East of the Euphrates

Professor Sam Lieu

Professor Sam Lieu has attracted a star-studded research team whose expertise in ancient history stretches from Rome to China, and whose work proceeds largely through the study of religious sources. 

From Macquarie University’s Department of Ancient History, and using the resources of four back-to-back Australian Research Council major research grants, this international research team follows their own silk road.

Who are they?

Dr Ken Parry is the principal research officer of the team’s project on the remnants of the Manichean religion in southern China, centred on a single surviving temple. To showcase the iconographical value and high artistic quality of what remains, he has mounted a photographic exhibition which travelled to Salzburg, London and Ankara.

Dr Kevin Kaatz joined the team after a productive research career in the neurosciences, and an MA in Religious Studies from Berkeley, California. His PhD, using the rich resources of Macquarie’s Manichean Documentation Centre, was on the way the religion, from Iraq, successfully penetrated the Roman Empire along the Silk Road, and became a major influence on the intellectual development of Augustine.

Dr Jonathan Markley learned classical Chinese to explore China’s relationships with Central Asia, and wrote his thesis on how the most famous of ancient China’s historians represented (or misrepresented) these. A New Zealander, he came to Macquarie from Hong Kong, where he was teaching history. His thesis received the Vice-Chancellor’s Commendation, and will be published as a monograph.

Dr Peter Edwell switched careers from accountancy to ancient history, and went on to gain First Class Honours. He researched Roman military control of the Roman Near East, a key part of the study of the western Silk Road, based on Roman Syria. The many photographs he took on field trips with Lieu have become part of the major teaching and learning website, The Roman East (http://online.mq.edu.au/pub/AHSTRE)

Clare Rowan came to Macquarie with a 100 score on her HSC and the ambition to become a top Roman historian. She has won many prizes, including the 2004 University Medal. Her PhD will look at religious change in the late second century AD, and she will accompany Lieu and Edwell on their field trips to Syria.

John Sheldon is studying prayer and confessional texts in three Middle Iranian dialects, one of which was the most commonly spoken language along the Silk Road for more than a millennium. Although the codex which is his source is in a Berlin museum, the Manichean Documentation Centre offers him photographs of every leaf.

Cross-institutional networking with fellow scholars in Canada, Denmark, Britain and the University of Sydney, make Lieu’s stars shine even more brightly.

For more information, contact Professor Sam Lieu at sam.lieu@mq.edu.au

The Department of Ancient History website is at www.anchist.mq.edu.au

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