Quelques reflets de la guerre russoroumano- turque de 1877-78 dans les littératures grecque et roumaine: « Moskov Sélim » et « Le Lieutenant Sterie »

Author(s): Ekkehard Wolfgang Bornträger / Language(s): French Issue: 2/2016

Article’s attempt is to apply a comparative approach to the literary reception of the Russo/ Romanian-Turkish War of 1877-78. By crossing different national perspectives, the article focuses on two characteristic (albeit not necessarily representative) literary works, a novel by the Greek author Georges Vizyinos and a Romanian short story by Duiliu Zamfirescu. In dealing with this conflict, both texts in a relatively modern and “individualistic” way, address the dilemma of conflicting moral duties or national allegiances. In the case of Vizyinos, the extravagant Turkish “hero,” Moskov-Selim of the novel of the same title participates in the legendary defence of the Ottoman fortress of Plevna. The cynical and pitiless attitude of his own army towards him and the benign and civilised treatment he receives as a Russian prisoner of war make him a fervent champion of reconciliation between the Russians and Turks. Although he even considers switching loyalty, he finally remains a faithful (yet enlightened) Ottoman subject. Zamfirescu’s character Sub-Lieutenant Sterie in the novel Sub-Lieutenant Sterie, deeply shocked and being in material hardship after the death of his only brother on the battlefield has to choose between patriotic obligations and caring of his family. He wants to comply with the order of mobilization, but his family urges him to ask for an exemption to which he is legally entitled as the only surviving brother. The article summarises the “message(s)” of these texts and puts them in a wider context of contemporary war literature of the same era.

REFLECTIONS ON DOMESTICATION: “TAME” AND “WILD” IN THE AESOPIC ANIMAL FABLES

Author(s): Tua Korhonen / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2017

The focus of this paper is a complex literary genre – the Aesopic fables – where animals are portrayed as agents, and the basic question rests on how “the animal’s point of view” and the “animality” of its depiction of animals are manifested. By using philosopher Clare Palmer’s conceptualizations, it is to be shown that although the Aesopic animal fables function as moral allegories,they may also explicate and reveal differing kinds of views on domestication and of such categoriesas “tame” and “wild” – especially the versions that are told by Babrius. Domestic animals can be depicted as a part of the household with different roles and different statuses, but domestication can also be represented as a form of slavery for animals in contrast to the human-free existence of the wild animals, and the reason for domestication is that humans have more or less cheated animals into working for them (as an aetiology of domestication).

THE GOLDEN FLEECE AND THE GOLDEN-FLEECED RAM: TESTIMONY AND INTERPRETATION OF ANCIENT LITERARY SOURCES

Author(s): Vita Paparinska / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2017

The Golden Fleece figures in Greek mythology as the objective of the voyage of the Argonauts. The incompatability of the object of the search with the effort invested in its acquisition has furthered discussion of the real meaning of the Golden Fleece, which has generally been accepted to be a metaphor since antiquity. Modernity, especially at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, has been productive and inventive in the decipherment attempts of the metaphor’s hidden meaning. A number of interpretation theories has been developed, which, though interesting and well argumented, are sometimes highly divergent from the interpretation of the Golden Fleece in the ancient sources. A proper understanding of the original or close to original meaning of the metaphor of the Golden Fleece requires a scrupulous look at ancient Greek and Roman testimony, an overview of which the paper intends to provide.

