: What the United States can learn from the internal faults that brought down the Roman Republic” (supervisor: Dr. John Mulhern)
Alexander Thomas King, “Health Differentials in the Aegean Bronze Age: The impact of sex and status on health outcomes in the Mycenean and Minoan worlds”
R. A. Lahiri, “Schoolboy Commentary and Tacitus’s Agricola in 19th Century England” (supervisor: Cynthia Damon)
Diane Panepresso, “The Painted House at Gordion” (supervisor: Brian Rose)
Lisa Picciotti, “Isis, the Ka of the Flavian Gens” (supervisor: Brian Rose)
Natalie Reynolds, “Eunomia in the Archaic Period of Greece” (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Jeremy Schwartz, “Galen on Athletic Training” (supervisor: Ralph Rosen)
John E. Stiffler, “Going to the Law: A Study of the Petitionary Process in Roman Egypt” (supervisor: Cam Grey)
Samuel York, “Julius Canus: A Case Study in the Exemplarity of Death” (supervisor: James Ker)
2016
Louis Capozzi, “Stilicho the Survivor” (supervisor: Cam Grey)
Shlomit Heering, “Cleopatra and Berenice: The Perception and Presentation of Two Queens” (supervisor: Julia Wilker)
Nina S. Kaledin, “Caracalla and the Military in Dio, Herodian, and the Historia Augusta” (supervisor: Cam Grey)
Allison Resnick, “Pallor in Juvenal: A Symptom of Social Disease” (supervisor: James Ker)
Kamillia Scott, “Partage, Conflict, and Value in the Joint Expeditions by the Penn Museum and the British Museum at Ur of the Chaldees” (supervisor: Dr. Ann Kuttner)
Allyson Zucker, “Perceptions of Time in Horace's Odes, Books 1-3: Through the Lens of Caesar's Calendrical Reforms” (supervisor: Joseph Farrell)
2015
Laura Agosto, “Fault Lines of the Oikos: The Relationship between Individual Desire and the Oikos in Euripides’ Medea” (supervisor: Sheila Murnaghan)
Donald Antenen, “Socrates' Silences” (supervisor: Emily Wilson)
KC Boas, “The Big Picture: The Relationship between Text and Image in Greek Comic Vase Paintings” (supervisor: Ralph Rosen)
Madeleine Brown, “Roman Virtus and Greek Ἀνδρεία in Jewish Writing: Examining Cultural Integration Through Changes in Conceptions of Manly Virtue” (supervisor: Cam Grey)
Kevin Ennis, “Synagogues in the Diaspora (2nd Century BC to 6th C. AD): A New Architectural Analysis and Historical Implications” (supervisor: Lothar Haselberger)
Christian Gilberti, “Francis Daniel Pastorius, the Classics, and Virgil’s Aeneid in Early America” (supervisor: Cam Grey)
Julianna Pakstis, “Farewell to Femininity: An Analysis of the Great Monologue in Euripides’ Medea” (supervisor: Sheila Murnaghan)
Carly E. Sokach, “A Potion for the Goddess: Controlling Menstruation and Fertility Through the Thesmophoria” (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Sarah Wilker, “What does the Pot say of the Potter? An Examination of the Ceramic Record from 3rd-c. BCE Egypt” (supervisor: Dr. Ann Kuttner)
2014
Amanda Ball, "The Rock-Vaulted Halls: A look into the landscape of the Greco-Roman underworld and its origins" (supervisor: Brian Rose)
Cara Cugley, "An Analysis of Tomb II of the Great Tumulus at Vergina" (supervisor: Julia Wilker)
Kate Goldenberg, "Reclaiming a Selected Past: Mussolini’s Rome and Bacon’s Philadelphia" (double major with URBS; supervisors: Eric Schneider [URBS], James Ker [CLST])
Julia Hurley, "Food in Roman Britain: A discussion of current issues in scholarship and a proposed new approach" (supervisor: Ann Kuttner)
Elizabeth Potens, "Dionysus and the Cultural Identity of Thrace: A xenos god for a xenos people" (supervisors: James Ker, Tom Tartaron)
Devin Scanlon, "Metabolai Politeiōn" (supervisor: John Mulhern)
Carson Woodbury, "Call Me Demaratus: Narrating Spartan ethnography in the Historiesof Herodotus (supervisor: Julia Wilker)
2013
Alex Clapp, "Politics of Culture in the Ancient Pontus" (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Kyle deSandes-Moyer, "Hunters, Guards, Companions: The Role of Dogs in Antiquity" (supervisors: Katherine Moore, Thomas Tartaron)
Sarah Gutman, "'The Ways of Conduct and Fate': Codes of Conduct in the Iliad and the Ethics of War" (supervisor: Peter Struck)
Molly Hutt, "Well That Escalated Quickly: Infanticide and Duality in Euripides' Medea as an Expression of Athenian Anxieties in 431 BC" (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Marguerite Leone, "The Justinianic Plague and the History of Epidemics" (supervisor: James Ker)
James Levy, "The Outsider as Insider: Aristophanes’ Understanding of the Classical Athenian Slave" (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Jamie O'Connell, "Maguš, Mágos, or Magician: Considering Herodotus as a Source for theMagoi in Achaemenid Religion" (supervisors: Justin McDaniel and Jeremy McInerney) [ANCH major]
Alethea Roe, "Ancient Faces, Enduring Questions: The 'Fayum' Mummy Portraits and the Problem of Verisimilitude" (supervisor: Ann Kuttner)
