Showing papers in "Greek Roman and Byzantine Studies in 1996"

Roof Tiles and Urban Violence in the Ancient World

Abstract: T HE ROOF TILE, besides its conventional use for protection against the elements, frequently served as a projectile in urban violence. Thucydides (2.4) provides the first mention of this secondary function-the pelting of the Thebans who had invaded Plataea at the outbreak of the Peioponnesian War. Perhaps the most historically significant roof tile, hurled by an old woman at the king of Epirus, felled Pyrrhus during his assault on Argos in 272 B.C. (Plut. Pyrrh. 34.2). Plutarch claims that the tile knocked Pyrrhus unconscious just as he was attacking the old woman's son. The king was subsequently dragged off and beheaded. 1 Like the pitchfork or the shepherd's crook for the peasant, the roof tile was for the urban dweller an important weapon in an otherwise limited civilian arsenal. For the historian, the roof tile as a weapon offers a revealing perspective on the experience of urban violence in classical antiquity. Three questions will be addressed here: under what circumstances were tiles thrown? how effective were they as weapons? which urban inhabitants threw them? The evidence will be considered down to ca A.D. 500.

New Light on Demeter’s Mysteries: The Festival Proerosia

Abstract: D EMETER'S \"MYSTERIES: festivals conducted mainly by women and in sanctuaries that were suitably withdrawn, were almost universal in Greek cities, like the cereal agriculture they were intended to promote. They were integral to Greek society and are now widely and profitably studied as a social phenomenon. If the general custom is important, so are the many ritual actions that constitute a given festival, through which (according to one's point of view) the women either worship the goddess Demeter, or work directly on the earth, or affirm their sense of the fitness of things. Animal sacrifice plays a large part, as usual, the pig species being favored by Demeter, and there is a peculiar practice of throwing piglets into a pit, which is then closed. It is a disadvantage that reconstructions of ritual must be sought in older handbooks and special studies. The basic work on Greek festivals was done long ago, and new evidence, though not wholly neglected, has not led to any sustained effort of revision. The festival Proerosia, \"Before-ploughing (rites),\" is such a case. The Athenian, or Eleusinian, version of this festival once seemed to stand alone, as if it were something secondary and contrived, without much bearing on the larger pattern of Demeter's worship. We can now see that the Proerosia was widespread. It may have been as common as the greatest of Demeter's festivals, the Thesmophoria: it was a sequel to it, coming later in the autumn season. The ritual of the Thesmophoria, which also included throwing piglets into a pit, cannot be understood without reference to the sequel. It is worth assembling the evidence for the Proerosia in detail. Our reconstruction must proceed from the better known to the lesser. So the Eleusinian Proerosia come first (I-VIII infra). Much more can be usefully said about it than in the handbooks, mostly in the light of Athenian inscriptions, especially the \"sacred calendar\" of Eleusis. Then the instances in Attic demes

Platonic Interpretation in Aulus Gellius

Abstract: 1\ THOUGH IT IS UNDERSTANDABLE that historians of philosophy prefer to deal with material from the philosophers' own works, the works of informed amateurs can often say much about the intellectual world in which they lived, and may supplement comparatively meagre information from the pens of esteemed professionals. The Platonism of the second century is particularly prone to this problem, with a much fuller picture being built with the help of those whom we are inclined to think of only secondarily as philosophers. Plutarch can be fitted into this category in spite of his standing in philosophy. The figures of Theon of Smyrna, Apuleius, and Maximus of Tyre all contribute considerably to the picture of a vital new Platonism, which none of them has quite seemed to master. Many principal figures wi thin the philosophical schools, such as Taurus, Atticus, and Numenius, are by contrast known only from fragments, and these fragments frequently derive from non-philosophers. Much of what is known of Taurus comes from Aulus Gellius, himself no theorist.! His Noctes Atticae mark the reflections of a fairly conservative, practically minded Roman on his educational experiences in Greece. The issues about which he writes are sometimes interesting, sometimes less so, sometimes of farreaching importance, sometimes of curiosity-value only. All are treated quite briefly, from the simplest matters of etymology and pseudo-etymology to the treatment of the most farreaching ethical questions. Gellius, an interesting witness to the workings of the intellectual world of the second century, writes from a perspective essentially beyond it. He had found within it a great deal of useful advice and a great deal of unhelpful bickering; morally uplifting teachers, and others who had simply

The Three Movements of the Iliad

Abstract: T HE ILIAD FOR US is a text to be read; for its composer, his audiences, and several generations of audiences after them, it was a live vocal performance. Scholars of Greek epic and related genres have become increasingly sensitive to the losses in affect and significance that occur when such a performance survives only in the form of its 'libretto'.! But for students of Homer the desire to recapture the power of the performed Iliad confronts the silence of the historical record: the first traces of performances of Homer date from the mid-sixth century, perhaps more than a century after the epic's composition.2 Denys Page probably spoke for many in declining to speculate about how the questions concerning Homeric performance might be answered. 3 Others have been less cautious. The issue of the performance structure of the Iliad has proven an especially fertile ground of speculation, because the evident

