Caroline Waerzeggers is Professor of Assyriology at the Leiden University Institute for Area Studies.

More information about Caroline Waerzeggers

Research

I am an Assyriologist who focuses on the history of Mesopotamia in the first millennium BC. This was the time of Sargon, Nebuchadnezzar, Cyrus, and Alexander the Great - a time of great political transformations that affected an immense area from the Mediterranean to the Indus. I am particularly interested in the establishment of the Persian Empire in Babylonia and the reactions that this process triggered among different social groups. My ERC Starting Grant project evaluated the Babylonian context of the Judean deportees who returned home after the fall of Babylon to build the Second Temple of Jerusalem. Currently, I am leading an ERC Consolidator Grant project on the Persian Empire. In 2018 and 2019, I served as Director of the Netherlands Institute of the Near East.

Supervision

I am willing to supervise MA students on projects concerning any topic relating to the history of Mesopotamia from the Late Bronze Age to the Parthian period. For PhD projects, I welcome those interested in topics relating to the social and cultural history of Babylonia in the first millennium BCE.

CV

Education 
2001: PhD in Assyriology, Ghent University, Belgium 
1997: MA in Assyriology and Biblical Hebrew, Ghent University, Belgium 

Employment 
2018-2019: Director of the Netherlands Institute for the Near East, Leiden University
2016-present: Professor of Assyriology, Leiden University
2014: Senior Lecturer in Assyriology, Leiden University
2012: Lecturer in Assyriology, Leiden Unversity 
2010: Lecturer in Ancient Near Eastern History, University College London 
2006: Lecturer in Ancient Near Eastern History, VU University Amsterdam 
2005: Post-doctoral researcher (Project: “Borsippean Families”), FWF Austria, Vienna University 
2003: Post-doctoral researcher in START-project “The Economic History of Babylonia in the First Millennium BC” co-ordinated by Michael Jursa, FWF Austria, Vienna University 
2002: Post-doctoral researcher, BOF, Ghent University

PhD supervision

Topics relating to the social and cultural history of Babylonia.

Grants and awards

• ERC Consolidator Grant (2017-2022)
• ERC Starting Independent Researcher Grant (2009-2015)
• FWF Austria Research Grant (2005-2006)
• BOF Research Grant Ghent University (2002)
• FWO Flanders PhD Research Grant (1997-2001)

Office hour

Monday 13:00 - 14:00

Publications