Callinicus of Petra (Καλλίνικος ὁ Πετραῖος) was a 3rd-century CE Greek sophist and rhetorician from Petra. A student of the sophist Genethlius, he later taught in Athens, where he was a contemporary of Cassius Longinus [1]. Forced to flee Athens after the Herulian sack of 267 CE, he found patronage in Alexandria under Queen Zenobia of Palmyra, dedicating a work to her son, Vaballathus [1].

His works, mostly lost, include the Prosphonetikos eis Kleodora ("Address to Cleodora"), Historia Alexandrou ("History of Alexander"), Persika ("Persian Matters"), and the fragmentary Ktiseis ("Foundations") [1]. Fragments also survive from Ten tôn philosophôn diadokhên ("The Succession of Philosophers") [1].

Callinicus exemplifies the displacement of intellectuals during the Crisis of the Third Century and the geographical reach of the Second Sophistic. His connection to Zenobia's court highlights her regime's cultural patronage, and his fragments were used by later biographers, attesting to Petra's integration into Hellenic intellectual networks [1].

Sources 1. Suda, Kappa 231, "Kallinikos" (Suda On Line): https://www.cs.uky.edu/~raphael/sol/sol-entries/kappa/231