For this lecture, Associate Professor at Florida State University James Sickinger will discuss finds related to the Athenian practice of ostracism uncovered in excavations in and around the Athenian Agora over the last decade. These finds include possible evidence for the specific place in which votes of ostracism were conducted as well as dozens of inscribed sherds naming candidates from the 480s BC. In addition to their historical implications, the lecture will also address how the recently-discovered ostraka compare to previous finds from the Agora and Kerameikos and what light they shed on Athenian writing and literacy in the early fifth century BC