Chiara Ombretta Tommasi

Chiara Ombretta Tommasi was educated at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, where she graduated in 1995, obtaining her Master’s degree summa cum laude from the University of Pisa in the same year. She completed her PhD in Greek and Latin Philology in 2000. In 2017, she obtained the French Qualification aux fonctions de Professeur and the Italian National Scientific Qualification for full professorship in two fields (2018; 2020).
Currently Associate Professor of the History of Religions and Early Christianity at the University of Pisa (since 2017), she also teaches Classical Civilisations and Late Antique Latin Literature. She has recently been appointed Director of the post-lauream programme “Religion, Esotericism, New Spiritualities”, the first of its kind in Italy. Visiting professorships include Université Paris IV Sorbonne (2024), the Scuola Galileiana in Padua (2018), and the University of Geneva.
Her research lies at the intersection of classical philology, the history of religions, and early Christianity, with a particular focus on Late Antiquity, Latin Neoplatonism, epic poetry, and the transmission of religious and esoteric traditions.
Her scholarly work includes critical editions of late antique writers, including Flavii Cresconii Corippi Iohannidos liber III (Florence, 2001); Iohannes Scottus Eriugena, De Imagine (Turnhout, 2020) and Tertulliano, Adversus Valentinianos (Rome 2010), Arnobio, Adversus Nationes (Rome, 2017; new edition under contract for Brepols Publishers in Turnhout). Her interest in late antique esotericism has led to extensive research on Martianus Capella, culminating in a monograph (Naples, 2012) and a series of edited volumes in the Bibliotheca Chaldaica series (Heidelberg). In 2009, she broadened my scope with Giacomo Leopardi, Rhetores underscoring my interest in the reception of antiquity within modern intellectual traditions. Among her most recent works is a widely accessible global history of religions (Religioni. Una storiaglobale, Mondadori Education, 2024). Her interests also extend to Sino-European religious interactions, an area in which she has developed linguistic competence: she has recently published (with Luigia Businarolo) Michał Boym’s Flora Sinensis and is currently preparing a commented edition of Athanasius Kircher’s China Illustrata.
Author of approximately 200 publications and participant in more than 100 international conferences, she has been involved in major research collaborations with leading European institutions (Tübingen, Frankfurt, EPHE Paris, Santander). She has also coordinated funded projects, including the FISR 2019 “SERICA. Sino-European religious interactions in Central Asia” (with Andrea Balbo, University of Turin), securing €1.4 million.
She has organized major international conferences, including the EASR Conference (Pisa 2021, over 800 participants), alongside other events on intercultural and religious themes.
At the University of Pisa, she has held several institutional roles, including Quality Assurance Coordinator (2024), member of the Academic Senate (2023–2024), and Head of Departmental Communication (2020–2024).
Actively engaged in the international scholarly community, she serves as Vice-President of the European Association for the Study of Religions (also Deputy Secretary in previous terms), Treasurer of the Italian Society for the History of Religions, and member of the Executive Board of the Institut d’Études Augustiniennes (Paris). Since 2016, she has been affiliated with the CNRS (LEM, Paris).
Her editorial activity includes board membership in several international journals and series, as well as co-direction of the Documenta Orientalia series (since 2022).
Her achievements have been recognized with awards such as the Prize for Young Researchers from the University of Pisa (2011) and election to Academia Europaea (London, 2019).