<p> In this dissertation, I explore the intertextual dialogue between two fifth century Attic playwrights, the comedian Aristophanes and the tragedian Euripides, and the influence that each had on the development of the other's characteristic style, or 'brand' (&chi;&alpha;&rho;&alpha;&kappa;&tau;&eta;&rho;). Scholarship on the two playwrights has tended to focus almost exclusively on the transgression of generic boundaries. But studies of paratragedy and parody in Aristophanic comedy and comic elements in late Euripidean tragedy fail to take into consideration the fact that in addition to appropriating material widely across genres, Aristophanes and Euripides also seem to have shared a specific mutual interest in each other's work. I propose a refinement to the traditional model and argue that the two playwrights mutually drew inspiration from each other's differing interpretations of similar themes and motifs. </p><p> Over the period of two decades, the comedian and the tragedian gradually expanded a common repertoire from which they responsively developed variations on the same themes. Each sequence of variations on a theme begins with an Aristophanic running gag mocking a recurring tendency in Euripides' tragedies. Euripides tended to respond to Aristophanes' variations on his themes by embracing and continuing to employ the tropes that Aristophanes had singled out as being characteristically Euripidean. My study focuses primarily on Aristophanes' <i>Acharnians</i> and <i>Thesmophoriazusae </i> and Euripides' <i>Helen</i> and <i>Bacchae</i>. I argue that this exploration of shared thematic material was for both Aristophanes and Euripides an endeavor that was especially productive of their unique brands. </p>

Universiẗat, Diss. u.d.T.: Dembski, Günther: Römerzeitliche Gemmen und Kameen aus Carnuntum--Wien, 1969. / Literaturverz. S. 179-185.

Univ., Diss.--Perugia. / Contains bibl. (p. 602-683) and notes.

No description available.

The double-pipe reed woodwind known as the aulos was the most pervasive instrument in ancient Greek life. Despite recent attention to affect and the senses and advancements in ancient musicology, there remains no comprehensive study of this cultural phenomenon. Bringing the burgeoning field of sound studies to bear on the diverse range of evidence, this dissertation offers the first cultural history of aulos performance, focusing on a crucial period of its activity spanning the sixth through fourth centuries BCE. I propose an interpretive model that works across textual and material sources to account for the ineffable, affective ways in which the instrument acts upon the embodied listener. When we consider the aulos as a sonic medium that works beyond the structural and semantic boundaries of music and language, we can identify how the instrument communicates across contexts through certain structures of feeling its sound. By exploring the world-building capacities of the instrument’s sound effects and harmonics, I chart the history of these embodied ways of knowing its sound. I argue that the aulos operates through a culturally conditioned interface with the body, exerting an agency that impacts social and civic identity, drives musical innovation, and poses a cultural threat to discursive ways of knowing and rational persuasion. The five chapters identify the interplay of tradition and innovation across the contexts of aulos performance, between musical and theatrical genres as well as civic practices involving corporate movement. Meanwhile, with the rise of prose, the emerging critical discourse on the aulos analyzes its effect on the body specifically and aims to expose how the listener is tricked into the “enchanting” soundworlds it constructs. This interdisciplinary media-based approach to ancient Greek performance thus presents a new register of meaning-making that articulates unexplored aspects of the artistic, literary, and philosophical works that preserve this culture.

<p>commentary on Medea with an introductory chapter<br />discussing authorship, date, dramatic technique,<br />style and philosophical elements.</p> / Master of Arts (MA)

Gregory Vlastos claims that in the Gorgias Socrates is confident that the elenchos is the only and the final arbiter of moral truth. Traditionally, the object of elenchos has been viewed as not one of moral truth, but one of simply revealing to Socratic interlocutors confusions and muddles within themselves, thereby jarring their unquestioning adherence to some moral dogma. On Vlastos' view, however, Socrates claims that he proves by elenchos that an interlocutor's thesis is false. How can he, when in point of logic all he has proved is that the thesis is inconsistent with the agreed-upon premises in that argument whose truth Socrates does not undertake to establish? While Vlastos attempts to solve what he calls "the problem of elenchos" with all the ingenuity that we have come to expect from him, I argue that there are two major obstacles in his way. First, elenchos is not the only arbiter of moral truth in the Gorgias Socrates has a number of other reasons for believing certain things, but according to Vlastos, Socrates looks to elenchos, and to nothing but that, for the truth of his beliefs. I argue that, first, Vlastos' characterization of elenchos is unsatisfactory, for on his criteria it is difficult to distinguish it from other kinds of arguments. This in turn seriously hampers a proper evaluation of elenctic arguments. I then show that at least in this dialogue Socrates has certain religious beliefs that he holds without relying on elenchos, and so elenchos is not the only avenue for acquiring moral knowledge. Under Vlastos' correcting lenses, Socrates emerges also as a morally upright philosopher who would never knowingly conduct fallacious arguments. I argue that Socrates cheats at elenchos, and he does so in order to win over his interlocutors. I conclude that because of certain assumptions Vlastos makes about the character of the model philosopher and the model method, he exaggerates the strength of elenchos. If I am right, the Gorgias is witness to, not the power of elenchos as Vlastos would have us believe, but its limitations.

