Postgraduate Seminar: "The Necropoleis of Alexandria: Funerary Performance, Space, and Society in Ptolemaic Alexandria"
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The BA Alexandria Center for Hellenistic Studies, in cooperation with the Hellenic Foundation for Books and Culture, organizes a postgraduate seminar entitled "The Necropoleis of Alexandria: Funerary Performance, Space, and Society in Ptolemaic Alexandria," Prof. Nikolas Dimakis, Associate Professor of Archaeology - National and Kapodistrian University of Athens.
The seminar is held on Thursday, 22 October 2026, from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm.
Beyond its harbours, palaces and Library, Ptolemaic Alexandria was ringed by vast cemeteries, the necropoleis or "cities of the dead". They stretched east of the city at Shatby, Hadra and Mustafa Kamel, west at Gabbari, and on the former island of Pharos at Anfushi.
Since most of the ancient city lies beneath modern Alexandria, these tombs are among the richest surviving evidence for how its people lived, worshipped, mourned and presented themselves.
This seminar treats the necropoleis not merely as places of burial but as settings for ritual action, approaching them through the three themes of its title. It asks how tomb architecture shaped the movement and gatherings of the living, which rites can be reconstructed from the surviving evidence, and what burials reveal about status, origin and the meeting of Greek and Egyptian traditions in the Hellenistic capital.
It is followed by case-study work in which participants examine one necropolis each and present their findings to the speaker.
The seminar is in English.
Registration link:
https://forms.gle/AiJjEWBM2DBbB5BS7
Places are limited to 35 postgraduate students and are awarded by selection.