Classics

Presentation at a special event hosted by Harvard University's Standing Committee on Archaeology related to past and present iconoclastic events.

In times of crisis, we often turn to the past to explain the present. In addition to using history to understand the present, however, we can use the present to evaluate our approaches to the past. How can our reactions to iconoclasm in a modern context prompt us to reflect on how we write history? When we read about the cultural heritage destructions in Syria and Iraq, we are justifiably saddened and outraged. Yet, we often write scholarly histories of iconoclasm from a dispassionate perspective. This presentation, therefore, explores why we may or may not want to rebuild our narratives about the past, particularly regarding iconoclasm in the Greco-Roman world, with a view to present emotions, especially in asking who was most affected by these events.

The koinon, often translated as ‘federal state’, had a long history of structuring political relationships in the region that became the Roman province of Achaea and that is now part of the modern nation Greece. Recent scholarship has focused on how, from the 6th to 2nd centuries BCE, koina united individual city-states in political, religious, and economic activities on a regional scale through common institutions. How embedded these federal structures were in the region, however, begs the question of what happened to these well-established institutions in the Roman imperial period. Histories of these structures tend to end in 146 BCE—the traditional start date for direct Roman control of the region—and scholarship has often presented implicitly or explicitly this moment as a failure of federalism. Yet, despite little scholarly attention outside Roman emperor worship scholarship, epigraphic, numismatic, literary, and archaeological evidence records the survival of koina and the persistence of associated activities on a regional scale through at least the 3rd century CE.

This paper thus takes a holistic view of the koinon and considers broad continuities and discontinuities between how koina operated in the late Hellenistic period and later under the Roman empire. The paper focuses in particular on how the new citizenship structure of the Roman empire and the addition of a broader, imperial sphere of action affected the workings of koina, particularly politically and economically. Ultimately, the paper argues that even though these imperial koina may not have been as fully federal as their predecessors, they still reflect the flexibility and potential for innovation that earlier koina exemplified, and they continue to embody the “persistent negotiation” by now associated with federal structures (cf. Beck and Funke 2015, 26). What has been perceived as a moment of failure for federalism in the ancient world—the coming of Rome—cannot be so simply understood and can potentially help us understand contemporary moments of perceived failure in federal states.

This talk in the new joint series between ASCSA and EFA presents evidence for the dynamic survival of koina in mainland Greece under the Roman empire. It explores the activities in which koina engaged, especially beyond emperor worship, as well as who participated in koinon politics. It ultimately argues that the koinon and its concomitant discourse of 'commonness' was important not only for scaffolding increasingly unequal social relationships but also for shaping how regional elites understood and negotiated their place within what we now call the Roman Empire.

This chapter explores how the anthropologist Edward Burnett Tylor integrated evidence from the ancient world into his most well-known work Primitive Culture (1871) and how his ideas about culture influenced early theories of Romanization. Tylor’s study of classics shaped how he entered one of the preeminent anthropological debates of his time: what is “culture” and do cultures progress towards civilization, degenerate towards savagery, or do both at different times? He famously defined culture as a holistic concept consisting of belief, art, laws, morals, etc., and he promoted an evolutionary theory of culture, which viewed cultures as progressing from a savage to civilized state with ‘survivals’ that could persist across stages. His evolutionary and more material ideas about culture, which drew on classical scholarship as well as ancient Greek and Latin texts, were broadly influential and, in turn, shaped the development of scholarship about the ancient world. Here, F. J. Haverfield and R. G. Collingwood—both based in Oxford around the same time that Tylor was—serve as case studies for the legacy of Tylor’s theories in so-called Romanization studies. Haverfield’s notion of a superior, comprehensive Roman culture that unilaterally spread throughout the provinces and his idea that aspects of ‘native’ culture could survive both seem in dialogue with Tylor’s ideas. More explicitly, Collingwood’s writings indicate that he was familiar with Tylor’s work and that he added nuance to Tylor’s ideas in promoting his own fusion model of Romanization. Tylor’s progressive theory of culture, refracted through Haverfield and Collingwood as well as more recent scholars, has a legacy in today’s studies of cultural change in the Roman provinces. Excavating the history of the term can, therefore, help us refine current approaches to questions raised in these studies.

