Classics Commons^™

Religious Ramifications: An Analysis Of Ancient Religious Mythologies And Their Effects On Societal Gender Roles, Christina E. Burkhalter

World Languages, Literatures and Cultures Undergraduate Honors Theses

An analysis of the effect of ancient religious writings in the Mediterranean on local gender culture with a specific focus on the texts deities.

Romulus As A Rhetorical And Historiographical Tool In Imperial Roman Literature, Jaden M. Perry

History Undergraduate Honors Theses

This study exames the figure of Romulus in imperial Roman literaure as neither a fixed mythological nor historical subject, but as a flexible rhetorical and historiographical tool. Surveying a range of authors from the late first to fourth centuries CE, inlcuding historians such as Florus, Tacitus, Justin, Suetonius, and the Historia Augusta, as well as literary authors like Juvenal, Silius Italicus, Valerius Maximus, and Seneca, the thesis argues that references to Romulus and his deified counterpart Quirinus are deliberately manipulated to serve distinct authorial purposes. Rather than merely recounting Rome’s foundational myth, these writers employ Romulus to construct comparisons, …

A Preliminary Study On A Variant British Recension Of De Excidio Troiae, Kailee M. Rowe

History Undergraduate Honors Theses

Dares Phrygius’s De excidio Troiae (“On the Destruction of Troy”) is a fifth or sixth century historical account of the Trojan War that gained significant attention during the medieval period in western Europe. Surviving in over 200 manuscripts, De excidio Troiae had been widely disseminated, developing different traditions in Latin as well as inspiring translations and adaptions in vernacular languages, such as Irish, Middle High German, and Old Icelandic. Dares was considered one of the most reliable sources on the Trojan War, partly because of the decline of Greek in Western Europe, but also partly because of its claim to …

Contextualizing Egyptian-Themed Art In Pompeiian Shops, Kelsey Myers

The Ozark Historical Review

This project focuses on the art historical, architectural, and archaeological evidence outside the domus to investigate the multivalent messaging communicated by Egyptian imagery in Pompeii’s civic and commercial spaces. By examining the artifacts and images commissioned by traders and craftsmen in their production and shop spaces, this research offers a bottom-up approach to Roman culture and society to balance the textual based top-down perspective that has dominated the discipline. Focusing on foreign-themed objects and images in these spaces, this study also explores the reception and adoption of foreign/eastern influences by the lower social strata of Romans in a multiethnic empire.

Archaic Burials In The Necropolis Of Aigai And The Manufacturing Of Significance In Archaeology, Abigail Chapman

Anthropology Undergraduate Honors Theses

The excavation of Ancient Aigai, modern Vergina in Greece, has unearthed a wealth of archaeological treasures, including Macedonian tombs attributed to Philip II and Alexander the Great. However, the manufactured significance imposed on these excavations has shaped the contemporary understanding of Archaic burial practices in Aigai. This paper aims to understand how the constructed narratives surrounding these excavations influence current ideas on burial customs in Aigai during the Archaic period. By analyzing the layout of the city and its necropolis, scholarship can gain valuable insights into the social structure of Archaic Macedonia. This can help to develop a more complete …

Who Sings And Who Falls Silent? A Spatial And Social Analysis Of Virgilian Graffiti In Pompeii, Rachel Murray

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study analyzes Pompeian domestic spaces in which graffiti that quote the works of Virgil have been found. This is particularly compelling because of the Aeneid’s status as a ‘national epic,’ simultaneously ‘high’ culture and seemingly part of the ‘common’ imagination. In the past scholars have argued that the presence of Virgilian graffiti was not indicative of widespread interaction with Virgil, and that a select few individuals were responsible for these quotations. Drawing from ideas proposed by modern graffiti studies and spatial theorists and employing the methodology developed by the Virtual Pompeii Project, this study uses network analysis measures to …

Sexual Agency And Erotic Depictions Of Sexually Non-Normative Women In Ancient Roman Art, Laura Young

School of Art Undergraduate Honors Theses

Ancient Roman women, regardless of their status, were to some extent bound by the sexual norms of their time. Much of the textual and visual evidence constructs the ideal Roman woman as a chaste and sexually submissive matron figure, loyal to her husband and the bearer of his citizen descendants. These patriarchal norms appear to have given women little room to exercise their own agency in and out of their sexual relationships. Accepting these ideals of female sexuality, scholars have often characterized normative male-female sex in the ancient Roman world as a sexual act in which the woman is in …

Anthropomorphism In Architecture: An Investigation Into Anthropomorphism Through Ancient Greco-Roman Religious Structures, Emily Wilcox

