Biography

Dr M. E. Stewart completed his PhD at the University of Queensland in 2013. His research focuses on issues of culture, gender, and identity in Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages. He has a published a number of articles and a book on these themes. His most recent paper, 'The Dangers of the Soft Life: Manly and Unmanly Romans in Procopius Gothic Wars' will appear in the Journal of Late Antiquity in 2017. Dr Stewart taught HIST2615: Age of Crusades in semester 1 2016 and HIST1400: Medieval and Early Medieval World in semester 2 2016 at the University of Queensland.

Qualifications

  • 2013 PhD, History, University of Queensland
  • 2003 MA, History, San Diego State University

Research Interests

Culture, gender, literature and identity in Late Antiquity, Byzantium, and the early Middle Ages.

Current Research Projects

  1. Editor with Conor Whately and David Parnell on a planned volume on the mid-sixth century Gothic Wars of the emperor Justinian.
  2. Conference Paper, May 2017 (invited): “The Fine Lines Between Courage and Fear in Procopius’ Vandal Wars.” ICMS 52: Barbarians & Barbarian Kingdoms.
  3. Paper, “Playing the Manly Man: Andreia and Generalship in Procopius’s Gothic Wars” for a forthcoming volume of papers edited by Shaun Tougher based on The Art of Generalship: Late Antique, Byzantine, and Chinese Ideals, sessions from IMC Leeds 2015.

Selected Publications

Books

  • The Soldier’s Life: Martial Virtues and Manly Romanitas in the Early Byzantine Empire. Leeds: Kismet Press, 2016.

Journal Articles, Book Chapters, and Reviews

  • “The Dangers of the Soft Life: Manly and Unmanly Romans in Procopius’ Gothic War.” Journal of Late Antiquity 10.2 (forthcoming).
  • “Breaking Down Barriers: Eunuchs in Italy and North Africa, 400-625.” In Byzantine Culture in Translation AABS 21 (forthcoming).
  • “Review of Kate Cooper & Conrad Leyser, eds. Making Early Medieval Societies: Conflict and Belonging in the Medieval West, 300-1200.” Journal of Social History 51.2 (Winter, 2017).
  • “The Soldier’s Life: Early Byzantine Masculinity and the Manliness of War.” Byzantina Symmeikta 26 (2016): 11-44.
  • “The Andreios Eunuch Commander Narses: Sign of a Decoupling of Martial Virtues and Masculinity in the Early Byzantine Empire?.” Cerae 2 (2015): 1-25.
  • “Contests of Andreia in Procopius’ Gothic Wars,” Παρεκβολαι 4 (2014): 21-54.
  • “Review of Philippe Buc, Holy War, Martyrdom, and Terror: Christianity, Violence, and the West.” Parergon 32.2 (2016): 274-76.
  • “Review of Jonathan Arnold, Theoderic and the Roman Imperial Restoration,” The Medieval History Journal 18. 1 (April, 2015): 169-72.

Other Activities and Service

Guest lecture November 2017 on notions of identity and Romanitas during the emperor Justinian’s mid sixth-century reconquest of Italy for the meeting of the Queensland Club History group.