Daniel Fleming has taught and served in the Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University since 1990, when he received his doctorate in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University. He currently serves as Chair of the Advisory Committee for NYU's Institute for the Study of the Ancient World. The current volume was launched with financial support from a Guggenheim Fellowship (2004). Fleming was also a senior Fulbright fellow to France (1997–8) and recipient of a one-year research fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies (2004–5). He is author of three books and co-author of a fourth: The Installation of Baal's High Priestess at Emar (1992); Time at Emar (2000); Democracy's Ancient Ancestors (Cambridge University Press, 2004); and, with Sara J. Milstein, The Buried Foundation of the Gilgamesh Epic (2010). Fleming has contributed many articles on topics related to the ancient Near East to a range of professional journals and collected works.