eLatin eGreek eLearn2024-03-29T11:25:46ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasishttps://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/352106374?profile=RESIZE_48X48&width=48&height=48&crop=1%3A1https://eclassics.ning.com/forum/topic/listForContributor?user=amasis&feed=yes&xn_auth=noNutting's 'Ad Alpes' Latin Audiobooktag:eclassics.ning.com,2020-07-02:727885:Topic:913652020-07-02T18:03:34.231ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
<p><em>Ad Alpes: a Tale of Roman Life</em> is a Latin reader for intermediate students.</p>
<p>It was originally published in 1923. The story is held together by the narrative conceit of a journey from Ephesus in Asia Minor, where the father, Publius Cornelius, had been serving as a government official, back to Italy and then overland to the Alps.</p>
<p>On the way, the family travel via Brundisium (Brindisi), visit Rome briefly, and then travel on towards the Alps.</p>
<p> During the journey,…</p>
<p><em>Ad Alpes: a Tale of Roman Life</em> is a Latin reader for intermediate students.</p>
<p>It was originally published in 1923. The story is held together by the narrative conceit of a journey from Ephesus in Asia Minor, where the father, Publius Cornelius, had been serving as a government official, back to Italy and then overland to the Alps.</p>
<p>On the way, the family travel via Brundisium (Brindisi), visit Rome briefly, and then travel on towards the Alps.</p>
<p> During the journey, Cornelius, his wife Drusilla, sons Publius and Sextus, daughter Cornelia and a Greek slave Onesimus and servant/slave Stasimus (who is impudent, and is always is getting into scrapes) tell each other stories. The family also own a Jewish slave, Anna, who is the wet nurse for their infant son, Lucius. She from time to time relates stories from the Bible.</p>
<p>The text of the 1927 edition can be read on-line on the <a href="https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.$b60534;view=1up;seq=1" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">Hathitrust</a> site </p>
<p>The book is available for streaming or download to subscribers at <a href="https://www.latinum.org.uk/intermediate_1" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Latinum Institute.</a></p>
<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/6528850064?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/6528850064?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-full"/></a></p> The Vulgate Psalms in Classical Audiotag:eclassics.ning.com,2017-07-18:727885:Topic:851472017-07-18T18:54:41.677ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
<p><a href="https://www.patreon.com/latinum" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.patreon.com/latinum</a><br></br><span>New at Latinum: the Vulgate Psalms in classical audio are now complete. I have also started working on recording versions of Buchanan's Psalm paraphrases, and Castellio's more classical translation. In progress is an audiobook of L'Homond's 'Historiae Sacrae', Maude's 'Julia', and Latin paraphrases by John Stirling (currently I am producing an audio version of his…</span></p>
<p><a href="https://www.patreon.com/latinum" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">https://www.patreon.com/latinum</a><br/><span>New at Latinum: the Vulgate Psalms in classical audio are now complete. I have also started working on recording versions of Buchanan's Psalm paraphrases, and Castellio's more classical translation. In progress is an audiobook of L'Homond's 'Historiae Sacrae', Maude's 'Julia', and Latin paraphrases by John Stirling (currently I am producing an audio version of his Eutropius paraphrase). I encourage my members to make suggestions for new recording projects; I currently work on Latinum for a couple of hours a day.</span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1002077420?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="750" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1002077420?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750" class="align-center"/></a></p> Statues of Greek Gods Unearthed in Cretetag:eclassics.ning.com,2016-01-28:727885:Topic:814482016-01-28T15:29:54.183ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
<p>Source: <a href="http://news.discovery.com/history/archaeology/statues-of-greek-gods-unearthed-in-crete-160127.htm">http://news.discovery.com/history/archaeology/statues-of-greek-gods-unearthed-in-crete-160127.htm</a></p>
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<div class="title-ad-container"><div class="title-container"><h1 class="content-title">Statues of Greek Gods Unearthed in Crete</h1>
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<div class="title-sub"><span class="content-date">JAN 27, 2016 03:05 PM ET </span>// …</div>
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<p>Source: <a href="http://news.discovery.com/history/archaeology/statues-of-greek-gods-unearthed-in-crete-160127.htm">http://news.discovery.com/history/archaeology/statues-of-greek-gods-unearthed-in-crete-160127.htm</a></p>
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<div class="title-ad-container"><div class="title-container"><h1 class="content-title">Statues of Greek Gods Unearthed in Crete</h1>
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<div class="title-sub"><span class="content-date">JAN 27, 2016 03:05 PM ET </span>// <span class="content-author">BY <a href="http://news.discovery.com/rossella-lorenzi.htm">ROSSELLA LORENZI</a></span></div>
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<div class="media-body-wrap"><div class="media-body">The statues of Artemis and Apollo were recovered in relatively good condition.<p class="image-credit">GREEK MINISTRY OF CULTURE</p>
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<div class="over-main"><div class="over-inner"><span>Top</span><span>Archaeological</span><span>Finds</span><span>Expected</span><span>in</span><span>2015</span></div>
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<div class="editorial-body"><p>Archaeologists excavating a Roman-era villa in Crete have uncovered two impressive, small-sized statues depicting the gods Artemis and Apollo, according to a statement by the Greek Ministry of Culture.</p>
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<p>Found in the archaeological site of Aptera, a city in western Crete destroyed by an earthquake in the 7th century AD, the sculptures date to the first or second century AD and stand at around 21 inches in height.</p>
