This collection of essays on the Byzantine culture of war in the period between the 4th and the 12th centuries offers a new critical approach to the study of warfare as a fundamental aspect of East Roman society and culture in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. The book's main goal is to provide a critical overview of current research as well as new insights into the role of military organization as a distinct form of social power in one of history's more long-lived empires. The various chapters consider the political, ideological, practical, institutional and organizational aspects of Byzantine warfare and place it at the centre of the study of social and cultural history. Contributors are Salvatore Cosentino, Michael Gru nbart, Savvas Kyriakidis, Tilemachos Lounghis, Christos Makrypoulias, Stamatina McGrath, Philip Rance, Paul Stephenson, Yannis Stouraitis, Denis Sullivan, and Georgios Theotokis. See inside the book.

The story of humanity is the story of textiles-as old as civilization itself. Textiles created empires and powered invention. They established trade routes and drew nations' borders. Since the first thread was spun, fabric has driven technology, business, politics, and culture. In The Fabric of Civilization, Virginia Postrel traces this surprising history, exposing the hidden ways textiles have made our world. The origins of chemistry lie in the coloring and finishing of cloth. The beginning of binary code-and perhaps all of mathematics-is found in weaving. Selective breeding to produce fibers heralded the birth of agriculture. The belt drive came from silk production. So did microbiology. The textile business funded the Italian Renaissance and the Mughal Empire; it left us double-entry bookkeeping and letters of credit, the David and the Taj Mahal. From the Minoans who exported woolen cloth colored with precious purple dye to Egypt, to the Romans who wore wildly expensive Chinese silk, the trade and production of textiles paved the economic and cultural crossroads of the ancient world. As much as spices or gold, the quest for fabrics and dyes drew sailors across strange seas, creating an ever-more connected global economy. Synthesizing groundbreaking research from economics, archaeology, and anthropology, Postrel weaves a rich tapestry of human cultural development.

Solon, the first poet of Athens, had a formative influence on later poetry, including tragedy. Using an integrated literary, historical and philological approach, Maria Noussia Fantuzzi studies the poetry of Solon and offers a thorough analysis of the multifaceted art of this poet, sage and political actor and his place in the history of literature. Issues which she addresses include the transmission of the poems, the use of strategies of persuasion in the creation of an authoritative voice, and the author's immediate political and social context. As well as providing insight into Solon, her book enriches our understanding of archaic literature and the ways in which the culture of Athens was prepared for the 'miracle' of the fifth century.

Written by an international cast of experts, The Materiality of Text showcases a wide range of innovative methodologies from ancient history, literary studies, epigraphy, and art history and provides a multi-disciplinary perspective on the physicality of writing in antiquity. The contributions focus on epigraphic texts in order to gauge questions of their placement, presence, and perception: starting with an analysis of the forms of writing and its perception as an act of physical and cultural intervention, the volume moves on to consider the texts' ubiquity and strategic positioning within epigraphic, literary, and architectural spaces. The contributors rethink modern assumptions about the processes of writing and reading and establish novel ways of thinking about the physical forms of ancient texts.

David L. Thurmond's From Vines to Wines in Classical Rome is the first general handbook on winemaking in Rome in over 100 years. In this work, Thurmond surveys the biology of the vine, the protohistory, history, viticulture, winemaking, distribution and modes of consumption of wine in classical Rome. He uses a close reading of the relevant Latin texts along with a careful survey of relevant archaeology and comparative practices from modern viticulture and oenology to elucidate this essential element of Roman culture.

This book presents the results of a major project carried out by a team from the Universidad Autonoma de Madrid and the 14th Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities at Lamia. The book gives a full picture of a extensive area of Greece known as Epicnemidian Locris, on which very little has been studied and published in the past. Its relevance in historical times was due to its natural environment and mainly on the pass at Thermopylae, which marked the physical boundary between central/northern Greece and the south, being the scene of repeated conflicts. The book offers a a complete picture of what Epicnemidian Locris was like in the past: its geography, topography, frontiers and the ancient settlements of the region.

Traces the anthropological and ethnological theories of the ancient Greeks and Romans from the creation of the world to the invention of the Americas. In ancient Greek and Roman thinking, whether the world is flat or spherical it will have imaginary boundaries and liminal areas where the norms of nature and culture are thought to break down. Analogies are constantly drawn between 'primitive' peoples at the 'edges of the world' and 'primitive' people in prehistory. Distance, both in time and space, leads to difference, and the idea that strange things happen out there or happened back then dominates Greek and Roman thinking on other cultures. This book examines ancient ideas of the creation of the world, the beginnings of life and origin of species, humans and animals, utopias and blessed islands, and 'barbarian' cultures beyond the Mediterranean world, before going on to trace the influence of ancient anthropological and ethnological thought on the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. We begin with primordial chaos and end with the invention of the Americas, taking in on the way many strange creatures, among them the noble or ignoble savages of Britain, Gaul and Ireland, the Man-faced Ox-creatures of Empedocles, the Dog-heads of India, the Amazons, Centaurs, Columbus, and the Tupinamba of Brazil.

