me in the last month and a half of a semester, what is religion what is an artifact what information do sources really give us anyhow how can we conceive anything from the past really what does it mean to
Thank you!!
Some big news: I've accepted an offer to start a PhD with Yale Religious Studies! But first! I've also accepted to do a one-year graduate internship at the Getty Villa. I’m excited—and grateful—for continued opportunity to research ancient Mediterranean religion & material culture in different ways.
do you ever just poke around at the digital facsimile Vienna Genesis for hours and hours? it that just me?? the full digitized VIENNA GENESIS can be right at your fingertips:
viewer.onb.ac.at/106F8E6A/
7. Now that my semester has officially finished(!), I can add that I wrote 5 term papers about religion & late antiquity this year. My topics included the famous BM crucifixion amulet; a gold medallion with St Thomas; liturgy and Santa Costanza; Eucharist fraction; and Samaritans in late Roman laws.
6. I gave two papers this year, which were both thrilling & terrifying. I presented on epigraphy, icons, and frames at Mt Sinai for the Newman Seminar in Late Ancient & Byzantine Cultures and, just yesterday(!), I talked about 6th century amulets at the Yale Medieval Lunch Colloquium
5. co-organizing the Late Antiquity Reading Group the last few years has been a real joy—and this last year was especially exceptional with readings from @jennisifire.bsky.social @chancebonar.bsky.social @lsnasrallah.bsky.social, Georgia Frank, Ignazio Tantillo, & John Matthews
4. Speaking of imperial purple, not a day has gone by since May 3 that I haven’t thought just a little bit about the 5th/6th c. purple dye production center at Andriake (ancient port of Myra in Lycia/s. Turkey). Excavators estimate 300 cubic meters of sea snail shell debris!!!!
3. I think I may well be in the “top 1%” of late antique sarcophagi observers. In Marseille, Arles, Rome, the Vatican, Istanbul, and NYC, I spent dozens of hours this year looking at these stone burial boxes. The imperial porphyry sarcophagi at the Istanbul Archaeological Museums were spectacular!
2. Tied for 2nd are the new late antique finds uncovered at the excavations in Stromboli (Italy) and Golemo Gradište, Konjuh (N Macedonia). These projects continue to teach me so much about rituals sites in peculiar regions—and I’m grateful to work with incredible teams in such wonderful locations
There are so many glorious late antique features of this trip that probably all each deserve their own review (icons! doors! roof beams!), but I might have to come back to this [including playing 20 questions on the bus with entries from the Age of Spirituality catalogue]
1. visiting the monastery of St Catherine’s at Mt Sinai for the feast of the Nativity in January was the wildest way to start my year. An easy #1
“my year in late antiquity” wrapped 2025
