Papers by Theodore Antoniadis
Angeliki-Nektaria Roumpou (Ed.,) Ritual and the Poetics of Closure in Flavian Literature Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2023, pp. 111-134, 2023
In ancient Roman culture and ritual, funeral processions and triumphs have been found to share ma... more In ancient Roman culture and ritual, funeral processions and triumphs have been found to share many features as public ceremonies not just of purification, but also of demonstration both of individual glory and Rome’s imperialist enterprise. Seneca captures the symbolic capital these complex social institutions may endorse as tropes of power and prestige by referring to Drusus’ funeral as funus simillimum triumpho (Marc. 3.1). However, it is rather in the Flavian epics that the common imagery related to funeral rites and triumphs is often reversed or perverted in a way that undermines their obvious function as public spectacles and artistic representations. This is particularly evident in the closing scenes of several books of Silius Italicus’ Punica, where different aspects of ritual are often associated to create a sense of an ending that is ambiguous and incomplete. Such poetics of closure fuse together resolution and constraint to undercut the establishment of order supposedly achieved by ritual performances and religious practices on individual and public level. From this point of view, Silius may reflect upon the extreme subjectification and ritualisation of public spectacles under Nero and Domitian, who indulged themselves in playing the role of religious actors during their rule.
Dynamics Of Marginality: Liminal Characters and Marginal Groups in Neronian and Flavian Literature (pp. 113-136). Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter., 2023
Focusing on the dynamics of marginality and marginalization surrounding Hercules’ liminal, vulner... more Focusing on the dynamics of marginality and marginalization surrounding Hercules’ liminal, vulnerable, and ambivalent status in the Punica as well as his transgressive heroism, this chapter casts further light on the epic’s moralizing mechanism which often invests on ambiguity to evoke the abnormal ethics of the early Empire. It illustrates how the complicated aspects of Hercules as a model for kingship and cosmocracy, square not only with his autocratic twist in Seneca’s Hercules Furens, but also with his implicit ‘marginalization’ in the Flavian epics as a result of his emotional instability. More specifically, Hercules’ complex heroic exemplum together with his liminal status is best reflected in the polarized portrayal of the major characters of the Punica who are connected to him either as heroes or villains, while it resonates the emotional instability and extreme theatricality of Rome’s controversial emperor, Nero, whose disastrous reign left an indelible mark on his age.
Spyridon Tzounakas, Stella Alekou and Stephen Harrison (eds.) The Reception of Ancient Cyprus in Western Culture. Berlin / Boston: Walter de Gruyter 2023, 2023
Teucer, the legendary founder of Salamis in Cyprus, is not registered among the prominent figures... more Teucer, the legendary founder of Salamis in Cyprus, is not registered among the prominent figures in classical literature, though he has his moments not only in the epic tradition, but also in tragedy, Greek and Roman. Τhe son of king Telamon of Salamis and Hesione, daughter of king Laomedon of Troy, took part in the Trojan War fighting as a great archer alongside his half-brother Ajax against the Trojans. Having failed to stand by him after the award of Achilles’ arms to Odysseus, however, Teucer stood trial as soon as he got back home and eventually was disowned by his father and banished from his homeland. Such is the basic version of his myth as we know it from ancient Greek authors, but to the Romans it seems that Teucer was more familiar, or even cherished, as a refugee, a man who was forced to abandon his native land and set out to find a new home for himself and his compan-ions. Ηis toils and wanderings already make him a counterpart of Aeneas in the eyes of Vergil’s Dido. However, it is rather Horace’s famous lines in Ode 1.7 that associate Teucer’s myth with the themes of war, voyage, adventure, and rehabilitation that are also inherent in Vergil’s epic, as well as in Latin lyric and elegiac poetry.
