Esther Eidinow

Esther Eidinow FBA (born 1970) is a British ancient historian and academic. She specialises in ancient Greece, particularly ancient Greek religion and magic.^[1][2] She has been Professor of Ancient History at the University of Bristol since 2017.

Eidinow was awarded a Doctor of Philosophy (DPhil) for a thesis entitled Exploring risk among the ancient Greeks: prolegomena and two case studies. Her doctoral research was completed at the University of Oxford under the supervision of Robert Parker in 2003.^[3] A monograph based on the thesis, Oracles, Curses and Risk Among the Ancient Greeks was published in 2007, and praised for its 'analytic rigor' and accessibility.^[4]

From 2011 to 2012, Eidinow was a Solmsen Fellow at the Institute for Research in the Humanities of the University of Wisconsin–Madison.^[5] Between 2017 and 2018 she was a visiting fellow at the Davis Center for Historical Studies of Princeton University.^[6] Since 2017, she has held the Chair in Ancient History at the University of Bristol.^[7] She was previously a lecturer at Newman University College and at the University of Nottingham.^[8][9] She was awarded a Philip Leverhulme Prize in 2015, and was described as "an original and powerful new voice in the field of ancient Greek history".^[10] In July 2024 she was elected as a Fellow of the British Academy.^[11]

• Eidinow, Esther (2007). Oracles, Curses, and Risk Among the Ancient Greeks. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0199277780.
• Eidinow, Esther (2011). Luck, Fate, and Fortune: Antiquity and its Legacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0195380798.
• Hornblower, Simon; Spawforth, Antony; Eidinow, Esther, eds. (2012). The Oxford Classical Dictionary (4th ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0199545568.
• Hornblower, Simon; Spawforth, Antony; Eidinow, Esther, eds. (2014). The Oxford Companion to Classical Civilization (2nd ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0198706779.
• Eidinow, Esther (2015). Envy, Poison, and Death: Women on Trial in Classical Athens. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0199562602.
• Eidinow, Esther; Kindt, Julia, eds. (2015). The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0199642038.
• Eidinow, Esther; Kindt, Julia; Osborne, Robin, eds. (2016). Theologies of Ancient Greek Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1107153479.
• Dillon, Matthew; Eidinow, Esther; Maurizio, Lisa, eds. (2016). Women's Ritual Competence in the Greco-Roman Mediterranean. London: Routledge. ISBN 978-1472478900.
• Driediger-Murphy, Lindsay; Eidinow, Esther, eds. (2019). Ancient Divination and Experience. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0198844549.
• Eidinow, Esther, and Lisa Maurizio, eds. (2020) Narratives of Time and Gender in Antiquity London: Routledge.