The Masters course Water resource in time and space: Focus Greece has been given every year since 2008 in co-operation with the Departments of Economic History at Uppsala University, Cultural Geography at Stockholm University, and Thematic Studies/Environmental Change at Linköping University. During the last couple of years the fieldwork, which is an important part of the course, has been conducted in the Navarino Environmental Observatory in the south-western part of the Peloponnese.

A course that gives postgraduate and presumptive doctoral students an opportunity to travel around in Greece in order to visit archaeological sites and museums has always been very much at the core of the Institute’s activity. It has been given since the Institute’s founding in 1948, and most Swedish scholars in Classical archaeology have at some point taken part in it. Today, the course is given biannually, and the Institute gives five grants to students at the four universities in Sweden that have departments in Classics (Uppsala, Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Lund).

Take part in this year’s online competition and win a free language course in Swedish, English, French, German, Polish, Czech or Italian!

To participate, visit the European Day of Languages’ online competition site. The winners will be announced at the European Day of Languages event held at Klafthmonos Square on 26 September.

Closing date for entries: Sunday 13 September 2015

The project aims to make available the information and material from all Swedish excavations in Greece from 1894 and onwards. By organizing and complementing the Institute’s archive, and by creating an online database comprising digitized excavation documentation and information about the archaeological material, it will be accessible to researchers.

From 7–9 July 2015 the Swedish Institute at Athens, in collaboration with the British School at Athens, organized a three-day international conference titled

A Greek cityscape and its people. A study of Ancient Hermion/Hermione

In 2015, together with the Ephorate of Antiquities of Argolida, the Swedish Institute at Athens commenced work on a joint three-year study of Hermione or Hermion, an ancient city known through written sources and archaeological remains identified through surveys and scattered rescue excavations. The General Director of this project is Dr Alcestis Papadimitriou, Ephorate of Antiquities of Argolida, and Dr Jenny Wallensten is responsible for the Swedish team...

Excavations at the Sanctuary of Poseidon at Kalaureia on Poros were recommenced in June 2015 under the direction of Arto Penttinen.

The gods of the Greeks liked things. Greek religion is inseparable from its temples, altars, statues, and votive offerings; the last of a dazzling variety, ranging from gleaming bronze tripods or elaborate gold jewellery, to simple terracotta figurines, used shoes and dirty pieces of clothing. As a corollary, to understand Greek religion one has to integrate into any study of its theology and rituals, its distinctive materiality. This conference examines this “distinctive materiality” on two levels: firstly, by examining the role of religious objects in human society and secondly, by looking at the significance that objects were thought to have for the gods themselves. The discussions will aim specifically at exploring the ancient Greek ideas on objects and their materiality, a perspective that has hitherto been given little attention.

Programme: The Stuff of the Gods

Poster: The Stuff of the Gods