HelleNET — International Network on Hellenistic Studies

HelleNET – International Network on Hellenistic Studies is an international research network dedicated to promoting the study, dissemination, and advancement of scholarship on the Hellenistic world and its enduring intellectual, cultural, and scientific legacy.

Founded in 2024 on the initiative of Valeria Annunziata, HelleNET was established to create a durable international platform for dialogue and collaboration among PhDs, Early Career Researchers, and other scholars working on Hellenistic Studies. From its foundation, the project has sought to connect different scholarly traditions, disciplines, and generations within a shared research community.

Hellenistic culture was never confined to a single geographical. From the eastern Mediterranean to Egypt, from the Near East to Rome, and from the ancient world to its later Byzantine, Renaissance, and modern receptions, the circulation of texts, ideas, people, languages, scientific knowledge, and cultural practices created a profoundly interconnected world. HelleNET seeks to study precisely these connections.

Its mission is to foster dialogue between scholars working on different aspects of Hellenistic civilization, bringing together Classics, Ancient History, Philology, Papyrology, Manuscript Studies, Archaeology, History of Science, Philosophy, Literature, and the History of Ideas. Particular attention is given to the transmission and transformation of knowledge across geographical, linguistic, disciplinary, and chronological boundaries.

At the heart of HelleNET is the conviction that Hellenistic Studies are inherently international and interdisciplinary. The network therefore connects researchers across continents and academic institutions, creating opportunities for collaboration that transcend traditional institutional and national boundaries.

Its international community extends across Europe, North America, South America, and Asia, bringing together academics from the Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa, Trinity College Dublin, University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, University of London, University of Edinburgh, Utrecht University, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Università degli Studi di Genova, Università di Bologna, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II, University of Virginia, Harvard University, University of Michigan, University of Ottawa, South Dakota State University, Universidade de São Paulo, Universidad de Buenos Aires, University of Crete, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Zhejiang A&F University, and Beijing Foreign Studies University, among others.

This geographical breadth is not merely a feature of the network: it is fundamental to its intellectual identity. HelleNET provides a platform in which different scholarly traditions, methodologies, languages, and academic environments can meet and interact. It aims to facilitate international research collaborations, academic exchanges, seminars, lectures, workshops, conferences, and joint research initiatives, while also creating opportunities for younger scholars to enter and actively contribute to the international community of Hellenistic Studies.

A central objective of HelleNET is therefore to connect scholars who might otherwise remain separated by geography or disciplinary specialization. By creating a shared intellectual space, the network encourages the exchange of expertise and resources and promotes the development of new research perspectives.

HelleNET also places particular importance on the mobility of ideas. Just as the Hellenistic world was shaped by the movement of knowledge across cities, regions, languages, and cultures, the network seeks to trace and encourage comparable forms of intellectual exchange in contemporary scholarship. The study of the ancient circulation of knowledge thus becomes, itself, a model for a modern international scholarly community.

Ultimately, HelleNET aims to build more than a network of scholars: it seeks to build a community. A community capable of connecting established researchers and emerging academics, bringing together different generations and disciplines, and creating lasting intellectual relationships across borders.

HelleNET is international by nature, interdisciplinary by vocation, and collaborative by design. Its goal is to make Hellenistic Studies a space in which scholarship can move freely across institutions, countries, disciplines, and generations.