Dr Consuelo Manetta

My research interests are architecture and architectural decoration (e.g. ancient covering systems, esp. coffered ceilings); ancient topography and urbanization; funerary archaeology; sculpture; Greek, Thracian, and Roman funerary painting; mosaics; iconography and iconology; transmission and evolution of iconographies throughout the centuries and across different cultures (Greek/vs peripheral regions; Rome and suburban areas/vs provincial regions). She is also experienced in managing classical antiquities collections, 19th-century antiquities trafficking, as well as the dynamics related to the reuse of ancient marbles and the possible re-contextualization of spolia. She favors a contextual approach that uses a wide range of archaeological, epigraphic, visual, and literary evidence as sources for wider historical enquiries.

I am currently a Marie Skłodowska Curie Research Fellow (Individual Fellowship 2019-2021) at the Department of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Exeter. My project titles "Public Cults in Private Hands: the Appropriation of cult sites from the 2nd century BC to the 2nd century AD" (acronym: CULTUS).

Drawing on exciting new discoveries in the Colli Albani area, the CULTUS project offers an unprecedented opportunity to
explore the role of religion in Roman élite competition, identity creation, and state ideology, from the perspective of actual
practice, agency, and integration into daily activities and more mundane physical surroundings. The identification of the
famous sacrarium of Bona Dea at the ʽVilla of Clodiusʼ, Castel Gandolfo, and a re-assessment of the villas of Secciano and
La Torretta, have closed important gaps in our knowledge of the Colli Albani’s sacred landscape, and have paved the way
for the successful application of an innovative approach that moves away from still-prevailing paradigms of normative and
static concepts of religion, and binary oppositions such as public/private or official/popular. Focussing on the much-neglected semi-public cult sites situated in private properties, the study aims to identify the patrons of these initiatives (male and female private individuals; emperors), and the reasons for their actions (self-promotion and socio-political ‘cultural capital’) over four centuries of extensive change in Roman political and social history (2nd c. BC to 2nd c. AD).