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This article investigates the relationship between historical/religious memory and the perception of power in the early Sasanian period, and analyses how dynastic reflexes are formulated by religion/tradition in the new system within the context of Ardashir, Kerdir and Mani. It asserts that we can discover the relationship between the Sasanian elites and religion if we understand the factors that mobilised and remodelled their historical memories. Based on these factors, it proposes that the natural relationship established by the Sasanian dynasty during the state-building phase was fuelled by historical/traditional factors rather than by conscious political factors. Thus, the inherent links between the representatives of power and the religious tradition in the reign of Ardashir, founder of the Sasanian state, have been consciously politicised since the reign of Shapur I.
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This article presents the iconographic concept of the bow as an insignia in ancient Iran of the imperial era. The primary source of the bow’s association with the depiction of royal power is Mesopotamian iconography, where the bow is shown in the hands of kings without any connection to the act of shooting itself. The model of depicting a ruler with a bow resting on his foot, developed in the Neo-Assyrian period, was entirely adopted by imperial Achaemenid iconography. Another aspect expressing the association of the bow with royal power is the habit of depicting, in the Mesopotamian tradition, shooting kings without quivers. Iranian art of the Parthian and Sasanid periods, on the other hand, adopted the quiver as a sign of status from the nomadic steppe tradition, but one can nevertheless see in Sasanid iconography relics of the functioning of the bow as an insignia in the Mesopotamian sense.
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The history of the Median period written by Igor Mikhailovich Diakonoff (published in 1956) was translated to Persian by Karim Keshavarz in 1345 Solar year. This book was the product of profound and insightful research of this author that had been done by the request of Azerbaijan Science Academy in that time and its importance at the time of its publication and translation was immense as there had been no single book or other research publication directly covering this period in the Persian literature before. The available historical or archeological information on this period was only limited to the notes of Greek historians and some new western resources. Although those sources were valuable, they could not fill the vacant place of rigidly and accurately written resources for other researchers of this period because they were not based on direct data i.e. scripts, tablets and other archaeological data found during relevant excavations. The difference between Diakonoff’s research and other resources is that he first gives comprehensive information concerning resources from this period, then fully assesses them, and additionally describes the geographical and historical aspects. This makes Diakonoff’s Median book an exceptionally accurate resource in this regard and therefore even after several decades it still remains so important in Iranology and cognition of Iranians. In fact, one can see the immense impact of Diakonoff’s research on the field of the Median history since the translation time until the present time. It has always been one of the main sources cited in historical, linguistic, ethnological, archaeological and interdisciplinary studies by Iranian researchers.
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Economic espionage especially with regard to luxury goods has been known since Antiquity. A key event in economic history of late Antiquity is smuggling of the silk worms, described by the Byzantine historian Procopius of Caesarea in his eighth book of the Wars.
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The priority for the Sasanid rulers was to eliminate from the throne of Armenia, the Parthian Arsacid dynasty, linked by blood ties to the formerly abolished Iranian ruling dynasty. In 298, the Battle of Satala took place in Armenia, in which the Roman army commanded by Caesar Galerius won a crushing victory over the Sassanian troops headed by King Narseh. The Romans captured huge amounts of booty and captured the Persian royal family. The campaign ended with a peace treaty very favourable to Rome, in which Narseh renounced Trans-Tigritania, pledged non-intervention in Armenia, and recognised the Roman protectorate in Iberia. The revision of the so-called Treaty of Nisibis was the foundation of the Persian-Roman wars in the 4th century carried out by Shapur II. In this study, it is aimed to give information about the effect of the Battle of Satala on the beginning of the Persian-Roman wars in the 4th century and its results.
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In this paper we aim to study the monetary examples of Venus dedicated to Julia Domna. The goddess appears in the numismatic records with a series of epithets and although they were initially created with specific connotations, they evolved and were widely employed on the coins of imperial women. The social and political context encouraged some types to be produced more than others at certain times. This is precisely one of the most important aspects that will be reflected upon in this study. Beyond responding to virtues related to the conjugal or maternal sphere, the policy developed by Septimius Severus and continued by his son Caracalla may have been decisive in encouraging the creation of certain coin types in order to transmit a message that was convenient for the state apparatus.
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Royal Elamite inscriptions offer valuable insights into a range of themes related to ancient Iran. However, to date, no Elamite creation myth has been recovered. Nonetheless, there exist indirect references in the inscriptions and rock reliefs that can be used to reconstruct such an account. This study aims to partially reconstruct the Elamite genesis by examining the linguistic and iconographical clues. It is important to note, however, that this primary investigation provides only limited insights into the creation myth in ancient Elam.
