Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Faculty of Language, Literature and Humanities - Alexander von Humboldt Professorship

PD Dr. Chiara Thumiger - CV and publications

Research Interests

Literary Studies:
  • Greek Tragedy
  • Greek medical texts
  • Ovid’s Metamorphoses
  • Literary imagery
  • Ancient technical texts and their genres
History of medicine, history of science; cultural and intellectual history
  • Ancient medical texts (especially Hippocratic texts, Galen, Caelius Aurelianus)
  • History of psychiatry
  • Ancient ideas about nutrition and gastric anatomy
  • History of the body (ancient disabilities and disability studies, ancient views of health and disorder, ancient ideas about nutrition and gastric anatomy)
  • Ancient emotions
  • Ancient animals
Literary and cultural theory
  • Post-human approaches to cultural history; environmental criticism
  • Animal studies
  • Theories of cognitive embodiment and their application to the hermeneutics of ancient texts
  • Gender, queer theory
  • Narratology

 

Higher Education and Qualifications

26.02.2025: Abilitazione Scientifica Nazionale alle funzioni di professore universitario di prima fascia in Lingua e Letteratura Greca

2017: Habilitation in Klassische Philologie – Humboldt Universität zu Berlin with the study ‘A History of the Mind and Mental Health in Classical Greek Medical Thought.’

2000-2004: PhD. Department of Classics, King’s College London. Supervisor: Prof. M.S. Silk.

1994-1999: Laurea in Greek Literature (MA equivalent). Università Statale di Milano.

 

Institutional Employment

  • 2019- Research Fellow, Cluster of Excellence ROOTS, CAU Kiel 
  • May-October 2023 Professor of Greek, the Dept. of Classical Philology, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (W3, Professur-Vertretung Philip van der Eijk)
  • 2022- PI of the DFG-funded project "Mental Health in Late Antique Medicine: Caelius Aurelianus on Mental Disorders" (CAU Kiel) 
  • 2015-2019 Wellcome Research Fellow, University of Warwick; Visiting Scholar at the Dept. of Classical Philology, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin 
  • 2010-2015 Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin (Research Associate / Lecturer) at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (Klassische Philologie, research Project ‚Philosophy of the Body, Medicine of the Mind‘)
  • 2009-2010 Lecturer in Classics at University College London
  • 2008-2009 Visiting Lecturer at University College London, Royal Holloway, Reading University, King’s College London
  • 2007-2008 Lecturer in Classics at University College London
  • 2006-2007 Lecturer at Queen Mary (University of London)
  • 2006-2007 Head of Latin at Abercorn School (London)
  • 2005-2006 Teaching Fellow at Queen Mary (University of London)

 

PhD Supervisions

Krystal Marlier (CAU Kiel-HU) ‘Mental Health in Late Antique Medicine: Caelius Aurelianus on Mental Disorders’)

Dana Zentigraf (CAU Universität zu Kiel, with Konrad Ott) ‘Gardens in the Anthropocene’, (2020-)

Alena Mikhailova (provisional title: Mental life in the Defixiones, HU Berlin, 2025- )

 

Publications

Monographs

In Print
  • Phrenitis. Mental Pathology and Bodily Localisation, 500 BCE-1800 CE. Cambridge University Press (2024). OA.
  • A History of the Mind and Mental Health in Classical Greek Medical Thought. Cambridge University Press (2017). 505 pp.
  • Hidden Paths. Notions of Self, Tragic Characterization and Euripides’ Bacchae. BICS Suppl. 99, London (2007).

 

Co-edited Books

In Press
  • Caelius Aurelianus in Context. Textual Transmission, Medical Practices, Intellectual History. Leiden: Brill/De Gruyter (2025).

 

In Print
  • Horror in Classical Antiquity and Beyond: Body, Affect, Concepts (co-edited with G. Kazantzidis). Bloomsbury (2024). OA.
  • Comparative Guts. The Catalogue. (2024) https://doi.org/10.38071/2024-00345-3. OA.
  • Holism in Ancient Medicine and its Reception. Brill (2020). 461 pp. OA.
  • Mental Illness in Ancient Medicine. From Celsus to Caelius Aurelianus (co-edited with P. Singer). Leiden: Brill (2018).
  • Eros in Ancient Greece (co-edited, with C. Carey, N. Lowe, and E. Sanders). Oxford University Press (2013). 349 pp.
  • Approaches to the Patient in the Ancient World (co-edited with G. Petridou). Leiden: Brill (2015).

 

Co-edited Volume series

I am general editor, in cooperation with J. Sadowsky, of the six-volume series Bloomsbury Cultural History of Madness.

