His dissertation was supervised by Hans Ulrich Instinsky and dealt with the examination of the Roman history at the end of the 2nd century AD.
Previously, he had obtained a master's degree in history and classical philology at the University of Mainz.
[2] After having completed his PhD, Chantraine worked from 1957 to 1958 on projects, supervised by Konrad Kraft, that were dealing with ancient Roman coins found in Germany and afterwards served as research associate at the University of Mainz.
In 1965, Chantraine finished his habilitation with his work on "Slavery and Release in service for the Roman Emperor" (Freigelassene und Sklaven im Dienst der römischen Kaiser).
Two years later he became chaired professor at the history department of the University of Mannheim (UMA).