New Publication: Portraying the Individual in the Roman East
What did portraits look like on the edges of the Roman Empire? In the new publication "Portraying the Individual in the Roman East", editor Rubina Raja shifts the focus away from Rome itself to the vibrant borderlands where local identities met imperial power.
Brepols has released a new edited volume titled Portraying the Individual in the Roman East: Local–Imperial Entanglements in Sculpture, Mosaics, and Paintings (1st–4th Centuries AD). It is the 18th volume of the book series “Studies in Classical Archaeology”.
The volume examines Roman portraiture beyond the empire's core territories, focusing on regional borderlands where portrait traditions varied across cities and time periods. Contributions analyze both adherence to and departures from common portrait conventions, exploring the relationship between local identities and imperial visual norms.
The book covers multiple media types including sculpture, mosaics, and paintings. Topics addressed include workshop practices, resource circulation, reworking and reuse of portraits, reconstruction of display contexts, and the development of regional visual languages. Case studies span locations across the ancient Mediterranean and West Asia.
The volume stems from an international conference held in December 2024 in Copenhagen and contains ten chapters covering topics from Hellenising imperial images in the Greek East to funerary portraits from Hierapolis in Syria and depictions along the Rhine.
Read more about the book here.
Explore the book series here.
Contributions by team members:
Bobou, O. Calomino, D., Lenghan, J., and Raja, R. (2026). ‘Putting Portraits in the Big Picture: Otacilia Severa and Faustina the Elder in Palmyra’, in R. Raja (ed.), Portraying the Individual in the Roman East. Local–Imperial Entanglements in Sculpture, Mosaics, and Paintings (1st–4th Centuries AD), Studies in Classical Archaeology 18 (Turnhout: Brepols), pp. 85-112.
Bobou, O. and Dickenson, C. (2026). ‘The Portrait Statues from the Artemision at Messene — Expressing Identity and Representing Power', in R. Raja (ed.), Portraying the Individual in the Roman East. Local–Imperial Entanglements in Sculpture, Mosaics, and Paintings (1st–4th Centuries AD), Studies in Classical Archaeology 18 (Turnhout: Brepols), pp. 187-206.
Raja, R. (2026). ‘Portraying the Individual in the Roman East: Local–Imperial Entanglements in Sculpture, Mosaics, and Paintings (1st–4th Centuries AD)’, in R. Raja (ed.), Portraying the Individual in the Roman East. Local–Imperial Entanglements in Sculpture, Mosaics, and Paintings (1st–4th Centuries AD), Studies in Classical Archaeology 18 (Turnhout: Brepols), pp. 1-8.
Raja, R. (2026). ‘Locally Crafted Empires: The Case of the Palmyrene Portrait Habit and the Legacy of Greek Art’, in R. Raja (ed.), Portraying the Individual in the Roman East. Local–Imperial Entanglements in Sculpture, Mosaics, and Paintings (1st–4th Centuries AD), Studies in Classical Archaeology 18 (Turnhout: Brepols), pp. 59-84.