Research Bio

Susanna Elm, Fellow, the British Academy, is Sidney H. Ehrman Chair and Distinguished Professor in the Departments of History and Ancient Greek and Roman Studies. Her current research focuses on the reality of enslavement  in the later Roman empire and its impact on the formulation of core Christian tenets, especially in the writings of Augustine of Hippo. She is currently working on a projected monograph on the topic, entitled Augustine the Economist: Enslavement, Taxation, and Original Sin. In 2025, she published her book The Importance of Being Gorgeous: Gender and Christian Imperial Rule in Late Antiquity with UC Press. She has also published an article in Fashion Theory in 2025, as well as the volume she co-edited with Kristina Sessa,  War and Community in Late Antiquity, with Cambridge University Press.

Research Expertise and Interest

history of the Later Roman Empire, pagan - Christian interactions, ancient medicine, slavery and the evolution of Christianity, leadership and empire, gender and imperial rule, reception of antiquity