Archaeological Institute of America lecturer and host Cynthia W. Shelmerdine is Robert M. Armstrong Centennial Professor of Classics, emerita, at The University of Texas at Austin and a Research Associate at Bowdoin College. Her specialty is the Aegean Bronze Age, particularly Mycenaean Greece. An expert on both archaeological material and the written evidence of the Linear B documents, Professor Shelmerdine has published extensively on the archaeology, history and culture of Mycenaean Greece. Her publications include The Cambridge Companion to the Aegean Bronze Age (Cambridge 2008, editor and contributor); articles on Mycenaean women, warfare, and cooking vessels; and the third edition of her ancient Greek textbook, Introduction to Greek (Hackett 2020, in collaboration with her sister Susan C. Shelmerdine). Professor Shelmerdine is a ceramic and historical expert for the Iklaina Archaeological Project (University of Missouri-St. Louis and the Greek Archaeological Society). She has also participated in the excavation of Nichoria by the Minnesota Messenia Expedition (1970s), and in the Pylos Regional Archaeological Project (1990s). She was educated at Bryn Mawr College (A.B. 1970), the University of Cambridge (B.A. 1972, M.A. 1980), and Harvard University (Ph.D. in Classical Philology 1977). Professor Shelmerdine is widely traveled in Greece and has lectured on several AIA-sponsored voyages in the region.
Professor Emerita in the Classics Department at The University of Texas at Austin