<p><a href="http://news.discovery.com/history/archaeology/wreck-yields-treasures-of-ancient-greeces-1-percent-150928.htm">Wreck Yields Treasures of Ancient Greece’s ’1 Percent’</a></p>
<p>The one depicting the hunting goddess Artemis is made of copper, while the other, portraying her twin brother Apollo, is carved from marble.</p>
<p>Once standing on an ornate base also made of copper, Artemis is wearing a short chiton, or tunic, and is ready to shoot an arrow.</p>
<p>The statue is described as being in an excellent state of preservation.</p>
<p><a href="http://news.discovery.com/history/art-history/apollo-statue-turkey.htm">Colossal Apollo Statue Unearthed in Turkey</a></p>
<p>“The preservation of the white material used for her eyes is spectacular,” the ministry said.</p>
<p>The marble statuette of Apollo is simpler in style, but nevertheless finely carved. Traces of red paint are still visible on the statue’s pedestal.</p>
<p>According to the team led by archaeologist Vanna Niniou-Kindelis, director of excavations at Aptera, both sculptures were likely imported to the island in order to decorate a shrine in the luxury Roman villa in which they were found.</p>
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<div class="group editorial-tags"><span class="tag-title">Tags</span> <a class="button button-pagination button-0" href="http://news.discovery.com/history/tags/artifacts.htm">ARTIFACTS</a> <a class="button button-pagination button-1" href="http://news.discovery.com/history/tags/ancient-greece.htm">ANCIENT GREECE</a> <a class="button button-pagination button-2" href="http://news.discovery.com/history/tags/history.htm">HISTORY</a></div>
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</div> Ancient Script Spurs Rethinking of Historic ‘Backwater’tag:eclassics.ning.com,2015-09-17:727885:Topic:794572015-09-17T14:35:21.136ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
<p>Source: <a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/09/150916-caucasus-writing-republic-of-georgia-grakliani-iron-age/">http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/09/150916-caucasus-writing-republic-of-georgia-grakliani-iron-age/</a></p>
<p><strong style="font-size: 14pt;"><span>Ancient Script Spurs Rethinking of Historic ‘Backwater’…</span></strong></p>
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<p>Source: <a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/09/150916-caucasus-writing-republic-of-georgia-grakliani-iron-age/">http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/09/150916-caucasus-writing-republic-of-georgia-grakliani-iron-age/</a></p>
<p><strong style="font-size: 14pt;"><span>Ancient Script Spurs Rethinking of Historic ‘Backwater’</span></strong></p>
<div class="row clearfix row--mainArt"><div class="col-md-12 col-md-offset-1"><div class="parsys mainArt"><div class="titleAndDek TitleAndDek section"><div class="article__deck"><p>At a temple site in the Republic of Georgia, letters carved in stone could change the way we see the development of writing.</p>
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<div class="media__caption--text"><p>Mysterious script etched on the side of a collapsed stone altar at the ancient temple site of Grakliani, in Georgia, may be the oldest example of native writing found in the Caucasus.</p>
<span> </span><br/><small class="media__caption--credit">PHOTOGRAPH BY SHALVA LEJAVA</small></div>
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<div class="row clearfix row--byline js-top-byline"><div class="col-md-12 col-md-offset-1"><div class="BylineComponent byline article__byline"><div class="byline"><div class="byline__category byline__contributor">By <span>Tara Isabella Burton</span>, <span>National Geographic </span></div>
<div class="byline__publish"><p>PUBLISHED SEPTEMBER 16, 2015</p>
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<div id="article__body" class="paragraphs col-md-8"><div class="content parsys"><div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p><span>GRAKLIANI, Georgia</span>—Sophia Paatashvili, a third-year graduate student in archaeology at <a href="https://www.tsu.ge/en/">Ivane Javakashvili Tbilisi State University,</a> was excavating an ancient temple at an Iron Age site called Grakliani last month when she noticed something strange: a series of marks carved into a stone slab just below the temple’s collapsed altar.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Unlike inscriptions found in other temples at Grakliani, these didn’t show animals or people, nor were they random decorative elements.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Instead, says <a href="https://tsu.ge/science/?leng=eng&cat=autors&auid=%E1%83%9A%E1%83%98%E1%83%A9%E1%83%94%E1%83%9A%E1%83%98">Vakhtang Licheli</a>, who heads the university’s archaeology institute and has led excavations at Grakliani during the past eight years, they may be the oldest example of a native alphabet in the Caucasus—fully a thousand years older than any indigenous writing previously found in the region.</p>
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<div class="text parbase pullQuote PullQuote section"><div class="pull-quote small left"><blockquote class="double"><p>This discovery is important in the history of the development of writing.</p>
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<div class="pull-quote__author hidden-xs"><div class="author"><p>Vakhtang Licheli</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>“This discovery is not just important for the history of Georgia,” Licheli says, “but in the history of the development of writing.”</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>The excavated portion of the inscription—some 31 by 3 inches—features at least five curved shapes hollowed out in deep chasms in the stone.</p>
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<div class="media__caption--text"><p>This painted jug from the fourth century B.C. was found in a grave at Grakliani, not far from Georgia’s capital, Tbilisi.</p>
