The variety of topics offered in this volume of papers in honour of Emeritus Professor Samuel N.C. Lieu (劉南強) reflect his wide scholarly interests and remarkable record of publications. His interest in ancient cultures, history, religion, and historiography are exemplified in the many books and papers he has authored during his academic career. His research interests cover a broad range of topics across a geographical spread extending from north Africa to southern China. These topics are matched only by their chronological breadth that extends in some cases through to the twentieth century. His career is known principally for his many contributions to our understanding of Manichaeism in its linguistic, cultural, theological, and political settings. It is true to say that his research on Manichaeism has transformed our understanding of the religion and its broader impacts, while also making textual sources for its study available in a way that was once considered difficult, if not impossible, but for which task he has encouraged and enlisted many scholars to collaborate.
Sam Lieu was born on 4 March 1950 in Hong Kong and educated at Saint Paul’s College. He received his high school education in the United Kingdom and was an Exhibitioner in History at Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge. He took his DPhil degree in Ancient History at the University of Oxford where he was also a Junior Research Fellow at Wolfson College. He was successively Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, Reader and Professor of Ancient History at Warwick University in the United Kingdom. In 1996 he was appointed to the Chair of Ancient History at Macquarie University in Sydney, and in 2010 he was awarded the title of Distinguished Professor by Macquarie University. He retired in 2016 and became Emeritus Professor in 2017. Since 2018 he is a Bye Fellow of Robinson College, University of Cambridge.
Sam has been the recipient of several distinguished fellowships. He was Alexander Von Humboldt Stipendiat, Universität Tübingen (1989–1990), Leverhulme Visiting (Professorial) Fellow at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (2000–2001), and Walker-Ames Visiting (Professorial) Fellow at the University of Washington, Seattle, 2009. In 2012 he was awarded a DORA (Discovery Outstanding Research Award) by the Australian Research Council for a project on Chinese Manichaean texts (2013–2017). In 1998 he was elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities, in 2016 Fellow of the Royal Society of New South Wales, and in 2019 Honorary Fellow of the Hong Kong Academy of the Humanities, and most recently, in 2021, he was elected (UK) Fellow of the British Academy. He is a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society, a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. In 2003 he was awarded a Centenary Medal by the Governor General of Australia for his contribution to both Classical and Asian Studies.
Sam has been the delegate of the Australian Academy of the Humanities to the UAI since 2004 and was elected a Bureau (Council) member of the Union Académique Internationale (UAI) (2013–2017), before being elected President at the 89th General Assembly of the Union at Tokyo (2017). He is the first Academician of Asian descent to hold this prestigious international position. Two major projects sponsored by the UAI are under his direction: the Corpus Fontium Manichaeorum (since 1996) and China and the Ancient Mediterranean World (since 2008).
In the field of Byzantine historiography, he has published the following volumes: (with contributions by M. Morgan and J.M. Lieu) The Emperor Julian: Panegyric and Polemic, Claudius Mamertinus, John Chrysostom and Ephrem the Syrian in 1986; (with D.A.S. Montserrat) From Constantine to Julian: Pagan and Byzantine Views. A Source History in 1996; followed two years later by (also with D.A.S. Montserrat) Constantine: History, Historiography and Legend in 1998. And on Roman/Byzantine relations with Persia he has published (with M.H. Dodgeon) The Roman Eastern Frontier and the Persian Wars AD 226–363. A Documentary History in 1991; followed by (with G. Greatrex) The Roman Eastern Frontier and the Persian Wars, Part II AD 363–630: A Narrative Sourcebook in 2002. Most of these titles are still in print and new editions have been prepared and published. This is in addition to his many articles touching on Late Roman and Byzantine topics. The two volumes dedicated to the Roman Eastern Frontier remain indispensable textbooks for the study of Eastern Roman and Sasanian relations.
Various grants from the British Academy, the Nuffield Foundation and the Wolfson Foundation have supported Sam’s research in the area of Byzantine historiography and hagiography. These awards have covered the topics of Early Christian (Greek and Syriac) and Early Chinese Buddhist hagiography; Libanius as a source for the history of the Eastern Roman frontier; the Artemii Passio as a source for fourth-century history; Rome and Persia relations; the Holy Man in Early Byzantium and Medieval China; Urbanism in Hellenistic, Parthian and Roman Mesopotamia and Syria; and Roman foreign policy in the East from Severus Alexander to the Arab Conquest and the development of a frontier. These grants contributed to his initiating output in relation to the study of the Eastern Roman/Byzantine world from the third to the seventh century. His contribution to the study of Byzantine hagiography has focused on Constantine the Great and the Great Martyr Artemius, as well as the study of comparative hagiography as exemplified in Byzantine Christian and Chinese Buddhist sources.
