The Cheatsheet Has Arrived

The long-awaited Campus Mawrtius Grad School Cheat Sheet has arrived.

It's still very much a work in progress and is primarily intended to help Bryn Mawr folk easily access online resources (hence the special links for off-campus access which require BMC IDs).

But maybe some of our extra-Mawrital associates will find it helpful or have suggestions.

I'll add a link to the sidebar too.

Check it out and let me know what you think.

Small News in Any World

Three items here (for those of you keeping score at home) in order of interest and excitement:

1) My thesis will now (probably) be on the ideology of myth in Greek city festivals.

2) I finally passed the Latin exam!

and most importantly ...

3) I conquered Jim the arm-wrestling champ at the bar on Friday night. The bartenders have never heard of such a feat, and I believe it is incumbent upon Eric to compose an epinician poem in my honor. For those of you who don't know Jim, here he is in his own words (viz. in direct speech):

I don't got hands ... I got PAWS!

Now picture a mean lookin' motha' wagging his tongue at you with arms like tree trunks ... with, um, paws on the ends of them. Or something.

And then there was Dennis ...

big news in the classics world

a group of scholars thinks that there may be another library yet to be discovered in the villa of the papyri at herculaneum. this is surely a tantalizing possibility (LvBW). here are a couple of excerpts:

All knowledge of the great house was lost until 1738, when workmen sinking a well shaft encountered a mosaic floor. It was too deep to excavate; instead, over the next 20 years under the supervision of Karl Weber, a Swiss military engineer, a network of tunnels was hewn through the debris clogging the great peristyle, the atrium and the Olympic-sized swimming pool. Cartloads of treasures were brought to the surface, destined for the art collection of the King of Naples.

Throughout this time, mingled with the sculptures and glassware, workmen retrieved what looked like lumps of coal which they unthinkingly dumped in the sea. It was not until 1752 and the discovery of an intact library lined with 1,800 rolls of papyrus, that the excavators realised that what they had been throwing away were carbonised books. The site has since been known as the Villa of the Papyri.

from the 1800 rolls discovered previously, some interesting things have been found:

The author chiefly represented in the collection is Philodemus, an Epicurean philosopher of the 1st century BC who taught Virgil, the greatest Latin poet, and probably also Horace. He may indeed have given lessons to both beneath the porticoes of the Villa of the Papyri, for it is known that Philodemus was employed in the household of a powerful Roman senator, Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus, father-in-law of the dictator Julius Caesar. And it is now regarded as almost certain that Piso — who died more than a century before the eruption of Vesuvius — was the original owner of the Villa of the Papyri.

Apart from the texts of Philodemus, hundreds of other lost works of Greek philosophy — including half of Epicurus’s entire opus, missing for 2,300 years — have been rediscovered. Among them is a treatise by Zeno of Sidon, who Cicero saw lecture in Athens in 79BC. According to Richard Janko, professor of classics at Michigan University [sic]: “This is the first copy of Zeno’s writings to come to light; they had all been lost in later antiquity.”

the late professor marcello gigante thinks that the extant collection represents perhaps only half of the villa's collection.

read all about it here.

Classics watch

I spotted this in the latest Teen Girl Squad over at homestarrunner.com, and had to post a screen capture:

So and So is hooked on classics!

Ausonius Revisited

i was looking through michael von albrecht's survey of the history of roman literature this evening and found some very unflattering things he had to say about our grammarian friend ausonius, such as:

'Book 16' is the Griphus ternarii numeri, and 'book 17' the Cento nuptialis, an unholy montage out of shredded sentences of the chaste Virgil...(vol.2, 1322).

and:

Just as Lucilius had once done, Ausonius mixed Latin and Greek elements to produce a hybrid poetry. This practice, an affront to both languages, seems to be typical of semiliterate epochs. Particularly striking is the slipshod prosody in many Greek words; he is not especially competent in this language. Even in Latin he shortens the a in contra (vol.2, 1324).

