Classics Commons^™

Repainting The Republic: How Color Changes The Reception Of Roman Honorific Portraiture, Madelyn Fisher

Classics Honors Papers

Most people commonly imagine gleaming, unpainted, white marble under the lights of a museum gallery. However, Roman sculpture was far from how we commonly view it today; the Roman world was full of painted statues. How and why was Roman portraiture stripped of its color? This thesis discusses the development and use of Roman honorific portraiture over the course of the Republic, and the existence of polychromy within the Greco-Roman world. Furthermore, this paper also explores how color was erased from the historical narrative and argues that the understanding of Roman sculpture as polychromatic must be reincorporated back into the …

Casting Long Shadows: Political Influence On Classical Scholarship In The 20th And 21st Centuries, Anna Taylor

Classics Honors Papers

History, especially Classical history, is not as objective as it is often made out to be. Classical scholarship is not immune to the influence of politics, even if and when a scholar does not explicitly reference it or intend for the scholarship to be political. To explore this influence, this thesis examines two case studies: Edmund Buchner’s work from the 20th century on the so-called “ Horologium Augusti, ” and the rise of regime transition scholarship in the 21st century. Both case studies examine the impact of contemporary politics on a scholar’s perception of a contentious period of Roman history: …

Creation Of A New Roman Identity: Encounters, Conflicts, And The Establishment Of Multicultural Order In Virgil’S Aeneid, Caleb Butler

Classics Honors Papers

Virgil composed the Aeneid at a moment when Roman cultural identity experienced a thorough reevaluation. This thesis argues that the Aeneid does not merely reflect the cultural moment in which it was written but rather presents a model for the formation of this new Roman identity. The second half of the Aeneid centers almost entirely upon the interactions and developing relationships between the different peoples who reside within Latium. It is only through the formation of alliances – built upon equal treaties (foedera) and cultural exchange – that peace is able to be formed between those peoples. The …

Jörgensen’S Law Das Auftreten Der Goetter In Den Buechern Ι–Μ Der Odyssee, Erwin F. Cook

Classical Studies Faculty Research

No abstract provided.

Ztc Sls 302: Medieval/Early Modern Cultures, Nicolette Guida

Open Educational Resources

This course explores the depiction of gender, race, and social class in Shakespeare’s plays, with a focus on how his works engage with and challenge the norms of early modern society. In this course, we will study two of Shakespeare’s comedies: Much Ado About Nothing and The Taming of the Shrew; as well as two of his tragedies: Romeo and Juliet and Othello in relation to the culture of early modern England. Through an in-depth study of these texts, students will examine the complexities of these social categories as portrayed in the plays and how they continue to resonate in …

Oedipus Tyrannus: A New Performance Translation, Maura Giles-Watson

English: Faculty Scholarship

A new performance translation (to colloquial Modern English) of Sophokles' tragedy Oedipus Tyrannus (c 429 BCE) for the Old Globe/USD Shiley Graduate Theatre MFA Program.

An Ideological Target Through The Archaeological Archive: The Islamic State’S Destruction Of Palmyra And Its Impact On Local Syrian Identity, Tristen A. Leone

Pomona Senior Theses

This paper investigates how Palmyra's multicultural archaeological archive incited ISIS's destruction of the site during the Syrian Civil War through an analysis of sepulchral and religious architectural structures and onomastic practices. In contributing the cultural heritage scholarship, this paper places the motives of Islamic extremist groups in conversation with intellectual discourse around the multicultural identities of the Ancient Near East during the Roman Imperial Period. Further, through anthropological methodological frameworks and the photographic archive of excavation efforts at Palmyra, I aim to center modern local communities' experiences of living on and near an archaeological site like Palmyra. In consulting modern …

Syncretism Of Culture Through Restoration At Cyrene’S Temple Of Lykeian Zeus, Melanie Stevenson

Undergraduate Research Awards

Starting with the earliest accounts of the temple and tracking it through the cycles of destruction and reconstruction that have characterized it as a blend of time periods and constantly modernizing culture will uncover the mysteries of who exactly influenced this temple. It must have held a notable amount of significance in the ancient city, since there is a plethora of archaeological evidence—from fragmented cult statues to charred limestone remains—that marks this site as a victim of multiple bouts of religious violence. Far from being a static monument, the Temple of Lykeian Zeus in Cyrene is an intersection of Arcadian …

“Legendary Comebacks”:The Refiguring Of Iliad 2’S Thersites, Steven A. Heil

UNH URC Open (2026 and after)

“Legendary Comebacks”: the Refiguring of Iliad 2’s Thersites

By The Light, Desiree Galamgam

CMC Senior Theses

On the island of Helios, the sun god, a water nymph finds comfort tending to the flora along  riverbanks. Clytie avoids her oceanid sisters’ poisonous proclivities. Modeling herself after the sun god’s incessant responsibilities, she spends her existence working. Only taking breaks to perch herself at the top of her alcove’s hill to watch Helios drive his chariot to rise and set the sun, she sees him as the epitome of perfection and freedom.

Her tranquil life is interrupted by the sudden arrival of Helios himself at the footsteps of her isolated cave. Clytie begins to feel new emotions as …

Just War Theory In The Hunger Games: Suzanne Collins’S Critique Of Violence, Power, And Rebellion, Laila Hannum

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis applies just war theory to Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games trilogy, arguing that while the districts' rebellion satisfies the principles of jus ad bellum (justice in going to war), it systematically violates jus in bello (justice in the conduct of war) and jus post bellum (justice after war), and ultimately replicates the oppressive structures of the Capitol it sought to overthrow.

