For several years I have been exploring the religious activities of women in the Greek city of Epizephyrian Locri in southern Italy. During a study leave in 2003-2004 I focused on women?s rituals at a cave of the nymphs in Locri (the Grotta Caruso), exploring its connections to the chthonic aspects of Persephone in Magna Graecia and to the Underworld and theatrical aspects of Dionysus. In exploring the archaeological evidence left behind in these sanctuaries I was surprised to find a surprising number of figurines of comic actors and masks from the comic theatre. This has led me to work on the hypothesis that women's chthonic rituals in the Greek West contributed to the development of Greek comic theatre. I intend for this to become a monograph that will combine archaeological and literary evidence from the late Classical and Hellenistic period.

An aspect of ancient religion that has intrigued me is the worship of meteorites. The dramatic intrusion of a rock from the sky was seen as a missive from the gods. It led to the baetyls of the Semitic world, and to such physical incarnations of gods in the Classical world as the stone that Pindar recognized as the Magna Mater (Pythian 3.77-79), the black stone of Cybele and Elagabalus' baetyl that he imported to Rome from Syria. On this subject I have submitted an article for publication entitled "Some Gods are not Crazy: Worshipping Rocks in the Ancient World."

Another article in preparation is one that looks at eponymous nymphs and the way they confer identity on athletic heroes in epinician poetry.