LONDON (BU) -- Standing before the Cyrus Cylinder at the British Museum in February 2025, Pardee School student Katie Harmon experienced a moment that would become a cornerstone of both her academic thesis and personal growth.
Harmon, a recipient of the William R. Keylor Travel Grant, undertook a week-long research expedition to London that proved pivotal for her study of Persian kingship and the continuity of power structures in Iranian history.
Harmon’s journey took her through three of London’s most renowned cultural repositories: the British Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the British Library. Her research focused primarily on Ancient Persian artifacts and Islamic Persianate artwork, with special attention to the Shahnameh (Book of Kings), the national epic of Iran.
The British Museum provided Harmon with rare opportunities that few undergraduate researchers experience. She held private meetings with the assistant keeper for Islamic objects, who provided a personalized tour of the collection. Even more remarkably, Harmon gained access to the Museum’s Middle East Department Study Room, where she personally handled cylinder and stamp seals from the Achaemenid and Sasanian Persian dynasties—artifacts that span thousands of years of Persian history.
“My thesis would not be possible without this trip,” Harmon reflects. “Witnessing these artifacts in person, having meetings with the curator, and experiencing the study room at the British Museum and the reading room at the British Library answered my remaining questions that were hindering me from finishing this project.”
One of Harmon’s key insights concerned what she describes as “the paradoxical nature of the impact of the Mongol and Timurid conquests” on the Persian region, and how Persian concepts of kingship allowed these conquerors to legitimize their rule despite the destruction they had wrought.
Perhaps most significantly, Harmon observed striking continuities between ancient and modern Persian leadership. Her examinations of artifacts from Cyrus the Great’s era revealed patterns of legitimization through language that parallel techniques used by Iranian leaders.
“I was able to witness the flexibility of the figure of the Shah that was present from day one,” Harmon notes, expressing how this discovery confirmed her hypothesis about continuity in Persian power structures across millennia.
Beyond academic discoveries, Harmon’s London expedition marked her first solo international travel experience. The independence afforded by the grant allowed not only for rigorous research but also meaningful personal reflection.
“This experience changed me as a person,” she writes. “I not only got to do amazing research and connect with wonderful people in the process, but I also got to spend a lot of time with myself, reflecting on what I was doing and what I wanted for my future as a whole.”
One particularly memorable moment came during lunch with curators from the British Museum’s Middle Eastern departments. During their conversation about career paths, the curators shared their own winding journeys into Middle Eastern studies—paths that, like Harmon’s, rarely began with a direct focus on the field.
“They all told me, if they had learned anything, that what they learned is the path chooses you,” Harmon recalls. This conversation left a lasting impression, providing both validation and perspective on her own academic journey.
The experience has cemented Harmon’s interest in pursuing graduate studies in the United Kingdom, where she hopes to continue her work under specialists in Persianate studies.
“This trip proved to me that it is something I really do want to pursue after my graduation,” she writes, “as after only a week in London, I fell in love with the country and its people, and I felt at home.”