Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art, Department of Ancient Art

My work in the Ancient Art Department of the RISD Museum of Art under the supervision of Gina Borromeo, Curator of Ancient Art, has been wide-ranging. In two of my major projects, I catalogued the museum’s 4th millennium BCE Iranian projectile points, and I edited, updated, and produced the museum’s catalogue of Roman coins. I often do extensive scholarly and archival research on objects—from Corinthian pottery to 4th century CE Egyptian paintings—and I wrote many of the antiquities entries for RISD Museum’s forthcoming handbook. I have also written gallery labels and informational panels, designed gallery displays, and helped plan the reinstallation of the antiquities galleries. As part of my duties, I lead tours of the museum, give lectures based on the collections and assist the curator in teaching classes and moving objects.

U.S. Epigraphy Project

Since January 2004, I have worked for the U.S. Epigraphy Project, an online database that seeks to publish digitally all ancient Greek and Roman inscriptions in the United States, under the direction of Prof. John Bodel from Brown’s Classics Department and in collaboration with Elli Mylonas of Brown’s Scholarly Technology Group. I have edited most of photos on the website using Photoshop, I instruct and supervise undergraduate workers, and I am responsible for describing the inscriptions and coding them in Extensible Markup Language (XML).

Weight Standard of 4th century BCE Athenian Tetradrachms

Tetradrachms minted in Athens in the 4th century BCE are frequently well below the supposed weight standard of 17.30 gm. I have been looking at statistically significant group of these coins to better understand how different the weights are as struck from the official standard and whether there might have been a lower unofficial standard. These results will be published in a forthcoming article with Peter van Alfen in the American Journal of Numismatics.

Research on “Syro-Hittite Goddess” Figurines

I am beginning work on a small group of 2nd millennium BCE seated bronze figurines that have been published erroneously as “goddesses.” These figurines are held in a variety of museums around the world, including one at RISD.

PhD Dissertation: 'The Roman Military Community as Expressed in Its Burial Customs during the 1st-3rd Centuries CE'

Dissertation Abstract

Fragmentary inscription, Adamklissi Museum, Romania

Past Projects

Ethics Bowl, Brown University, Spring 2007

Member of the winning Brown University team at the SAA’s fourth annual Ethics Bowl in Austin, TX. For an overview of our experiences preparing for and participating in the Ethics Bowl, see this article written for Archaeolog by the team.

Mellon Workshop Participant, Collective Identity and Its Visual Expressions, Spring 2007

National Museums of Scotland, Archaeology Department, Fall 2006

While at the (then) Museum of Scotland, I catalogued finds from a 1970s excavation of the Roman fort of Inveresk using Microsoft Excel, and I assembled a written report of the objects. I also catalogued a field walking collection from the Roman fort of Newstead, researched objects within the archaeology department, supervised undergraduate volunteers and studied the design planning of the archaeology galleries. I also did extensive research on the iconography and possible find spot of a cameo of Augustus.

PhD Written Comprehensives, September 2005

I took and passed exams on

• Topography and Monuments of Athens
• Roman Historical Relief Sculpture through the Time of Hadrian
• Art and Archaeology of the Flavians through the Antonines

Webpage Manager for Center for Old World Archaeology and Art, 2003-2006

In this job, I was responsible for

• Adding new files, debugging old files
• Updating and maintaining course webpages and online resources

Secretary for the Narragansett Society of the Archaeological Institute of America, 2003-2006

As secretary, among other duties, I was responsible for

• Arranging lecture rooms
• Setting up equipment, sending out mailings
• Maintaining email correspondence with speakers, officers, and the membership at large

Forum Boarium, Rome, Italy, 2006