Among Ovid’s love poems, there is one that stands out among the rest due to the stark reality of the subject. I believe it must have arisen from Ovid’s own love life. It is a personal, passionate and powerful poem against domestic violence. Excerpts: Put my hands in manacles (they are deserving of chains), if any friend of mine is present, until all my frenzy has departed. For frenzy has […]
Read moreCategory: Classics
Greco-Roman and Eastern Classics: Mythology, Philosophy, Literature.
“The Art of Love” by Ovid
Twelve love tips from Roman gods and heroes 1. First and foremost, be confident that all women may be won. As the numberless ants come and go in lengthened train, when they are carrying their wonted food in the mouth that bears the grains; so rush the best-dressed women to the thronged spectacles. They come to see, and be seen. Romulus and his men swept the Sabine damsels off their […]
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“The Works of Lucian of Samosata” by Lucian
Lucian, an Assyrian who lived during the Roman Empire and wrote in Greek, was known for his witty satires. A Pagan Perception of Christians Lucian’s depiction of Christians in antiquity is almost sympathetic by his standard, and perceptive as well: The Christians, you know, worship a man to this day — the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account. … The activity of these […]
Read moreMoralia: VI. Alexander and the Republic of Zeno
Plato wrote a book on the One Ideal Constitution, but because of its forbidding character he could not persuade anyone to adopt it; but Alexander established more than seventy cities among savage tribes, and sowed all Asia with Grecian magistracies, and thus overcame its uncivilized and brutish manner of living. Although few of us read Plato’s Laws, yet hundreds of thousands have made use of Alexander’s laws, and continue to […]
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“The True History” by Lucian
The motives of my voyage were a certain intellectual restlessness, a passion for novelty, a curiosity about the limits of the ocean and the peoples who might dwell beyond it. The Island of the Blest As we drew near it, a marvellous air was wafted to us, exquisitely fragrant. Its sweetness seemed compounded of rose, narcissus, hyacinth, lilies and violets, myrtle and bay and flowering vine. There were meadows and […]
Read moreMoralia: The True Meaning of “Eye for Eye”
Plato writes in “Phaedrus” that if Wisdom has a visible image, men would be transported by her beauty and loveliness, and be roused to pursue wisdom above all else. But alas, we have no eye for wisdom; Plutarch relates a story of the legendary lawgiver Lycurgus that suggests the true meaning of the law, “eye for eye”. The well-to-do citizens resented Lycurgus’ radical reform, denounced him and pelted him, wishing […]
Read more“Constitution of the Lacedaemonians” by Xenophon
Education of the Spartan Youths Their voice you would no more hear, than if they were of marble, their gaze is as immovable as if they were cast in bronze. You would deem them more modest than the very maidens in their eyes. In other states equals in age associate together, and such an atmosphere is little conducive to modesty. Whereas in Sparta Lycurgus was careful so to blend the […]
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