-
A Translation Note on Pseudo-Seneca, Her. O. 1907 Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-08-29 Eirene Evdokia Noussia
The passage from pseudo-Seneca, Hercules Oetaeus 1905-1908 describes how Hercules briefly replaced the Titan Atlas in his duties supporting the Sky. However, the poet refers to Olympus, characterizing it with an epithet that does not belong to a mountain but to the sky. In this way an equation is created between these two places, mountain and sky. What is noteworthy in the passage of pseudo-Seneca
-
Aristotle’s On the Good and the “Categorial Reduction Argument” Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-07-31 Roberto Granieri
Alexander of Aphrodisias reports a series of arguments from Aristotle’s Περὶ τἀγαθοῦ purportedly deployed by Plato to defend his doctrine of principles. One of these arguments, the so-called “categorial reduction argument”, underpins the postulation of the two first principles, the One and the Great and Small, through a bipartition of all beings into two categories, labeled ‘in themselves’ and ‘opposites’
-
Tanks for Nothing: an Explanation of Plautus Casina 121-125 Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-07-31 Peter Barrios-Lech
The author uses the literary and material record to explicate the manual labour described in Plautus, Casina 121-125. The original Greek (it is argued) featured a simpler task, evocative of the myth of the Danaids.
-
“Is the Embryo a Living Being?” (Aët. 5.15) Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-07-31 Claudia Zatta
Building on previous studies, this essay discusses the use of embryological images and analogies in Anaximander, Empedocles, Democritus, and Lucretius. It pursues their intertextual connections arguing that in ancient philosophy embryology was not only relevant for conceiving the early formation of the cosmos as has been claimed so far, but that it also shaped the conception of the primeval rise of
-
Make Art, Not War Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-07-31 Thomas Emmrich
This essay critically examines Peter Sloterdijk’s Zorn und Zeit. Politisch-psychologischer Versuch (Rage and Time. A Psychopolitical Investigation) and his attempt to rehabilitate a culture of thymos, i.e. a culture of self-confidence and self-assertion, whose emotional agent Sloterdijk sees in rage. As an alternative to Achilles’ rage in Homer’s Iliad, Sloterdijk’s ancient reference, I will propose
-
Pinpointing Linguistic Emphasis in Classical Greek Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-05-16 Alessandro Vatri
Emphasis is a ubiquitous notion in classical scholarship, but its vagueness has repeatedly been criticized (and its usefulness, consequently, questioned) by Greek linguists. This brief study seeks to identify (and secure) a place for this notion in the analytical toolbox for the description of Classical Greek by applying the strict but nuanced definition of emphasis in Functional Discourse Grammar
-
On the Text and Interpretation of Accius 306-307 Dangel Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-05-15 Basil L.P. Nelis
This article argues that the text of Accius 306-307 Dangel, as transmitted, cannot stand on grammatical grounds. It aims to clarify the use of the word cuiatis, propose an emendation of the text, and suggest a new explanation of the metre of the fragment.
-
The inscitia rei publicae ut alienae in the Preface to Tacitus’ Histories Revisited Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-05-14 Zhongxiao Wang
In this article, I aim to challenge previous interpretations of the phrase inscitia rei publicae ut alienae in Tacitus’ Histories 1.1.1, offering a new reading which has been overlooked in Tacitean scholarship. I argue that this phrase reflects Tacitus’ criticism of Augustan historians, who, in distancing themselves from the state, were no longer concerned with state affairs and abandoned historical
-
Turn the Mirror of Your Soul Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-05-10 Wiebke-Marie Stock
Plotinus treats memory not simply as a capacity of the soul, but as an essential part of the process of the soul’s ongoing self-formation. Plotinus argues that memory and forgetting affect the soul, now and in the future. Since memories define who one is and who one is going to be, the soul must learn how it can or should shape memories. I address the topic of memory-shaping in Plotinus not only as
-
Letters, Mirrors, and Fiction in Iamblichus’ Babyloniaka Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-05-10 Claire Rachel Jackson
This article explores the depiction of letters, epigraphs, and other texts in Iamblichus’ fragmentary Babyloniaka, primarily preserved by the ninth-century writer Photius in his Bibliotheca, and argues that they act as evidence for the novel’s own cultural and literary positioning. These texts, while superficially unconventional in their form and mode of transmission, in practice reiterate traditional
-
An Overlooked Quotation from Phaedrus’ Appendix Perottina Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-05-10 Giovanni Zago
This paper analyses an overlooked quotation from Phaedrus’ Appendix Perottina in a grammatical miscellany by Godescalc of Orbais and makes a contribution to the textual history of Phaedrus’ fables; it also demonstrates once and for all, through irrefutable evidence, that the Appendix Perottina cannot be a humanistic forgery.
