Est. MMXVI
Soon after this, I met with the then Senior Curator of the Nicholson Museum at the University of Sydney, Australia (now the CCW Museum), Michael Turner, to give me a tour of the collections and to guide me through the LEGO Pompeii model that he commissioned as a teaching aid for visiting school groups. This inspired me so much because it made me see a more serious use of LEGO with teaching classical history. So, I knew I wanted to create a minifigure portrait for Michael. But this was not as easy as the Tom minifigure since Tom's was a happy accident whereas this time I had to consider artistically what the perfect criteria for making a minifigure portrait of a real person were so that the result looks like the subject while simultaneously looking like an official LEGO toy that you would see in a store. It was through this process that I came up with the BCE Manifesto that I still use to this day to keep all the minifigures consistent. Michael loved his figure and again it went viral across academic circles, and so, with this second portrait, I had begun to build an empire of LEGO minifigures and the classicists who liked them.
In early 2017, in the lead up to the anniversary of that first LEGO figure of Tom, during conversations I had with Department Head Assoc. Prof. Ian Plant, the two of us decided it would be a nice idea to have a celebratory afternoon tea at their museum and to invite academics to come and engage with history through LEGO. Through those conversions, we played around with some names for the event and International LEGO Classicism Day was mentioned as a kind of ironic joke (because it sounded so comically grandiose) and at the time I thought “Oh, imagine if that caught on!”. It did, as again on social media, word reached some academics and LEGO communities around the world and they shared links to LEGO models they found relating to ancient history.
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​Among the academics who were invited and came to the tea party we organised in the museum, was Emeritus Prof. Judge, the founder of the Department and museum. Edwin found the idea of using LEGO to engage with history intriguing and I, of course, gave him a LEGO portrait of himself, too, which seemed to delight him.
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In conversation with my manager one day, we were discussing how intresting it was that LEGO was engaging with such serious academics. I said, “Imagine if there was a real LEGO theme set called LEGO Classicists” and after laughing at such a funny, unlikely juxtaposition, we both said “That’s what this needs to be called”. And so LEGO Classicists' name was officially born (of course this got changed later to Brick Classicists Empire, BCE, as a better pun).
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Since then, International LEGO Classicism Day has grown to a point I could have never have imagined, with ancient history and classics departments, classical societies and museums, academics and students all over the world getting involved every year, and renowned international classicists throughout the world proudly turned into LEGO figures. These include the University of Cambridge, the University of Warwick, the University of Sydney, the British School at Athens, the British Museum, Teece Museum, the Acropolis Museum, and academics of BBC fame Prof. Dame Mary Beard and Prof. Michael Scott. The project owes all of this success to its humble and comical beginnings at Macquarie University’s Department of Ancient History and its underpinning philosophy that ancient history should be relatable, engaging and available to everyone.
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For the rest of that year, in my spare time I started creating more minifigures of my colleagues and academic friends at Macquarie University Department of Ancient History (at this time one of the largest Classics departments in the world), including the Head of Department, Assoc. Prof. Ian Plant, the previous head, Prof. Alanna Nobbs, managing staff of their museum and the founder of the Department, Emeritus Prof. Edwin Judge. Prof. Judge is a ferocious advocate of teaching history in a straightforward, approachable way and had developed the museum to be a teaching collection that allowed people to touch the pieces and directly engage with them (it also grew to become the largest collection of papyrus in the southern hemisphere).
I interviewed the very first Brick Classicist, Assoc. Prof. Tom Hillard to talk about his life as a Classicist and whether Pop Culture, including the use of LEGO, can complement the study of such a traditional discipline as classical ancient history, to celebrate the 10th Annual International LEGO Classicism Day.
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INTERVIEW WITH ASSOC. PROF. TOM HILLARD
Question 1:
What first drew you to classics and when did you realize you wanted to learn more about the ancient world?
Answer:
The shelves of my childhood library were packed with Illustrated Bibles and Atlases of the Ancient World. That fascination stayed with me, and grew, outliving the original inspiration. It eventually became a fascination with humanity, its wonders and its vulnerabilities, its strengths and frailties.
