Wednesday, February 26, 2025, 7 – 8pm EST

The city of Palmyra in the Syrian desert is a world-famous site due to its monumental ruins from the Roman period. The Palmyrene funerary limestone portraits are also well-known, but not many are aware that these portraits make up the largest group of representations of individuals stemming from one location in the ancient world. Today, these portraits make up an important part of Syria’s cultural heritage and remind us that ancient people put as much of an emphasis on self-representation as we do today – just in different media.

In this talk Rubina Raja, professor of classical archaeology and art at Aarhus University, and director of the Danish National Research Foundation’s Centre of Excellence for Urban Network Evolutions, will focus on Palmyrene portraits and their cultural contexts, and pull to the forefront some object biographies, giving insight into the spread of these portraits across the world from the 19th century onwards and the various meanings these came to hold in different countries.

In 1992, the architectural firm of Nix Mann & Associates (now Perkins&Will) endowed this lecture to bring distinguished speakers to campus on an annual basis.

The program is free and open to the public, and registration is required.