on the other hand, von albrecht also points out that his epigrams 'do betray considerable linguistic awareness' (1324).
finally, the following passage on ausonius' outlook perhaps causes one to think of pliny the younger:

The most important witness to Ausonius' view of his task as an author is the all-embracing character of his collection of poems. To this poet everything seems worth immortalizing: his family, the professors at Bordeaux, and much more. As in the case of Luciliusone is tempted to say that the old gentleman's life lies before us as on a votive tablet. Like some early Latin authors do, Ausonius leaves us with the impression that the personality of the author is more significant than his modest and often incidental verse....In the jumble of seemingly unimportant matters, the reader is conscious of an individual attempting to become a mirror of the world (1325-26).

More on the APA

I listened to the first selections of section 35: Memory and Destruction, presided by Harriet Flower who has done some important work recently on damnatio memoriae.

The second paper, 'City-Destruction in Athenian and Theban Social Memory,' was delivered by Bernd Steinbock of Michigan and incorporated modern psychology in a way I'm not used to (i.e. in a good way) and powerfully used the Morgenthau plan, fueled by Nazi propaganda and spread by word of mouth, as a parallel to the way social memory is formed in wartime. I was especially interested in Steinbock's mention of the First Sacred War though I expected him to emphasize its role in influencing social memory. All in all a refreshingly good paper.

The first however, Julia Shear's talk on 'Stasis, Good Victory, and the Athenian Demos,' plodded along to a predictable end (the Athenians de-emphasized stasis in accord with decree of Demophantos -- *yawn*), so it was especially annoying when she showed up during section 44: Athenian Culture and History only to unduly attack a presenter who'd received a bachelor's degree just a year ago. Sarah Murray's 'Man Overboard: A Re-evaluation of the Underrepresentation of the Navy in Classical Athenian Art' might have benefited from some polish, but that's hardly a thing to hold against a young scholar.

Murray argued succesfully that the navy itself had never been depicted on Athenian vases, countering a common view that there was a decline in their representation during a certain period due to fear and disdain on the part of the citizenry. In the second half of her paper, Murray showed that pride in naval victory was depicted through mythological symbolism. One vase employing a divine scene showed two individual sailors on the opposite side exercising.

This vase alone damaged Shear's criticism, which was essentially that the Athenians may have taken pride in naval victories while hating the sailors. But I suppose anything is possible.

What was really objectionable was that Shear, while pretending to question Murray, began lecturing all in attendance, turning several times to address the room as though we were her students, virtually pleading with us to see through Murray's holes. Then she would turn back to Murray and tell her sternly that her work was essentially evasive and incomplete.

To her credit Murray handled herself well and countered Shear successfully.

I'm afraid I may end up focusing on negatives, but I will eventually get to Robert Tordoff, who delivered one of the most satisfying papers of the convention.

one more APA report

i also caught part of the 'lucretius, vergil, and ovid' session and heard two papers on vergil. the second was called 'the aristeia and the poetics of failure in book nine of vergil's aeneid', given by mark a. thorne of the university of iowa. he cites three times in book 9 in which an aristeia seems to be on the horizon and in which it ultimately fails: turnus' attack on the fleet (9.69ff.), compared to hector's attack in iliad 12; nisus' failed aristeia in 9.339ff., compared to the doloneia in iliad 10; finally, turnus almost gets his aristeia at 9.573-76. this is interesting, because turnus slays 7 opponents within three lines (citations taken from handout):

Ortygium Caeneus, victorem Caenea Turnus,
Turnus Ityn Cloniumque, Dioxippum Promolumque
et Sagarim et summis stantem pro turribus Idan... .

but then, right at the moment when the action seems to be taking off, vergil gives us this:

Privernum Capys.

he changes the subject and diverts attention away from turnus. when turnus finally does get his aristeia, thorne argues that it ends in strategic failure (9.759ff.). if he had let his fellow soldiers in at the gates, vergil states that that would have been the last day of the war (759-61):

ultimus ille dies bello gentique fuisset.
sed furor ardentem caedisque insana cupido
egit in aduersos...