Architecture Undergraduate Honors Theses

This paper will outline and detail an investigation into religious Greco-Roman structures of antiquity through the lens of anthropomorphism. Through defining anthropomorphism, three lenses of thought have presented themselves as means of inquiry: metaphor, scale and proportion, and ergonomics. Previous research into these structures and cultures has shown that there was indeed consideration for the human body in designing in construction; this project hopes to solidify these claims and present new supporting information regarding specific relationships to the body using anthropomorphism. Many contemporary buildings approach the relationship to the human body as a mask or an afterthought, disregarding what reflecting …

Fine Roman Dining At Affordable Pompeian Prices: Reevaluating The Commercial Gardens Of Pompeii, Claire Campbell, Rhodora G. Vennarucci

Inquiry: The University of Arkansas Undergraduate Research Journal

Previous scholarship has designated Roman gardens into binary otium or negotium designations; however, this research on Roman gardens suggests that these concepts often exist in spaces simultaneously. The reevaluation of commercial gardens in Pompeii presented in this article allows for an integrative analysis of garden spaces, which reveals that commercial gardens have coinciding qualities and functions with private elite gardens and that various trades were actively integrating these features into commercial settings to promote and financially supplement their businesses. This research challenges the assumption that non-domestic, commercial gardens only have qualities indicative of negotium and that garden spaces were not …

Designing Digital Antiquity: Classical Archaeology In New Virtual Applications, William Loder

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this thesis, I argue that the combination of existing archaeological theory with game design theory offers an innovative avenue for creating serious 3D applications of archaeological sites in virtual reality that can be productively used for pedagogical, research, and outreach solutions. In this thesis, I engage with the archaeological theories of phenomenology and sensory studies, briefly touching on structure and agency as well as discussion of some current digital applications in use in the field. For this project, I am interested in game design theory as it relates to education and I view Virtual Reality as an important tool …

Fine Roman Dining At Affordable Pompeian Prices: A New Evaluation Of The Non-Domestic Gardens Of Pompeii, Claire Campbell

World Languages, Literatures and Cultures Undergraduate Honors Theses

Previous scholarship has designated Roman gardens into otium or negotium designations; however, this research on Roman gardens suggests that these concepts often exist in the spaces simultaneously. To address this issue, I compiled catalogs of garden spaces identified at Regio I and Regio VI of Pompeii. This methodology cuts across traditional public and private or productive and aesthetic designations, which will allow me to draw connections between the gardens found in different types of settings. This new catalog methodology of Roman gardens presented in this thesis allows for an integrative analysis of garden spaces, which reveals that these commercial gardens …

Gynocentric Apuleius: Female Agency In 'The Golden Ass', Kelsey Schalo

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Through a close reading of Apuleius’ Golden Ass, I argue that characters such as Byrrhena, Photis, and Psyche function as positive examples of female sexual authority and autonomy and effectively challenge the phallocentric theories commonly applied to Greek and Roman gender and sexuality, the Penetrative Model associated with Foucault, and structuralism, associated in classics with French historians Marcel Detienne, J-P Vernant, and Pierre Vidal-Naquet. While still penetrated, many of these women actively claim their agency in sex through pleasure and narrative. Additionally, in correlation with Julia Kristeva’s theory of the abject, while Apuleius’s female witches behave in horrific and chaotic …

Recovered Images: Medieval Echoes In C. S. Lewis’S Space Trilogy, Nathan Earl Houston Fayard

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

C. S. Lewis has begun to garner more scholarly attention in the last few decades, but his first novels, his science fiction or Space trilogy, continue to be largely ignored by academia. Yet, these three novels are deserving of more serious study, as they are pioneering works of literary science fiction, and even more surprisingly, of literary medievalism. Though long derided as mere reactionary attacks on Modernism and science, when properly understood, these strange and wonderful tales actually reveal the complexity and nuance of Lewis’s response to his times. In them, the Inkling author creates a unique combination of the …

Was Rome Not Beautiful Too? Modern Germany And The Legacy Of Ancient Rome, Jason Charles Phillips

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

It has been over two thousand years since the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest (9 A.D.). What really happened at the battle is anyone’s guess. It is this silence that allowed for the Germans to appropriate this battle and turn it into a major moment of German history. In the modern German imagination this story became one of Hermann liberating the ancient Germans from the tyranny of Rome. This battle preserved the purity of the ancient Germans and prevented a Roman corruption of their world. From the rediscovery of Tacitus in the fifteenth century to the era of Hitler, ancient …

The Spatial Agency Of The Catacombs: An Analysis Of The Interventions Of Damasus I (305-384), Natalie A. Hall

