An eighth-century Latin version of a Greek edition of Aratus preserves valuable ancient scholarship on the Phaenomena, including material not preserved in Greek. Examination of over thirteen thousand Latin–Greek correspondences enables one to interpret passages of the Latin that have so far resisted analysis, including information about an ancient edition equipped with critical signs and commentary, ancient discussion of the primary narratee in Aratus and Homer, and the alternative proem to Anclides (SH 84).

Two conjectures are proposed on Sophocles’ Thyestes (fr. 260a Radt) which restore Sophoclean language and metre.

This paper argues that: (a) the transmitted text of Pind. Nem. 3.35–6 ποντίαν Θέτιν κατέμαρψεν | ἐγκονητί (‘[Peleus] caught the sea-nymph Thetis quickly’) is not the original text of Pindar; (b) ἐγκονητί does not fit the context, is not an attested Greek word and should be eliminated from dictionaries of ancient Greek; (c) Byzantine etymological works, followed by many modern scholars, base their explanations on the late antique form ἀκονητί, which should be eliminated from classical, Hellenistic and imperial texts; (d) the tradition of the Etymologicum Magnum knows the variant ἐγκονιτί (conjectured for Pindar by Bergk) ‘with dust’ (‘with effort’), which seems presupposed by the scholia on Pindar; (e) the form ἐγκονιτί (created on the pattern of ἀκονιτί) is to be preferred in Pindar for reasons of language and content and should be added to the dictionaries of ancient Greek.

In his brief comments on the Abraham-episodes of Genesis 15:1–11, Emperor Julian the Apostate indirectly attacks the apostle Paul's interpretation that Abraham exhibited πίστις as a justifying ‘faith’. Through a close reading of the biblical text, he interprets Abraham as, rather, receiving a divine πίστις—a ‘pledge’ or ‘confirming sign’—during two theurgical rituals. Although modern scholars have overlooked Julian's subtle argument, Cyril of Alexandria recognized Julian's strategy and responded directly. Attention to Julian's and Cyril's competing accounts shows that different conceptual grammars, tied to rival traditional narratives, lay behind their incompatible claims to Abraham and his πίστις.

This article examines the citation of Didymus’ ‘first’ commentary on Pindar's Paeans in Ammon. Diff. 231 Nickau. It argues that the commentary on the Paeans was the first volume in Didymus’ commentary to all of Pindar.

This article proposes that untethering amerina at Stat. Silv. 1.6.18 from Pliny's mention of varieties of apples and pears called Amerina allows us to read the line as instead referring to a type of pastry originating in Umbrian Ameria, which is within ancient naming practices for pastries and fits better into the context of the catalogue in which the line occurs. In this case, the second half of the catalogue is closely akin to the crustulum et mulsum donative of wealthy Italian patrons in the early empire.

This article analyses a clause of the alliance treaty between Sinope and Heraclea Pontica concerning the exiles of both cities (I.Sinope 1, lines 8–15). The clause in question states that the exiles may remain in the cities (ἐν ταῖς πόλεσι διατελεῖν) on condition that they do not commit any crimes and prescribes the measures to be taken should this occur. After explaining the content of the treaty, the existing interpretative proposals on the clause are discussed and the hypothesis that the cities in question are Sinope and Heraclea is put forward; some examples of treaties showing a similar concern to regulate the issue of exiles are adduced. Lastly, considerations are offered as to the reasons that led Sinope and Heraclea to introduce such a treaty clause.

The Corinthian Speech (Corinthiaca) in the corpus of Dio Chrysostom (Or. 31) is attributed to Favorinus (c.80–160) based on internal criteria of content and style. This article argues that a reference to an author of a Corinthian speech found in a collection of sayings in codex Vaticanus Graecus 1144 is a unique external reference to Favorinus as author of this speech.

The anti-Catullan and anti-elegiac perspective characterizing Horace's erotic Odes builds on elements of the biography of his persona found in his juvenile collections, the Satires and the Epodes, where the construction of Horace's poetic autobiography as a lover brings together matters of didactics, ethics and literary criticism.

Different translations of Plutarch's De Pythiae oraculis 404B reflect an interpretative difficulty not yet adequately thematized by exegetes. Plutarch's dialogues on the Delphic oracle describe two perspectives on mantic inspiration: possession prophecy, where the god takes over the prophetess as a passive apparatus, and stimulation prophecy, where the god incites the prophecy, but the prophetess delivers the oracle through her own faculties. Plutarch understands the Pythia at Delphi to exhibit stimulation prophecy, not possession. One of his metaphors for inspiration comes from the theatre: the god ‘puts the oracle into the Pythia's mouth, like an actor speaking through the mask’ (De Pyth. or. 404B [Russell]). Some translators take the metaphor as describing possession prophecy (Goodwin), while others take it as stimulation prophecy (Babbitt)—in other words, it may describe the view Plutarch affirms or the view he rejects. This article assesses the two alternatives, concluding that the theatre metaphor describes possession prophecy.

One of the most remarkable features of the language of early Greek writing is a pervasive rhetorical strategy which consists in personifying objects for the purpose of identifying humans closely associated with them. Such ‘speaking objects’ have no Semitic parallel; how, then, is their conventional status in the Archaic Age to be explained? This article first considers the formulaic language of speaking objects, which is no straightforward transcription of speech, and seeks to explain where it comes from. It then turns to the question of why writers employed the curious strategy of personification by setting it in the broader context of early Greek writing and literature. Variously analogous to herms, slaves and skytalai, speaking objects are shown to have been conceived as messengers acting on behalf of their senders by not speaking in their name.

