Ancient History, Greek and Roman through Late Antiquity Commons^™

Mythos And Meaning: Medieval Appropriations Of Mythological Types In The Consolation Of Philosophy And Later Western Literatures, Francis J. Hunter

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Often referred to as the last Roman and first medieval, Boethius, author of The Consolation of Philosophy, has been widely received as an unoriginal philosopher who sought to preserve Platonic thought as the Western Roman Empire fell. However, this essay features an investigation into the literary originality of Boethius who initiates a line of Christian and Platonic literatures to follow in the medieval European tradition. Boethius demonstrates himself to be a poet who makes great use of philosophy rather than as a philosopher writing poetry. Boethius’ poetic influence is felt most strongly in major aspects of Dante’s Divine Comedy and …

Review Of Tales Of Dionysus: The Dionysiaca Of Nonnus Of Panopolis, Dominic Greenlee

Field Notes: A Journal of Collegiate Anthropology

No abstract provided.

The Roman Language Policy: Its Parts, Presence, And Consequences, Lilianna Darnell

Honors Bachelor of Arts

No abstract provided.

The Pie Verb: A New Reconstruction, Percy Huffman

Honors Bachelor of Arts

No abstract provided.

Quid Multa?: What More? A Translation And Digital Annotation Of Selected Letters From Cicero To Atticus, Kelly Zach

Honors Theses

Modern Classicists are modernizing and digitizing the field of Classical Studies with great success. Philology, translation, and annotation are all aspects that have been evolved using techniques from the Digital Humanities. This project is a foray into the intersection between Classics and Digital Humanities combining traditional Classical work with a digital aspect. This digital aspect of annotation using a dependency grammar-based approach and intuitive software enhances the understanding and translation of selected letters from Cicero to Atticus.

The Desert A City: A Study Of Antony The Great’S Life, Hanyang Chen

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

This paper attempts to provide an insight of asceticism and its development in Egypt through the literal work Athanasius's Life of Antony. It sets out to explain how the peculiar geography and environment in Egypt contributed to the development of asceticism and how the practices of St. Antony reflected the contemporary ideas on soul and body.

A Typological And Chemical Analysis Of Roman Oil Lamps From Poggio Del Molino, Brandon Tejo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Terracotta lamps, known to the Romans as lucernae, are small, handheld, often decorated objects which provided ancient people light. To modern researchers, they serve as tools for dating stratigraphy and iconographic studies. Beyond their immediately apparent aesthetic and symbolic value, the chemical compositions of the clay of these lamps reflect their origin. This study complements archaeological typologies with chemometric analyses to describe 16 Late Republican and Imperial Roman lamps recovered from the villa at Poggio del Molino (PdM), Tuscany. These finds were recovered from the 2021 and 2022 PdM excavations. The combined approach of typology with X-ray Diffraction (XRD) …

The Development And Adoption Of The Codex, Rutherford Allison

Honors Bachelor of Arts

One of the longest-lasting and least recognized changes that occurred under the Roman Empire is the transition from scrolls as a vessel for literature to codices, the format which, in some way, is still used today. Indeed, until the invention of the printing press, texts had not undergone as impactful a shift as was experienced during the period between 250 and 450 AD. This shift was tied closely to the spread of Christianity; the codex’s rise to dominance maps closely to the spread of Christianity, and this is no accident. As will become apparent, Christians possessed a strong and distinctive …

Man, Myth And Medicine: The Exchange Of Healing Deities In The Bronze Age Mediterranean, Ryan Vincent

Undergraduate Honors Theses

This paper is an in depth analysis of the Bronze Age interactions between Egypt and Greece and the legacy of physicians and physician gods in the region through an exploration of religion, medicine and linguistic exchange. The Egyptian physician Imhotep bears a striking resemblance to the Greek god Asklepios. It seems this similarity may be a result of Asklepios and his predecessor Paieon actually being based on the story of Imhotep, brought to the Mycenaeans during the Bronze Age.