Εικόνα εξωφύλλου Η γερόντισσα διηγείται στη θλιµµένη Χαρίτη το 'παραµύθι' του Έρωτα και της Ψυχής... more Εικόνα εξωφύλλου Η γερόντισσα διηγείται στη θλιµµένη Χαρίτη το 'παραµύθι' του Έρωτα και της Ψυχής, ενώ ο µεταµορφωµένος σε όνο Λούκιος ακούει την αφήγηση µε ορθάνοιχτα τα µεγάλα αυτιά του. Σχέδιο του Δανού ζωγράφου Lorenz Frølich (1820-1908) από µια σειρά είκοσι σχεδίων εµπνευσµένων από το ίδιο 'παραµύθι'. Αυτά φυλάσσονται σήµερα στην Εθνική και Πανεπιστηµιακή Βιβλιοθήκη του Στρασβούργου (BNUS) που µας επέτρεψε να αποκτήσουµε, µέσω της φωτογραφικής υπηρεσίας της, έξι αντίγραφα για επιστηµονικούς-διδακτικούς σκοπούς.
Intratextuality and Latin Literature, 2018
For many readers of the Punica, Hannibal’s portrayal represents an amalgam of or even a conflict ... more For many readers of the Punica, Hannibal’s portrayal represents an amalgam of or even a conflict between Silius’ historiographical and epic influences. For some others, it rather serves or reflects the poet’s strenuous endeavor to reconcile the Carthaginian general as an historical figure with outstanding models of epic heroism such as Homer’s Achilles. At the same time, Hannibal’s unrelenting struggle against the Romans brings him closer to other ‘exemplary villains’ of Roman literary tradition such as Sallust's and Cicero's Catiline, Vergil's Mezentius, Lucan's Caesar, Statius’ Capaneus and Seneca's Atreus. Thus, as the recent study of Claire Stocks (2013) further illustrates, we are confronted here with probably the most ‘intertextual’ hero in Flavian epic, whose poetic incarnation is repeatedly crossing genre‒boundaries.
On the other hand, discussion about Silius’ attempt to reconstruct Hannibal’s figure in his work may acquire a new interpretative twist, and actually a more ‘intratextual’ one, if viewed through a more philosophical perspective, as the text itself seems to be inviting us to do. So far, the intratextuality of the Punica has been found at the core of many critical studies and theories examining the thematic links between individual books or episodes in order to identify the epic’s larger structure. Taking ira as an intratextual ‘marker’ of generic identity, structure, characterization and plot since the wrath of Achilles in the Iliad, this paper will further apply Seneca’s theory on anger as a tool first to ‘compartmentalize’ the text of Punica 1‒2 into small ‘Stoic chunks’ and then try an alternative, more ‘unified’ reading of the ‘anger motif’ in these two books. Given that for many readers Silius’ narrative of the fall of Saguntum constitutes an ‘epic within the epic’, such a ‘case study’ may help us reconsider the poem’s Makrostuktur in view of the moral climate in which Silius actually began to write his epic or, at least, conceived it.
Latomus, 2018
This paper aims to investigate the intertextual and intratextual dynamics of the Callimachean flo... more This paper aims to investigate the intertextual and intratextual dynamics of the Callimachean flooding river imagery in the relatively uncharted for its Hellenistic/neoteric echoes area of imperial epic. While the appropriation of the water symbolism in classical Roman poetry from Catullus to Ovid has been examined thoroughly, emphasis now is laid on Caesar’s crossing of the swollen Rubicon in Lucan’s Bellum Civile as well as in similar water-imagery before the main war action takes place in the epics of Valerius Flaccus and Statius. In particular, it will be argued that the epic successors of Vergil, while exhibiting their well-attested belatedness, apply and/or ‘rework’ the epic-river symbol in cases where the emergence of war-narrative is imminent, but is undermined by a sense of delay (‘mora’).
ILLINOIS CLASSICAL STUDIES, 2017
In his version of the bout between Amycus and Pollux, which culminates the Argonauts’ stopover at... more In his version of the bout between Amycus and Pollux, which culminates the Argonauts’ stopover at Bebrycia in Argonautica 4, VF is evoking a well-known epic tradition of boxing matches. Simultaneously, he appears to be re-working those model-texts with the same protagonists ‘in the ring’, by topping further elements from Homer, Vergil and Ovid that bring Amycus closer to other terrifying creatures of epic such as Polyphemus and Cacus. However, as this paper will argue, the portrayal of Amycus’ almost inexplicable furor and ira bears some discernible Stoic influences: the symptoms that, according to Seneca’s theory in his treatise De Ira, are exhibited by a precipitous man who, having lost his self-control and reasoning, is prone to anger and its devastating effects. On the contrary, Pollux’s more calculating tactic during the fight reveals the kind of rational perceptiveness of a Stoic sage which gradually paves the way for his feat. Overall, the boxing match itself introduces a philosophical element to Valerius’ source material that propels the reader to assess the whole episode both through its more or less apparent intertextual and intratextual dynamics and beyond it.
