Dr. Alasdair Grant
Sprechstunde: nach Vereinbarung 
E-Mail: agrant@uni-mainz.de
I studied Medieval History, Latin and Byzantine Studies at the universities of St Andrews, Oxford and Edinburgh. My research interests are broad but coalesce around the social history of the medieval Mediterranean and Caucasus regions, with particular focus on the themes of slavery and rebellion. My first book, Greek Captives and Mediterranean Slavery, 1260–1460, a substantially revised version of my PhD thesis, was published by Edinburgh University Press in 2024.
My current project, in the context of the Emmy Noether Junior Research Group ‘Social Contexts of Rebellion in the Early Islamic Period’ (SCORE, 2020–26), concerns contention in Armenia during its time as a province of the early Islamic Empire (seventh to ninth centuries CE). I am also undertaking editorial and translation work – partially collaborative – on martyrological texts, which offer important but so far underused perspectives on early medieval Armenian society. This project will culminate in a monograph provisionally entitled Armenian Rebels in the Early Islamic Empire, 640–900. Together with SCORE group leader Dr Hannah-Lena Hagemann, I have co-edited the multi-author volume Between Rebels and Rulers in the Early Islamicate World: Power, Contention and Identity based on our first project conference and published by Edinburgh University Press in 2025.
I also retain a keen interest in the history and culture of my native Scotland. Before coming to Hamburg, I curated an exhibition at the University of Edinburgh on Scottish–Hellenic connections, ‘Edina/Athena: The Greek Revolution and the Athens of the North, 1821–2021’, funded by the A. G. Leventis Foundation, and I continue to publish on this topic.
In parallel to SCORE, I continue to be involved in several other professional activities. I was co-principal investigator (with Dr Daphne Penna) of the collaborative Hamburg–Groningen research project ‘Loyalty Oaths in the Roman, Byzantine and Islamicate Legal Spheres’ (LORILS, 2023–24). Since 2024, I have been a Young Academy Fellow of the Academy of Sciences in Hamburg. Since 2025, I have been dividing my time between Hamburg and the Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz, where I am acting assistant (wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter) to Professor Johannes Pahlitzsch, Department of Byzantine Studies. I was elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (UK) in February 2025.