D. Alex Walthall
PhD 2013, Princeton University
Assistant Professor
Contact
- E-mail: dwalthall@austin.utexas.edu
- Office: WAG 213
- Campus Mail Code: C3400
Interests
Archaeology of ancient Sicily, Numismatics, Hellenistic monarchy
Biography
Alex Walthall specializes in the material culture of the ancient Mediterranean region, particularly the archaeology of ancient Sicily. His dissertation, “A Measured Harvest: Grain, Tithes, and Territories in Hellenistic and Roman Sicily (276–31 BCE),” utilizes archaeological, numismatic, and epigraphic material as a means of documenting political consolidation and economic development in eastern Sicily from the rise of the Syracusan monarch Hieron II to the island’s absorption into the Roman Empire.
He earned a B.A. in classics and archaeology from the University of Virginia in 2004 and has worked with the American Excavations at Morgantina in eastern Sicily since 2003. Serving as a senior field supervisor since 2007, he has worked on excavations in the agora and the North Bath complex. In 2011, he directed excavations in the West Granary which recovered archaeological material that helped refine the chronology of a monumental storage building constructed in the city’s agora during the third century BCE.
Alex’s research has also explored issues ranging from the visual language of Hellenistic monarchy and the impact of agricultural taxation on trade and economic performance in the ancient world to the relationship between numismatics and archaeology.
Current Research
Alex currently serves as field director of the Contrada Agnese Project (CAP) at Morgantina, a long-term excavation and research project which investigates developments that occurred in the urban center of Morgantina between the 3rd and 1st centuries BCE. For the latest updates and preliminary reports on the CAP excavations, click here.
With Malcolm Bell, Alex is currently collaborating on the publication of the Central Shops at Morgantina, a suite of commercial establishments that was razed around the middle of the third century BCE to accommodate the construction of monumental steps in the agora. Together with Tom Groves, he is preparing the final publication of nearly one thousand coins recovered in excavations at the site between 1982 and 2014. He is also at work on a book based on his dissertation.
Selected Publications
“Preliminary Report on the 2014 Field Season of the American Excavations at Morgantina: Contrada Agnese Project (CAP).” Fasti On Line Documents & Research 359:1–23. With R. Souza and J. Benton. (2016)
“Recenti scavi nei granai monumentali a Morgantina,” in L. Maniscalco (ed.) Morgantina ieri e oggi, 82–91. Enna. (2015)
“Becoming Kings: Spartan Basileia in the Hellenistic Period,” in Splendors and Miseries of Ruling Alone: Encounters with Monarchy from Archaic Greece to the Hellenistic Mediterranean, ed. N. Luraghi (Steiner Verlag, 2013).
“A Hoard Containing Late Republican Denarii from Morgantina (Sicily),” American Journal of Numismatics 25 (2013).
“Magistrate Stamps on Grain Measures in Early Hellenistic Sicily,” Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 179 (2011).
