Showing papers in "Greek Roman and Byzantine Studies in 2000"

Simulacra Pugnae : The Literary and Historical Tradition of Mock Battles in the Roman and Early Byzantine Army

Abstract: The mock battles by which Heraclius trained the army before the Persian wars of the 620’s A.D., called an innovation by George of Pisidia, can be shown to have a long history of precedents both in practice and in military theory.

New Greek Curse Tablets (1985–2000)

Abstract: Defixiones published between the listing in 1985 ( GRBS 26) and 2000 are tabulated and described. [The on-line article is a corrected version of the printed text.]

A missing woman: the Hellenistic leases from Thespiae revisited

Abstract: In the leases, π ὰρ + name in the genitive indicates the original property owner, and in one text π ὰρ Μeνίας, rather than Παρμeνίας, adds to the number of rich women attested in Hellenistic Boeotia.

Boiotia, Athens, the Peisistratids, and the Odyssey's Catalogue of Heroines

Abstract: In Odysseus’ account of the Underworld told to the Phaeacians, his selection of heroines ( Od. 11.225-332) focuses on legends of Boeotia, southern Thessaly, and Athens; literary and archaeological evidence for connections between the Peisistratids, Boeotia, and Thessaly suggest a time and region for the incorporation of this catalogue of women in the poem.

From Byzantine to Persian Jerusalem: Jewish Perspectives and Jewish/Christian Polemics

Abstract: Several piyyutim, the Hebrew liturgical poems of late ancient date, make reference to the Persian and then Arab conquests of the Holy Land, and can shed light on Jewish responses to the Byzantine losses, losses which some Christian authors sought to blame on the Jews.

Abduction and Elopement in the Byzantine Novel

Abstract: Violent abduction of a woman against her will is treated with some sympathy in the twelfth-century novel, especially in Theodore Prodromos, in sharp contrast to the romanticism of the ancient novel; this departure is illuminated by the contemporary conflict between the harsh secular and the more indulgent canon law on abduction.

The Poet, the Bishop, and the Harlot

Abstract: Nonnus composed both the Dionysiaca and the Paraphrase of John, and in that order; he is distinct from Nonnus of Edessa and from the Nonnus who appears in the Life of Pelagia the Harlot.

The Ptolemaic View of the Universe

Abstract: Ptolemy, as part of his account of the universe, applied the established principles of astrology in arriving at a systematic characterization of the different regions and peoples of the earth.

The Homicide Courts and the Dikasteria : A Paradigm not Followed

Abstract: The Athenians praised the Areopagus and the other homicide courts as the city's finest tribunals, seeing in their unusual procedures, particularly the relevancy rule, a greater emphasis on legal argument and less vulnerability to influence by the emotional appeals or social standing of litigants. A distinctive conception of justice, and not only elite competition or social drama, was thus a part of Athenian judicial practice.

Gnomology and Criticism

Abstract: Of popular maxims in drama, Eur. Hipp. 695-701 is not sophistic thought but conventional morality, and reworkings of Phrynichus fr.9 show that this maxim has evolved in the telling.

Talthybius in Euripides’ Troades

Abstract: There is only one herald, Talthybius, throughout Troades , and he exhibits significant independence and humaneness when compared with the Greek commanders.

Observations on the Historical Geography of Roman Lycaonia

Abstract: Evidence for the changing Roman administrative divisions of Lycaonia and Isauria allows us to clarify the historical relationships of the “eleventh strategia,” the “tetrarchy of Lycaonia,” the strategia Antiochiana, and the Lycaonian koinon

Repetitions and their Removal by the Copyists of Greek Tragedy

Abstract: Assessment of a number of passages in tragic texts establishes that their scribes not only introduced repetitions but also sometimes removed them.