Ovid's Caeneus As A Queer Hero: Understanding Gender And Gender Variance In The Ancient Mediterranean., Rj Palmer

Theses and Dissertations--Modern and Classical Languages, Literature and Cultures

Caeneus, as written in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, is a notable blend of ancient and Hellenistic versions of the myth. Ovid’s Caeneus can be understood as a transgender man, since he was assigned female at birth, but asks for his gender to be changed by the god Neptune, and goes on to live the rest of his life with the body, appearance, and social roles of a man. Ovid incorporates Caeneus’ trans identity with his use of grammatical gender endings for Caeneus, using masculine gender for Caeneus except when discussing his pre-transition childhood, or when the centaurs address him mockingly while fighting. …

Women's Marital Roles In Classical Athens: Male Understanding And Portrayal In Aeschylus' Agamemnon And Euripides' Medea, Elena Graf, Mary Boyes

Undergraduate Research Posters

Abstract

The Classical Period of Athens (500-336 BCE) was an era of sociocultural growth and stability for the ancient Greeks, renowned for its development of tragic theatre. While Classical Athens nurtured the public sociocultural success of male citizens, women adopted a submissive role, confined to their marital responsibilities. Women were forbidden from directly taking part in politics, philosophy, and above all, the theatrical scene of Athens. Due to these societal perceptions of traditional gender roles, the literature of the Classical Period was heavily influenced by a male bias. This study investigates the connections between women’s role in Classical Athenian society …

The Intersection Of Prose And Poetics In Apollonius’ Argonautica, Stephen B. Ogumah

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Detecting allusions in the Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes is not quite new except for the fact that it has been carried out for long mostly within the poetic tradition. Looking at the proem of the epic, where there is mixing of genres, this mixture suggests that scholars may need to look beyond the Homeric epics and the poetic tradition for better appreciation of the Alexandrian epic. This dissertation explores the relationship between certain features and episodes of Apollonius’ Argonautica and the prose tradition, and seeks to show that the prose tradition, particularly Herodotus’ Histories, is germane to the …

In Search Of The Pelasgians: Discursive Strategies And Greek Identities From The Archaic Period To The Roman Imperial Era, Tristn Lambright

Theses

In ancient literature, the Pelasgians appear as an ambiguously defined and geographically ubiquitous primeval ethnic group or tribe. Various classical writers describe the Pelasgians as simultaneously pre-Hellenic and non-Hellenic –– ancestral and barbarian, chronologically earlier and essentially different. The ongoing ideological and rhetorical negotiations of Pelasgian identity in ancient literature played a critical role in discussions of Greekness –– discussions rooted in the distant past, informed by fluid and contradictory myths, and shaped by intellectual, social, and political transformations of the period. By contextualizing these discussions, this study attempts not simply a reconstruction of the mythological Pelasgians, but a reconstruction …

Sexual Objectification Of Women: What Can Ancient Rome And Modern Psychology Teach Us?, Noa Raskin

Honors Theses

Sexual objectification (SO) is an omnipresent experience for women that decreases their quality of life. Researching why SO occurs and is perpetuated can help us understand how to decrease the interpersonal, mental health, and safety consequences women face from being sexually objectified. This presentation looks at sexual objectification through the lenses of two different disciplines: psychology and classics. The psychology component involved an empirical study aimed at better comprehending women’s perceptions of their own SO and the connection SO has to Greek life. Nineteen men from Union College completed two scales to assess their direct and indirect SO of women, …

How Translations Affects Understanding In Euripides’ Medea, Alexis Nicole Candido

Honors Theses

This thesis considers Medea, from Euripides’ Medea, in her role as mother, wife, and a Woman of Corinth. Previous literature has considered the context within which Medea can be viewed as an icon for feminism in the modern world. Utilizing the translations from George Theodoridis, David Kovacs, Gilbert Murray, E. P. Coleridge, and Cecilia Luschnig, as well as my own translation, I investigated how Medea’s story can be viewed differently when carefully selecting words as a translation of the original Greek from her famous “Women of Corinth” speech. Each translation has similarities and differences, but they all portrayed a slightly …

Weaving In Mythology: Women’S Agency And Portrayed Character, Molly Mcleod

Honors Theses

Although weaving would have been a daily activity for many people in the ancient Greek world, the nature of the practice remains somewhat unknown to the modern view. The archaeological record contains loom weights and spindle whorls, but the looms and textiles themselves have almost entirely decomposed. Scholars have attempted to reconstruct what weaving looked like in the ancient world through a combination of literary sources, archaeological methods, and visual representations. Based on this research, and in order to better understand the process and difficulties of ancient weaving, I have constructed and woven fabric on a model of an ancient …