This article argues that at Lucr. 6.391 (icti flammas ut fulguris halent) fulguris is a corruption, and proposes to read sulpuris instead. While the case against fulguris may in itself not be incontrovertible, the advantages of sulpuris include the acquisition of a new Homeric intertext in Il. 8.135 δεινὴ δὲ φλὸξ ὦρτο θεείου καιομένοιο.

This article identifies an ostracism joke in Menander's Samia (364–6) during a climactic scene in which the Athenian Demeas ejects the titular Chrysis from his house. The joke, uttered by a cook who is reacting to Chrysis’ expulsion, plays on the usage of ὄστρακα—broken pieces of pottery—as ballots in the institution of ostracism. The article proposes that the joke references the final abolition of ostracism during Demetrius of Phalerum's reign and reveals Menander's support for the regime.

The following paper proposes that Sallust offers a conceptualization of civil conflict more in line with the Greek paradigm of stasis than with its Roman counterpart bellum ciuile. In doing so, it argues for the actual coexistence of these two differentiated conceptual strands in the political thought of the Late Republic. To this end, Sallust's corpus is analysed to identify the main threads that articulate civil strife in its multifarious manifestations: how it arises and who its protagonists are or, conversely, how it is kept in check, how it is connected to the human passions that drive ideology, and the violence that stems from the clash between political and familial spheres of influence. The article shows how the pathos of familial drama is what characterizes civil conflict for Sallust, rather than the struggle for legitimacy found in Cicero's narrative.

This article examines the reform of the comitia centuriata in the mid to late third century b.c.e. This involved demoting in voting order the six most prestigious cavalry centuries, distributing the centuries of the first class two per tribe, and assigning one tribe's iuniores to vote first as the centuria praerogatiua. The article argues that this gave more equitable representation to rich citizens from more distant parts of Roman territory, but still preserved the essential military character of the assembly by ensuring that the serving men voted first in any election for consuls and praetors.

This article investigates why Lucretius does not dedicate any section of his poem to atomic size or provide a technical term to describe the concept. This absence is particularly significant because Epicurus’ Letter to Herodotus both uses the term μέγεθος to indicate atomic size and contains a passage reporting specifically on this property. First, the article argues that atomic size and shape are causally redundant in Epicurus’ ontology. Second, it demonstrates that the origin of both shape and size is found in the smallest magnitudes in Epicurean physics, the minima. Drawing on these findings, it concludes that, since atomic size violates the law of parsimony, it is a superfluous entity in the Epicurean system. After analysing passages from the De rerum natura, it suggests that the absence of atomic size in Lucretius may be deliberate. Lucretius’ microphysics works perfectly without introducing a philosophical notion of atomic size, and is more economical and efficient than that of Epicurus.

One of the most distinctive rituals of Roman imperial accession was the adlocutio, the speech delivered by the new emperor to a military assembly, which can be documented from the first to the fifth centuries a.d. This article seeks to explain the extraordinary endurance of this neglected genre of speech by examining its origins, setting and content. After outlining the unusual nature of the accession adlocutio when set against both earlier and contemporary Mediterranean practice, the first half of this article traces its origins to the military culture of the late Roman Republic. In particular, the adlocutio is related to two other rituals which rose to new prominence in the era of the Civil Wars: the acclamation of the victorious general as imperator and the granting of military gifts. In the second part of this article, the setting for the typical adlocutio of the Imperial era is discussed using the often-problematic evidence of our ancient historical sources. The content of the speech itself is then reconstructed primarily through a close reading of our one surviving example, the brief address of Leo I preserved by Peter the Patrician. Finally, the evidence for the origins and content of the speech are brought together in an argument for the speech's survival as a useful tool for emperors seeking to establish a permanent bond with the soldiers they commanded.

This article examines the appearances of Augustus in Suetonius’ Lives of the Caesars outside Augustus' own Life. It shows how Suetonius contrasts the positive image of Augustus drawn in the Life of Augustus with the distortion of this image by Augustus’ successors, depicted in the later Lives. In their reception, he is still presented as an ideal to follow, yet as a role model for cruelty (Tiberius), adultery and military failure (Caligula), or lyre-playing (Nero)—roles which Suetonius’ real Augustus never or only marginally assumed. Thus in a series of close and intratextual readings, this article invites a more general reassessment of Suetonius’ work: it suggests that the Lives of the Caesars draw a more critical image of the Principate than has often been said, that they are more consciously part of an image-making process and, above all, that they should more commonly be understood as one whole work, rather than read individually and in isolation.

This article argues that Caesar puns on the cognomen of Pompey the Great through his use of the adjective magnus at least twice in his Bellum Civile. In each instance, the wordplay contributes to (1) evoking the memory of Pompey's past triumphs and (2) exploring the gulf between past reputation and present reality. By focussing on this particular wordplay, the article contributes to a wider discussion of Caesarean language and wit as well as to studies of Caesar's art of characterization.

This paper defends an interpretation of Plato, Soph. 259c7–d7, which describes a distinction between genuine and pretender forms of ‘examination’ or ‘refutation’ (ἔλεγχος). The passage speaks to a need, throughout the dialogue, to differentiate the truly philosophical method from the merely eristic method. But its contribution has been obscured by the appearance of a textual problem at 259c7–8. As a result, scholars have largely not recognized that the Eleatic Stranger recommends accepting contrary predication as a condition of genuine refutation. After reviewing various proposals to change the text, the paper defends this reading. Finally, the paper turns to the methodological significance of accepting contrary predication. The dialogue depicts contrary predication as an instance of a class of statements that compel the soul's disbelief. Soph. 259c7–d7 suggests that these kinds of statements are a crossroad: one can either reject them and turn to eristic discourse or accept them and practise genuine refutation. The paper reflects on what this indicates about Plato's meditations on contradiction and philosophy.