M. Rahim Shayegan
Director
Amuzegar Chair in Iranian; Professor, Iranian Philology and Ancient History
Email: shayegan@humnet.ucla.edu
Biography
M. Rahim Shayegan is Professor of Iranian and the Ancient Near East and the Eleanor and Jahangir Amuzegar Chair in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures (NELC) at UCLA. At UCLA, he also serves as the founding director of the Pourdavoud Institute for the Study of the Iranian World (established 2017), the founding director of the Yarshater Center for the Study of Iranian Literary Traditions (established 2023), as well as the founder and chair of Global Antiquity (established 2020), an academic unit of the Humanities.
Professor Shayegan received his PhD from Harvard University, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, and was a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows before joining the NELC faculty at UCLA.
He has been the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship (2013–14), is a Foreign Member of the Academia Europaea, Section of Classics and Oriental Studies (2019–present); a Corresponding Member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW) (2021–present), and the invited Yarshater conférencier in November 2022 delivering five lectures at INALCO/Collège de France.
Professor Shayegan has authored and edited several books, among them: Arsacids and Sasanians: Political Ideology in Post-Hellenistic and Late Antique Persia (Cambridge UP, 2011); Aspects of History and Epic in Ancient Iran (Harvard UP, 2012); and Cyrus the Great: Life and Lore (Harvard UP, 2019). He is currently working on a number of volumes on the Achaemenid and Sasanian empires, among them Achéménides et Sassanides : Continuités et ruptures, which is the text of the cinq conférences delivered at INALCO/Collège de France; History of the Sasanian Empire (Cambridge University Press); and Ancient Iran and the West (Getty Publishers).
He is currently working on a number of volumes on the Achaemenid and Sasanian empires, among them Achéménides et Sassanides: Continuités et ruptures, the text of cinq conférences at INALCO/Collège de France; The World of Ancient Iran and the West (Getty Publishers), and Companion to the Sasanian Empire (Wiley-Blackwell). He is editor of a number of newly established series, among them Iran and the Ancient World with University of California Press (UCP).
Education
- PhD, Iranian Philology and Ancient History • Harvard University
- Graduate Work, Iranian Philology, Seminar für Iranistik • Georg-August-Universität, Göttingen, Germany
- MA, Iranian Philology and Ancient History • Institut des Études Iraniennes, Université de la Sorbonne, Paris, France
- BA, Philosophy, Comparative Philology, History, Philosophisches Seminar • Albertus-Magnus-Universität zu Köln, Cologne, Germany
Research
- Old and Middle Iranian philology and epigraphy
- Iranian epigraphy
- Achaemenid, Arsacid, Seleucid, and Sasanian history with special attention to interactions between Mesopotamia and Iran; as well as Greco-Roman and Iranian cultural and ideological exchanges
- Ancient Iranian and Near Eastern religions
- Greek historiography; Hellenistic and Late Antique worlds
- Epic and oral traditions
Selected Writing
- Bakhos, Carol; Shayegan, M. Rahim, eds. (2010). The Talmud in Its Iranian Context. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. ISBN 978-3-161-50187-6.
- Shayegan, M. Rahim (2011). Arsacids and Sasanians: Political Ideology in Post-Hellenistic and Late Antique Persia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-76641-8.
- Shayegan, M. Rahim (2012). Aspects of History and Epic in Ancient Iran: From Gaumāta to Wahnām. Hellenic Studies. Vol. 52. Cambridge, MA: Center for Hellenic Studies, Trustees for Harvard University. ISBN 978-0-674-06588-8.
- Shayegan, M. Rahim (2013). “Sasanian Political Ideology”. In Potts, Daniel T. (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Iran. Oxford and New York City: Oxford University Press. pp. 805–813. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199733309.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-973330-9.
- Shayegan, M. Rahim (2017). “Persianism: Or Achaemenid Reminiscences in the Iranian and Iranicate World(s) of Antiquity”. In Strootman, Rolf; Versluys, Miguel John (eds.). Persianism in Antiquity. Oriens et Occidens. Vol. 25. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag. pp. 401–457. ISBN 978-3-515-11382-3.
- Shayegan, M. Rahim, ed. (2019). Cyrus the Great: Life and Lore. Washington, D.C./Cambridge, MA: Illex Foundation. ISBN 978-0-674-98738-8.
- Shayegan, M. Rahim (2022). “The End of the Parthian Arsacid Empire”. In Gehler, Michael; Rollinger, Robert; Strobl, Philipp (eds.). The End of Empires. Universal- und kulturhistorische Studien / Studies in Universal and Cultural History. Wiesbaden: Springer Fachmedien. pp. 213–247. doi:10.1007/978-3-658-36876-0_9. ISBN 978-3-658-36876-0.
Courses
Undergraduate
- Achaemenid Civilization and Empire of Alexander
- History of the Achaemenid Empire
- History of the Arsacid (Parthian) Empire
- History of the Sasanian Empire
- Introduction to Western Middle Iranian (Pahlavi; Manichaean Middle Persian)
- Religions of Ancient Iran (Zoroastrianism; Manichaeism; Mazdakism)
- Early New Persian Epic Poetry and Prose
Graduate
- Old Persian Cuneiform
- Avestan (Old and Younger)
- Advanced Western Middle Iranian (Pahlavi; Manichaean Middle Persian and Parthian; Sasanian epigraphy)
- Introduction to Eastern Middle Iranian (Sogdian; Bactrian)
- Topics on Ancient Iranian History and Religions
- Early Persian Prose and Poetry, including the Šāhnāme and popular romances and historiographical writings
Selected Grants & Awards
- Corresponding Member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (2022–).
- Conférencier des 10èmes Conférences d’Études iraniennes Ehsan et Latifeh Yarshater à INALCO/Collège de France (November 2022).
- Academia Europaea, Foreign Member to the Section of Classics and Oriental Studies (2019–present).
- John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellow (2013–2014).
- Ehsan Yarshater Book Award (for Arsacids and Sasanians, Cambridge UP, 2011) by the International Society for Iranian Studies (2012).