Graikiško Odarion’o (1604) šv. Kazimiero garbei autorystės problema

Author(s): Tomas Veteikis / Language(s): Lithuanian Issue: 3/2006

The present article focuses on the question of the authorship of the Greek Odarion to St. Casimirus, one of the most outstanding pieces of Greek poetry in Early Modern Lithuania, recently famed for its dual versification. This amusing piece of work, located in the collection of the panegyrical texts to the same saint, carrying the title THEATRVM S. CASIMIRI, IN QVO IPSIVS PROSAPIA, VITA, MIRACVLA, & illustris pompa in solemni eiusdem apotheoseos instauratione, Vilnae Lithuaniae Metropoli V. Id. Maij, Anno D[omi]ni M. DC. IV. instituta graphice proponuntur. […] Editum ibidem [sc. Vilnae], eodem anno [sc. 1604], operis Typographicis Academiae SOCIETATIS IESV, was performed orally during the solemnities that took place 10–12 May in 1604 in Vilnius due to the recent canonization of this saint. The true author of this collection is actually unknown and the same is applicable to the Odarion. Gregorius Swięcicki, the member of Vilnius chapter, whose name appears in several parts of the convolute (especially, under the short introductory letter Author Lectori), is generally being taken as an author’s name for the whole printed collection (including Odarion). This position was recently questioned due to the detection of one more important part of the convolute, the so-called Pompa Casimiriana written by certain Quirinus Cnoglerus Austrius. The main idea of this article is to reveal the complicated cultural, educational and confessional surroundings of such a litterary composition as Odarion and give several suggestions concerning the personalities who might be called its authors. First of them is Austrian “philhelenic” humanist and probably convertite Quirinus Cnogler, the author of the panegyrical oration (sermo panegyricus) Pompa Casimiriana (s. l., s. a. [=Vilnae 1604?]) and a number of occasional, publicistical, polemical writings of different scope. Another “candidate” is Swedish poet Laurentius Boierus (1561–1619), the author of Carolomachia (Vilnae, 1606) and meanwhile unknown, not-extant poem Pompa Casimiriana (Brunsbergae, 1604), mentioned by various Jesuit bibliographies. Finally, the third of the „candidates“ is Ioannes Kraykowski of Polish/Lithuanian origin, the student of rhetoric at Vilnius Jesuit college, the author of various occasional Latin and Greek verses and one larger poem, Epos de S. Casimiro (Vilnae, 1604), composed for the mentioned solemnities of S. Casimirus and dedicated to his patron Fabian Plemięcki. The article doesn’t solve the problem of the authorship of Odarion completely and leaves the question open. Nevertheless, a certain strand of tentative conclusions is to be drawn. First of all, the authorship of Gregorius Swięcicki is to be reduced, reserving him only the name of the organizer or co-author of the whole collection (Theatrum S. Casimiri). The role of all the professors and students (especially the members of pious congregations and rhetorical/poetical ‘academies’) of Vilnius Jesuit academy is to be stated more firmly, too. Certain lexical and methodological affinities between Odarion and a couple of Greek compositions of Ioannes Kraykowski (including his Greek Odarion, written in dactylic tetrameters) enable us to state the hypothesis that he was its actual author. Nevertheless, the outstanding “philhelenism” of Quirinus Cnoglerus and the intricate manner of the self-camouflage (writing suppresso nomine) of Laurentius Boierus still remain as a serious claim for the name of the author of Odarion.

О семантических связях между басней и ее моралью (на материале басен Эзопа)

Author(s): Elena Viktorovna Padučeva / Language(s): Russian Issue: 2/1977

Любое исследование басни исходит из того, что человек способен осознавать соответствие между басней и моралью. Во всяком случае, на гипотезу о наличии такой способности опирается любое доказательство несоответствия между содержанием басни и моралью. Возьмем, например, известный анализ басен Крылова, проведенный Л. С. Выготским [1], который обнаруживает, в частности, что содержание басни «Ворона и лисица» не соответствует тезису Лесть гнусна ( = ‘Льстец гнусен’); что басня «Стрекоза и муравей» не убеждает в моральном превосходстве муравья, поскольку наши симпатии полностью на стороне стрекозы; что в басне «Лебедь, щука и рак» дело вовсе не в том, что в товарищах согласья нет и т. д. Ясно, что этот анализ может быть обращен только к такому человеку, который обладает интуитивным представлением о соответствии между басней и моралью.

Narodzenie z wody i z Ducha w J 3,5 jako gwarant dostąpienia królestwa Bożego

Author(s): Krystyna Kern / Language(s): English,Polish Issue: 23/2019

The article presents a new look at the subject of the birth of water and of the Spirit (John 3:5) which is necessary for attainment of the kingdom of God. It is a new birth for the Christian in his life. The explanation of the meaning of the birth of water and of the Spirit is difficult, because it is found only once in the Holy Bible (John 3:5). In this work it is discussed the meanings of words “water” and “spirit” in the phrase “to born of water and the Spirit” (John 3:5). The pericope John 3:1-21 is compared with other texts of the Holy Scripture (especially with the Gospel of John, the Letter to the Galatians and the Book of Ezekiel). In the Gospel of John and the Letter to the Galatians there is an opposition between the flesh and the Spirit (John 3:6 and Gal 5:19-23). The meanings of deeds done in God (John 3:21) and of the fruit of the Spirit (Gal 5:22-23) can mean the same. People who do the deeds of the flesh “shall not obtain (not inherit) the kingdom of God” (Gal 5:21). The text Gal 5:4-6 is very important, because it shows the importance of Christ and the Spirit in the Christian life. In the Book of Ezekiel God promises the sprinkling of clean water, a new heart, a new spirit and a gift of His Spirit (Ezek 36:25-27). Jesus Christ is “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29) and “baptises with the Holy Spirit” (John 1:33).

