Professor Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones

Biography

I was born in Bridgend, raised in Cefn Cribwr, and attended Cynffig Comprehensive School. I read Drama at the University of Hull (1985-1988), followed by a Masters (1996-1997) and a PhD (1997-2000) in Ancient History at Cardiff University. Following a Research Fellowship at the Open University and a lectureship at Exeter, I joined the Classics department at the University of Edinburgh in 2004 and in 2015 I became Professor of Ancient Greek and Iranian Studies. I took up the Chair of Ancient History at Cardiff University in February 2016.

My research interests include ancient Greek socio-cultural history, especially women's history and gender-issues, dress, and visual culture. My book Aphrodite's Tortoise: the veiled woman of ancient Greece has won much critical acclaim. For the last decade, however, I have expanded my research into the study of ancient Persia, especially the history and culture of the Achaemenid period (559-331 BCE) and I am fortunate to be one of only a few scholars world-wide to work on pre-Islamic Iran. Recent publications have included Ctesias' History of Persia: Tales of the Orient and King and Court in Ancient Persia. I'm thrilled to be bringing the study and teaching of Iranian history to Cardiff and to add this important discipline to SHARE's impressive research portfolio.

I travel frequently to Iran and the Middle East, often leading cultural and historical tours. I have worked with the BBC, Channel 4 and the History Channel and even with Hollywood production companies as historical advisor. I am a regular reviewer for The Times and Times Higher Education.

Follow my blog, Persian Things

Twitter: https://twitter.com/lloydllewj

Documentary on Persepolis (including interviews with myself)

Persian Past, Iranian Present (KE Project)

For some further biographical details see: Alumnus returns to alma mater as Professor of Ancient History

For cultural tours see: www.martinrandall.com

Education and qualifications

• 1997 - 2000 PhD. Ancient History, Cardiff University, Wales, UK.
• 1996 - 1997 MA (Distinction) Ancient History, Cardiff University, Wales, UK.
• 1985 - 1988 BA (Hons) Drama, University of Hull, England, UK.

Honours and awards

• Iran Heritage grant
• British Consul Starting Fund
• Principal's Knowledge Exchange Grant
• AHRC conference funding
• Carnegie Trust Award

Professional memberships

Present - Trustee of the British Institute of Persian Studies

02/2016 - Present Chair of Ancient History, Cardiff University

08/2015 - 01/2016 Chair of Ancient Greek and Iranian Studies, University of Edinburgh.

08/2010 - 07/2015 Senior Lecturer in Ancient History, University of Edinburgh.

08/2004 - 07/2010 Lecturer in Ancient History, School of History, Classics &\; Archaeology, University of Edinburgh.

08/2003 - 07/2004 Lecturer in Ancient History, Department of Classics and Ancient History, University of Exeter.

01/2000 - 08/2003 Research Fellow, Department of Classical Studies, The Open University

• Head of Classics, University of Edinburgh
• Associate Dean (Academic Conduct)
• Principal Discipline Officer
• College Recruitment & Admissions Committee
• College Recruitment Team
• College Recognition Awards Committee
• College Fitness to Study Committee

Academic positions

Editorships

Series Editor for Edinburgh University Press (commissioning and overseeing production of monographs and edited volumes from established academics):

Edinburgh Studies in Ancient Persia

Screening Antiquity (Co-Series Editor, with Prof. Monica Cyrino)

Editorial boards

• Journal of Greek Archaeology
• CADMO, Ancient History Review of the University of Lisbon
• DABIR (Digital Archive of Brief notes & Iran Review)

Membership of academic societies

• British Institute of Persian Studies
• Society for the Study of the Old Testament
• St Andrews Centre for the Study of Iranian Civilization
• Iran Heritage Foundation
• Textile Research Centre, Leiden
• The Classical Association
• The Classical Association of Scotland

Speaking engagements

Items of esteem at international institutions, symposia and congresses

"When Animals Go Wrong", Animals in Ancient Material Cultures; Allard Pierson Museum, University of Amsterdam. October 2015.

