Nikolay Kun

Nikolai Albertovich Kun was a Russian historian, writer, and educator; the author of the popular book Legends and Myths of Ancient Greece, which has gone through many editions in the languages of the peoples of the former USSR and in the major European languages.

Biography

He graduated from Moscow University in 1903 and began working in Tver at the P. P. Maksimovich Women's Teachers' Seminary. In 1905 he worked at Ed. Meyer’s university in Berlin. At the end of 1906 he returned to Tver and was elected chairman of the board of the Tver Private Real School. With the opening of the People's University in Tver in January 1907, he gave lectures on the history of culture at this educational institution.

In 1908 he was elected professor of general history at the Moscow Higher Women's Pedagogical Courses, founded under the Society of Educators and Women Teachers named after D. I. Tikhomirov; he lectured there until the courses were closed in 1918. At the same time, he taught history at educational institutions in Moscow and gave lectures at the Moscow Society of People's Universities.

In 1911–1912 he led excursions for Russian teachers in Rome and gave lectures in Roman museums on the history of ancient art, the Roman Forum, and the Palatine. From 1915 he was professor at A. L. Shanyavsky Moscow City University in the chair of history of religions.

From 1920 he was a professor in the Faculty of Social Sciences of Moscow State University. At the same time, he taught the history of culture at the First Moscow Pedagogical Institute (1918–1925). From 1935 until his death he was professor at IFLI (the Moscow State Institute of History, Philosophy, and Literature).

Since 1933 he was editor of the Ancient History department of the Great Soviet Encyclopedia and the Small Soviet Encyclopedia, and wrote several hundred articles and notes.