Valérie HuetView profile
Professor
Valérie Huet serves as Professor of Ancient History at the University of Brest, affiliated with the Breton and Celtic Research Center (CRBC, EA 4451). Her academic profile centers on interdisciplinary approaches bridging historical, anthropological, and visual studies of Roman antiquity. Her educational background includes a Doctorate in History and Art History from EHESS (School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences), an HDR (Habilitation à Diriger des Recherches) from EPHE (École Pratique des Hautes Études) in Religious Studies, and training from the École du Louvre in Museology. She currently directs the Jean-Bérard Center (UAR 3133 CNRS-EFR). Huet's research explores Roman religion through anthropological lenses, focusing on image anthropology (particularly historical and funerary reliefs), ritual practices (including sacrifice and banqueting), and bodily expressions (costume, gestures, identity construction). Her work examines how visual culture intersects with religious experience, political power (notably damnatio memoriae), and cultural identity formation in antiquity. She has pioneered approaches connecting material evidence with ritual performance theory. Her publication record demonstrates sustained engagement with Mediterranean ritual systems, evidenced through 15 recent scholarly outputs spanning archaeological analysis, iconographic studies, and theoretical frameworks. These works reveal consistent thematic threads: the materiality of religious practice, cross-cultural adaptation of religious imagery, and the political dimensions of visual representation in Roman contexts. Huet actively supervises doctoral research, currently mentoring three PhD candidates examining gentile cults in early Republican Rome, anthropological approaches to fear in Roman society, and Dougga's altars and cippi through iconographic analysis. Her academic leadership extends to directing major research centers and coordinating international collaborative projects. Director, Jean-Bérard Center (UAR 3133 CNRS-EFR) Member, CRBC Research Axes 1 (Identity Instruments) and 2 (Creation to Reuse) Coordinator, Thesaurus Cultus et Rituum Antiquorum (ThesCRA) chapters on Roman sacrifice and banquets