This article contributes to the discussion for the significance of the Latin Love Elegy, with reg... more This article contributes to the discussion for the significance of the Latin Love Elegy, with regard to its language, themes and conventions, as a means of generic innovation in Valerius Flaccus’ Argonautica. In particular, it will be demonstrated that in the scenes of lament and separation that take place in books 2 and 3, Valerius incorporates a selection of elegiac themes and motifs to enhance the effect and sensationalism of these episodes as well as the pathos in the rhetoric of his female protagonists (in particular the Lemnian wives and Hypsipyle as well as Clite, the wife of king Cyzicus). At the same time he will be seen to take a step further by inverting and/or refashioning some of these topoi and tropes so as to leave his own metapoetic comment on his negotiations with other genres in the Argonautica.
In S. Frangoulidis, S. Harrison & G. Manuwald eds., Roman Drama and Its Contexts. Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter (2016).
The influence of Senecan drama on the literature of the Flavian Age remains, more or less, a rath... more The influence of Senecan drama on the literature of the Flavian Age remains, more or less, a rather uncharted area in recent bibliography, even if many critical studies have appeared in the last two decades suggesting that scholarly interest in (especially)
the epic poetry of this period has almost reached its climax. This seems to be particularly true in the case of Valerius Flaccus, since Seneca has been found at the core of many interpretative works examining the intertextual landscape of his Argonautica.
This article makes the case for the importance of Seneca’s Agamemnon as a model, in terms of both... more This article makes the case for the importance of Seneca’s Agamemnon as a model, in terms of both language and content, for the account of the Lemnian massacre in the second Book of Valerius Flaccus’ Argonautica, an episode which has been much discussed or disputed because of its extensive and digressive character. It will thus become evident that the semantics of adultery and crime, combined with those of vengeance elaborated on in the Agamemnon, have exercised a
significant influence on Valerius’ detailed sketching of the slaughter conducted by the Lemnian women as well as on the thematic coherence of the second Book as a whole.
Petronius’s debt to Ovid’s amatory works is frequently acknowledged
when discussion comes to the ... more Petronius’s debt to Ovid’s amatory works is frequently acknowledged
when discussion comes to the so-called “Croton episode”, where Encolpius’s
love affair with an aristocratic woman, named Circe, ends rather unsuccessfully
with the protagonist’s famous double sexual failure (Sat. 126.12–128.4 and
131.8–132.5). Although most scholars connect this event with the well-known
impotence theme, especially as treated by Ovid in Am. 3.7, the purpose of this
paper is to move beyond the impotentia, tracing some other, unexplored, elegiac
allusions and illusions in the whole narrative. Thus, it will become apparent that
it is Petronius’s use of erotic motifs as well as the depiction of (stock-) characters
and roleplaying that is further indebted to Ovidian discourse and poetics.
After almost three decades since the now classic study of Amy Richlin, The Garden of Priapus:
Sex... more After almost three decades since the now classic study of Amy Richlin, The Garden of Priapus:
Sexuality and Aggression in Roman humor (New Haven and London:1983) the humorous depiction of
Roman sexuality and eroticism still appears in the core of a number of studies examining the dynamics
of appropriation in Latin love poetry. This paper focuses primarily on the sexually charged literary
humor of a variety of texts (and their intertexts) treating the male sexual incompetence from Catullus’
corpus and Horace’s Epodes to the elegiac distiches of Ovid and the Satyricon of Petronius.
