Jeanne Reames

Education

Ph.D., Pennsylvania State University (History)

M.Div., Emory University (Theology)

BA, University of Florida (English)

Background

Dr. Reames somehow managed to acquire three different degrees in three different subjects, but finally settled down to pursue ancient history after being lured in by the age-old fascination of Alexander the Great. She received her PhD from the Pennsylvania State University in 1998, where she studied Macedonian history under Eugene N. Borza.  She also developed a fascination with the Ancient Near East, especially the Sargonids of Neo-Assyria and the Achaemenid Persians.

She is the author of over fifteen articles about Alexander and his court, including, “Appropriating Narratives of Empire: Alexander and the Destruction of the Branchidai,” in Macedon and Its Influences, “Becoming Macedonian: Name-mapping and Ethnic Identity,” in Karanos, “The Cult of Hephaistion,” in Responses to Oliver Stone's Alexander, “The Mourning of Alexander,” in Syllecta Classica, and “An Atypical Affair: Alexander the Great, Hephaistion Amyntoros and the Nature of Their Relationship,” in The Ancient History Bulletin.

These also include several book chapters in various Companion volumes: Cambridge Companion to Alexander the Great (2023), Blackwell’s Companion to Greek Warfare (2021), Brill's Companion to the Campaigns of Philip II and Alexander the Great (2024?), and Routledge’s Companion to the Reception of Greek and Roman Gender and Sexuality (2022). In 2008, she edited (with Tim Howe) Macedonian Legacies (Regina Pub.), and is finishing editing Macedon and Its Influences (with Graham Wrightson) for Colloquia Antiqua (2025). Her current monograph project is a court study tentatively titled Playing for Keeps: Hephaistion and Krateros at the Court of Alexander the Great. She also writes historical fiction and has a pair of novels from Riptide Publishers about the young Alexander before he became “the Great”—Dancing with the Lion: Becoming and Rise (2019).

Outside academia, Reames writes fiction, cooks, and enjoys getting her hands in the dirt (gardening). She has one adult son and two impertinent black cats. She's a part-blood Miami-Peoria Indian and belongs to UNO's Native American Studies faculty -- mostly as support personnel and living proof that one's interests are not genetic.

Frequently Taught Courses

• Ancient Greek History (HIST 2510)
• Mesopotamia and Pre-Islamic Persia (HIST 4820/8826)
• Greek Myth, Religion, and Magic (HIST 4830/8836)
• Alexander the Great and the Macedonian Origin (HIST 4840/8846)
• Rome and the Early Church (HIST 4850/8856)