PD Dr. Alexander Free

Alexander Free holds a professorship at the Department of Ancient History at the University of Freiburg. Between 2005 and 2010, he studied history and classical philology at the University of Tübingen before transferring to the University of Munich. Here, he completed his doctoral thesis in 2014 on ‘Geschichtsschreibung als Paideia. Lukians Schrift “Wie man Geschichte schreiben soll”’. Since 2014, he has been a research assistant in the Department of Ancient History at the LMU Munich, where he obtained his habilitation in 2022 with a thesis on ‘Polis und Metropolis im römischen Ägypten. Städtisches Selbstverständnis in Hermupolis Magna’.

Alexander Free’s research focuses on the history of ancient historiography. He is interested in the social conditions for the writing and reception of historiography, as well as the methodology and theoretical prerequisites of historical analysis in antiquity. In addition, he deals with Ptolemaic, Roman and Byzantine Egypt, focusing on research into the ancient city on the one hand and the edition of papyri on the other.

Selection of Publications

• A. Free, Geschichtsschreibung als Paideia. Lukians Schrift „Wie man Geschichte schreiben soll“ in der Bildungskultur des 2. Jhs. n. Chr. (Vestigia Band 69), München 2015.
• A. Free, Polis und Metropolis im römischen Ägypten. Städtisches Selbstverständnis von Hermupolis Magna (Klio-Beihefte Band 39), Berlin – Boston 2024.
• S. Bönisch-Meyer, A. Free, I. Mossong (Hrsgg.), Bilder urbaner Lebenswelten in der griechisch-römischen Antike (Philippika 146), Wiesbaden 2024.
• A. Free, Die Faktion des Geschichtsschreibers im Widerstreit mit der Theorie. Oder: Wird die antike Historiographie ihren eigenen Ansprüchen gerecht?, in: T. Blank, F. K. Maier (Hrsgg.), Die symphonischen Schwestern. Narrative Konstruktionen von ‚Wahrheiten‘ in der nachklassischen Geschichtsschreibung, Stuttgart 2018, S. 241-261.
• A. Free, List of Deliveries in Kind in the Eparchy of Arcadia, in: F. A. J. Hoogendijk, J. Stolk (Hrsgg.), Greek, Demotic and Coptic Papyri and Ostraca in the Leiden Papyrological Institute (P. L. Bat. 40), Leiden – Boston 2023, S. 195-209.

Alexander Free teaches courses on Greek history from the Archaic period to Hellenism, with a particular focus on Hellenism. In Roman history, he focuses particularly on the Imperial period and Late Antiquity. He attaches particular importance to a reflective approach to the basic sciences and to addressing key topics for teacher training.