Michael Shenkar is an Associate Professor of Pre-Islamic Iranian studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His specialisation is the study of civilisations and cultures of the pre-Islamic Iranian world through their material remains and visual representations. His research interests encompass the archaeology, art, and religions of pre-Islamic Iran and Central Asia, including Zoroastrianism (with a particular focus on religious iconography), the culture of the Eurasian nomads, the Sogdian civilisation, and the “Silk Roads”. He is a co-director (with Sharof Kurbanov of the Tajik Academy of Sciences) of the excavations of the Sogdian site of Sanjar- Shah and the academic head of the Kafyr-Kala excavations projects in Tajikistan. He is also a Director of The Kliakhandler Program in Central Asian Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and an Honorary Affiliate at the Oxford Nizami Ganjavi Centre, University of Oxford.