Latin Literature

Recensione a FERDINAND STUERNER, Monologe bei Plautus. Ein Beitrag zur Dramaturgie der hellenistisch-roemischen Komoedie, Stuttgart 2011, "Aevum" 86 (2012), pp. 371-373

by Maria Jennifer Falcone

Irrationality in the Ancient World

by Laurel Bowman

Special issue of Mouseion (Series III v. 6, no. 3, 2006).co-edited with Dr. Gregory Rowe

‘Passing over Cephisos’ grandson: literal praeteritio and the rhetoric of obscurity in Ovid Met. 7.350-93’

by Bob Cowan

Ramus 42.2 (2011) 146-67.

After tricking Pelias’ daughters into killing their father, Ovid’s metamorphic Medea flies in her (future reflexive)... more After tricking Pelias’ daughters into killing their father, Ovid’s metamorphic Medea flies in her (future reflexive) Euripidean dragon chariot from Thessaly to Corinth by a very circuitous route.  In so doing, she performs a physical and narrative praeteritio, passing rapidly over both the landscape and its local myths, which remain unnarrated.  This article reflects on some of the metapoetic connotations of the praeteritio and its rhetoric of obscurity, and propose an identification for one of the most obscure of the figures over whom Medea passes. It also identifies a technique whereby Ovid plays with concepts of obscurity and doctrina to unmask and dramatize a common reading practice.

Michael Dewar, "The Loeb Statius" (review)

by Mouseion (Journal)

Published in Mouseion 9.1 (2009), pp. 57-66.
This is a review of D. R. Shackleton Bailey, editor and translator. Statius. Loeb Classical Library, Volumes 206 (= Statius I: Silvae), 207 (= Statius II: Thebaid 1-7), and 498 (= Statius III: Thebaid 8-12; Achilleid), Harvard University Press, 2003.

The Many Shades of Praise: Diversity in Epideictic Rhetoric in Diplomatic Settings

by Brian Maxson

proofs of an article published in Rhetorik in Mittelalter und Renaissance: Konzepte – Praxis – Diversität, eds. Georg Strack and Julia Knödler, 393-412 (Munich: Herbert Utz Verlag, 2011).

The Many Shades of Praise: Diversity in Epideictic Rhetoric in Diplomatic Settings

Fifteenth-century... more The Many Shades of Praise: Diversity in Epideictic Rhetoric in Diplomatic Settings

Fifteenth-century diplomatic protocol required the city of Florence to send diplomats to congratulate both new and militarily victorious rulers.  Diplomats on such missions poured praise on their triumphant allies and new rulers at friendly locations.  However, political realities also meant that these diplomats would sometimes have to praise rulers whose accession or victory opposed Florentine interests.  Moreover, different allies and enemies required different levels of praise.  Jealous rulers compared the gifts, status, and oratory that they received from Florence to the Florentine entourages sent to their neighbors.  Sending diplomats with too little or too much social status and eloquence could spell diplomatic disaster.  Diplomats met these challenges by varying the style, structure, and content of their speeches.  Far from formulaic pronouncements of goodwill, diplomatic orations varied from one speech to the next in order to meet the demands of the complex diplomatic world into which they fit.  Contextualizing these orations reveals the subtle reservations of diplomats praising a hostile ruler, the insertion of specific citations to flatter specific audiences, and the changing intellectual and stylistic interests of humanists throughout the fifteenth century.  This essay will examine the different shades of flattery practiced by Florentine diplomats and the contexts that explain these variations.

Lavorare concretamente su Cicerone e Seneca: i siti Tulliana e Senecana e un po’ di filologia digitale, in E-latin…o? Sì, no, forse… Un viaggio tra gli strumenti e i percorsi della didattica multimediale e della formazione a distanza dedicati al latino, «Il Quaderno di Latino» 3 (ISSN 1828 - 4582), «Nuova Secondaria» 2011, http://nuovasecondaria.lascuolaconvoi.it/index.php, pp. 12-18

by Ermanno Malaspina

Come forma di conclusione del tutto provvisoria, credo si possa dire che Tulliana è, come Senecana, un esempio di... more Come forma di conclusione del tutto provvisoria, credo si possa dire che Tulliana è, come Senecana, un esempio di progetto informatico con efficaci ricadute didattiche, ottenute partendo da basi di finanziamento molto limitate e grazie al libero concorso volontario di vari collaboratori in tutto il mondo. In tutti e due i casi, la forma stessa del sito e la logica sottesa alla presentazione dei dati richiedono una partecipazione attiva del docente: sta a lui cogliere che questa caratteristica, apparentemente poco allettante, rispetto ad altri siti più comodi e pieni di contenuti “precotti” e pronti all’uso, costituisce invece una formidabile opportunità di aggiornamento per lui e di crescita per i suoi studenti, nell’ottica della sinergia tra competenze informatiche, linguistiche e storico-letterarie.