Isocrates's Place In Postmodern Advertising, Christopher Barkley

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study in communication and rhetoric seeks to ascertain constructive applications for distinct advertising practices by examining Isocrates’s work and place in postmodern advertising. The focus uses 5 principles known to Isocrates which are: 1) commonwealths of households, 2) integration of reputation, elegance, substance and style, 3) education and public discourse, 4) phronesis and praxis, and 5) truth and verisimilitude. These 5 principles can form a constructive and practical advertising approach. This study is important. It examines Isocrates through the lens of advertising and extends the research done about him by leading Isocrates scholars who have looked primarily at his …

Mercy Otis Warren’S Marcia(S) And Cornelia(S): A Case Study In Women’S Internalization Of Classicism In Early America, Brittany Ellis

Honors Theses

The connection between people in early America and classicism is a field of study that has been heavily documented, although it has remained a very male-focused field with little research done about how women in early America formed a relationship with antiquity. This thesis reveals that elite white women had a deep emotional and intellectual attachment with mothers and matrons from ancient Greece and Rome as a basis for expressing political thoughts and identity; classicism formed a common language that many women could relate to each other before, during, and after the American Revolution. This assessment is achieved through a …

The Greco-Roman Influence On Early Christian Art, Tim Ganshirt

Honors Bachelor of Arts

It cannot be denied that early Christian communities used familiar Greco-Roman symbols, images, icons, and ideas in their own ways. For this reason, it will be necessary to examine why these communities in Rome took parts of Greco-Roman society that were familiar to them and used them in a different way, in addition to exploring the varying degrees of effect that these images had on the Christian communities themselves and on the society around them. By “early Christian communities,” I mean Christians living in Rome at the beginning of the third century until the late fifth century.[1] For these …

A Point In Time Filled With Significance: The Application Of Kairos In Contemporary Rhetoric And Civic Pedagogy, Bryant Smilie

<strong> Theses and Dissertations </strong>

This study examines how kairos continues to operate in contemporary discourses and disciplines despite its inadequate treatment as a normative principle in modern studies. Notwithstanding James Kinneavy’s revival of kairos encouraging many scholars to revisit the term in search of a complete definition, there is still an absence of conclusive application of the concept in contemporary pedagogy. I argue that, over time, the two versions of kairos have become entangled, contradictory, and thought of as too flexible to be taught in a modern setting because they have resisted concrete methodology. While the idea that kairos possesses two dimensions has already …

An Illustrated Metamorphoses, Alexandria Devlin

Undergraduate Research Symposium Posters

This project was a comic consisting of five different myths from Ovid's Metamorphoses. My goal was to make it easier and more enjoyable for audiences to read classical myths, and give these stories a way to shine in the 21st century. Myths from many different cultures have been adapted into comics, but direct depictions are much less common than shaping mythological figures to fit a new story. I have yet to find a direct comic adaptation of Metamorphoses. Ovid's Metamorphoses is full of rich and interesting stories and deserves to be represented alongside other mythological tales.

By The Power Vesta-Ed In Me: The Power Of The Vestal Virgins And Those Who Took Advantage Of It, Elena M. Stanley

Classical Mediterranean and Middle East Honors Projects

Vestal Virgins were high ranking members of the Roman elite. Due to the priestesses’ elevated standing, Romans made use of their inherent privileges. Through analyses of case studies from ancient authors and archaeology, I identify three ways Romans wielded Vestal power: familial connections, financial and material resources, and political sway. I end by exploring cases of crimen incesti, the crime of unchastity, which highlight all three forms. The Vestals were influential women who shared access to power in different ways. The Vestals were active participants in the social and political world of Rome.

