About
I am a historian of the Roman world in late antiquity. I research and teach the political, cultural, and religious history of the later Roman Empire and its early medieval successors. In particular, I explore the Christianisation of the Roman world which followed the Emperor Constantine’s conversion in 312 CE, and the impact of Christian beliefs, practices, and institutions on what we might consider ‘secular’ aspects of political and social life. My first book, Being Christian in Vandal Africa (University of California Press, 2018) was about the consequences of theological debate and church conflict in post-Roman Africa (modern-day Tunisia and Algeria). I have just finished a project on the ways in which Christian ideology reshaped the representation and practice of governance in late antiquity. My new book, Serving the Christian State in Late Antiquity (Cambridge University Press, forthcoming in Summer 2026), considers the Christian identities and entanglements of imperial and royal officials in the Roman world from the late fourth to the late sixth centuries. I am currently working on gender and political service, political emotions, concepts of polarisation and consensus, and developing pedagogical roleplaying games.
I have spent most of my life on Merseyside: I grew up on the Wirral and moved to Liverpool in January 2018 to join the Department. But my journey in between was slightly longer than a trip across the Mersey: I first did a BA in History and then an MSt in Late Antique and Byzantine Studies in Oxford, before moving to Cambridge for a PhD in Classics (which included Erasmus doctoral study at the Universität zu Köln). I then went back to Oxford to take up a research fellowship at Brasenose College and The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities (TORCH), with a stint as a temporary Departmental Lecturer in Early Medieval History at Balliol College, Brasenose College and St Peter’s College thrown in for good measure.
I am very happy to supervise MA and PhD dissertations and mentor post-doctoral projects on late ancient, early medieval, and early Byzantine topics. If you’d like to work with me, please send me an e-mail and we can talk about your project.
I am the founder of the Liverpool Late Antiquity and Early Middle Ages research group (LLAMA). For more information on our activities, visit https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/histories-languages-and-cultures/research/liverpool-late-antiquity-early-middle-ages/
Prizes or Honours
- Ecclesiastical History Society Book Prize (Ecclesiastical History Society, 2020)