Guidelines for Contributors
Submission deadline
We invite submissions for the eleventh issue of SAMAI (for the year 2026) by 31 August 2026.
Frequency and publishing model
SAMAI is published annually (one issue per calendar year); issues may be supplemented by additional volumes. All texts are published in open access, with no charges to authors or readers.
Submitting articles
Authors should submit their papers in two digital copies (formatted .doc and .rtf) to: samai@uwr.edu.pl
Publication ethics
SAMAI follows the Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). SAMAI considers plagiarism, falsifying data and submitting for publication a paper previously published (or its part) as a breach of ethical standards. If any of the above is identified in a submitted paper, the editors of SAMAI will ask the author for an explanation and then follow the COPE guidelines in their next steps.
Use of artificial-intelligence tools
Generative artificial-intelligence tools (e.g. large language models) may not be listed as an author or co-author of a text — authorship entails responsibilities that AI tools cannot bear. If an author has used such tools while preparing the work (e.g. for language editing), this must be disclosed in the text or in the acknowledgements, indicating the scope and purpose of their use. The author bears full responsibility for the content and integrity of the entire text, including any parts produced with the help of such tools. The position of the Editorial Board follows the COPE position on AI tools.
Corrections and retractions
Should significant errors be discovered in a published text, the Editorial Board issues a correction (erratum); where an error affects the reliability of the work, the text is corrected. In cases of serious research misconduct (including plagiarism, data falsification, or duplicate publication) an article may be retracted, and a notice of retraction remains permanently attached to the publication record. The Editorial Board acts in accordance with the COPE retraction guidelines.
Complaints and appeals
Authors have the right to appeal editorial decisions and to raise complaints regarding the review or editorial process. Such matters should be sent to samai@uwr.edu.pl; they are considered by the Editor-in-Chief and, where warranted, may be referred for a further, independent review. The Editorial Board handles all such matters in accordance with COPE principles.
General guidelines
SAMAI accepts:
- papers no longer than 20 standard pages,
- book reviews no longer than 4 standard pages,
- announcements of forthcoming conferences.
A standard page is 300 words (in English) or 1800 characters with spaces (in Polish).
Every paper should be accompanied by an abstract in English, up to 50 words.
The preferred languages are English and Polish.
Main text
Times New Roman 12, with 1.5 spacing and justified, should be used in the main body of a paper.
The title should be in small caps, titles of cited works in italics (e.g. PHOTIUS ON THE HISTORIES OF HERODOTUS), titles of sections within a paper in italics.
All personal names and toponyms should be spelled in the original form of the ancient or medieval source or in transliteration, except for those generally accepted in English-language publications (e.g. Ovid – not Ovidius; Philip II – not Philippos II). If the source is written in a script other than Latin, please transliterate. Roman names known from Greek sources should be spelled either in their transliterated Greek form (e.g. Ioulios) or in the corresponding Latin form (e.g. Iulius), consistently throughout the paper. Greek and Roman names known from sources in languages other than Greek or Latin should be spelled in their Greek or Latin form, but accompanied by the transliterated original form in parentheses when mentioned for the first time, e.g. Alexander (A-lek-sa-an-dar-ri-is).
Quotations from ancient and medieval sources in languages other than Latin should be entered using True Type fonts. All source quotations should be accompanied by an English translation. Very short quotations should be in italics, longer ones in double quotation marks. Quotations within quotations should be put in single quotation marks. Conventional phrases (e.g. Zeitgeist, avant-garde) should be in italics.
Anti-plagiarism measures
SAMAI makes every effort to protect its authors from plagiarism; therefore, all texts submitted to SAMAI are checked with plagiarism-detection software before publication (in the years 2019–2025 this was antyplagiat.pl).
Archiving policy
All texts published in SAMAI (articles, reviews and other) are archived in the National Library (Biblioteka Narodowa) and, from 2019, also in the Repository of the University of Wrocław (Repozytorium Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego).
Notes
SAMAI prefers footnotes over endnotes.
The names of ancient authors should be given in full form in the main text and in abbreviated form in footnotes, following the lists of authors and works in Liddell, Scott, Jones, Greek-English Lexicon (9th edition) for Greek authors and the Oxford Latin Dictionary for Latin authors.