finally, he pointed out the importance of the final victim of turnus' aristeia, the poet cretheus, who is intended to remind us of the singer of the aeneid himself (semper equos atque arma virum pugnasque canebat, 9.777). if i remember correctly, thorne argued that, because the poet sang of arms, a man, and battles, he is the one person who should have been able to control the aristeia, but he is unable to--hence, epic failure and the need for a new form of combat (see summary below). in the death of cretheus, it seems to me, vergil also may be saying that poetry/art is ruined by war, or that it is powerless in the face of war.

here is thorne's summary of his argument (taken from handout):

In Book 9, Vergil sets up an aristeia three times only to abort each one as a poetic tactic to delay the start of the fighting. These are linked with the images of tragic death and mourning that lie at the center of the book. When Turnus finally is granted his full aristeia, it accomplishes nothing. I argue that Vergil has transformed the Homeric aristeia to show how glory through combat in the traditional "epic" sense must not be sought by Rome as its own end, for to do so will only result in further loss and defeat.

That was a pretty boss town

And at long last my first APA report. I hope there really wasn't much anticipation.

We picked Mo up at Philadelphia International at 9:30 Friday night, and made it to Boston by 4am. We slept two to three hours then had to face the regrettable consequences of requesting a wake-up call.

After getting lost in the maze of the hotel/convention center, I ran into Professor Kitchell, who is as funny and charming as ever. He proceeded to tell someone who seemed important to watch out for me because I'm a thief and a liar, and the stories about the goat are all true.

From there I snuck into section 31: Using Linguistic Evidence to Enrich the Teaching of Classical Languages and Cultures. I caught the second half of Mary Bacharova's talk, yeah? But I didn't really see the usefulness of the approach and felt that her extensive treatment of the so-called English 'get passive' was tedious and often incorrect. Mastering the verb is the key to reading Greek, and the teaching of individual verb forms based on relative frequency can at best give a temporary satisfaction to the textbook learner. What happens when the most common forms are not encountered, and your students have no idea how to determine what it is they're looking at?

Rex Wallace in turn offered his own approach, namely teaching Greek pronunciation from an articulatory perspective from day one, and empowering students throughout the first year of Greek to determine forms which most people would consider irregular but which are in fact perfectly consonant with native phonetic rules. This answered part of Bacharova's paper in which she noted that her students often can't find words in the dictionary.

Andrew and I were taking a coffee break today and for some reason I asked him what the aorist of βλώσκω is. It took a minute to remember ἔμολον and it occurred to me that it's probably not irregular. I reckoned that the root might well be *mol(o)-. The present would then be zero grade, *ml(o)-, with the bi-labial nasal affected by native phonological rules to produce the stem *blo-. Understanding phonology early can eliminate a lot of the confusion.

Professor Wallace's examples included Grassmann's law and loss of voice before -s, among others.

To be continued ...

Calvinists and Epicureans

and now for the next installment of the piecemeal report on the APA.

i attended part of a panel called 'epicureanism in the renaissance' and heard a paper by kirk summers entitled 'the calvinists against the epicureans: whom are they attacking?' the epicureans are frequently mentioned in reformation texts as a currently existing group with whom Christians must contend, and are rebuked with force. prof. summers, if i am remembering correctly, suspected, before he began his investigation, that the calvinist disagreement with the epicureans would be on ethical grounds; as it turned out, however, ethics were a basis on which Catholics disagreed with epicureans. calvinists, on the other hand, found fault with them because they viewed God as uninvolved in His universe--a view which flew in the face of calvinist ideas and doctrine about Divine Providence. these epicureans were viewed as such important opposition that they received mention in both the belgic confession and the second helvetic confession. from the belgic confession (as quoted in the handout):

On Providence
"For that reason we reject the damnable error of the Epicureans, who say that God involves himself in nothing and leaves everything to chance."

and from the second helvetic confession:

The Epicureans. We therefore condemn the Epicureans who deny the providence of God, and all those who blasphemously say that God is busy with the heavens and neither sees nor cares about us and our affairs.

