Biography
My research focuses on the history of information and information technologies in the Mediterranean Middle Ages. Using the massive amounts of legal and bureaucratic documents produced by late medieval scribes known as notaries in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, I study the rapid expansion of the written word in the form of legal contracts, especially in late medieval Provence. I treat these practical written documents as a new information technology that radically transformed how individuals throughout the medieval Mediterranean produced and consumed information related to social life and economic exchange. These transformations did not impact everyone in medieval society in the same ways, and much of my research focuses on the effects of this late medieval phenomenon on Jews, women, peasants, and artisans.
I am also a project lead for The Documentary Archaeology of Late Medieval Europe, an international and interdisciplinary research project that collects, edits, and publishes lists of everyday objects recorded in late medieval household or estate inventories. I have edited dozens of archival manuscripts related to Jewish households, parish churches, and urban artisans. I have also contributed to the Historical Pharmacopeias Research Project which publishes lists of ingredients and medicaments found in pharmacies throughout Europe and the Western Hemisphere up to 1800.
HIST 101: Western Civilizations I
HIST 105: World Civilizations I
HIST 265: History of Medicine: From Ancient Mesopotamia to the Atlantic World
HIST 301: Medieval Worlds
HIST 341: Bodies and Things: Humans and Technology from the Paleolithic to Today
Publications
"The Crown of Aragon." In The Documentary Archeology of Late Medieval Europe, edited by Daniel Lord Smail, Gabriel H. Pizzorno, and Laura Morreale. 2025.
"Greater Provence." In The Documentary Archeology of Late Medieval Europe, edited by Daniel Lord Smail, Gabriel H. Pizzorno, and Laura Morreale. 2024.
"Jewish Households." In The Documentary Archeology of Late Medieval Europe, edited by Daniel Lord Smail, Gabriel H. Pizzorno, and Laura Morreale. 2020.
"A Prayer for Wisdom: Dominican Educational Ambitions and Humbert de Romans." Revue Mabillon 32: 77-96, 2021.
"Bernard Gui's De tribus gradibus and Institutional Preservation." Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum Nova Series 4: 37-66, 2019.
Recent Presentations
"The Late Medieval Inventories of Gabriel Durand's Alpine Apothecary Workshop," Renaissance Society of America, 2025.
"Jewish Identity, Medieval History, and Citizenship in Modern France," Medieval Academy of America Annual Meeting, 2025.
"AI Assignments in the Humanities," AI and Human Innovation Showcase, University of North Dakota, 2025.
"Une histoire des juifs au Moyen Âge," Archives départementales des Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, 2024.
“Intersections of Hebrew and Latin Documentary Cultures: A New Digital Resource,” The Medieval Out of Time & Place, a joint meeting of the Mid-America Medieval Association, the Medieval Association of the Midwest, and the Midwest Medieval History Conference, 2024.
"La circulation des documents latins par les juifs en Provence médiévale," Congrès de la Société des études juives, 2024.
"Les instruments notariés des juifs en Provence médiévale," Journée d'étude sur l'histoire des juifs en France, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, 2024.
"Jews in Rural Society in Medieval Provence," Beyond Large Communities: Small Jewish Settlements in the Middle Ages, Institut für Geschichte an der Universität Klagenfurt in cooperation with the Institut für jüdische Geschichte Österreichs, 2024.
Ph. D., History, Harvard University, 2024
M. Phil., History, University College London, 2018
A.B., History, Princeton University, 2016