"Salome, Nice Girl". Bar-Ilan University, Israel. April 2013.

"The mise-en-scène of Monarchy in Achaemenid Persia". Université Paris-Est Créteil. November 2013.

"The Great King's Two Bodies. Constructions of the Persian Body, East and West." Conference on The Body in Transition. University of Cologne. May 2011.

‘Teaching, Learning and Innovation in Classics." University of Rennes. January 2010.

"Concluding Thoughts" to Vêtements antiques. S"habiller, se déshabiller dans les mondes anciens. Paris 8. November 2009.

"Berenike II and Ptolemaic Propaganda". University of Nantes. December 2007.

National invitations

"The Persians in Egypt". Leicester Egypt Society, March 2016.

"Animals as Tribute, and Display in the Achaemenid Empire". Durham. June 2015.

"Reviewing Space, Context and Meaning: The Eurymedon Vase Again". Exeter. November 2014.

"The Great King"s Robe: Sacred Majesty in Achaemenid Iran". St Andrews. June 2014.

"The Horse in Achaemenid Thought, Culture and Ritual". Sacred Animals in Antiquity. St Andrews. January 2014.

"The Body of the Great King". Cardiff Classical Association. October 2013.

"An Empire of Pleasure? The Great King and his Lands". St Andrews. April 2013.

"The Great King and his Courtiers". Workshop on Status in Antiquity. Leeds. March 2012.

"The Great King"s Robe: dress, the body and monarchy in Achaemenid Persia". Leeds Classical Association. November 2011.

"Dressing the Empire. Thoughts on Clothing in Ancient Persia". The World of Ashama Conference. Oxford. July 2011.

"Trouble at the Tehran Multiplex: 300 in Iran". Cinema and Antiquity 2000-2010. University of Liverpool. July 2011.

"Dress, Costume and Race on the Apadana Reliefs at Persepolis". Cardiff and District CA. April 2010.

"The Memory of the Past in Achaemenid Iran: Reading Ctesias" Persica". Durham seminar in Classics and Ancient History. November 2009.

"An Empire of Pleasure? Concubinage, Masculinity and the Harem in Persia and the Near East". Cardiff and District CA, December 2008.

"Imagining Alexander". Triennial Conference. Oxford, July 2008.

"An Empire of Pleasure? Concubinage, Masculinity and the Harem in Persia and the Near East". Department of Classics Research Seminar, Liverpool. April 2008.

"Was there a Persian Harem?" Leeds Classics Seminar. December 2006.

"Society on Display: Persian Dress". The British Museum, London. November 2005.

"Persepolis". Society for the Study of Art, London. September 2005.

Public lectures given as guest lecturer

"Screaming Queens and Perverted Emperors: Sexuality and the Religious Epic in 1930s Hollywood". ENFYS/PRIDE Cymru, Cardiff University, February 2016.

"Camp as Christmas". Welsh Government LGBT & staff network, PRISM Christmas Lecture, December 2015.

"Sex and Sexuality in Ancient Athens". Welsh Government LGBT & staff network, PRISM, March 2015.

"Xerxes" Cabinet of Curiosities: Exotic Animals and Royal Authority in Achaemenid Iran". The British Institute of Persian Studies Summer Lecture. London. June 2014.

"Beautiful to Behold is the King". Iran Society, London. February 2014.

"The Pleasures and Perils of the Persian Court". Edinburgh Iran Festival. February 2013. (Followed by book launch)

"Gods of the Silver Screen. Reading Greek Divinity Through Harryhausen". National Museum of the Moving Image, Bradford. Opening for the exhibition on Ray Harryhausen and the Classics. November 2011.

"Ancient Persia in American Popular Culture". St Andrews Institute of Iranian Studies. September 2009.

"Domestic Violence in Ancient Greece". Cardiff University. May 2009.