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Damasus I (305-384) ascended to the office of the Bishop of Rome after a bitter and bloody battle with Ursinus in 366 CE. The violence was a culmination of doctrinal squabbles and power contests which erupted in the Roman church over the course of the fourth century. Damasus engaged in a substantial program of physical renovation and enlargement of martyr sites and personally penned numerous epigrams both extolling the virtue of the honored dead and the patronage of the bishopric. Scholarship related to Damasus and his works is typically narrowly focused, considering motive(s) for his actions, his use of specific …

An Embarrassment Of Riches: Data Integration In Vr Pompeii, Adam Schoelz

Computer Science and Computer Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

It is fair to say that Pompeii is the most studied archaeological site in the world. Beyond the extensive remains of the city itself, the timing of its rediscovery and excavation place it in a unique historiographical position. The city has been continuously studied since the 18th century, with historians and archaeologists constantly reevaluating older sources as our knowledge of the ancient world expands. While several studies have approached the city from a data driven perspective, no studies of the city have taken a quantitative holistic approach on the scale of the VR Pompeii project. Hyper-specificity has been the order …

Exploring The Contemporary Use And Understanding Of Precedent In Architectural Design Via A Comparative Analysis Of Brunelleschi And Le Corbusier, Shaelyn J. Vinson

Architecture Undergraduate Honors Theses

Abstract

As a student of architecture, conducting precedent research before diving into the design phase of a project is something that I am very familiar with. But, following each project’s precedent research, is often an overwhelming feeling of uselessness for the material found. For each project, assignments call for students to find a certain number of buildings on which to base their project. While historically this step makes sense, 21^st-century architecture students are taught that there is no “new” architecture, and that copying and collaging together existing buildings is the best way to achieve a successful design. This …

A Soldier In The Dark: Navigating Gaul Through The Eyes Of Caesar And His Men, Thomas Christian Mcmahon

World Languages, Literatures and Cultures Undergraduate Honors Theses

An investigation into the veracity of Caesar's account of the Battle of Alesia as told in Commentarii de Bello Gallico.

Ancient Greek Mythology In The Modern Albanian Epic, "Songs Of The Frontier Warriors", Lydia Osborn

World Languages, Literatures and Cultures Undergraduate Honors Theses

A discussion of the Albanian epic, "Songs of the Frontier Warriors," parallels to Greek and Roman mythology, and Illyrian history.

Eroticism In Theognis, Josh C. Koerner

World Languages, Literatures and Cultures Undergraduate Honors Theses

I will be examining the Theognidean corpus for contexts relating to eroticism. These include an examination of the use of the words Eros (love), Aphrodite, Philos (dear/friend), Hate, and Boy. I will keep in mind a number of cross-contextual questions during my examination. These include: Which ideas for love are used in relation to Boy? What is the difference between using masculine Eros and feminine Aphrodite as evidenced by the context of the poetry? I will first examine poems that use the word Eros and its cognates, and see that Eros occupies on the spectrum of love positions in the …

The Responses Of The Roman Imperial Government To Natural Disasters 29 Bce-180 Ce, Michael Timothy Mccoy

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines the practice of imperial disaster relief between 29 BCE and 180 CE. It focuses upon both the process of disaster aid delineating how Roman emperors were petitioned for assistance, the forms disaster relief took, and the political motives individual emperors had for dispensing disaster aid. Chapter 1 provides a brief introduction to the topic. Chapter 2 outlines the scope of the study as well as the examples used to establish disaster relief in context. Chapter 3 gives an overview of euergetism and also discusses two cases of disaster assistance that pre-date the reign of Augustus. Chapter 4 …

Domus, Villa And Insula: A Neo-Rationalist Taxonomy Of Housing Types Along The Via Consolare-Pompeii, Joseph Weishaar

Architecture Undergraduate Honors Theses

In the early letters of Cicero, the guide on agriculture by Varro, and the complete works of Vitruvius, there is a foundation laid for the governance of domestic architecture which can only be glimpsed through the moment frozen in time at Pompeii. This thesis is directed at a critical analysis of the residential architecture situated along the Via Consolare in Pompeii. The question posed at the onset was how do dwellings change and adapt based on the localized context. The context in this case can be as simple as neighbor to neighbor spatial relationships and as complex as urban to …

Re-Examining Late Chalcolithic Cultural Collapse In South-East Europe, Harvey Benjamin Smith

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Research into the Balkan Chalcolithic often overlooks the dramatic changes in society that occurred beginning in the late Fifth Millennium BCE. Most settlements were abandoned along with changes in mortuary customs, ceramic and decorative traditions, domestic rituals, crafts, housing styles, mining, and metallurgy. These changes happened at a time when these Chalcolithic societies seemed to be at their peak. Theories as to what caused these changes include migrations/invasions, anthropogenic environmental degradation, gradual internal changes through innovation and outside contacts, and climate change. This thesis attempts to synthesize, and critique material relating to this topic, and ultimately provide my own opinions …

Philosophical Influences In The Art Of War Found In The Romance Of The Three Kingdoms, Nathaniel Ethan Clark

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

“Philosophical Influences in The Art of Warfound in The Romance of the Three Kingdoms” is an examination of Sunzi’s philosophy about leadership in The Art of War as applied to the moral character, or lack thereof, of historical Han Dynasty leaders, Liu Bei and Cao Cao. In Luo Guanzhong’s The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the two are fictionalized with oppositional personalities and corresponding philosophical bases. I explore the ways in which their actions embody or reject the philosophy found in Sunzi’s The Art of War.

