The Thanjavur Marathas : Art, Architecture and Culture

Dr. Sethuraman Suresh is an Archaeologist, Art Historian and Tourism Consultant based in Chennai, India. He is presently the Tamil Nadu State Convener at the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) and Academic Director, Bharat Travel Services, Chennai. He was recently in the U.S. as a Fulbright Senior Research Fellow at the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Washington D.C. and the School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation of the University of Maryland. As a Fulbright Scholar, he lectured at several universities including the Harvard University and the Art Institute of Chicago. He was earlier Research Fellow at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi and at the French Institute, Pondicherry (India) and Nehru Visiting Fellow at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. He was awarded the P.L. Gupta Medal of the South Indian Numismatic Society for his pioneering studies on the Roman numismatic finds in India and the INTACH-SATTE Award for his contributions to heritage tourism. Educated in Delhi, Chennai, Mysore and London, he holds B.A., M.A. and M.Phil. degrees in History and Archaeology, all with a First-Class-First, from the University of Madras, a Ph.D. in Classical Archaeology from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi and another Ph.D. in Medieval Indian Art from the University of Mysore. He has, to his credit, over 30 books and 70 published research papers on various aspects of cultural tourism and South Asian and Roman history, numismatics, art and archaeology. He is most well-known for the unique educational tours (to archaeological sites and monuments in India and Cambodia) that he designs and conducts for schools, colleges, museums and the general public.