Latin Culture Research Articles

Contenuto e significato del prologo al Narciso di Hryhorij Skovoroda

Hryhorij Skovoroda (1722-1794) was an alumnus at the Kyivan Mohyla Academy, an institution founded in 1632 that played a crucial role in Eastern Europe in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Its courses were held primarily in Latin, and Greek and Hebrew were also taught. Skovoroda is considered the last exponent of Ukrainian baroque and founder of Eastern European philosophy. The significant influence of his thinking can be found in many Russian and Ukrainian writers and thinkers. The article focuses on the writing and publication of Skovoroda’s dialogue Narcissus and its Prologue. The figure of Narcissus is, unusually, positive for Skovoroda and connected to the theme of know thyself in the Augustinian sense. He was led to make this association by an iconographic tradition which can be traced back to certain late medieval representations of Narcissus as a symbol of the contemplative life. From the ontological point of view, it is suggested that Skovoroda’s ontology is a Christian Plutarchism: a transformation of Stoic individual hegemony into an ability to grasp the invisible divine, in a perspective close to St. Augustine. The Prologue is Skovoroda’s philosophical testament: an original synthesis of Latin culture and humanism with modernism and Hesychasm’s spirituality.

Defiance of Docile Body : The Dynamics of the Female Body in Three Selected American Plays

Docile | Female Body | American Plays | Foucault | Discipline | Punish | Body Art | Sexuality | Latin Culture | Repressionrecognition | Pain | Native American | Colonizer | Pocahontas | Egyptian | American | Veil | Weight

Tertulliano e la filosofia

Tertullian is an important participant in the early dialogue between Christian faith and Latin culture. The aim of this article is to provide some elements useful in reconstructing the idea of philosophia in the writings of this apologist, following a metaphilosophical approach. After briefly presenting the occurrences of philosophical terms (listed in the Appendix), the Author proposes that Tertullian conceives of philosophia as an erroneous form of knowledge, which is not capable of adequately dealing with reality. Considering Tertullian’s thought from a metaphilosophical perspective could therefore be conducive to better understanding and explaining his negative view of philosophy.

Justinian’s πάτριος φωνή

In the Justinianic Novellae, repeated occurrences of the phrase ??????? ????, meaning the Latin language, are generally believed to be indicative of Justinian?s favourable stance towards Latin culture, Roman tradition, and his own roots. Per se, the importance and dignity of Latin needed no advocacy in the actual environment of the sixth-century Constantinople: not only was the idiom in wide official use, but a fair share of literary production was in Latin, and proficiency in that language was normal with the many admirers and connoisseurs of Roman antiquities. The usual understanding is that by calling Latin the ?father tongue? Justinian never emphasized the contingent fact of its being his own first language, but rather referred to Latin as the primary language of the Roman people and the traditional vehicle of high administration throughout the Empire. In the present paper the use of ??????? ???? (or ?. ??????) is examined in the wider context of earlier, contemporary and later Greek sources, in which it normally means the native language of a foreign individual or ethnicity as opposed to the Greek of the author and his readers; the instances involve a large number of foreign languages, including contemporary spoken idioms as well as traditional languages of different communities. However, the question whether ??????? ???? ever became a context-free denotation of Latin viewed as the traditional language, by all appearances, is to be answered to the negative. On the other hand, the phrase ??????? ???? often assumes the specific task of ?flagging? instances of code-switching in Greek texts, and it is this special purpose that it seems to fulfill more than once in the Novellae as well.

Contemporary Homo Europeicus. Transformation of European Identity

This article explains the origins of European identity, contemporary Homo Europeicus and transformation of European identity. It describes, in a synthetic form, the symbolic sources of European identity like ancient Greek philosophy, Roman law, Christian religion, Barbarian aspects of civilisation and the Age of Enlightenment. It as well describes the circumstances and causes of the crisis of Latin civilization and traditional European Identity in relation to the population boom of Muslims in the Western Europe. Further on, it concludes with an outlook on the role of Postmodernism, Islam, Christian evolutionism, Neo-pagan religion, New Age Movement and Consumptionism in the transformation process of the traditional EuropeanIdentity. Conclusion is an attempt to exemplify the style of Andrzej Wierciński’s scientific approach. This part presents his concept of the peculiarity of the specific human nature which is polarized into the animal side versus the human potential.