<span> </span><br/><small class="media__caption--credit">PHOTOGRAPH BY EMZAR LOMTADZE</small></div>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>The script as a whole bears no relation to any other alphabet, although Licheli detects similarities to letters in ancient Greek and Aramaic.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>He says there’s no doubt that the carvings are part of an alphabet rather than a decorative pattern.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>“In a decoration you see repetition every two, four, six times. Here there’s no repetition.” He notes the skill of the carver in smoothing the design. “He was very comfortable doing this—this was not his first time.”</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Licheli says it’s reasonable to assume that the writing dates to the seventh century B.C., when the temple is believed to have been built.</p>
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<div class="text parbase pullQuote PullQuote section"><div class="pull-quote small left"><blockquote class="double"><p>These few letters upend traditional historical narratives about the native population of the region.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Shards of pottery found at the site are emblematic of that period. Their color, material, and design, Licheli says, resemble those from similar sites in Georgia, leaving little doubt as to their age.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><h2><span>No Longer A Backwater</span></h2>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>These few letters in stone upend traditional historical narratives about the native population of the region the Greeks and Romans called Iberia (not to be confused with the modern-day Iberian Peninsula), which bordered the Georgian coast of the Black Sea.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Archaeologists have long known that literate civilizations were present there as long ago as the fourth millennium B.C.—excavations throughout Georgia have unearthed coins, beads, and pottery from Assyria, Greece, and Persia.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Until now, though, no trace of Iberian literacy from as long ago as the Iron Age, which in the Caucasus lasted from about the late second millennium B.C. to the fifth century B.C., has been found. (The earliest known Georgian and Armenian scripts date from the fifth century A.D., shortly after these cultures converted to Christianity.)</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Ancient Iberia, Licheli says, has been seen by Georgian and international archaeologists as a backwater, unworthy of study on its own terms, especially during the middle years of the first millennium B.C., when foreign conquerors (notably the Greeks and Persians) made their mark.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><h2><span>A Wealth of Objects</span></h2>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Licheli’s initial excavations surfaced a wealth of objects: children’s toys made of carved stone, imitation Persian pottery, and a fifth-century B.C. stone temple that blended ancient Persian Zoroastrian altar architecture with ram sculptures representing Caucasian folk gods.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>To Licheli, these finds suggested that Iron Age Iberians were an advanced and complex culture, in close contact with the “highly developed” societies of the age—not only Greece and Persia but also Mesopotamia and Egypt. “We even found a Egyptian scarab beetle here,” he says, showing off the carving.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>But one question kept nagging at him: How could the Iberians have such cultural richness—but no written language? It didn’t make sense.</p>
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<div class="media__caption--text"><p>Students from Ivane Jakashvili Tbilisi State University excavate at Grakliani. Inscriptions discovered here, possibly from the seventh century B.C., appear to be part of an alphabet. Until now, the earliest known writing in Georgia dated from the fifth century A.D. </p>
<br/><small class="media__caption--credit">PHOTOGRAPH BY SULIKO KOKHREAIDZE</small></div>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Licheli wasn’t the first to suspect that the Iberians had writing long before the fifth century A.D. Medieval Georgian chronicles from the 11th century refer to an ancient Georgian script. In the early 1900s the Georgian historian Ivane Javakhashvili—excavating the Iron Age Armaziskhevi site just outside Tbilisi— put heart and soul into a vain attempt to prove its existence.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Another question that intrigues Licheli is why three letters carved on one corner of a stone altar in the temple, also newly discovered, seem to bear no relation to the letter on the stone slab.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>“Maybe there were two languages in one temple,” he conjectures—two ethnically related Iberian groups, each with its own script, living side by side. “This is very unusual, not just for Georgians but in the whole world.”</p>
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<div class="adunit--automatic-ad adunit--not-rendered right-rail-slot"><div class="AdSlot"><div class="adunit display-block" id="ng_news_history_and_civilization_buildings_article-auto-gen-id-10"><div id="google_ads_iframe_/2994/ng/news/history_and_civilization/buildings/article_5__container__"><span style="font-size: 1.5em;">Slow Progress</span></div>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Although Grakliani itself was first identified as a site of potential importance during the 1950s, excavations proper didn’t start till 2007.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>“During the Soviet era, we were very closed,” Licheli says. There was little opportunity to work with other scholars or to keep up with international methodological and technological developments.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>And during the chaotic early days after Georgia’s independence, in 1991, it was even worse. There was no academy to train new archaeologists, and the few existing ones were overextended, unable to investigate the country’s wealth of ancient sites.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Even today, Licheli says, there’s a “generation gap”—Soviet-trained archaeologists in their sixties and a new young generation of eager archaeologists-in-training but no one in between.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>But Licheli places his hope in the new generation—as does the nationalist Georgian government.