Project Team

Chair

Alan Stahl (Princeton University)

astahl@princeton.edu

Alan is Curator of Numismatics at Princeton University and teaches in the departments of Art and Archaeology, Classics, and History; he also currently teaches the summer course in Byzantine Numismatics at Dumbarton Oaks. He holds a Ph.D. in Medieval History from the University of Pennsylvania and has received fellowships from the Guggenheim and Delmas Foundations, has been PI for major grants from the NEH and NSF, and is a recipient of the Medal of the Royal Numismatic Society. Among his publications relevant to the FLAME Project are his book The Merovingian Coinage of the Region of Metz, the chapter “The Transformation of the West,” in The Oxford Handbook of Greek and Roman Coinage, and two articles on the Sutton Hoo coin parcel.

Director

Lee Mordechai (Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
lee.mordechai@mail.huji.ac.il

Lee is a senior lecturer at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Most of his work examines social and environmental history during late antiquity and the middle Byzantine period. Lee designed the application, tests it and imports new datasets when relevant (using Python). The code for imports is available here.

Advisory Board

Helmut Reimitz (Princeton University)
hreimitz@princeton.edu, (609) 258-6449

Coordinator

Mark Pyzyk (Princeton University)
mpyzyk@princeton.edu

Mark Pyzyk is the current Database Coordinator for the FLAME project. He works on the political and social history of the ancient Greek classical period: as a numismatist, he focuses on the production of coin dies and the relationship of minting to state power. He received a PhD in Classics from Stanford University in 2016. He is the principal investigator on the Greek Coin Dies project and has written work on economic administration, taxation, as well as the changing role of experts (including mint officials and die engravers) in classical and hellenistic Greek states. He writes on sports for publications like The Athletic.

Assistant Coordinator

Ilia Curto Pelle (Princeton University)

Ilia Curto Pelle is an undergraduate student at the Classics Department of Princeton University. At Princeton, Ilia works with the Princeton University Numismatic Collection as a student cataloger, focusing on Byzantine and Seleucid coinage. As president of the Princeton Classics Club and a peer-editor for the Princeton Journal Late Antiquity and Medieval Studies, he has decided to deepen his involvement with the discipline. He is currently a student assistant to the coordinator of the FLAME Project, Mark Pyzyk. In this capacity, Ilia focuses on researching, inputting, and editing data on coin finds and coin groups from different regions, with a particular emphasis on Southern Italy and the Northern Balkans. His academic interests also include Hellenistic numismatics and epigraphy, the grand strategy of the Balkan countries in the Middle Ages, the history of the Balkans and the Near East during Late Antiquity, and the pagan influences on Christian iconography. To learn more about Ilia and get in touch with him, visit his website at www.curtopelle.com. 

Developer (ArcGIS, Javascript)

Pavle Jovanov (Freelancer)
pavlejovanov@yahoo.com

The application is developed using MVC 5 and ArcGIS API for Javascript. The maps are published as REST services using ArcGIS for Server 10.3.1. We are using SQL Server 2012 for our database.

Current Contributors

Stefano Bruni (independent researcher) – Italy

Stefano Bruni is an independent researcher and specialist in Late Antique coinage. He obtained a MA degree in Archaeological Science and Methods (Università degli Studi Roma Tre, Rome) in 2015. Since 2010, he has been leading archaeological treks near Rome – in Tuscia, Sabina and Campagna Romana. Since 2012, he has collaborated with the Coin Cabinet of the Musei Capitolini in Rome, examining Roman, Ostrogothic and Byzantine coins from old private collections, and excavation finds from Rome. He is particularly interested in the coins struck at Rome between the fifth and sixth centuries, and spent the last three years analysing the well-known Campana Collection.