-
An Acrostic in Quintus Serenus’ Liber medicinalis? Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-05-08 Gabriel A.F. Silva
The aim of this note is to highlight an acrostic regarding leprosy (lepra) in Quintus Serenus’ Liber medicinalis (vv. 48-52), arguing that it is no accident but intentional. To this end, I show its relevance in context and take as examples the structure and contents of the poem, namely its reference to the case of Sulla’s disease.
-
Seneca’s Thyestes: Ode 920-969 as an Amoibaion Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-04-04 Iwona Słomak
This article aims to revise the editorial and interpretive tradition that regards Thy. 920-969 as a monody. Based on a systematic analysis of attribution differences in three selected plays by Seneca and, comparatively, in several other problematic places, it confirms earlier general findings: the A-branch of the MS tradition shows traces of conscious interpolation, while the codex Etruscus (E-branch)
-
Catullus 32: Fututiones with Ipsitilla Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-04-04 Jennifer Ferriss-Hill
Catullus poem 32 has traditionally been read as describing an afternoon assignation with a prostitute. The reinterpretation offered here reads the poem not as a one-off piece about a figure mentioned nowhere else in Catullus, but rather as a poem that connects with those in the Lesbia-cycle as well as with Catullus’ metapoetic project more broadly. Ipsitilla, I argue, acts as a Muse-like figure analogous
-
The Logic of Imitations Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-03-29 Loren D. Marsh
The meaning of the term mimesis when applied to artistic works in Aristotle’s Poetics is thought to be extrapolated from its dictionary definition of ‘imitation’. I argue that a key word in the single passage directly linking mimesis to imitation has been consistently misunderstood. A correct reading could indicate mimesis has a different definition in this particular text only indirectly related to
-
The Art of Communicative Grammar Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-02-01 David Christenson
This review article of the Oxford Latin Syntax (Vols. I-II, 2015 and 2021) demonstrates how the communicative approach of Harm Pinkster’s monumental grammar complements recent revivals of oral, aural, and active Latin pedagogical methods. I conclude with examples of how Pinkster’s analysis of discourse may be applied to select passages (from Plautus’ Rudens, as a productive means of explicating dramaturgical
-
Provoking Politeness Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-24 Oscar Goldman
Dialogic interaction plays important generic, poetic, and structural roles within hexametric Latin satire. One aspect of this interaction which has received little prior exegesis is the presence, or lack, of politeness. By adapting and applying existing models which study this sociolinguistic phenomenon, we can perceive not only patterned use of politeness across the genre, but further intertextuality
-
Statues, Roads, and Money Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-24 Claire McGraw
The differences between the narratives about Augustus’ silver statues in Cassius Dio, Augustus himself, and Suetonius are better explained in the context of gift-debt and gift-exchange rather than focusing on cult alone. Whereas Suetonius and Augustus emphasize Augustus’ correction of the statues as a pious act and a statement on imperial honors, Dio overlooks honors and gods, instead revealing how
-
Anchoring Genealogy: Hecataeus of Miletus, Pherecydes of Athens, and Herodotus Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-23 Joseph Zehner
The writings of both Hecataeus and Pherecydes focus on genealogies, but scholars have characterized their styles differently: Hecataeus is anti-traditional and idiosyncratic, while Pherecydes is an impartial recorder of myths. This contribution argues for a neglected side of each author: Hecataeus follows Homeric genealogical traditions, while Pherecydes constructed novel genealogies of his own. Both
-
Lucretius’ Allegoresis and Invective: De rerum natura 2.598-660 Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-23 Mikolaj Domaradzki
