Born in 1976 in Ruda Slask, Poland, Przemyslaw Marciniak intends to use the fellowship to write a book on satire in Byzantium as well as to extend relations between his home university in Katowice and Freie Universität Berlin. He plans to return regularly to Berlin to use the libraries of Freie Universität for his research and to consult with his mentor, Professor Johannes Niehoff-Panagiotidis in the field of Byzantine Studies at the Institute for Greek and Latin Language and Literature of Freie Universität Berlin. In addition, he will be able to travel to countries of the former Byzantine Empire such as Turkey or Syria. "This research fellowship goes hand in hand with an enormous amount of academic freedom," stated the young scholar.

Przemyslaw Marciniak studied classics at the University of Silesia in Katowice and at Collegium Invisibile in Warsaw. From 2000 to 2003 he taught in the classics department of the University of Silesia in Katowice. In 2003 he concluded his doctoral thesis on "Greek Drama in Byzantine Times." Since then he has been an assistant professor in the classics department of the University of Silesia in Katowice. He has been abroad for research and teaching assignments at various institutions including King’s College in London, Queen’s University in Belfast, Maison des Sciences de l’Homme Paris, the institutes für Byzantine Studies in both Munich and Vienna, and the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin.

Przemyslaw Marciniak's main areas of research are Greek drama during the Byzantine period, Byzantine theater, and Byzantine satire.