Approach
The project draws on social gerontology to treat ageing as a lived and variable experience rather than a fixed stage of life. Gender, class, and geo-ethnic identity are not simply part of the background: they are central to how old age was lived and understood in Late Antiquity.
Research Objectives
RomAge approaches later life from several directions at once: the physical changes of the body, the imperial legislation that defined the rights and status of the elderly, the social, cultural, and religious attitudes that shaped old age, and the visual images that both reflected and influenced how older people were perceived.
Sources and Method
The project works across a wide range of evidence. It draws on medical literature; secular law, and church normative texts in Greek, Latin, Coptic, and Syriac; and epigraphic, papyrological, and visual material such as statues, icons, frescoes, mosaics, and carvings. By giving priority to understudied sources, like the Coptic and Syriac texts and the epigraphic, papyrological, and visual record, RomAge sets out to challenge the Eurocentric and elitist biases found both in the ancient sources themselves and in the scholarship that has interpreted them.
