Quaestiones in magica: Antony Lee

We’re back with more informal questions on ancient magic from people who definitely have better things to be doing! Thanks for the interest folks. Today’s client is museums-archaeologist Antony Lee, now a full time PhD Student at Durham University. His thesis topic is: “Gods behind glass: Exploring approaches to Romano-British religious experiences in museums”.

Antony Lee: Often found lounging on ruins.

Easy first question – what are you currently researching and how did that come about?

AL: “Its only easy if you don’t ask me what my actual research questions are at any given moment… But I’m researching how museums in Britain are presenting religious beliefs and practices in Roman Britain, particularly how lived religious experiences are being engaged with. So I’m looking at a selection of museums across the country, large and small, and analysing how they are integrating and interpreting religious material in their displays and how they are representing ‘native’ and ‘Roman’ religious interaction. It also means I’m looking at how museums are dealing with the juicy bits of religious experience like the materiality of and embodied engagement with material culture, how senses and emotions played a part in religious ritual, how they are defining difficult terms like ritual, religion and magic, and whether non-temple based religious acts such as structured deposition and everyday magic are being included.

I’m a museum bod through and through and think that museum displays still have a huge part to play in how our communities understand their own heritage and how it fits into bigger narratives. I’m really keen on finding new ways that we can not only better reflect current academic thinking but do so in a way that’s more engaging to a non-specialist visitor. The dry ‘catalogue of named gods illustrated by a row of figurines’ approach that many museums take is not only unreflective of the religious reality but also rather uninspiring for visitors. I have a mad vision of how religion can be a way that we can start to better challenge visitors’ long-held and generally uncritical perceptions of Roman Britain, and get them to see the period in a little less familiar and comfortable light.” What was the most recent (academic) book you bought? And have you opened it yet?

AL: “‘Beyond the Romans’, the new TRAC Themes volume. Does flicking through it count as opening it? If so, yes, if not then its on the ever-tottering pile on my desk! Although there are some specifically religious chapters in it, I think I’ll be reading Jay Ingate’s chapter on water supplies first. People’s relationships with water is such a fascinating subject to look at through a posthuman lens.” AP: I completely forgot this was coming out. NEED!

The hardest question in three words: magic or religion?

AL: “Damn you Parker! Both, no wait, neither. Both terms are so entwined and crippled by later usage, yet both have ancient origins which make it hard to dump them entirely. I definitely prefer to see them both as equally valid manifestations of the ways that humans have attempted to understand and influence the world around them. One person’s solemn ritual is indeed someone else’s heretical magic and I think this is why we continue to struggle to find a universally satisfactory definition for either term – both terms are so utterly relative to the person using them and the acts they are describing. I therefore hereby decree that any and all interaction with any supernatural forces shall henceforth be called ‘Nargle’…” AP: *More maniacal laughing*…

Imagine you are on commission and trying to sell me an ancient curse, spell, amulet, or ritual. Choose your favourite and give me the pitch:

AL: “Building a nice new house for the family I see? Lovely spot you’ve chosen. Well, those foundations look nice and solid now but you can’t trust wood and plaster to last for ever now, can you? I once knew a chap, built a lovely house down near Corinium. Spent a fortune on it, but one night the roof caved in! Boom, 5 generations and 53 kiddies all wiped out in one night. You know where he went wrong? Forgot his foundation deposit, didn’t he! No, I’m sure you want the best for your lovely wife and kids there, don’t you? Just let me go to my cart and get my basket of puppies. I can give you a great deal, buy two spaniels and a dachshund and I’ll give you this cockerpoo free. Bury one in each corner of the building under the floor with a nice broken cooking pot and you’ll have a happy home for generations. Oh, is that a boundary ditch you’re digging too? Better not take any chances with that either, don’t want any misfortune getting past that threshold, do you? It’s a bugger to get out once its set in. How about a nice horse for under the entranceway? Now, my brother sells good cooking pots, let me give you his details…

(In the context of keeping this vaguely palatable for a family audience, I went with puppies rather than stillborn babies…)” AP: This made my day. I am so glad I asked!

2020 has been an undeniable mess. How are you finding the world of academia/classics/heritage [delete as appropriate] right now?

AL: “Without wishing to be overly-dramatic, I think that it’s the big problems that are the most worrisome at the moment. Academia in general is rather under attack right now and its only likely to get worse. Too many people across the world seems to be caught up in an increasing anti-intellectual mindset, and the study of the past is right there at the centre of it. When every bit of scholarship or new discovery is popularly presented as either ‘experts baffled’ or ‘history rewritten’ we shouldn’t be too surprised when people don’t understand the nuances of what we do or the relativistic nature of historical enquiry.

We need to find better ways of not just presenting new findings but taking people with us on the journey and understanding why we now look at the past differently to the way we did when people were at school 50 years ago – and why that’s a good thing! The strength of the negative response to the National Trust’s acknowledgement that the proceeds of slavery paid for some of its properties has laid bare a dark side to popular perceptions of history.

There’s a worrying widely-held belief that history is a place of unchanging ‘facts’ that have no impact on the present, and we shouldn’t spoil people’s pleasant fantasies by looking at things from different perspectives. There’s an insatiable popular appetite for history and heritage, but we’re in danger of the narratives being controlled by pseudo-scientific nonsense-peddlers and those who don’t wish for everyone’s voices past and present to be heard. Nothing annoys me more that people saying that ‘museums shouldn’t be political’ when all they mean is ‘I don’t want you presenting a picture of the past different to the one I’m already comfortable with’. Sorry, that was a rant, but it felt good…”

If you could have a toasty caffeinated beverage with anyone in the field of religious and magical studies, classics, and archaeology, who would it be and why?

AL: “Not a religious scholar (or even a scholar at all!), but if I could have a fireside chat with anyone in the history of the field then it would be Roque de Alcubierre. I’d love to hear his first-hand story about those early excavations at Herculaneum and the experience of being lowered down the well into what we now know was the theatre. It would be fascinating to get his version of events about the subsequent accusations of incompetence made against him by Winckelmann and others. His assistant Carl Weber is always touted as the better excavator but I’ve always felt Alcubierre has been a little shabbily treated by posterity. Although he clearly didn’t do everything right he was a pioneer and certainly made more records of his finds than his accusers claimed, all while under pressure from the highest levels of the aristocracy desperate for new finds to adorn their homes. I’d love to know how he reacted to Winckelmann’s famous jibe that he ‘knew as little about antiquities as the moon did about lobsters’” AP: Coffee with a dead 18th century engineer? I’m sure with the right spell we could get that sorted out in a jiffy.

Hit me with an excellent blog and/or someone on twitter we should all follow.

AL: “I’m actually involved with a new initiative – a new group (hopefully to be an SSN) being set up looking at the care and interpretation of religious collections in museums and religious institutions – so it would be remiss of me not to take the chance to promote it a little! The new blog for the group is at https://religioncollections.wordpress.com/. Although it covers all religions and periods I’m keen for ancient religion to be well represented and we’re looking for content to be submitted from anyone with an interest in the subject” AP: This is a safe space for shameless self-promotion. Great project! Go check it out folks.