The study of Classics includes every aspect of the ancient culture of Greece and Rome, ranging from the worlds of Mycenaean Greece to Homer to Rome to early Medieval Europe to the Colonial Americas and well beyond.
The Department of Classics at Yale is one of the leading Classics Departments in the country, with access to unparalleled resources in papyri, ancient coins, and manuscripts, as well as outstanding library facilities and the holdings of the Yale University Art Gallery. As a Classics student at Yale, you will be able to make the most of these resources in pursuit of your studies.
Each year we offer a wide range of courses in Greek and Latin language and literature and in Greek and Roman history, philosophy, archaeology, and culture—you might take a seminar on Greek and Roman medicine, attend lectures on environmental humanities, participate in discussions about the reception of classical antiquity, and much more. We currently have specialists in the following areas: art history and archaeology; military, social and economic history; religion and mythology; medicine and science; ancient magic; literary criticism and cultural history; ancient music; Greek and Roman law; philosophy; imperial Greece; the Second Sophistic; and ancient manuscripts and papyri.
Faculty in our department do not participate in the undergraduate admissions process at Yale College. Due to concerns of equity and high levels of interest among high school students from across the US and abroad (combined with Yale’s low admission rate, <4%), we are unable to meet with interested students prior to their acceptance at Yale. Instead, our faculty requests that you reach out in the spring after your admission to Yale if you have accepted an offer of admission and would like to discuss a Classics major. Faculty make themselves available at in-person admission events like Bulldog Days to discuss the major and departmental opportunities with prospective admitted students.