Two Unpublished Psychophelitic Tales

Abstract: T HE THIRD EDITION of the Bollandists' repertoire of Greek hagiographyl contains some sections that do not strictly speaking list saints' lives. One of these (BHG3 III 175-82) Halkin named Narrationes animae utiles, accurately reflecting the terms in which many of its contents are described in the manuscripts that preserve them: iill1YllO'nc; '!'UXOlq>EA£lC;, "spiritually beneficial tales." There is another section that is like unto it (BHG3 III 191-214) but longer. Although it is entitled Patrum Vitae, Oa:tEpn:u, fEPOV'tU:u, its contents are very similar to those of the former section; so much so that, towards the end of his life, Pere Halkin was known to say that he regretted having made the distinction. In fact the only perceptible distinction seems to be that, by and large, the stories under Patrum Vitae tend to occur in recognized collections (Ila'tEpu(u, fEPOV'tlKU) rather than floating freely in the manuscripts, but there are exceptions in both sections. In fact the contents of both are almost identical. They almost all consist of a brief story-which mayor may not be about named persons-often in a monastic context and usually with a spiritual point to make. And although many of them do carry a heading that describes them as ~ioc;/vita, these are by no means saints' lives, but rather single scenes from the lives of persons, many of whom never acquired the epithet "saint" and some of whom did not even aspire to it. Many of the tales were eventually used as building

Vix aerarium sufficeret. Roman Finances and the Outbreak of the Second Macedonian War

Abstract: 1 Useful sU,rveys of earlier bibliography are included in discussions of the problem by E. WILL, Histoire politique du monde hellenistique IF (Nancy 1982: hereafter 'Will ' ) 131-49; L. Raditsa, -Bella Macedonica I. Bellum Philippicum,w ANRW I.1 (Berlin 1972) 564-76; J. BRISCOE. A Commentary on Livy, Books XXXIXXXIIJ2 (Oxford 1989: 'Briscoe') esp. 39-47; E. GRUEN, The Hellenistic World and the Coming of Rome (Berkeley 1984: 'Gruen') 382-98; N. G. L. Hammond and F. W. Walbank, A History of Macedonia III (Oxford 1988) esp. 419f; cf also esp. the views of W. V. HARRIS, War and Imperialism in Republican Rome, 327-70 B.C. (Oxford 1979: 'Harris') 212-18, and their criticism by A. N. Sherwin-White, \"Rome the Aggressor?W jRS 70 (1980) 180, as well as the concise presenations by M. Crawford, The Roman Republic (Glasgow 1978) 65ff (his views unchanged in the second edition, 1993), and R. M. ERRINGTO N, \"The East after the Peace of Phoenice,\" CAll VIIF (1989: 'Errington') esp. 254-61. See also the following notes and discussion. 2 B. L. Twyman, \"Philip V, Antiochus the Great, the Celts and Rome, W in Ancient Macedonia IV (Thessaloniki 1986) 667-72, who sees the Roman war in the East as resulting from a fear of collaboration between eastern powers and the Celts in the West; this view rests on some insecure temporal correlations and appears rather self-contradictory as regards his remarks on the strength of Roman manpower. C. D. HAMILTON, \"The Origins of the Second Macedonian War, w in Ancient Macedonia V.l (Thessaloniki 1993: hereafter 'Hamilton') 559-67, looks for internal Roman motives for the war in the fear of Scipio's senatorial opponents about the general's returning veterans and po-

The Saracen Defenders of Constantinople in 378

Abstract: Unde Constantinopolim, copiarum cumulis inhiantes amplissimis, formas quadratorum agmimum insidiarum metu servantes, ire ocius festinabant, multa in exitium urbis inclitae molituri. Quos inferentes sese immodice, obicesque portarum paene pulsantes, hoc casu caeleste reppulit numen. Saracenorum cuneus (super quorum origine moribusque diversis in locis rettulimus plura), ad furta magis expeditionalium rerum, quam ad concursatorias habilis pugnas, recens illuc accersitus, congressurus barbarorum globo repente conspecto, a civitate fidenter e rup it, diuque extento certamine pertinaci, aequis partes discessere momentis. Sed orientalis turma novo neque ante viso superavit eventu. Ex ea enim crinitus quidam, nudus omnia praeter pubem, subraucum et lugubre strepens, educto pugione, agmini se medio Gothorum inseruit, et interfecti hostis iugulo labra admovit, effusumque cruorem exsuxit. Quo monstroso miraculo barbari territi, postea non ferocientes ex more, cum agendum appeterent aliquid, sed ambiguis gressibus incedebant. 1

Some Passages in Polyaenus Stratagems concerning Alexander

Abstract: I N THIS ARTICLE I am concerned with the historical worth of some passages in Polyaenus concerning Alexander. and therefore with the sources from which these derive, whether directly or through an intermediary.l It should be noted that Alexander's stratagems were of greater importance to Polyacnus than any others, for thc emperors Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, to whom Polyaenus dedicated his work, were about to campaign against the Parthians in the very parts of Asia where Alexander and his Macedonians had defeated the Persians; and they would be able to learn from the prowess of Polyaenus' ancestors and from their ability to defeat

Close-Kin Marriage in Late Antiquity: The Evidence of Chrysostom

Abstract: BECAUSE marriage is one of the fundamental institutions of society, changes in marital practice often reflect larger societal changes. Roman marriage and family structure have inspired prolific scholarship in the last ten years: some recent work on marriage in Late Antiquity rightly argues (against traditional views) for a large degree of continuity between Classical and Late Antique marriage practice, and maintains that Constantinian legislation on marriage was not simply the product of Christian influence. 1 One area of concern to this legislation was the apparent practice of close-kin marriage. 2 Although fourth-century Imperial legislation prohibited closekin marriage, it is difficult on that evidence alone to determine how common the practice of close-kin marriage actually was.3 The pioneering work of Evelyn Patlagean, one of the first scholars to examine family structure in the Early Byzantine period, remains a point of departure for all later scholarship on