Seneca's Apocolocyntosis is a sat.ire on the deceased emperor Claudius. probably written in the early months after his death in AD54. Although the authorship and title of the work have been called into question. scholars have now reached a consensus that the sat.ire was written by Seneca and is titled "Apocolocyntosis." Its purpose, characteristic of the Menippean genre, was didactic.

<p>This thesis examines the Christian context of the former pagan sanctuary of Zeus Labrandeusin Caria during the Early Byzantine period, ca. 325-730 A.D. The focus is on the church, positioned outside the pagan sanctuary’s temenos area. The architecture of the church has been empirically analysed. It is argued that the church shows strong Syrian influences. The Syrian features are a tripartite sanctuary enclosed by a straight back wall, an interior supported by pilasters and a west part with two towers. The study of the architecture has also been used in an attempt to discuss the liturgy at Labraunda.The finds from the excavations of 1951-2005 have been categorized and examined in order to establish a <em>terminus post quem</em> for the Christian presence at the site of the church. This has been crucial for the dating of the church. Furthermore, the finds illustrate the social and economic conditions that prevailed at Labraunda during the Early Byzantine period. Finally, this study tries to enlighten the process of transition from a pagan sanctuary into a Christian place of worship.</p>

<p>This is a study about life and death in prehistory, based on the material remains from the Early Bronze Age on the Greek mainland (<i>c.</i> 3100-2000 BC). It deals with the settings of daily life in the Early Helladic period, and the lives and experiences of people within it.</p><p>The analyses are based on practices of Early Helladic individuals or groups of people and are context specific, focussing on the interaction between people and their surroundings. I present a picture of the Early Helladic people living their lives, moving through and experiencing their settlements and their surroundings, actively engaged in the appearance and workings of these surroundings. Thus, this is also a book about relationships: how the Early Helladic people related to their surroundings, how results of human activity were related to the natural topography, how parts of settlements and spheres of life were related to each other, how material culture was related to its users, to certain activities and events, and how everything is related to the archaeological remains on which we base our interpretations.</p><p><i>Life and death in Early Helladic</i> <i>Greece</i> is the overall subject, and this double focus is manifested in a loose division of the book into two halves. The first deals primarily with settlement contexts, while the second is devoted to mortuary contexts. After an introduction, the study is divided into three parts, dealing with the house, the past in the past and the mortuary sphere, comprising three stops along the continuum of life and death within Early Helladic communities. Subsequently, mortuary practices provide the basis for a concluding part of the book, in which the analysis is taken further to illustrate the interconnectedness of different parts of Early Helladic life (and death).</p>

This is a study about life and death in prehistory, based on the material remains from the Early Bronze Age on the Greek mainland (c. 3100-2000 BC). It deals with the settings of daily life in the Early Helladic period, and the lives and experiences of people within it. The analyses are based on practices of Early Helladic individuals or groups of people and are context specific, focussing on the interaction between people and their surroundings. I present a picture of the Early Helladic people living their lives, moving through and experiencing their settlements and their surroundings, actively engaged in the appearance and workings of these surroundings. Thus, this is also a book about relationships: how the Early Helladic people related to their surroundings, how results of human activity were related to the natural topography, how parts of settlements and spheres of life were related to each other, how material culture was related to its users, to certain activities and events, and how everything is related to the archaeological remains on which we base our interpretations. Life and death in Early Helladic Greece is the overall subject, and this double focus is manifested in a loose division of the book into two halves. The first deals primarily with settlement contexts, while the second is devoted to mortuary contexts. After an introduction, the study is divided into three parts, dealing with the house, the past in the past and the mortuary sphere, comprising three stops along the continuum of life and death within Early Helladic communities. Subsequently, mortuary practices provide the basis for a concluding part of the book, in which the analysis is taken further to illustrate the interconnectedness of different parts of Early Helladic life (and death).

Im September 2008 fand der 4. Potsdamer Lateintag statt. Er war Bestandteil des auf drei Jahre angelegten Brandenburger Antike-Denkwerks (BrAnD), das von der Robert Bosch Stiftung gefördert wurde. Der Band versammelt die Vorträge des Lateintags von Frau Prof. Dr. Chr. Kunst und Herrn Prof. Dr. M. Janka sowie eine Auswahl der Berichte zu den Schulprojekten. / In September 2008 the ‚Potsdamer Lateintag‘ took place for the fourth time. At the same time the second topic of the ‚Brandenburger Antike-Denkwerk‘, a project funded by the Robert Bosch Foundation, was presented: “o tempora. o mores. Relevance and relativity of values”. Nowadays, when the discussion ofmoral values has become relevant again, one is often looking at values of the ancient world but without thorough examination. In an attempt to differentiate themselves from other cultures or political/social systems politicians and social scientists go back to the common intellectual and cultural history of Europe. In this project the distinctivenessof the Roman values was to be examined: What was the meaning of the so called mos maiorum? How could these values be passed on over such a long time? How did they ‚work‘? What was the reason for the much lamented decline of the values in the late republic? Can we even compare these values with ours? In this volume you can find the lectures from the Lateintag given by Prof. Dr. Chr. Kunst and Prof. Dr. M. Janka as well as reports on the whole project and on some of the schoolprojects.