Ausonius and Catullus

of the panels of which i attended at least a part, the one on late antiquity was the most interesting to me. the papers read included bret mulligan's aforementioned 'epistolarity in claudian's carmina minora'; 'constantius II and eusebius' constantine', given by david potter; 'eusebius' chronological tables and the invention of Christian history in late antiquity'; scott mcgill's 'ausonius and recitation'; and joseph pucci's 'catullan extremism in fortunatus' poem to agnes'.

but there's something that's been bothering me since then that i am glad to be able to report on. after joseph pucci's talk, there was some dispute over, if i understood correctly, the availability of catullus to late antique authors. i was almost certain that i had seen direct reference to catullus in ausonius, and, now back at home, i submit that there are at least two quotations in ausonius of catullus 1. the first is in Praefationes Variae 4 Green ('G' hereafter) (one of only two surviving ausonius passages in hendecasyllables; the other is Ep.13G.82-104). here are ll.1-9, which, in addition to the direct quotation, contain a number of other allusions to catullus 1 and to catullus himself (italicized, and cf. the use of ineptiae elsewhere in catullus):

'Cui dono lepidum novum libellum?'Veronensis ait poeta quondam
inventoque dedit statim Nepoti.
at nos illepidum rudem libellum,
burras quisquilias ineptiasque,
credimus gremio cui fovendum?
inveni--trepidae silete nugae--
nec doctum minus et magnis benignum
quam quem Gallia praebuit Catullo.

the other quotation of catullus 1 is found in the preface of the Griphus Ternarii Numeri, addressed to Symmachus:

dein cogitans mecum, non illud Catullianum 'cui dono lepidum novum libellum', sed amousoteron [sorry, no greek] et verius 'cui dono illepidum, rudem libellum', non diu quaesivi... .

au bon pain

alright, just got back from the APA. just a quick note for the moment after the whirlwind trip up and back. i heard a number of interesting and stimulating papers, including one by a reader of the campus on claudius claudianus and epistolarity in the carmina minora. i tried to ask a question, but my hand-raise must have been too low and too late. alas!

also, welcome to coke! it's about time he posted on here! be sure to check out his hexameter in the comments section a couple of posts below--a line which deserves a post of its own (hint, hint). anyway, more soon, i hope.

love,
your friendly misanthropologist

I found my password

Having found my password and having found little else to do with a dull Saturday (other than grade papers which I REFUSE to do right now) I have decided to make my first (?) posting on this lovely website.

After teaching Latin to a century of highschoolers for half a year, I have very little to show for my development as a classicist. But if you read my little comment on the last posting, you'll see that I have not been entirely idle.

Not long now ...

Andrew and I will be picking up Eric soon, then we're off to Philadelphia International to grab Mo. From there it's a late night drive to Boston and the final two days of the APA where we'll meet up with Diane and Jessica.

Better late than never, right?

HOT TIPS

yes, be sure to look for us at the APA/AIA. we will be the ones who are togate, and dennis will be sporting the laurel.

A new look for the new year!

Happy new year to all our faithful readers who doubtless have stayed tuned for nearly a month of inactivity!

You are rewarded with a fresh new look, and coming soon (thanks to occasional nudging by the Hawk) will be "the Campus Mawrtius Grad School Cheat Sheet," a handy collection of research tools available on the internet — just some of the tricks of this tricky trade.

A number of these resources require institutional subscription, which is identified by the IP address of the computer you use to log on. Ever the keen-minded helper, I've included special links for my BMC-ers for off-campus access.

That's just one of the things to look forward to in the new year.

I don't know what else there is, but we'll think of something.

And I'm sure Eric and I will have plenty to say about the APA convention (to which we'll be driving in the middle of the night Friday — in time to catch the final two days of papers and see Nick deliver an abbreviated version of his archaeology MA at the AIA).

Excelsior!