Pavla Drapelova (Czech Academy of Sciences) – Czech Republic

Pavla Gkantzios Drapelova is a post-doc at the Institute of Slavonic Studies of the Czech Academy of Sciences (Department of Paleoslovenic and Byzantine Studies). Pavla obtained her PhD at the University of Athens where she also completed her MA in Byzantine Art history and archeology (both άριστα). She also completed two bachelor degrees at the Charles University in Prague in Classical archaeology and in Slavic and East-European studies (both summa cum laude). During her studies she was awarded by various fellowships (A.G. Leventis Foundation, Greek State Scholarships Foundation and others). She specializes in Byzantine archeology, relations between the Slavs and Byzantium and Byzantine numismatics and economic history.

Arkadiusz Dymowski (independent researcher) – Poland
arekdym@yahoo.com

I obtained my first PhD in 2010 and habilitation in 2018 (in archaeology) from the University of Warsaw. My second PhD (history, 2016) is from the University of Gdansk. I focus mostly on ancient coin finds from Central/Eastern Europe and their value as archaeological sources. I am especially interested in problems of inflow, redistribution and use of Roman coins east of the Rhine/north of the Danube during the pre-Roman, Roman, and the Migration Periods. I have published three books and more than 70 papers/reviews. Since 2012, I have participated in research projects undertaken through the University of Warsaw (e.g., IMAGMA: Imagines Maiestatis. Barbarian Coins, Elite Identities and the Birth of Europe, jointly with the Deutsches Archäeologisches Institut). From 2014–2020, I led two projects—Coins of the Roman Republic in Central Europe and Use of ancient coins in East-Central Europe in the Middle Ages and the Modern Period. In 2019 I began a new project, addressing the use and manufacture of counterfeit Roman coins in Barbaricum.

Merle Eisenberg (The National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center) – Southern Gaul
merlee@princeton.edu

Merle is a postdoctoral fellow at the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC) at the University of Maryland and received his Ph.D. in history from Princeton University. He works on late antiquity and the early middle ages, which includes thematic work on environmental history and the history of pandemics. He is currently at work on two book projects, one on the transformation of the post-Roman west and a second on the history of the Justinianic Plague from the sixth century to the present. Merle has published articles in Past & Present, Byzantine & Modern Greek Studies, and Late Antique Archaeology among others. He has also co-authored an article in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, which received press coverage including in CNN, Fox News, and USA Today. His media outreach efforts include an op-ed in the Washington Post and an interview on CNN. In addition to his work on FLAME, his digital media projects include a co-created online resource for teaching, Middle Ages for Educators, he is the co-host of the Infectious Historians podcast, and the PI of PLAGUE (Plague in Late Antiquity: Gathering the Uncertain Evidence).  

Lara Fabian (University of Pennsylvania) – South Caucasus
lfabian@sas.upenn.edu, webpage: laralfabian.com

Andrei Gandila (University of Alabama in Huntsville) – The Balkans

Rory Naismith (King’s College London) – British Isles
rory.naismith@kcl.ac.uk

Aikaterini Peppa (Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University) – Greece
peppa.kat@gmail.com

Ruth Pliego (University of Lisbon) – The Iberian Peninsula
ruthpliego@gmail.com

Jane Sancinito (Oberlin College and Conservatory) – Roman and Byzantine Syria and Egypt
Jane_Sancinito@uml.edu

Jane Sancinito is an assistant professor of history at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell. She is a specialist on Roman merchants and the provincial coinage of Antioch. She is currently writing a book on the reputation strategies of Roman merchants and working on a series of die studies from Antioch. 

Mariele Valci
Mariele Valci is a postdoctoral fellow in Medieval History and Archaeology at the Istituto Italiano per gli Studi Storici in Naples with a project on the economy and monetary system of Rome between the 8th–12th centuries. She obtained a PhD in Medieval History at the University of Nottingham. Her doctoral research focused on the economy of Rome in the Communal Period (1143-1398) through the study of coins and related archival data. Since 2013, she has collaborated with the Musei Capitolini, Museo Nazionale Romano, and Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, examining their collections of medieval coins from Rome.