Books by Theodore Antoniadis
Ars Vivendi, 2024
Το βιβλίο αποτελεί μια εισαγωγική παρουσίαση του φιλοσοφικού στοχασμού του Σενέκα του Νεότερου, ε... more Το βιβλίο αποτελεί μια εισαγωγική παρουσίαση του φιλοσοφικού στοχασμού του Σενέκα του Νεότερου, ενός εκ των σημαντικότερων Ρωμαίων συγγραφέων και απολογητών της Ύστερης Στοάς τα αυτοκρατορικά χρόνια. Μέσα από μια ποικιλία αποσπασμάτων, ανθολογημένων σε εννέα θεματικές ενότητες, αναδεικνύεται η στωική τέχνη του βίου που έδωσε έμφαση στην εκρίζωση των παθών, στον αυτοέλεγχο, στην απαλλαγή του ανθρώπου από τον φόβο του θανάτου, στην απεξάρτηση από τα υλικά αγαθά, στη δημιουργική αξιοποίηση του χρόνου κλπ., με σκοπό την εξασφάλιση της αρετής, της ψυχικής γαλήνης και της εσωτερικής πληρότητας του ατόμου. Τα στοιχεία αυτά που συνθέτουν το πορτρέτο του Στωικού σοφού, όπως αυτό φιλοτεχνείται συστηματικά μέσα από τις φιλοσοφικές πραγματείες του Σενέκα, παραμένουν στο επίκεντρο των αναζητήσεων του σύγχρονου ανθρώπου, στον πολιτισμό και στην κουλτούρα του οποίου η ψυχοθεραπεία και παρόμοιες πρακτικές βρίσκουν συχνά κοινό έδαφος με τις στοχεύσεις του Στωικισμού. Ως εκ τούτου, η πρακτική φιλοσοφία του Σενέκα, ενός ανθρώπου που βρέθηκε συχνά στο επίκεντρο της κριτικής συγχρόνων του αλλά και μεταγενέστερων μελετητών όσον αφορά τον τρόπο με τον οποίο διαχειρίστηκε προσωπικά τις προκλήσεις της εποχής του από τη θέση του συμβούλου του αυτοκράτορα Νέρωνα, παρουσιάζει ιδιαίτερο ενδιαφέρον, διότι πολλοί από τους προβληματισμούς που θέτει αφορούν σε μεγάλο βαθμό τόσο την πολιτικο-κοινωνική και λογοτεχνική avant-garde της πρώιμης περιόδου του ρωμαϊκού Imperium όσο και τον σημερινό πολίτη του δυτικού κόσμου. Όλα τα λατινικά παραθέματα συνοδεύονται από εισαγωγικό δοκίμιο, μετάφραση, γραμματικά και ερμηνευτικά σχόλια, ενώ στο τέλος του βιβλίου υπάρχει και παράρτημα λατινοελληνικού λεξιλογίου και ευρετήριο χωρίων.
Ο Πόπλιος Οβίδιος Νάσων (43 π.Χ.-18 μ.Χ.) είναι χρονολογικά οψιμότερος σε σχέση τόσο με τους ρωμα... more Ο Πόπλιος Οβίδιος Νάσων (43 π.Χ.-18 μ.Χ.) είναι χρονολογικά οψιμότερος σε σχέση τόσο με τους ρωμαίους ερωτικούς και νεωτερικούς ποιητές όσο, ακόμη πε-ρισσότερο, και με τους έλληνες ελεγειακούς των αρχαϊκών και ελληνιστικών χρό-νων. Έχοντας ο ίδιος βρεθεί αντιμέτωπος με ένα ποιητικό είδος που είχε φθάσει στην ωριμότητά του και που, μέσα στη φορμαλιστικά οριοθετημένη ζώνη του, είχε δοκιμάσει όλες σχεδόν τις τονικότητες της ερωτικής έκφρασης, ο Οβίδιος γνώριζε καλά ότι οι αναγνώστες του ήταν ήδη μυημένοι σε έναν καλά επεξεργασμένο κώ-δικα με αναγνωρίσιμους κοινούς τόπους, τυπικά ερωτικά σενάρια και με μια συμ-βατική ερωτική ρητορική. Τη συμπτωματολογία της επιγονικότητας-οψιμότητας, όπως αυτή αποτυπώ-νεται στο corpus των ελεγειών της δεύτερης έκδοσης των Amores, τις διαστάσεις και τις εκφάνσεις της σε ερωτογραφικό και σε μεταποιητικό επίπεδο έχει στόχο να εξετάσει η παρούσα μελέτη. Στο πλαίσιο αυτό, ερμηνευτικός σχολιασμός των ελεγειών αναζητεί σταθερά τον ποιητή που μετέτρεψε τη χρονολογική του οψι-μότητα – επιγονικότητα σε πλεονέκτημα, με την έννοια ότι κατέστησε τον διακει-μενικά υπερ-κορεσμένο λόγο των Amores μια συστηματική μεταγλώσσα η οποία σχολιάζει και, σχολιάζοντας, αποκαλύπτει σε «κοινή θέα» τους ιδεολογικούς, γραμ-ματολογικούς και αισθητικούς μηχανισμούς που συγκρότησαν τον «κλασικό» ερω-τικό λόγο της ρωμαϊκής ελεγείας. Το βιβλίο αυτό αποτελεί τη δεύτερη και αναθεωρημένη έκδοση της ομότιτλης διδακτορικής διατριβής υπό την εποπτεία του καθηγητή και ακαδημαϊκού Θ. Δ. Παπαγγελή, η οποία υποβλήθηκε στο Αριστοτέλειο Πανεπιστήμιο Θεσσαλονίκης το έτος 2007.
