Dr Alfonso Moreno

Background

I grew up in Colombia, but my first contact with Latin and Greek was in secondary school in the US, at Phillips Exeter Academy. Spending the summer before university backpacking around Greece and Turkey impressed me indelibly. It pushed me to get a BA in Classics at Harvard, where I was taught by Ernst Badian and so began to gravitate towards ancient history. For some years I took a detour into law, receiving a JD from Georgetown and joining the New York Bar. In 1998, finding that the Internal Revenue Code could not push the Mediterranean out of my head, I came to Oxford (Balliol College), and wrote my DPhil thesis under Oswyn Murray. I have been lucky to work on topics that require wide travel, from Athens to the Black Sea, and interaction with archaeologist colleagues. My present focus on aerial photography as a source for ancient history (see below), has led to an interest in photography generally. I came to Magdalen in 2003, after brief stops at the Universidad Nacional in Bogotá, Balliol and St. John’s Colleges, Oxford, and Royal Holloway College, University of London.

Teaching

I cover virtually all papers in Greek and Roman history for Classical Archaeology and Ancient History (CAAH); Ancient and Modern History (AMH); and Classics (Literae Humaniores). I am the senior (organizing) tutor for CAAH and (jointly) for AMH. Please contact me if you have any questions on these courses in particular and on the study of ancient history at Magdalen generally.

Research Interests

My main research interest is in the interplay of politics and the economy in Classical Athens. I am currently working on World War II aerial photography as a source for Athenian topography, settlement, and trade.

Selected Publications

• Feeding the Democracy: the Athenian Grain Supply in the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC, Oxford (2007).
• edited jointly with Oswyn Murray: D. Asheri, A. Lloyd, A. Corcella, A Commentary on Herodotus Books I-IV, Oxford (2007).
• “’The Attic Neighbour’: The Cleruchy in the Athenian Empire,” in J. Ma, N. Papazarkadas, R. Parker (eds.), Interpreting the Athenian Empire, London (2009), pp. 211-221.
• “Hieron: The Ancient Sanctuary at the Mouth of the Black Sea,” Hesperia 77 (2008), pp. 655-709.
• “The Greek Gem: A Token of Recognition,” in M. Revermann & P. Wilson (eds.), Performance, Reception, Iconography: Studies in Honour of Oliver Taplin, Oxford (2008), pp. 419-438.
• “Athenian Wheat-Tsars: Black Sea Grain and Elite Culture”, in V. Gabrielsen & J. Lund (eds.), The Black Sea in Antiquity: Regional and Interregional Economic Exchanges, Black Sea Studies 6, Aarhus (2007), pp. 69-84.