Jack Tannous
I am interested in the cultural history of the eastern Mediterranean, especially the Middle East, in the Late Antique and early medieval period. My research focuses on the Syriac-speaking Christian communities of the Near East in this period, but I am interested in a number of other, related areas, including Eastern Christian Studies more broadly, Patristics/early Christian studies, Greco-Syriac and Greco-Arabic translation, Christian-Muslim interactions, sectarianism and identity, early Islamic history, the history of the Arabic Bible, and the Quran. I am also interested in manuscripts and the editing of Syriac and Arabic (especially Christian Arabic) texts.
I am working on a book entitled Lovers of Labor at the End of the Ancient World: Syriac Scholars Between Byzantium and Islam. I have edited and translated the Syriac letters of George, Bishop of the Arab Tribes (d. 724) as well as the Karshuni life of Theodota of Amid (d. 698). I have also translated the Syriac life of Simeon of the Olives (d. 734). These latter two are to eventually be published in collaboration with Andrew Palmer.
With Scott Johnson, I created and maintain the site syri.ac(link is external), an online resource for Syriac studies, originally hosted at Dumbarton Oaks and now at the University of Oklahoma.
Education
Ph.D., Princeton University
M.Phil., Oxford
B.A., University of Texas, Austin
Source: Princeton University Department of History
