Click here to access my CV on Academia.edu.
Research Interests
• Roman history of the late Republic and early Principate
• Pre-Islamic Iranian history
• Ancient political thought
• The Hellenistic East
Academic Employment
2019—present. Assistant Professor in Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies — Pennsylvania State University
2018/19. Lecturer in Near Eastern Languages and Cultures & Research Associate at the Pourdavoud Center for the Study of the Iranian World — UCLA
2017/18. Postdoctoral Fellow — Getty Research Institute
Education
2017. PhD, Classics — Cornell University
Dissertation: “The Arsacids of Rome: Royal Hostages and Roman-Parthian Relations in the First Century CE.”
Adviser: Prof. Barry Strauss
Committee: Profs. Eric Rebillard, Sturt Manning, Lori Khatchadourian
2010. Post-Baccalaureate Program in Classical Studies — University of Pennsylvania
2007. B.A., Classics and Philosophy — Bard College
Teaching Experience
At Penn State (2019—present)
CAMS 5Z — Ancient Mediterranean Civilizations (1x)
CAMS 83 — First Year Seminar: Populism, Democracy, and Empire (2x)
CAMS 101 — The Roman Republic and Empire (3x)
CAMS 150 — Roman Archaeology (1x)
CAMS 199 — Summer Study Tour of Roman History and Archaeology (1x)
CAMS 480 — Greeks & Persians (1x)
CAMS 496 — Independent Study: Middle Persian Language Tutorial (2x)
LAT 403 — Augustan Age Latin Literature (1x)
LAT 404 — Silver Age Latin Literature (1x)
At UCLA (2018/19)
History of the Sasanian Empire
At Oregon State University (2018)
History of Western Civilization to 1000 CE (online class)
At Cornell University (2011—2017)
Elementary Latin II (3x)
First Year Writing: Greek Myth (2x)
Greek Mythology (online class; Teaching Assistant)
History of Rome I (Teaching Assistant)
Initiation to Greek Culture (Teaching Assistant)
Awards
2022/23. Loeb Classical Library Foundation Fellowship
2021. William C. Mullen Memorial Fund, Bard College
2020. Dumbarton Oaks/Hill Museum and Manuscript Library Armenian Summer School Fellowship
2015. Jesse F. and Dora H. Bluestone Peace Studies Fellowship, Cornell University
2014. Summer Fellowship in Digital Scholarship, Cornell University
2014. Bradley Grant for Research in Ancient History, Cornell University
2013/14. Director’s Fellow, Judith Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies
2013/14. Lane Cooper Fellowship, Cornell University
Publications
In print
2022. “The Parthian Empire.” In Jeffrey Spier, Tim Potts, and Sara E. Cole (eds), Persia: Ancient Iran and the Classical World, 157–64. Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Trust.
2022. “Hydration, Ancient Persian-Style.” In Touraj Daryaee and Shervin Farridnejad (eds), Food for Gods, Food for Mortals: Culinary and Dining Practices in the Greater Iranian World, 161–8. Irvine, CA: Jordan Center for Persian Studies.
2020. “The Arsacids of Rome and Parthia’s ‘Iranian Revival’ in the First Century CE.” In Kai Ruffing, Kerstin Droß-Krüpe, Sebastian Fink, and Robert Rollinger (eds), Societies at War: Proceedings of the 10th Symposium of the Melammu Project held in Kassel September 26-28 2016 and Proceedings of the 8th Symposium of the Melammu Project held in Kiel November 11-15 2014, 475–94. Vienna: Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.
2020. “Exemplary History and Arsacid Genealogy in Tacitus, Annals 6.31.” Dabir 7, 175–91.
2019. “Tiridates in the Forum, Peroz on his Knees: Religion and Reputation in Ancient Iranian Diplomacy.” Anabasis: Studia Classica et Orientalia 10, 214–36.
2019. “Arsacid Beverages in Lucan.” Classical Quarterly 69 (2), 776–82.
2019. “Lucan’s Parthians in Nero’s Rome.” Classical Philology 114 (4), 604–25.
2019. “Remembering Intervention: Parthia in Rome’s Civil Wars.” Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte 68 (3), 327–52.
2018. “Alexander between Rome and Persia: Politics, Ideology, and History.” In K. Moore (ed.), Brill’s Companion to the Reception of Alexander the Great, 197–232. Leiden: Brill.
2017. “The Seleucids Imprisoned: Arsacid-Roman Hostage Submission and its Hellenistic Precedents.” In J. Schlude and B. Rubin (eds), Arsacids, Romans, and Local Elites: Cross-Cultural Interactions of the Parthian Empire, 25–50. Oxford: Oxbow Books.
