Estella Kessler received her BA, MSt, and PhD in Classics from the University of Oxford, where she studied at Brasenose College. Afterwards she moved to New College to teach on the Greek and Latin epic, tragedy, and Hellenistic poetry as a Stipendiary Lecturer. Currently, she is a Fellow at the Center for Hellenic Studies, Washington D.C.

• Center for Hellenic Studies, Washington D.C.;

• New College, Oxford

Estella specialises in Hellenistic literature, particularly the remains of the scientific scholarship conducted by the Hellenistic poets in Alexandria. She has just finished her monograph—based on her PhD thesis—on Callimachus’ paradoxographical fragments expanded with a critical edition, translation, and commentary. Currently she works on the occurrences of birds and particularly ornithomancy in Hellenistic times. Birds play a variety of roles in Hellenistic literature, but evidence particularly for ornithomancy is surprisingly hard to come by in this period: hence, her research will explore the presence of birds also in the arts, historiography, and epigraphic sources to reach a complete picture of the period. An important role also plays the Egyptian environment in which the Alexandrian poets were operating. This work will lay the groundwork for a monograph on this topic.

• Callimachus' scholarship

• Paradoxography

• Local Hellenistic historiography

• Ancient ornithology

• Reception of Hellenistic poetry in Gregory of Nazianzus