 

Digital and outreach

Comparative Guts – Online exhibition (as curator)
https://comparative-guts.net/

 

Articles and Chapters

In Press
  • Entry ‘Ancient Medicine’. In: AAVV. Encyclopaedic Dictionary of Phoenician Culture
  • (with Peter Pormann) ‘A filly’s mangled mane reflected: Sophocles, Tyro fr. 659 Radt’. Classical Quarterly (forthcoming)
  • ‘”The ancient made a mistake”: the elusive Greek phrenes and the usefulness of lost knowledge’. In: Lost Knowledge. Studies in transmission, translation and discontinuities from prehistory until the renaissance, ed. by J. Kneisel, C. Damm, B.V. Eriksen, A. Schwab, G. Schwedler (forthcoming).
  • ‘Disease as beast, disease as plant’. In: Healing Classics. Classics and the Medical humanities, ed. by M. Meeusen, M. Trapp. Berlin: Peter Lang (2025).
  • ‘Localising the localisation of phrenitis in De Locis Affectis’. In: Human Nature: Medical and Philosophical Perspectives in the Work of Galen of Pergamum, ed. by Teun Tielemann, Leiden: Brill (2025).
  • ‘Disability’. Chapter. In: The Oxford History of the Classical Greek World, ed. by Hans Beck, Christy Constantakopoulou, Jeremy McInerney (2025).
  • ‘Bipolarism’ and mental disorder in ancient Greek medicine. Patients, doctrines and medical historiographies’ In: James Loeb and the History of Psychiatric Medicine, ed. by Michael B. Sullivan. Harvard University Press (2025).
  • ‘Introduction.’ In: Caelius Aurelianus in Context. Textual Transmission, Medical Practices, Intellectual History. Leiden: Brill/De Gruyter (2025).
  • (with N. Lamare) ‘The doctor of Sicca Veneria’. In: Caelius Aurelianus in Context. Textual Transmission, Medical Practices, Intellectual History. Leiden: Brill/De Gruyter (2025).
In Print
2025
  • Entry ‘Mental illness/mental health’. Oxford Classical Dictionary (OCD IV), Oxford University Press (2025). 
2024
  • ‘Eyes wide shut. Appearance, vision, and care in a 12th-century illustration of a phrenitic patient’. Classica Vox 6 (2024) 123-44 (OA).
  • (co-authored with L. Schmidt) ‘Gardens as spaces of physical and mental well-being in ancient literature’. In: Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes, ed. by D. Zentgraf, L. Schmidt, 44.2-3 (2024) 216-228.
  • ‘Phrenitis. Mental Pathology and Bodily Localisation, 500 BCE-1800 CE. A Resume’. History of Psychiatry 35.3-4 (2024).
  • ‘Medicine and the emotions. Problemata in dialogue with the Hippocratic writings’. In: H. Bartoš (ed.), Aristotle reads Hippocrates, (2024) 375-407.
  • (with G. Kazantzidis) ‘Introduction’. In: Horror in Classical Antiquity and Beyond: Body, Affect, Concepts (co-edited with G. Kazantzidis). Bloomsbury (2024). OA.
2023
  • ‘Guts, hollows and coils: inside stories in ancient literatures’. In: Medicine and Literature. Critical Concepts Series. Cambridge University Press 2023, ed. by Anna Elsner and Monika Pietrzak-Franger..
  • ‘Bodies with organs, bodies without organs’. In: G. Chesi, M. Gerolemou (eds.) Body technologies in the Graeco-Roman world. Techno bodies, sex and gender, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press (2023).
  • ‘Ovidius Medicus. Knowledge of the body in the Metamorphoses’. Maia 75 (2-3) 2023) 244-276.
2022
  • ‘The body to be hidden: shame in ancient medicine’. In: Kazantzidis, G., Spatharas, D. (eds.) Medical Understandings of Emotions. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter (2022) 145-171. 
  • ‘Clitoridectomy and the definition of sexual intercourse’. In: Kazantzidis, G., Serafim, A. (eds.) Sexual Intercourse in Ancient Greece. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter (2022).
2021
  • ‘Information and history of psychiatry. The case of the disease phrenitis’. In: C. Meyns (ed.) Information and the History of Philosophy. Routledge (2021) 59-76.
  • ‘The Ophthalmology of Lovesickness: Poetry, Philosophy, Medicine’. In: D. Kanellakis (ed.) Pathologies of Love in Classical Literature, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter (2021) 23-46.
  •  ‘Animals and medicine’. In: L. Totelin (ed.) The Berg / Bloomsbury Cultural History of Medicine. Volume on Antiquity. London: Bloomsbury (2020) 93-117.
2020
  • (With L. Graumann) ‘Children and the Art of Medical Storytelling: Contemporary Practice and Hippocratic Case-Taking Compared’. In: M. Asper (ed.) Thinking in Cases. Ancient Greek and Imperial Chinese Case Narratives (2020) 31-48.
  • 'Pandemia and Holism: What Ancient Medicine Has to Say’. In: L. Käppel, C. Makarewicz and J. Müller (eds.) Pandemics and Crises Reloaded. Distant Times So Close, ed. by Sidestone (2020) 32-37.
  • ‘Introduction’. In: Holisms in Ancient Medicine and its Reception. Leiden: Brill (2020). 1-22.
  • ‘Holisms, parts, wholes’. In: Holisms in Ancient Medicine and its Reception. Leiden: Brill (2020) 25-46.
  • ‘Therapy of the word and other psychotherapeutic approaches in Ancient Greek medicine’. Transcultural Psychiatry 57(6) (2020) 741-752.
2019
  • ‘Asclepiades on phrenitis and the problem of consistency (Caelius Aurelianus, Ac.Dis. 1.1, 14-15). In: L. Perilli et al. (ed.) Asclepiades of Bythinia. Technai 10 (2019) 23-43.
  • ‘Animality, Illness and Dehumanisation: The Phenomenology of Illness In Sophocles’ Philoctetes’. In: G.M. Chesi and F. Spiegel (eds.) Undoing the Human: Classical Literature and the Post-Human. Bloomsbury (2019) 95-102.
2018
  • ‚The Hippocratic Patient‘. In: P. Pormann (ed.) Cambridge Companion to Hippocrates. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (2018) 263-91.
  • ‘A History of the Mind and Mental Health in Classical Greek Medical Thought. A Resume’. History of Psychiatry (2018).
  • ‘Liebe als Krankheit’. In: N. Reggiani and F. Bertonazzi (ed.) Parlare la Medicina: fra lingue e culture, nello spazio e nel tempo. Atti del Convegno Internazionale (Parma, 5-7 Settembre (2018). Firenze: Le Monnier, 2018. Collana "STUSMA - Studi sul Mondo Antico".
  • ‘A most acute, disgusting and indecent disease’: Satyriasis in ancient medicine’. In: Mental Illness in Ancient Medicine. From Celsus to Caelius Aurelianus (co-edited with P. Singer). Leiden: Brill (2018) 269-284.
  • ‘Stomachikon, Hydrophobia and eating disorders: volition and taste in late-antique medical discussions’. In: Mental Illness in Ancient Medicine. From Celsus to Caelius Aurelianus (co-edited with P. Singer). Leiden: Brill (2018) 245-268.
  • ‘Introduction’. In: Mental Illness in Ancient Medicine. From Celsus to Paul of Aegina (co-authored with P. Singer). Leiden: Brill (2018) 1-32.
  • ‘The professional audiences of the Hippocratic Epidemics. Patient cases, in ancient scientific communication’. In: The Greek Medical Text and its Audience: Perception, Transmission, Reception, ed. by P. Bouras-Vallianatos and S. Xenophontos. Tauris (2017) 48-64.
  • ‘Aretaeus’ Stomachikon: a parodistic vein in a nosological description’. In: Kazantzidis, N. Tsoumpra D. (eds.) Morbid Laughter. Illinois Classical Studies 43.2 (2018) 473-87.
2017
  • ‘The view of madness in the Ancient Greek and Roman tradition’. In: G. Eghigian (ed.) The Routledge History of Madness (London: Routledge, 2017), 42-61.
2016
  • ‘The tragic prosopon and the Hippocratic facies: face and individuality in Classical Greece’. Maia. Rivista di Letterature Classiche 3.3 (2016) 637-664.
  • ‘Mental disability? Galen on mental health’. In: C. Laes (ed.) Disabilities in Antiquity. London: Routledge (2016) 267-282.
  • ‘Fear, Hope and the definition of Hippocratic Medicine’. In: W.V. Harris (ed.) Popular Medicine in the Graeco-Roman World: New Approaches. (Columbia Studies in the Classical Tradition 42) (Leiden: Brill, 2016) 198-214.
  • 'Grief and Cheerfulness in early Greek medical writings'. In: Bosman, P.R. (ed.) 2016. Ancient Routes to Happiness. Acta Classica Supplement 7. Pretoria: Classical Association of South Africa, 95-116.
  • (with Ph. van der Eijk and Orly Lewis), ‘Gradualism and mental health in ancient medicine’. In: G. Keil, and L. Keuck and R. Hauswald (eds.) Gradualist Approaches to Mental Health and Disease. Oxford: Oxford University Press (2016), 27-45.
2015
  • ‘Patient function and physician function in the Epidemics cases’. In: G. Petridou and C. Thumiger (eds.) Approaches to the Patient in the Ancient World. Leiden: Brill (2015) 107-137.
  • ‘Introduction.’ In: G. Petridou and C. Thumiger (eds.) Approaches to the Patient in the Ancient World. Leiden: Brill (2015), 1-22.
2014
  • ‘Animals in tragedy’. In: G. Campbell (ed.) Oxford Handbook of Animals. Oxford: Oxford University Press, (2014), 84-98.
  • ‘Metamorphosis: human into animal’. In: G. Campbell (ed.) Oxford Handbook of Animals. Oxford: Oxford University Press (2014), 384-413.
  • ‘Mental insanity in the Hippocratic texts: a pragmatic perspective’. Mnemosyne (2014) 1-24.