Echoes of Sapphic Gods and Goddesses, Immortality, Eros and Thanatos in the Work of Modernist Women Poets

Author(s): Iris Rusu / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

In the context of Modernism’s constant return to the past that results in self-knowledge and innovation, certain women writers found Sappho’s writings relevant for their own poetic endeavours. My article will mainly focus on the mythological aspects of both Sappho’s and the modernist women’s poetry. Invocations of and allusions to gods and goddesses and other mythical figures, which involve introspection and expressing certain erotic concerns in stylised ways, will be discussed in order to show how all these women poets innovated. and, in many different ways, significantly enriched the literature of their times. Critics have mainly focused on H.-D.’s poetry in relation to Sappho’s, most likely because the modernist poet had also translated (or adapted, according to most scholars) a number of Sappho’s poems. As regards other modernist women poets, such as, for instance, Amy Lowell or Marianne Moore, critics have refrained, for various reasons, from analysing their work in relation to Sappho’s. There are very few critical accounts of Sappho’s influence on their (and even H.-D.’s) poetry, and this article will, perforce, draw on these, but aims, all the while, to provide new and relevant insights.

Poza strukturą. Metonimia i tradycyjne obrazy w eposach Homera

Author(s): Jędrzej Soliński / Language(s): Polish Issue: 10/2020

The article discusses the question of traditional images in Greek epic poetry, which are based on metonymy, coexisting with themes and type-scenes and stabilising the epic song. Firstly, I present a sketch of oral theory, originally presented by M. Parry and A. Lord. Secondly, I deal with the question of the type-scenes in Homeric epics and Russian oral epic songs—the middle element of A. Lord’s oral song structure. After that, I move on to cognitive theory and its application to Homeric epics, especially in the matter of cognitive scripts as a basis for the construction of type-scenes. Furthermore, I connect cognitive theory with M. Nagler’s Gestalt, A. N. Sabynin’s DRK-structures and J.M. Foley’s traditional referentiality, which are based on a metonymy. On that basis, I present some examples of traditional images of “house” in the Odyssey, which consist of recurrent elements, such as “megaron,” “bedroom,” “wife,” “children,” etc. The singer evokes the traditional image of the “house” using metonymy. The analysis of examples reveals that these images, regardless of the exact words used by the singer, are stable—just as the type-scenes built on M. Clark’s basic scaffolding

Die Antike Biographie als Hintergrund des Evangeliums

Author(s): Milan Kostrešević / Language(s): German Issue: 1/2020

This essay continues the critique of perceived evangelical exceptionalism by providing a detailed study of the genre of biography in antiquity. While some scholars claim that the Gospels were a literary anomaly without clear precedents, we instead claim that they are an innovative variation of the classical biographical tradition. By classifying the Gospels into this generic classification, we work to establish an access to this literature that is historically grounded and does not seek the presumed religious ‘community’ of the author in the rhetorical framework of their writings.

Thomas A. Szlezak: Was Europa den Griechen verdankt. Von den Grundlagen unserer Kultur in der griechischen Antike

Author(s): Zoran Andrić / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 2/2012

BATILAŞMA DÖNEMİNDE İSTANBULİSTANBUL’DA RUM CEMAATİNİN EĞİTİMİ

Author(s): Nikolaos LIAZOS / Language(s): Turkish Issue: 17/2021

The Imperial Decree of 1856 became the occasion for the reorganization of the millet, in the non-Muslim communities constituting the Ottoman society of the 19th century and reaffirmed their prerogatives. Communities were first invited to form assemblies to reorganize their internal affairs. The Greek communities of Istanbul could then rebuild new schools and repair the old buildings along with their churches and hospitals. At the same time, a major innovation of the Decree allowed the establishment of public science schools, ensuring that students have the right to attend higher education after elementary primary education. The conditions within the boundaries of the Ottoman Empire, especially after the Tanzimat (1839), Islahat (1856) reforming decrees and the sultan Abdulhamit II’s (1876) reform, have been proved to be appropriate for the advancement of a more modern education for Greek students in Istanbul.