The present paper suggests that Lucretius’ Magna Mater interpretation (2.598-660) can fruitfully be approached through the lens of invective oratory. While this difficult passage of De rerum natura has long puzzled scholars, this article argues that in his interpretation Lucretius masterfully transforms the encomiastic topos of allegoresis into a powerful means of blame: the poet allegorically interprets
-
Pistis and Apodeixis: On the Disputed Interpretation of Aristotle, Rhetoric 1.1, 1355a5-6 Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-23 Jamie Dow
‘We are convinced most of all whenever we take something to have been demonstrated’ (1355a5-6). The meaning and significance of this claim is a key point of dispute between those who take Aristotle’s project in the Rhetoric to be defending his distinctively argument-centred kind of rhetoric on the grounds that it is most persuasively effective, and those for whom he does so on the more normatively-charged
-
‘Solving’ the Paradox of the Odyssean Ethiopians’ Twin Dual Localization: The Narrative Significance of Literary Spatiality Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 Joel Gordon
This paper considers the narrative significance of localization in Homer’s Odyssey, in particular singular places that are associated with multiple spaces (identified here as dual localization). Our reading posits that spatial features hold narrative significance and, once uncovered, this resolves ‘problematic’ issues that may arise from spatial paradoxes. The chosen case study is the Odyssean land
-
On Prodicus and the Derveni Papyrus Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 John Henry
Another identification for the author of the Derveni papyrus has been suggested: the fifth-century BCE sophist Prodicus of Ceos. Producing over 18 testimonia, Lebedev argues that the Derveni papyrus and the thought of Prodicus agree on many points that have previously been disregarded, including their linguistic approach and cosmological doctrines. On the basis of this evidence, it is suggested that
-
Qui volunt eos cognoscere, Argonautas legant: An Ambiguous Reference in Dares Phrygius’ De excidio Troiae historia Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 Alexandra Madeła
The late antique De excidio Troiae historia, supposedly written by a soldier in the Trojan War, Dares the Phrygian, encourages the reader to consult a work called Argonautae. This article discusses three possibilities of how to understand this reference—it could either be a comment by the real author of this pseudonymous work, or the supposed translator Nepos, or the ostensible author Dares. It argues
-
The Final Chapter of Aristotle’s Poetics Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-22 Stavros Tsitsiridis
In the following close examination of chapter 26 of Aristotle’s Poetics it is argued (a) that unlike the main part of the treatise, tragedy and epic are no longer compared in the frame of ‘poetic art’, i.e. as literary genres, but rather as Gesamtkunstwerke judged by elitist criteria; (b) that the chapter adopts a logical method of argumentation founded on the dialectical method of the Topics; (c)
-
The Three Parts of Philosophy Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-24 Lorenzo Salerno
In Pl. 1.3, Apuleius provides an account of the genesis of the tripartition of philosophy, recalling its incorrect (but by then traditional) attribution to Plato. In doing so, Apuleius states that Plato showed that the three parts of philosophy do not fight each other, but on the contrary support each other with mutual aid. While the meaning of the passage is clear, the text has been long debated.
-
Exspatiantur: Warum scheitert der ovidische Phaethon am Sternbild des Skorpions? Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-22 Wolfgang Hübner
The ride of the Ovidian Phaethon hitherto has not been explained sufficiently, in particular by J. Loos in Mnemosyne 2008 and 2012. Instead for the different motion of the sun one has to regard the particularities and position of the zodiacal signs, especially that of the Scorpion.