2013

  • ‘Vision and knowledge in Greek drama’. In: D. Cairns, N. Rabinowitz, S. Blundell (eds.) Vision and Viewing in Ancient Greece. (Special Issue of Helios, 40, 2013, 223-46).
  • Entries ‘Ancient and modern views on character and personality’, ‘Madness’, ‘Concept of Mind’, ‘Animals and animal imagery’, ‘Vision and knowledge’, ‘Bacchae’. In: H. Roisman (ed.) Blackwell Encyclopedia of Greek Tragedy. Oxford: Blackwell (2013) 206-12; 785-7; 849-51; 112-4; 1466-7; 353-9.
  • ‘Hallucination, Drunkenness and Mirrors: Ancient Reception of Modern Drama’. In: A. Bakogianni and M. Edwards (eds.), Dialogues with the Past 1: Classical Reception Theory and Practice. BICS Supplement 226-1. London (2013) 39-60.
  • ‘The early Greek medical vocabulary of insanity’. In: W.V. Harris, (ed.) Mental Disorders in the Classical World. Leiden: Brill (2013) 61-95.
  • ‘Mad Eros and eroticized Madness in Tragedy’. In: E. Sanders, C. Thumiger et al. (eds.) Eros in Ancient Greece. Oxford: Oxford University Press (2013) 27-40.
  • ‘Introduction’. In E. Sanders, C. Thumiger et al. (eds.) Eros in Ancient Greece. Oxford: Oxford University Press (2013) 1-8.
2009
  • ‘Metatheatre in modern and ancient fiction’. Materiali e Discussioni per l’Analisi dei Testi Classici 63 (2009) 9-58.
  • ‘Epidemia tra le Baccanti di Euripide, Tucidide e il Corpus Hippocraticum’. Studi Italiani di Filologia Classica 7(2) 2009.
2008
  • ‘anagkês zeugmat’ empeptôkamen: Greek Tragedy between Human and Animal’. Leeds International Classics Seminar (2008).
  • ‘Personal Pronouns as Identity Terms in Ancient Greek: The Surviving Tragedies and Euripides’ Bacchae’. Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 104 (2008).
2007
  • ‘Visione e identità nelle Baccanti di Euripide’. ACME II (2007) 3-30.
2006
  • ‘Animal World, Animal Representation, and the “Hunting-Model”: Between Literal and Figurative in Euripides’ Bacchae’. Phoenix 60.3-4 (2006) 191-210.

