Eugene Numa Lane was born on August 13, 1936, in Washington, D.C. He first attended public schools in Chapel Hill, N.C. and then Episcopal High School, in Alexandria, Va., where he graduated in 1954.
He received his A.B. from Princeton University in 1958 and was Salutatorian of his graduating class; his M.A. from Yale University in 1960 and his Ph.D. from Yale in 1962. He spent his junior year abroad in Munich and did one year of graduate study at the American School of Classical Studies in Athens. He is married to Carol Gault Lane, and they have two children, Michael and Helen. He was Assistant Professor of Classics at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, from 1962 until 1966. He then moved to the University of Missouri at Columbia, where he served as Associate Professor, then Professor of Classical Studies. He became Professor Emeritus in March of 2000.
His departmental service was notable, especially his role as library representative for the last thirty-four years, except while on leave. He served one three-year term as chair of the department, as well as Director of Graduate Studies for two years. In addition he was on the following committees for the College of Arts and Science: (an asterisk indicates committees he chaired) Linguistics Committee, *Policy Committee, Curriculum Committee, and the Arts and Science Planning Council. In the Graduate School he served on the *Ancient Studies Committee and the Committee for the selection of NEH fellowship nominees. Campus wide, Gene served on the *Library Committee, the Committee on Revision of Records, the Faculty Council, the Committee on Honorary Degrees, and the Student Conduct Committee. Finally, for the entire University of Missouri system, he served on the University Press Committee.
Gene taught a wide variety of courses throughout his career, ranging from small seminars for upper-level and graduate students to lectures in Classical Mythology for up to 400 students. Most of the courses were language courses, usually in Ancient Greek (Gene has from time to time offered courses in Modern Greek), but a few have been in Latin. Other classes covered Classical Civilization and were taught in English. He has served on numerous M.A. and Ph.D. committees, not only in his own department, but also in the History and Art History/Archaeology departments, and occasionally farther afield. He has directed five Ph.D. dissertations. Currently as Emeritus he is directing three more.
Gene was the director of the first summer session of the American School of Classical Studies in Athens in 1992. He served as an Archaeological Institute of American traveling lecturer in 1984 and has been a guest lecturer in Athens, Germany, and several other places. He was the numismatist for the University of Arizona excavation at Kourion, Cyprus in 1985. He has held offices in local chapters of the Archaeological Institute of America and Phi Beta Kappa. He was the chief organizer of the Classical Association of the Middle West and South (CAMWS) meeting in Columbia in 1990. He currently serves as a member of the Managing Committee of the American School of Classical Studies in Athens.
Gene's scholarly accomplishments are impressive, as the publication list below demonstrates. He has made significant contributions to the study of ancient religion, especially in the area of the cults of the Roman period. His assembly and evaluation of evidence for the cults of Men and Sabazios in the Brill
Études Préliminaires aux Religions Orientales dans l'Empire Romain series are achievements that will be of tremendous value to all future researchers on these cults. One review of the first volume of the
Corpus Monumentorum Religionis Dei Menis commented on the "energy and thoroughness" with which the monuments were presented and pointed out the "exemplary" bibliographies accompanying each item. A reviewer referred to the
Corpus Cultus Iovis Sabazii, of which Gene did the second and third volumes, as "definitive" and deemed it "essential to any library with a serious concern for Greco-Roman religion." A review of the second volume mentioned the "scholarly service" provided and noted the difficulty of the task of compiling evidence from so many different and often hard to locate sources. Another reviewer referred to the third volume as "exemplary," "well-documented," and "clear and persuasive." His valuable collection of primary sources,
Paganism and Christianity, A Source-Book, co-authored with Ramsay MacMullen, has become a standard textbook for history and religion classes focusing on ancient religions during the early years of Christianity. In short, Gene's work has advanced our knowledge and understanding of the ancient world and will continue to provide important assistance to the scholars of the future.