Humanity And Nature: From Vergil To Modernity, Aaron Ticknor

Honors Bachelor of Arts

Though ecology is a relatively new field of study, the human relationship to nature has shifted and changed throughout history. In antiquity, it has been understood by scholarly consensus that there was a more general understanding of nature as a living force with spirit, for example the Roman animist concept of numen, and humanity being one with nature. In modernity, however, under the influence of Rene Descartes and Francis Bacon, nature is seen as completely separate from humanity and devoid of any value beyond the economic value of resources. Later philosophers such as Nietzsche lamented this shift, advocating for …

Cultural Collapse Of The Seleucid Empire, John Paul Mastandrea

Honors Bachelor of Arts

This paper seeks to explore the causes for the collapse of the Seleucid Empire following the death of Alexander the Great. The reasons for this collapse were numerous, but primarily focus on the administrative difficulties inherited from the Persian empire, the vast cultural differences within the empire, and the priorities of the Seleucid rulers. In order to show a counter point of a Greek state that succeeded in ruling a foreign people, the exploration of Ptolemaic Egypt is put alongside the Seleucids. The Egyptian Greeks succeeded in all of the ways that the Seleucids failed. By putting these two states …

The Name And Its Significance: An Examination Of Names In Aristotle’S And Plato’S Philosophy Of Language, Matthew Blain

Honors Bachelor of Arts

In the early 20th century, philosophy underwent a “linguistic turn,” in which philosophy, humanities, and even sciences made a redoubled focus on language itself. This turn was quite comprehensive, focusing on nearly every aspect of language such as meaning, reference, truth and falsity, logic, and the connection of language and reality. This renewed focus garnered a significant amount of attention and thought in the 20th century by some of its most prominent thinkers of both the analytic and even continental traditions. In the analytic tradition, Wittgenstein, in his Tractatus, saw language as the logical limit of our known world, out …

The Impact Of Women On The Life And Legacy Of Mark Antony, Lauren E. Yaple

Honors Theses

Throughout the life of Mark Antony, the women he became involved with had a large impact on his political career, life, and legacy. These women, such as Fulvia and Cleopatra, used Antony as a means to achieve their own political, economic, and personal goals and were able to gain power in a very anti-feminist society through their relationships with and manipulations of him, affecting the career of Antony in many ways including his politics and his actions as a military commander, as showcased by the examination of primary sources from the late Roman Republic and early Roman empire periods. This …

Contingent Catastrophe Or Agonistic Advantage: The Rhetoric Of Violence In Classical Athenian Curses, Radcliffe Edmonds Iii

Greek, Latin, and Classical Studies Faculty Research and Scholarship

The surprising absence of violent language from classical Athenian curses is best understood as a rhetorical strategy appropriate for getting the divine powers to enact the curser's desire to harm his or her enemies and to gain an advantage in the particular agonistic context. A contrast with the extravagantly violent language of other contemporary curses, which call for unmitigated catastrophe to befall their targets, shows that the fundamental difference between these curses is the audience that they primarily address, which shapes the nature of the request that is made in the imprecation. Whereas contingent curses primarily address the human community …

"All That Remains Of Husband", James L. Kleerup

Scripps Senior Theses

Within Book 4 of Virgil’s Aeneid, the question of marriage is repeatedly raised. Specifically, it is debated whether or not Dido and Aeneas are married. This question is hotly debated by both the characters and scholars, as the answer is not definitively given within the text. This paper seeks to provide an answer, as the contemporary Roman reader would likely have interpreted their relationship, and also address why Virgil remained purposefully vague. Within Book 4, three key scenes are examined: the discussion between Juno and Venus where Juno proposes the wedding, the cave scene, and Dido and Aeneas’ argument …

Signs In Sophocles: Modern Approaches To Ptsd In The Ajax, Charlotte Simon

Honors Theses

This project explores the relationship between ancient Greek tragedy and modern psychology, specifically focusing on instances of PTSD, both through the descriptions of symptoms and the cultural reaction to such trauma responses in both ancient and modern sources. The case study from ancient Greece is Sophocles’ play, Ajax, a dramatic depiction of a post-PTSD soldier who has a mental break and is faced with either living with what he has done or committing suicide. The primary objective of this project is to illustrate what modern psychological theory can reveal about the portrayal of PTSD in Greek tragedy and therefore also …

The Multifront Battle Waged Against Female Autonomy: A Comparative Study Of Ancient Medical And Literary Texts, Leah K. Montello

Honors Theses

Male authors have long waged a multifront campaign against female independence. In this thesis, I focus on two specific fronts: literary and medical texts of the Classical Greek period. This thesis intends to explore the varying strategies in a selection of works, employed to reinforce prescribed gender norms. I approach this with a feminist lens to critique attempts made by elite educated Greek men to define what a woman ought to be like. I do not, however, explore every single tactic a medical and literary writer has applied to uphold patriarchal norms. My two body chapters revolve respectively around two …