 

Book Reviews

  • Swift, Laura, Allan, William (eds.) Euripides. Bacchae. Oxford University Press (2024). Gnomon (forthcoming).
  • Carlig, Nathan (ed.) Mes vœux les meilleurs et santé continuelle: réponses aux épidémies dans le monde gréco-romain. Liège: Presses universitaires de Liège 2023. 121 S. (2024). Gnomon (forthcoming)
  • Laes (C.), Metzler (I.) (edd.) 'Madness' in the Ancient World: Innate or Acquired? From Theoretical Concepts to Daily Life. (Antiquité et Sciences Humaines 10.) Pp. 360, b/w & colour ills. Turnhout: Brepols, 2023. Classical Review 74.2 (2024) 625-627.
  • J. Devinant, Les troubles psychiques selon Galien: étude d'un système de pensée. Collection d'études anciennes. 2020. BMCR (2023).
  • L. Salas, Cutting Words - Polemical Dimensions of Galen's Anatomical Experiments. The Classical Review (2023).
  • Hedvig von Ehrenheim & Marina Prusac-Lindhagen (eds.) Reading Roman emotions: visual and textual interpretations. Stockholm (2020). Journal of Roman Studies 111 (2021) 311-313.
  • C. Laes, Disabilities and the Disabled in the Roman World: A Social and Cultural History. Cambridge (2018). Classics Ireland 28 (2022) 81-82.
  • H. Bartoš, Philosophy and Dietetics in the Hippocratic On Regimen: A delicate Balance of Health. Leiden (2015). Isis 47.1:70-71.
  • I. Israelovich, Patients and Healers in the High Roman Empire. Baltimore (2015) CW.
  • V. Zajko, E.O'Gorman (eds.), Classical Myth and Psychoanalysis: Ancient and Modern Stories of the Self. Oxford (2013). CW.
  • M. Ahonen, Mental Disorders in Ancient Philosophy. Berlin (2014). CW.
  • Laes, C., Goodey, C.F., Lynn Rose, M. Disabilities in Roman Antiquity. Disparate Bodies a Capite ad Calcem. Amsterdam (2013). Classical Review 62.2 (2014) 527-9.
  • Oberhelman, S.M. (ed.). Dreams, Healing, and Medicine in Greece: from Antiquity to the Present. Ashgate (2013). BMCR. 2013.11.33.
  • Holmes, B. The Symptom and the Subject. CW (2013) 291-2.
  • Colleen Chaston, Tragic props and Cognitive Function. Aspects of the function of Images in Thinking. Classical Review 61 (2011) 375-7.
  • Richard Buxton, Forms of Astonishment. Oxford (2009). Classical Review 61.1 (2011) 23.
  • Luigi Battezzato, Linguistica e Retorica della Tragedia Greca. Rome (2008). Classical Review 60,01 (2010), 13-15.
  • Barbara Goward, Telling Tragedy. Journal of Hellenic Studies 125 (2005) 163-4.

 

Conferences

Conferences and Workshops organised

  • September 2023. Caelius Aurelianus. Humboldt Universität zu Berlin. Co-organised with Krystal Marlier.
  • June 2023. ‘Comparative Guts/Imag(in)ing the guts’. CAU Kiel (Cluster of Excellence Roots)
  • November 2021. ‘Medical Knowledge and its ‘Sitz im Leben’: Body and Horror in Antiquity’ (with George Kazantzidis, University of Kiel, Excellenz Cluster ROOTS) (postponed November 2021)
  • 12 May 2021. ‘SOOTHING GARDENS. Ancient ideas and practices about plants, natural environments and well-being’. Invited speakers: Sean Coughlin, Patty Baker, Grazia Piras, Laurence Totelin. Co-organised with Dana Zentgraf, Roots, University of Kiel.
  • 11-12 September 2017. ‘Ancient Holisms’. International Conference. University of Warwick and ICS (a two-days international conference). 
  • 6-8 October 2014. ‘Mental Diseases in Ancient Medicine’ (a three-day International Workshop; Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung and Topoi Project).
  • 29 June-1 July 2012. ‘Homo Patiens’, with Georgia Petridou (a three-days International Conference, Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung).
  • 28-31 July 2010. ‘Animals in the Greek and Roman World’, co-organised with Sarah Hitch (a four-day panel within the Sixth Celtic Conference in Classics, Edinburgh).
  • 28-31 March 2009. ‘Eros in Ancient Greece’ co-organized with Chris Carey, Nick Lowe, and Ed Sanders (a four-day International Conference, UCL/ICS).
  • 23 May 2008. ‘Classical empires in contemporary culture’, co-organized with Maria Wyke (a one-day conference, UCL).

