Dr Timothy Smith

My research focuses on three aspects of the ancient world: popular participation in politics in Rome; how popular processes were used and abused by authoritarian regimes; and the consequences of war and violence. I am working on two books: the first on the aedileship in Rome; the second on survivors of war in the Roman world. I also have a few side projects on literary translation: I have published on Dante and Seamus Heaney’s reception of Italian poetry, and I am working on translating an extensive collection of selected poems by the Italian poet Claudio Pasi.

Roman Republic, Roman Empire, Roman Historiography, Elections

I teach all topics on Roman history and on Cicero.

Full Publications: Dr Tim Smith Publications 2026

Selected Publications:

Antoniou, A. A., Webb, K., and Smith, T. (eds) (2026) The Roman Censorship: Perceptions and Realities (Berlin).

Smith, T. (2026) ‘Performing the Censorship in the Early Principate’, in A. Antoniou, K. Webb, and T. Smith (eds) The Roman Censorship: Perceptions and Realities (Berlin), 376–404.

– (2025) ‘Reluctant Candidates and Spontaneous Elections in Republican Rome’, Classical Antiquity 44.2, 315–51.

– (2025) ‘Election promises in Rome’, in E. Zampieri (ed.) In ambitione artifices: Electioneering and Elections in the Roman Republic (Sevilla), 71–90.

– (2024) ‘Sulla and Electoral Authoritarianism’, Phoenix 78.3–4, 87–114.

– (2024) ‘Authoritarian elections in imperial Rome’, Omnibus 88, 1–3.

– (2024) ‘Where’s Vestorius? Locating Rome’s Aediles’, in A. López García (ed.) Running the Empire: The Places of Roman Governance (London), 99–119.

– (2023) ‘State Terrorism in the Late Roman Republic’, in G. Wrightson (ed.) Terrorism through the Ages (Leiden and Boston), 72–83.

– (2021) ‘Elections in the Time of Cinna’, Historia 70.1, 29–54.