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Two years ago then Minister for Education Giorgi Margvelashvili, now the country’s president, made governmental stipends available for students studying Georgian archaeology.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>These days, for the first time, Licheli says he has “more than enough” students to do the work on his agenda. Plus, he adds, “the government has doubled our research budget.”</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>Meanwhile, a new paved pathway is being built from the highway to the Grakliani site to make it more accessible to curious visitors.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>The script offers the confirmation Licheli has long sought that Georgia should be considered among the world’s “highest developed societies. For Georgians,” he says, “cultural knowledge is very important. Now at last they’re able to ascribe that knowledge to their ancestors.”</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>With a bigger budget, governmental support, and a wider platform for their research, Licheli reasons that more inscriptions will come to light.</p>
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<div class="text smartbody parbase section"><p>“Somewhere,” he grins, “we can find another.”</p>
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</div> The Six Weirdest Ancient Roman Ideas About The Human Bodytag:eclassics.ning.com,2015-07-23:727885:Topic:788552015-07-23T14:34:33.390ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
<p>Source: <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinakillgrove/2015/07/22/the-six-weirdest-ancient-roman-ideas-about-the-human-body/">http://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinakillgrove/2015/07/22/the-six-weirdest-ancient-roman-ideas-about-the-human-body/</a></p>
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<h1>The Six Weirdest Ancient Roman Ideas About The Human Body…</h1>
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<p>Source: <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinakillgrove/2015/07/22/the-six-weirdest-ancient-roman-ideas-about-the-human-body/">http://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinakillgrove/2015/07/22/the-six-weirdest-ancient-roman-ideas-about-the-human-body/</a></p>
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<h1>The Six Weirdest Ancient Roman Ideas About The Human Body</h1>
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<div id="attachment_764" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img class="size-full wp-image-764" src="http://blogs-images.forbes.com/kristinakillgrove/files/2015/07/Fresco_depicting_Iapyx_removing_an_arrowhead_from_Aeneas_thigh_from_Pompeii_Naples_National_Archaeological_Museum_15307350275.jpg" alt="Fresco depicting Iapyx removing an arrowhead from Aeneas' thigh. Pompeii. (Image by C. Raddato, used under a CC-BY-SA 2.0 license, via wikimedia commons)"/><p class="wp-caption-text">Fresco depicting Iapyx removing an arrowhead from Aeneas’ thigh. Pompeii. (Image by C. Raddato, used under a CC-BY-SA 2.0 license, via wikimedia commons)</p>
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<p>Given our 21st century understanding of medicine, in which scientists can grow or 3D print new organs, the ancient Romans may seem fantastically clueless about human anatomy and disease. But until Anders Vesalius revolutionized the study of anatomy in the 16th century, Western medicine was dominated by the thoughts of Greek physicians like Hippocrates and Galen, whose work was amplified by Roman historians such as Pliny the Elder.</p>
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<p>Pliny notoriously perished in the eruption of Mt. <a href="http://www.forbes.com/companies/vesuvius/" class="exit_trigger_set">Vesuvius</a> in 79 AD, but not before he completed a 37-book (ten-volume) encyclopedia of ancient knowledge known as <em>Historia Naturalis</em>, or <em>Natural History</em>. Book VII of Pliny’s history focuses on anthropology and human physiology. Many of the bits of knowledge he collected, though, are… less than accurate. Following are some of the weirdest things that Pliny (and, by extension, many people over the next millennium) believed about the human body.</p>
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<p><strong>Height. </strong>Human stature is known to vary significantly, with the <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2014/11/13/tallest_man_shortest_man_guinness_world_records_day_celebrated_with_meeting.html">current tallest man in the world</a> coming in at 8’3″ and the shortest at 19″. Pliny’s report of the shortest man in Rome could be right, but his claims about the tallest Romans stretch the truth:</p>
<blockquote><p>In the reign of the deified Augustus, there was a couple called Pusio and Secundilla who were half a [Roman] foot taller [approx. 9'10" tall] and their bodies were preserved as curiosities in the Sallustian gardens. In the reign of the same emperor, the smallest man was a dwarf called Conopas, who was two [Roman] feet and a palm [approx. 26" tall] in height. — Pliny, <em>Natural History, </em>7.75 [trans. M. Beagon]</p>
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<div id="attachment_458898132" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img class="dam-image getty size-large wp-image-458898132" src="http://specials-images.forbesimg.com/imageserve/458898132/640x0.jpg?fit=scale" alt=""/><p class="wp-caption-text">Chandra Bahadur Dangi, from Nepal, (L) the shortest adult to have ever been verified by Guinness World Records, poses for pictures with the world’s tallest man Sultan Kosen from Turkey, during a photocall in London on November 13, 2014, to mark Guinness World Records Day. Chandra Dangi, measures a tiny 21.5in (0.54m) the same height as six stacked cans of beans. Sultan Kosen measures 8 ft 3in (2.51m). AFP PHOTO / ANDREW COWIE (Photo credit should read ANDREW COWIE/AFP/Getty Images)</p>
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<p><strong>Handedness. </strong>Anthropological studies show that about 10% of the human population is left-handed, although the exact reason for lateralization, or handedness, is not entirely clear. Pliny seems to have noticed this, but gets confused:</p>