Few compositions provide as much insight into the structure of the Hittite state and the nature of Hittite society as the so-called Instructions. While these texts may strike the modern reader as didactic, the Hittites, who categorized them together with state treaties, understood them as contracts or obligations, consisting of the king's instructions to officials such as priests and temple personnel, mayors, military officers, border garrison commanders, and palace servants. They detail how and in what spirit the officials are to carry out their duties and what consequences they are to suffer for failure. Also included are several examples of closely related oath impositions and oaths. Collecting for the first time the entire corpus of Hittite Instructions, this accessible volume presents these works in transliteration of the original texts and translation, with clear and readable introductory essays, references to primary and secondary sources, and thorough indices.

Scholarship on ancient Pyrrhonism has made tremendous advances over the past three decades, thanks especially to the careful reexamination of Sextus Empiricus' extant corpus. Building on this momentum, the authors of the eight essays collected here examine some of the most vexed and intriguing exegetical and philosophical questions posed by Sextus' presentation of this form of skepticism. The essays explore in a new light the skeptical interpretation of Plato, the differences between Pyrrhonism and Cyrenaicism, the Pyrrhonist's stance on ordinary life, religion, language, and ethics, Sextus' discussion of our access to our own mental states, and the relationship between Pyrrhonism and epistemic internalism and externalism. These new essays represent a substantial contribution to the advancement of scholarship on Pyrrhonian skepticism.

Until recently, biblical studies and studies of the written and material culture of the ancient Near East have been fragmented, governed by experts who are confined within their individual disciplines' methodological frameworks and patterns of thinking. The consequence has been that, at present, concepts and the terminology for examining the interaction of textual and historical complexes are lacking. However, we can learn from the cognitive sciences. Until the end of the 1980s, neurophysiologists, psychologists, pediatricians, and linguists worked in complete isolation from one another on various aspects of the human brain. Then, beginning in the 1990s, one group began to focus on processes in the brain, thereby requiring that cell biologists, neurologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, linguists, and other relevant scientists collaborate with each other. Their investigation revealed that the brain integrates all kinds of information; if this were not the case, we would not be able to catch even a glimpse of the brain's processing activity. By analogy, van Wolde's proposal for biblical scholarship is to extend its examination of single elements by studying the integrative structures that emerge out of the interconnectivity of the parts. This analysis is based on detailed studies of specific relationships among data of diverse origins, using language as the essential device that links and permits expression. This method can be called a cognitive relational approach. Van Wolde bases her work on cognitive concepts developed by Ronald Langacker. With these concepts, biblical scholars will be able to study emergent cognitive structures that issue from biblical words and texts in interaction with historical complexes. Van Wolde presents a method of analysis that biblical scholars can follow to investigate interactions among words and texts in the Hebrew Bible, material and nonmaterial culture, and comparative textual and historical contexts. In a significant portion of the book, she then exemplifies this method of analysis by applying it to controversial concepts and passages in the Hebrew Bible (the crescent moon; the in-law family; the city gate; differentiation and separation; Genesis 1, 34; Leviticus 18, 20; Numbers 5, 35; Deuteronomy 21; and Ezekiel 18, 22, 33).

SEG LVI covers the publications of the year 2006, with occasional additions from previous years that we missed in earlier volumes and from studies published after 2006 but pertaining to material from 2006.

Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

Sir Charles Willink was responsible for some of the most important advances in the study of the text and metre of Greek tragedy published in the last fifty years. With his unrivalled knowledge of tragic usage and ear for subtle rhythmical points, he was able to solve long-standing problems in areas ranging from metrical analysis to staging and the detection of interpolations, and many of his proposals have already been adopted in standard editions. This volume collects all Willink's published papers, except the two earliest, which are summarized. Three important new articles, on Euripides "Helen," " Medea," and "Alcestis," are published for the first time, and additions and corrections to the published papers are included, together with an index of passages discussed.

Caesar's Army in peace and war
Students of military history have long been fascinated by the history, armies and great commanders of ancient Rome; for within its organisation, strategy, tactics, weapons, campaigns and wars are to be found the origins of each of the military disciplines, demonstrated by often sophisticated methods and practices, developed millennia in the past and yet still able to provide valuable lessons to strategists and tacticians in the modern world. Rome had a long history and in keeping with all empires marched a Hard road to its zenith before commencing an equally long decline. We often look towards the period of Gaius Julius Caesar and his legions to appreciate the Roman military machine in some of its finest hours. This book is an invaluable guide for those interested in the Roman Army during Caesars time. It details army organisation, weapons and equipment. It examines the Legions and the cavalry in detail both on and off the field of battle. Tactics, fortifications and siege engines are fully described, as are methods of fighting afloat. Finally, the enemies of the Roman Empire, from the Gauls to the ancient Britons, are considered and their battle tactics and fortifications examined. In this Leonaur edition the illustrations from the original edition have been enlarged to assist the reader and maps of notable campaigns, battles, sieges and marches are also included.
Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their spines and fabric head and tail bands.

