Paul Koudounaris has a PhD in art history from the University of California and has written widely on European ossuaries and charnel houses for both academic and popular journals. He is the author of The Empire of Death: A Cultural History of Ossuaries and Charnel Houses, Memento Mori: The Dead Among Us, and Heavenly Bodies: Cult Treasures and Spectacular Saints from the Catacombs. Paul is a member of the Order of the Good Death and has over 110k followers on Instagram.