<blockquote><p>It has also been observed that the right side of the body is the stronger, but sometimes both sides are equally strong and in some people the left hand predominates, although this is never the case with women. — Pliny, <em>Natural History</em>, 7.77 [trans. M. Beagon]</p>
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<p><strong>Birth. </strong>Without a clear understanding of sperm and eggs, not to mention an inability to see the developing fetus through ultrasound like we can, Pliny has some odd thoughts about pregnancy and childbirth. Still, we can see aspects of this in old wives’ tales that persist today:</p>
<blockquote><p>Girls are born more quickly than boys, just as they grow old more quickly. Boys move often in the womb and are generally carried on the right side, while girls are carried on the left. — Pliny, <em>Natural History</em>, 7.37 [trans. M. Beagon]</p>
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<div id="attachment_762" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img class="size-full wp-image-762" src="http://blogs-images.forbes.com/kristinakillgrove/files/2015/07/Ancient_Roman_relief_carving_of_a_midwife_Wellcome_M0003964EB.jpg" alt="Ancient Roman relief carving of a midwife attending a woman giving birth. (Image by the Wellcome Trust, used under a CC-BY 4.0 license, via wikimedia commons.)"/><p class="wp-caption-text">Ancient Roman relief carving of a midwife attending a woman giving birth. (Image by the Wellcome Trust, used under a CC-BY 4.0 license, via wikimedia commons.)</p>
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<p><strong>Death. </strong>I’m not sure how many dead bodies Pliny saw floating in rivers, but apparently enough that he felt he could comment that:</p>
<blockquote><p>Male corpses float on their backs but female corpses float on their faces as though nature were preserving their modesty even in death. — Pliny, <em>Natural History</em>, 7.77 [trans. M. Beagon]</p>
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<p><strong>Disease. </strong>The Romans mostly subscribed to a miasma-type theory about disease: bad humors, bad air, and other sorts of things were blamed for sicknesses before the modern understanding of germ theory took hold in the 19th century. Worse than that, though, were the cures for disease, which often included lead (Pb):</p>
<blockquote><p>The same substance [lead] is also employed in preparations for the eyes, cases of prolapse of those organs more particularly; also for filling up the cavities left by ulcers, and for removing growths and fissures of the anus, as well as hemorrhoidal and wart-like tumors. — Pliny, <em>Natural History</em>, 34.50 [trans. J. Bostock]</p>
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<div id="attachment_765" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img class="size-full wp-image-765" src="http://blogs-images.forbes.com/kristinakillgrove/files/2015/07/Sommer_Giorgio_1834-1914_-_n._11141_-_Museo_di_Napoli_-_Strumenti_di_chirurgia.jpg" alt="Roman surgical tools, found at Pompeii. (Image by G. Sommer, in the public domain, via wikimedia commons.)"/><p class="wp-caption-text">Roman surgical tools, found at Pompeii. (Image by G. Sommer, in the public domain, via wikimedia commons.)</p>
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<p><strong>W</strong><b>omen’s <a href="http://www.forbes.com/health/" class="exit_trigger_set">Health</a>. </b>The Romans’ understanding of gynecology was spectacularly poor. So your final quote is one of my all-time favorites; Pliny here talks about ’that time of the month’. Forget such cliches as “being on the rag” when you can use “blunting the edge of steel” instead:</p>
<blockquote><p>It would indeed be a difficult matter to find anything which is productive of more marvelous effects than the menstrual discharge. On the approach of a woman in this state, must will become sour, seeds which are touched by her become sterile, grafts wither away, garden plants are parched up, and the fruit will fall from the tree beneath which she sits. Her very look, even, will dim the brightness of mirrors, blunt the edge of steel, and take away the polish from ivory. A swarm of bees, if looked upon by her, will die immediately; brass and iron will instantly become rusty, and emit an offensive odor; while dogs which may have tasted of the matter so discharged are seized with madness, and their bite is venomous and incurable. — Pliny, <em>Natural History</em>, 7.13 [trans. J. Bostock]</p>
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<p>While the ancient Romans knew quite a lot about the human body, their understanding of disease and of internal anatomy were limited. For more interesting quotes and commentary on this, I recommend Audrey Cruse’s book<em>Roman Medicine</em>, which deals with archaeological evidence like surgeon’s tools and anatomical votives and some bioarchaeological studies in addition to surveying the historical record.</p>
<hr/><p class="next_to_loge">Translations of <em>Historia Naturalis</em> above are from: Bostock, John. 1855. <em>The Natural History</em>, Pliny the Elder. Taylor & Francis. Beagon, Mary. 2005.<em>The Elder Pliny on the Human Animal, Natural History Book 7</em>. Clarendon Press.</p>
<p class="next_to_loge">Thanks to <a href="http://uwf.edu/cassh/departments/anthropology-and-archaeology/graduate-programs/grad-student-directory/biological-anthropology/andrea-acosta/">Andrea Acosta</a> for helping me collate these quotations.</p>
<p class="next_to_loge"><em>Kristina Killgrove is a bioarchaeologist and<a href="http://uwf.edu/cassh/departments/anthropology-and-archaeology/our-faculty-and-staff/department-of-anthropology/killgrove/">university professor</a>. For more osteology news, follow her on Twitter (<a href="https://twitter.com/DrKillgrove" target="_blank">@DrKillgrove</a>) or like her Facebook page <a href="https://www.facebook.com/PoweredByOsteons" target="_blank">Powered by Osteons</a>.</em></p>
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<p></p> Homer's Iliad to become an epic online performancetag:eclassics.ning.com,2015-07-22:727885:Topic:788502015-07-22T13:45:36.915ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
<p><a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-32980075">http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-32980075</a></p>
