NORTH STAFFS BRANCH OF THE CLASSICAL ASSOCIATION

Report for the Year 2012/13

As the Treasurer reports elsewhere, we experienced an insignificant drop in our otherwise healthy financial position. We now have 59 paying members, all at the full £5. (58 last year.) Our attendances rose very slightly after several years of falls, but again there was often only a small percentage of members present. This continues to be an issue we need to address.

In the Autumn we opened in late October with a reading from Livy, Books I and II in translation at our Chairman's house. This was followed by a lecture at Keele by John Davie (Oxford) on Shakespeare & the Classics. (Hellenic Society joint meeting.) We were very unlucky with the snowy weather in early December, when Roy Gibson (Manchester) spoke entertainingly at Wolstanton on The Villas of the Younger Pliny (Roman Society Joint Meeting).

In January we had a play reading of Euripides' Eumenides at our Chairman's house, completing our reading of the Trilogy. In a first for us, a Joint Meeting with the Friends of Keele, Gaye Blake-Roberts (Director of the Wedgwood Museum) spoke in the Raven-Mason Suite at Keele on Classical Inspirations of Wedgwood Ceramics. The next meeting, in April, was a lecture by Aimee Schofield, (Manchester) at Clayton Hall Business & Language College on A Bolt from the Blue: How Catapults Changed the Face of Ancient Warfare. The lecture attendance was supplemented by 90+ (half the school's Year 7) to which she spoke earlier in the afternoon on the Roman Army. Because of this, we changed our usual start time of 7.30 to 5.30 for this occasion.

We are grateful to both schools, Keele SCR and the Friends of Keele for free use of the rooms for these meetings.

Our annual coach trip, in May, was as usual open to other bodies and was to Silchester Roman Town, via the villa site at Littlecote Hall Hotel. The original plan to go instead via Reading Museum proved impracticable because of the very long outward trip before our first stop and the logistics of movement around the town. Littlecote proved however to be a very successful alternative. We are grateful as ever to Andy Fear for leading us round both sites.

The Latin and Greek reading groups have continued to run approximately monthly throughout the year, independently of the core programme.


Events 2012/2013

NO KNOWLEDGE OF ANY ANCIENT LANGUAGE IS REQUIRED TO ENJOY AND TAKE PART IN OUR EVENTS, OTHER THAN THE READING GROUPS

READING: (in English Translation) of Livy Books I & II (Lucretia, Coriolanus, etc)

7.30 pm, Monday 29 October 2012
Priest's House, St Wulstan's, Church Lane, Wolstanton, Newcastle-under-Lyme, ST5 0EF

Copies will be available, but please bring the Penguin Classics edition, if you are able.

LECTURE: John Davie (University of Oxford)

'SHAKESPEARE AND THE CLASSICS'
7.30 p.m., Thursday 15 November 2012
Common Room, Keele Hall, University of Keele, ST5 5BG
Joint meeting with the Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies

LECTURE: Professor Roy Gibson (University of Manchester)

'THE VILLAS OF PLINY THE YOUNGER'
7.30 p.m., Tuesday 11 December 2012
St Wulstans's (RC) Primary School, Church Lane, Wolstanton, ST5 0EF
Joint meeting with the Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

PLAY READING: (in English translation) of Aeschylus' Eumenides

7.30 p.m., Monday 28 January 2013
Priest's House, St Wulstan's, Church Lane, Wolstanton, Newcastle-under-Lyme, ST5 0EF

      Roman Theatre, Orange, © Stephen Clifford, June 2004 The Roman Theatre at Orange.

Copies will be available, but please bring the Penguin Classics edition, if you are able.

LECTURE: Gaye Blake-Roberts (Director, the Wedgwood Museum)

'CLASSICAL INSPIRATIONS OF WEDGWOOD CERAMICS'
7.30 p.m., Thursday 7 March 2013
Raven Mason Suite, Keele Hall, University of Keele, ST5 5BG
Joint meeting with the Friends of Keele

LECTURE: Aimee Schofield (University of Manchester)

'A BOLT FROM THE BLUE: HOW CATAPULTS CHANGED THE FACE OF ANCIENT WARFARE'
5.30 pm, Wednesday 17 April 2013
The Library, Clayton Hall Business & Language College, ST5 3DN

SILCHESTER COACH TRIP

ANNUAL COACH TRIP, Saturday 11 May 2013.

As usual we will depart by coach from Keele, about 9.00 a.m., returning late the same evening. On our outward journey, we shall visit the Littlecote Villa site in Wiltshire, then Silchester Roman Town, stopping for an evening meal on our return journey. Admission is free for both sites. Members are invited to bring packed lunches to eat at the coach park before going round Silchester Roman Town and excavations.

      The 'Orpheus' Mosaic The 'Orpheus' Mosaic - subject to interpretation. Silchester Amphitheatre Silchester, the Amphitheatre

Final details of costs will be given with confirmed bookings, but these are expected to be similar to 2012, exclusive of evening meal, depending on final costs of group entry etc, i.e. abouit £24. Further details will appear on this site before the trip. The booking form may be downloaded here.

Annual General Meeting

The AGM of the Branch will take place on Tuesday 25 June 2013, at 7.30 pm, at the Priests' House, Wolstanton. This event is for members only.

Latin and Greek Reading Groups 2012/13

The Latin and Greek reading groups continue to meet every 3 - 4 weeks at 7.30 p.m., independently of the general programme, for those who wish to read ancient (and medieval Latin) literature in the original, and to work together on deciphering the meaning, in a relaxed atmosphere.

Last year's programme and Annual Report

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