Our first major publication is an edited volume of specially commissioned chapters, entitled Visualising War: Interplay between Battle Narratives across Antiquity (eds. A. König and N. Wiater). Reflecting the two main elements of our project, this volume (a) provides critical, up-to-date discussions of key methodological issues relating to the study of narrative interplay and the evolution of cultural discourses, and (b) examines instances of narrative interaction between representations of battle in all sorts of genres and media from the 9th century BCE to the 6th century CE. Ranging across Greek, Roman, Jewish, early Christian and ancient Near Eastern material, the volume illuminates gaps in interaction as well as connections and dialogue. Above all, it examines the far-reaching impact of battle narratives from different periods and places, in particular the ways in which they have helped to canonise certain ideals/ideals about war and military behaviours.

Dr Alice König is currently editing an innovative, multi-media publication to build on the successful Visualising War podcast. Its goals are threefold: (1) to deepen understanding of how different media have shaped our habits of visualising war in the past and how they might continue to do so in the future; (2) to encourage those who study conflict, security and peace-building to pay more attention to narratives of war as having critical influences on how war and peace are viewed and pursued; and (3) to promote more dialogue between different kinds of experts, academic and non-academic, by bringing together insights from both theory and practice. Each chapter focuses on a case study from a different medium (e.g. the visual arts, theatre, music, conflict photography), with practitioners (i.e. novelists, composers, theatre-makers, museum curators, etc) discussing their practice alongside scholarly analysis of wider trends in their medium. This expert input from practitioners with direct experience of representing war in their respective fields will significantly enhance our wider discussion and understanding of how war stories work and what they do to us. Academic input will broaden each chapter’s reflections, contextualising individual case studies and drawing connections between the dynamics of different media.

Project members are also engaged in separate research and publication projects of their own which feed into the Visualising War research project.