Peter Sidney Derow (11 April 1944 – 9 December 2006) was Hody

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and Tutor in

Ancient History Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history to as far as late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient history cove ...

Wadham College, Oxford Wadham College () is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It is located in the centre of Oxford, at the intersection of Broad Street and Parks Road. Wadham College was founded in 1610 by Dorothy W ...

and University Lecturer in

from 1977 to 2006. As a scholar he was most noted for his work on

Hellenistic In Classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Mediterranean history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the emergence of the Roman Empire, as signified by the Battle of Actium in ...

and

Roman Republic The Roman Republic ( la, Res publica Romana ) was a form of government of Rome and the era of the classical Roman civilization when it was run through public representation of the Roman people. Beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Kin ...

an history and

epigraphy Epigraphy () is the study of inscriptions, or epigraphs, as writing; it is the science of identifying graphemes, clarifying their meanings, classifying their uses according to dates and cultural contexts, and drawing conclusions about the wr ...

, particularly on the histories of

Polybius Polybius (; grc-gre, Πολύβιος, ; ) was a Greek historian of the Hellenistic period. He is noted for his work , which covered the period of 264–146 BC and the Punic Wars in detail. Polybius is important for his analysis of the mixed ...

Biography

Born in Newport,

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, Derow obtained his secondary education at

The Roxbury Latin School The Roxbury Latin School is a private boys' day school that was founded in 1645 in the town of Roxbury, Massachusetts, Roxbury (now a neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts) by the Rev. John Eliot (missionary), John Eliot under a charter rec ...

in West Roxbury, Massachusetts. After an

A.B. Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four yea ...

degree at Amherst (with Peter K. Marshall), he read for Greats as a second B.A. degree at

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in 1965–1967, achieving a First. At Oxford he was taught by, among others, W. G. (George) Forrest, who was a lasting influence. He completed a Ph.D. at

Princeton Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ni ...

on 'Rome and the Greek world from the earliest contacts to the end of the first Illyrian war', for which Professor J. V. A. Fine was his Advisor; in the preface to that work, he acknowledges the additional inspiration he had drawn from T. J. Luce and the historian and epigrapher C. Bradford Welles. After a spell of teaching at

the University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...

, he returned to succeed Forrest at Wadham in 1977 when the latter was elected to the

Wykeham Professor The University of Oxford has three statutory professorships named after William of Wykeham, who founded New College. Logic The Wykeham Professorship in Logic was established in 1859, although it was not known as the Wykeham chair until later. I ...

ship of Ancient History at New College. In 2002–2005 Derow was also Director of

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in ancient history for the Oxford Faculty of Classics. He was a contributor to the ''

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'' in matters relating to the

world and the Roman republic, and wrote the chapter on ‘

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

, the fall of

Macedon Macedonia (; grc-gre, Μακεδονία), also called Macedon (), was an ancient kingdom on the periphery of Archaic and Classical Greece, and later the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. The kingdom was founded and initially ruled by ...

and the sack of

Corinth Corinth ( ; el, Κόρινθος, Kórinthos, ) is the successor to an ancient city, and is a former municipality in Corinthia, Peloponnese, which is located in south-central Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform, it has been part o ...

’ for the 2nd edition of the ''Cambridge Ancient History'' (volume 8; 1989). In this chapter, he expounded his view of Roman imperialism in the

Greek East Greek East and Latin West are terms used to distinguish between the two parts of the Greco-Roman world and of Medieval Christendom, specifically the eastern regions where Greek was the ''lingua franca'' (Greece, Anatolia, the southern Balkans, the ...

as harsh, a view he had earlier proposed in an article on Polybius and Roman imperialism; a more accessible version of these views can be found in his chapter in the Blackwell Companion to the Hellenistic world. These (and other papers) represent a sustained argument about the impact of Rome on the Hellenistic world, contesting the previously accepted views of

Maurice Holleaux Maurice Holleaux (15 April 1861 – 21 September 1932) was a 19th–20th-century French historian, archaeologist and epigrapher, a specialist of Ancient Greece. Biography Années de formation Admitted in the École normale supérieure in 18 ...

on the nature of Roman expansion and of Polybius' narrative of it. Later he co-edited (with Robert Parker) a memorial volume for George Forrest, ''

Herodotus Herodotus ( ; grc, , }; BC) was an ancient Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus, part of the Persian Empire (now Bodrum, Turkey) and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria ( Italy). He is known f ...

and his World'' (

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, 2003). Many of his papers were published posthumously as ''Rome, Polybius, and the East'', edited by Andrew Erskine and Josephine Crawley Quinn. Probably his most accessible work is a volume of translated sources for Hellenistic history, co-edited with Roger S. Bagnall. First issued in 1981 as ''Greek Historical Documents: The Hellenistic Period'' (Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press), it was somewhat overshadowed by M. M. Austin’s comparable (and excellent) collection of sources, ''The Hellenistic World from

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to the Roman Conquest'' (

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, 1980). But ‘Bagnall & Derow’ had a distinctive tone, with its greater emphasis on inscriptions and

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texts, and it found favour with many students and teachers who used the two volumes together. Long unavailable, it was reissued (and updated) in a second edition in 2004, as ''The Hellenistic Period: Historical Sources in Translation'' (Oxford: Blackwell). It was typical of Derow to combine scholarly research with a passion for communicating his learning to the widest audience. Derow was a strong supporter of the campaign to return the Parthenon (Elgin) marbles to

Athens Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates ...

