http://hdl.handle.net/2451/34768 2026-04-12T08:59:20Z http://hdl.handle.net/2451/69538 Title: Agoranomika, the Ancient Greek Trading Game: Basic Instructions Authors: Ratzan, David Martyn Abstract: This document is a condensed version of the basic instructions for playing Agoranomika, primarily intended for teachers interested playing a version of this game in their own classrooms. For a full discussion of the theory and aims of this game, the phases of play, teacher strategies for guiding play, illustrations, and references, please see: David M. Ratzan, “Agoranomika: Playful approaches to teaching the serious economic and institutional history of measurement in the ancient Greek world.” In: Gabriel Mckee and Daniela Wolin, eds. 2022. Re-Rolling the Past: Representations and Reinterpretations of Antiquity in Analog and Digital Games. ISAW Papers 22.7. URI: https://hdl.handle.net/2333.1/3n5tbf7b. This paper describes the game Agoranomika, which is designed to help students learn some of the basic challenges associated with measuring, buying, and selling goods in the ancient Greek world. By inhabiting and working through some of the structural problems and costs associated with measurement in this interactive, strategic setting, students not only learn substantive lessons (e.g., what it takes to erect and maintain standardized measures; the economic role money plays as often the only pre-measured, commodified good in an ancient Greek market; or the relationship of standardized qualities to quantities), but also how to deploy their own lived experience creatively, critically, and responsibly in the analysis of ancient primary evidence. They also begin to appreciate the embeddedness of any social activity, since they must erect “market” norms for themselves in the classroom laboratory, thus leaving them more attuned to the importance of personal ethics and social norms in ancient society, rules which, unlike laws, often leave few explicit traces in our documentary or archaeological record. There is an introduction to the pedagogical history and theory of "serious" games, or educational, game-based simulations, with specific reference to ancient studies, followed by an Appendix, in which the game is fully described, including set-up, rules, phases of play, and possible follow-up discussions of primary texts and artifacts that relate directly to the establishment, negotiation, use, policing, and politics of measurement in Greek markets like the Athenian Agora. The author and editors have also provided a printable short version of the Appendix for those who wish to try this game in their own classrooms. 2023-09-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/2451/63578 Title: Ratzan on Bannon, A Casebook on Roman Water Law Authors: Ratzan, David Martyn Abstract: Book review of Cynthia Jordan Bannon, A Casebook on Roman Water Law. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2020. Pp. 262. ISBN 978-0-472-03786-5. 2021-12-20T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/2451/61725 Title: Teaching Information Literacy in the Digital Ancient Mediterranean Classroom Authors: Ratzan, David Martyn Abstract: This chapter argues that designing activities and paper topics with information literacy in mind can help to lay a foundation for critical engagement with digital approaches as well as to adumbrate for a non-specialist, undergraduate audience the distinctive challenges, pleasures, and intellectual value of studying the ancient world. This chapter contains a review of the recent shift in the theory and practice of information literacy in the United States and the description of specific projects I have assigned in class that include an information literacy objective. 2020-04-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/2451/61541 Title: De poculo Caesareo Authors: Ratzan, David Martyn; Ratzan, Richard Martyn Abstract: English translation and commentary on De poculo Caesareo, a short encomiastic poem honoring Charles V by Gaspar Brusch, first published In divorum Caroli V. Romanoru(m) et Germaniae Imperatoris victoriosissimi et Ferdinandi regis Ro. Bohemiae etc. Hungariae Augustissimi, Archiducu(m) Austriae etc. fratrum: honorem et laude(m), Schediasmata quaedam fatidica. Carmine Elegiaco scripta à Gaspare Bruschio poeta Laureato ..., (printed in 1548 in Augsburg; Munich BSB: Res/Asc. 802). 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z