Sam’s contribution to the research of Manichaeism is major and significant. He has been a leader in the field since the publication of his main monograph, Manichaeism in the Later Roman Empire and Medieval China—A Historical Survey (Manchester University Press, 1985, 1988; Sandpiper, 1994; 2nd ed., Mohr-Siebeck, 1992), which remains the most influential publication on the history of the Manichaean church, and the initiation (with P. Bryder) of the Database of Manichaean Texts and Dictionary of Manichaean Terms and Concepts projects in the mid-1980s. For his research on Manichaeism, he has been the recipient of several major grants from the Australian Research Council and funding bodies in the UK.
Among his many notable publications on Manichaean texts and texts about Manichaeism are: (with I. Gardner) Manichaean Texts from the Roman Empire (Cambridge University Press, 2004) and (with M. Vermes) [Hegemonius], Acta Archelai (The Acts of Archelaus) (Brepols, 2001); and for the Corpus Fontium Manichaeorum: (with S. Clackson and E. Hunter) Dictionary of Manichaean texts, vol. I: Texts from the Roman Empire (Texts in Syriac, Greek, Coptic and Latin) (Brepols, 1998); (with L. Eccles, M. Franzmann, I. Gardner and K. Parry) Medieval Christian and Manichaean Remains from Quanzhou (Zayton) (Brepols, 2012); and (with G.B. Mikkelsen) Tractatus Manichaicus Sinicus—摩尼教殘經, Pars Prima: Text, Translation and Indices (Brepols, 2017). His collected papers were published in two volumes: Manichaeism in Mesopotamia and the Roman East (Brill, 1994) and Manichaeism in Central Asia and China (Brill, 1998). Sam has served on the board of the International Association of Manichaean Studies since its inception in 1989. He was president from 2009 to 2013.
In addition to pioneering the study of Manichaeism in the English-speaking world, he has made an important contribution to the study of Eastern Christianity, especially the history of the Church of the East (Nestorian) in Central Asia and China. We should point out that the logo for Brill’s Texts and Studies in Eastern Christianity series edited by Ken Parry, in which this volume of papers appears, is based on an early fourteenth-century tombstone from Quanzhou in Fujian, South China. Several contributors to this volume—Iain Gardner, Majella Franzmann and Ken Parry—were part of the Australian research team that worked in South China from 2002–2010 with the support of the Australian Research Council and the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation and sponsored by UNESCO, under Sam’s direction. The results of the team’s research appeared in Medieval Christian and Manichaean Remains from Quanzhou (Zayton) in 2012.
Sam has left a formidable legacy at Macquarie University through his promotion of the study of Late Antiquity, the Roman East, Byzantium, and Silk Road Studies. A notable feature of his scholarship has been the way it has informed his teaching, with the introduction of undergraduate and postgraduate seminars related to his research interests. Macquarie’s interdisciplinary approach to the study of Ancient History owes much to his vision for teaching the subject in a modern university. The topic of ancient Palmyra was introduced into the high school syllabus of New South Wales in 2018 and was partly informed by the teaching of Palmyrene history at Macquarie, and a postgraduate unit, Caravan Cities, which Sam introduced soon after his appointment to the department in 1996.
We might end by saying that everyone who knows Sam has enjoyed his exuberant and enthusiastic personality as well as benefiting from his generosity and kindness. His unbounded energy and l’ amour de la vie have been an inspiration to many a student and collaborator. We trust that this volume of papers will stand as a monument to his achievements as an outstanding scholar, whose trailblazing research continues to inspire many in different parts of the world. Unfortunately, one of the contributors to this volume, Fergus Millar, passed away in July 2019, but we are fortunate and honoured to publish the last piece he wrote before he died. Sadly, another contributor and colleague, Aloïs van Tongerloo, passed away in February 2022.
The list of contents for the volume was presented to Sam at a symposium held at the Ancient India and Iran Trust in Cambridge in March 2020, the month of his 70th birthday. We are grateful to Nicholas Sims-Williams for making the presentation in our absence. We would also like to thank Peter Edwell for his assistance in the initial stages of preparing this volume for publication, and Janet Wade for producing the index.
The editors
Macquarie University