Poetry and exegesis in premodern Latin Christianity : the encounter between classical and Christian strategies of interpretation /
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This volume investigates various exegetical possibilities in Christian Latin poetry during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. In the Latin West poetry was mainly associated with the powerful pagan tradition of writers like Vergil and Ovid, and by many poetry was considered to tell lies and provide mere entertainment potentially corrupting the soul. Therefore, Christians initially had reservations about this genre and believed it to be incompatible with Christian worship, literacy and intellectual activity. In practice, however, forms of specifically Christian poetry developed from the end of the third century onwards; theoretical reconciliations were developed around 400 A.D. This collection examines specimens of Christian poetry from Juvencus (the first biblical epicist shortly after 300) up to the thirteenth century. Its particular usefulness lies in the combination of literary theory and hermeneutics, close readings of the texts and new readings on a sound philological basis.
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1 online resource (xi, 360 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789047421320 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Philological and historical commentary on Ammianus Marcellinus.
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This is the final volume in the series of commentaries on Ammianus' Res Gestae . The last book of Ammianus Marcellinus' Res Gestae is the most important source for a momentous event in European history: the invasion of the Goths across the Danube border into the Roman Empire and the ensuing battle of Adrianople (378 CE), in which a Roman army was annihilated and the emperor Valens lost his life. Many contemporaries were of the opinion that this defeat heralded the decline of the Empire. Ammianus is sharply critical of the way Valens and his generals handled the military situation, but holds on to his belief in the permanence of Roma Aeterna , reminding his readers of earlier crises from which the Empire had recovered and pointing to the incompetence of the barbarians in siege craft.
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Online resource; title from PDF title page (EBSCO, viewed January 3, 2018). :
1 online resource (362 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789004353824 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Mythical and legendary narrative in Ovid's Fasti /
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This book analyses the mythical and legendary narratives in Ovid's Fasti as narrative and concentrates on the neglected literary aspects of these stories. It combines traditional tools of literary criticism with more modern techniques (taken especially from narratology and intertextuality). From a narratological viewpoint it covers important features such as aperture, closure, characterization, internal narrators, description, space, time and cinematic technique. On the intertextual level it examines the narratives' complex relationship with Virgil, Livy and Ovid's own earlier works. Recent criticism on the Fasti has addressed various elements (religious, historical, political, astronomical et cetera), but detailed narrative study has been wanting. This book fills that gap, to provide a more informed and balanced appreciation of this multifaceted poem aimed at classicists and literary critics in general (for whom all the Latin is translated).
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1 online resource (xiii, 299 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 289-294) and indexes. :
9789047407225 :
0169-8958 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.