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In the course of history, peoples and tribes have given each other designations on the basis of distinctive features, qualities and circumstances. The pretext for the creation of such names was the geographical area, special qualities of a particular people, religious affiliation or epic genesis. With the beginning of the Arab conquests and campaigns in the middle of the 7th century CE, Armenia fell under Arab domination becoming part of the Arab Caliphate within the next decade. The aim of the paper is to present what names were given to Muslims in what historical context, how these names reflected the perception of a different ethnoreligious community.
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Šāh-nāma of Firdowsī and the naqqāli tradition are two distinctive traditions of Iran. Šāh-nāma, an epic that tells the story of pre-Islamic Iran, focuses on a heroic narrative. The naqqāli’s distinctive feature, against the background of other oral traditions, is the combination of heroic and religious narrative in order to spread Shiism in a way that is interesting to the audience. Ferdowsī's work and the naqqāli tradition represent two periods in Iran’s history and its traditions and culture. These periods are separated by the Islamic invasion and the fall of the Sasanid dynasty. Despite some ideological differences, the Šāh-nāma was for a number of centuries one of the sources for naqqāli and from the early period of the Pahlavi dynasty became its main focus. The article briefly discusses the naqqāli tradition, Šāh-nāma of Firdowsī and the relationship between the two. It also introduces the figure of Gordāfarid, daughter of Gaždaham, who, being the heroine of the Persian national epic, became the inspiration for a revolutionary change in the naqqāli tradition – the first naqqāl woman.
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The goal of the present paper is to formulate a concise framework for part of Daniel Boyarin’s work which he is most known for, namely his analysis of sexuality in late antiquity Judaism and the critique of contemporary culture he eventually derived from it, above all his objections to the idea of the Jewish nation-state. Within the brief scope here I intend to provide the reader with a simple roadmap for orienting oneself in Boyarin’s relevant literature. Boyarin, a Jewish-American scholar, traces rabbinic, Jewish-Hellenic, and Pauline texts that he believes were part of one arc of Jewish culture in Palestine of late antiquity, and reveals the discourse that was at the center of this one Jewish culture, namely that the famous debate between Judaism and Christianity was essentially over the interpretation of the physical body and sexuality in the Bible, a debate during which critical cultural decisions were made that still have an impact on Western society today in the realms of gender and identity. Through his original “cultural reading” that employs critical current postmodern methods, Boyarin demonstrates that both have complex ethical and political issues, such as rigid hierarchies, colonialism, and racism, but they also have a lot of promise, namely that by examining them side by side, the possibility of finding a more just alternative for our present and future is increased, through mutual correction of each other.
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In Plato’s diegetic dialogues, as well as in dramatic works, you can find a distinctive feature, an autonomous part opening the work, which is usually called “a prologue”. This term is taken from an ancient Greek drama and means in literal translation “before the content”. In dramatic scenes, which precede the main narrative part of Plato’s dialogues, one of the characters is so interested in the discussion held by Socrates in more or less distant past, that he asks the discussion participant or the person who has some knowledge about it to relate him the debate. The aim of this analysis are the prologues in Protagoras, Phaedo, Symposium, Euthydemus and Theaetetus to answer the question what function in Plato’s dialogue structure they play.
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In book VII of Strabo’s Geography there are passages about the religion of the ancient Germans. One of them mentions the name of the Chatti priest Libes. In two others, the customs of the Kimbrians are mentioned. The purpose of this article is to interpret the religious customs of these peoples, on the basis of which Strabo’s texts are created. In addition to historical data, linguistic and ethnological materials will be used in a comparative approach. A hypothesis will be presented that the considered texts of Strabo describe the Germanic religion subjected to strong Celtic influences. The following conditions were considered. In describing the religion of the Kimbrians, Strabo did not have to use Posidonius regarding them as Celts. Such an assumption results from the analysis of texts. Blood divination rituals are known to be a Celtic tradition, but they were performed by Druids. Among the Kimbrians, gray-haired soothsayers did it. The Gauls did not have women – priestesses. Meanwhile, among the Germans, women dealing in divination played an important role. The Germanic element in the activities of the Kimbrians is also the use of ritual stairs, which Strabo writes about. Archaeological and linguistic research proves the great influence of the Celts on the Germans. Probably Strabo, writing about the Kimbrians as a Germanic tribe, testified to such a process. Regardless of the ethnic identity of the Kimbrians, the picture of their customs given by Strabo is an important source for research on the religion of the Barbaricum peoples.