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and was one of the original members of the

Marbles Reunited Marbles Reunited: Friends of the British Committee for the Reunification of the Parthenon Marbles is a campaign group, governed by charter and funded by donations from members and supporters, which lobbies and raises awareness about the case for th ...

campaign. Derow died unexpectedly on 9 December 2006 in

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from a

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, after collapsing in Wadham College. His funeral, attended by a great many colleagues and former students, was held in Wadham College Chapel on 16 December 2006, followed by a memorial service in the Sheldonian Theatre on 28 April 2007. A conference devoted to his memory, entitled 'Rome and the Mediterranean', was held at Wadham College from 2 to 4 April 2009.

Selected works

* ''Rome, Polybius and the East'', edited by A. Erskine and J. Crawley Quinn (Oxford: OUP, 2015) * "The Arrival of Rome: From the Illyrian Wars to the Fall of Macedon", in A. Erskine (ed.), ''A Companion to the Hellenistic World'' (Oxford: Blackwell, 2003), pp. 51–70. * (with R.S. Bagnall) ''Greek Historical Documents. The Hellenistic Period'' (Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1981). * (with R.S. Bagnall) ''The Hellenistic Period. Historical Sources in Translation'' (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004). * (ed. with R. C. T. Parker) ''Herodotus and His World: Essays from a Conference in Memory of George Forrest'' (Oxford: OUP, 2003). * "Herodotus Readings", ''Classics Ireland'', Vol. 2 (1995), pp. 29–51. * "Historical Explanation: Polybius and His Predecessors", in S. Hornblower (ed.), ''Greek Historiography'' (New York: OUP, 1994), pp. 73–90. * (with W.G. Forrest) "An inscription from Chios", ''Annual of the British School at Athens'', Vol. 77 (1982), pp. 79–92. * "Kleemporos", ''

Phoenix Phoenix most often refers to: * Phoenix (mythology), a legendary bird from ancient Greek folklore * Phoenix, Arizona, a city in the United States Phoenix may also refer to: Mythology Greek mythological figures * Phoenix (son of Amyntor), a ...

'', Vol. 27 (1973), pp. 118–134. * "A New Inscription from Chios", in G. E. Malouchou and A. P. Matthaiou (eds.), Χιακον Συμποσιον. Εις μνημην W. G. Forrest (Athens, 2006), pp. 95–102. * "Perseus", in S. Hornblower and A. J. Spawforth (eds.), ''Oxford Classical Dictionary'', 3rd ed. (Oxford: OUP, 1996), pp. 1143–1144. * "Pharos and Rome", ''Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik'', Vol. 88 (1991), pp. 261–270. * "Philip V", in S. Hornblower and A. J. Spawforth (eds.), ''Oxford Classical Dictionary'', 3rd ed. (Oxford: OUP, 1996), p. 1162. * "Polybios and the Embassy of Callicrates", ''Essays Presented to C. M. Bowra'' (Oxford: Alden Press, for Wadham College Junior and Middle Common Rooms, 1970), pp. 12–23. * "Polybius", in T. J. Luce (ed.), ''Ancient Writers: Greece and Rome'', Vol. 1 (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1982), pp. 525–539. * "Polybius", in S. Hornblower and A. J. Spawforth (eds.), ''Oxford Classical Dictionary'', 3rd ed. (Oxford: OUP, 1996), pp. 1209–1211. * "Polybius, Rome, and the East", ''Journal of Roman Studies'', Vol. 69 (1979), pp. 1–15. * "Pyrrhus", in S. Hornblower and A. J. Spawforth (eds.), ''Oxford Classical Dictionary'', 3rd ed. (Oxford: OUP, 1996), p. 1283. * (with J.T. Ma and A. Meadows) "RC 38 (Amyzon) reconsidered", ''Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik'', Vol. 109 (1995), pp. 71–80.http://www.uni-koeln.de/phil-fak/ifa/zpe/downloads/1995/109pdf/109071.pdf * "The Roman Calendar, 190–168 B.C.", ''Phoenix'', Vol. 27 (1973), pp. 345–356. * "The Roman Calendar, 218–191 B.C.", ''Phoenix'', Vol. 30 (1976), pp. 265–281. * "Rome, the Fall of Macedon, and the Sack of Corinth", ''Cambridge Ancient History'', 2nd edition, vol. 8 (Cambridge, 1989), pp. 290–323.

References

External links

A memorial page at Wadham College website; includes Funeral Address, by Stephen Heyworth

An obituary in The Independent, 21 December. 2006 (by Thomas Harrison)

* ttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article1356249.ece An obituary in The Times, 9 February. 2007
Obituary notice at the Elginism website

{{DEFAULTSORT:Derow, Peter Amherst College alumni Princeton University alumni Alumni of the University of Oxford Fellows of New College, Oxford Fellows of Wadham College, Oxford 1944 births 2006 deaths Roxbury Latin School alumni