Trevor Evans

Trevor Evans is a linguist. His research focuses on ancient languages and the people who spoke and wrote them. He works mainly on the post-classical history of Greek and has a special interest in the language of documentary texts and the unique links they provide with our deep human past.

Trevor’s main areas of research supervision are:

1. Greek and Latin documentary texts (e.g. papyri and inscriptions)

2. the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament)

3. Greek and Latin lexicography

Top five publications on documentary texts:

1. ‘Complaints of the Natives in a Greek Dress: the Zenon Archive and the Problem of Egyptian Interference’, in A. Mullen and P. James (eds.), Multilingualism in the Graeco-Roman Worlds (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 106–23.
2. ‘Identifying the Language of the Individual in the Zenon Archive’, in T. V. Evans and D. D. Obbink (eds.), The Language of the Papyri (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 51–70.
3. ‘Not Overstrong in His Greek: Modern Interpretation of ‘Egyptian’ Greek Texts in the Zenon Archive’, in M. Leiwo, M. Vierros, and S. Dahlgren (eds), Papers on Ancient Greek Linguistics: Proceedings of the Ninth International Colloquium on Ancient Greek Linguistics (ICAGL 9), 30 August–1 September 2018, Helsinki (Helsinki: Societas Scientiarum Fennica, 2020), 43–62.
4. ‘Valedictory ΕΡΡΩΣΟ in the Zenon Archive Letters of Hierokles’, Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, 153 (2005), 155–8.
5. ‘Textual Criticism of Greek Papyri’, forthcoming in W. de Melo and S. Scullion (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Greek and Latin Textual Criticism (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

Top five publications on the language of the Septuagint:

1. Verbal Syntax in the Greek Pentateuch: Natural Greek Usage and Hebrew Interference (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001).
2. ‘Embracing Advances in the Interpretation of LXX Language: A Continuing Challenge for LXX Studies’, Journal of Septuagint and Cognate Studies, 55 (2022), 43–54.
3. ‘The Grammarian Cannot Wait: Thackeray, Muraoka, and the Analysis of Septuagint Syntax’, Journal for the Study of Judaism (Special Issue: The Septuagint within the History of Greek, ed. J.K. Aitken† and M. Dhont), 52 (2023), 558–81.
4. ‘The Nature of LXX Greek: Language and Lexicography’, in A.G. Salvesen and T.M. Law (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of the Septuagint (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021), 91–104.
5. ‘Approaches to the Language of the Septuagint’, Journal of Jewish Studies, 56 (2005), 25–33.

Top five publications on Greek and Latin lexicography:

1. ‘Verbs of Sexual Intercourse in the Greek Pentateuch: A Lexical Analysis’, Journal of Hellenic Studies, 143 (2023), 202–21.
2. ‘Counting Chickens in PSI VI 569’, Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, 173 (2010), 191–200.
3. Howlett, D. R. (ed.), with the assistance of T. G. Christchev, T. V. Evans, P. O. Piper, and C. White,  Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, Fasc. IX: P-Pel (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 2005).
4. Howlett, D. R. (ed.), with the assistance of T. G. Christchev, T. V. Evans, P. O. Piper, and C. White,  Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, Fasc. X: Pel-Phi (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 2006).
5. Howlett, D. R. (ed.), with the assistance of T. G. Christchev, T. V. Evans, P. O. Piper, and C. White,  Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, Fasc. XI: Phi-Pos (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 2007).

Trevor trained as a classicist at the University of New England (BA Hons 1992), focusing on ancient languages and in particular on Greek, Hebrew, and Latin.

He undertook doctoral research at the University of Sydney (PhD 1998), writing a thesis on the verbal system in the Greek Pentateuch under the supervision of John A.L. Lee.

The early years of his professional career were spent at Macquarie University as Research Officer (1998-2001) and later Macquarie University Research Fellow (2001-4).

Trevor was then appointed Assistant Editor of the Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources at the University of Oxford (2004-7), and later also Senior Golding Fellow at Brasenose College, Oxford (2005-7).

He returned to Macquarie in 2007 to take up a lectureship within the Department of Ancient History (since 2021 the Department of History and Archaeology), initially as a member of the Concentration of Research Excellence (CORE) in Ancient Cultures. He was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2009 and to Associate Professor in 2016.

He is the Department's coordinator of ancient-language teaching, convenes several units in ancient Greek, Hebrew, and Latin, and is also Director of the Macquarie Ancient Languages School (MALS).

In 2021 Trevor was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities.