Weekday Greek

Some closing thoughts on Solon: Generally Solon feels pretty distinctive compared to the other elegy and iamb so far. If you gave me an unseen and asked me to identify if it's Solon, I think I'd do pretty well. In particular, I think of: There's just so much Athens. Athens is frequently named, and generally there's a lot of discussion of contemporary Athenian politics (rich vs. poor, debts, etc.) Linked with this discussion of Athenian politics is moralizing; moralizing is a common feature with other elegy, but Solon is particularly focused on a set of related ideas (hybris, kore, ate) and tying political discussion (especially leaders' success and failure) to those ideas. Some of his moralizing is more general and not so strongly linked to Athens (perhaps selection bias; stuff that's preserved in Stobaeus and Clement of Alexandria). Bits the most like other elegy include the descriptions of various person's lives in Solon 13 (~Semonides 1) and the 7 ages of...

Anchises undid her bra (lit. girdle) and took off her clothes and put them on a chair. Then, by the gods' will and fate, a mortal lay with an immortal goddess without knowing it. At the time when herdsmen bring cattle and sheep back from pasture, then she poured sleep on Anchises, and put her own clothes on. The goddess stood in the hut, and her head touched the roof. Beauty shone from her cheeks like that of the Cytherean. She woke him up and said: "Get up; why do you sleep? Consider whether I seem to be similar to the kind of woman I was when you first saw me." So she spoke. When he saw Aphrodite's neck and eyes, he looked away in fear and covered his face. He begged her: "Right when I first saw you I knew you were a god. You didn't speak truthfully. I beg you, don't let me live in weakness, but have mercy. Since no man lives with flourishing life who has gone to bed with goddesses." Aphrodite responded: "Anchises, don't be afraid of me or...

Solon 36 Of the reasons I assembled the people, which of them was not achieved when I stopped?  In the court of Time Mother Earth would be a witness that I removed the boundaries stones and freed her.  I led back to their homeland Athens many who had been enslaved, some justly, some not, who no longer spoke the Attic tongue. Trembling before their masters, I freed them.  Uniting force and justice I did all this, achieving what I promised.  I wrote laws for the noble and ignoble alike.  An unscrupulous man would have taken the goad and not restrained the people. For if I had been willing to do what either side wanted, the city would have been widowed of many men. So fashioning a defense on every side I whirled like a wolf among dogs. 

Solon 27 A child, still young, grows his teeth and throws them out in his first seven years (0-7). When god fulfills the next seven (8-14), he shows the signs of hebe. In the third (15-21), his beard and limbs grows, changing the skin's flower. In the fourth (22-28), everyone is by far the best in strength, when men reach the peaks of arete. In the fifth (29-35), it's time for a man to think about marriage and to seek the generation of children. In the sixth (36-42), a man's mind sharpens about everything, and he no longer wants to do dumb things. In the seventh (43-49) and eighth (50-56), he is by far the best in mind and tongue. Of both there are fourteen years. In the ninth (57-63), he still is able, but his tongue and wisdom are softer toward great arete. If he should achieve the tenth (64-70) and reach his full measure, not untimely would he obtain death's share. 

Solon 13.57-76 57-62: Others are doctors; but even they have no power. Sometimes a little wound becomes big, and nobody could fix it giving drugs; other times he cures a man stirred with diseases by touching with his hands. 63-6: Fate brings good and evil to mortals; the gifts of the immortal gods are unavoidable. All things have risk, and no one knows where a thing will go once it's begun. 67-70: One man trying to do good falls into unforeseen disaster; another man, doing evil, god gives every good fortune. 71-76: There is no end to wealth. Those of us who have a large livelihood strive for double; what could sate everyone? The gods gave profits to mortals, and from them come disaster, which different people get at different times, whenever Zeus punishes them.

 hAp 139-163 [Aphrodite speaking: "Marry me and tell my parents.] They will send gold and clothing. Do it and offer a charming wedding feast." Desire took Anchises, and he said, "If you are a mortal woman, and Otreus is your famous father, as you say, and if you came here by the will of Hermes, and if you will be called my wife all my days -- if all that, then no god or mortal will prevent me from mingling in love right now. Not even if Apollo shoots painful arrows from his bow. I'd rather climb your bed and enter Hades -- you look just like a goddess." He took her hand. And smiling Aphrodite turned her head away and looked down, and crept to the bed covered with soft blankets. On top were skins of lions and bears that Anchises himself had killed. He took off her adornment, her bracelets and necklaces.

