Situated within the framework of Classical reception studies, this article examines examples of Etruscan motifs in late nineteenth-and early twentieth-century European academic paintings, challenging the conventional emphasis on Greco-Roman classicism in the history of art. The analysis of artworks by Kristian Zahrtmann, Aleksandr Svedomsky, Lawrence Alma-Tadema, John William Godward, and Edward John Poynter reveals a subtle yet significant incorporation of Etruscan imagery. This research examines how these artists engaged with Etruscan motifs, either intentionally or inadvertently, and challenges the historiographical bias that has marginalised Etruscan contributions in the study of Classical reception. It advocates for a more inclusive understanding of ancient cultural influences in nineteenth and twentieth-century art.
This article re-examines the figure of Trimalchio in Petronius' Cena Trimalchionis, arguing against the enduring tendency to dismiss him as a purely grotesque parody of the nouveau riche. Through close analysis of the banquet's spectacles, narrative instability, and Encolpius' unreliable focalisation, it is argued that Trimalchio's excesses function as performative self-fashioning rooted in freedman status anxiety, Roman social hierarchy, and social liminality. Rather than mere buffoonery, Trimalchio's world of illusion exposes the fragility of social hierarchies and implicates the reader in the text's unsettling play between ridicule, identification, and self-recognition.
This article examines the presence of Jewish elements in selected texts from the Greek Magical Papyri (PGM), including the Prayer of Jacob, Charm ofPibechis, Eighth book of Moses, andA love spell of attraction. Through textual and comparative analysis, it argues that Jewish divine names, biblical figures, and ritual registers operate not as markers of Jewish authorship or confessional identity, but as adaptable sources of ritual authority within a broader syncretic repertoire. Hebrew-associated names such as Ia & omacr;, Saba & omacr;th, and Ad & omacr;nai are shown to circulate alongside Egyptian, Greco-Roman, and early Christian elements in efficacy-driven ritual collections shaped by performance, technical competence, and persuasive power. By situating these texts against both Greco-Egyptian magical traditions and materially attested Jewish magical corpora, the study demonstrates that syncretism in the PGM reflects pragmatic strategies of ritual authentication rather than the fusion of coherent belief systems. The article, therefore, contributes to ongoing debates on syncretism, authority, and religious interaction in Late Antiquity by foregrounding practice, transmission, and ritual expertise over rigid notions of religious identity.
Epic: The Musical is a modern reimagining of Homer's Odyssey in which the character of Circe is reframed. In the Odyssey, Circe is depicted as a magically and sexually dangerous adversary of Odysseus. In the musical, Circe's narrative role is more complex, and her perspective is included to shed light on her actions. Further, while Circe and Odysseus have sexual intercourse in the Odyssey, they do not in the musical. The significance of these changes is investigated by analysing the cultural norms and social morality which underlie the respective portrayals of Circe in the Odyssey and in the musical.
This article examines how Greek and Roman military manuals codified deception and the concealment of information as a central element of warfare. Authors, including Xenophon, Aeneas Tacticus, Frontinus and Polyaenus, provide systematic instructions for hiding messages, exploiting perception, and securing communication. From steganography and signalling systems to inventive devices such as water clocks and astragali, these manuals show that concealment was not ad hoc but operationally essential. By focusing on prescriptive texts rather than narrative histories, the study highlights the practical sophistication of ancient military strategy and the enduring cross-cultural continuity of information as a decisive resource in warfare.
Thrasymachus' thesis that 'justice is the advantage of the stronger' has been interpreted in three main ways: (1) sociologically, (2) prescriptively, and (3) as a definition of justice. In three sections, this paper focuses on (1) to advance the thesis' sociological reach and applicability. But as claims that the thesis is incoherent threaten its explanatory and predictive power, Section One addresses that problem and shows that the thesis is neither elenctically nor definitionally incoherent. Section Two provides textual grounds for a sociological reading of the thesis, and Section Three indicates the thesis' sociological capacity to explain human relationships.