David Yoon (The American Numismatic Society) – The Iberian Peninsula
dyoon@numismatics.org

David Yoon is Associate Curator of European Coins at the American Numismatic Society. He is a medieval archaeologist specializing in political economy and structural change in medieval Mediterranean Europe. He has published several articles pertaining to coin finds from medieval sites and to the coinage of the Visigothic kingdom.

Collaborative Research Groups

Italy

Giuseppe Sarcinelli – Coordinator
PhD in “Ancient history: sources, methods and tools (disciplinary and technological) for the study of ancient civilizations”. He is responsible for the Laboratory of Study and Computerized Documentation of Numismatic Evidences at the University of Salento. His areas of interest range from the ancient numismatics (finds and coinage in Siris-Herakleia and Metapontum in Basilicata), to the Roman (coins from the excavations of Aquinum, Fabrateria and Costigliole d’Asti) and Medieval (coin finds from excavations at Terravecchia di Grammichele [Catania], Siponto, Fiorentino, Tertiveri [Foggia], Lecce, Taurisano, Castro, Ugento, [Lecce]). He is currently taking part in the publication of the British Museum’s corpus of medieval and modern Italian coins. He is responsible for the numismatic section of the PRIN project on “The Byzantine heritage of southern Italy: settlement, economy and resilience of changing territorial and landscape contexts.”

Gianluca Mandatori – Assistant Coordinator
Gianluca Mandatori was born in Latina (Italy) in 1981. After getting his M.B. in Classical Philology and M.A. in Philology, Literature and Ancient World History, he obtained a Ph.D. in Philology and Ancient History at the Sapienza-Università di Roma, carrying out a research project on the coinages of Latin colonies. He has been Visiting Research Scholar at the Universidad de Sevilla. He has written numerous scientific articles and has taken part in several archaeological campaigns in Italy and abroad. He currently collaborates with various museums and research institutes in Italy, Spain, and Finland, dealing mainly with economic history, numismatics, and epigraphy.

Daniele Castrizio
Daniele Castrizio is a full professor of Numismatics at the Department of Ancient and Modern Civilization of the University of Messina, where he holds the assignment of teaching of Greek and Roman Numismatics, Medieval Numismatics, and Iconography and Archaeology of Coins. Since January 2005, he has been a member of the Archaeological Mission of Antinoupolis / El Sheik Abada of the Papyrological Institute “G. Vitelli” of Florence. Since 2015, he has been a member of the Scientific Committee of the Archaeological Museum of Reggio Calabria.

Claudia Devoto
Claudia has a PhD in Classical Archaeology from the Università degli Studi di Messina, with a dissertation on the topography of ancient Campus Martius in Rome. She took part in several excavation projects with roles of responsibility (Elaiussa Sebaste, Turkey; Horrea Piperataria, Rome; Capitolium, Pompei). She is a numismatic consultant at the excavations of Capitolium, Pompei (Università di Catania), Horrea Piperataria (Rome), and Agrigento (Università di Catania).

Brunella Gargiulo
Brunella Gargiulo is an archaeologist, numismatist, and tour guide. She holds a PhD from the University of Basilicata and a specialization in Late Ancient and Medieval Archeology from the University of Salerno. She researches ancient and medieval numismatics, monetary circulation in Basilicata, and does work with GIS on the distribution of coin finds in Basilicata. She has collaborated with private companies, universities, museums, and superintendencies for the organization of archaeological excavation in Basilicata and Campania. She has been a member of international projects collaborating with Italian and foreign universities (Chora-Laboratori di Archeologia in Basilicata, Galileo Matera-Rennes2 Project).