Turning The Cup: Thematic Balance In The Greek Symposium, Matthew Naglak

Inquiry: The University of Arkansas Undergraduate Research Journal

The concept of “nothing in excess” was an important one in ancient Greek life. The guiding principle of moderation and/or balance appears in poetry from the 7th to the 5th centuries BCE and has been extensively explored by scholars. My research project adds to this scholarly work by considering for the first time the relationship between moderation and the visual. That is, I explore whether and how this key Greek notion was expressed in the images that appear on pottery of the time period. More specifically, I focus on pottery used in thesymposium, a politically-charged aristocratic male drinking party, and …

Is Jove A Rock Or Leaner? Interpreting The Central Paintings Of Pompeii's House Of The Tragic Poet, Rachel Newberry

Inquiry: The University of Arkansas Undergraduate Research Journal

When confronting a piece of ancient Roman artwork, the modern viewer faces the question, "How do we see like the Romans did?" Geographical, temporal, and cultural differences combine to make the process of understanding ancient art particularly complex. This piece attempts to bridge the gap between ancient Rome and the present through an analysis of the central mythological paintings located in region VI, insula 8 of Pompeii. A three-dimensional model of the insula, created in the honors research colloquium "Digital Pompeii" at the University of Arkansas, is essential to the examination of the complex interaction between the paintings and their …

The Sainte-Chapelle Ivory Virgin & Child: Rayonnant Style And Private Devotion, Caroline Harrington

Inquiry: The University of Arkansas Undergraduate Research Journal

This paper examines a major shift in French Gothic sculpture of the second half of the thirteenth century, as exemplified by the Sainte-Chapelle Virgin and Child. During this period there was a new emphasis on elegance in art works, giving rise to a new style called Rayonnant, a style paralleled by a new emphasis on the humanity of Christ and the Virgin Mary. The scale and patronage of the Sainte-Chapelle Virgin and Child demonstrate the changing purpose of sculpture from a ceremonial role in church life to a private devotional object for the French elite, in particular king of France …

Roman Isis And The Pendulum Of Tolerance In The Empire, D. Jasmine Merced-Ownbey

Inquiry: The University of Arkansas Undergraduate Research Journal

This paper examines the evolution of Isis, ostensibly the "sacred mother," as a political tool in Egypt and (especially) in Rome. Through an analysis of primary and secondary source materials, it is established that Isis' treatment by Roman politicians represented a running discourse on the contemporary political relationship between Rome and Egypt, and, at times, on Rome's complex negotiation of foreign influences on its own society. Following the deaths of the first two Roman emperors, Isis was gradually elevated from the status of pariah to an acclaimed goddess within the Roman pantheon who was deemed worthy of beneficence and protection …

The Unsettling Landscape: Landscape And Anxiety In The Garden Of The House Of Octavius Quartio, Sarah Brutesco

Inquiry: The University of Arkansas Undergraduate Research Journal

Ancient Roman houses (domus) were both public and private spaces and were used by the homeowner (dominus) to send messages of power to his guests and family members. Scholarly analysis of the rhetorical power of the architecture and decoration of the domus has largely overlooked the role of the garden within this context. It is generally assumed that the purpose of the garden was to provide a calm green space in the center of an urban home. The purpose of this paper is to challenge this overly simplistic reading of Roman gardens and to explore how the dominus might have …

Projecting The Passion: The Invention Of The 'Judeo-Christian Tradition' In The Roman/Biblical Genre Of Postwar American Film, Don Michael Burrows

Inquiry: The University of Arkansas Undergraduate Research Journal

This paper traces the changes in the American view of the relationship between Jews and Christians from the First World War to the present as reflected in motion pictures from the earliest of the biblical epics to Mel Gibson's The Passion of Christ. It demonstrates that the "Judea-Christian tradition " as it has developed since the Second World War is a political theme that functioned first as anti-fascist propaganda and then as anticommunist propaganda that portrayed Jews and Christians as good and free in contrast to Nazis and communists; and it shows what an effective medium the movies were in …