Jan Ziolkowski

Jan Ziolkowski (b. 1956) is Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor of Medieval Latin at Harvard University and served from 2007 to 2020 as Director of the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Harvard’s leading institute for Byzantine, Pre-Columbian, and Garden & Landscape studies.

Education

• A.B. summa cum laude, Princeton University (1977)
• Ph.D. Medieval Latin, University of Cambridge (1982) – Marshall Scholar
• Fellow, American Academy in Rome (1980–1981)

Research Interests

His scholarship centers on Medieval Latin literature and Comparative Literature, with particular attention to folklore and fairy-tale traditions, beast poetry, grammar and sexuality, memory studies, and the classical tradition in the Middle Ages. He has produced critical editions, translations, and wide-ranging monographs that illuminate the intellectual and cultural life of medieval Europe.

Across nearly four decades his publications have ranged from Alan of Lille’s Grammar of Sex (1985) to the six-volume Juggler of Notre Dame and the Medievalizing of Modernity (2018), exploring how medieval texts were read, adapted, and remembered. His editorial leadership of the Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library has further expanded the availability of medieval Latin, Greek, and Old English texts with facing-page translations.

Honours & Awards

• Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2010)
• Fellow, Medieval Academy of America (2008)
• Member, American Philosophical Society (2017)
• Corresponding Member, Austrian Academy of Sciences (2006)
• Member, Academia Europaea (2015)
• Austrian Cross of Honor for Science and Art, First Class (2015)
• John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship (1987–1988)
• Multiple Hoopes Prizes for outstanding thesis direction

Advising & Grants

At Harvard he has chaired the Department of Comparative Literature, the Committee on Medieval Studies, and the Department of Classics. He has directed numerous senior honors theses recognized by the Hoopes Prize and has held residential fellowships at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study (2005–2006) and Villa I Tatti (1992–1993, 1997–1998).

Laboratories & Teams

As Director of Dumbarton Oaks he oversaw an international community of scholars, librarians, and curators, expanded public programming, and forged partnerships with institutions throughout Washington, D.C. He founded and continues to guide the Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library, a major series published by Harvard University Press.