Talks by Theodore Antoniadis
CHS Research Bulletin 9, 2021
Teucer (Τεῦκρος), the legendary founder of Salamis in Cyprus, is not registered among the promine... more Teucer (Τεῦκρος), the legendary founder of Salamis in Cyprus, is not registered among the prominent figures in classical literature, though he has his moments not only in the epic tradition, but also in tragedy, Greek and Roman. Τhe son of king Telamon of Salamis and Hesione, daughter of king Laomedon of Troy, took part in the Trojan War fighting as a great archer alongside his half-brother Ajax against the Trojans. Having failed to stand by him after the award of Achilles’ arms to Odysseus, however, Teucer stood trial as soon as he got back home and eventually was disowned by his father and banished from his homeland. Such is, more or less, the version of his myth as we know it from ancient Greek authors, but to the Romans it seems that Teucer was more familiar, or even cherished, as an exile/refugee, a man who was forced to abandon his native land and set out to find a new home for himself and his companions. Ηis toils and wanderings already make him a counterpart of Aeneas in the eyes of Vergil’s Dido. However, it is rather Horace’s famous lines in Ode 1.7 that associate Teucer’s myth with the themes of war, voyage, adventure, and rehabilitation in a new homeland which have been explored during the CHS Fellowship as an inherent element of the Augustan poetry.
Book Reviews by Theodore Antoniadis
Classical Journal 1-3, 2022
Greek students of Classics may no longer deplore the scarcity of secondary literature on Latin in... more Greek students of Classics may no longer deplore the scarcity of secondary literature on Latin in their native language. Even though recently published work is focused mostly on Augustan poetry, it undoubtedly represents a substantial contribution both to Greek and international scholarship. This is the case with this generous volume, which provides a translation and a full literary and textual commentary on the single epistles of Ovid's Heroides (Her. 1–15).
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Papers by Theodore Antoniadis
On the other hand, discussion about Silius’ attempt to reconstruct Hannibal’s figure in his work may acquire a new interpretative twist, and actually a more ‘intratextual’ one, if viewed through a more philosophical perspective, as the text itself seems to be inviting us to do. So far, the intratextuality of the Punica has been found at the core of many critical studies and theories examining the thematic links between individual books or episodes in order to identify the epic’s larger structure. Taking ira as an intratextual ‘marker’ of generic identity, structure, characterization and plot since the wrath of Achilles in the Iliad, this paper will further apply Seneca’s theory on anger as a tool first to ‘compartmentalize’ the text of Punica 1‒2 into small ‘Stoic chunks’ and then try an alternative, more ‘unified’ reading of the ‘anger motif’ in these two books. Given that for many readers Silius’ narrative of the fall of Saguntum constitutes an ‘epic within the epic’, such a ‘case study’ may help us reconsider the poem’s Makrostuktur in view of the moral climate in which Silius actually began to write his epic or, at least, conceived it.
