This thesis examines the cultural, religious and therapeutic functions of Roman baths and bathing during Late Antiquity, as they are presented in a wide range of primary literary sources, and the way in which they are addressed in current research. The chronological scope of the work stretches from the late 3rd to the early 7th century. The geographical focus is on the Eastern part of the Roman Empire. The aim of the thesis is, primarily, to analyse aspects of bathing during this period that have not been previously addressed in detail (such as medicinal uses of bathing) and to examine the issues that have been discussed in the past but had not been answered unequivocally, or which have not been treated in an exhaustive manner – such as the matters of nudity and equality in a bath-house environment, or of Christian attitudes to bathing in this context. The thesis also considers what the knowledge of the subject topic contributes to our understanding of the period of Late Antiquity. The thesis examines the changes that occurred in the bathing culture during Late Antiquity and their causes, exploring in detail the impact of Christianity on bathing customs, and devotes special attention to how the perceptions of bathing were presented in the contemporary sources. This will be achieved by investigating passages from a wide range of texts mentioning baths and bathing and subsequently drawing conclusions based on the analysis of the primary sources.

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The present study investigates attitudes towards and teachings about the end of life and the soul’s passage to the next world, as expressed in late antique religious tales in Greek, particularly from Egypt and the Sinai. The intellectual setting is that of Chalcedonian Christianity, but within those strictures there was scope for a range of creative treatments and imaginings of a topic which canonical Scripture touched upon in mostly vague terms or glancing allusions. While there was much speculation and discussion in what we may call formal theology, the use of arresting narrative, some of it with an almost dramatic character, gave exponents of doctrine the ability to reach a wider audience in a more penetrating and persuasive way. And, as the number of scriptural allusions here will make clear, it was possible to develop ideas and images within the large gaps left by Holy Writ which were nevertheless not inconsonant with the same. Coupled with the relative freedom allowed for presentations of a universal (death) was an urgency to do so which was particular to the time (one of sweeping social and political changes within, and threats to, the empire). We consider here the connection between the universal and the particular, and some of the most important approaches taken to the subject. This work builds upon that of a number of scholars, including Derek Krueger, John Wortley, Phil Booth, André Binggeli, Elizabeth Castelli and Aron Gurevich. The first and last chapters of the dissertation are given to thematic treatment of the moments immediately before and immediately after death. The second, third and fourth chapters are each dedicated to one of the three most influential ascetic writers of the period: John Klimakos, John Moschos, and Anastasios of Sinai. We look at how their presentations of death not only frame the ideals of monastic life but to record for posterity the fading ways of a changing world. / Classics

A range of present stems in Khotanese which historically ended in a consonant behave synchronically as vowel final stems. Forms like bvāre ‘they know’ or bvāne ‘may I know’ imply a synchronic stem bu-, but most scholars have preferred a shape bud- because the Proto-Iranian antecedent is *baud-. A metanalysis resolves the apparent contradiction between diachrony and synchrony. Sometime in pre-Khotanese there was a morphophonological reanalysis wherein some consonant final verb stems were reinterpreted as being vowel final, and a series of suffixes historically beginning with single *-t- were reinterpreted as beginning with double /tt/. A word like 3Sp.m butte ‘he knows’ was originally analyzed as *bud- + -te and later reanalyzed as bu- + -tte /βuttē/. The vowel stems resulting from the metanalysis behave no differently from other vowel stems. All forms arising from the addition of vowel initial suffixes show contractions which are either attested elsewhere in the grammar or are phonologically natural. They show no trace of a final consonant on the synchronic level. Properly identifying the synchronic forms of the affected stems and suffixes enables a more regular and systematic description of the attested forms. It permits a reduction from Emmerick’s four present stem types, A, B, C, D, to just two, A and B. / Inner Asian and Altaic Studies

This dissertation explores the significance of spoils and the practice of spoils-taking in Roman culture. Working from the premise that spoils in the classical sense (Latin spolia, exuviae) are items singled out for their symbolic value and accordingly subjected to different treatment than other war booty (Latin praeda, manubiae), I begin by examining arma, one of the primary targets of despoliation, in order to show how this symbolic value is generated based on the identity of the spoils’ original owners. From there I show that the value of spoils depends directly upon the virtus (i.e. “manliness” as demonstrated primarily through courage or prowess in combat) of the parties involved in taking and giving them, as shown by cases involving male figures who lack this quality or female figures who exhibit it. In the following two chapters I propose a model of “inheritance by conquest”: that spoils are earned through successful acts of virtus and can thereafter be deployed as handles by which to manipulate the identity of their original owners. In order to demonstrate this model at work, I trace several case studies that highlight the role of spoils as symbolic capital in the context of aristocratic competition, as well as the transformation of two spoils traditions (the laurel-wreath and the spolia opima) during the transition from Republic to Empire. Finally, I look to related phenomena, including headhunting and other human trophy collecting, relic culture, and architectural spolia, to help illuminate the dual nature of spoils as both proofs and remembrances of victory and victim. / Classics

No description available.

