Subdivisions: The Containment of Femininity in Aristophanes’ Ecclesiazusae
By Mason Johnson
In the Ecclesiazousae, Aristophanes presents his audience with a radical political question: what if the entire Athenian democracy were turned over to the women of the city, and they became the custodians of democracy rather than the men? As Zeitlin (1999) notes, the overall effect of this radical change is never fully explored within the play, and thus there is ambiguity as to whether or not this “communist” innovation deserves political approbation or blame. However, as Lape (2004) explores, Greek comedy had a powerful ability to reinforce norms and laws in society.
"ἵνα κλέος ἐσθλὸν ἄροιτο κεῖσ’ ἐλθών": Kleos in the Voyage of Telemachus
By Joshua Benjamins
Commentators on Homer’s Odyssey have offered several unsatisfactory or incomplete explanations of Athena’s repeated affirmation (Od. 1.93-95; 13.421-424) that kleos will come to Telemachus in the course of his voyage to Pylos and Sparta (Clarke 1967; Rose 1967; Jones 1988; Van Nortwick 2008). I propose an interpretation of Athena’s statement which takes into account the broad scope, lineal roots, and social character of kleos in the Homeric world.
"Et Legebat et Mutabatur Intus:" Reading and Conversion in Augustine's Confessions
By Joshua Benjamins
The purpose of this essay is to analyze the relationship between reading and conversion in Augustine’s Confessions and to suggest that incidents of ‘literary conversion’ structure the entire work. Drawing on the insights of Flores 1-13 and O’Donnell (esp. 2:163), I argue that the Confessions is arranged according to a sequence of text-encounters, arranged in a definable and revealing pattern. I also show how these incidents of reading poignantly illustrate Augustine’s understanding of written texts as living speech (sermo) with the power to convert the reader.
The Seal of Theognis and Oral-Traditional Signature
By Maxwell A. Gray
On first glance, “oral-traditional signature” is an oxymoron. Only the literate in literary contexts sign their names on dotted lines, for example. And yet, Albert Lord gave credit to the “signature” of the oral poet (Lord 1960).
"To Laugh at One's Enemies:" Vengeance by Humiliation and the Tyranny of the Stronger in Sophocles' Ajax
By J. LaRae Ferguson
In the past fifty years and more, when studying and writing about Sophocles’ Ajax, classical scholars have focused much of their attention on drawing out some coherent understanding of justice propounded by the author in his drama of anger, vengeance, and suicide.
Foreign Voices: Caesar's Use of 'Enemy' Speech in the Helvetii Campaign
By Haley Flagg
Whatever one thinks of Julius Caesar and his motives behind writing his war commentaries, he has done posterity the service of giving a voice to an otherwise mute and unknowable cultural presence of the ancient world: the peoples of Gaul. Caesar deems his ‘barbarian’ opponents worthy of a voice in his narrative, even if that voice is fabricated and only serves to justify their subjugation. In the account of the Helvetii in Book 1, Divico provides the first instance of substantial enemy speech.
Towards a New Lexicon of Fear: A Statistical and Grammatical Analysis of pertimescere in Cicero
By Emma Vanderpool
I employ the University of Chicago’s PhiloLogic, an automatic word search system created for the study of corpus linguistics, along with manual contextual observations, in order to explore how Latin authors from Plautus to Jerome, and more specifically Cicero, use pertimescere, “to become very scared (of) or to be excessively frightened (at)” (OLD). While Brenda Marina Fields and Andrew M.
Privacy in the Iliad
By Kelly Schmidt
The Iliad is filled with compelling public scenes, such as assemblies, battles, and funerals. While these scenes contribute to the epic’s overall progression and drama, private scenes provide a more intimate glimpse into the lives and emotions of characters. Private scenes also reveal much about cultural practices, attitudes, and traditions of the time. To illustrate what these private scenes reveal, this study organizes these intimate settings into two categories: Trojan domestic scenes and the Achaean shelters.
The Noble Lie in Terence’s Hecyra
By Alexander Karsten
At the conclusion of Terence’s Hecyra, the marriage of Pamphilus and Philumena survives when Philumena’s mother Myrrhina and Pamphilus’s former girlfriend Bacchis agree never to disclose the distressing origin of the couple’s child, who was begotten by rape before the marriage was arranged.
The Reception of Cicero and Roman Culture in Theodor Mommsen’s Römische Geschichte
By Emily S. Goodling
Theodor Mommsen (1817-1903) was one of the greatest classical scholars of 19th-century Germany. He set a new standard for the systematic study of history with his three-volume Römische Geschichte (Roman History), winning the Nobel Prize for the work in 1902. The history is compelling not only as a monument of ancient scholarship, but also as a window into aspects of historical writing and classical reception in Mommsen’s own age.