A New Award for Hard-Won Scholarship
We are delighted to announce a new annual competition, open to all worldwide. The Antigone Prize for Classical Philology seeks to reward excellence in rigorous philological scholarship on understudied works of Greek and Latin literature.
The challenge set before entrants is to provide the best edition, translation and commentary of a modern literary work composed in Ancient Greek or Latin. A new prize, then, for new work conducted according to ancient principles, on relatively new works written according to ancient principles.
First Prize: The complete Loeb Classical Library (some 660 volumes) plus £5,000; or (for those without space for more books!) a cash prize of £10,000.
For the two best runners-up there will be a Second Prize of £2,000 and Third Prize of £1,000.
Antigone is always keen to reward important new work in the field of Classics. This prize, funded by an exceptionally generous reader of Antigone and true lover of philology, seeks to reward the application of philological energy and acumen on materials in the Classics which have been unduly neglected by scholars. We speak of modern compositions in Latin and Ancient Greek which were composed in the style of ancient writers, by figures who were deeply immersed in, and passionate about, the Classical tradition.
For the texts in question there exist no translations, no commentaries and (almost no) scholarly discussions. Below are six titles, three Greek and three Latin, from which entrants must choose one text. The challenge is to produce a self-standing edition of that work: the text is to be presented with an English translation. It is to be preceded by an introduction (in English or Latin) and followed by a scholarly commentary on the text.
The total work should not exceed 25,000 words, excluding the Latin/Greek text and its translation. The commentary should cover philological topics, treating the Greek and Latin seriously as literature, but also show sensitivity to the literary, historical, sociopolitical, satirical (etc.) elements that may be at play in the text. In short, the end product should have the feel of a typical Classical commentary, albeit on a short text of eight to twelve pages.
The focus for this year’s competition lies on Victorian and Edwardian Oxford prize compositions, both prose and verse. These works, composed by students generally around the age of twenty, marked the zenith of Classical training in their day – both of linguistic fluency; it is very depressing that in the 21st century, such works are almost entirely unread, with practically zero scholarship undertaken on them. Until now!
The six prize compositions available for selection are either in Greek prose (winners of the Gaisford Prize) or in Latin verse (winners of the Chancellor’s Verse Prize). The PDFs available for download here are to be treated as the definitive version of the text. (If anyone discovers a later version of these texts published by their author, please do contact us, as that would be interesting and potentially important!)
Greek Prose
1) The Plague of London, J. Bryce (1860)
2) Anaximander, or On the Origin of Animals, P.E. Raynor (1878)
3) Aristophanes, or On Humour, H. Sidebotham (1894)
Latin Verse
4) Empedocles, by A.S. Ward (1897)
5) Poetae Lucani morientis oratio, F.S. Porter (1906)
6) Napoleo in Sancta Helena insula captivus secum loquitur, J.N. Dark (1907)
The deadline for entries, which should be submitted as PDFs to competition@antigonejournal.com, will be 31 July 2026. All those who intend to enter are requested to send a message to this email address confirming their choice of text by 31 January 2026. Fuller guidelines about form of submission will be shared with confirmed entrants after that date.
The panel of judges, formed of Classical scholars with a particular interest in the subject, will reward objective excellence, accurate elegance, and genuine originality. Their job is made easier by the fact that in path-breaking work of this kind there is no scope for inaccuracy, irrelevance, AI-riddled vacuity, or empty jargon. It is a cause of particular excitement to them that they now have a substantial prize to award for philological expertise.
Finally, leaving the glittering prizes to one side, we hope that the best crop of entries will have a life beyond this competition. These should be all but ready for publication, in one form or another, and thus help inject some interest and energy on this unduly overlooked corner of Classics. In this, as in other fields, Antigone hopes to be a spur to action within the discipline.
Good luck to all who take up the challenge!
