<p> This dissertation investigates the meaning and usage of a particular set of linguistically related Talmudic terms in order to show how and in what cultural context the Talmud began to take shape in the emerging scholastic centers of rabbinic learning in late Sassanian Babylonia. The term tistayem is here defined as meaning, "let it be promulgated" and is thus shown to be inherently redactional in nature. By its very meaning and the way it is employed it speaks to the ordering of extant traditions in new literary frameworks. This term has analogs both in early sources dating from Amoraic disciple circles, in which an analogous term was used to indicate the process by which different reports of statements could be combined to achieve a more authoritative version of a tradition, and in later texts from Geonic times in which the term comes to denote a specific kind of scholastic practice in which traditions were ordered for easy memorization and promulgation. Additionally, parallels to these terms are found in the literatures of Syriac speaking Christians providing avenues for comparisons between these scholastic cultures which shared scripture, language and similar modes of study as worship. Finally, this study demonstrates the ways in which increasing sophistication in usage of these terms mirrors increasing academization during the Talmudic period. As such, evidence is marshalled in support of a more gradual model of the redaction of the Talmud. </p>

This dissertation presents a comprehensive study of a fragmentary text of Greek prose fiction generally known as The Sesonchosis Novel (2nd century CE). It provides a new picture of the scope, character, and date of the work with the help of two new papyrus fragments and explores its relationship to both the complex tradition of the Greco-Roman Sesostris legend and the genre of the ancient novel. Thus the first part of the dissertation focuses on the Sesostris legend by tracing the position of the character Sesostris in Egypt, surveying the nature and development of the legend in Greek and Roman texts, and analyzing in detail two episodes from the legendary material (the attempted coup and the royal chariot). It explores how Sesostris held almost semi-divine status in Egypt as well as how useful and potent a symbol of Egyptian kingship he became in Greco-Roman culture. The second part focuses on The Sesonchosis Novel, arguing that the novel's plot may have covered the whole life of its main character and that the text may thus be best described as a biographical novel or "ruler novel." The implications of this hypothesis for the ancient novel genre as a whole are discussed in some detail, particularly in relation to The Ninos Novel. / The Classics

Conics and Geometry is a report that focuses on the development of new approaches in mathematics by breaking from the accepted norm of the time. The conics themselves have their beginning in this manner. The author uses three ancient problems in geometry to illustrate this trend. Doubling the cube, squaring the circle, and trisecting an angle have intrigued mathematicians for centuries. The author shows various approaches at solving these three problems: Hippias’ Quadratrix to trisect an angle and square the circle, Pappus’ hyperbola to trisect an angle, and Little and Harris’ simultaneous solution to all three problems. After presenting these approaches, the focus turns to the conic sections in the non-Euclidean geometry known as Taxicab geometry. / text

<p> A particular range of sounds express the presence and power of the god Dionysos. &Bgr;&rhov;&oacute;&mu;&iota;o&sigmav;, an epithet almost exclusively applied to Dionysos, especially connotes powerful sounds from the natural world, frenetic sounds, and sounds construed as foreign. The kind of noise conveyed by the name &Bgr;&rhov;&oacute;&mu;&iota;o&sigmav; is created in the ecstatic worship of Dionysos, generating an aurally-defined mobile and temporary Dionysiac space that blurs boundaries and infringes upon other types of spaces. Dionysiac sound conveys the vitality associated with Dionysos and provides a mechanism for his epiphany.</p><p> Accounting for Dionysos&rsquo; relationship with sound allows for new readings of <i>Bacchae</i> and <i>Frogs.</i> The aural aspects of Bacchae provide a counterpoint to its rich visual imagery. Pentheus threatens to silence Dionysos and remains oblivious to the importance of sound in Dionysiac worship. When he dresses as a maenad, he assumes only the visual aspects of the cult. Pentheus&rsquo; screams are incorporated into the Dionysiac soundscape before he dies, silenced forever. Aristophanes&rsquo; <i> Frogs</i> subverts the usual relationship between Dionysos and sound in a way that emphasizes the comical stereotype of the god as weak and incompetent. In particular, both choruses present Dionysiac sound to an oblivious Dionysos. He is irritated by the frogs and enthralled by the initiates.</p>

Jokes were considered low and insignificant in traditional Chinese literature. Ssu-shu hsiao is witty and provocative, different from other conventional and contemporary jestbooks for its parodic relationship with the Four Books, which were the core-texts of Neo-Confucianism and civil service examinations. The purpose of this study is to examine the late Ming jestbook, Ssu-shu hsiao, and analyze its cultural value, sociopolitical implications, and psychological concepts. This dissertation is divided into four chapters. Chapter one contains two important parts: It establishes the ground of historical studies relevant to the significance of the Four Books and Five Classics as well as the tradition of humor and jest. Part two provides an introduction of the text Ssu-shu hsiao and a description of my interpretive strategy. In order to help the reader understand the Chinese and Western theories of humor and literary tropes related to Ssu-shu hsiao, I direct my discussion to the following issues: imitation, allusion, quotation, parody, intertextuality, and paradox. Through the comparison between Ssu-shu hsiao and two other contemporary jestbooks, Hsien-hsien p'ien and Hsiao-fu, we can understand that the jokes of the late Ming were considered as public property used by people regardless of authorship. Chapter two investigates jokes in relation to the civil service examinations. Through examination books in the bookmarkets, we know the commercialized texts available for the prospective examinees; such a cultural phenomenon sheds light on the derailing of educational function from the level of self-cultivation to that of profit-making. The downward transformation of intellectual status from the Sung dynasty to the Ming resulted from defects in various factors. Jokes concerning the examination consisted of those making fun of the forms and contents of the eight-legged essays. The methods that enable one to become an expert of this type of prose include the memorization of the Four Books, Five Classics, and their commentaries, imitating the words and teachings of ancient sage-kings. Chapter three deals with the Sung-Ming pedagogical authority, Neo-Confucianism or the so-called "True Way Learning," and its activity of "learning by discussion" (chiang-hs Ueh). The factional disputes, philosophical debates, and the problem of legitimacy are signaled by the jokes targeting the Ch'eng Brothers and Chu Hsi. The equalization of the scholars of "True Way Learning" and "mountain-recluse" ("shan-jen") was an indication of the decline of intellectual status in the late Ming. Chapter four discusses gender and sexuality in the bawdy jokes of Ssu-shu hsiao. Dirty jokes expose the conflict of moral principle and pleasure-pursuit. The male jokesters manipulated gender stereotypes humorously by which we can probe into the problems such as the practice of concubinage, the remarriage of widows, and female same-sex relationship and adultery. Joking on male same-sex sexuality is also discussed. A conclusion recapitulates the key issues of the previous chapters.

Recent deconstructionist trends within Syro-Palestinian archaeology and biblical studies have now converged on the Israelite Monarchy causing two major ceramic reappraisals of the Iron Age I and II Periods. The result is a proposal for a new low chronology in Syro-Palestinian archaeology. These trends are creating more problems than they are solving by naively assuming ceramic change was consistent throughout Syro-Palestine and manipulating the archaeological data to fit the new models. The dissertation addresses the radical archaeological and historical reconstructions of the current trend by focusing on the Iron Age I-II transition in the northern parts of the Philistine coast and Shephelah (foothills)--Aijalon Valley Region. Excavations at Tel Miqne-Ekron provide new evidence for an evaluation of recent chronological proposals and aide in the development of a ceramic corpus of the Aijalon Valley Region. As a border site between the coastal region and the hills, Tel Miqne is an important site to isolate and compare regional variations and the complex socioeconomic variables that pattern the archaeological record. The dissertation is divided into three parts. Part I includes a review of current work in Syro-Palestinian Iron Age research and an overview of ceramic theory development. Part II contains the core database: (1) development of the Tel Miqne Stratum IV typology, and (2) a comparanda, with other sites in the region and attempt to isolate the chronological and spatial patterns of the Iron Age transition (11/10th century B.C.E.). Part III contains the results and interpretations. This study concludes that: (1) ceramic change is not chronologically homogeneous and therefore regional variation must be incorporated in all ceramic analyses; (2) the proposed new Low Chronology for the Iron Age in the southern Levant cannot be supported by the archaeological evidence; and (3) the Aijalon Valley Region reflects the complexity of the Iron Age transition as many ethnic elements and political groups vied for control of the important crossroads and access to coastal ports.

This paper proposes a plan for an archaeological survey of the ancient Greek city of Tegea, in Arcadia. Excavations at the temple of Athena Alea in Tegea have uncovered evidence of cult practice that extends into the tenth century BC, which provides the basis for further archaeological investigation. An archaeological survey would connect known developments within the religious sphere to developments in the social and political spheres of the surrounding territory. The survey will be an intensive, pedestrian, and all-period survey, will follow the methodology of the Cambridge/Bradford Boeotian Expedition, and will use computer databases and GIS. From the diachronic changes in settlement pattern discovered, we can infer the answers to questions regarding the social, political and economic structures in all periods from the Neolithic to modern times. The materials collected by the survey will provide opportunities for research beyond their immediate usefulness to the survey itself.