Committees and reviewing

• Present - Member of SHARE Impact & KE Committee
• Present - NSS Champion, Ancient History

Publications

• Date
• Type
• Selected

Teaching

Courses

• Persian Superpowers
• From Great Kings to Shahs: History and Storytelling in Iran
• Ancient Assyria
• Courtly Cultures: the Art of Living Royally
• The History and Religion of Ancient Israel
• Objects of Empire: Ancient Iran Through Matierial Culture
• King and Court in the Ancient Near East
• Ancient Persia: the Achaemenid Dynasty 559-331 BCE
• Orientalism: the Middle East in Western Imagination from Antiquity to the Present
• Persica: Greek Historians and the Persian Empire
• Projecting the Past
• Hollywood's Ancient World
• Ancient History 1: Gods, Kings and Citizens

Second Year Independent Study

Final year dissertations

Topic areas for graduate supervision:

• Achamenid Dynasty of Iran, 559-331 BCE
• Ancient Persian Empire
• History & Culture of Iran
• Greek and Persian interactions in antiquity
• Ancient Historiography
• Near Eastern and Egyptian monarchy and court societies
• Gender, dress, sexuality in antiquity
• Reception of antiquity in the arts, especially Hollywood cinema

Research interests

• Ancient Iran, especially the Achaemenid period (559-331 BCE)
• Persian and Greek encounters in the Archaic and Classical Periods
• monarchy and court societies
• Iranian culture
• Cross cultural and cross temporal comparatives
• Gender and sexuality
• Clothing, textiles and dress history
• Reception of antiquity in the arts and popular culture, especially Hollywood cinema
• Cultural History
• Global History

Books

Monographs and co-authored

Designs on the Past: How Hollywood Created the Ancient World. Publisher: Edinburgh University Press. 2018.

The Culture of Animals in Antiquity (co-author). Publisher: Routledge. 2017.

King and Court in Ancient Persia 559-331 BCE. Publisher: Edinburgh University Press. 2013 (translated into Persian by Fereydoun Majlessi, Tehran 2015).

Ctesias' History of Persia: Tales of the Orient (co-author). Publisher: Routledge. 2010 (translated into Persian by Fereydoun Majlessi, Tehran 2013).

Dress in Ancient Greece and Rome A-Z (co-author). Publisher: Routledge. 2007.

The Greeks at War (co-author). Publisher: Osprey. 2004.

Aphrodite's Tortoise: The Veiled Woman of Ancient Greece. Publisher: Classical Press of Wales. 2003\; second edition (paperback) 2010.

Edited and co-edited

The Hellenistic Court (co-editor). Publisher: Classical Press of Wales. 2018

Greek Notions of the Past in the Archaic and Classical Eras (Edinburgh Leventis Studies) (co-editor). Publisher: Edinburgh University Press. 2012.

Creating a Hellenistic World (co-editor). Publisher: University of Wales Press. 2010.

The Clothed Body in the Ancient World (co-editor). Publisher: Oxbow. 2005.

Women's Dress in the Ancient Greek World. Publisher: Duckworth/Classical Press of Wales. 2002.

Articles

‘Body and Clothing’ in D. Wharton (ed.), A Cultural History of Color in Antiquity. Publisher: Berg. 2021. 81-102.

‘Dress and Ceremony in Achaemenid Persia: The ‘*Gaunaka’’ in A.J. Batten and K. Olsen (eds.), Dress in Mediterranean Antiquity: Greeks, Romans, Jews, Christians. Publisher: Bloomsbury. 2021. 159-72.

‘Hair and Social Status in the Near East and Early Greece, c. 900–300 BC’ in A.J. Batten and K. Olsen (eds.), Dress in Mediterranean Antiquity: Greeks, Romans, Jews, Christians. Publisher: Bloomsbury. 2021. 173-

“The Royal *Gaunaka: Dress, Identity, Status and Ceremony in Achaemenid Iran” in S-J. Simpson and S. Pankova (eds.), Scythians and other early Eurasian Nomads. Publisher: Archeopress. 2021. 248-57.

"Violence and the Body in Achaemenid Iran" in L. Fibiger, G. G. Fagan and M. Hudson (eds.) The Cambridge History of Violence. Volume 1 ⎯ The Prehistoric and Ancient Worlds. Publisher: CUP. 2020.