Discussion of the nature of Sumerian wisdom literature and complete editions of many Sumerian wisdom texts, including the Instructions of Shuruppak, Instructions of Ur-Ninurta, Counsels of Wisdom, Sumerian fables, Nothing Is of Value, Ballade of Early Rulers, and more. This unusual book describes the Sumerian literature and many of their proverbs featured in speeches of wise men of that time.

What was Roman political praise for and what could it achieve? Could it have literary merit? What do the surviving examples of Roman political praise-giving reveal about the circumstances and milieu in which they originated?
Latin Panegyric brings together sixteen essays focusing on praise in the Roman Empire and, in particular, on praise of the emperor. Spanning a century of scholarship, and constituting landmark studies on different aspects of the largest collection of classical Latin oratory to survive after Cicero--the Panegyrici Latini--this collection includes speeches addressed to the emperors Trajan, Maximian, Constantine, Julian, and Theodosius, and traces three centuries of oratorical praise-giving in the Roman world. These influential readings consider textual, rhetorical, literary, political, and religious matters, and together represent the evolving landscape of academic attitudes towards praise discourse, with its strengths and problems, and towards some of the best-known Roman emperors. With a full introduction by the editor, and with four essays translated into English for the first time, this valuable volume plots the narratives of Roman praise and gives students of classical literature, history, and rhetoric direct access to key scholarship.

This book brings together new and original work by forty two of the world's leading scholars of Indo-European comparative philology and linguistics from around the world. It shows the breadth and the continuing liveliness of enquiry in an area which over the last century and a half has opened many unique windows on the civilizations of the ancient world. The volume is a tribute to Anna Morpurgo Davies to mark her retirement as the Diebold Professor of Comparative Philology at the University of Oxford.
The book's six parts are concerned with the early history of Indo-European (Part I); language use, variation, and change in ancient Greece and Anatolia (Parts II and III); the Indo-European languages of Western Europe, including Latin, Welsh, and Anglo-Saxon (Part IV); the ancient Indo-Iranian and Tocharian languages (Part V); and the history of Indo-European linguistics (Part VI).
Indo-European Perspectives will interest scholars and students of Indo-European philology, historical linguistics, classics, and the history of the ancient world.

Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

Karl Valentin once asked: "How can it be that only as much happens as fits into the newspaper the next day?" He focussed on the problem that information of the past has to be organised, arranged and above all: selected and put into form in order to be perceived as a whole. In this sense, the process of selection must be seen as the fundamental moment - the "Urszene" - of making History. This book shows selection as highly creative act. With the richness of early medieval material it can be demonstrated that creative selection was omnipresent and took place even in unexpected text genres. The book demonstrates the variety how premodern authors dealt with "unimportant", unpleasant or unwanted past. It provides a general overview for regions and text genres in early medieval Europe.

Key aspects of philhellenism - political self-determination, freedom, beauty, individual greatness - originate in antiquity and present a complex reception history. The force of European philhellenism derives from ancient Roman idealizations, which have been drawn on by European movements since the Enlightenment. How is philhellenism able to transcend national, cultural and epochal limits? The articles collected in this volume deal with (1) the ancient conceptualization of philhellenism, (2) the actualization and politicization of the term at the time of the European Restoration (1815-30), and (3) the transformation of philhellenism into a pan-European movement. During the Greek struggle for independence the different receptions of philhellenism regain a common focus; philhellenism becomes an inextricable element in the creation of a pan-European identity and a starting point for the regeneration and modernization of Greece. - It is easy to criticize the tradition of philhellenism as being simplistic, naive, and self-serving, but there is an irreducibly utopian element in later philhellenic idealizations of ancient Greece.

The late antique and early medieval Mediterranean was characterized by wide-ranging cultural and linguistic diversity. Yet, under the influence of Christianity, communities in the Mediterranean world were bound together by common concepts of good rulership, which were also shaped by Greco-Roman, Persian, Caucasian, and other traditions. This collection of essays examines ideas of good Christian rulership and the debates surrounding them in diverse cultures and linguistic communities. It grants special attention to communities on the periphery, such as the Caucasus and Nubia, and some essays examine non-Christian concepts of good rulership to offer a comparative perspective. As a whole, the studies in this volume reveal not only the entanglement and affinity of communities around the Mediterranean but also areas of conflict among Christians and between Christians and other cultural traditions. By gathering various specialized studies on the overarching question of good rulership, this volume highlights the possibilities of placing research on classical antiquity and early medieval Europe into conversation with the study of eastern Christianity.