​The BCE has the Macquarie University Department of Ancient History and their Museum of Ancient Cultures, Sydney Australia, to thank for its strong start in 2016 and through 2017. In 2015, while working on a new upcoming exhibition at the Department of Ancient History (in my capacity as an Historical Archivist), I came across some LEGO parts online for a minifigure that reminded me of Assoc. Prof. Tom Hillard, an old family friend who I have known since birth, who was also working on the exhibition. I thought it would be ironic to have a classicist, with all the academic gravitas the discipline historically is afforded, turned into a cute, colourful and approachable LEGO figure: the opposite of what is normally expected! After sourcing all the parts I needed, I then put them together and on the 20th of February, 2016, I gave the LEGO figure to Tom. On the same day, I took a picture and then posted it on my personal Facebook page. Over the next week it went viral across academic social media groups across the Australia and academics and students instantly recognised the LEGO figure as Tom, who is well loved in the Australian classics community.
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Gallery images of the first International LEGO Classicism Day tea party at the Museum of Ancient Cultures, Macquarie University.
BCE Minifigure of Tom Hillard. Taken at Macquarie University campus on the 20th February 2016.
Question 2:
You were using pop-culture to apply to the study of the ancient world long before most people were doing it (reception studies is now a much more common and accepted practice).
How important do you think it is to engage and connect with students using these mediums to create a stronger connection to the more important underlying material of the historical facts and understanding?
Answer:
I confess to an adolescent attraction, as a teenager in the 50s and 60s, to B-grade ‘Swords & Sandals’ epics, but hopefully one outgrows the escapism and the pandering to voyeuristic fantasies. As a teacher, I always thought that it was important to convey to students how absorbing I found the material myself. That enthusiasm can be conveyed in numerous ways and need not be restricted to the realm of ‘pop culture’, but I think it’s helpful to be able to communicate via common reference points. When students are engaged, they will embark on their own serious voyages of discovery.
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Question 3:
One of the most remembered features of your lectures, according to many of your students, is the use of a watermelon and a terracotta roof tile to show the impact of a falling tile on a human head.
How did you come up with such a theatrical teaching method that obviously was remembered by many students who continued their studies with great enthusiasm?
Answer:
There’s no doubt about it. The kinetic energy of a rooftile hurled from a Roman rooftop as a weapon in urban warfare is a truly fascinating topic. I come from a non-academic background, and my mother had been involved in the entertainment industry (mostly as a theatre acrobat — and, for one glorious year, traveling the United States with the circus, Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey). I have always thought that entertainment was a natural way of capturing people’s attention. If people are going to do you the honour of sitting and listening to you for an hour, I think it’s incumbent upon the lecturer to at least ensure that they don’t feel bored or restless.
​Left: BCE Minifigure of Michael Turner. Right: the real Michael Turner looking over the LEGO Pompeii model at the Nicholson Museum, University of Sydney (now the CCW Museum).
Question 4:
As a teaching tool, how much potential do you think LEGO has?
Answer:
One thing that I would say about the value of LEGO is the undeniable joy that it seems to bring to people. One will never see a crowd of people standing around a LEGO reconstruction of Rome, Pompeii or the Acropolis without seeing a sea of smiling and animated faces.
Question 5:
How does it make you feel knowing that your LEGO figure has been responsible for so many eminent classicists around the world being made into LEGO figures, including Prof. Mary Beard, Prof. Andrew Wallace-Hadrill and Prof. Michael Scott who love their LEGO figures and have used them in their work?
Answer:
All I can say is that I’m chuffed — and really honoured (in a modest way). I hadn't realized until now that February 20th was so personally relevant. Wow! I'm blushing at that. The celebration of connections and inclusivity comes across loud and clear with the Brick Classicists Empire. You're obviously bringing a lot of joy to the world.
Assoc. Prof. Ian Plant with his BCE Minifigure.
Assoc. Prof. Tom Hillard looking up another BCE Minifigure of Prof. Christopher Smith (then Director of the British School at Rome).
Assoc. Prof. Tom Hillard with his BCE Minifigure.
Assoc. Prof. Tom Hillard working in his office with his BCE Minifigure on his desk and a copy of a Roman bust.
So, thank you Tom and indeed the whole Macquarie University Department of Ancient History for all your encouragement and for letting me participate with you through this joyful engagement with LEGO and ancient history! Who knew Macquarie Ancient History would unknowingly help create a LEGO Empire?!
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Liam D. Jensen AKA The Brick Classicist
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Left: Prof. Dame Mary Beard with her BCE Minifigure. Right: Prof. Michael Scott with his BCE Minifigure.