Department: Faculty of Classics
Supervisor: Rebecca Flemming
College: St John's College
Title of thesis: Politics and the Past in the Age of Nerva and Trajan
Biography:
Before embarking on the PhD, I did both my BA and MPhil at Cambridge. My PhD thesis examines how the memory of the emperor Domitian (81-96) was made and unmade in the aftermath of his assassination, and what role it played during the reign of his successors Nerva (96-98) and Trajan (98-117). My wider interests include Flavian poetry, the literature of the Nervan-Antonine period (in particular Pliny the Younger and Tacitus), the relationship between historiography and epigraphy, and memory studies. In addition, I am also interested in contemporary politics (which furnish surprisingly many parallels to my period of study- for example, I find that the Romans would have been no stranger to the phenomenon of "fake news" .)
Research Interests
Domitian, Pliny, Tacitus, Memory, Historiography and Epigraphy
Research Supervision
I supervise undergraduate students in Ancient History and Latin Language.
Key Publications
‘Condemning Domitian or un-damning themselves ? Tacitus and Pliny on the Domitianic “reign of terror” ’, Illinois Classical Studies 44.2 (2019), pp. 430-452.
‘An Age of Post-Truth Politics ? Making and Unmaking Memory in Pliny’s Panegyricus’, in M. de Marre & R. Bhola (edd.), Making and Unmaking Ancient Memory (500 BCE – 500 CE), Routledge, London (forthcoming).
