This thesis places Chaucer within the tradition of philosophical poetry that begins in Plato and extends through classical and medieval Latin culture. In this Platonic tradition, poetry is a self-reflexive epistemological practice that interrogates the conditions of art in general. As such, poetry as metapoetics takes itself as its own object of inquiry in order to reinforce and generate its own definitions without regard to extrinsic considerations. It attempts to create a poetic-knowledge proper instead of one that is dependant on other modes for meaning. The particular manner in which this is expressed is according to the idea of the loss of the Golden Age. In the Augustinian context of Chaucer’s poetry, language, in its literal and historical signifying functions is an effect of the noetic fall and a deformation of an earlier symbolism. The Chaucerian poems this thesis considers concern themselves with the solution to a historical literary lament for language’s fall, a solution that suggests that the instability in language can be overcome with reference to what has been lost in language. The chapters are organized to reflect the medieval Neoplatonic ascensus. The first chapter concerns the Pardoner’s Old Man and his relationship to the literary history of Tithonus in which the renewing of youth is ironically promoted in order to perpetually delay eternity and make the current world co-eternal to the coming world. In the Miller’s Tale, more aggressive narrative strategies deploy the machinery of atheism in order to make a god-less universe the sufficient grounds for the transformation of a fallen and contingent world into the only world whatsoever. The Manciple’s Tale’s opposite strategy leaves the world intact in its current state and instead makes divine beings human. Phoebus expatriates to earth and attempts to co-mingle it with heaven in order to unify art and history into a single monistic experience. Finally, the Nun’s Priest’s Tale acts as ars poetica for the entire Chaucerian Performance and undercuts the naturalistic strategies of the first three poems by a long experiment in the philosophical conflict between art and history. By imagining art and history as epistemologically antagonistic it attempts to subdue in a definitive manner poetic strategies that would imagine human history as the necessary knowledge-condition for poetic language.

The Sermo antequam iret in exilium and the Sermo cum iret in exsilium are two homilies allegedly pronounced by John Chrysostom in Constantinople at the end of summer 403, some time between the verdict of the Synod of the Oak and the day he left the city for his first exile. The aim of the thesis is to demonstrate that a new critical edition of these texts is needed before any study of their literary and historical value can be conducted. Chapter one sketches the historical background to which the text of the homilies refers and a concise survey about previous scholarship on the homilies on the first exile, from the time of Montfaucon’s edition until our days. The problem of the authenticity occupies the last part of the chapter. Chapter two investigates the history of the texts and takes into account both the direct and indirect traditions. It discusses the existence of double recensions hitherto unknown and provides the prefatory material for the new critical edition of recensio α of Sermo antequam iret in exilium and of the Sermo cum iret in exsilium. Chapter three comprises the Greek editions of the two homilies, as well as a provisional edition of the Latin version of the Sermo antequam iret in exilium. Chapter four is divided into two parts, each presenting a philological commentary on the text of the new editions. Systematic analysis of all the most important variant readings is offered. The final chapter summarizes the new findings and assesses the validity of previous criteria used for discerning the authenticity of the homilies on the exile.

This thesis provides a fresh investigation of a collection of Roman imperial biographies conventionally known as the 'Historia Augusta'. The thesis supports the authenticity of the texts included in this corpus, in particular the claims they make about their dates, authorship, and scope, through philological, literary, prosopographical, and historical arguments. It shows that this corpus of texts, if the main conclusions are accepted, potentially improves our understanding of the tetrarchic-Constantinian era. It also explores the wider implications for the historiography of the fourth century; the transmission and formation of multi-author corpora in antiquity and the middle ages. It also suggests that the canon of Latin imperial biographies be widened. The thesis has two parts. Part I explores the actual state of the corpus, its textual transmission, and relation to other texts. It shows that the ancient and medieval paratexts presented the corpus as a collection of imperial biographies. The paratexts are compatible with the authorial statements in the main text. It then explores the corpus' medieval transmission, and the interest medieval scholars had in such texts. This part suggests that the corpus’s current state explains well the inconsistencies found in it. Finally, it shows that words and phrases, once thought peculiar to the corpus and the holy grail of the forgery argument, are intertextual links to earlier texts. Part II explores chronological statements and historical episodes relevant to the Diocletianic-Constantinan period. It establishes the actual dates of each author, and suggests that the confusion found in these biographies is similar to that of other contemporaries. The few apostrophes are shown to be authentic, and the historical and prosopographical passages are shown to represent, and improve our understanding of, the zeitgeist and history of the period. The final conclusion weaves the various arguments together, and emphasises the authenticity and significance of the corpus' texts. It suggests separating the composition of the texts from the disinterested formation of the corpus as a whole, as part of a new hypothesis and further lines of enquiry.

The work describes the theoretical foundations of modern methods of creating new fonts, that is, using information technology, specifically vector programs. It also marginally shows the history of the font, Roman writing, the basic division of its compositions and describes its individual elements. The next part of the project focuses on creating digital fonts and continues with bringing it to live using algorithms and methods that can easily be processed in Matlab programming language. The method of implementation of the bringing the typeface to live is described and presentation of the generated results are then shown in few examples. Attention is also paid to the coordinates system, which is very important to solve geometric transformations, and two-dimensional vector graphics, which are widely used in the design and to render the fonts. Bézier curves and cubic Bézier curves are described in further detail along with vector graphics rasterization. One part of this text describes very important de Casteljau algorithm. The last chapter focuses on implementation in Matlab programming language, the creation of curves, that means single font characters, and the ways of how the algorithm works with transformations. Some sample images showing transformations using different input arguments are displayed in this section as well. There is evaluation of the contribution of this application and the possibilities of further expansion at the end.

In thesis themes of typography and computer font of OpenType format is described in details. At the beginning attention is paid to historical development of typeface, where stress is laid mainly on development of Roman and white letter with their characteristics. Having presented basis of typography work is concentrated on topic of digital font with emphasis on possibilities of OpenType format. Further its characteristics and advantages were listed compared to another formats and it was evaluated as format appropriate also for creating font in education process. Letterspacing and kerning were mentioned between basic graphical modifications in creating fonts. In theoretical part of the thesis they were examined in available programs designed for creating font in OpenType format. Except free available means into summary were included also commercial types due to absence of more advanced instruments and functions with free available applications. In evaluation was found that the most convenient for education is Fontlab Fontographer commercial program, free Type lite and Fontforge indicated for Open-source platform. Practical part of the thesis is focused on two chosen programs for creating main font characteristics. The goal was to detect if it is possible to reach identical results when using both programs. Fontographer program enabled to use wide tool palette dedicated to vector graphic processing by means of Adobe Illustrator similar instrument. In the case of Type lite program there were rather less instruments, what is sufficient for elementary work and familiarization with creating of digital typeface. Freeware shortage is basic absence of kerning, spacing or hinting functions. Comparing program possibilities, it falls that freeware programs based on OS Windows with their functionality are sufficient only for entry level users. The best option within free available programs is Fontforge for OS Linux which supports mentioned typographic functions. Fontographer was recommended for teaching of basic characteristics of OpenType font format. Another goal of the thesis was creating of recommended work procedure for creating basic characteristics of OpenType font for students, that is enclosed at the end of the thesis.