 

Recent and Forthcoming Conference Papers

I have been invited to offer papers at a variety of university and institutions in Germany (Berlin, HU and FU, the CMG, Mainz, Kiel, Münster, Münich), Europe (KCL, UCL, Institute of Classical Studies, Roehampton, Cambridge, Warwick, Oxford, Manchester, Exeter, Durham, Glasgow; Ghent, Leuven, Utrecht; Prague; Bucarest; Athens, Patras, Rethymnon; Istanbul; Paris; Toledo; Napoli, Rome, Parma, Malta); Istanbul; and overseas (US: Cornell, University of Pennsylvania, Columbia, NY; Penn State, Cleveland CASE University; South Africa: Pretoria, Cape Town).

 

2026

  • Summer. Workshop in Exeter on Volume 1, Antiquity, of The Cambridge History of Medicine, 6 Volumes (ed. by L. Totelin, R. Flemming).
  • tbd. ‘The Physiology of Hope and Belief’. Conference in Pisa organised by Naama Cohen-Hanegbi, MedPlaceboEffect Project.
  • 5 June 2026 tbd. Séminaire Physiologies médicales et philosophiques (online), Centre L. Robin, CNRS – Sorbonne Université.
2025
  • 3 December 2025. Cambridge University, part of the series ‘Caucus Seminar Cambridge Affect/Emotion’. Tbd, paper on animal emotions.
  • 13-15 November 2025. in Stellenbosch, Cape Town, South Africa, as invited speaker at the conference ‘Responsive governance and population well-being in later antiquity’ (Stellenbosch, University of the Western Cape, and Ghent University).
  • 6-7 October 2025. Valletta, Malta, as keynote, Conference ‘Discourses on Illness: Ancient Ways of Coping with Ill-Health’
  • 12 June 2025. CAU Kiel, ‘Geschlecht, Sexualität und die Konstruktion von Normen in der Medizin’. Ringvorlesung fur die ‘Abendvorträge den Semesterschwerpunkt "antike Körperkonzepte"’ organised by A. Haug.
  • 27 May 2025. ‘Reflected emotions: a foal's honour and shame in a fragment from Sophocles's Tyro (659 Radt)’. Conference ‘Premodern Animal Emotions’. Academy of Athens
  • 27 May 2025. ‘Galen and the question of metabolism. Body and environment in ancient medicine’. Invited paper, Online Conferences Series of the CMSBR - Centre for the Study of Medicine and the Body in the Renaissance.
  • 15 May 2025. ‘nec quicquam nisi vulnus erat; the medical code as vehicle for violence in Ovid’s Metamorphoses.’ Conference ‘Understanding Ovidian Violence’, organised by Marco Formisano (Ghent) and Stella Alekou (Ioannina)
  • 12 May 2025. ‘Hyperbolic accumulation, microscopic detail, and the ‘why?. Medical elements and poetic effect in some examples from Latin poetry’ Keynote speaker, conference Technical Arts in Imperial Latin Literary Texts.
  • 8 May 2025. ‘Origins of the mind/body problem in Graeco-Roman/Mediterranean thought’. Workshop and TV Programme on ‘The History of the Mind: From Psyche to Psychology Axel and Margaret Ax:son Johnson Foundation for Public Benefit’, Stockholm.
  • 5-6 May 2025. ‘Devouring oneself: sources and parallels of a Byzantine image between metaphor and representation’. Conference ‘Being 'Mad' in Byzantium. Mental Disorders from Aetius of Amida to John Actuarius’, Danish Institute of Athens.
  • 28 March 2025. ‘Elefanti, elefantiasi e spettacolo nella rappresentazione del patologico: Areteo di Cappadocia e altri’. Invited speaker at the V Seminario interateneo di letture sui testi classici. Università di Napoli L’Orientale.
  • 28 January 2025. ‘Agave, Pentheus, Cadmus: making sense of a therapeutic moment in Euripides’ Bacchae’. Round Table ‘Dialogue entre humanités médicales et littérature grecque ancienne à l’occasion de la soutenance de thèse de Vasiliki Kondylaki “Modern Empathy and the Physician: Dialogue with Ancient Texts as Performative Experiences”.
  • 10-11 January 2025: ‘Change within the body, change within the world: ecological conceptualisations of the body and its functions in Galen of Pergamon’. Workshop ‘Social Metabolism and historical human-environment interaction: The Pergamon Micro-region and Beyond’, organised by F. Pirson, Transformation der Mikroregion Pergamon vom Hellenismus bis in die Römische Kaiserzeit, Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Istanbul.
2024
  • 6 December 2024, Roehampton University, as keynote speaker: on ‘Sexual jealousy in ancient medicine . Workshop ‘Capturing the Green-Eyed Monster: Gender and Jealousy in Antiquity’. Organised by F. McHardy and N. Meimarogiou, Roehampton University.
  • 24 September 2024. Round table on ecocriticism, with Simon Goldhill, Marco Formisano, Leila Williamson. Part of the activities of ‘Coming after. Ecopoetics in Late Antiquity and Beyond’ (https://comingafter-ugent.be/), PI Marco Formisano.
  • 11 June 2024. ‘‘Where it hurts’. Medical regionalism and environment in Caelius Aurelianus’. Workshop ‘Illness, Health and Healing in Late Antiquity’, organised by I. Sanchez, C. Petit, Toledo.
  • 15 May 2024. ‘Loxias – On queerness, agency and enigma in tragedy’. Conference ‘Tragedy | Trauma || Bodies | Boundaries’, organised by S. Nooter, G. Chesi, HU Berlin
  • February 2024. ‘Idesthai deimatōdes: Elephantiasis and the disease as wonderful creature’. Workshop on ‘The Aesthetics of Disease in Graeco-Roman Antiquity’. Organised by G. Kazantzidis, University of Patras.  
2023
  • November 2023. ‘Dark and light: some reflections on colours and opposites in Greco-Roman medicine’. Conference on ‘Colours in Ancient Medicine’, organised by Georgios Kazantzidis, Katerina Ierodiakonou and Petros Bouras-Vallianatos at the University of Patras on 3-4 November 2023
  • July 2023. ‘Elephas - An affection unlike any other: the working of animal imagery and zoology in Aretaeus, 4.13 (85-90 Hude)’. Conference on ‘Animals and the Environment in Ancient Mediterranean Medicine’. University of Exeter.
  • June 4-7 2023. Paper on ‘‘Bipolarism and ancient medicine’ (Munich and Murnau, with sessions perhaps based at the Max Plank Institute for Psychiatry and LMU in Munich). Conference on James Loeb, organised by the Loeb Classical Library Foundation