"Knocking her teeth out with a stone: Domestic Violence in Ancient Greece" in L. Fibiger, G. G. Fagan and M. Hudson (eds.) The Cambridge History of Violence. Volume 1 ⎯ The Prehistoric and Ancient Worlds\; Publisher: CUP. 2020.

“Harem Politics: Royal Women and Succession Crises in the Ancient Near East (c. 1400-300 BCE)” in E. Woodacre (ed.), History of Monarchy. Publisher: Routledge, 2019.

“Trouble in the Tehran Multiplex: Iranian Perceptions of the Heroic in 300 and 300 Rise of an Empire” in A. Augoustakis and S. Richie (eds.), Hercules and the Other Heroes. Publisher: Edinburgh University Press. 2018. 191-205.

“Manliness, Violation and Laughter: rereading the space and context of the Eurymedon vase”, Journal of Greek Archaeology 2 (2017). 217-31.

“Salome, Nice Girl. Rita Hayworth and the Problem of the Hollywood Biblical Vamp”, in E. Almagor and L. Maurice (eds.), Virtue and Vice and the Reception of Antiquity. Publisher: Brill. 2017. 206-30.

“Keeping and Displaying Royal Tribute Animals in Ancient Persia and the Near East”, in T. Fögen and E. Thomas (eds.), Interactions Between Animals and Humans in Graeco-Roman Antiquity. Publisher: de Gruyter. 2017. 305-338

“Gender and Sexuality”, in M. Harlow (ed.), A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion. Volume I: Antiquity. Publisher: Berg. 2017. 87-104.

“The Body”, in M. Harlow (ed.), A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion. Volume I: Antiquity. Publisher: Berg. 2017. 49-69.

“Reviewing Space, Context and Meaning: The Eurymedon Vase Again”, in D. Rodriguez Perez (ed.), Greek Art in Context: Archaeological and Art Historical Perspectives. Publisher: Routledge. 2017. 97-115.

“The Achaemenids” in T. Darayee (ed.), King of the Seven Climes: a History of Ancient Iran. Publisher: Irvine Centre for Persian Studies. 2017. 50-92.

“‘Open Sesame!’ Orientalist Fantasy and the Persian Court in Greek Art 430-330 BCE” in R. Strootman & M.J. Versluys (eds.), Persianism in Antiquity. Publisher: Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart. 2017.

“Persianisms: the Achaemenid Court in Greek Art, 380-330 BCE” in N. Pak-Shiraz (ed.), The Visual Word of Persian Culture. Special Edition: Iranian Studies, 2017.

"Berenike II and the Hathoric model of Queenship", in I. Rutherford (ed.), Greco-Egyptian Interactions: Literature, Translation, and Culture, 500 BC-AD 300. Publisher: OUP. 2016. 139-162.

"The Kingdom of Lydia" "The Median Empire" "The Achaemenid Empire" in J. MacKenzie (ed.), The Encyclopedia of Empires. Publisher: Wiley Blackwell. 2016.

"Beautiful to Behold is the King: the Body of the Achaemenid Monarch" in F. Wascheck & A. Shapiro (eds.), Fluide Körper-Bodies in Transition. Publisher: Centre for Advanced Studies "Morphomata, Cologne. 2015. 211-48.

"Empire of the Gaze: seraglio fantasies à la greque in Chariton's Callirhoe" in S. Blundell, D. Cairns & N. Rabinowitz (eds.), Vision and Power in the Ancient World. Publisher: Helios (special edition). 2013. 167-91.

"An Almost All Greek Thing: Cleopatra VII and Hollywood Imagination" in K. P. Nikoloutsos (ed.), Ancient Greek Women in Film. Publisher: Oxford University Press. 2013. 305-30.

"Jewel-in-the-belly-button Orientalism in Oliver Stone's Alexander" in S. Knippschild & M. Garcia Morcillo (eds.), Seduction and Power: Antiquity in the Visual and Performing Arts. Publisher: Bloomsbury. 2013. 21-34.