-
Vividness and Spatial Scenes: Four Examples from Heraclitus’ Fragments Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-12-22 Kathrin Winter
Heraclitus’ fragments employ a powerful literary technique which is used to convey information without giving it directly: the texts appeal to sensation and bodily experience to evoke spatial scenes and so become intuitively comprehensible and display a surprisingly vivid quality. The means to bring this effect about can be analysed and explained with approaches from cognitive studies. This article
-
The Hymn to Delos and Callimachus’ Blame of Thebes Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-11-13 Leanna Boychenko
This article seeks to explain Callimachus’ blame of Thebes in the Hymn to Delos, arguing that Callimachus uses Apollo as a mouthpiece to voice the goals of his poetic project, signaling not only the influence of earlier Greek works—particularly Pindar’s Isthmian 1—but also his departure from these models. Moreover, Callimachus’ relationship with Pindar is more than simply literary, as shown through
-
Lucanian Pragmatism and the Manilian Cosmos: Celestial Aspect and Positioning in Lucan’s Invocation to Nero Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-11-13 Elaine C. Sanderson
Lucan’s invocation to Nero (1.33-66) is notorious for its seemingly contradictory praise and condemnation of the emperor. While analyses of this passage often turn to Virgil’s Georgics (1.24-28, 489-497, 500-515) to begin to explain this inherent paradox, Grimal (2010) has demonstrated the importance of Manilius’ Astronomica as a cosmological framework for these lines which invites a more positive
-
Did Fully Fledged humanitas Exist before the Ciceronian Age?: A Study on the Relation between humanus, its Comparative and Superlative, and the Noun humanitas Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-11-13 Simon Mollea
This article investigates the relationship between the noun humanitas and the adjective humanus. In particular, it argues that literary evidence suggests that the comparative and the superlative of humanus are far more suitable than its positive grade to render the Greek ideas of παιδεία and/or φιλανθρωπία which are usually subsumed in the word humanitas. One of the main consequences of this is therefore
-
Procopius of Caesarea, Peter the Patrician, and the Outbreak of the Gothic War Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-10-19 Dariusz Brodka✝
This article seeks to answer several questions about Procopius’ account of the causes for the Gothic war. The fundamental question is who was responsible for Amalasuintha’s death. Another issue under scrutiny relates to Procopius’ sources. The figure of Peter the Patrician sketched by Procopius is another point of interest. In the light of a comparative analysis of the sources, the accusation of Peter
-
Ismene, Interrupted: Conflict and Resolution through the Particle μέν in Sophocles’ Antigone Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-10-10 Erynn Kim
This article studies the usage of the particle μέν as a discourse marker in the speech of Antigone and of Ismene in Sophocles’ Antigone, focusing on the prologue and the final dialogue between the two sisters. By demonstrating how the discursive practices of the sisters reflect their respective styles of reasoning, particularly through their differing usages of the particle μέν, this article explores
-
For the Most Part Serious? The Comic Potential of Authorial Metalepsis from Aristophanes to Lucian Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-10-05 Thomas Kuhn-Treichel
Scholarship has drawn a contrast between modern uses of metalepsis (illogical transgressions of narrative levels), which are frequently assigned comic effects, and their ancient counterparts, which are deemed more serious. This article argues that in the case of authorial metalepsis, a way of expression presenting the narrator as bringing about the effects he describes, the comic potential was already
-
On the Imperfect ἐβίβασκεν (Homeric Hymn to Apollo 133) and the Causative Forms of the Paradigm of βαίνω Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-10-04 José Miguel Jiménez Delgado, Patricia García Zamora
The imperfect ἐβίβασκεν (h.Ap. 133) has generally been considered an Ionic imperfect of βίβημι / βιβάω. However, its morphosemantic characteristics instead suggest an imperfect of βιβάσκω, a derivative of the former with the suffix -σκω. This present is used in the classical period with a causative value, but in the archaic period was documented in an inchoative sense. This evolution forms part of
-