  • 13-14 February 2023. 2023 – paper on Comparatism and anatomy. “Health and Healing in Ancient Greece and China". A documentary and workshop organised by Chloe Balla (University of Crete)
2022
  • 8 October 2022. ‘Human Body and Identity in Greek Philosophy and Culture’ in a conference organised by the Norwegian Institute in Athens (postponed from 2020)
  • 23 September 2022. ‘‘Ox hunger’. Food, psyche and society in ancient eating disturbances’. Public Lecture, Cleveland, OHIO
  • 07 September 2022. ‘Disease as animal, disease as plant’. In  “The Healing Classics: Medical Humanities and the Graeco-Roman Tradition”. Organised by B. Hurwitz, M. Meeusen, M. Trapp (postponed from 2020), KCL London.
  • 3-6 June 2022. ‘The madness of small things’. Conference ‘Body and soul: Relationships and implications in the body's functioning (from Antiquity to the Modern Age)’. Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris.
  • March 2022. ‘The pathe as object of nature: the problemata as source in history of the emotions’. University of Patras.
  • January 2022. ‘Mental illness in ancient medicine’. Serie “Follia nel mondo antico”, Bellinzona, Delegazione Svizzera Ital. AICC (culturaclassica.ch).
2021
  • 23 November 2021. “Gates, towers and trenches: history of emotions and the definition of ‘human’”. Crete/Patras Ancient Emotions Workshop IV (2021), organised by Dimos Spatharas and George Kazantzidis
  • 25. Oktober 2021. Montagskolloquium, HU Universität, Berlin. Invited paper: ‘Medicine and the emotions. Problemata in dialogue with the Hippocratic writings’.
  • 9-10 September 2021. KCL London, ‘Disease as animal, disease as plant’. In  “The Healing Classics: Medical Humanities and the Graeco-Roman Tradition”. Organised by B. Hurwitz, M. Meeusen, M. Trapp.
  • 17-19 September 2021. Charles University, Prague. Invited paper on ‘Medicine and the emotions. Problemata in dialogue with the Hippocratic writings’. In ‘Aristotle reads Hippocrates’ (postponed from 2020).
  • 13-15 July 2021. ‘Localising the localisation of phrenitis in De Locis Affectis’. In the conference on ‘Human Nature: Medical and Philosophical Perspectives in the Work of Galen of Pergamum’, organised by Teun Tielemann, University of Utrecht (postponed from 2020).
  • 29 April 2021. Manchester Research Seminar, ‘The sun-disease? summer heat and the ancient disease phrenitis’.
  • 19 April 2021, HU Berlin. ‘Disease as beast, disease as plant’.
  • Colloquia Ceranea, organised by the Ceraneum Centre, University of Lodz, Poland, 15-17 April 2021. Invited paper on ‘πόθεν φρενῖτις? The popular reception of the disease phrenitis in Christian sources’.
2020
  • 17 December 2020. Dialogue on the Hippocratic text ‘Girls’, with Giulia Sissa. Meeting series Titubanti Testi, organised by Marco Formisano (Ghent)
  • 28-30 October 2020. Invited paper on ‘Suffering and emotions: what the doctors of the Hippocratic Epidemics saw’. In ‘Emotions and Clinical Communication’ organised by the Australian Catholic University’s (ACU) (Australian Research Council’s Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions). Online.
  • 22 October 2020. Invited paper on ‘Brain or chest: ambiguities and solutions in the medieval reception of the Greek disease phrenitis’. ‘History of Science, Medicine and Technology Seminar Series’, University of Edinburgh.
  • 15 November 2020. Invited paper on ‘Aretaeus on melancholy’. Humboldt Kolleg Conference, Bucharest (RYA). Online.
  • 3-4 Oktober 2020 Invited paper on ‘Human Body and Identity in Greek Philosophy and Culture’ in a conference organised by the Norwegian Institute in Athens (postponed 2022)
  • 17-18 September 2020. Invited paper on ‘Painful knowledge: suffering and the parts of man in some examples from Latin poetry’. In ‘Body and Medicine in Latin Poetry. Online Conference’, University of Durham, organised by Allegra Hahn, Chiara Blanco, Simona Martorana.
  • 28 March - 1 April 2020. Invited paper on ‘Ancient Diagnostics’, Jerusalem, Israel (postponed): ‘Diseases as beast, diseases as plant’.
  • 15 February 2020. Invited paper, Humboldt Kolleg, Bucharest (postponed)
  • 31 January - 1 February 2020. Invited paper on Hippocratic and Galenic evidence at the conference on ‘Natural Born Fools in the Ancient World’, University of Manchester, organized by Christian Laes and Peter Pormann.
2019
  • October 2019. Invited paper on ‘God, Medicine, and the Body without Organs’ at the Workshop ‘Ancient Narratives of Artificial Life’. Humboldt Universität zu Berlin.
  • 12-14 June 2019. Invited paper on ‘’For some women’. An ancient testimony on clitoridectomy practices’. Conference on ‘Sexual Intercourse in the Ancient World’, organised by A. Seraphim, G. Kazantzidis, and Demetriou, University of Cyprus.
  • 20 March 2019. Invited paper on ‘Phrenitis in ancient medicine and history of psychiatry’. The Richardson Research Seminar (DeWitt Wallace Institute for the History of Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College, New York City).
  • 21 March 2019. Invited paper on ‘Ancient medicine on phrenitis’ University of Pennsylvania (Dept. of classics)
  • 22 March 2019. Invited paper on ‘Ancient and modern psychiatry medicine on mental disorder: the case of phrenitis’, Penn State University (Dept. of classics / History of Science)
  • 17 January 2019. Invited paper on ‘Phrenitis and history of psychiatry’ at the departmental seminar of the Dept. of Classics, University of Durham.
2018 (10.01.-10.11. Maternity leave)
  • 8-9 December 2018. Invited paper as Keynote speaker at the conference ‘Sensual Reflections: Re-Thinking the Role of the Senses in the Greco-Roman World’ at the Faculty of Classics, Cambridge University.
  • 27 September 2018. Invited paper on ‘Phrenitis according to Asclepiades of Bithynia’ within the Workshop on Asclepiades organised by Ambra Serangeli, Centro Studi di Tor Vergata, Rome.
  • 9-10 June 2018. Invited paper on  ‘The eyes of the lover: medical elaborations on lovesickness and opthalmology’ at the conference ‘The Pathology of Love in Greek and Roman Art and Literature’, organised by E. Savva and D. Kanellakis, University of Oxford.
