About

Sarah James is an Associate Professor of Classics at the University of Colorado Boulder and serves as the Associate Chair of Graduate Studies. She earned her PhD in 2010 from the University of Texas at Austin. Her primary research interests include Greek archaeology, ceramics, landscape studies, and ancient trade and economies, with a particular focus on the Hellenistic period. She has contributed to the understanding of northeastern Peloponnesian ceramics, Hellenistic trade networks, and cultural transitions from the Greek to Roman period through her fieldwork and publications. Her notable projects include her role as assistant director of the Sikyon Excavations from 2013 to 2019 and her position as co-director of the Western Argolid Regional Project. Additionally, she is the director of the Brač Island Project in Croatia, which investigates regional interactions in the central Adriatic through the study of an Iron Age hillfort. Her scholarly work encompasses fieldwork projects and publications that advance knowledge of ancient Greek material culture, trade, and regional interactions.

Research topics

• Geography
• Political Science
• Archaeology
• Cartography
• History
• Ancient history
• Economic history
• Ethnology
• Physical geography

Selected publications

• Landscape Histories and Terrestrial Networks in the Peloponnese: Results from the Western Argolid Regional Project

  Hesperia The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens · 2024 · 3 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Geography
  • Archaeology
  • Physical geography

  ABSTRACT: The Western Argolid Regional Project (WARP) is an intensive pedestrian survey of 30 km2, located northwest of Argos along the banks of the Inachos River. Using high-intensity collection strategies, WARP generated very fine-resolution data that provide insights into the ways this seemingly marginal area contributed to and was impacted by regional histories. A key question is how the network of mountainous routes that traverse this landscape, connecting the area to the Corinthia and Arkadia, may have influenced localized, diachronic settlement patterns. This article focuses on areas of high artifact densities to demonstrate how regional activity and interconnectivity changed from the Neolithic to Modern period at this crossroads in the northeastern Peloponnese.

  PublisherDOI

• Survey and the 7th century in the Western Argolid

  JOURNAL OF GREEK ARCHAEOLOGY · 2020 · 5 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding
  • Political Science
  • Geography
  • History

  The past two decades have witnessed a major change in how archaeologists understand the Late Roman and Early Medieval landscape of Greece. The rise of survey archaeology in the late-20th century fueled a growing awareness of the ‘busy countryside’ of Late Antiquity. This complemented work in urban areas across Greece and the Eastern Mediterranean more broadly by demonstrating that Late Roman cities and their countryside experienced continued prosperity, social vitality, and political and economic significance into the 5th and 6th centuries. Recent work has challenged the idea that the supposed Slavic invasions of the late-6th century brought an end to this Late Antique prosperity and initiated a period of economic, political, and social dislocation often called the ‘Dark Ages.’ This revised interpretation draws on evidence from the northeastern Peloponnese, with work at the site of Corinth, in particular, demonstrating that the city continued to prosper well into the 7th century. Imported ceramics indicate that Corinth remained connected to production sites across the Mediterranean even if these connections appear to be less dynamic and consistent than earlier centuries. The site also benefited from the intensification of regional networks from the late-6th through 7th centuries. The results from Corinth suggest that the city experienced economic change in the 7th century, but that this change was not the same as decline and indicates continuity with earlier centuries as much as new patterns of economic and social relations. This revised view of the 7th century at Corinth has pushed both excavations and intensive survey projects to think more critically about the chronology of assemblages elsewhere in Greece and the Eastern Mediterranean.

  PublisherDOI

• Social Work. A Quiet Exit: On the social work of art: a rare, humanizing show by Laurie Parsons at Museum Abteiberg

  Frieze: Contemporary Art and Culture · 2019-01-01

  article1st authorCorresponding
  Publisher

• The South Stoa at Corinth: New Evidence and Interpretations

  Hesperia The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens · 2019-01-01 · 11 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  The first modern systematic excavations in the South Stoa at Corinth in 2015 revealed much about the history of this area of the later Forum and about the stoa itself prior to the installation of the Eutychia mosaic in room C (the so-called Agonotheteion) around A.D. 150. Neolithic pottery, an Early Protogeometric grave, an Archaic votive pit, and a possible industrial installation cut into the bedrock give insights into the landscape before the construction of the stoa. Construction trenches and a foundation deposit provide a date in the 280s B.C. for the first building activities at the stoa's east end. Roman-era finds shed light on the history of room C from the later 1st to the 5th century A.D.

  PublisherDOI

• Unclean priests and the body of Christ

  2019-08-06

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  This chapter aims to undertake a comparison of three late medieval English versions of the Elucidarium alongside the Latin text, in order to try and understand their specific contributions to the nature of fifteenth-century English pastoral care. The Elucidarium occupies a place of unique importance in the religious instruction of the laity in the Middle Ages. Although the author of the Latin text deliberately chose to remain anonymous, he is now widely accepted to be one Honorius Augustodunensis. The Elucidarium may be his earliest work and appears to be the product of his years at Canterbury, displaying clear signs of the influence of Anselm’s thought, including, it has been suggested, evidence of access to his teaching in its earliest oral manifestations. The conduct of priests and the duty of obedience owed to them by the laity are matters of concern to Honorius, and they recur in the fifteenth-century English versions.

