Project within the Research Initiative Rhineland-Palatinate (2024–2028)

The aim of the project is to investigate the nature, form, and significance of naval power in the early and middle Hellenistic periods, thereby contributing to a more precise understanding of the establishment and imperial positioning of Hellenistic kingdoms.

Student assistant: Christophe Schoetter

Joint Project with Patrick Reinard (Papyrology). Funded by the Research Fund of the University of Trier (Project Duration: 2023–2024)

Scholarship continues to be shaped by the notion of a unified "Hellenistic kingship." Yet such a thing never truly existed. A Ptolemaic pharaoh-king ruled differently than a Seleucid-Babylonian monarch or a king in Macedonia. The persistence of the idea that there was only one form of Hellenistic kingship is primarily due to our literary—mostly historiographical—sources, which are Greek and Roman. We read the Antigonids, Seleucids, Ptolemies, and also the ruling dynasties in Asia Minor as similar chiefly because our main sources portrayed them that way. There was no single Hellenistic monarchy—but rather multiple, distinct forms of monarchy within the Hellenistic world. This insight also helps explain why existing research has so far failed to provide a satisfying explanation for the historically novel phenomenon of kingship in the Hellenistic period, modeled after Alexander the Great.

The current research project aims to lay the groundwork for a larger grant proposal that will address these questions and develop a new interpretive model of Hellenistic kingship based on an interdisciplinary approach.

Subproject within the TRANSMARE Collaborative Research Initiative “Maritime Dynamics”

This project explores the ambivalent relationship of ancient peoples and civilizations with the sea and nautical-maritime dangers through the lens of modern risk research. The maritime context is particularly well suited to analyzing ancient conceptions of risk: the sea, which moves both itself and others (sometimes against their will), created an immensely dynamic physical and mental space for action. While hazards such as weather, shoals, or currents exist independently of human agency, the same is not true for risks, which need not be empirically measurable or tangible, but can also be subjectively perceived or assumed—and thus shaped or conditioned by prior knowledge or cultural assumptions. The subproject focuses on identifying dangers specific to maritime contexts in ancient seafaring and on investigating the cultural and mental processes by which existing and/or perceived, often incalculable, dangers were discursively transformed into risks—risks whose significance and consequences could be understood, relativized, and accepted.

Member of the DFG Network directed and coordinated by Dr. Bernadette Descharmes (TU Braunschweig). 

Subproject: "The Purity of the Monarch."
In late antique discourse and in scholarly debates about the ideological foundations of ancient monarchies—particularly the late antique and early Byzantine emperorship—concepts of ritual purity and physical integrity repeatedly appear. These are viewed as important elements in assessing the suitability of private individuals for rulership. In particular, the Levitical prohibition (Lev 21:16–23) against ‘impure’ bodies serving in the priesthood is often cited as a basis for discourses and practices concerning the emperorship (e.g., rhinotomy and blinding as disqualifying punishments). This planned project will critically examine this widespread view and investigate whether Old Testament normative concepts found expression in the political practices of Late Antiquity, thereby contributing to the bodily history of the emperorship.

Internationales Forschungsprojekt der Universität Potsdam und der Durham University im Rahmen des DFG/AHRC-geförderten Programms "UK-German Collaborative Research in the Humanities“, 2020-2022. PI des Teilprojekts 3: "Diplomatic Gifts in the Principate and in Late Antiquity". Laufzeit: 2021-2023. Bildquelle: Professur Geschichte des Altertums, Potsdam / Michael Fetzer. 

Gifts exchanged between ambassadors and rulers of polities were a staple of ancient diplomacy. They could serve to open and support negotiations, but also to celebrate the successful conclusion of a treaty, and, particularly in Late Antiquity, were firmly embedded in an elaborate ceremonial of diplomatic exchanges. However, no gift is innocent. In ancient sources, interpretations and judgements of gifts vary wildly and depending on who gave what to whom and on which occasion. Gifts to the Roman Empire were likely to be seen or represented as tribute owed. Conversely, similar transfers of wealth by Romans to external polities may have been presented as voluntary gifts by the imperial court, but our sources often see in them little less than tributes. A contemporary discourse about the purpose, appropriateness and adequacy of diplomatic ‘gifts’ interpreted them either as economically preferable alternatives to war, as subsidies given to loyal allies or as humiliating tributes paid from a position of weakness, depending on the circumstances. This project aims to investigate these discourses, with a particular focus on Late Antiquity, but always taking into account the evolution of such discursive elements from the time of Augustus onwards.

Co-edited volume: Brill's Companion to the Late Roman Emperor (under contract), w/ H. Börm & F. Carlà-Uhink