Αντικείμενο αυτής της μελέτης είναι οι Τραχίνιες του Σοφοκλή και ο τρόπος με τον οποίο ο τραγικός ποιητής επενέργησε τόσο σ΄ επίπεδο μύθου όσο και σ΄ επίπεδο γλωσσικού ύφους επάνω στο υλικό μυθολογικό και λογοτεχνικό, που παρέλαβε και γνώριζε πολύ καλά, προκειμένου να οργανώσει τον ολότελα δικό του ποιητικό λόγο και να πλάσει τον ολότελα δικό του τραγικό κόσμο. Πιο συγκεκριμένα, στο πρώτο κεφάλαιο επιχειρείται μία διακειμενική προσέγγιση του τέλους που επέλεξε για τον Ηρακλή ο Σοφοκλής στις Τραχίνιες του σε σχέση με τον θάνατο και την αποθέωση του μεγάλου ήρωα, όπως παρουσιάζονται στα Ομηρικά Έπη και στον Γυναικῶν Κατάλογο του Ησιόδου. Ο Σοφοκλής ξεπερνά τους προκατόχους του επικούς ποιητές και καινοτομεί καθώς ο θάνατος και η αποθέωση του Ηρακλή δεν είναι μία κατάσταση συντελεσμένη, όπως στον Όμηρο και τον Ησίοδο, αλλά μία ενέργεια σε εξέλιξη: παρακολουθούμε επί σκηνής έναν νέο θεό εν τη γενέσει του. Βλέπουμε τον μεγάλο εκπολιτιστή ήρωα περνώντας μέσα από τον έσχατο πόνο ένα ακριβώς βήμα πριν γίνει ένας νέος θεός δίπλα στους παραδοσιακούς θεούς του Ολύμπου. Τι συμβαίνει όμως στις Τραχίνιες με την ανθρώπινη πλευρά του μεγάλου Ηρακλή; Το δεύτερο κεφάλαιο αυτής της εργασίας επικεντρώνεται στο νόστο του ανθρώπου – Ηρακλή. Ο Σοφοκλής χτίζει αυτόν το νόστο επάνω σε δύο άλλους διάσημους νόστους προκατόχων του ποιητών, τον ομηρικό νόστο του Οδυσσέα και τον αισχύλειο νόστο του Αγαμέμνονα. Ο σοφόκλειος Ηρακλής επιστρέφει ως πολύπαθος Οδυσσέας για να μεταμορφωθεί και να εξοντωθεί λίγο αργότερα ως αισχύλειος Αγαμέμνονας. Όταν στις Τραχίνιες ο νόστος του Ηρακλή ολοκληρωθεί, ο μεγάλος Πανελλήνιος ήρωας δεν θα είναι πια ούτε Οδυσσέας ούτε Αγαμέμνων αλλά ένας νέος ήρωας, ένας ήρωας τραγικός. Λίγο πριν ο Ηρακλής χαθεί μέσα στις φλόγες και γίνει ένας νέος θεός, είναι υποχρεωμένος να φέρει εις πέρας έναν τελευταίο άθλο: είναι υποχρεωμένος να πραγματοποιήσει μία δύσκολη και απαραίτητη μετάβαση από έναν αρχαϊκό ηρωισμό λαγνείας, φυσικής δύναμης και αιματοχυσίας, τον ηρωισμό του παλιού επικού κόσμου, σ’ έναν ηρωισμό πραγματικά τραγικό. Ο Ηρακλής των Τραχινίων αποδεικνύεται ένας νέος τύπος ανθρώπου - ήρωα ο οποίος νικά τον πιο άγριο εχθρό, τα τέρατα που κρύβονται μέσα στην ίδια την ανθρώπινη φύση του. Αυτός είναι ο ηρωισμός ο οποίος ίσως βρει μία τιμημένη θέση μέσα στην πόλη. / The subject of this work is Sophocles’ Trachiniae and how the tragic poet elaborated his mythological and literary sources as far as the plot and the language of his play are concerned, in order to create his own poetic language and his own tragic world. To be more exact, the aim of the first chapter is an intertextual approach of the ending that Sophocles chose for Heracles in his Trachiniae in relation to the death and apotheosis of the great hero, as they are presented in Homer’s epics and Hesiod’s Women’s Catalogue. Sophocles surpassed his preceding epic poets and managed to innovate because Heracles’ death and apotheosis are not a complete state, as in Homer and Hesiod, but an action in progress: in Trachiniae we watch a new god being born on stage. We watch the great civilizing hero suffering the greatest pain of all and at the same time being about to take his place among the old gods of Olympus. But what happens with Heracles’ human side in Trachiniae? The second chapter focus on Heracles’ return home, the great hero’s nostos. Sophocles organizes this nostos based on two other famous heroes coming back home and the description of their journey by two older poets: the Homeric Odysseus and the Aeschylean Agamemnon. Sophoclean Hercules is coming back as a storm – tossed Odysseus in order to be transformed and later murdered as an Aeschylean Agamemnon. When Heracles’ nostos is completed in the Trachiniae, the great Panhellenic hero will not be Odysseus or Agamemnon but a new hero, a tragic hero. Before Heracles disappears into the flames and becomes a new god, he must carry out one last labour: he must enact a painful transition from an archaic heroism of lust, physical strength and bloodshed, the heroism of the old epic world, to a heroism that is truly tragic. In the Trachiniae Heracles is proved to be a new kind of man – hero who beats the worst enemy, the monsters which hide into the human nature itself. This is a heroism which might find a place of honor within the polis.