An inquiry into the use and meaning of the forms ἔθηκε(ν) and θῆκε(ν) in the Iliad: Syntax and semantics

Author(s): Filip De Decker / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2020

In this article, I discuss the use and absence of the augment in the 3rd singular forms ἔθηκε(ν) and θῆκε(ν) in the Iliad. In the previous article (De Decker 2020), I explained why I chose this corpus and determined the value of the different forms. Here I proceed to the actual analysis of the forms: do they confirm the previous syntactic and semantic observations that have been made for the use and absence of the augment (the clitic rule by Drewitt and Beck, the reduction rule by Kiparsky and the distinctions: speech versus narrative, foreground versus background and remote versus recent past)?

CONSTANTINE LASCARIS, HIS MANUSCRIPTS AND HIS ETHICAL CONCERNS

Author(s): Juan Felipe Gonzalez-Calderon / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2021

This article aims to examine Constantine Lascaris’s work on Aristoteles’ ethical corpus. We consider evidence from the textual witnesses of the Nicomachean Ethics, the Eudemian Ethics, the Magna Moralia, and some other minor ethical writings, which belonged to Lascaris, in order to reconstruct his working methods. We also explore Lascaris’ own statements about virtuous life; a life devoted to the service of the common good, to philosophy and to the study of texts. For him philosophy was a way of life, rather than simply a discourse. We look at the link between written culture and philosophical life and propose further research into how Byzantine and Renaissance scholars understood their own intellectual activities to be a special kind of spiritual exercise intended to promote moral improvement in both individuals and societies.

The Slavic Homer: From Grigorios Stavridis to Grigor Prličev

Author(s): Małgorzata Borowska / Language(s): English Issue: 10/2021

In 1860 Stavridis/Prličev’s poem Armatol unexpectedly won him the University of Athens poetry competition, which met with opposition from part of the Greek community and a smear campaign in the press. Despite his declarations of having a “Hellenic heart”, the author from Ohrid was not well received by Athenian society. He took part in the competition once more two years later, this time trying to match Homer himself and presenting an extensive though unfinished epic poem with Gjergj Kastrioti Skanderbeg as the protagonist. The paper, which serves as an introduction to the Polish translation of Skanderbeg, contains extensive excerpts from the reports of both competition committees, chaired by Alexandros Rangavis, especially the second one, when the judges justified why they could not award Stavridis the prize despite being impressed with his poem. His disappointment at his cool reception and his failure in the competition most likely contributed to a radical change in the attitude of the Slavic Homer, who not only stopped “serving Greece” but began vigorously eliminating any Greek influences in his native Ohrid.

The Marginalised Romani Culture in Greek Society and Its Portrayal in Greek Children’s Literature

Author(s): Meni Kanatsouli,Rosy-Triantafyllia Angelaki / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2022

In Greek children’s literature, very few books deal with Roma children, especially in a protagonist role – therefore, the aim of this article is to examine literary representations of Roma children. The four books presented in this paper help the youngest readers understand how marginalised this social group is in the context of Greek society. Adopting the basic principles of multicultural literature as well as the method of imagology or cultural iconology, it can be said that prejudices and stereotypes are projected through literary characters. In addition, the perpetual persecution of the Roma people is revealed in the works analysed herein, including their genocide during the Second World War. The ideological stance of the books is one of friendliness towards Roma children, even though the racist and suspicious attitude of non-Roma is not in any way glossed over or concealed. In conclusion, according to the authors of the article, what is missing in Greek and European children’s literature is the authentic portrayal of Roma and the authentic voices of Roma writers.

The difference between the optative and the “modal” indicative in Homeric Greek: four case studies. Part 1: The optative

Author(s): Filip De Decker / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2022

In epic Greek both the optative and the indicative (the so-called “modal indicative”) can be used in contexts where the degree of realization is uncertain or even impossible, while in Attic Greek only the indicative is used. In these two articles I discuss whether there is a difference between the optative and the modal indicative in these contexts and/or if it can be determined which was the original mood. As there are about 1500 optatives and 250 modal indicatives in Homer, it is not possible to discuss them all and, therefore, I focus on the passages in which aorist forms of γιγνώσκω, βάλλω and of ἴδον appear, and those conditional constructions in the Odyssey in which the postposed conditional clause is introduced by εἰ μή with either a “modal” indicative or optative. The corpus comprises 100 forms (80 optatives and 20 indicatives), but in each example I also address the other modal indicatives and optatives in the passages, which adds another 50 forms to the corpus. In this part (part 1) I address the optative. First, I provide an overview of the research on the optative in Homeric Greek, discuss the different suggestions for the co-existence of the optative and indicative in these uncertain and/or unreal contexts, explanations which can be summarized into two categories, those assuming that the indicative replaced the optative and those arguing that both moods were original, but had different meanings. Then I explain why this corpus was chosen, prior to the analysis that focuses on two elements, namely the temporal reference (does the mood refer to the past or not) and the degree of possibility (is the action described likely, possible, remotely possible or unlikely/impossible). Initially I consider the optatives with a past reference, then the optatives that could be interpreted as remotely possible or unlikely/impossible (“irrealis” in the terminology of Classical Philology) and conclude by discussing two passages that have been reused in the epics in different contexts with different protagonists and, consequently, with different modal meanings for the same forms. The conclusion of the first part of the article is that the optative was at the most unreal extreme of the irrealis-continuum and could initially refer to the present and future, as well as the past, but that the instances in which there was an exclusive past reference were (very) rare.

