William Mierse joined the faculty of Art History in 1988. He received his BA from the University of California, Berkeley and his MA and PhD from Brown University. He teaches courses in the Art of the Ancient Near East and Egypt, Greece, Rome, and Central Asia before Islam as well as courses on the art of late antique and Early Medieval Europe and Pre-Columbian Mexico, Central America, and the Andean region. He is the author or co-author of four books and many articles. His scholarship has mostly focused on ancient architecture of the Roman world and the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age Near East, but he has recently begun to study and publish on ancient Central Asian textile art.