the epic poetry of this period has almost reached its climax. This seems to be particularly true in the case of Valerius Flaccus, since Seneca has been found at the core of many interpretative works examining the intertextual landscape of his Argonautica.
significant influence on Valerius’ detailed sketching of the slaughter conducted by the Lemnian women as well as on the thematic coherence of the second Book as a whole.
when discussion comes to the so-called “Croton episode”, where Encolpius’s
love affair with an aristocratic woman, named Circe, ends rather unsuccessfully
with the protagonist’s famous double sexual failure (Sat. 126.12–128.4 and
131.8–132.5). Although most scholars connect this event with the well-known
impotence theme, especially as treated by Ovid in Am. 3.7, the purpose of this
paper is to move beyond the impotentia, tracing some other, unexplored, elegiac
allusions and illusions in the whole narrative. Thus, it will become apparent that
it is Petronius’s use of erotic motifs as well as the depiction of (stock-) characters
and roleplaying that is further indebted to Ovidian discourse and poetics.
Sexuality and Aggression in Roman humor (New Haven and London:1983) the humorous depiction of
Roman sexuality and eroticism still appears in the core of a number of studies examining the dynamics
of appropriation in Latin love poetry. This paper focuses primarily on the sexually charged literary
humor of a variety of texts (and their intertexts) treating the male sexual incompetence from Catullus’
corpus and Horace’s Epodes to the elegiac distiches of Ovid and the Satyricon of Petronius.
Books by Theodore Antoniadis
Talks by Theodore Antoniadis
Book Reviews by Theodore Antoniadis
On the other hand, discussion about Silius’ attempt to reconstruct Hannibal’s figure in his work may acquire a new interpretative twist, and actually a more ‘intratextual’ one, if viewed through a more philosophical perspective, as the text itself seems to be inviting us to do. So far, the intratextuality of the Punica has been found at the core of many critical studies and theories examining the thematic links between individual books or episodes in order to identify the epic’s larger structure. Taking ira as an intratextual ‘marker’ of generic identity, structure, characterization and plot since the wrath of Achilles in the Iliad, this paper will further apply Seneca’s theory on anger as a tool first to ‘compartmentalize’ the text of Punica 1‒2 into small ‘Stoic chunks’ and then try an alternative, more ‘unified’ reading of the ‘anger motif’ in these two books. Given that for many readers Silius’ narrative of the fall of Saguntum constitutes an ‘epic within the epic’, such a ‘case study’ may help us reconsider the poem’s Makrostuktur in view of the moral climate in which Silius actually began to write his epic or, at least, conceived it.
the epic poetry of this period has almost reached its climax. This seems to be particularly true in the case of Valerius Flaccus, since Seneca has been found at the core of many interpretative works examining the intertextual landscape of his Argonautica.
significant influence on Valerius’ detailed sketching of the slaughter conducted by the Lemnian women as well as on the thematic coherence of the second Book as a whole.
when discussion comes to the so-called “Croton episode”, where Encolpius’s
love affair with an aristocratic woman, named Circe, ends rather unsuccessfully
with the protagonist’s famous double sexual failure (Sat. 126.12–128.4 and
131.8–132.5). Although most scholars connect this event with the well-known
impotence theme, especially as treated by Ovid in Am. 3.7, the purpose of this
paper is to move beyond the impotentia, tracing some other, unexplored, elegiac
allusions and illusions in the whole narrative. Thus, it will become apparent that
it is Petronius’s use of erotic motifs as well as the depiction of (stock-) characters
and roleplaying that is further indebted to Ovidian discourse and poetics.
Sexuality and Aggression in Roman humor (New Haven and London:1983) the humorous depiction of
Roman sexuality and eroticism still appears in the core of a number of studies examining the dynamics
of appropriation in Latin love poetry. This paper focuses primarily on the sexually charged literary
humor of a variety of texts (and their intertexts) treating the male sexual incompetence from Catullus’
corpus and Horace’s Epodes to the elegiac distiches of Ovid and the Satyricon of Petronius.