Meet the Trustees

Mary Beard is Professor of Classics at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Newnham College, where she has taught since 1984. She is also Professor of Ancient Literature at the Royal Academy, Classics editor of the Times Literary Supplement and a Fellow of the British Academy and International Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Beard has written numerous books and articles on ancient history and archaeology. Her books include: The Parthenon (2002), Pompeii: Life in a Roman Town (2008), Laughter in Ancient Rome (2014) and SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome (2015). Her Women and Power: A Manifesto (2017) was based on two lectures first given in the British Museum. She's currently finishing a book on images of Roman Emperors in Renaissance and later art.

She's presented many BBC television documentaries on Roman history and art more generally, from Meet the Romans (2012) through two episodes of Civilisations (2018) to Shock of the Nude (2020). She currently presents the BBC Two arts series Inside Culture.

As well as a DBE (2018), Beard was awarded the Wolfson History Prize (2009), the Bodley Medal (2016), the Princess of Asturias Award for Social Science (2016) and the Getty Medal (2019).