

Prof. Dr. Antonio C. D. Panaino
E-mail: antonio.panaino@unibo.it
Research Interests:
Avestan and generally Mazdean literatures; history of religions in Pre-Islamic Iran; the mutual influences between Byzantium and the Sasanian; Astronomy and Astrology in the ancient world; History of ancient philosophy in its intercultural connections between East and West with a special focus on the concept of Time; Ethno-linguistics of the Yaghnobi and of the Iranian area. Preservation of the ethno-cultural heritage in areas of crisis and conflict; History of games in antiquity.
Biography
Born in 1961: he followed Classical Studies in Milan and graduated at the State Univ. of Milano in Classical and Indo-Iranian Studies; PhD program in Iranian studies (3 years) at “l’Orientale”, Naples (1985-89) with period of studies in Liège, Cambridge (UK) and London (SOAS). Full Prof. of Iranian Studies at the Univ. of Bologna; he has also worked with D. Pingree (Brown University) and has developed many research programs on ancient and Oriental sciences.
Project Abstract
“Time as an ontological category in ancient Iran."
The concept of Time (Zurwân) has assumed a central importance in Ancient Iran, where the distinction between eternal and limited time had theological (and liturgical) relevance. The present research focuses on three main problems: 1) The qualitative distinction between eternity and human history played a special role in the framework of the Mazdean millenarianism, whose development and impact on other cultures must be anew considered also with reference to Jewish and Christian chiliasm. 2) Another related investigation concerns the possible interferences between the Iranian idea of Time and the Platonic concept of Aiôn as eternal time. 3) Time and motion. The motion of the astral bodies starts with Ahreman’s invasion, and in Avestan sources it is connected with an action played by the Fravashis (the feminine pre-existing souls of the human beings). In later sources in Pahlavi, its origin shows more intricate aspects, sometimes attributed to Ahreman himself. The philosophical dimension of the origin of the astral motion in the Mazdean sources will be the subject of this study.
Curriculum vitae
Prof. A. Panaino is Full Professor of Iranian Studies at the University of Bologna, where he has been also Dean of the Faculty for the Preservation of the Cultural Heritage. Member of many academic institutions, He has been President of the Societas Iranologica Europaea, of the Italian Society for the Study of the Caucasus and Central Asia, and Chairman of the Melammu Project, etc, He graduated in Classical and Indo-Iranian studies at the State University of Milan; PhD at the Oriental Institute of Naples (under Gh. Gnoli) with periods of research in Liège (with J. Kellens) and Cambridge (I. Gershevitch). Director for 9 years of the Italian ethno-linguistic mission in Tajikistan, Yaghnob Valley, he has also be responsible for many national and international scholarly projects. Doctor honoris causa at the New Bulgarian Univ., Sophia (2011) and Prize Girshman of the French Academy (1998).
Selected Publications
Tištrya. Part I: The Avestan Hymn to Sirius. (SOR, LXVIII, 1). Roma 1990, XX, 158 pp.
Tištrya. Part II: The Iranian Myth of the Star Sirius. (SOR, LXVIII, 2). Is.M.E.O., Roma 1995, XVI, 150 pp.
Tessere il cielo. Considerazioni sulle Tavole astronomiche, gli Oroscopi e la Dottrina dei Legamenti tra Induismo, Zoroastrismo e Mandeismo. (SOR, LXXIX). Is.M.E.O., Roma 1998, 114 pp.
A. Panaino – V. Sadovski, Disputationes Iranologicae Vindobonenses, II: 1. Velizar Sadovski, Zur Morphologie und Semantik von Namen und Epitheta im Indo-Iranischen. 2. Mortality and Immortality: Yama’s / Yima’s Choice and the Primordial Incest (Mythologica Indo-Iranica, I). (Sitzungsberichte der ÖAW. Philosophisch-historische Klasse, 845. Band / Veröffentlichungen zur Iranistik, Nr. 65). Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien 2013, 221 pp.
A. Panaino, Sidera Viva. Studi Iranici di Storia della mitologia astrale, dell’astronomia e dell’astrologia antica. Iranian Studies in history of Ancient astral Mythology, Astronomy and Astrology. Edited by Andrea Gariboldi, Paolo Ognibene, Velizar Sadovski. (Indo-Iranica et Orientalia. Collana diretta da A. Panaino e V. Sadovski. Series Purpurea, 2,1 – 2,2). Mimesis, Milano – Udine – Paris, 2014, pp. 1-403, 405-824.