Zinon Papakonstantinou

About

Zinon Papakonstantinou is Professor of Classics at the University of Illinois at Chicago, USA. From 2013 to 2016 he was Alexander von Humboldt Foundation fellow at the University of Hamburg, Germany; in Spring 2021 he was Visiting Professor at the University of Mannheim, Germany.

A cultural historian of ancient Greece, his research interests span the entire Greco-Roman antiquity (8th century BCE–4th century CE) as well as the field of Classical reception, with a particular emphasis on sport, magic, popular culture, disputes, and legalities.

He is the author of more than forty articles and book chapters on sport, leisure, law, and magic in the ancient Greek world. His current book project, tentatively entitled “First of the Greeks”: Victory and Memory in Greek Sport, examines patterns of competition, victory, and commemoration of Greek athletics in the Hellenistic and Roman Imperial eras.

Research focus

• Greek and Roman sport
• Greek magic, especially curse tablets
• Greek law
• Popular culture in the Greco-Roman world
• Leisure in the Greco-Roman world

Awards

• Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Fellowship for Experienced Researchers, 2013–2016
• Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft Mercator Fellow, Spring 2021