Nanno Marinatos

Marinatos was born in Athens in 1950; her parents were Aimila Loverdos and Spyridon Marinatos, an archaeologist of the Bronze Age Aegean.^[1][2] Named Ourania after her grandmother, she was nicknamed "Nanno" by her father after a woman associated by ancient sources with the poet Mimnermus.^[2] Marinatos studied at the German School in Athens, from where she graduated in 1968.^[3] She studied classical philology and archaeology at the University of Colorado at Boulder, receiving her PhD in 1979.^[2][3][4]

Marinatos is Professor Emerita of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies at the University of Illinois Chicago, where she was previously Head of Department.^[5][1][6] Prior to joining the University of Illinois Chicago in 2001, she taught at Oberlin College, Ohio, the University of Bergen, and the University of Zurich.^[2][3] She has excavated at the prehistoric site of Akrotiri on Santorini and at Tell el Da'ba in Egypt.^[3] She has published research on Minoan religion, particularly on the roles of iconography and symbolism;^{[7][8][9][10][11]} on Arthur Evans' excavations at Knossos;^[12] on the site of Akrotiri;^[13] on the work of her father Spyridon;^[14] and on ancient Greek religion more widely.^[15][16] She has been described as 'a leading figure in the area of interconnections between the ancient Aegean and the wider world of the Eastern Mediterranean, the Near East, and Egypt'.^[2]