"Ray Harryhausen and Other Gods: Greek Divinity in Jason and the Argonauts and Clash of the Titans in S. Green and P. Goodman (eds.), Animating Antiquity: Harryhausen and the Classical Tradition. 2013. [online refereed].

Contributor to the Blackwell Encyclopedia of Greek Tragedy. Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell. 2013 (entries on Men in Female Roles, Costume, Jewelry, Veiling, Persians on Stage, Susa, Thracians, Egyptians, Hair, Performative Approach, Schema)

"Great Kings of the Fourth Century BCE and Greek Conceptions of the Persian Past" in J. Marincola, L. Llewellyn-Jones & C. McIver (eds.), Greek Notions of the Past in the Archaic and Classical Eras (Edinburgh Leventis Studies). Publisher: Edinburgh University Press. 2012. 317-46.

"Veiling the Spartan Woman" in M. Harlow (ed.), Dress and Identity. Publisher: Oxbow, Oxford. 2012. 19-38.

Contributor to the Blackwell Encyclopedia of Ancient History. Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell. 2012 (entries on Arsinoe I, Arsinoe III, Beauty, Berenike I, Berenike II, Cleopatra IV, Cleopatra V Berenike III, Cleopatra VI Tryphaena).

"Domestic Violence in Ancient Greece" in S. Lambert (ed.), Sociable Man. Essays in Greek Social Behaviour in Honour of Nick Fisher. Publisher: Classical Press of Wales, Swansea. 2011. 231-266.

"Immortals and Persian Cataphracts" in C. Ridler (ed.) Elite Fighting Forces. Publisher: Thames & Hudson. 2011. 10-11, 26-27.

"Dress, Hair, Textiles" in M. Finkelberg (ed.), Homer Encyclopedia. Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell. 2011.

"Pre-Islamic dress codes in the Eastern Mediterranean and Southwest Asia" in G. Vogelsang-Eastwood (ed.) Berg Encyclopedia of World Dress Volume 2: The Middle East and Central Asia. Publisher: Berg, 2010. 24-30.

"Orientalism in Western Dress and Stage Costume" in G. Vogelsang-Eastwood (ed.) Berg Encyclopedia of World Dress Volume 2: The Middle East and Central Asia. Publisher: Berg, 2010. 487-88.

"The Big and Beautiful Women of Asia: Picturing Female Sexuality in Greco-Persian Seals" in J. Curtis & S. Simpson (eds.), The World of Achaemenid Persia. Publisher: I.B. Tauris. 2010. 165-176.

"Ethnic Conceptions of Beauty in Achaemenid Period Seals and Gemstones" in S. Hales & T. Hodos (eds.), Local and Global Identities: Rethinking Identity, Material and Visual Cultures in the Ancient World. Publisher: Cambridge University Press. 2009. 171-200.

""Help me Aphrodite!" Representing the Royal Women of Persia in Oliver Stone's Alexander" in F. Greenland & P. Cartledge (eds.), Responses to Oliver Stone's Alexander. Publisher: Wisconsin University Press. 2009. 150-197.

"The First Persian Empire" in. T. Harrison (ed.), The Great Empires of the Ancient World. Publisher: Thames & Hudson. 2009. 65-95.

"Hollywood's Ancient World" in A. Erskine (ed.), The Blackwell Companion to the Ancient World. Publisher: Blackwell. 2009. 564-579.

"Achaemenid Persia" in S. Bourke (ed.), The Middle East. The Cradle of Civilization Revealed. Publisher: Thames & Hudson. 2008. 216-45.

"House and Veil in Ancient Greece" in N. Fisher, R. Westgate & J. Whitley, (eds.), Building Communities: House, settlement and society in the Aegean and beyond. Publisher: British School at Athens. 2007. 251-58.

"Gods of the Silver Screen: Cinematic Representations of Myth and Divinity" in D. Ogden (ed.), A Companion to Greek Religion. Publisher: Blackwell. 2007. 423-38.

