20 Facts About Averil Cameron

Dame Averil Millicent Cameron, often cited as AM Cameron, is a British historian.

Averil Cameron is an expert on Late Antiquity, Classics, and Byzantine Studies.

Averil Cameron was Professor of Late Antique and Byzantine History at the University of Oxford, and the Warden of Keble College, Oxford, between 1994 and 2010.

Averil Cameron was the only child of working-class parents, Tom Roy Sutton and Millicent Sutton.

Averil Cameron read literae humaniores at Somerville College, Oxford, where she was awarded the Edwards Scholarship in 1960 and the Rosa Hovey Scholarship in 1962.

From 1965 to 1994, Averil Cameron taught at King's College, London.

Averil Cameron began as an Assistant Lecturer, before being promoted to Lecturer in 1968 and to Reader in Ancient History in 1970.

Averil Cameron was Professor of Ancient History from 1978 to 1989, and Professor of Late Antique and Byzantine Studies from 1989 to 1994.

Averil Cameron was Founding Director of the Centre for Hellenic Studies at KCL, serving from 1989 to 1994.

Averil Cameron was Editor of the Journal of Roman Studies from 1985 to 1990 and has served as Chair of a number of academic institutions, including the Oxford Centre for Byzantine Research and the Institute of Classical Studies Advisory Council.

Averil Cameron chaired the project on the Prosopography of the Byzantine World at King's College London.

Averil Cameron was Vice-Chair and then Chair of the Cathedrals Fabric Commission for England and chaired the Review of the Royal Peculiars.

Averil Cameron has acted as the President of academic societies including: the Ecclesiastical History Society, the Council for British Research in the Levant, and the International Federation of Associations of Classical Studies.

Averil Cameron wrote on late antiquity and the emergence of Islam, having been a co-founder of the series Studies on Late Antiquity and Early Islam, and recently published a number of influential studies opening up the subject of literary, philosophical and theological dialogues and debates in Byzantium from the early Christian period to the twelfth century, Dialoguing in Late Antiquity, Arguing it Out and an edited volume with Niels Gaul.

Averil Cameron holds honorary degrees from the Universities of Warwick, St Andrews, Aberdeen, Lund, London, and Queen's University Belfast, as well as a DLitt.

Averil Cameron became a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1999 and a Dame Commander in 2006.

Averil Cameron is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, the British Academy, the Ecclesiastical History Society, the Institute of Classical Studies, London King's College, London, and the Royal Historical Society.

In 2007, a Festschrift edited by Hagit Amirav and Bas ter Haar Romeny, From Rome to Constantinople: Studies in Honour of Averil Cameron, was published in Cameron's honour.

In 2020, Averil Cameron was awarded the British Academy Kenyon Medal for her lifetime contribution to Byzantine Studies.

Averil Cameron is the second woman to receive the award, after Joyce Reynolds.