2015. “Horace and the Tiridates Episode.” Rheinisches Museum für Philologie 158 (3/4), 304–25.
2015. “Venus’ Boots and the Shadow of Caesar in Book 1 of Virgil’s Aeneid.” Classical Quarterly 65 (2), 689–92.
Forthcoming
“Rome, Parthia, and the Horizons of Ancient Diplomacy.” In John Hyland and Khodadad Rezakhani (eds), Brill’s Companion to Warfare in Ancient Iran. Leiden: Brill.
“Fish out of Water: Greek Deportees and Persian Empires in Philostratus’ Life of Apollonius.” In M. Rahim Shayegan (ed), The Classical World in Context: Persia. Los Angeles: Getty.
Presentations
March 2022. “The Arsacid Empire and Its Western Neighbors.”
Talk delivered at the Payravi Conference on Ancient Iranian History IV: Contextualizing Iranian History: The Arsacids, UC Irvine.
February 2020. “On Dynasties and Fosterage: Kinship as a Feature of Interstate Relations between Imperial Rome and Pre-Islamic Iran.”
Talk delivered at Forging Kinships, Wolf Humanities Center, University of Pennsylvania.
June 2019. “Fictive Kinship and Elite Networking in Parthian and Sasanian Iran.”
Talk delivered at Persianate Cultures of Power and Global Elite Networks, UC Irvine.
May 2019. “Did the Parthian Kings Hate Democracy?”
Talk delivered at Ancient Iran and the Classical World, UCLA/J. Paul Getty Museum.
— (recording available here and Q&A session here)
May 2019. “The Arsacids of Rome: Royal Fosterage and Interdynastic Kinship in the First Century CE.”
Talk delivered in the Ancient Mediterranean Studies Program, UC Santa Barbara.
May 2019. “From Captivity to Family: Iranian Perspectives on the Arsacids of Rome.”
Paper workshopped at The Mediterranean Seminar: Captivity & Ransom, Brown University.
July 2018. “From Anarchy to Family: Roman-Persian Relations and their Near-Eastern Foundations.”
Presented at the 64th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Innsbruck, Austria.
April 2018. “Fish out of Water: Greek Deportees, Persian Empires, and the Classical Mediterranean.”
Presented at Ancient Persia and the West, UCLA/J. Paul Getty Museum.
— (recording available here)
April 2018. “Fish out of Water: Greek Deportees, Persian Empires, and the Classical Mediterranean.”
Presented at Xenophobia and Difference in the Pre- and Early Modern World, UC Berkeley.
February 2018. “The Greeks between Rome and Parthia: Iranian Revival and Hellenistic Eclipse in the First Century CE.”
Presented at Iran after Alexander: Hellenism in the East, UC Irvine.
February 2018. “Freed from Hostageship: Iranian Perspectives on the Arsacids of Rome.”
Presented at the Pourdavoud Center for the Study of the Iranian World, UCLA.
April 2017. “Lucan’s Parthians in Nero’s Rome.”
Presented at Lucan in his Contemporary Contexts, Brigham Young University (Provo).
January 2017. “Lucan’s Parthians in Nero’s Rome.”
Presented at the 148th Annual Meeting of the Society for Classical Studies (Toronto).
April 2016. “Parthian Sources Online: Digital Editing as Dissertation Reading.”
Presented at The Humanities and Technology Camp, Cornell University.
January 2015. “A Bridge to Nowhere: Caligula’s Baiae Procession and its Models.”
Presented at the 146th Annual Meeting of the Society for Classical Studies (New Orleans).
November 2014. “The Seleucids Imprisoned: Roman-Parthian Hostage Exchange and its Hellenistic Precedents.”
Presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Schools for Oriental Research (San Diego).
November 2014. “The Arsacids of Rome and Parthia’s ‘Iranian Revival’ in the First Century CE.”
Presented at the Eighth Symposium of the Melammu Project (Kiel, Germany).
January 2014. “The Mercenary, the Polis, and an Athenian Inscription from the 4th Century BCE.”
Presented at the 145th Annual Meeting of the Society for Classical Studies (Chicago).
November 2013. “Greek Mercenaries and the Achaemenid West.”
Presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Schools for Oriental Research (Baltimore).
September 2013. “Alexander’s Exiles: The Greeks in the Eastern Cities.”
Presented at Alexander the Great in the East: History, Art, Tradition, University of Wroclaw, Poland.
January 2013. “The Origins of Alexander’s Eastern Cities: Deportation and Resettlement in the Persian and Macedonian Empires.”
Presented at the 144th Annual Meeting of the American Philological Association (Seattle).
