Nationality Dutch Years active 1974-2009 | Education Ph.D. (1979) | |
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Full Name Jan Nicolaas Bremmer Occupation Professor, Author, Editor Notable work The Early Greek Concept of the Soul, Interpretations of Greek Mythology People also search for Herman Roodenburg, Andrew Erskine Books The Early Greek Concept, Interpretations of Greek Mythology, Initiation Into the Mysteries, Between Poverty and the P, From Sappho to De Sade | ||
Jan N. Bremmer (born 18 December 1944) is a Dutch academic and historian. He served as a professor of Religious Studies and Theology at the University of Groningen. He specializes in history of ancient religion, especially ancient Greek religion and early Christianity.
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Early life
Jan N. Bremmer was born during the World War II in 1944 in Groningen, Netherlands. Though he became a liberal protestant later in life, he was brought up in an orthodox Calvinist family. His father Rolf Hendrik Bremmer was a Calvinist minister and a church historian, and his mother Lucy Lindeboom also came from a family of Calvinist ministers. His maternal great-grandfather Lucas Lindeboom (1845-1933) was a professor at the Kampen Theological College.
Bremmer studied Classics and Spanish at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (1962-1970) and the University of Bristol (1969-1970). During 1970-1972, he did his military service with the Dutch Military Intelligence. He married Christine, a British citizen. They have two daughters: Melissa and Rebecca.
Academic career
During 1972-74, Bremmer taught Classics at Christelijk Streeklyceum (Christian Regional Lyceum) in Ede, Netherlands. Subsequently he taught ancient history at the University of Utrecht, as an Assistant Professor (1974-1978) and as an Associate Professor (1978-1990). In 1979, he obtained a Ph.D. from the Vrije Universiteit with a dissertation on The Early Greek Conception of the Soul (published by Princeton University Press in 1983).
In 1990, Bremmer joined the University of Groningen as the Chair of Religious Studies, in Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies. He served as the dean of the Faculty during 1996-2005. He was the inaugural Getty Villa Professor at Malibu during 2006-2007. He served as a visiting professor at several other places, including the University of Edinburgh (2007). He retired from teaching in December 2009. In his farewell lecture in January 2010, he discussed the rise of Christianity through the eyes of scholars Edward Gibbon, Adolf von Harnack and Rodney Stark.
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