An Image Sublime: The Milky Way in Aratus and Manilius

Sublime Cosmos: in Greco-Roman Literature and its Reception: Intersections of Myth, Science, and History, 2023

Time's subjectivity; ontological insecurity; divine birth and the nature of divinity; (im) mortality and regenerative rites; metatheatricality and the notion that we are actors in a cosmic drama; the sublimely metaphysical power of erotic passion and what threatens it (e.g. strife, marriage); the impact of astronomical (ir)regularity and cosmic (dis)order; catastrophic epidemics; the play of reflection and distortion in our perception of the world; awesome technology and the suspicion it may overpower us in spite of, or because of, our self-interest: these phenomena, fears, thoughts and intimations that suggest human experience runs deeper than its mundane particulars make up the stuff of this volume. Since Graeco-Roman antiquity and no doubt much longer, human beings in moments of expansive thought and feeling have lived and laboured under the conviction, or delusion, that there is more to our biology-, time-and gravity-bound planetary experience than meets the eye, and that we respond profoundly to the vast, enveloping cosmos that dwarfs and awes us-or viewed differently, that human existence and thought open out to 'the sublime' (cf. Lat. sublimis, Grk. ὕψος). Sublimity in turn tenders the allure of consciousness beyond normalcy, conventionality and quotidian experience. James Porter has persuasively argued for the prevalence of a more encompassing idea of sublimity in antiquity than that historically assumed by classicists, based primarily on their restrictive and misrepresentative readings of Longinus' , or Pseudo-Longinus' , Peri hupsous. This evocative first century ce (?) essay in fact constitutes an amalgam of collective Graeco-Roman reflection on the concept. 1 The sublime, as it seems to have been broadly perceived and experienced in antiquity, might be glimpsed not only in the unfamiliar and exuberant intensity of extreme circumstances (high or low, massive or miniscule, etc.), but through encounters with, for example, the immanence of (im) mortality, violent transitions and transformations, the collision of opposite forces, the expression of extraordinarily intense emotions, irregularities of time and season, shocking violations of nature or other jolting disruptions of regularity and cosmic order. Porter further suggests: Whatever the sublime is, it remains highly paradoxical to the core. Not fixed in objects per se, its assertion will always be the sign of a willed, if not willful, reading. But more than anything else, sublimity is a sign of the human propensity to locate great heights or depths of meaning in the surface of all things. Thus, if we have trouble putting our finger on the sublime whenever we try to catch it in the act, as though it were something else and more, this is because we are looking in the wrong places: the sublime, in the end, is nothing other than the very ecstasy of

Aratus' Phaenomena describes the constellations as a sign system devised by Zeus for the benefit of human beings. This article argues that Aratus figuratively depicts these signs as though they were "letters in the sky," a veritable text inscribed in nature. Through a cumulative argument that considers, among other things, the hermeneutics of Aratean sign-reading, the myth of Dike, Aratus' acrostic and other forms of letter play, and the reception of the Phaenomena, the article arrives at the conclusion that the writing metaphor is indeed pervasive in Aratus' poem. The Phaenomena thus presents an important early instance of a pervasive trope in the history of ideas, the concept of the "readability" of the world.

The sublime, defined in modernity as a certain je ne sais quoi that utterly transforms whatever it touches (Boileau), is an elusive entity in any context. How can we tell when the idea of sublimity is being discussed in antiquity? Take the following four passages as a kind of blindfold test:

It is admittedly acknowledged that ancient Alexandria contributed much knowledge to the field of astronomy. Consequently, this astronomical heritage was transmitted to Rome. Hence, the Roman poets of the Empire were working within an established tradition of astronomical knowledge. It seems that this tradition was much on the Roman poets' minds that they embedded this sort of knowledge in their poetical production. In several mythological love stories that were treated by the Roman poets, it is noticeable that at the moments of crisis of female intensified passion, or torment by conflicting emotions, the poets give a prominent role in the love stories to the stars (their risings and settings) and to other astronomical elements (the first visibility of the new moon, etc.), while portraying the unspoken anguish, the intensity of the suffering, or the frenzy of the woman who is overcome by obsessive love. Here we place this design of poetic thought within the Alexandrian tradition and explore the cumulative effects of the physical environment as a site for sustained poetic treatment. We cast light on comprehending the ideas of the Roman poets in the light of the increasing importance of astrophysics, experiencing a mythological feminine tragedy in cosmological terms.

Aestimatio: Sources and Studies in the History of Science, 2021

In this article, I compare the astronomical poem by Aratus called Phaenomena (third century bc) with the citations of a work of the same name by Eudoxus that are found in Hipparchus’ only extant work, In Arati et Eudoxi phaenomena (second century bc). I argue that, contrary to what most scholars maintain, Aratus’ poem is not a mere versification of Eudoxus’ work but a version enriched in style, language, and content. Indeed, Aratus’ Phaenomena is a paradigmatic reflection of the astronomical knowledge of the period in which it was written and a comprehensive, non-technical presentation of the celestial phenomena known in his time. It was, as I show, a very popular work, so popular that Hipparchus was moved to correct it in the hope of establishing himself as the authority in astronomy and prose as its proper medium. Published Online (2021-04-30)Copyright © 2021 by Stamatina Mastorakou Article PDF Link: https://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/aestimatio/article/view/37591/28593 Cor...

CULTURE AND COSMOS xix - 1-2, 2015

This paper focuses on Proclus's On the hieratic art of the Greeksconsidered as a contemporary philosophical problem -exploring some of its fundamental concepts and images, thus delineating Proclus's notion of theurgy, which he primarily conceived as divine action manifesting in the union between a god and the theurgist, and only secondarily as a technique. These aesthetic experiments of thought or philosophical performances, by means of which a divine self is created, had deep metaphysical, cosmological, psychological, ethical, linguistic and even political and religious implications for Late Antiquity Platonism, and had a profound impact on the development of Renaissance philosophy and magic. Such practices are meant to be understood in the context of the philosophical paideia of which it represents its final stage and consummation; they are developed by intricate hermeneutics of a poetic theology operated by very sophisticated conceptions of symbol, analogy and the imagination, all of which are at the base of the celestial-terrestrial correspondences used by theurgists in their hymn singing.

in S.J. Green and K. Volk (eds.), Forgotten Stars: Rediscovering Manilius’ Astronomica, Oxford: 120-38, 2011

If Manilius" Astronomica has suffered an unfavourable modern reception, especially from the Anglophone world, it is largely due to the complexity of its astrological instruction. As a selfconsciously didactic poem, following a long tradition of Greek and Roman poetry which purports to teach a specific skill, philosophy or way of life to a less-specialised, "student" audience, the reader is led to expect a lesson which is accessible to the average learner. 2 But this is not the case with Manilius. Those readers who approach the text with a certain eagerness for the topic but without detailed astrological knowledge and, as such, slip into the role of the "model" student constructed in the text, have often found Manilius" teachings very tough to chew. Those who approach the text with knowledge of astrology have (also) found it strewn with astrological errors.

2012