El trabajo aún en curso que aquí osamos presentar se inició por nuestra convicción de la necesidad -percibida desde la vertiente de la investigación literariade contar con un índice iconográfico de los libros de emblemas españoles. Hasta fechas muy próximas la emblemática española, ciertamente abundante y original, ha permanecido casi ignorada fuera de la Península Ibérica. Ello, entre otras causas, se ha debido a su inaccesibilidad: los pocos textos que cuentan con ediciones facsímiles o modernas son difíciles de encontrar al distribuirse por circuitos de limitado alcance y en reducidas tiradas; el corpus de la emblemática española ha adolecido, igualmente, de indefinición hasta el oportuno trabajo globalizador de Pedro Campa1• Otro factor a tener en cuenta es que la emblemática española ha sido invisible desde fuera de España por motivos lingüísticos. Lamentablemente, es un hecho que muy pocos expertos en el campo de la emblemática en la comunidad internacional dominan el castella...

, •den nachdem Aristotles so oft nachc,esproohen hat; es sei der Zweck des Trauerspiels die Leidenschaften zu reinigen oder die Sitte zu bilden, Er iat;i wo nlcht falsch, dooh wenigstens nicht allgemein 1 und Schuld daran, daB Viele deutsche Trauersplele so Schlecht sind. Ich setze also den Zwack des Trauerspiels in die Erregung der Leidenache.ften und sage: de.s best~;~ Tz•auerspiel ist das, welches die Le.idenschaften~ am~b:efj;.f.gsirens erregt, nicht das, welches geschickt 1st, die Leidenschaften zu reinigen. 11 7 Nicolai obviously takes a more mundane approach to tragic 8. drama than does Aristotle. The purpose of trag¢dy is not as eso• teric as a pergation of existing emotions or as noble as proper formation of mot•als; it is SiiJ1PlY the strong arousal of these emo• tions which occur in everyday life. The value of tragic drama lies in its ability to depict life in as "true 11 or "natural" a sta:t;e as possible, while elevating it to a high level of emotional intensity and abstract reflection. Following Ar1stotles1 outline, !Ueolai further develops the concept of arousal of emotions in the light of dramatic action! one of the three unities. He considers action a crucial instrUir,ent for exciting the proper emotion at the right time. Three essential qualities of dramatic action which are necessary for arousal are ttGr8sse, die Fortdauer und die Einfalt". Nicolai, in his epistle to Lessing elaborates further on these three aspects of action. First; he says, actions are great and tragic not because they are performed by great people, but because they arouse deep emotion; secondly 1 dramatic action has "Fortdauern (continuity) if it is not interrupted by another action; and finally, it possesses slmplicity if it is never complicated by incidental actions which divert the attention 8 of the audience. The unity of action, as described in continuity and simplicity by Nicolai, is a quality pertaining to the whole drama. :o OtherWise, emotions will be aroused but. never sustained long enough to ach~.eve the desired effect. Nicolai also categorizes aiff'erent traged.ies according to their action and the emotions• they evoke in the same ws:y as Aristotle. First, there is the "ri1hrende 11 or "moving" tragedy "t1ttieh excites the audience with f'r:i.ght and compassion, 11 Schrecken und Mitleid 11 • Next is the 11 heroiscb.e" di>ama in which i'l•ight and compassion help to evoke admiration. The third or 11 mb:ed" type • of tragedy occUJ:>s wben admiration, f'right ana•• compassion are of" equal importance. A fourth type of tragedy is one in which ad-• • • o'l•:miration is aroused w:'l.thout the help of' the usual fright or compassion assion. NicoJ.ai observes that this type of' tragedy is not practical because the hero 11 :l.m Unglil.ck, die gr8Bte Bewunderung, aber aueh zugleieh Metleiden el'!'ege~ 11 9 Ntcolai seelllS to ha1re been rather, indif:rarent to the moral and pedagogical aspects of tragedy whicP. ' Aristotle recognized~ Re attdbutes the downfall of the tragic 1 hero to a "mistake" which he ool1llllits as a result of frailty. Th~s :t>esults in a conflict between the hero's desires and the objective oJiaer which cannot be reconciled. Thus; regarding Oedipus: • '• so 1st z.B. in des Soghokles Oedipus der Fehler des : Oedipus nicht der l"iord des Laios, weloher auBer Handlung(ist • sondern die Neugier, .w.s l4'elcher die Aufl8sung i flieBt. 10 • Uioolai feels that • within the limits of the play's action, the ~• tragedy of Oedipus arises out of his curiosity-his longing f'or r ;.;. self-identity, For Nicolai it is this unfortunate emotional urgJ, and not the guilt incurl'ed from the murde1• of his fatb.er which \ supplies the impetus for the Oedipus 1 s eventual tragedy. Thus, j ,, the moral and pedagogical elements of the tragedy are di:ffused ~~ 11. t:ra~~o char&chl". fib pt>S.-d• .and &.-t&l'lilt1rutti.<Hl ewb t~d:Lngt: <>f ¥Ul.VJ nt;ho.l" than r,>i'llyo !n. tSmr.tdn.g u:p the [email protected]!~ ~J.$iiltl!lll c.nu$ed b:y pity u'l'U.U~!d" 1 I.e:tdn!t tJ&f8 s. ~P1e .a:r,iltl:~ 4ev 'ff'f,.~tillJ.t~ itl d.i~#>IH ~!e. aoll urus~e-. !"ittl tt!.t:~1 h ll'l:lt:.