The Prologue to the Narcissus of Hryhorii Skovoroda as a Philosophical Testament

The article points out the composition and publication of the dialogue Narcissus and its Prologue, why the figure of Narcissus is for Skovoroda so unusually positive and why it is connected to the theme of “know thyself.” The article also draws an unprecedented parallelism between the “sacred narcissism” of Skovoroda and the “heroic frenzies” of Giordano Bruno. The theoretical meaning of the Narcissus’ figure in Skovoroda’s philosophy is the link between epistemological idealism, self-love (which is a strong ethical and personal commitment, a love of own character and fate) and deification. From the ontological point of view, it is suggested that Skovoroda’s ontology is a Christian Plutarchism: a transformation (by Platonizing and Christianizing it) of the Stoic individual hegemonic into an ability to grasp the invisible divine, in a perspective close to St. Augustine. Finally, we find, in Skovoroda’s philosophical testament, an original synthesis of Latin culture and humanism with modernism and Hesychasm’s spirituality.

MOULDING CULTURAL CHANGE: A CONTEXTUAL APPROACH TO ANATOMICAL VOTIVE TERRACOTTAS IN CENTRAL ITALY, FOURTH–SECOND CENTURIES BC

This article demonstrates how a contextual approach to material culture can help us think about the link between Roman hegemony and cultural change in Republican Italy. It does this by focusing on a particular set of artefacts — anatomical votive terracottas — that have been seen to indicate the spread of Roman and/or Latin culture in central Italy. Although the use of anatomical terracottas may have begun in the vicinity of Rome, communities in central Italy actively engaged with these artefacts according to their own cultural dispositions. Such signs of local agency are especially visible in the way that worshippers in the Apennine areas of central Italy favoured votive terracottas depicting legs, feet and hands, instead of reproductive organs, which were more popular in the Tyrrhenian zone. These findings emphasise the key role of local cultural practice in shaping the effect of accelerated political change on the micro-level.

Likwidacja unii cerkiewnej na Białorusi według Wasyla Lencyka

As a result of the partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth at the end of the eighteenth century more than half of 4 million faithful of the Uniate Church in the Polish-Lithuanian-Ruthenian lands fell under Russian rule. The theory and practice of religious and ethnic policies of the Russian Empire had not allowed the existence of East Slavic Christians minority not subject to the Great Russian Orthodoxy but associated with Rome and Latin culture. The first dissolution of the Church Union performed immediately after the partitions of Poland proved to be only partially successful for tsarist regime. Another liquidation of Church Union during the reign of tsar Nicholas I, completed in 1839, was carried out in the so-called Taken Lands (Western Krai) on the right bank of the Bug River following a carefully prepared and consistently implemented plan of “reforms” of the rite in the Great Russian and Orthodox spirit until completely merge into the state religion. The Work of Vasil’ Lencik, American historian of Ukrainian origin, was the first attempt to bring the researchers and the general public in the Western world the issue of the controversial religious policy of the Russian state in the first half of the nineteenth century. The author argued that the objectives of tsarist religious policy was the complete unification of the East Slavic inhabitants of Belarus and its neighbouring lands with Russia, breaking all ties of hierarchy and clergy with the Latin and Polish culture influence and the destruction of emerging national consciousness among Ukrainian and Belarussian population.

Modernist Concerns and Greek and Latin Culture: Thomas S. Eliot’ s Mythical Method in Thomas C. Wolfe’ s Novels

Thomas Stearns Eliot est le poète et critique américain qui a parlé au début du XX e siècle d’une « méthode mythique » pour décrire la tâche des meilleurs écrivains de l’époque moderniste, qui commence après la guerre de 1914-1918. On étudie ici les caractéristiques de cette méthode telles qu’elles apparaissent dans son grand poème : La Terre gaste . On s’intéresse ensuite à la façon dont le romancier américain Thomas Clayton Wolfe utilise l’élément mythique afin d’écrire une seule et vaste épopée pour les temps de détresse que l’après-guerre a ouverts.

From Dozy’s Source Analyses Towards an Interdisciplinary Approach to Avoiding Muslim and Christian Stereotypes

European scholarship developed a strong a tradition of Oriental studies, especially from the nineteenth century. A Dutch hispanismo was born from the pioneering spirit of some scholars who realized the importance of drawing more attention to the Spanish culture and language in the late nineteenth century. Notably, the history of al-Andalus did not prompt any great interest, except for the scholar Reinhart Dozy whose work exerted a major influence both in his time and later. This article aims to examine whether Dozy’s writings on the topic of the Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula tend to stereotype both the Arab and the Christian Latin cultures as a result of his analyses of historical sources. Some of the Dozy’s source interpretations, which have been thoroughly studied elsewhere, are brought here and refuted in an attempt to raise the issue of the impact of bias in a text presentation when it comes to the reader’s assumption about Muslims and Christians from the medieval historical period. In addition, this article points out some putative determinant factors in Dozy’s analyses of the sources based on his known private and academic life. We may conclude that Dozy’s approach to the subject of Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula fails to present the account of this Iberian period in all its otherness. Nowadays, this abridgment can be overcome with an integrated approach in which perspectives emerging from different disciplines are applied in order to render interesting empirical and theoretical insights.