Hecate is a complex and enigmatic goddess in ancient Greek religion, associated with boundaries, transformation, and magic. Her depiction evolves from a cosmic power in Hesiod's Theogony to a chthonic, liminal figure in later texts such as the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, Apollonius of Rhodes' Argonautica, and Lycophron's Alexandra. She is linked to necromancy, nocturnal rituals, and the supernatural. Hecate is also invoked in curse tablets and Greek magical papyri. This article explores how a range of literary texts, supplemented by ritual and magical evidence where appropriate, establishes Hecate as a powerful mediator between realms, shaping ancient Greek understandings of transition, the divine, and magical practice. By tracing how boundary language (spatial, generational, nocturnal, and ritual) structures these texts, the article argues that Hecate's liminality is not a later accretion but a coherent literary logic visible across genres.
At first glance, Cephalus' role in the Republic is brief and superficial. In this very long dialogue, Cephalus features in only a few passages during which he initiates the Republic's famous discussion of justice but then departs as it begins. This unusual and seemingly unnecessary choice by Plato to remove Cephalus from the conversation is fascinating and begs for a deeper exploration of this character. This paper explores Cephalus' role in the Republic's discussion of justice and its concluding myth. The significance of Cephalus' departure and the narrative connections between Book 1 and Book 10 indicate that Plato had a greater role in mind for Cephalus than as a mere catalyst. Interpreting Cephalus' character in light of the myth of Er shows that he serves as a cautionary example of the fate awaiting those who practise justice without philosophy.
Ovid’s Metamorphoses expresses Apollo’s grief for Hyacinthus as understood by ancient Romans. A fanfiction work, The making of flowers, a tragedy by Kekune, reimagines this grief for a modern audience. This paper analyses how this is accomplished in the fanfiction. It examines the contrasting expressions of ancient and modern grief by analysing the use of Jenkins’ fanfiction writing strategies of recontextualisation, altering the timeline of the canon, and refocalisation. Examining such strategies illustrates how the fanfiction creates a better understanding of Apollo’s grief for modern readers, by providing reasons for the characters’ conduct, their psychological motivations, and the emotional context for their grief.
Ovid's Metamorphoses expresses Apollo's grief for Hyacinthus as understood by ancient Romans. A fanfiction work, The making of flowers, a tragedy by Kekune, reimagines this grief for a modern audience. This paper analyses how this is accomplished in the fanfiction. It examines the contrasting expressions of ancient and modern grief by analysing the use of Jenkins' fanfiction writing strategies of recontextualisation, altering the timeline of the canon, and refocalisation. Examining such strategies illustrates how the fanfiction creates a better understanding of Apollo's grief for modern readers, by providing reasons for the characters' conduct, their psychological motivations, and the emotional context for their grief.
As one of the first operas written on a Late Antique subject for a Venetian theatre, Matteo Noris’s Attila (1672) provides a unique case study on the dynamics of the reception of post-Classical history. In this paper, I examine what materials the librettist had access to, how particularly one work of Carlo Sigonio consequently shaped his understanding of Late Antiquity as a period, and thus how this and other primary sources influenced his treatment of the subject matter. I further examine how Noris accommodates traditionally Classical symbolism in his characterisation of Attila and how he freely alters the historical events in service of his specific audience and performance context. It is thus shown that the librettist presents a nuanced understanding of the period within the framework of traditional heroic operatic narrative, clearly delineating Late Antiquity as a separate conceptual category.
The present article aims to review the evidence for black or dark eyes in ancient poetry, track the development of this convention over time, and ascertain whether it is possible to identify changes in what black/dark eyes signify. The article will further explore whether the association of this convention in poetry is replicated in physiognomical texts, which constitute another genre of ancient discourse in which eyes, including their various hues, receive detailed attention.
