Dr Jack Lennon

I studied Ancient History and Classics at Nottingham and received my PhD in 2011. Before coming to Leicester in 2016 I held positions at Nottingham, Kent, and University College London. I also spent time at the British School at Rome as the Mougins Museum Rome Award holder.

My main interest is in Roman cultural history and is divided into three distinct strands which have frequently overlapped in my research: Roman religion and magic; Roman notions of dirt and dirtiness; and processes of marginalisation and stigmatisation in antiquity and the various groups that suffered forms of stigma (or inflicted it on others).

Many of these interests came together in my most recent book, Dirt and denigration: stigma and marginalisation in ancient Rome (2022), which explored the perception and presentation of various ‘dirty’ groups in Rome, such as pimps, undertakers, gladiators, and executioners, but also used them to consider long-term patterns of stigma in Roman society and the ways in which forms of stigmatising behaviour were taught and learned by people at every level of Roman society. Moving forward, I want to take a much broader look at stigma in the ancient world and think about how the various forms of stigma that are present in the ancient world went on to inform stigmatising views and practices in the medieval world and beyond.

I have always been especially dedicated to teaching, and in addition to the modules I oversee at Leicester I am also keen to raise awareness of how amazing the ancient word is to wider audiences. I am actively involved in talking to schools in the midlands (and beyond, if possible!), and am happy to offer talks on a range of topics.

I have been a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society since 2022.

Roman cultural history: pre-Christian Roman religion and magic; dirtiness in Roman society; stigma and marginalisation.

• Roman political history from the late Republic to the High Empire.
• The history and historiography of the sixth and early seventh centuries CE

Books

• Lennon, J.J. (2022) Dirt and Denigration: Stigma and Marginalisation in Ancient Rome (Approaches to Ancient History series: 1) (Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen).
• Lennon, J.J. (2014) Pollution and Religion in Ancient Rome (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge).

Articles/Chapters

• Lennon, J.J. and N. Wilshere (forthcoming, 2024) ‘The role of pollution in Agathias’s Histories’, Dumbarton Oaks Papers (78).
• Lennon, J.J. (forthcoming, 2024) ‘Pollution, divine anger, and political legitimacy in Rome’s civil wars’, in I. Polinskaya, A. James and I Papadogiannakis (eds.) Religion and war from antiquity to early modernity (Bloomsbury).
• Lennon, J.J. (2017) ‘The contaminating touch in the Roman world’, in A. Purves (ed.) Touch and the Ancient Senses (Routledge, London) 121-33.
• Lennon, J.J. (2015) ‘Ritual Pollution’, ‘Birth Rites’, ‘Taurobolium’, in E. Orlin (ed.) Routledge Dictionary of Ancient Mediterranean Religions (Routledge, London).
• Lennon, J.J. (2015) ‘Victimarii in Roman religion and society’, Papers of the British School at Rome (83) 65-89.
• Lennon, J.J. (2015) ‘Dining and obligation in Valerius Maximus: the case of the sacra mensae’, Classical Quarterly (65.2) 719-31.
• Lennon, J.J. (2012) ‘Pollution, religion and society in the Roman world’, in M. Bradley (ed.) Rome, Pollution and Propriety: Dirt, Disease and Hygiene in the Eternal City from Antiquity to Modernity (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge), 43-58.
• Lennon, J.J. (2010) ‘Jupiter Latiaris and the Taurobolium: inversions of cleansing in Christian polemic’, Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte (59.3) 381-84.
• Lennon, J.J. (2010) ‘Menstrual blood in ancient Rome: an unspeakable impurity?’, Classica et Mediaevalia (61) 71-87.
• Lennon, J.J. (2010) ‘Pollution and ritual impurity in Cicero’s De Domo Sua’, Classica Quarterly (60.2) 427-45.

I am happy to supervise students in most aspects of Republican and early Imperial cultural and political history and I am especially interested the following subject areas:

• Roman religion
• Stigma and Marginalisation in antiquity
• Ancient magic

I am involved with a wide range of teaching within the School (both campus-based and distance learning) and am currently co-ordinating the following modules:

• AH1009 - Approaching Ancient Evidence: Roman
• AH1701 – Approaching the Roman World (Distance Learning)
• AH2041 - Religion in the Roman World
• AH3083 - An Empire Reborn: Justinian and his Age
• AH3702 – The End of Antiquity (Distance Learning)

I am involved with a wide range of teaching within the School (both campus-based and distance learning) and currently co-ordinate the following modules:

• AH1009 - Approaching Ancient Evidence: Roman
• AH2023 - The Roman Principate
• AH2038 - The Roman Family
• AH2041 - Religion in the Roman World
• AH3081 - The Fall of the Roman Republic
• AH3083 - An Empire Reborn: Justinian and his Age

• Ancient Roman history
• Roman Religion
• Roman culture
• Stigmatised groups in antiquity
• Ancient dirtiness

• BA, MA, PhD (Nottingham)
• Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy
• Fellow of the Royal Historical Society