De la φρόνησις à la prudentia

This paper focuses on the equivalence between Greek phronesis, a very hard word to translate, and Latin prudentia. Based on the word phren, phronesis means ‘thought’, ‘intellectual perception’, ‘sense’, ‘prudence’, ‘practical wisdom’, while prudentia is derived from prouidentia, meaning ‘ability to look ahead’, ‘forecast’, ‘foresight’ and also ‘Providence’. Why, although their etymological roots were apparently different, did the Romans choose the word prudentia in order to translate Greek phronesis? And how did such a translation alter the evolution of the philosophical concept of prudence in Latin culture? It seems that Cicero offers a new analysis of prudentia by dividing the term prouidentia, from which it was formed, into two parts. The prefix pro- alludes not only to Aristotelian phronesis (a virtue especially related to the future and most important in political field), but also to Stoic pro-noia (or Pro-vidence) on a cosmological level, while the Latin verb videre (‘to see’) leads Ciceronian prudence, in ethics, towards a theoretical, i.e. contemplative, wisdom (sophia), inspired by Plato.

The Two Latin Cultures and the Foundation of Renaissance Humanism in Medieval Italy

<i>The Two Latin Cultures and the Foundation of Renaissance Humanism in Medieval Italy</i>

Edukacja kształtująca spełniający się twórczy podmiot – ideałem pedagogicznym cywilizacji łacińskiej

Edukacja kształtująca spełniający się twórczy podmiot – ideałem pedagogicznym cywilizacji łacińskiej

Cultural Factors That Influence the Intervention with Latin-American Minors

This article tries to announce the cultural factors that influence the intervention with Latin-American minors. For it there offers a general vision of the situation that the minors present in some countries of Latin America (Colombia, Ecuador and Dominican Republic) due to the fact that according to information of the last poll of the National Institute of Statistics, in Spain they represent the second group of immigration and if one speaks about minors have a major presence in Spanish soil being outlined the band of age between the 10 to 19 years. It is a study of descriptive character; the interview is in use to key informants who come from Latin America especially from the renowned countries previously. In this investigation, the situation of the minors is described in risk in his native land, the familiar models inside the Latin culture, the role of the man and the woman, the migratory process, the meeting with the culture of reception, the reasons and motives that take these young persons to the formation of gangs, the situation that the same ones present in the Spanish company and which are the cultural guidelines that can influence at the moment of attend users of Latin-American origin. One has thought that the young persons form gangs to find the fondness and the attention, often denied in the home or to be protected from other gangs; on the other hand, it highlights an increase of the feminine headquarters where there is related to the belief increasingly widespread that the children are a private cost that must be taken up office basically for the women; in addition, the young persons observe his parents with the modal of economic but not emotional stability.

Reception

A recent special issue of the Classical Receptions Journal marked the twentieth anniversary of the publication of Charles Martindale's Redeeming the Text. Latin Poetry and the Hermeneutics of Reception. Although the rich and various examples of classical reception scholarship that have appeared over the past two decades are by no means all cut from Martindale's cloth, the ‘seminal’ and ‘influential’ nature of his study is surely not in doubt. It is fitting, then, that this issue's round-up of reception publications focuses on a small cluster of recent studies that, like Redeeming the Text, explore the complex reception histories of Latin literature, and do so with a keen eye to the theoretical underpinnings of such scholarship; fitting, too, that our first title, Romans and Romantics, features Charles Martindale among its editors. The eighteen essays in this collection in fact range well beyond literature, with visual culture and the physical fabric of the city of Rome playing an important role; but encounters with Latin texts are a central component of the book, and the overarching theoretical and methodological framework for examining them bears the clear imprint of Martindale's reception manifesto. The introduction emphasizes the importance of remaining alert to the two-way dynamics of reception: not only do the contributors explore the ways in which Romanticism was shaped by antiquity, but they also examine the impact that Romanticism has had on subsequent views of antiquity. Although the idea of reception as a two-way process is often parroted, its implications are not always interrogated and explained so carefully as they are here. Most valuably, Romans and Romantics acknowledges and confronts the overly simple ‘myths’ that attach to our ideas of both the classical and the Romantic, showing how notions of what Romanticism ‘is’ are just as contingent and subject to distortion as those of the classical. So, for example, Timothy Saunders' fascinating chapter on ‘Originality’ successfully challenges the assumption that Romanticism was in some way antithetical or inimical to Roman studies, and that it was responsible for the lasting negative impression of Latin (literary) culture as imitative and inferior. Instead, he argues, ‘Romantic notions of originality’ (85) were more complex than we might assume, and could certainly find space for recognizing and celebrating Rome's creative use of its Greek heritage. Other chapters offer useful studies of the ‘varied, vital, and mutually sustaining’ (v) interactions between Romantics and Romans, including accessible accounts of key authors such as Shelley, Byron, and de Staël. Particularly worthwhile, though, is the final section, ‘Receptions’. By focusing on post-Romantic material, it lays bare our own modern preconceptions of the Romantic movement and encourages contemplation of how receptions of Romanticism are as important as receptions of Rome. Ralph Pite's excellent chapter on Thomas Hardy, for example, shows how this author, and many of his late nineteenth-century contemporaries, might be disappointed by visiting Rome: their expectations of the city, shaped by their own Romantic inheritance, could be undermined by the revelation of the modernized capital of a newly unified Italy, ‘threaten[ing] the post-Romantic traveller's cherished idea of ‘an eternal city frozen in time’’ (328).