Domenico Moretti
Domenico graduated in Medieval History with a thesis in medieval numismatics. He oversees research activities relating to medieval numismatics, with particular attention to Southern Italy in the period between the 5th and 13th centuries. He also deals with the study of monetary circulation in Emilia-Romagna from the 9th to the 15th century, through notarial documents and archaeological finds. He is the president of the “Centro Studi Storico Archeologici del Gargano”, and Editor-In-Chief of the scientific magazine “Kalkas”. He is one of the scientific directors of the international numismatic conferences “Langobardorum Nummorum Doctrina” (2018), and “In Sanctorum Nummis Effigies” (2019). He is currently collaborating in the study of numismatic materials for the “Ficocle – Cervia Vecchia” project. He is also part of the numismatic team coordinated by dr. G. Sarcinelli for the project “PRIN-Byzantine heritage of southern Italy” by prof. P. Arthur (University of Salento).

Alfredo Santoro
Since 2008, Alfredo has been Adjunct Professor of Medieval Archaeology and Material Sources for Medieval History at the University of Angers (France). Since 2008, he has taught at the University of Salerno (most recently in 2017). From 2014 to 2018, he was a member of the international national scientific research project “EUROPANGE – Les processus de rassemblements politique: l’exemple de l’Europe Angevine XIIIe-XIVe siècle,” financed by the ANR-Agence Nationale de la Recherche. He has published several articles on numismatic and medieval economic themes, most frequently related to the production and circulation of coins and their use in the economic and ritual field, also through archaeometry, archaeology and written sources; the occupation and development of settlements in the Middle Ages.

Adriana Travaglini
Adriana’s activities embrace different branches of numismatic research, favoring aspects of monetary production and circulation relating to various eras and areas located in diverse geographical areas such as southern Italy, Albania, Turkey, and Egypt. She is a scientific manager of national and international projects, and turns her interests in particular to materials found during archaeological excavations at many Apulian locations (Egnazia [Fasano], Brindisi, Oria, Vaste [Poggiardo], Apigliano [Martano], and Otranto) and Museum finds preserved in the same regional area (Bari, Brindisi, Mesagne, Gallipoli, and Ugento).

Asia Minor

Luca Zavagno – Eastern Mediterranean Islands

Luca Zavagno graduated from the University of Venice (2002); he obtained his Ph.D. (2007) at the University of Birmingham with a dissertation on the society, economics and politics of Byzantine cities in the early middle ages. He is Assistant Professor of Byzantine Studies in the Department of History at Bilkent University, where is currently working on his third monograph entitled Is there any urban life after Late Antiquity? The Byzantine City from Heraclius to the Fourth Crusade (610-1204 (Palgrave- Pivot Series). Dr. Zavagno is the author of many articles on the early Medieval and Byzantine Mediterranean, as well as two monographs: Cities in Transition: Urbanism in Byzantium Between Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (British Archaeological Reports-International Series, 2009) and Cyprus between Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. An Island in Transition (Routledge, 2017). He co-authored (with Özlem Caykent) the edited volumes Islands of Eastern Mediterranean. A History of Cross Cultural Encounters (I.B. Tauris, 2014) and People and Goods on the Move. Merchants, Networks and Communication Routes in the Medieval and Early Modern Mediterranean (IMK, 2016).  

Yunus Doğan
Yunus Doğan got his bachelor’s degree from the Department of History at Middle East Technical University (METU) with a thesis entitled “Convivencia and Reconquista a History among Muslims Jews and Christians in Medieval Iberian Peninsula” in 2016. After graduation, he continued his studies in the master’s program at Bilkent University Department of History and completed his master’s degree with a dissertation on “The Transformation of an Itinerant Army: from the Catalan Company to the Catalan Duchy of Athens and Neopatras (1303- 1388)”). Currently, he is a doctoral candidate in the same department, working on the socio-political and cultural role played by the Taifa kingdoms of Andalus in the Mediterranean between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries. Since 2019, he is one of the managerial assistants of the Byzantium at Ankara Seminar Series.

