The CSPS AGIDO webinar / online talk “Across the Sea: Empowerment and the Hellenistic Royal Women of Sparta and the Seleucid Kingdom” by Stavros Mitsianis (University of Crete) and Abigail Costello (University of Nottingham) will take place on Monday, June 1, 17:00 BST (19:00 Athens time) via MS Teams. The event is free and open to everybody, but you should register in advance via this link: https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/ebecad8b-84b2-4d98-a233-0e1cd0d439c1@67bda7ee-fd80-41ef-ac91-358418290a1e
The talk will also be livestreamed via https://vachosradio.gr/ (no registration required for the livestream).
The webinar series is kindly supported by the “Daughters of Penelope – Sparta” Association.
Abstract
This talk compares the royal women of Sparta and the Seleucid kingdom during the Hellenistic period through the theme of empowerment. To examine this concept, Stavros and Abbie concentrate on (a) strategic marriage, (b) property, wealth and land ownership, and (c) the political role these royal women occupied. Drawing on both archaeological evidence (such as inscriptions and coinage) and literary sources (including Plutarch, Appian and Polybius), they examine these themes through key figures such as Laodike I, Laodike III, Cleopatra Thea, Agiatis and Chilonis. Ultimately, Stavros and Abbie ask whether the empowerment of these royal women was truly as distant as the sea that separated them.
Abigail (Abbie) Costello is a first-year doctoral student at the University of Nottingham, funded by the Wolfson Foundation. Her MA dissertation examined Spartan women and their association with textiles in the Archaic and Classical periods, challenging both traditional and feminist interpretations. For her doctoral research, she is undertaking a diachronic study of non-royal Spartan women from the Bronze Age through to the Hellenistic period. She is a member of the Centre for Spartan and Peloponnesian Studies (CSPS) and hosts the CSPS AGIDO (ΑΓΗΔΩ) webinar series.
Stavros Mitsianis completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Crete in Rethymno and is currently pursuing postgraduate (MA) study at the same institution in the Ancient Mediterranean World: History and Archaeology programme, under the supervision of Professors Katerina Panagopoulou and Kostas Vlassopoulos. His academic interests centre on the Hellenistic period, with particular focus on the Seleucid Kingdom and the Hellenistic East. His MA thesis examines the Roman War of Antiochus III the Great (192–188 BC), with an emphasis on the Treaty of Apamea and its impact on the Seleucid dynasty through to the end of the reign of Antiochus VII Sidetes (138–129 BC).