Group Minds in Ancient Narrative: Herodian’s History of the Roman Empire as a Case Study Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-10-04 Chrysanthos S. Chrysanthou
The present article adopts a cognitive approach to examine the representation of group minds in ancient narrative and show the specific purposes to which they are put. Herodian’s History of the Roman Empire, a work that illustrates the social and collective dimension of mental functioning, is chosen as a case study. After a brief exposition of the state of research on collective minds in narratology
-
The Names of Sidonius’ Addressees and the Manuscript Tradition of the Letters Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-29 Giulia Marolla
Sidonius is often the only source of information on his addressees. Following Dolveck’s stemma codicum of Sidonius’ Letters, the present contribution offers a timely reassessment of the manuscript tradition attesting the names of his addressees by using manuscript studies and onomastics as a tool for prosopography. The paper first examines the evolution of onomastics in the Late Antique West and Sidonius’
-
The Text of Aristotle’s Poetics and its Arabic Translation: Two Thorny Case Studies Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-28 José B. Torres Guerra
This contribution highlights the importance of the Arabic version of the Poetics in establishing the text of this work. This is a well-known fact, expressly considered in the most recent editio maior of the Poetics. Nonetheless, the latter edition does not discuss all the evidence relating to the Arabic translation. This article examines two much-discussed passages of the Poetics (1454b30-32, 1448a25-28)
-
Patterns of Religious Content and Narrative Arrangement in Arrian’s Anabasis of Alexander Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-27 Vasileios Liotsakis
This study examines three patterns of religious content in Arrian’s Anabasis of Alexander: (a) ritual reports, (b) religious material culture, and (c) omens. Although ritual reports and omens mainly mark turning points of the expedition and certain qualities of Alexander’s character, the passages pertaining to religious material culture also transfer our focal point of interest to the author’s religious
-
Leben im Verborgenen Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-26 Simon Varga
This article focusses on an examination of Epicurus’ understanding of self-sufficiency, which is only marginally addressed within research. But many traditions suggest paying more attention to the concept of self-sufficiency. The scarcity of available sources must be regarded as problematic; therefore here an attempt is made to reconstruct this concept. The thesis is that Epicurus discusses human striving
-
Reading Skillfully Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-26 Travis Mulroy
This paper examines Socrates’ problematic analogy of reading big and little letters in Book 2 of Plato’s Republic. The examination highlights a significant grammatical detail, which has been generally overlooked in contemporary Platonic scholarship: Socrates refers to the justice of the city as ‘doing one’s own thing’ (τὸ αὑτοῦ πράττων), in the singular, but the justice of the individual as ‘doing
-
Throwing Jason off the Scent Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-26 Alastair Daly
This article argues that Apollonius was aware of the foul smell of the Lemnian women and its mythological variants. While Apollonius does not mention the δυσοσμία, he builds a complex allusion to it and its omission around the rare verb ἀμαλδύνω. Its deployment to cap Hypsipyle’s speech to Jason (A.R. 1.834) draws a parallel between her erasure of the Lemnian crime and the obliteration of the Achaean
-
Valerius Maximus on Exceptional Honours—and the Augustan Principate (V. Max. 8.15) Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-26 Heiko Westphal
In chapter 8.15 of his Facta et dicta memorabilia, the Tiberian author Valerius Maximus offers his readers a series of historical exempla which depict the grant of extraordinary honours to deserving individuals. Surprisingly, however, Valerius explains that he has no intention of engaging with any of the honours granted to the imperial family. While, so far, Valerius’ claim has not been called into
-
Voces Furiarum Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-26 Joshua M. Paul
I argue that Priapus offers a bilingual gloss on the name ‘Tisiphone’ in Horace, Satires 1.8. I trace the folk etymology of the Fury’s name and identify various passages in which Latin authors emphasize a perceived connection between Tisiphone and φωνή, voice. I then demonstrate how this bilingual pun casts Priapus as a narrator capable of learned, Alexandrian wordplay.