Fermude Gülsevinç
Fermude Gülsevinç graduated from Hacettepe University the Department of History, she obtained her master’s degree (2018) at the same university with a dissertation on the sense of victimhood of Early Christian societies that scattered around the heartland of Byzantine Empire. Currently, she is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of History at Bilkent University where she studies on the Christianization process of the Aegean Islands during the passage between the Late Antiquity and Early Middle Ages. Since 2019, she is one of the managerial assistants of the Byzantium at Ankara Seminar Series.

Ayşenur Mulla
Ayşenur Mulla graduated from Bilkent University the Department of English Language and Literature in 2018 with a thesis entitled “Ƿine orrybyll flesche, rotyng & stynkynge”: Decomposition in A Disputacioun Betwyx þe Body and Wormes. Currently, she is a master candidate in the Department of History at Bilkent University where she studies on Animals in Byzantium: “ And to Every Beast of the Earth and to Every Bird of the Heaven and to Everything That Creeps on the Earth” . Since 2019, she is one of the managerial assistants of the Byzantium at Ankara Seminar Series.

Ukraine

Vasyl Orlyk (Central Ukrainian National Technical University)

Vasyl is a Doctor of History (Dr. habil), professor, and head of the Departments of History, Archaeology, Information and Archival Affairs in the Central Ukrainian National Technical University (Kropyvnytskyi, Ukraine). He is, furthermore, an Editor-in-Chief of the journal “The Ukrainian Numismatic Annual” and the head of the Center of Numismatics and Monetary Circulation at Gregory Skovoroda University in Pereyaslav, Ukraine. Vasyl organizes an annual international science conference “The actual problems of the numismatics in the system of the special historical disciplines.” He is an researcher specializing in the ancient northern Black Sea coast: the coinage of the Crusader States, Byzantium empire, the Teutonic orders in Prussia and Livonia. He also studies the economic and financial history of the Russian empire and the history of trade in Ukraine.

Andrii Boiko-Haharin (The National Bank of Ukraine)

Andrii is a Doctor of Philosophy (History) and is the senior curator at the “Museum of Money” in the Sector of Public Relations and Financial Awareness at the Department of Communications of the National Bank of Ukraine. He is furthermore a senior lecturer in the Department of Art History at the National Academy of the Government Managerial Staff of Culture and Arts in Kyiv. He specializes in the history of money counterfeiting in Central and Eastern Europe from the early Middle-Ages to the present. He also conducts research in Oriental numismatics and the history of monetary circulation in Ukraine, as well as neighboring regions. He is, finally, very interested in the public outreach and communication practices of museums.

Olena Petrauskas (The Institute of History of Ukraine of NAS of Ukraine – Kyiv)

I am an assistant researcher in the genealogical and heraldic research unit within the Institute of History of Ukraine of NAS, in Kyiv, Ukraine. My academic interests includes American history, Ukrainian history, and archaeology. I have published seven articles in Ukrainian research journals, and am highly dedicated to professional development and enhancing my own scholarly experience. I am also a certified specialist in pedagogy and a private tutor in Ukraine history. For the last eight years, I have prepared students to complete college exams.

Data Contributors

The following individuals and institutions have generously contributed or provided private/open access data to FLAME. More detailed write-ups of these datasets and descriptions of how they were processed can be found here.

Portable Antiquities Scheme – UK (PAS UK dataset)
Coin Hoards of the Roman Empire (CHRE dataset)
Andrei Gandila (Thessaloniki dataset)
Peter Philps (Early Islamic dataset)

Former Contributors

James Shackelford (University of Pennsylvania) – Sasanian Empire
jshack@sas.upenn.edu

Alejandro G. Sinner (York University) – Iberian Peninsula
agsinner@yorku.ca, (647) 928-0490

Paolo Tedesco – Central and Northern Italy
paolo.tedesco@oaw.ac.at – tedesco.paolo@tiscali.it

Felege-Selam Solomon Yirga (The Ohio State University) – Aksum
yirga.5@buckeyemail.osu.edu