Surviving Childhood Leukemia in a Latin Culture: An Explorative Study Based on Young Adults’ Written Narratives

This study investigated memories of childhood leukemia conveyed by survivors belonging to a Latin culture, exploring whether benefit findings was spontaneously reported, as by non-Latin survivors. Three hundred patients previously treated for leukemia were contacted by post/e-mail and asked to write freely about their illness experience. The 106 letters received were analyzed for narrative structure and content, according to a grounded theory approach. Participants expressed most of the themes conveyed by childhood cancer survivors in non-Latin countries, and benefit finding was spontaneously reported. To the latter, the usefulness of creating and maintaining personal narratives on cancer experience, sustained by health care professionals, is discussed.

Ronald G. Witt, The Two Latin Cultures and the Foundation of Renaissance Humanism in Medieval Italy

Ronald G. Witt, <i>The Two Latin Cultures and the Foundation of Renaissance Humanism in Medieval Italy</i>

Aeternum Dei servitium ad sanctum locum. Pokuta zabójców Pięciu Braci Męczenników w relacji Brunona z Kwerfurtu

Aeternum Dei servitium ad sanctum locum. The Penance of the Murderers of Five Martyred Brethren in an Account by Bruno of QuerfurtThis article is a first attempt at systematically considering the penance imposed by Bolesław the Brave on the assassins of the so-called Five Martyred Brethren, described in Vita Quinquae Fratrum Eremitarum by St. Bruno of Querfurt (BHL 1147). The killers of the hermits were condemned to life-long penance in an abbey founded by Duke Bolesław on the site of the desecrated hermitage soon after the crime (about 1003–1006). The posed research questions concern, predominantly, the reasons for this particular penance, its purpose and character, as well as sources and cultural context in the form of the tradition of monastic penance (Klosterbuße).The conducted analysis leads to a conclusion claiming that putting murderers in monastery was the result of a carefully planned decision of the Polish ruler, taking into consideration a number of the factors, including legal requirements. Comparative survey made it possible to find many significant West European analogies to the penance imposed on murderers of Five Martyred Brethern both in normative sources (capitularies, penitentials, canon law collections, synodal statutes) and those referring to the penitentiary practice of the early Middle Ages. Their confrontation with the account by Bruno of Querfurt demonstrates that the solution accepted by Bolesław the Brave took into consideration regulations known from penitential or canonical tradition condemning the killers of clergymen to life-long penance in a monastery known from the seventh century as servitium Dei. Following their contents, the duke resigned from his original intention to incarcerate the felons in ducal prison or to sentence them to death in favour of chastisement corresponding to standards that should be respected by a Christian ruler. The penalty did not deprive the perpetrators of the perspec tive of salvation.The proposed analysis casts a new light not only on the issue of penitential practice during the Early Piast era but also on the wider problem of the application of regulations borrowed from Western culture in the domain ruled by Bolesław the Brave. The article expands heretofore knowledge about the part performed by Duke Bolesław in binding his state with the circle of post-Carolingian Latin civilisation through a conscious acculturation of Christian customs and norms.

On Being a Doll

On Being a Doll

:The Two Latin Cultures and the Foundations of Renaissance Humanism in Medieval Italy

:<i>The Two Latin Cultures and the Foundations of Renaissance Humanism in Medieval Italy</i>