Tuesday 20 October 2026, 4pm
Seminar Room 63, Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities
All welcome
The ancient Greek practice of consulting oracles looms large in popular imaginations of the Greek world, especially in the Archaic and Classical periods (ca. 650-323 BCE). It was at Delphi that Oedipus first learned of his terrible future, Croesus discovered that ‘a great empire would be destroyed’ (unfortunately not the one he expected), and Socrates was told that he was the wisest of all men. Yet Delphi was only one of many oracular sanctuaries in the ancient Mediterranean, and oracles continued to thrive long after the Greek world was subordinated to Roman power.
This talk will examine one of the best attested of these oracular sanctuaries, the sanctuary of Apollo at Klaros in western Asia Minor, in the first and second centuries CE. The evidence of inscriptions, archaeology, literature, and coinage paint a vivid picture of a sanctuary mediating between human and divine, cities and their peers, provincial communities and Roman imperial power. How did the process of oracular consultation at Klaros work? Who consulted at Klaros, on what questions, and why? How did the sanctuary staff navigate the potential conflicts between oracular authority and Roman power?
Tom Gavin is Stipendiary Lecturer in Ancient History at Oriel and Jesus Colleges. His research focuses on the civic life and political institutions of Greek cities (also known as poleis) in the Roman imperial period, and how these cities interacted with each other and external authorities. He is currently preparing his first book for publication (The Politics of Homonoia: Concord and Political Culture in Roman Asia Minor) on the discourses and realities of cooperation between cities under Roman rule.
Divination, Oracles, and Omens Network
