Taught courses

You will take several courses across two semesters of teaching, including a compulsory course and a range of optional courses.

Core courses

There is one required training course in classical research methods and skills that runs across the two teaching semesters (20 credits). This course is specially designed for classicists and aims to introduce you to areas of the discipline beyond your own specialities and to help you with the practical skills of finding and presenting information; it also equips you with the independent skills you need to complete your dissertation.

Course name	Credits
Skills and Methods in Classics	20

Optional courses

Students will choose five courses from a list of options, subject to availability. Greek and Latin language courses will be offered every year, as will a number of Latin and Greek text seminars and core Ancient History and Classical Archaeology courses. Please note: at least three of your option courses must be on specific classics topics.

You will choose a further 100 credits from a wide selection of optional courses, subject to availability.

Option Courses 2025-2026

* * Please note that the list of courses below is provisional and subject to change.

Choose three courses from the list below:

Course name	Credits
Advanced Ancient Greek (PG) 1	20
Advanced Ancient Greek (PG) 2	20
Elementary Ancient Greek (PG) 1	20
Elementary Ancient Greek (PG) 2	20
Advanced Latin (PG) 1	20
Advanced Latin (PG) 2	20
Elementary Latin (PG) 1	20
Elementary Latin (PG) 2	20
A Topic in Late Antique and Byzantine History 1	20
Archaeological Illustration	20
Archaeomaterials Analysis	20
Bronze Age Civilisations of the Near East and Greece	20
Conflict archaeology: materialities of violence	20
Epicurus and Epicureanism	20
GIS and Spatial Analysis for Archaeologists	20
Greek Text Seminar 1	20
Heritage Studies and the Archaeology of the Contemporary World: Investigating How the Past Shapes the Present	20
Jewish Texts through the Ages	20
Judaea under Roman Rule	20
Popular unrest, revolts, and rebellions in the Byzantine world	20
Roman Archaeology	20
Space, Place and Time: the archaeology of built environments	20
The Archaeology of Children and Childhood	20
The Athenian Akropolis	20
The Hellenistic City	20
The Hittites: The Archaeology of an Ancient Near Eastern Civilisation	20
The Latin Manuscript: Palaeography, Codicology, Textual Criticism	20

Choose up to two courses from the list below:

Course name	Credits
Advanced Ancient Greek (PG) 1	20
Advanced Ancient Greek (PG) 2	20
Elementary Ancient Greek (PG) 1	20
Elementary Ancient Greek (PG) 2	20
Advanced Latin (PG) 1	20
Advanced Latin (PG) 2	20
Elementary Latin (PG) 1	20
Elementary Latin (PG) 2	20
A Topic in Late Antique and Byzantine History 1	20
Archaeological Illustration	20
Archaeomaterials Analysis	20
Bronze Age Civilisations of the Near East and Greece	20
Centre, Province and Periphery in the Age of Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos: Byzantium and its Neighbours in the Tenth	20
Conflict archaeology: materialities of violence	20
Data Science for the Past: Statistical Thinking & Visualization	20
Epicurus and Epicureanism	20
Greek Text Seminar 1	20
Heritage Studies and the Archaeology of the Contemporary World: Investigating How the Past Shapes the Present	20
Jewish Texts through the Ages	20
Judaea under Roman Rule	20
Popular unrest, revolts, and rebellions in the Byzantine world	20
Roman Archaeology	20
Space, Place and Time: the archaeology of built environments	20
The Archaeology of Children and Childhood	20
The Athenian Akropolis	20
The Hellenistic City	20
The Hittites: The Archaeology of an Ancient Near Eastern Civilisation	20
The Latin Manuscript: Palaeography, Codicology, Textual Criticism	20
The Neo-Hittite Kingdoms: A World between Empires	20

Choose up to one courses from the Level 10 Classics Language Courses list below:

Course name	Credits
Early Greek Philosophy	20
Greek Tragedy	20
Homer	20
Latin Tragedy: Medea on the Roman Stage	20
Lucretius. 'De rerum natura'	20

Choose up to one courses from the Level 10 Classics Language Courses list below:

Course name	Credits
Seafaring and Society in the Ancient Greek World (Online)	20
The Jewish Diaspora in the Roman Empire (Online)	20

Priority for Level 10 courses goes to undergraduate students.

