Keith Bradley

Biography

Keith Bradley is the Eli J. and Helen Shaheen Professor of Classics Emeritus. He lives in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, where he holds the position of Adjunct Professor in the Department of Greek and Roman Studies at the University of Victoria. He was educated in the United Kingdom at the University of Sheffield and the University of Oxford (St. John’s College), from both of which institutions he holds advanced degrees, including from the former the super doctorate (Litt.D.). At Oxford he was the pupil of the eminent ancient historian A.N. Sherwin White.

He is internationally known as a leading historian of ancient Roman society and culture. He has lectured widely throughout North America, the United Kingdom, Europe, Australia, and Asia, and has held visiting appointments at the Australian National University (Canberra) and Stanford University. In 2001 he was the principal historical adviser and commentator for the PBS television series The Roman Empire in the First Century. He has written some 200 essays, papers, and reviews, and is the author of seven books: Suetonius’ Life of Nero: An Historical Commentary (Brussels 1978); Slaves and Masters in the Roman Empire (Oxford 1987), Slavery and Rebellion in the Roman World (London 1989, rev. 1998), Discovering the Roman Family (Oxford 1991), Slavery and Society at Rome (Cambridge 1994), Apuleius and Antonine Rome (Toronto 2012), and Marguerite Yourcenar’s Hadrian: Writing the Life of a Roman Emperor (Toronto 2024); he also co-edited and contributed to the opening volume on Greco-Roman antiquity of The Cambridge World History of Slavery (Cambridge 2011), and his writings have been variously translated into German, Spanish, and Korean.

He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, the nation’s highest academic distinction, and a sometime Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London (UK). He has received numerous research awards from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and has held a highly prestigious Canada Council Killam Research fellowship. He has also held administrative and editorial offices in the Classical Association of Canada and the Society for Classical Studies (US). At Notre Dame he was Concurrent Professor of History, and served two terms as Chair of the Department of Classics. Current research projects (2025) include further studies of Roman social relations under the High Empire, the life and literary œuvre of Marguerite Yourcenar, and commissioned contributions to the projected Oxford Handbook to Everyday Life in Ancient Rome and Cambridge Companion to Suetonius.