  • 2-3 April 2018. Invited paper on ‘dolor. The patients of Caelius Aurelianus’ at the conference ‘Pain in the Roman Empire’ organised by D. King, Exeter (on Skype).
  • 8-12 March 2018. Invited paper on ‘The power of the voice: different forms of therapy of the word in ancient Greek medicine’ at the workshop ‘Les dimensions thérapeutiques de la parole: représentations poétiques en Grèce et à Rome’ (Atelier suivi d’une table ronde sur le pouvoir émotionnel de la poésie antique dans le monde contemporain), organised by Vasiliki Kondylaki, David Bouvier, Vincent Barras, Université de Lausanne)  (on Skype).
  • 19 January 2018. Invited paper on ‘Medea the megalosplanchnos’, University of Warwick (cancelled, maternity leave).
2017
  • 8 December 2017. Invited paper on ‘Shame and shamefulness in ancient medicine’ at the conference on ‘Ancient Emotions’, organised by D. Spatharas and G. Kazantzidis, University of Patras  (on Skype).
  • 16 November 2017. Invited paper on ‘Astrology and Pathologised Sex: The Creation of Sexual Disorders in the Early Centuries of our Era’ at the conference ‘Instinct, Desire, the Monster and the Machine’, organised by Sophie Wennerscheid and Marco Formisano (University of Gent).
  • 7 November 2017. Invited paper ‘Quasi Phreneticus: metaphorical and technical interactions in the history of the ancient disease concept phrenitis’ at the Joint Seminar of the Department of Classics and the Centre for the History Science, Technology and Medicine at KCL, London, KCL.
  • 23 October 2017. Invited paper ‘Mental health and the everyday in Hippocratic medicine’ at the London Seminar in Greek Literature, ICS, London. Series on ‘The Quotidian’.
  • 27 September 2017. Invited paper ‘Insanity ‘from without’: mental disorder and intoxicants in Greek medicine’ at the conference ‘Pharmacology and psychology’ organised by R. Wittwer and M. Martelli, Berlin BAAW.
  • 4 April 2017. Invited paper ‘Therapy of the word and other psychotherapeutic approaches in ancient Greek medicine’ as keynote speaker at the ‘Alternative psychotherapies’ conference, University of Glasgow. 
  • 16 March 2017. Invited paper ‘Phrenitis and the development of mental disorder in ancient medicine’ at the University of Warwick, Department of Classics, Work in Progress Seminar Series. 
2016
  • 15 December 2016. Invited paper ‘The boy who bit a snake: a marvelous anecdote in Epidemics V’. Conference on ‘Ancient Paradoxography’, University of Patras.
  • 29 October 2016. Paper on Animality and illness in Sophocles’ Philoctetes. In ‘Departure from Humanity: homo selvaticus, Bestiality and Monstrosity’, conference organized by Francesca Spiegel and Giulia Maria Chiesi, HU Berlin.
  • 5-7 September 2016. Invited paper ‘Ancient Narratives of Illness and Healing’ as keynote speaker at the Conference ‘Lingua e medicina dall'antichità a oggi’ (Universita’ di Parma): ‘Narrating patient histories in Hippocratic medicine. The example of the wife of Theodorus’.
  • September 2016. Invited paper as keynote speaker at the Workshop ‘Morbid Laughter’, University of Patras: ‘Aretaeus’ Stomachikon disease: parody in a pathological portrayal?’
  • 31 May 2016. Paper on ‘Performance’. In ‘Classics and Cognitive Theory’, seminar organised by P. Meineck and E. Eidinow, Nottingham University/NYU.
  • 8 March 2016. Invited paper on ‘The patient in History of Medicine’ within the series ‘Warwick Centre for the History of Medicine's Reading Lunches’, University of Warwick.
2015
  • 8-10 December 2015. Invited paper on ‘Hope in Ancient Medicine’. Conference on hope organized by George Kazantzidis and Dimos Spatharas (Rethymno, University of Crete).
  • 16-17 November 2015. Invited paper on the Hippocratic Epidemics within a workshop on ‚Patient cases and anecdotes in Greece and China‘, organised by M. Asper, Topoi and Humboldt Universität: ‘Children and the art of medical storytelling: contemporary practice and Hippocratic case-taking compared’
  • 12 June 2015. Invited paper as keynote speaker at the Humanities Research day at the University of Roehampton. Paper on ‘Mental suffering and Hippocratic medicine. The case of the wife of Hermoptolemus’. 
2014
  • 12-13 December 2014. Paper within the conference ‘The Greek Medical Text and its Audience: Perception, Transmission, Reception‘, Université Libre de Bruxelles (organized by P. Bouras-Vallianatos and S. Xenophontos).
  • 11-13 September 2014. Paper on ‘The Doctor-Patient Relationship’ within the Workshop organized by P. Pormann towards the preparation of the Cambridge Companion to Hippocrates. Manchester University.
  • 8 September 2014. Paper on ‚Der Wahnsinn beim Wort genommen – Geistige Ausnahmezustände in der Literatur‘ within the PRO SCIENTIA Sommerakademie devoted to the topic ‚WahnSinn‘, Mariazell (Österreich), 5-11 September 2014.
  • 18/19 April 2014. Paper on Prometheus' gift: healing and hope in popular and technical reflections on medicine’ within the conference ‘Popular Medicine’ Columbia University, New York.
2012
  • October 2012. Invited paper on ‚Ancient medical views on mental health and flourishing‘ within the conference on ‘Happiness’ - CFP: 13th Unisa Classics Colloquium, Pretoria, 25-27 October 2012: 
  • April 2012, invited paper on ‘Mind and body in the ancient patient; history and the limits of individual psychology’. Crossing Boundaries. New directions in the study of Ancient History. Columbia University, New York.
  • March 2012 (with Ph. van der Eijk, Orly Lewis,). Invited paper on aspects of Galen’s De Sanitate Tuenda within the conference ‘Gradualist Approaches to Health and Disease. Philosophical, Medical and Legal Perspectives’, Humboldt-Universität Berlin.
2011
  • January 2011. Invited paper on ‘Orestes’ mania and Orestes’ synesis: models of madness in Greek tragedy’. ‘Neues aus der Altertum’, Ringvorlesung des August-Boeckh-Antikezentrums, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.