Courses for those studying from September 2026 will be available from April 2026.

Elementary Greek (PG) 1

Elementary Greek (PG) 2

Intermediate Greek (PG) 1

Intermediate Greek (PG) 2

Elementary Latin (PG) 1

Elementary Latin (PG) 2

Intermediate Latin (PG) 1

Intermediate Latin (PG) 2

A Topic in Late Antique and Byzantine History 1

Ancient Philosophy Seminar I

Ancient Superpowers: The Armies and Military Monuments of Rome and Persia

Apocalypse: The Book of Revelation in History and Culture (PG)

Archaeological Illustration

Bronze Age Civilisations of the Near East and Greece

Conceptualising the Neolithic

Conflict archaeology: materialities of violence

Constantinople: The History of a Medieval Megalopolis from Constantine the Great to Suleyman the Magnificent

Greek Palaeography & Manuscript Culture

Greek Philosophy (Plato's Republic)

Greek Text Seminar 3

Hellenistic Art and Archaeology

Issues in Egyptian Archaeology: the Second Intermediate Period until the end of the Late Period (1650-332 BC)

Latin Text Seminar 1

Religion and War in Archaic and Classical Greece

Scottish Latin Literature

The Archaeology of Children and Childhood

The Art and Archaeology of Sparta and Laconia

The Hellenistic City

The Hittites: The Archaeology of an Ancient Near Eastern Civilisation

The Jewish Diaspora under the Roman Empire

Urban Labour in Classical Attica

Women, Writing, Greece: From Sappho to Virginia Woolf and Beyond

Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy ^

Greek Pastoral Poetry ^

Latin Epic ^

Latin Satire ^

Plato's Republic ^

Herod the Great and the End of Hellenism (online) *

The Athenian Akropolis (online) *

^ A maximum of one Level 10 course can be chosen. Priority for Level 10 courses goes to undergraduate students.

*A maximum of one online course can be chosen.

Elementary Greek (PG) 1

Elementary Latin (PG) 1

Elementary Greek (PG) 2

Elementary Latin (PG) 2

Intermediate Greek (PG) 1

Intermediate Latin (PG) 1

Intermediate Greek (PG) 2

Intermediate Latin (PG) 2

A Topic in Late Antique and Byzantine History 1

A Topic in Late Antique and Byzantine History 2

Apocalypse: The Book of Revelation in History and Culture (PG)

Archaeological Illustration

Archaeology of Late Antique Religion

Bronze Age Civilisations of the Near East and Greece

Classical Greek Sculpture

Conflict archaeology: materialities of violence

Debating Marriage between Antiquity and the Middle Ages

Dispute Resolution in the Roman Empire

Egypt under the Ptolemies

Greek Philosophy (Plato's Republic)

Greek Text Seminar 2

Handling Greek Pottery

Honour in Ancient Greece

Human Evolution

Issues in Egyptian Archaeology: the Second Intermediate Period until the end of the Late Period (1650-332 BC)

Latin Text Seminar 2

Space, Place and Time: the archaeology of built environments

The Archaeology of Children and Childhood

The Hittites: The Archaeology of an Ancient Near Eastern Civilisation

The Latin Manuscript: Palaeography, Codicology, Textual Criticism

The Maccabaean Revolt

Early Greek Philosophy ^

Greek Literature of the Roman Empire ^

Greek Tragedy ^

Later Latin Poetry ^

Latin Poets From North of the Po ^

Lucretius, 'De rerum natura' ^

Lyric ^

Seneca the Younger ^

The Latin Manuscript: Palaeography, Codicology, Textual Criticism ^

Honour in Ancient Greece (Online) *

Roman Egypt (Online) *

Sparta and Crete: Classical Greek Society Beyond Athens (Online) *

^ A maximum of one Level 10 course can be chosen. Priority for Level 10 courses goes to undergraduate students.

*A maximum of one online course can be chosen.

Teaching and assessment

Teaching takes place in small groups with most courses taught via weekly seminars. The majority of the 20-credit courses are assessed by single pieces of coursework, usually essays of 4-5000 words, while the language courses are assessed by weekly exercises and a final exam.

Further information

You can see more details about the 2025/26 programme structure on the Degree Programme Table for the MSc in Classics. We expect the 2026/27 programme structure to be available from May 2026.

This article was published on 2024-08-01