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The article presents an episode related to the erroneous attribution of the phrase carmina non dant panem to Nemesianus, a Carthaginian poet living in the 3rd century AD, who did not enjoy the due authority among researchers. Later, Nemesianus’ Eclogue IV, which – as a literary space – is an example of an original intertextual collage, was analysed. The analysis of the last Eclogue written by Carthaginian poet shows how he weaved this work out of the poetic tradition concerning the truth about the transience of youthful beauty. Both the Latin sentence carmina dant panem, quoted in Umberto Eco’s novel, and versus intercalaris, quoted ten times in the Nemesianus’ Eclogue, make us think about the most desirable value that is expected from poetry, both from the point of view of the author and the recipient. Eclogue IV reveals the author’s melancholy poetic reverie about the transience of the things of this world, and also shows that the poet does not listen to his predecessors to speak in the same way as them, but he listens to their voices in order to better hear and articulate his own separate voice, as it were a tribute to poetry, which is therapy for the creator.* Działania badawcze wsparte ze środków przyznanych w ramach programu Inicjatywa Doskonałości Badawczej Uniwersytetu Śląskiego w Katowicach.
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The copyist Athanasios monk was in the mid-15th century active in copying numerous manuscripts, some of them on medical topics. Among them, three pass on the sixteen Libri medicinales of Aetius Amidenus, lived in 6th century and one of most important authors for medicine in late antiquity. Among these, two are complete copies made by Athanasius, the manuscript now in Paris and the one at the Mount Athos, but in the case of the Vienna manuscript, which dates back to the 14th century, he was the restorer.By reading these Aetius manuscripts, it was possible to rediscover some fragments of Philagrius, an author lived probably between 3th and 4th century. Among the numerous marginalia in Athanasius’s own hand, new fragments have thus been identified that can be attributed to Philagrius, whose works have come down to us only through indirect tradition, as well as a short passage from the tenth book of Galen’s treatise De anatomicis administrationibus, which is lost in Greek.
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The aim of this article is to analyse two examples of the motif of arboreal metamorphosis in the Neo-Latin bucolic, present in the poems by Jacopo Sannazaro (Salices) and Pierre-Daniel Huet (Vitis). In Salices, nymphs fleeing from the deities are transformed into willows, repeting the fate of Ovid’s Daphne, Syrinx and the Heliades. In Vitis the poet creates a story about a nymph, named Vitis, on the basis of the love story of the satyr Ampelos and Dionysus. For betraying Bacchus, she is turned into a vine and her lover Ulmus into an elm. Their fate is similar to Ovid’s Myrrha and Philemon and Baucis. In the history of Vitis, particularly in the description of the lovers’ metamorphosis, one can see borrowings from Sannazaro. Both bucolic poems are linked by the ambiguity of the ontological status of the newly created plants. They differ in their moral interpretation of metamorphosis. The turning of the nymphs into trees can be understood as some kind of punishment for the rape that had been committed on them. On the other hand, Vitis, who committed treachery, is in fact rewarded and by the will of Jupiter she remains united with her lover forever.
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The article presents the edition and commentary of an adhortatio to learn Greek addressed to the pupils of the Gymnasium Dantiscanum (Gdansk). The text was printed in 1571 as part of an anthology of Greek poems and prose composed by Humanist Michael Retell from Zittau (1530–1576). Retell was invited to Gdansk to organize the recently founded grammar school. Although a number of publications are now available on Retell, reconstructing his biography and commenting on his Latin works, however, there is still a lack of studies on his Greek output. They could help clarify the author’s use of ancient models, since his poems often have bilingual versions, and only the Latin ones have been studied. Moreover they could offer more insight into the school and its scholars during its lesser-known early years of activity (1558–1580).
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The aim of the article is to explain how views on Xanthippe as a wife and Socrates as a husband were verified in modern times, i.e., how the defence of a woman considered the most unbearable in ancient Greece looked like. Four texts served as the most representative examples: Ch.M. Wieland’s short essay on Xanthippe, E. Zeller’s essay entitled Zur Ehrenrettung der Xanthippe and S. Pawlicki’s the fictitious defence speech of Ksantypa (titled The Apology Xanthippe), and L.H. Morstin’s comedy The Apology Xanthippe. It should be emphasized that the above-mentioned writers and researchers of antiquity were clearly influenced by their predecessor.
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The article concerns the possibility of using Latin as a means of communication by the medical community. It is an analysis leading to an answer to the question of the possibility of conveying in Latin the content, which determines the intellectual activity of a modern man. Meeting this challenge requires the introduction of new terms and phrases into Latin vocabulary. The currently used words in the field of medical devices and procedures will be discussed. Motivation of Neo-Latin terms, the reasons for the word transformation and the directions of these changes, as well as calques from modern languages and the issue of terms that can be called ‚loan words returning’ (i.e. words of Latin origin, which survived in modern languages and returned to the Neo-Latin vocabulary, following the path: Latin to modern languages to Latin) will be the subject of the analysis. Finally, it will be focused on the intelligibility and communicativeness of these terms. The purpose of the study was to draw attention to the enormous potential of Latin and to demonstrate that Latin (similarly to modern languages) has the opportunity to meet the challenges posed by significant technological progress and related to its requirement of creating new specialized terms.
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