-
Muses as ‘Fellow Citizens’? Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-23 Tomasz Mojsik
In line 1 of the so-called Seal (118 AB), Posidippus invokes Μοῦσαι πολιήτιδες (‘Muses fellow citizens’). This fact has puzzled scholars for years, as the Muses are nowhere else referred to as such. Referring to an epigram of Queen Eurydice, a dedication in honour of the Muses from the Pella area as well as evidence of cultural activity in the Macedonian capital, I demonstrate that the term πολιήτιδες
-
Noisy Omens and Enslaved Gods Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-19 Matthieu Réal
I offer a reconsideration of Zoilus’ treatise Against Homer’s Poetry. Two fragments of this work, F9a and F14 Fogagnolo, especially showcase Zoilus’ significance in the context of ancient literary criticism. F9a is usually considered a sarcastic comment on Homer’s lack of realism. I propose instead that it is a critique of the way the poet crafted the bird omen of Il. 10.174-177: Zoilus regarded the
-
Was Medusa a Priestess of Athena? Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-09-19 John Henry
In Book 4 of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, the famous backstory of the Gorgon Medusa is related by her slayer Perseus: Neptune raped her in the temple of Minerva, and the goddess turned her hair into snakes out of divine vengeance for the desecration of her sanctuary. With few exceptions, most Ovid scholars are hesitant to posit any explanation for Medusa’s appearance at the temple, which does not appear to
-
The Subdivision of Boys in the Leonidean Decree (IG V.1 19) Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-08-15 Shanshan Bai
This paper examines two problematic appellations of boy victors, παῖς καθαρός and παῖς κρίσεως τῆς Ἀγησιλάου, and the subdivision of boys in the Spartan festival Leonidea in inscription IG V.1 19. I propose several emendations to the edition of this inscription with the hope to correct a mistake and add two events into the athletic contest. I argue that age and birth were important criteria for the
-
Τὸ κενὸν τοῦ πολέμου (Th. 3.30.4) and Its Uses in Greek and Latin Texts Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-08-09 Antonis Tsakmakis
The analysis of Thucydides 3.30.4 (from the speech of Teutiaplos), which contains the obscure phrase τὸ κενὸν τοῦ πολέμου, as well as of all occurrences of the same phrase in Greek and Latin texts confirms the reading κενόν against the vv.ll. καινόν and κοινόν, and helps establishing the meaning of the proverbial expression πολλὰ (τὰ) κενὰ τοῦ πολέμου. It does not refer to a mental state (illusion
-
Le culte de la déesse dardanienne, dea Dard(…), au cœur de la diplomatie divine de l’armée romaine Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-07-27 Arben Hajdari, Christophe J. Goddard
Tributes to the enigmatic dea Dard(…) show a typically Roman political and religious intention to show respect for a local deity, within the framework of the control of isolated but strategic areas in the heart of the Illyrian region and the province of Moesia Superior. These acts of piety reflect the desire on the part of the Roman authorities to carry out diplomatic action with the local population
-
Olivier ou palmier ?: Iconographie et appropriation athénienne de la plante sacrée de l’accouchement de Léto Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-07-03 Ana Valtierra
The oldest Greek sources narrate how Leto at the time of childbirth held on to a palm tree on the island of Delos to help herself with the effort of contractions. Under this palm tree, the god Apollo was born, making it an element of sacred worship of which the ancients said that it never died. Despite the clarity of the sources in the plant identification from the 5th century BC onwards, we can observe
-
Pherecydes in Alexandria Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-06-06 Laura Marshall
Pherecydes of Syros’ work is difficult to understand because of its fragmentary nature. A previously unexplored perspective on his work is to analyze how it was understood and used in Ptolemaic Alexandria, particularly by Eratosthenes and Callimachus. Eratosthenes’ distinction between Pherecydes of Syros and Pherecydes of Athens (DL 1.119) has been used as a key piece of evidence that those two authors