This book is an entry in the "Oxford History of Art" series, aiming to provide a broad overview of art in a particular time and place. This entry looks at art in the mid to late Roman empire, making the central argument that there is meaningful continuity between the pagan high empire & the Christian late empire, and that indeed continuity itself is a key feature of Roman culture (“its ability to reinvent itself while preserving a rhetoric of continuity” 3).  I'm not sure that 'continuity' and 'reinterpreting the past' is a distinctive feature of Roman culture, and I'm not sure that Elsner really means it. He tends to want it both ways: actual continuity & rhetorical rupture when it suits him, and alternatively rhetorical continuity & actual rupture. For example: he offers actual continuity with rhetorical rupture for relics (similar relic movement for Baal and Christians, pp. 215-6), but rhetorical continuity and actual rupture for natural...

hAp 114-136 [Aphrodite speaking: "I know your language]; a Trojan nurse raised me. But as it is, Hermes snatched me from a dance, where we young women were playing and a limitless group had encircled us. He led me through many fields of beasts and unapportioned, uncultivated land of wild beasts. I don't think my feet touched the ground. He said I would be called Anchises' wife, and bear him glorious children. Then he left to go to the gods' tribes. So I came to you out of necessity. I beg you, by Zeus and by your good parents (for no bad parents could have created you). Marry me, a virgin inexperienced in love, and show me to your father, mother, and brothers. 

 hAp 84-113 84-91: Anchises marveled when he saw Aphrodite, at both her appearance, size, and her clothing; for she wore a shining robe, jewelry, and necklaces. She shone like the moon, a wonder to see. Desire took Anchises and he said: 92-106: "Hello Queen, whichever blessed one has come to my house: Artemis, Leto, Aphrodite, Themis, or Athena, or one of the Graces, the gods' friends, or one of the nymphs, who live in groves or who live on this mountain, and springs, and meadows. I will build you an altar on a lookout-place, in a visible spot, and I will perform sacrifices for you in all seasons. And you, benevolently, grant that I be distinguished among the Trojans, and later make me offspring, and grant that I live long and come prosperous to the threshold of old age." 107-115: Aphrodite replied: "Anchises, the most glorious of people, I am no god. Why do you compare me to immortal goddesses? Rather I am mortal, and my mother was a woman. My father's name is O...

 Solon 13.25-56 25-36: Such is the vengeance of Zeus. He never forgets who has a sinner's heart, and in the end they are revealed, some sooner, some later. Even for those who escape, it still comes: the blameless pay it back, their children or further generation. We mortals, good and bad alike, think that each person's reputation goes well until they suffer. And then they mourn; until then, they rejoice slack-jawed in empty hopes. 37-42: Those who are sick are convinced they will be healthy. The cowardly and ugly think they are brave and beautiful. The poor man, oppressed by poverty's works, thinks surely he will acquire wealth.  43-56: Everyone hurries everywhere. One wanders on the sea, tossed by harsh winds, eager for profit, careless of their soul. Another is a servant on the land for a year. Another assembles a living learned in the works of Athena and Hephaestus. Another [assembles a living] taught gifts from the Muses, understanding the measure of wisdom. Another Apo...

 hAp 68-83 She [Aphrodite] reached Ida, the mother of beasts, and went straight to the hut. Behind her came wolves, lions, bears, and panthers. She delighted and threw desire in their hearts, and they lay down two-by-two in shadowy haunts. She found the hero Anchises left alone. The others all followed cattle in grassy pastures, but he left alone went here and there playing the guitar thrillingly. Zeus' daughter Aphrodite stood in front of him, looking like a single girl, so that he didn't get scared.

 Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite 45-67 45-52: And Zeus put in her own heart a desire to mingle with a mortal man; in order that she not be deprived of a mortal bed, and in order that Aphrodite, who laughs sweetly and loves to smile, never boast among the gods that she made gods and goddesses mix with mortal men and women. 53-67: He put in her heart a desire for Anchises, a cowherd on Ida like the gods in form. When Aphrodite saw her, she fell in love; she went to her temple at Paphos and closed the doors; the Charites bathed and oiled her, and she put on beautiful clothing. She rushed toward Troy high and easily in the clouds.  Anchises, another Trojan prince cowherding on Mt. Ida -- cf. his son Aeneas (Il. 20), Paris (Cypria, not in Il. I think); and also other stray relatives like Melanippus (Il. 15.547). Some discussion in Gutzwiller: https://books.google.com/books?id=rJmFvRNHbo4C&pg=PA27 . Lots of emphasis among the Trojans on pasturing; increasingly thinking that there are ...