Biography

Ian Hathaway holds a doctorate in History and Renaissance Studies from Yale University, and a bachelor and master’s degree from the University of Pavia. His work explores issues of mobility, protection, diplomacy, and state building in the early modern Mediterranean from a comparative and connected perspective. His interests focus on several Mediterranean polities, including the Republic of Venice, the Grand Duchy of Florence, the Order of St. John of Rhodes and Malta, the Republic of Ragusa/Dubrovnik, and the Ottoman Empire. His research, which takes place in Italy, Turkey, Croatia, and Malta has been supported by the US Fulbright Program (Turkey) and by the Council for American Overseas Research Centers.

As a Max Weber Fellow at the European University Institute, Ian plans to focus on editing his dissertation for future publication as well as on two separate article projects. The first will be a methodological study of the formal features of early modern Mediterranean travel papers; the second is a comparative project on the commensurability of travel papers and practices in the Ottoman and Latin Mediterranean during the sixteenth century.

During his time as a graduate student, Ian has also developed an interest in the teaching of global connected and comparative history. He has worked as a teaching assistant for several classes in this field (The World Circa 1000; The World Circa 1500) and is passionate about discussing topics such as cross-cultural trade, cultural encounters, conquest, violence, as well as incipient Orientalism in the Medieval and early modern periods.