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<h1 class="story-body__h1">Homer's Iliad to become an epic online performance</h1>
<div class="byline"><span class="byline__name">By Tim Masters</span><span class="byline__title">Arts and entertainment correspondent…</span></div>
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<p><a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-32980075">http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-32980075</a></p>
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<h1 class="story-body__h1">Homer's Iliad to become an epic online performance</h1>
<div class="byline"><span class="byline__name">By Tim Masters</span><span class="byline__title">Arts and entertainment correspondent</span></div>
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<li class="mini-info-list__item"><div class="date date--v2">5 June 2015</div>
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<li class="mini-info-list__item"><span class="mini-info-list__section-desc off-screen">From the section</span><a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment_and_arts" class="mini-info-list__section">Entertainment & Arts</a></li>
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<div class="story-body__inner"><img class="js-image-replace" alt="Lia Williams (left), Ben Whishaw (centre) and Kate Fleetwood (right) star in the Almeida season of ancient Greek plays" src="http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/936/media/images/83442000/jpg/_83442902_greeks.jpg" width="624" height="351"/><span class="media-caption__text">Lia Williams (left), Ben Whishaw (centre) and Kate Fleetwood (right) star in the Almeida season of ancient Greek plays</span>
<p class="story-body__introduction">One of the ancient world's longest poems, The Iliad, is set for a marathon performance this summer as part of a festival celebrating ancient Greek culture.</p>
<p>Theatre director Rupert Goold plans to bring Homer's epic to life with the help of 50 star names from the worlds of the arts, academia and politics.</p>
<p>The event will begin at the British Museum in London <a href="http://www.almeida.co.uk/whats-on/the-iliad/14-aug-2015-15-aug-2015" class="story-body__link-external">on 14 August </a>and continue into the night at the Almeida Theatre.</p>
<p>Every word of the 15,000 line poem, about the fall of Troy, will be spoken.</p>
<p>The whole thing will also be streamed online - for 15 hours. "It's all or nothing," Goold told the BBC.</p>
<p>"Some years ago I did a stage adaptation of Paradise Lost, so I have previous form when it comes to verse narrative."</p>
<p>Devotees of ancient literature might be surprised to learn that Goold's idea for the performance sprang from something far more contemporary.</p>
<p>"I was inspired by Dermot O'Leary's <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-31869219" class="story-body__link">24-hour dance-a-thon</a> [for Comic Relief] and how addictive it was to tune in and out of," he said.</p>
<p>"I think it's unlikely that many people will sit through 15 hours of it - but I like the idea that you could stream it round the world and look at all these amazing actors, newsreaders and historians who are reporting the story.</p>
<p>"My hope is that it will build a momentum like the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-13186039" class="story-body__link">Passion</a> that Michael Sheen did for National Theatre Wales - and by the time it comes to fruition it will pull the artists and audience together at the Almeida."</p>
<p>The Iliad event is part of a one-off festival, Almeida Greeks, which will run alongside the north London theatre's <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-31848054" class="story-body__link">three main stage productions</a> of Oresteia, Bakkhai and Medea.</p>
<p>The new version of Aeschylus' Oresteia by Robert Icke (who will also co-direct The Iliad) opens tonight with a cast that includes Lia Williams as Klytemnestra and Jessica Brown Findlay as Electra.</p>
<p>The only surviving tragic trilogy from ancient Athens, the Almeida's Oresteia runs for three hours and 30 minutes, including two breaks.</p>
<p>"The thing I've heard most from people at previews is that they enjoy it in the way that that they can guzzle on boxsets, like fans of Breaking Bad or Mad Men," said Goold.</p>
<p>Bakkhai, which opens in July, stars Ben Whishaw as Dionysos. Rachel Cusk's new version of Medea, starting in September, stars Kate Fleetwood as Euripides' tragic heroine.</p>
<p>Other events in the Almeida Greeks festival, which runs from June to October, include a number of debates about ancient and contemporary culture. Titles include From Medea to Mumsnet, From Dionysos to Dawkins, and From Aristotle to Albert Square.</p>
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</div> New Scarab Beetle from Cambodia Named After Roman Goddess of Lovetag:eclassics.ning.com,2015-07-16:727885:Topic:788482015-07-16T13:34:00.759ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
<p>Source: <a href="http://entomologytoday.org/2015/07/16/new-scarab-beetle-from-cambodia-named-after-roman-goddess-of-love/">http://entomologytoday.org/2015/07/16/new-scarab-beetle-from-cambodia-named-after-roman-goddess-of-love/</a></p>
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<h1 class="entry-title">New Scarab Beetle from Cambodia Named After Roman Goddess of Love</h1>
<div class="wp-caption alignnone"><img alt="" height="218" src="https://entomologytoday.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/termitotrox-venus-wp.jpg?w=410&h=218" width="410"></img><p class="wp-caption-text"><em>Termitotrox venus</em>, a newly discovered beetle species from Cambodia. Photo by…</p>
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<p>Source: <a href="http://entomologytoday.org/2015/07/16/new-scarab-beetle-from-cambodia-named-after-roman-goddess-of-love/">http://entomologytoday.org/2015/07/16/new-scarab-beetle-from-cambodia-named-after-roman-goddess-of-love/</a></p>
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<h1 class="entry-title">New Scarab Beetle from Cambodia Named After Roman Goddess of Love</h1>
<div class="wp-caption alignnone"><img src="https://entomologytoday.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/termitotrox-venus-wp.jpg?w=410&h=218" alt="" width="410" height="218"/><p class="wp-caption-text"><em>Termitotrox venus</em>, a newly discovered beetle species from Cambodia. Photo by Dr. Munetoshi Maruyama. CC-BY 4.0.</p>