This article examines Ovid’s depiction of the Arachne myth in the Metamorphoses (6:1–145). Within the context of Augustan Rome, it explores the intricate dynamics of power, artistic autonomy, and the interplay between divine intervention and human agency in relation to the Arachne narrative. Moreover, it positions the narrative against the backdrop of Ovid's own literary career and exile. Thus, through a close reading of the text and an analysis of intertextual references to Ovid's earlier works, it suggests that the Arachne narrative may have undergone revision sometime after Ovid’s relegation sentence was handed down and, as such, reflects his own encounters with imperial authority and censorship.
In the prose work, Taurine Provence (1932), and in his collection of poems, Mithraic emblems (1936), the South African poet Roy Campbell (1901–1957), heavily influenced by Franz Cumont’s interpretation of Mithraism and its perceived influence on Christian myth and ritual, by Montherlant’s novel Les bestiaires (1926), and by his experience of bullfighting in the south of France and in Spain, uses Greek and Roman mythology, together with Mithraic art and symbols, to explore emotional and spiritual crises in his personal life. In this article, I wish to offer an interpretation of the explicitly Mithraic poems in Mithraic emblems focusing on the nature of his Modernist engagement with the Classical tradition.
In recent decades, Classical Studies have seen a steady growth in women’s, gender, and feminist studies. Euripides’ Medea counts among plays on women which have attracted considerable attention. The Medea has an evergreen quality as it resonates with and provides insight into spousal experiences, touching on, amongst others, trust, fidelity, commitment, jealousy, divorce, loneliness, domestic violence, interests of children, and power play. This analysis of passages from the play builds upon psychological studies of Euripides’ characters that have been undertaken since the 1970s, while also drawing on more recent insights into the dynamics of intimate relationships from a social-psychological perspective.
This article discusses the content of the private letter POxy. 9.1220, which provides information about the behaviour of hippopotamuses in the Nile region. The existence of the wild mammal in Oxyrhynchus is probably related to Thoeris’ cult in that city, while its occurrence in the text relates to its habit of raiding farm crops. This interpretation is supported by literary sources, but also by the sense of the verb ἀφανίζω, used to describe the animal’s behaviour, in current lexica of ancient Greek. Additionally, an examination of textual variants of the fragment dealing with the hippopotamus’ behaviour supports this interpretation and provides insights into animal-human interrelationship in Roman Egypt.
The article analyses private Roman birthday parties as they are represented in Augustan poetry, to discuss to what extent literary texts from the Augustan period can be trusted as sources revealing historical Realien. It revisits some of our knowledge regarding these celebrations and is especially interested in those birthday rituals referenced in the poems and considered private birthdays. The article makes interpretative remarks on poems where this historical knowledge contributes to our understanding of the poems as literary artworks, but since a large number of poems are covered, no in-depth analysis is attempted.
Researchers routinely stress that, compared to the Julian-Claudian period, the Flavian period had no ‘great women’. But what do these researchers mean by ‘greatness’? This contribution examines processes of inclusion and exclusion of women in ancient, early modern and modern historical narratives about the Flavian period. Drawing on the conceptual frameworks advanced by Linda Nochlin and Michel-Rolph Trouillot, the article argues for more complex and more diverse grand narratives about Flavian women: instead of continuing the practice of making these women ‘invisible’, we would gain more by focusing on the subtleties of the act of silencing in both past and present.
In this paper, I consider two interpretations of Xenophanes’ epistemology – that he is an empiricist and that he is a global skeptic. I argue that two these interpretations are not mutually exclusive, and that Xenophanes should, in fact, be thought of as both an empiricist and a global skeptic.
In recent scholarship, characters in Attic tragedies are often described as victims. Modern audiences may be familiar with the word ‘victim’, but victimological studies have shown that the notion of victimhood, the recognition of a person as a victim, is culturally and historically contingent. As a step towards a cultural victimology of Attic tragedy, this article posits that epithets of misery are markers of the undeserved and unjust suffering which often serves as a foundation for the development of victimhood. In order to illustrate how an analysis of epithets of misery can contribute to a victimological reading of an ancient text, the article discusses the use of these epithets in Euripides’ Hecuba, the extant Attic tragedy with the highest number of occurrences of such epithets.
