Subscribe to Blog via Email
December 2024 M T W T F S S 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
Category: Literature
Ooh! He Said ‘Fuck’! He must be a revolutionary!
I’ve been pondering taboos for quite a while now; you’ll see a recent rumination from me at Nice skewering of Humour as Virtue Signalling. In the West latterly, we exult in people breaking taboos, as if being a rebel and a taboo-breaker is its own reward. You know, Well, people tell me love is for […]
What are the most important new discoveries that have been made about the ancient world in the 21st Century?
In Greek philology, the biggest finds this century have been: The previously unreadable texts in the Archimedes Palimpsest, that have become readable through a synchrotron, including a couple of new texts by Archimedes, a new speech by Hyperides, and a new commentary on Aristotle by Alexander of Aphrodisias. Transcribed and released in 2008, though only […]
Which books on Greek and Roman mythology list the most number of mythological characters?
As I am nowadays saying openly, I worked at the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae for 17 years, 13 which I spent working on word recognition. As a result, I got to know pretty well where all the obscure names were in Greek literature. In the classical Canon, hands down, the Bibliotheca (Pseudo-Apollodorus). Among online resources, THEOI […]
What did Socrates mean when he said, “The unexamined life is not worth living”?
Not quite “not worth living”. The Greek is more absolute than that. I’ve been feeling guilty about Nick Nicholas’ answer to Since the active and middle voices of the 2nd aorist forms of “to stand” are intransitive (ἵστημι – ἔστην vs ἐστάμην), are these forms synonymous?, where I basically dismissed nuance in Ancient Greek as […]
Have the Eclogues and Florilegium of Stobaeus been translated into English?
To confirm what Alberto Yagos said: The best Princeton’s database of Byzantine translations has is Iamblichus’ Life of Pythagoras, or, Pythagoric life, which includes some sentences by Stobaeus. Here’s some bits translated online: The Gentle Exit ” Stobaeus Extracts Sentences and Precepts. By bits, I mean one paragraph. Here’s Roger Pearse, Patristic blogger, asking the […]
How did Plato address Socrates? Teacher? Master?
Originally Answered: How does Plato call Socrates? Of course, we don’t have transcripts by Plato of chats with Socrates, we have dialogues he made up. But Socrates is constantly addressed in Plato’s dialogues as “O Socrates” (ὦ Σώκρατες), with monotonous regularity—over 1200 times in the works of Plato. Socrates in turn addresses his trollees (er, […]
Why did the Byzantines call Western Europeans beef-eaters?
Because Byzantines did not eat beef as often as Western Europeans did. See Karen Carr’s answer to What was the basic diet like in the Byzantine era (circa 530) under Emperor Justinian and Empress Theoradora? They occasionally ate lamb and mutton, chicken, and pork; rarely beef. Or the Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, s.v. meat: The […]
What does Archaiomelesidonophrunicherata mean?
https://books.google.co.jp/books?id=SYkS-Vj-g3wC&pg=PA353&lpg=PA353&dq=Archaiomelesidonophrunicherata&source=bl&ots=3zo-hj2vo_&sig=97J1-BT8D-UNebTujARTq3xXhNU&hl=en&sa=X&ei=0A_5VLPQFoSf8QXG8IJI&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=Archaiomelesidonophrunicherata&f=false My thanks to Konstantinos Konstantinides for doing the back research. The word is real, and it’s not mangled much: it should be –melisi– It’s another coinage by Aristophanes, from Wasps 220: ἀρχαιομελισιδωνοφρυνιχήρατα. Aristophanes, Wasps, line 183 ὡς ἀπὸ μέσων νυκτῶν γε παρακαλοῦσ’ ἀεί,λύχνους ἔχοντες καὶ μινυρίζοντες μέληἀρχαιομελισιδωνοφρυνιχήρατα,οἷς ἐκκαλοῦνται τοῦτον. They arrive here, carrying lanterns […]
The Lay of Armoures
Song of Armouris – Wikipedia. A heroic Greek ballad, 200 verses, likely dating from the 11th century, though the manuscript is from the 15th. I got into an altercation in comments to Bruce Graham’s answer to What language was used to connect Europe and Byzantium?, an answer approving of the description of Byzantine vernacular Greek […]
Did Caesar say “I could kill you faster than I could threaten to kill you?”
At a first stab (so to speak): Plutarch • Life of Caesar After this speech to Metellus, Caesar walked towards the door of the treasury, and when the keys were not to be found, he sent for smiths and ordered them to break in the door. Metellus once more opposed him, and was commended by […]