Contributor to The Cambridge Guide to Classical Civilization. Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2006 (entries on: Antigone, Asterix, Antony, Arsinoë, II Philadelphus, Aspasia, Artemis, Athenaeus, Atlantis, Boudicca, Berenike I, bestiality, chiton, Cleopatra VII, comic strips, dance, Ethiopia, Ethiopians, fashion, femininity, film, fur, heritage (Classical), love, marriage (Greek), mime, Nonnos, novels (historical), perfume, prostitutes, orientalism, Neaira, queens, scandals, Shakespeare, Spartacus, theatre (modern), veiling).

"Body Language and the female role-player in Greek Tragedy and Japanese Kabuki Theatre" in D.L. Cairns (ed.), Body Language in the Greek and Roman Worlds. Publisher: Classical Press of Wales. 2005. 73-105.

"Herakles Re-Dressed" in L. Rawlings & H. Bowden (eds.), Herakles and Hercules. Exploring a Greco-Roman Divinity. Publisher: Classical Press of Wales. 2005. 51-69.

"The Fashioning of Delilah. Costume Design, Historicism and Fantasy in Cecil B. DeMille's Samson and Delilah (1949)" in M. Harlow & L. Llewellyn-Jones (eds.), The Clothed Body in the Ancient World. 2005. 14-29. Publisher: Oxbow. 2005.

"Celluloid Cleopatras or Did the Greeks ever get to Egypt?" in D. Ogden (ed.), The Hellenistic World: New Perspectives. Publisher: Duckworth/Classical Press of Wales. 2002. 275-304.

"The Queen of Sheba in Popular Culture, 1850-2000" in St John Simpson (ed.), The Queen of Sheba: Treasures of Ancient Yemen. Publisher: British Museum Press 2002. 12-30.

"Eunuchs and the Harem in Achaemenid Persia" in S. Tougher (ed.), Eunuchs in Antiquity and Beyond. Publisher: Duckworth/Classical Press of Wales, London/Swansea. 2002. 19-49.

"A woman's view? Dress, eroticism, and the ideal female body in Athenian art" in L. Llewellyn-Jones (ed.), Women's Dress in the Ancient Greek World. Publisher: Duckworth/Classical Press of Wales, London/Swansea. 2002. 171-202.

"Sexy Athena: The Dress and Erotic Representation of a Virgin War Goddess" in, S. Deacy and A. Villing (eds.), Athena in the Classical World. Publisher: B.J. Brill, Leiden. 2001. 233-57.

"Trasedi Gymraeg: Is there a Classical Tradition in Welsh Language Drama?" in L.P. Hardwick & C. Gillespie, eds., The Role of Greek Drama and Poetry in Crossing and Redefining Cultural Boundaries. 2000. [Refereed].

"Understanding Theatre Space". 2000. [Refereed].

Books in press and in development

Sister-Queens in the High Hellenistic Period: Kleopatra III and Kleopatra Thea (co-author). Publisher: Routledge. Forthcoming, 2021

The Persians. Publisher: Wildfire Books. Forthcoming 2022

Ancient Persia: the Achaemenid Dynasty 559-331 BCE. Publisher: Routledge. Forthcoming 2023.

A Visual History of Dress in Antiquity. Publisher: Routledge. Forthcoming 2024.

Articles in press

‘Bathsheba and Beyond: Harem Politics in the Ancient Near East’ in K. Droß-Krüpe and S. Fink (eds.), Perception and (Self)Presentation of Powerful Women in the Ancient World Proceedings of the 8th Melammu Workshop, Kassel, 30 January – 1 February 2019. Publisher: Zaphon. 2021.

Supervision

• Ancient Iran, especially the Achaemenid period (559-331 BCE)
• Persian and Greek encounters in the Archaic and Classical Periods
• Near Eastern and Egyptian monarchy and court societies
• Iranian culture
• Cross cultural and cross temporal comparatives with ancient Persia
• Gender and sexuality in antiquity
• Clothing, textiles and dress history
• Reception of antiquity in the arts and popular culture, especially Hollywood cinema

Past projects