Ancient architects tell us that every Roman settlement should have a prison at its center, and archaeology suggests that most cities did. Purpose-built prisons populated the ancient Mediterranean and so did practices of incarceration: sentences of prison time stood beside manual labor in cities, in bakeries, and in mines. Less fortunate souls entered facilities to await execution, sometimes for years. This lecture explores the evidence for ancient incarceration in vignettes: reading letters that prisoners wrote on papyrus, investigating spaces where they were held, and analyzing depictions of captives in monuments, law-courts, and homes. Roman evidence does not model a just society, but it does offer a mirror where we can see modern practices of incarceration in a new light, asking which aspects of contemporary prisons are unique to modernity, and which reflect longer histories.
Registration is required: https://events.uw.edu/event/HLS2026/summary