A Lost Epigram

ἡμεῖς γ’ ἀρχαῖον κεραμόν τε λογόν τε φιλοῦμεν
συγκρίνειν φρονιμῶς λείψαν’ ὀρυσσόμενα

- Philologus Philadelphus

are we there yet?

no.

anyway, sorry for the dearth of posts the last couple of days. maybe something sometime soon. as journey says, don't stop believing.

Vergiliana

a few questions for pondering on the eclogues resulting from class today.

Eclogue 7: why is daphnis under the holm-oak? how did he get there? where did he come from? (see especially the first word of the poem, forte--'by chance'.) what sort of creature, exactly, is he?

i find vergil a very cinematic (if you'll forgive the anachronism) writer. In ecl.7, you can almost see the screen go fuzzy flashback-style as we move from line 20 and then clarifying in re at some unspecified point in the past as the contest gets underway.

by the way, if you've ever wondered where we get our term 'sardonic smile', see ll.41-44:

Immo ego Sardoniis videar tibi amarior herbis,
horridior rusco, proiecta vilior alga,
si mihi non haec lux toto iam longior anno est.
Ite domum pasti, si quis pudor, ite, iuvenci.

coleman points out ad loc. that 'the celery-leaved crowfoot, Ranunculus Sceleratus, though not peculiar to Sardinia, was thought to be responsible both fo the proverbial 'Sardonic smile' of those who ate it...and for the acrid flavour of Sardum mel (Hor. A.P.375)'. in other words, it's bitter.

Eclogue 8: why do we have daphnis again, when this part of the poem is modeled on Th.Id.2, where we find 'delphis' instead? does daphnis actually return at the end of the poem? or, to put in in amaryllis' words (who i take to be the 'I' of the second song), Credimus? to be sure, the dog is barking about something. but her final question leaves room for doubt--an qui amant ipsi sibi somnia fingunt? ('or do those who love construct dreams for themselves of their own accord?').

Ll.36-41 are indeed exquisitely beautiful:

Saepibus in nostris paruam te roscida mala
(dux ego uester eram) uidi cum matre legentem;
alter ab undecimo tum me iam acceperat annus;
iam fragilis poteram a terra contingere ramos: 40
ut uidi, ut perii, ut me malus abstulit error!

page (ad loc.) quotes macaulay as saying the following about them: 'I think that the finest lines in the Latin language are those five which begin--saepibus in nostris parvam te roscida mala. I cannot tell you how they struck me. I was amused to find that Voltaire pronounces that passage to be the finest in Virgil' (Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay, 1.371).

Eclogue 10: why does gallus appear in 6 and 10, the beginning and end of the second half of the book? what is the significance of his playing hesiod in 6 and daphnis in 10?

on the whole, i do not understand the eclogues. either their depth or my denseness (or 'denstrosity'?)--or, more likely, a combination of the two--baffles me. what is the significance of the recurring characters? are they always the same people? is it possible to construct a narrative all ten poems as a whole? what is arcadia? when does it signify something more than a region in greece, and how do we know? and if it is a 'spiritual landscape' (cf. Snell), at what point in the book does it become such a thing? finally, why does the contemporary world continually break into vergil's idyllic domains?

Alexander, the Multiculturalist Freedom-spreading Visionary?

and speaking of bruce thornton, he's got a rather pointed review of alexander here. with the exception of a few scenes, i thought the movie was a stunning disaster. (Lvrogueclassicism.)

matters calendrical

december 7 is an important date in history for at least two reasons. first of all, japan attacke pearl harbor on december 7, 1941.

second, it is the date on which, in 43 BC, cicero was executed:

On this day in 43 BCE, the greatest Roman orator, Cicero, was executed at Formiae by order of Mark Antony. Cicero had angered Antony by his famous speeches, the Phillipics, that called for a restoration of the Republic. Mark Antony ordered his hands cut off after his death -- the hands that had written the speeches.

feel free to post any thoughts about cicero here today, be they historical, philosophical, philological, or anything else.