  PublisherDOI

• Nightmares : short horror film

  Cardinal Scholar (Ball State University) · 2018-05-01

  dissertationOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Horror films are often recognized as the easiest way to break into the film industry, as they are
\nrelatively cheap to make, however, creating a horror movie with a well thought out and thought
\nprovoking story line is difficult. I have always been a fan of the horror movies that make me
\nthink, that reflect ideas that are truly terrifying: isolation, loneliness, guilt, madness. In this script
\nI explore the aftermath of losing someone to suicide, the complications of mental illness, and the
\nemotions that pass through someone who doesn't quite know how to mourn. I also created a
\nprototype movie poster, concept art, and other preproduction documents could be utilized if this
\nfilm were to be produced in the future.

  Publisher

• <scp>A</scp> rundel, <scp>T</scp> homas

  The Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature in Britain · 2017-06-29

  other1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract Thomas Arundel was one of the most important political and religious figures of the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries, occupying the positions of Archbishop of Canterbury and Chancellor of England under both Richard II and Henry IV. His political activities saw him take a leading role in the reforming parliaments of 1386 and 1388, yet he managed to retain the favour of Richard II throughout most of the 1390s. Having finally lost Richard's favour, along with the positions of Archbishop and Chancellor, he was exiled and allied himself with Henry Bolingbroke's cause, being instrumental in the deposition of Richard II and the coronation of Bolingbroke as Henry IV. Alongside his political acticities, Arundel was also actively engaged in the fight against the Lollard heresy. His Constitutions represent a significant contribution to England's antiheresy legislation, although the suppression of the Lollards was not their only concern.

  PublisherDOI

• Corinth Excavations Archaeological Manual

  The Digital Press at the University of North Dakota eBooks · 2017-01-01 · 5 citations

  bookOpen access

  “The publication of the Corinth Excavation Manual offers us a unique view into real-life archaeological practice on one of the most important Classical sites in the Mediterranean.” Adam Rabinowitz, Associate Professor and Assistant Director, Institute of Classical Archaeology, University of Texas, Austin The Corinth Excavations Archaeological Manual is the first major field manual published from an American excavation in Greece and among a very small number of manuals published from the Eastern Mediterranean in the last generation. The appearance of this book is timely, however, as there is a growing interest in field methods and the history of excavation practices throughout the discipline of archaeology. Moreover, Corinth Excavations has long held a special place in American archaeology in Greece as the primary training excavation for graduate students associated with the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. As a result, the field manual has had a particular influence among American excavators and projects in Greece, among Mediterranean archaeologists, and in archaeology classrooms. Published as a technical field manual, an archival document, and a key statement of practice from a major excavation, the Corinth Excavations Archaeological Manual presents a guide for daily procedures at the Corinth Excavations, a complete record of documentation forms used in the field, and a practical glimpse into the functioning of a complex, major, project. The manual is a landmark text appropriate for the university student, the scholar of methodology, and the working field archaeologist. “The Corinth manual has grown over the years into a comprehensive and authoritative guide to open-area, stratigraphic excavation, covering everything from excavation of pits, wells, and robbing trenches to the removal of deposits to inventorying objects in the museum. ” David Pettegrew, Associate Professor, Messiah College and author of The Isthmus of Corinth (2016). All of the authors have worked on the excavations at Corinth in various capacities. This manual was developed under the directorship of Dr. Guy Sanders by former field directors Alicia Carter Johnson and Dr. Sarah James. Additional contributions come from past and present Corinth staff including assistant director Dr. Ioulia Tzonou-Herbst, architect James Herbst, conservator Nicol Anastasatou, and archaeologist Katerina Ragkou. The authors would also like to recognize the contributions of the many students from the American School of Classical Studies at Athens who offered valuable feedback on earlier versions of this manual over the past 10 years.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• To Argos: Archaeological Survey in the Western Argolid, 2014-2016

  Humanities Commons CORE (Modern Language Association / Columbia University) · 2017-01-01 · 4 citations

  articleOpen access

  The Western Argolid Regional Project (WARP) completed three seasons of intensive pedestrian survey from 2014 to 2016. Conducted under the auspices of the Canadian Institute in Greece (CIG) and the Ephorate of Antiquities of the Argolid, WARP is an interdisciplinary project focused around the upper valleys of the Inachos River to the north and west of Argos. The project aims to address a lacuna in our knowledge of the northeastern Peloponnese since, despite over a century of excavation and survey in the Argolid, little is known about the relationship between Argos and its countryside.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Book Review of Industrial Religion: The Saucer Pyres of the Athenian Agora, by Susan I. Rotroff

  American Journal of Archaeology · 2016-09-19

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Dimitri Nakassis

  4 shared

• William Caraher

  4 shared

• Steven J. Friesen

  2 shared

• A. S. G. Edwards

  2 shared

• Daniel Schowalter

  2 shared

• Scott Gallimore

  2 shared

• Guy D. R. Sanders

  2 shared

• Julia Boffey

  2 shared

Education

• PhD, Classics

  The University of Texas at Austin

  2010

• MA, Art History

  University of Toronto

  2003

• BA, Anthropology

  University of Toronto

  2001