This thesis examines the Christian context of the former pagan sanctuary of Zeus Labrandeusin Caria during the Early Byzantine period, ca. 325-730 A.D. The focus is on the church, positioned outside the pagan sanctuary’s temenos area. The architecture of the church has been empirically analysed. It is argued that the church shows strong Syrian influences. The Syrian features are a tripartite sanctuary enclosed by a straight back wall, an interior supported by pilasters and a west part with two towers. The study of the architecture has also been used in an attempt to discuss the liturgy at Labraunda.The finds from the excavations of 1951-2005 have been categorized and examined in order to establish a terminus post quem for the Christian presence at the site of the church. This has been crucial for the dating of the church. Furthermore, the finds illustrate the social and economic conditions that prevailed at Labraunda during the Early Byzantine period. Finally, this study tries to enlighten the process of transition from a pagan sanctuary into a Christian place of worship.

Amber has been a recurring luxury around the Mediterranean Sea for thousands of years in various cultures. This study treats the first two centuries AD in the Roman Empire. The early centuries of the Empire saw a brief period of relative calm in which Baltic amber became a fashion in Rome. The purpose of this investigation is to explain how and why amber journeyed from the northern oceans of Germania into Rome, and how it expressed itself in the Empire. The Amber Road between the Baltic Sea and Rome is well trodden by modern researchers, but very little has been written about why amber arrived in various contexts. The questions are on the topics of the amber’s origin, how it was consumed and by whom. Throughout the study, the agency of amber is considered in order to approach the source material from a new angle. The first chapter investigates what effect the geographical origin and trade had on the agency of amber. The first part of the second chapter discusses amber in material culture as well as examples of amber items in ancient texts. The second part of the second chapter analyses perfume vessels made from amber. The last chapter is on the topic of amber as a luxury. The discussion and conclusion argues that rich women were major consumers of amber in Rome.

The emperor Justinian's religious policy has sometimes been characterized as haphazard or incoherent. This dissertation examines religious policy in the Roman Empire from the accession of the emperor Justin to the inception of the Three Chapters controversy in the mid 540's AD. It considers the resolution of the Acacian Schism, Justinian's apparent ambivalence with regard to the Theopaschite formula, the attempt to court the anti-Chalcedonians in Constantinople in the period leading up to the Council of 536, and the relationship between the genesis of the Three Chapters and Second Origenist controversies. Even during these seemingly disparate episodes, this dissertation argues that it is possible to account for the apparent incoherence of this period. To do so, we create an account which includes and appreciates the embeddedness of imperial policy within a social context with two key features. First, we must bear in mind the shifting interests and information available to the individual agents through and over whom the emperor hoped to project influence. Second, we must identify the shifting and hardening symbolic and social boundaries established through the interactions of these same, competing agents. These form the basis for in- and out-group categorization. The individual interests of individual people—whether Justinian, Vitalian, Dioscorus, Leontius, Eusebius, Theodore Askidas, or Pelagius—within complex networks must always be accounted for to give a complete picture. When this social context is accounted for, Justinian's approach appears as that of a rational actor, having incomplete information, with consistent policy goals, working within inconsistent constraints to achieve those goals.

Between 1961 and 1963 a large terraced Etruscan building on the southside of the Acropolis at the archaeological site of San Giovenale in Italy was excavated. The building, named House K, remained largely unpublished and unstudied throughout the years, leaving our picture of the ancient settlement at San Giovenale incomplete. This thesis aims to get a better understanding of the Etruscan architecture, settlement, culture, and society at San Giovenale, by doing an architectural analysis of the building of House K, using unpublished field journals, drawings, and photographs. By comparing the architecture of House K and any structural elements immediately connected with the building, to other structures at San Giovenale, as well as other Etruscan sites, this thesis set out to learn: what kind of structure House K is; what function it had; what its relative dating is; what role it played in the settlement at San Giovenale; and what it can tell us regarding the society and culture at San Giovenale. Using environment-behaviour relations and building archaeology, the study first examined the structural elements of House K, before comparing House K to other structures at San Giovenale built 700–400 BCE. Thereafter, the study looked at parallels outside of San Giovenale, looking at the sites of Acquarossa, Luni sul Mignone, Poggio Civitate, Cerveteri, Pyrgi, Montetosto, Vulci, and Narce. Finally, a discussion was had regarding the character and function of House K, whether it was public, private, sacred, or profane. In the course of the study, an architectural chronology of San Giovenale was established, which dated the construction date of House K to between c. 565 BCE and the late 6th century BCE. The interpretation of the function of House K that seems most probable is that it was a monumental building complex of administrative, political and/or religious significance, which probably also acted as a residence for the ruling elite at San Giovenale – in other words: a palazzo. House K being a palazzo would mean that there was a centralised authority at San Giovenale, suggesting that there was some sort of ruler or leader at the top of the social hierarchy, splitting the social division at San Giovenale further than it was previously believed to have been.

The aim of this study is to examine and analyse how the Alexandrian prefect Orestes of late antiquity and his management of the events of 414-415 were depicted in the ancient sources: Socrates Scholasticus, John of Nikiu and Damascius. By applying S. Brownes rhetoric analysis to remove the authors “filters” in their depiction and then applying French &amp; Ravens bases of power to analyse how prefect Orestes power were depicted. Th analyses also applies the bases of power on bishop Cyril and philosopher Hypatia as the study found it difficult to analyses the prefect without them. The result of the analysis and discussion mainly found that the depiction of the prefect Orestes is affected by the rhetoric “filterers” of the three ancient authors. The study also found that the depiction of prefect Orestes and how he managed the events between 414-415 is always dependent on the office of prefectures authority and power. This what French &amp; Raven call legitimate power. Prefect Orestes actions were based on the office of prefecture authority and power, in accordance to the social structure and cultural rules. He was always depicted as the prefect not the person Orestes.