Laura Santander, "Playing With Our Expectations: The Narrator's Influence on the Audience's Experience in Homer's Iliad and Euripides' Troades" (supervisor: Emily Wilson)
Noreen Sit, "A Culture of Display: Expenditure and Image from Caesar to Nero" (supervisor: Cynthia Damon)
Adena Wayne, "'Contrarios ceteris mortalibus': Reading Tacitean Irony on the Jews in theHistories Book V" (supervisor: Natalie Dohrmann and Peter Struck)
2012
Jacob Finkel, "Deceptive Veracity: Cicero's Use of Direct Discourse for Dramatic Invention in ad Atticum 389" (supervisor: James Ker) [M.A. thesis]
Kalla Gervasio, "Improving Nutrition Education Curricula in the Philadelphia School District: From Hippocrates and Galen to the USDA" (supervisor: Ralph Rosen)
Catherine Krabbenschmidt, "Augustus' Projects on the Palatine: Rewriting Rome's Memory" (supervisor: Kimberly Bowes)
Mark Nakahara, "Art or Archaeology: Collections and Fieldwork of the Penn Museum's Mediterranean Section" (supervisor: Kimberly Bowes)
Alexandra Olsman, "Ipsarum tribadum tribas, Philaeni: The Curious Case and Reconstruction of the Roman Tribas" (supervisor: James Ker)
Anita Saggurti, "Artemis Patron of Fertility and Childbirth" (supervisor: C. Brian Rose) [ANCH major]
Michael Wadden, "Herodotus' Histories, Viewed Through an Ethiopian Lens: A Study of the Narrative Function of Herodotus' Ethiopian Episode" (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Taylor Williams, "'Storms of this Inconstant World': Ideology, Identity, and the Ideal State in Late Antiquity" (supervisor: Cam Grey)
Benjamin Winnick, "Arcadia's Sense of Identity Throughout Antiquity" (supervisor: Jeremy McInerney)
Tongjia "Alex" Zhang, "Socrates and the Irrational: On Plato's Symposium and Phaedrus" (supervisor: Emily Wilson)
2011
[Contact us if you can help fill in missing information!]
Abby Johnston, [on death, gender, autonomy in Ovid’s Heroides] (supervisor: Emily Wilson)
Sonya Parashar, Galen and his Insecurities (supervisor: Jeremey McInerney)
2010
Ava Childers, “The Politicization of Classical Greek Archaeological Heritage: Building a New Greek Cultural and Natoinal Identity Atop the Parthenon” (supervisor: Tom Tartaron)
Caitlin Foley, “T. Pomponius Atticus and the Pursuit of Self-Preservation” [supervisor: Cam Grey]
Sarah Hilker, “The Hippocratic Doctrine: Finding Traces of Magic in Classical Medicine” (supervisor: Ralph Rosen)
Lily Rogath, “Pinxere et mulieres: Description of the Villa and Tomb of a Gallo-Roman Female Artist Discovered at Saint-Médard-des-Prés (Vendée)” (supervisor: Ann Kuttner)
Christopher Santoli, “Beyond the Angry Man: Cannibalism in Seneca's Prose and Poetry” (supervisor: James Ker)
Johan Tatoy, “Navigating Generic Identities: Medea in Valerius Flaccus' Argonautica” (supervisor: James Ker)
2009
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Susan Garrigle, Alexander and the Succession Crisis (supervisor: Jeremey McInerney)
2008
David Blome, “Hunters and Hounds, Soldiers and Commanders: Combat leadership in Xenophon's Cynegeticus” (supervisor: Jeremey McInerney)
Michele Charles, “Gods, Heroes and the Hoplite: The Role of Religion in Ancient Greek Warfare” (supervisor: Jeremey McInerney)
Jane Raisch, “Agony and Theatricality in Euripides' Bacchae and Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus" (supervisors: Emily Wilson, Classical Studies; Margreta de Grazia English)
Curtis Roche, [on Socrates: focused on the Apology, questions of historicity] (supervisor: Emily Wilson)
2007
Sarah Buchanan, “Alexander’s Funeral Pyre for Hephaestion: A Motif-Based Reading of the Monument as Spectacle” (supervisor: Ann Kuttner)
Christine Quinn, “The Tomb of Philip II” (supervisor: David Romano)
2006
John Byck, “Sculpture through the Lens: A Retrospective Visual Analysis of the Tyrannicides and the Nike of Samothrace in the Light of Modern Photographic Culture” (supervisor: Ann Kuttner)
Abby Cohen, “The Architectural Landscapes of the Sanctuary of Demeter and Kore at Corinth” (supervisor: David Romano)
Michael Lackman, “Personal Politics: Thucydides' Anthropic Polis in the Archidamian War” (supervisor: Jeremey McInerney)
Claudia Moser, “Naked Power: The Phallus as an Apotropaic Symbol in the Images and Texts of Roman Italy” (supervisor: David Romano)
Alexander Perkins, “Scar, Sympathy, Icon, and Identity: The Power of the Name within the Ancient Imagination” (supervisor: Ralph Rosen)
Jessica Shore, [on the social role of the flamen from the late republic to first-century Pompeii] (supervisor: James Ker)
Kelly Sloane, “Epic Illuminations: Word and Image Relationships in the Illustrations of theAeneid in the Vergilius Vaticanus” (supervisor: Joseph Farrell)
2005
Dan Shu, [on Paradise Lost and the Phaethon episode in Ovid's Metamorphoses] (supervisor: Emily Wilson)