Mark Roblee

Mark Roblee works on intellectual and cultural history in the late antique Mediterranean world, particularly the intersection between religious and philosophical thought. Before joining Commonwealth Honors College, he was a lecturer in the history department at UMass Amherst and a visiting faculty member at Assumption College, Worcester, MA. Courses taught include: Ideas that Change the World; Introduction to World Religions; History and Its Publics; Reimagining Historic House Museums; Western Thought to 1600; and World History I and II. A longtime chair of the Five College Faculty Seminar in Late Antiquity, his research and publications focus on reading, imagination, and personal divinity in Neoplatonic and Hermetic literature. As a public historian, he wonders about the presentation of antiquity, "numinous objects," and why people love old things.