Sir John Boardman was a towering figure in Classical Archaeology who specialised first in the study of Archaic Greece and Greek vase-painting, then of Greek sculpture, gem-engraving, and art more broadly, and later in his career in the visual culture of Achaemenid Persia, Kushan Afghanistan, and the Silk Road as far as China. He had a strong impact through his many doctoral students and major collaborative research projects. His most important contributions as an individual scholar remain in the area of Archaic Greek archaeology, history, culture, and iconography. He was knighted for services to his subject in 1986.
Posted to Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the British Academy, 22