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<p><br/><span>A team of Japanese scientists found and described a new species of scarab beetle from Cambodia. The beetle was named </span><em>Termitotrox venus</em><span>after Venus, the Roman goddess of beauty and love. The study was published in the open-access journal </span><em>ZooKeys</em><span>.</span></p>
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<p>Mr. Kakizoe and Dr. Maruyama from the Kyushu University in Japan discovered the new scarab beetle among fungus garden cells during their research in Cambodia.</p>
<p>The species belongs to the <em>Termitotrox</em> genus and is only the second representative to have been found in the Indo-Chinese subregion after the discovery of <em>T. cupido</em> in 2012. The close relation between the two is the reason why it was named after Venus, who is often illustrated next to her male divine counterpart, Cupid.</p>
<p>Seven out of the eight recovered samples were found in the fungus garden cells of a termite species called <em>Macrotermes</em> cf. <em>gilvus</em>.</p>
<p>The researchers found that the termites are usually indifferent to the <em>T. venus</em> species, but the beetle is also treated amicably at times.</p>
<p>Compared to its relative, <em>T. cupido</em>, the <em>T. venus</em> beetles are large. According to the scientists, this is due to their different hosts.</p>
<p><strong>Read more at:</strong></p>
<p>– <a href="http://zookeys.pensoft.net/articles.php?id=5672" target="_blank"><em>Termitotrox venus</em> sp. n. (Coleoptera, Scarabaeidae), a new blind, flightless termitophilous scarab from Cambodia</a></p> What Was the Venus de Milo Doing With Her Arms?tag:eclassics.ning.com,2015-05-04:727885:Topic:782542015-05-04T14:11:15.781ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
<h1 class="hed">What Was the <em>Venus de Milo</em>Doing With Her Arms?</h1>
<h2 class="dek">3-D printing allows us to test a provocative theory that she was busy spinning thread.</h2>
<p><span>By </span><a href="http://www.slate.com/authors.virginia_postrel.html" rel="author">Virginia Postrel</a></p>
<div class="parbase image slate_image section"><div><img alt="3D print of Venus de Milo Spinning Thread, left, and computer re" src="http://www.slate.com/content/dam/slate/articles/arts/culturebox/2015/04/150429_CBOX_VenusDeMilo_then.jpg.CROP.original-original.jpg" title="150429_CBOX_VenusDeMilo_then"></img> 3-D print of <em>Venus de Milo</em> <em>Spinning Thread</em>, left, and computer renderings of original 3-D scan of <em>Venus</em>,…</div>
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<h1 class="hed">What Was the <em>Venus de Milo</em>Doing With Her Arms?</h1>
<h2 class="dek">3-D printing allows us to test a provocative theory that she was busy spinning thread.</h2>
<p><span>By </span><a rel="author" href="http://www.slate.com/authors.virginia_postrel.html">Virginia Postrel</a></p>
<div class="parbase image slate_image section"><div><img title="150429_CBOX_VenusDeMilo_then" alt="3D print of Venus de Milo Spinning Thread, left, and computer re" src="http://www.slate.com/content/dam/slate/articles/arts/culturebox/2015/04/150429_CBOX_VenusDeMilo_then.jpg.CROP.original-original.jpg"/>3-D print of <em>Venus de Milo</em> <em>Spinning Thread</em>, left, and computer renderings of original 3-D scan of <em>Venus</em>, missing her arms.
<p class="credit">Image courtesy of Cosmo Wenman</p>
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<div class="text text-1 parbase section"><p><span class="drop-capped">T</span>he <em>Venus de Milo</em> is a paradox: the embodiment of beauty, yet disfigured. And she is a puzzle, gazing serenely at something we cannot see, something once held, we assume, by her missing arms. “<em>La Vénus de Milo est un mystère</em>,” <a href="http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/gba1890_1/0412" target="_blank">declared</a> the French archaeologist Salomon Reinach in a 1890 essay, emphasizing the point with italics.</p>
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<div class="text-2 text parbase section"><p>In Reinach’s day, speculation about the statue’s original pose was a minor industry. She was imagined standing beside a warrior—Mars or Theseus—with her left hand grazing his shoulder. She was pictured holding a mirror, an apple, or laurel wreaths, sometimes with a pedestal to support her left arm. She was even depicted as a mother holding a baby. One popular turn-of-the-century theory understood her not as Venus but as Victory, supporting a shield on her left thigh and recording the names of heroes on it with her right hand. Other versions imagined her using the shield as a mirror, the goddess of beauty admiring her reflection.</p>
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<p>Full article: <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2015/05/the_venus_de_milo_s_arms_3d_printing_the_ancient_sculpture_spinning_thread.html">http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2015/05/the_venus_de_milo_s_arms_3d_printing_the_ancient_sculpture_spinning_thread.html</a></p>
</div> The Emotion of Hope in Ancient Literature, History and Arttag:eclassics.ning.com,2015-04-07:727885:Topic:777712015-04-07T16:04:15.696ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
<p>Source: <a href="https://www.archaeological.org/events/19089">https://www.archaeological.org/events/19089</a></p>
<div class="subhead">The Emotion of Hope in Ancient Literature, History and Art</div>
<div class="field field-name-field-startdate field-type-date field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><span class="date-display-start">Friday, December 11, 2015</span> to <span class="date-display-end">Sunday, December 13,…</span></div>
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<p>Source: <a href="https://www.archaeological.org/events/19089">https://www.archaeological.org/events/19089</a></p>
<div class="subhead">The Emotion of Hope in Ancient Literature, History and Art</div>
<div class="field field-name-field-startdate field-type-date field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><span class="date-display-start">Friday, December 11, 2015</span> to <span class="date-display-end">Sunday, December 13, 2015</span></div>
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<p><b>Location</b>:<br/>Rethymno <br/>Greece</p>
