First, a disclaimer. This is not the web site of Steve Tuck from Pot-TV, nor the Steve Tuck who sells flocks of pink flamingoes on the web, not even the Steve Tuck in the gay porn biz. I am Dr. Steven L. Tuck, classical archaeologist and college professor. If you want to hit the back button on the browser now, I’ll understand. I’ve been told that these introductions to web pages are supposed to be a balance between the personal and professional so here goes.

On to the personal. No admissions of childhood trauma, phobias or descriptions of my lint collection. In fact, the most personal item on here is my confession to being rather a doting father and attached to my work. I don’t even have any pets, so you won’t see any pictures of them on here; sorry about that. However, I have an 8 year old child, Emily, who recognizes Munch’s The Scream, knows that the Normans defeated the Saxons at the Battle of Hastings and is still deciding between being a pirate or a pumpkin farmer when she grows up. Let’s move on to the professional.

I received my B.A. in History and Classics from Indiana University and my Ph.D. in Classical Art and Archaeology from the University of Michigan. A term as the Arthur and Joyce Gordon Fellow in Latin Epigraphy at Ohio State University completed my formal training as well as my association with Big Ten institutions. I currently hold a position as Assistant Professor in the department of Classics, Miami University.  What follows is a more detailed description of my professional work. Still time to hit that back button.

            My graduate training was deliberately interdisciplinary so that in my scholarly work I focus on material culture, specifically sculpture and architecture, supported by literary, documentary and numismatic sources. My current and ongoing work falls into three categories.

            The first category of research concerns the public architecture and sculpture of imperial Rome. I published an article in the Journal of Roman Archaeology offering a solution to a long-standing problem in Roman architecture. I have three more article length studies planned on topics from the city of Rome addressing audience reactions to public sculpture and the placement, form and date of the Temple of Augustus.

            My dissertation and studies arising out of it constitute a second field of study. My dissertation was a systematic, comparative analysis of the monumentalization of Roman imperial harbors.  In it I demonstrated that these public spaces, elaborately decorated with temples, arches, statues, and other structures, served as a visual presentation of Roman authority replicated to all who entered Roman territory from the sea.  I concluded that an aesthetic of monumentalization, similar to that of imperial fora, existed in harbors across the Mediterranean and that emperors deliberately exploited harbors as components of their propaganda programs. My dissertation has informed additional work on imperial propaganda, the imperial cult and the ideology of rule. This continues to be an active area of interest.

The third category of work is epigraphical. I have completed a manuscript, A Corpus of Latin Inscriptions in the Kelsey Museum, publishing 400 Latin inscriptions.  This monograph, which I expect to be published by the University of Michigan Press, will present all of the Latin inscriptions in the Kelsey Museum for the first time.  In addition I have been engaged in other epigraphical projects including a number of projects on the Roman Imperial Navy.  My work on the navy builds from my time as Arthur and Joyce Gordon Fellow in Latin Epigraphy at the Center for Epigraphical Studies, Ohio State University.  In my studies of the navy I have attempted to analyze the epigraphical and historical evidence for personnel policies in the navy to argue that this branch of the Roman military service was the focus for yet another deliberate measure of “Romanization” pursued by imperial authorities.  Are you still here? Don’t tell the others, but you were always our favorite.