Lauren Marie Heilman

• MA Classical Studies Villanova University

Lauren Heilman earned her Master of Arts degree from Villanova University in Classical Studies. She also holds a BA in French and a BA in English from Bob Jones University and upon graduation was awarded Outstanding Graduate of Modern Languages and Literatures as well as Outstanding Graduate of English Language and Literature. She was spotlighted for her post-graduate comparative French/Classical research and translation work by Auburn University. She has varied interests, but her primary research focuses on the intersection of classical and biblical texts, the development of cult symbols in Ancient to Classical Greek literature, Ancient Greek philosophy, and Classics reception in the centos of Proba and Eudocia. Having previously worked in content marketing, Lauren assists in media marketing for HM Classics Academy where she also teaches short courses on Ancient Greek philosophy and history and Ancient Greek Music. Her doctoral thesis The Lyre and the Bow: Apollo’s Instruments from Oral Song to the Written Word traces the diachronic development of the lyre and the bow as a joint symbol within cultic and performative contexts from Homer to Herodotus with an emphasis on the role of the agon in musical competition.

PhD title

The Lyre and the Bow: Apollo’s Instruments from Oral Song to the Written Word

Supervisors

Dr Jessica Lightfoot and Dr Elena Theodorakopoulos

This thesis examines the diachronic development of the lyre and bow over a variety of genres and socio-political time periods and will analyze how they operate on the literary level, determining in what ways and in which periods they acquire cult significance or deviate from it, and observing what changes occur in their perception across time and across texts whether written or originally oral.

• 2025 Classical Association—"Duelling Adelphoi: The Contest of the Lyre in the Homeric Hymns to Apollo and Hermes”
• 2025 MOISA (Vilnius)—"Singing Incantations: A Key to Interpreting the Supremacy of the Logos in Plato’s Music”
• 2025 Bottom of the Iceberg: The Unwritten in Classical Literature (Co-organiser)— “Duelling Adelphoi: The Contest of the Lyre in the Homeric Hymns to Apollo and Hermes”
• 2024 Classical Association: “The Ensouled Word: Memory and Tools of Reminding in Plato’s Phaedrus”
• 2024 The Institute for Classics Education Guest Lecture—"Aeschylus’ Persians: Mirror of Empathy”
• 2024 The Institute for Classics Education Guest Lecture—"Heroic Intersections: Achilles and Hamlet”
• 2023 The Institute for Classics Education Guest Lecture—"Herodotus: Echoes of Epic”
• 2023 The Institute for Classics Education Guest Lecture —"Cento: A Byzantine Empress’ Reception of Homer”
• 2022 The Institute for Classics Education Guest Lecture—“Socrates’ Swansong: Immortality and Kleos in the Phaedo”
• 2022 Patristic, Medieval, and Renaissance Conference, Villanova University—“Through the Lens of the Cross: Christological Typology in the Centos of Proba and Eudocia”
• 2022 Belfast Summer School Guest Lecture “Dance in the Homeric World” (published on the Classical Association of Northern Ireland YouTube channel)
• 2022 Bryn Mawr Graduate Symposium— “‘Whirling in the Dance’: An Examination of Dance Motifs in the Shield of Achilles”
• 2022 AATF (American Association of Teachers of French) “Louis-Alfred Mercier—Francophone Classicist” (an examination of Mercier’s use of Homer and Virgil in his 19th novel, La Fille du Prêtre)
• 2021 AATF (American Association of Teachers of French) “The Role of Women in Mercier's La Fille du Prêtre"
• 2019 MIFLC (Mountain Interstate Foreign Language Association) "L'identité et l'humanité chez Giraudoux" (an examination of Giraudoux’s adaptation of classical texts)