<div class="field field-name-field-deadline field-type-date field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">CFP Deadline: </div>
<div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><span class="date-display-single">Monday, May 25, 2015</span></div>
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<div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><p><strong>Organizers:</strong><br/>George Kazantzidis (U. of Patras / Open University of Cyprus), Dimos Spatharas (U. of Crete)</p>
<p>In our modern cultures, hope is usually conceived as a positive sentiment. Hope, we tend to believe, is a necessary requirement for a happy life rather than a treacherous emotion that distorts realistic and pragmatic evaluations of our prospects. Ἐλπίζω/ἔλπομαι in ancient Greek is used to express positive hope or one's realistic calculations concerning the future, but it can also designate anticipation of failure and disaster. Already in Hesiod (Op. 90-99), hope (ἐλπίς) is associated with fraud and deceptiveness: being the last of ‘evils’ remaining in Pandora's jar, it is perceived in a negative light as a sense of waiting for the uncertain future to which human life is now consigned; worse even, it may be designed to generate failed expectations thus increasing, through suspense and the illusion that happiness can be restored, the pain inflicted upon the human race. Hope, according to Bacchylides (9.18), affects and distorts our perception of reality; it deprives us from our sense of reason (ὑφαιρεῖται νόημα). As Diodotus states in Thucydides' Mytilenean debate (3.45), 'desire leads and hope follows': though unseen and elusive (ἀφανῆ), they can both prevail over visible dangers and lead to impulsive and catastrophic actions. Plato (Leg. 644c) believes that ἐλπίς can accommodate both confidence in future happiness and fear for future pain; whether manifesting itself as expectation of good or evil, however, hope remains restricted to the realm of 'impressions' (δόξα μελλόντων) and blurs our firm grasp and knowledge of reality.<br/>Latin literature displays, to a large extent, this sceptical attitude towards hope (spes). The collocation spesque metusque is regularly used in Latin, from Cicero onwards, to translate the two prospective Stoic passions, ἐπιθυμία and φόβος respectively. According to Seneca, De brevitate vitae 17.1, hope lingers on as a self-perpetuating source of anxiety and disquiet: once fulfilled, old hope gives its place to new ones (spes spem excitat), in a never-ending circle of ambition and desire. The antithesis between spes and res (Lucretius, DRN 4.1086-90) is also prominent, especially in erotic contexts: Narcissus' delusion in Ovid, Met. 3.417 leads him to 'hope for something immaterial' (spem sine corpore amat); Leander's words at Heroides 18.178 (et res non semper, spes mihi semper adest) point to a similar breach between what one hopes and what can be actually attained. On a larger, epic scale, Lucan warns that knowledge of the future can only bring hopelessness with it (Pharsalia 1.522-5); the only way for humanity to retain any hope at all is to remain ignorant of what is to come and to nurture expectations which are almost surely destined to fail: sit caeca futuri / mens hominum fati; liceat sperare timenti (2.14- 15).<br/>This conference seeks to shed light on the complex <strong>emotion of hope</strong> in ancient Greek and Latin literature, history, and art and trace the development of its ambiguous nature across different times, cultural contexts and genres. At the same time, the conference seeks to raise questions concerning the place of hope in the history of emotions. </p>
<p><strong>Confirmed speakers:</strong><br/>Douglas Cairns (U. of Edinburgh): ‘Metaphors for hope in early Greek poetry’<br/>Angelos Chaniotis (IAS): ‘Displays of hope in the epigraphic evidence: from the deceived hopes of individuals to the fulfilled hopes of mankind’<br/>Laurel Fulkerson (FSU): ‘<em>Deos speravi</em> (<em>Miles</em> 1209): Hope and the gods in Roman Comedy’<br/>George Kazantzidis (U. of Patras): ‘Lucretius’ hopeless universe’<br/>Donald Lateiner (Ohio Wesleyan U.): ‘Hope is not a strategy’: wish and expectation in the <em>Histories</em> of Herodotos and Thukydides’<br/>Stelios Panayotakis (U. of Crete): ‘Hope in the Ancient Novel’<br/>Sofia Papaioannou (U. of Athens): ‘A historian utterly without hope: the narrative dynamics of despair in Tacitus' Historiae’<br/>Michael Paschalis (U. of Crete): ‘<em>vestras spes uritis</em>: Hope and Empire in Virgil's Aeneid’<br/>Dimos Spatharas (U. of Crete): ‘Hope, trust, and charis in Sophocles’ <em>Ajax</em>’<br/>Chiara Thuminger (Humboldt-Universität): 'Hope and the making of the Hippocratic doctor'<br/>Kostas Vlassopoulos (U. of Crete): ‘Slavery and hope: complexity and paradox’</p>
<p>Please submit abstracts <strong>(300-350 words)</strong> to <strong>both</strong> George Kazantzidis (<a href="mailto:kazanbile@gmail.com">kazanbile@gmail.com</a>) and Dimos Spatharas (<a href="mailto:spatharasd@gmail.com">spatharasd@gmail.com</a>) by <strong>May 25, 2015</strong>.</p>
<p><strong>Possible topics for discussion include:</strong><br/>Hope, faith and worship in Greek an Roman religions<br/>Disease, hope and hopelessness in medical texts<br/>Hope across literary genres<br/>Comparative analysis of hope in Greek and Latin literature<br/>Hope as a motive for political/military action<br/>Hope in the context of antiemotionalist moralizing discourse<br/>The psychopathology of despair<br/>Exploitation of hope by marginal social categories / hegemony and the manipulation of hope<br/>Philosophical stances towards hope<br/>Personifications of ἐλπίς/spes<br/>Hope and leadership in Greece and Rome<br/>Hope, narratives and plot twists; toying with reader’s expectations<br/>Hope and embodied metaphors<br/>Hope and distorted cognition<br/>Prophecy, oracles, and hope; magic and hope<br/>Hope and gender: is hope a gender specific sentiment?<br/>Hope and erotic desire<br/>Hope in the Greek and Roman art<br/>Rhetorical manipulation of hope</p>
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<div class="location-locations-display"><h3 class="location-locations-header">LOCATION</h3>
</div> Trajan's Columntag:eclassics.ning.com,2015-04-06:727885:Topic:777692015-04-06T18:29:05.677ZAndrew Reinhardhttps://eclassics.ning.com/profile/amasis
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