Dr Joe Grimwade

Research groups

Research interests

• Oratory and rhetoric.
• Memory in the ancient world.
• Ancient slavery.
• Communicative approaches to ancient languages.
• Cicero.

Current research

Joe is currently working on a monograph on the theory and practice of memory in rhetorical education, oratorical performance, and philosophical discourse in Ancient Greece and Rome.

His research demonstrates that instead of treating ostensibly esoteric mnemonic techniques as clever tricks confined to the declamatory schoolroom, we should understand the art of memory as inherently performative: mnemonic techniques allowed speakers (orators, rhetoricians, even certain philosophers) to free themselves from a script and to improvise.

He is also considering the nature and importance of mnemonic ability for non-elite specialists, such as the Roman nomenclator, a role typically performed by enslaved individuals, who were nonetheless skilled in memory, social diplomacy, and information management.

Separately, Joe has recently conducted a survey of medieval Latin legal texts from Huntingdonshire and Cambridgeshire in order to examine the discourse surrounding the introduction and management of watermills. The survey, undertaken alongside landscape historians, highlights the impact of watermills on the land around rivers such as the Great Ouse, and the ways in which local communities responded to the disputes and tensions that arose as a consequence of changing land use.