In evaluating Alcibiades' speech in Plato's Symposium, modern commentators often either conflate the historical figure and the fictive character, or else fail to make a distinction between Alcibiades the narrator and Alcibiades the eager young man whose adolescent encounters with Socrates which the more mature adult describes. The resulting scholarship tends to cast Alcibiades as a foil for Socrates and to reduce Plato's creation to a philosophic cautionary tale. Such reductions are misleadingly simplistic and require revision.By taking care to let neither history nor reputation supersede the textual evidence the Symposium provides, we can make a compelling case for a more moderate assessment of Alcibiades' philosophical progress. In doing so, we find that he is not lacking in understanding but rather that his understanding is incomplete. As such, Alcibiades occupies the vaguely defined space of intermediacy and intermediaries--the metaxu with which so much of the Symposium is concerned.

By the time Dionysius of Halicarnassus came to compose the brief biographies that introduce his essays on the ancient Athenian orators common histories of a variety of literary figures had already been assembled by earlier compilers of bioi into a collection known as the koine historia. This anonymous collection of biographies was the source that rhetoricians and other writers turned to for a standard account of an orator's life. This dissertation sets out to examine the development of the biographical tradition behind the common history, as it came to be preserved in a collection of bioi known as Ps.-Plutarch. In ancient times a canon of the ten best Attic orators was recognized. In Plutarch's collection of essays, the Moralia, is preserved a set of brief biographies of the orators of the canon, but this collection is no longer considered a genuine work of Plutarch. The introduction provides an extensive review of past scholarship on the problems of the nature and authorship of this collection, generally known as Ps.-Plutarch. It shows that the biographies are composites that were expanded through centuries of additions from a primitive core. The basic biography, which is still discernible and was originally composed by a grammarian, perhaps Caecilius of Caleacte (30 B.C.), was modeled on the biographies of the koine historia. The biographies found in this anonymous collection are themselves the product of Alexandrian scholarship. Chapter 1 examines the common history as the source of the biographies of Dionysius and Ps.-Plutarch. A comparison of their lives of Isocrates shows that the author of Ps.-Plutarch not only used the same source as Dionysius but also made a number of substantial additions, particularly of an anecdotal kind, to his account. These additions were taken from two places: from the same common history and f r om the biographer Hermippus. But the same comparison reveals that this biographer was an important source not only of the anecdotes on Isocrates, but also of much of the common history as it was preserved by Dionysius and Ps-Plutarch. Hermippus proved an important source for the compilers of the common history, since he himself gathered together and transmitted existing traditions on the orators. Chapters 2 and 3 examine and evaluate the historicity of the earlier contributions of Demetrius of Phalerum and Idomeneus of Lampsacus. The former treated Demosthenes in a treatise on rhetoric; the latter the orators Demosthenes, Aeschines and Hypereides in his polemic on the Athenian demagogues. The evidence indicates that Hermippus picked up, incorporated into his own biographies and transmitted into the later tradition their treatments of these orators. The final chapter (4) is devoted to Hermippus himself. He was a highly respected biographer and scholar in antiquity and his biographies were characterized by their rich mixture of anecdote and erudition. In particular attention was paid to his collection of biographies On the Isocrateans, which was schematically arranged into a diadoché as a construct of the history of 4th century Attic prose. From there attempts were made to reconstruct the scheme and content of his biographies of Demosthenes, Hypereides and Isocrates. From this study it became apparent that the type of biography written by Hermippus was essentially antiquarian in approach. Much of the research was into literary sources. That is to say much of the biographical information was inferred from texts, whether of the orator under consideration or of contemporary comic poets, or even from other antiquarian works, such Demetrius' work on rhetoric. In the end this type of biography was itself a product of same antiquarian interests that characterized much of the scholarship of the Alexandrian period.