Abstract not available.

Tuberculosis (TB) has killed millions of people throughout history and still isone of the leading causes of death. Since the early 1990s, ancient DNA(aDNA) research has made considerable contributions to the study of thisinfectious disease in the past. While early studies used polymerase chainreactions (PCRs) solely to identify the TB-causing organisms, namely theMycobacterium tuberculosis complex (MTBC), later approaches extended thefocus to assign the actual disease-causing species or strains of the MTBCbut were either directed at single or few individuals or only provided few data. This research project has screened a large set of European skeletaland dental samples from individuals of the 1st–19th centuries AD for IS6110,an insertion sequence believed to be specific to the MTBC, and has identifieda number of individuals that may indeed have suffered from TB. Reports ofIS6110-like elements in other mycobacteria, however, challenge thesuitability of IS6110 for detecting MTBC. Two sequences similar but notidentical to IS6110 were revealed from several of the samples analysed,supporting the proposal that IS6110 should not serve as the sole target foridentifying MTBC from archaeological material. It cannot be establishedwhere these sequences derive from, but application of a MycobacteriumspecificPCR and targeting of genomic regions of the MTBC that containsingle nucleotide polymorphism (SNPs) indicate that at least some of thesamples contain a range of unknown, most likely environmental, bacterialand/or mycobacterial species. Yet, screening for IS6110 together with thedetection of large sequence polymorphisms (LSPs) and SNPs in othergenomic regions has identified eight individuals to unambiguously containMycobacterium tuberculosis aDNA. Apart from one individual which wasrecovered from Northern France, these skeletons derived from Britisharchaeological excavation sites. The SNP and LSP results enabled theallocation of infecting MTBC strains into various classification systemsreported in clinical literature and revealed that M. tuberculosis strains variedthroughout different time periods, thereby mainly confirming evolutionarypathways suggested in previous studies. Additionally, it was found thatdistinct strains co-existed temporally, and maybe even spatially, in Britainand that at least one individual harboured two different MTBC strains,suggesting a mixed infection. Application of next generation sequencingenabled one of the 19th century strains from Britain to be characterised ineven more detail, revealing closest similarity to a M. tuberculosis strainisolated at the beginning of the 20th century in North America.

The study of the ancient tattooed Mediterranean people from Assyria (circa 3300 BCE-2100 BCE), Egypt (circa 2000 BCE-300 BCE) Nubia (circa 2000 BCE-300 BCE), Israel (circa 1500 BCE-1200 BCE), Greece (circa 510 BCE-323 BCE), and Rome (circa 510 BCE-323 BCE) comprises the interpretivist investigation into the social-scientific and critical spatial practices of the cultures in order to establish whether or not the tattooed individuals would have been othered because of their marks. This othering is investigated in terms of the body in space, as well as the body as space. The social-scientific and critical spatial interpretation of the tattooing practices of the ancient Mediterranean cultures show that there are nine social values which are common to these cultures. These values are clothing, communicativeness, honour and shame, humility, nudity, ordering, prominence, social norms, customs, and laws (originally referred to as Torah-orientation), and wholeness. The analysis of these values as they are applied to each of the aforementioned cultures allows for the establishment of the social body as an entity within social space, as well as a spatial entity in itself. The critical spatial interpretation of the phenomenon of Thirding-as-Othering is applied in terms of how the tattooed individuals are othered within the social spaces they inhabit. Critical spatiality is further applied in order analyse the tattooed body in space, based on its social interaction within societal space, as well as to body as space which is analysed based on the individual who bears the tattoos, and the meaning, affect, and esteem that are imparted to that individual by virtue of his or her marks. This study shows that there is a distinction between honourable and shameful tattoos, and that the othering which occurs based on the honour or shame of the tattooed individual either others the marked individual in the case of shameful tattoos, or, in the case of honourable tattoos, other the unmarked individuals by refusing them access and entry into elite communities, such as those of the military. Finally, the study identifies four factors of the ancient Mediterranean tattooing process which may be compared, namely, whether or not the tattooing process is engaged in under the individual’s own volition, whether the tattooing process is only applicable to one or both sexes, whether the tattoos are honourable or shameful, and whether the tattoos are decorative, religious, military, or punitive and preventative. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2015. / Ancient Languages / PhD / Unrestricted

The purpose of this paper is to trace some of the accepted characteristics of the devil to their origins through a study of folklore and ancient religions. The characteristics include the principal form taken by each devil and trace its beginnings through folklore; the animals connected with these devils; powers allotted to these devils; and purposes served by these devils.