Drawing primarily on Michael Walzer's Just and Unjust Wars and on Brian Orend's ideas on post-war justice, this thesis traces the rebellion's moral arc across all three novels. Chapter One shows that the rebellion meets the criteria …

Legal Stories Without Villains, Alison Peck

Law Faculty Scholarship

Lawyers have always been storytellers, and cognitive science is increasingly demonstrating that human beings are wired to learn through story. But legal stories may have a dark side if, as theorists have recently suggested, stories motivate pro-social action by reinforcing in-group identification and out-group hatred. In an increasingly divided polity, are we doomed to stories that drive us toward social disintegration? A solution to the legal storyteller’s dilemma may be found in an ancient source: Aristotle’s Poetics. By crafting legal stories that track the elements of the Tragedy as described by Aristotle and adapted by modern storytellers from Broadway …

Er-Reina A-10289, Hala Halabi

Favissa: Past Archaeological Excavation Reports

In April 2026, a trial excavation was conducted at Er-Reina (Permit No. A-10289/2026; map ref. 230650–75/736120–50), prior to development work. The excavation, undertaken on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority and funded by Nasser Abu Ahmad, was directed by H. Halabi (field photography), with the assistance of W. Atrash (supervision), W. Hamdan (photogrammetry and field photography), J. Zilpa (administration), M. Masarwa (Lower Galilee and Valleys District), and laborers from Umm al-Fahm.

Res Publica Recondita: Augustan Authors’ Use Of Archaic Heroes As Exempla For The Golden Age, Katherine Anna Hamner

Honors Program Theses

Following decades of civil war and moral collapse in the Late Republic, Augustus sought to legitimate his principate through a sweeping cultural program proclaiming the arrival of a new Golden Age. This thesis examines how the authors Livy and Virgil contributed a literary dimension to that program by retelling Rome's archaic past. Livy curates the Roman kings as exempla of entrepreneurial virtue and civic self-determination, while Virgil's Aeneid grounds proto-Roman identity in pietas and coalition-building across ethnic boundaries. Both works, independent of direct state commission, answered the moral demands of the Augustan moment and affirmed that civilizational renewal requires a …

A Technical And Performance Re-Examination Of Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’S Escarramán, Op. 177: Beyond The Angelo Gilardino Publication. A New Performance Edition Of Gallarda, Daniel Monroy Reyes

Theses and Dissertations--Music

This dissertation provides a technical and performance-oriented re-examination of the first four movements of Escarramán: A Suite of Spanish Dances from the XVIth Century (After Cervantes), Op. 177, by Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco. It argues that the suite embodies a fundamental tension between the composer’s original compositional and structural intentions and the ergonomic limitations of the guitar, and evaluates the proposed solutions by Angelo Gilardino in the 1979 Bèrben edition.

This research employs a comparative, practice-led framework to address the paradox of Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s non-idiomatic writing. Its primary contribution is the development of a performance synthesis that maintains harmonic integrity while enhancing …

The Divine Feminine Reframed: Dogma And Doctrine, Icon And Flesh, And The Sacred Embodiment Of Reclamation, Natasha Keckley

Dance (MFA) Theses

This thesis interrogates Marian iconography and its role in constructing a moral binary that marks female bodies as either sanctified or sinful. Drawing on feminist and postcolonial theory, iconographic analysis, and historical case studies, the research analyzes how Christian symbology established the Marian Mold: a theological aesthetic apparatus that exalts feminine sanctity through ideals of virginity, obedience, and maternal receptivity while constraining feminine expression. This paradigm, propagated through the British Empire’s colonial regimes, shaped the regulation and reinterpretation of embodied traditions. The thesis investigates these dynamics through two case studies: the Devadasi tradition and Bharatanatyam’s reformulation in South India, and …

Lucretius, Ovid, And Milton In Seventeenth-Century England: First Matter, Creation, And Food Of Angels, Conny M. Pfeifer

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Paradise Lost is a complex poem that not only contains John Milton’s rendition of the Genesis creation narrative and the Fall of humankind but also provides a voice for his unique theology. This dissertation argues that Milton’s creative use of the three disparate concepts of consuming and digesting knowledge, chaos, and the night sky allows him to respond to Lucretian atomism, to address questions regarding the mortality of the soul, and to navigate the scientific discoveries of the seventeenth century, especially the astronomical discoveries of Galileo Galilei. An examination of digestion, chaos, and night helps shed light on Milton’s unique …

Problems And Possibilities Of Namelessness In Late Antiquity And The Early Middle Ages, Jamie Wood, Hope Williard, Máirín Maccarron, Julia Hillner, James R. Burns

Medieval People

No abstract provided.

Cormac’S Court: Knights Without God In A Savage Land; Or, Chivalry And Existentialism In Cormac Mccarthy’S The Road, Zoë Margaret Metelerkamp

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Cormac McCarthy scholars have examined the influence of romantic grail quest literature and existential philosophy on McCarthy’s oeuvre, but they have treated these subjects independently of each other. This thesis offers a novel exploration of McCarthy’s use of these specific philosophical and literary precedents by focusing on the ways The Road unifies medieval literary principles in Chretien’s Perceval with the existential chivalry Søren Kierkegaard extrapolates in Fear and Trembling.

From Prometheus To Pygmalion To Pandora: Teaching Greek Mythology With Frankenstein’S “Dark Brides”, Kyle William Bishop

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

As Mary Shelley unambiguously informs readers on the title page of her 1818 novel Frankenstein, her tale of Victor’s discovery of the secret of non-biological reproduction represents the Promethean myth, a morality tale warning against the usurpation of divine authority. In Shelley’s novel, Victor ultimately recognizes the dangerous path he has discovered, and he refuses to create a female companion for his hideous progeny, risking his own life to protect the world from a potential race of monsters. In the cinematic tradition, however, this unrealized “bride” often has been created, and these fantastic narratives realize the Pygmalion myth, that …