The Atrium House at Aphrodisias is a well-preserved example of a large-scale townhouse in the Roman provinces. Sitting just on the east edge of the town center, the Atrium House has a long history, beginning in the late Hellenistic period and continuing through to the early to middle Byzantine period. This dissertation presents a full study of the buildings on the site: an archaeological presentation, a catalogue of the excavated rooms, and a breakdown of the appearance of the structures during the major phases of occupation, including a catalogue of the sculpture discovered during the investigation. The high level of preservation makes the study of the building extremely productive.

The Atrium House was originally two buildings during the late Hellenistic and Imperial periods. In the fourth century, there were large-scale renovations that transformed the appearance and use of the building. Renovations of this type are typical for the fourth century in the eastern empire, but the remodelling of the Atrium House created a building with a monumentality more common to public buildings. After a full theoretical reconstruction of the appearance of the Atrium House in the fourth century, I investigate the impact this had on visitors to house, and consider ways in which the modern viewer can reconstruct the motivations behind the owner's construction of self-identification.

In the fifth and sixth centuries further structural changes to the house were complimented by additions to the already rich sculptural group, in the form of a series of shield portraits of ancient philosophers and philosophy students. The display of this rare and suggestive sculptural monument together with the presence of objects of ritual significance, including three altars, raises important questions about religious identification in the tense late antique period, especially in the sixth century, when Aphrodisias was witnessing major religious changes in its political and architectural fabric. By engaging with earlier scholarship on the Atrium House, I argue that this townhouse may indeed have been a site of philosophical study, and that the suggestion of religious violence at the hands of the Christians is not necessarily borne out in the archaeological record.

The dissertation ends with a discussion of the 'afterlife' of the Atrium House, during which it was divided up into smaller apartments and no longer inhabited by one elite family.