Quando il paesaggio non era stato ancora inventato. Descriptiones locorum e teorie del paesaggio da Roma a oggi, in G. TESIO, G. PENNAROLI (a cura di), Lo sguardo offeso. Il paesaggio in Italia: storia geografia arte letteratura, Atti del convegno internazionale di studi, Vercelli, Demonte e Montà, 24-27 settembre 2008, Torino 2011, pp. 45-85

by Ermanno Malaspina

Si ringrazia l'editore per la gentile concessione della pubblicazione on line di una copia post-print dell'articolo

«Continua a mancare una | linea di indagine che tenti di sintetizzare tutti i fattori della letteratura, della... more «Continua a mancare una | linea di indagine che tenti di sintetizzare tutti i fattori della letteratura, della pittura, della descrizione di viaggio, della geografia, dell’agricoltura, della politica, della storia sociale e così via, e che, muovendo da confronti pertinenti, tenti di rispondere alla domanda fondamentale: nel mondo classico esisteva il paesaggio?» . Le pagine precedenti non hanno certo fornito la sintesi a tutto campo richiesta da Jakob, sintesi che per la sua complessità temo resterà per sempre un desideratum. Tuttavia, esse hanno almeno inteso fornire una risposta articolata e per quanto possibile sistematica alla domanda, ancorandola ad una nuova sistemazione del quadro teoretico di riferimento: il mondo ellenistico e romano percorre una sua particolare via come società inconsapevolmente paesaggistica, più matura e “moderna” in alcuni ambiti, meno in quello letterario, ove con l’ekphrasis si ritraggono quadri naturali, spesso con profonda sensibilità e straordinario nitore artistico, ma senza cogliere l’essenza del paesaggio quale noi lo percepiamo oggi.

Cynthia Serpens: A Reading of Propertius 4.8

by Daniel Walin

Classical Journal 105 (2009/10), 137-51.

A pattern of shared imagery in Prop. 4.8 assimilates the lover to the puella whose chastity is tested in the Lanuvian... more A pattern of shared imagery in Prop. 4.8 assimilates the lover to the puella whose chastity is tested in the Lanuvian rite (4.8.3–14), and Cynthia to the masculine tutelary serpent that does the testing. The figure emphasizes the gender reversals in the poem and heroizes Cynthia, whom the poet has “resurrected” for a final appearance from her death in 4.7.

Balbuena, 'Judeo-Spanish Texts in Latin American Genres'

by Monique Balbuena

Patriotism and the Rise of Latin in Eighteenth-Century New Spain

by Andrew Laird

Published in Renæssanceforum 8, 2012

This paper explains why Jesuit authors from New Spain wrote in Latin in order to promote the richness of Mexico’s... more This paper explains why Jesuit authors from New Spain wrote in Latin in order to promote the richness of Mexico’s nature and culture, in response to Enlightenment polemics about the degeneracy of human and natural life in the Americas. Consideration of some works produced between 1750 and 1780 indicates the principal reason: the creole Jesuits sought a legacy for Mexico to match the monumental representation of Iberia’s Greco-Roman past and of the Spanish Golden Age in the 'Bibliotheca Hispana nova' and the 'Bibliotheca Hispana vetus' which the Sevillian scholar Nicolás Antonio had compiled in Latin in the mid-1600s.

Review of M. Venier, Per una storia del testo di Virgilio nella prima età del libro a stampa (1469-1519) (Udine 2001)

by Enrico Magnelli

“Prometheus” 30, 2004, 95-96

Work Notes on the Tavola Eugubine Tablet 1a, Script N462-N748

by Mel Copeland

The Tavola Eugubine is a series of bronze tablets found near the city of Gubbio. There are seven tablets, some of which are written on both sides. The tablets are said to be written in the Umbrian language and in Latin. The texts of the group tend to follow a common theme, that of an oration. This text is a highly repetitive, hierophantic oration dealing with a funeral and perhaps a secret Bacchanalian rite. The archeological context of the tables is of interest, whether the seven bronze tablets were found in situ as one collection. This text appears to be an eulogy to Lord Tito.

This is an update of our work on the Tavola Eugubine, tables 1a, IIB , III and IV (http://www.maravot.com/Translation_EugubineQ.html et al.). Changes produced on this page will be added to our Etruscan GlossaryA.pdf. All of the words in the glossary follow a grammar similar to Latin. One can easily discover that the several hundred texts on Etruscan Phrases all share a common language and grammar. This controverts the prevailing theory that the Etruscan language is not an Indo-European language. It also warrants further examination of the prevailing conclusion that the Tavola Eugubine is written in the Umbrian language.

Etruscan GlossaryA.xls/pdf. is an index to about 2,300 Etruscan words that are similar to Latin, French, Italian and Romanian. Declension patterns follow those in Latin. The 2,500 words = the repeated words in 6,000 words of the major extant texts. The texts have been frozen in time, covering ~700-400 B.C., representing a lens to understanding the early formation of Indo-European languages, particularly the early Italic-Latin-Celtic languages, such as Italian, French & Romanian / Dacian. (By 45 BC. the language was a dead language - no one understood or could write Etruscan.)

This GlossaryA works together with Indo-European Table 1 which refutes theories by the Pallottino school of thought that the Etruscan language is not Indo-European and an isolate, unlike any other language. It is very close to Latin and, curiously, Romanian, Italian and French. The Latin suffix, "us" shifts to "o" as in Italian (Titus vs Tito); first person conjugation patterns are similar to French and Romanian. This GlossaryA provides a quick look at the grammatical structure of the Etruscan language, how closely it coincides with Latin. A more detailed Declension Table can be seen on the Etruscan Phrases website. These PDF documents facilitate independent confirmation of the words in GlossaryA.xls , the Grammar and Declension Table. All words can be examined from actual images of texts on the Etruscan Phrases website. Over 150 texts, with about 6,000 words can be examined at Etruscan Phrases.

The Etruscans surfaced in Italy about 1,000 B.C., reputed to have arrived from Lydia / Phrygia. The Phrygians originated near Macedonia in Thrace, according to Herodotus. One may therefore inquire whether the ancient Thracians (Dacians, Gettae, modern Romanians), spoke a language common to the Phrygians, at the time of the Trojan War and after (~1180 B.C.). The Thracians, Phrygians and Lydians (also dead languages) were allies of the Trojans, according to the Iliad. Etruscan Phrases finds a common vocabulary among Latin, Italian, French, Romanian, Etruscan and Phrygian. While French, Spanish, Italian and Romanian are considered Romance languages, showing a similar Latin heritage, Etruscan is not, of course, a Romance language, as it preceded Latin, at least in the written form (giving Rome its alphabet).
Resolution of the Etruscan Mystery may be likened to Michael Ventris' decipherment of Linear B and Jean-François Champollion's decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphics using the Rosetta Stone - written in Egyptian hieroglyphics, Demotic and Greek.

The decipherment of Etruscan is a bit more challenging; since we have no multilingual Rosetta stone, but we do have enough vocabulary and grammar to establish that Etruscan is similar to Latin, French, Italian and Romanian. (Certainly far more vocabulary and a more extensive grammar are provided in Etruscan Phrases than that used by Ventris to claim translation of Linear B as an old form of Greek.)

We look forward to the time when a peer review of these Work Notes will warrant corrections to the prevailing record, showing that the Etruscan language was similar to Latin and decry the theory that the "Etruscan language is unlike any other and not an Indo-European language." The theory of a non-Indo-European Etruscan language is absolutely false.

There is a far richer record to be written of an Indo-European branch, dead as of ~400 B.C., that can shed light on the movements of the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age Italic peoples, perhaps out of southeastern Europe to Anatolia and then to Italy by sea. Herodotus, who recorded the Etruscan tradition, that they came from Lydia as a result of a long drought after the Trojan War, may be right. We mention this because there is more to be gained in sorting out the grammar at Etruscan Phrases - and possible confirmation of Herodotus - than can ever be hoped for in the bogus theory that "the Etruscan language is unlike any other language known to man." Wikipedia et al. should be corrected.

This text may be of interest to those interested how the liturgy of an Augur may compare to that of a modern liturgy.

Three Orators and a Flawed Argument (Hor. Sat. 1.10.27-30)

by Ortwin Knorr

Classical Journal 100.4 (2005) 393-400.

Theatralisches Spektakel und Metatheater in der Andria und Hecyra des Terenz [Theatrical Spectacle and Metatheater in Andria and Hecyra of Terence, in German].

by Ortwin Knorr

Gymnasium 115.5 (2008) 435-451.

"The Character of Bacchis in Terence's Heautontimorumenos"

by Ortwin Knorr

American Journal of Philology 116 (1995) 221-233.

Plautus Mostellaria 213: Another anus ebria ?

by Ortwin Knorr

Mnemosyne 63 (2010) 450-53.

Horace's Ship Ode ( Odes 1.14) in Context: A Metaphorical Love-Triangle

by Ortwin Knorr

Transactions of the American Philological Association 136.1 (2006) 149-169.

Horatius romanus

by Horacio Silvestre

Horatius Romanus lived in 15th Century and was a poet and a clerk in the Court of the Renaissance Popes Nicholas V and... more Horatius Romanus lived in 15th Century and was a poet and a clerk in the Court of the Renaissance Popes Nicholas V and Pius II. His poems are a curious instance of the rebirth of classical Latin in the new cultural context of that time.

Review of P. Papini Stati Silvae, ed. A. Marastoni, Lipsiae 1961

by Giuseppe Aricò

«Rivista di filologia e di istruzione classica» 92, 1964, pp. 87-92

Catulli liber. Antologia dei carmi di Catullo a cura di L. Alfonsi e G. Aricò

by Giuseppe Aricò

Bologna 1969