The names of ancient authors not listed by these dictionaries, as well as medieval authors, should be given in full form in the footnote which names them for the first time, then consistently in abbreviated form.
The title of an ancient/medieval work should be italicised, books in Roman numerals, chapters and sections in Arabic numerals. No comma between Roman and Arabic numerals:
1 Plu. Alex. 5.7. 2 Hom. Il. XXIV 221. 3 Caes. Gal. VI 11-18. 4 Hydatius Lemicus, Continuatio Chronicorum Hieronymianorum ad ann. CCCCLXVII, ed. Theodorus Mommsen, MGH, Auctores Antiquissimi, XI, Pars II, Berlin 1894, 49 et 60. 5 Hydatius 55. 6 Juv. XIV 41.
For modern authors and their works, the Harvard style (author's name, date of publication and page and/or illustration numbers, always as 7–11, not 7ff) should be applied. When referring to two publications of the same author published in the same year, use a letter after the date (1970a). Do not use op.cit., ibidem. Apply only abbreviations commonly used in classical scholarship (e.g. RE, CIL, IG, SEG, MGH, OCD³, LSJ, FGrH):
7 Price 1984, 79-82. 8 Badian 1958a, 427. 9 LSJ, s. v. ̕Ασία.
References
All modern works used in the paper should be listed in alphabetical order of author, and within this in chronological order of publication, at the end of the paper. This bibliography should be preceded by a list of less common abbreviations:
FdD: Fouilles des Delphes, Paris 1909- . RICIS: Recueil des inscriptions concernant les cultes isiaques, Paris 2005.
Books should be listed as:
Bosworth A.B., 1988: Conquest and Empire: The Reign of Alexander the Great, Cambridge.
Chapters in edited volumes should be listed as:
Robertson N., 1996: 'The Ancient Mother of the Gods: A missing Chapter in the History of Greek Religion', [in:] E. N. Lane (ed.), Cybele, Attis and Related Cults: Essays in Memory of M.J. Vermaseren, Leiden, 239–304.
or:
Lane E.N. (ed.), 1996: Cybele, Attis and related Cults: Essays in Memory of M.J. Vermaseren, Leiden.
Robertson N., 1996: 'The Ancient Mother of the Gods: A missing Chapter in the History of Greek Religion', [in:] Lane 1996, 239–304.
Titles of journal articles should be in quotation marks; titles of journals should be abbreviated in accordance with L'Année Philologique and Lexikon des Mittelalters. If an abbreviation is not listed there, the title should be given in full. Titles of journals should be italicised, volume numbers in Arabic numerals:
Müller H., 2000: 'Der hellenistische Archiereus', Chiron 30, 519–542.
Illustrations
It is the responsibility of every author to secure appropriate permissions to publish illustrations, photographs and other graphic material, both in print and digital form. Please email illustrations to the editors as separate files in .bmp or .jpg format, in a resolution greater than 300 dpi. Captions should be emailed as separate files and should contain source and copyright information.
Reviewing
All articles submitted to SAMAI are subject to double-blind review, and acceptance for publication is conditional upon a positive opinion of the reviewers.
No publication fees
SAMAI does not charge any fees to authors submitting texts for publication.
Copyright and permissions
With the submission of a paper, every author declares that they are the sole owner of the copyright of the paper to be published. A paper is accepted for publication upon the granting by the author to SAMAI of the exclusive right to publish it. The paper may not be published in any other journal, book or website.
Once a paper is accepted by SAMAI for publication, the copyright to it is automatically transferred to the editors of SAMAI in accordance with the "Statement of delivering the work free of charge and transfer of the proprietary copyright to this work" (→ Author's Statement). The proprietary copyright is transferred to the editors of SAMAI free of charge and covers all known fields of recording, reproduction and distribution. The author grants the editors of SAMAI the exclusive licence to exercise derivative copyright, including the right to adapt the work for use in a multimedia version.
An author may use their own material for publication elsewhere on the condition of attesting that SAMAI was the original publisher of the paper and upon notifying the editors of SAMAI in advance. SAMAI will make every effort to ensure the widest possible distribution of the papers it publishes.
We welcome any questions and suggestions, which should be directed to: samai@uwr.edu.pl.