-
Ἐπιλλίζω (Od. 18.11), from ἐπι(λ)λίγδην ‘Grazing’ (Il. 17.599) to ἰλλός ‘Squint-eyed’: History of a Misunderstanding Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-06-06 Claire Le Feuvre
The article argues that the Odyssean hapax ἐπιλλίζω (Od. 18.11) does not mean ‘to wink’, as traditionally assumed, but ‘to harass, to provoke’, and is the verbal base of the adverb ἐπι(λ)λίγδην ‘grazing’, said of a projectile. It belongs to the PIE root *sleig̑- ‘to rub’ (rather than ‘to slide’). The Odyssey only features the metaphoric use of the verb, but the proper meaning is preserved in Nicander’s
-
Porphyry’s Life of Pythagoras and Athanasius’ Life of Antony Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-06-02 Andrew Cain
A little over a century ago, it was discovered that Athanasius’ Life of Antony echoes Porphyry’s Life of Pythagoras in two different passages, and scholars have since debated the implications of this clear intertextual linkage. Building on these initial findings, the present article adduces a previously undiscovered third echo of the Porphyrian Life and argues that Athanasius deploys this intertext
-
Voices of the Dying Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-06-02 Janek Kucharski
This paper discusses the convention of off-stage cries deployed in Greek tragedy and satyr play chiefly to represent violent events. Unlike other studies dedicated to this topic, it is primarily focused on the cries themselves and to a lesser extent on their context, both dramatic and theatrical. Using the familiar distinction between word and action, it begins with a simple question: how exactly does
-
The Capture of the Capitoline in Roman Historical Thinking Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-06-01 Jaclyn Neel
This article argues that the stories of Tarpeia and of Manlius Capitolinus are variations on a single, historically attested concern about internal enemies on the Capitoline. Moreover, the unusual presentation of these stories in Ovid in particular can be explained by various chemical properties of the mint, most likely located near the temple of Juno Moneta. Concerns about the safety of the mint in
-
The Social Profile of Hippocrates’ Patients Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-05-27 W.V. Harris
The seven books of the Hippocratic Epidemics appear to make it possible to describe the social profile of the patients who frequented Greek doctors from the mid-fifth to the mid-fourth centuries, and in particular to decide whether doctors attended mainly to the well-to-do. Previous studies have concentrated on the epigraphical evidence for the high status of many of the Thasian patients who are named
-
Virgilian Criticism and the Intertextual Aeneid Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-05-25 Elena Giusti
This review article of Joseph Farrell’s 2021 monograph on Virgil’s Aeneid (Juno’s Aeneid: A Battle for Heroic Identity, Princeton and Oxford) takes the cue from Farrell’s analysis of Virgil’s intertextuality with the Homeric epics and provides a methodological re-assessment of intertextuality in Virgilian studies and Latin literature more broadly. It attempts to retrace the theoretical history and
-
An Aristotelian Account of Religious Music in Strabo, 10.3 Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-05-23 Mor Segev
Strabo, in 10.3.7-23, presents an account of the music performed in initiation rites, according to which such music is used, naturally, to facilitate knowledge of divinity. I argue that, despite appearances, religious music, for Strabo, does not fulfill that function by reflecting the harmonious constitution of the cosmos—a Pythagorean-Platonic (and later, Stoic) idea that Strabo mentions but ultimately
-
Diphilus’ Paralyomenos (P. Louvre 7733v, col. ii, 32-35): Reading the Evidence Mnemosyne (IF 0.4) Pub Date : 2023-05-23 Ioanna Karamanou
P. Louvre 7733v is the only source to attest a comedy by Diphilus entitled Paralyomenos and fr. 59 K.-A. from this play. This article ventures a cautious interrogation of the available—albeit limited and thus unexplored—evidence, with the purpose of extracting as much material as possible that could shed light on this play’s dramatic circumstances. It is argued that the present participle in the title