This thesis is an analysis of the use of the homecoming ('nostos' in Greek) in Greek tragedy. I concentrate not just on the treatment of the nostos-theme within the plot and the imagery of the plays in question but also on nostos as part of Greek cultural experience. In order to illuminate the nature of nostos both as a life-event and as a story-pattern in the early literary tradition I begin with an overview of nostos in life and literature, and then give a detailed account of nostos in the Odyssey, since it is a major example of the nostos-pattern for Greek culture. By considering the literary treatment of nostos in the Odyssey one may understand the nature of nostos as a story-pattern and how that influences audience expectations. This is particularly important since the analysis of nostos in Greek tragedy will be especially related to the Odyssey. Specifically the thesis aims to describe and analyse common elements within the plot and the imagery of the plays that might be called nostos-plays. Primary nostos-plays are those where nostos serves as the fulcrum of the action, such as Aeschylus' 'Persians' and Agamemnon and Sophocles' 'Trachiniae'. The bulk of this study is devoted to the structural use of nostos in these plays. I stress at the outset, however, that the nostos-pattern in Greek tragedy is exploited more widely, and there are many occasions in Greek drama where nostos is an element of the plot. Among these, those with closest association to the treatment of nostos in the second half of the Odyssey are the Orestes-plots (notably Aeschylus' 'Choephori', Sophocles' 'Electra' and Euripides' 'Electra'). I also consider the use of nostos in Euripides' 'Andromache' and 'Heracles' since both plays illustrate that nostos is a means of creative variation on the part of the poet. Interpretation of the specific plays shows that the nostos-pattern common to these plays is a flexible set of conventions with significant variation in each case. Common themes and roles are developed in divergent ways, expectations raised are not necessarily met. Thus the thesis will recognise the variety of specific uses of the nostos-pattern on tragic stage. Finally, I suggest in the Appendix a new reading of Seferis' poem. In particular I relate the return of the exile in Seferis' poem to the return of Orestes, which underlines the idealistic nature of the notion of a return to the same. This notion is embodied in both the nostos-plays and Seferis' poem.

This thesis examines the transition from the Roman republic to the Principate of Augustus through the lens of the pontifex maximus, the office of the head of the pontifical college. Despite burgeoning interest in this role, current scholarship still regards the elevation of the chief pontiff to a politically significant position as a by-product of Caesar’s ambition and, subsequently, Octavian’s quest for both power and legitimacy. It is my contention that the trajectory of this priesthood’s ascendancy has been incorrectly plotted and that a proper understanding of the pontificate requires an analysis of the events surrounding the politically motivated murder of a tribune by the chief pontiff in 133 and subsequently over the next century. After a survey of literature and a summary of the key features of the office, the thesis argues that the position of chief pontiff had long since conferred a stable prominence which was unique in the Roman republic. This prominence brought with it a particular kind of power which interacted with the auctoritas of the men who occupied the priesthood: in this way, the holders of an office which was bound up with some of the most revered traditions of the city were empowered to improvise courses of action which further enhanced the standing and influence of the chief pontiffs. It was through this cycle of action and perception that the pontifex maximus became a mechanism of political change – and was itself transformed in the process. In considering this cycle, particular emphasis is placed on the phenomenon of ‘sacro-political’ violence which, as a novelty instigated by one chief pontiff, became a recurrent motif in Roman political life thereafter. I argue that Scipio Nasica Serapio made deliberate use of his office to sanction an intervention which would have serious consequences for the republic and which radically altered how the Romans saw this priesthood. The thesis then explores how subsequent holders of the office either negotiated or exploited this ‘legacy’ to further their careers, to respond to unprecedented constitutional crises or simply to stay alive. Although all the pontifices maximi from 141 B.C. to 14 AD are considered, this thesis focuses on the lives and times of Nasica Serapio, Quintus Scaevola, Julius Caesar and Augustus as their tenures are particularly emblematic of the tensions between the mos maiorum and an increasingly extreme political climate. I argue that the new dispensation established by the first princeps, with all the restorationist rhetoric which accompanied it, relied decisively on Augustus’ assumption of the role. Even if Augustus had absorbed virtually all of the available priesthoods, the long wait he had to endure for the office of chief pontiff says a great deal about the nature of the pontificate and its strategic value to the heir of Caesar. Two case-study Appendices discuss the disputed pontificate of Q. Servilius Caepio and the relationship between Cicero, Clodius and the pontifical college. These studies exemplify the prosopographical challenges in reconstructing republican priesthoods (even the most prominent) and the interaction between law, religion and politics in the mid first century B.C.

This work is the first full-length study of the dissemination of Greek tragedy in the earliest period of the history of drama. In recent years, especially with the growth of reception studies, scholars have become increasingly interested in studying drama outside its fifth century Athenian performance context. As a result, it has become all the more important to establish both when and how tragedy first became popular across the Greek world. This study aims to provide detailed answers to these questions. In doing so, the thesis challenges the prevailing assumption that tragedy was, in its origins, an exclusively Athenian cultural product, and that its ‘export’ outside Attica only occurred at a later period. Instead, I argue that the dissemination of tragedy took place simultaneously with its development and growth at Athens. We will see, through an examination of both the material and literary evidence, that non-Athenian Greeks were aware of the works of Athenian tragedians from at least the first half of the fifth century. In order to explain how this came about, I suggest that tragic playwrights should be seen in the context of the ancient tradition of wandering poets, and that travel was a usual and even necessary part of a poet’s work. I consider the evidence for the travels of Athenian and non-Athenian poets, as well as actors, and examine their motives for travelling and their activities on the road. In doing so, I attempt to reconstruct, as far as possible, the circuit of festivals and patrons, on which both tragedians and other poetic professionals moved. This study thus aims to both chart the process of tragedy’s dissemination and to situate the genre within the context of the broader ‘song culture’ of the Greek wandering poet.