Цветовете в поезията на Дионисиос Соломос

Author(s): Teofana Angelieva / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2008

Неоконченный труд Фукидида

Author(s): Dmitri Panchenko / Language(s): Russian Issue: 2/2022

Thucydides' statement that he described the entire war up to the surrender of Athens (V, 26, 1) must be taken in strict accordance with his words. On the whole, his work was completed; all that remained was to fix, supplement, decorate. The fact that in the published version the text breaks off at the presentation of the events of 411 is due to the following circumstances. During his stay in Athens, where he returned in the early summer of 404 after almost twenty years of exile, Thucydides introduced individual parts of his work to those who wish. There was a rumor about the work of Thucydides. The attention of Lysander's friends and henchmen was attracted by the presence in the work of detailed information about the establishment in Greek cities of political clientele, who were much more dependent on Lysander than on the Spartan state. The kings and other persons in the Spartan government, pushed into the background by Lysander, saw these actions of Lysander as the basis for the gradually carried out coup d'état by him. Authoritative information about the clientele founded by Lysander could pose a great danger to his career. Meanwhile, Thucydides, for some reason, returned to his Thracian possessions. Lysander went there too. In the fall of 404, Thucydides was murdered, and the manuscript of his work was stolen. Everything that seriously compromised Lysander was removed from it; the rest was saved and taken to Sparta. In the spring of 395, Lysander died in a battle. In the fall of 394, Agesilaus, who had returned to Sparta from Asia, searched the house of Lysander in order to find materials revealing that he was preparing a coup d'état. Along with the planted fake, books of the history of Thucydides were also discovered. After making sure that they did not contain anything fundamentally harmful to Spartan politics, Agesilaus handed the manuscript to Xenophon, an officer of his army, an Athenian exile and a credible writer. Xenophon published the intact part of the manuscript as it was, without editing it. The materials of the damaged part formed the basis of the first two books of his Hellenica.

Язык в эсхатологической перспективе и перевод Писания на греческий в сборнике мидрашей Деварим рабба

Author(s): Uri Gershowitz / Language(s): Russian Issue: 2/2022

Eschatology is one of the most important themes of Talmudic literature. With all the variety of end-time concepts and the abundance of research on the subject, the connection between universal deliverance and language remains overshadowed. This article is analyzing a composition from Debarim Rabba 1:1 that expresses the idea of improvement of the human language as a sign of the future world. What will lead to this improvement? One of the possible answers: translation of the Scripture into Greek. This answer, rather unexpected for the Sages of Talmud, will be analyzed in the context of the history of the attitude towards the Greek language in the Jewish culture of Late Antiquity. An image of a river, flowing out of the Temple from Ezekiel's prophecy (ch. 47), as an improved language of the universe, will be compared with Philo of Alexandria's concept of language.

Reception of Sophocles’ Antigone in the Baltic States

Author(s): Maria-Kristiina Lotman,Līva Bodniece,Jovita Dikmonienė / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2022

This paper analyzes the translations of Antigone by Sophocles and later authors and the performances based on them in the theaters of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. It investigates the necessity to translate the Antigone dramas by Sophocles, Jean Anouilh and Janusz Głowacki into national languages and stage them in theaters. The article analyzes how these works are related to the history of the Baltic countries. This paper is divided into three subparts that match the historical periods from the end of the nineteenth century to the beginning of the twenty-first century. The most important performances of Antigone in the Baltic countries are analyzed, highlighting the individual style of each director and their attention to the form and expression of the performances. The main themes revealed by the artists of the Baltic countries are conscious self-sacrifice for one’s neighbor and individual resistance to conformity and tyranny.