Digital output and outreach activity

August 2025: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-enduring-pathos-of-wound-man/

https://www.spiegel.de/geschichte/seelenleiden-der-antike-haben-sie-in-letzter-zeit-gebellt-oder-wie-ein-wolf-geheult-a-71b43d57-4efa-4452-a4a5-4e9a1ec24fae?giftToken=b543ba47-d906-4cfc-939a-1d4cd0666d1d

24.09.24: Round table on ecocriticism, with Simon Goldhill. Part of the activities of ‘Coming after. Ecopoetics in Late Antiquity and Beyond’ (https://comingafter-ugent.be/), PI Marco Formisano.

27.05.24 - Public event: “Ein Gespräch mit Chiara Thumiger”. Archaeological Museum of the University of Münster, part of the ‘Diversity Dialogues in Classical Studies’ - Institut für Klassische Archäologie, University Münster - Seminar für Alte Geschichte, organised by Prof. H. Beck.

Comparative Guts – Digital exhibition curated by me (Cluster of Excellence Roots); the opening conference included a workshop for a visually impaired public (https://comparative-guts.net/invisible-guts/)

In cooperation with colleagues in Berlin (HU and Topoi) we have curated an exhibition on ‘Mapping the soul in ancient medicine’ at the Charité Museum of History of Medicine (May-September 2016), entitled ‘The Soul is an Octopus’. I was responsible for the section on ‘Pathology’ (http://chiara-thumiger.net/chiaras-blog/2016/5/17/the-soul-is-an-octopus-exhibition-in-berlin).

I have offered advice and consultancy on ancient medicine for the following products: