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Alcaeus’s sophisticated use of imagery has been somewhat neglected in comparison with that of his Lesbian fellow-poet Sappho – but this neglect is unfair. This paper explores Alcaeus’s skillful use of one particular group of images, namely weather imagery; it shows that the poet is drawing on a nexus of topoi discernible both in sympotic poetry and on sympotic pottery, and it seeks to explain his peculiar manipulation of these topoi.

The conventional definition of skolia has largely hinged upon whether a poem was called a skolion by an ancient author (even Reitzenstein’s extensive and influential survey of skolia does not depart significantly from this conception and, more recently, Campbell follows Page in this classification). However, this is an inadequate approach to skolia.

In his obituary of the Neronian historian Servilius Nonianus , Tacitus praises the man for his achievements in oratory and historiography, but also for his elegantia vitae -- his “well-curated life,” as we might say.

Seneca is perhaps best known for his alleged hypocrisy: the wealthy equestrian who espoused the merits of asceticism. His philosophical output is often considered a refuge from, or a rejection of, his monetary wealth. And yet the language of commerce and debt pervades his letters.

Cicero’s De officiis is a foundational text for two important but seemingly opposed traditions: republicanism and cosmopolitanism (see respectively Viroli (1995) and Nussbaum (1997)). The former tradition identifies the res publica as the object of one’s greatest allegiance and thus sees patriotism as an important virtue for citizens; the latter holds that one’s greatest allegiance should be to the world community of justice and reason, and views patriotism as a potentially dangerous impediment to this wider community of human beings.

Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis is a tantalizing, troubling, dialogue by any account. Published between 37 and 27 BCE, dRR is both the only complete work by Rome’s “most learned individual” (Quint. I.O. X.1.95), and one that has resisted cohesive interpretation. The traditional approach to this text has been to take it at face value, as a straightforward, and dizzyingly encyclopedic, farming manual.

Varro’s De Lingua Latina is now recognized as a milestone in the history of linguistics, and scholars have done much to show just how sophisticated Varro’s deployment of morphology and historical phonology can be (on the former, see Taylor 1974; for the latter, Pfaffel 1981). This paper shows that Varronian semantics can be launched into the same orbit of study.

In his Punica, Silius Italicus draws on the geographical work of writers such as Pomponius Mela and Pliny the Elder to contest earlier poetic descriptions of the world and to assert the universal importance of his subject.

This paper discusses the character of Silius Italicus’ Hannibal and its implications for imperial times, starting from a contradiction in the famous oath-scene that has gone unnoticed by modern scholarship. The oath of Hannibal in which he vows – usually at the age of nine – eternal hostility to the Romans is referred to by many Greek and Roman authors (e.g. Livy, Nepos, Polybios and Appian). It usually serves to explain the disturbing, unwavering aggressiveness of the Carthaginian leader.

In his first Satire, Juvenal mocks the crowd of epic poets recycling hackneyed themes, questioning the relevance of such poetry for contemporary life. This paper will argue that Valerius Flaccus’ Argonautica uses the very fact of its recycled subject matter as a means to explore the re-use of traditional language in a new setting. It will examine the appropriation of female tropes by the poem’s heroines, as a means to insert their voices and interpretations into their own story.