Dr. Joseph “Joe” Manning

Joe Manning is the William K. and Marilyn M. Simpson Professor of Classics and History at Yale University. He has two primary research focuses, the Economic and legal History of the Hellenistic world, and Egyptian history in the long run. His main concern has been the historical interpretation of the Greek and demotic documentary texts of the Ptolemaic period, the role of archaeology in the context of Ptolemaic economic history, and the applicability of social science theory, particularly New Institutional Economics and Social Network Analysis, towards an understanding the contextualization of the historical developments in the Ptolemaic empire. His work now takes him in some new and exciting directions, including working on the modeling of Egyptian history using cultural evolutionary theory for the Seshat Project, the study of comparative bureaucratic developments in the Mediterranean and China, the history of property in the context of ancient law, and a new major project exploring and specifying the underlying links between short-term climate change, war, rebellion and economic performance in the Hellenistic world.