The1 high style of Byzantine literature modelled itself on classical works in grammatical constructions and vocabulary.2 Because these words and forms had long fallen out of daily use (indeed if they had ever been in common use), comprehension of certain major historical texts written in this classicizing language was hindered. To mitigate this difficulty, during the Palaiologan period, major historiographical works-the Alexiad of Anna Komnene, Basilikos Andrias of Nikephoros Blemmydes, and the Historia of the Niketas Choniateswere translated into a lower register to simplify the vocabulary and syntax of the texts. Although an apparently mass project of translation occurred in the 14th century,3 the production of translated texts was not a new phenomenon: already by the 5th century, Eutecnius the Sophist had undertaken an analogous project in producing metaphrases of the didactic poems of Oppian.4 Throughout the Byzantine period, the trend continued with, to name a few, several paraphrases/metaphrases of the Iliad,5 one of the Batrachomyomachia,6 and at least a partial translation of the Odyssey,7 in addition to the well-known 1 Many deserve thanks for their help in the production of this paper, but especially Prof. Ineke Sluiter and the Classics department at Leiden University for all of their assistance during my time there; the other participants of the Trends and Turning Points conference for helpful comments; the anonymous reviewers who saved me from many errors; the editor at Brill; Prof. Neel Smith; the Fulbright Foundation for providing me with funding; and Mr. Chase Padusniak (Princeton) who read several drafts of this paper.

of the Iliad is the same as the variant dialectal form in Theogony 126 and the reading of the papyrus of the Catalogue of Women. We might therefore suspect, and with good reason, that the neo-and hyper-Ionicisms that existed in the texts of Homer and Hesiod stem from copies produced by rhapsodes in an Ionian setting, and that ( ) , and all once appeared in Zenodotus' copy of Hesiod's poems. The methods by which Zenodotus' readings have passed into papyri of the Theogony and the Catalogue, medieval manuscripts of the Theogony and the Hesiodic scholia are opaque; yet taken together they point to the fact that ancient scholars who came after Zenodotus took an interest in preserving his readings and thoughts -if only to disagree with them. This theory about an Ionian rhapsodic copy of Hesiod in third-century Alexandria has the additional conclusion that Zenodotus' text of Hesiod contained both the Theogony and the Catalogue of Women. 17 This may serve as another reminder that ancient views on the authenticity of Hesiod's poems differ from our own.