The Particle γάρ: From Ancient Greek Sentence Connector to Blatant Line Filler? A Case-study on the Late Medieval Greek Chronicle of Morea

Ancient Greek is widely regarded as a language with an extraordinary number of so-called “Wackernagel P2 particles” such as γ?ρ, δ(?), and μ?ν, which serve a multitude of discourse functions. From the post-Classical period on, however, these small words gradually lose their importance in discourse and die out. This is reflected in the interest of scholars: while there are many studies on particles in older stages of Greek, not much research has been conducted on the particles in late medieval Greek (LMG; twelfth to fifteenth centuries). At this stage of the Greek language, the P2 particles are acknowledged to no longer be part of the living spoken language. Nonetheless, some of these small words still turn up in texts written in the vernacular. Since most LMG vernacular literature is composed in the metre of the 15-syllabic πολιτικ?? στ?χο? (vernacular prose being extremely scarce in this period), these occurrences are traditionally explained by appealing to metrical and/or stylistic reasons: the particles constitute archaizing relics merely inserted to give a classicizing flavour to the text, or are even used “metri causa”, simply to achieve the required number of syllables. In this note, I present a case-study on the “explanatory” particle γ?ρ (“for”) in the Chronicle of Morea, the best-known verse chronicle of the Greek Middle Ages. I show that γ?ρ is more than a blatant line filler. First, γ?ρ is not at all distributed at random, but consistently occupies P2 and thus obeys the so-called “Law of Wackernagel”, as the particles in Ancient Greek do. Moreover, γ?ρ can still exert a clear discourse function, albeit often a different one than in Ancient Greek.     

On St. Artemius as ‘Deacon’

Abstract

The publication of an English translation of the 7th-century Miracles of St. Artemios, with facing Greek text and accompanying commentary, is most welcome, and will undoubtedly invite further discussion of the various points of interest raised by this text. Here I wish to focus on the physical appearance of St. Artemios, in particular his alleged appearance as a deacon in miracle 32. In this miracle, a friend tells a certain Menas how St. Artemius had appeared to him as he slept in the Church of St. John the Baptist and had cured his hernia.     

Non-Lucian Sources for Demonax with a new collection of “fragments”1

Apart from Lucian's Demonax, our only other sources on Demonax the philosopher are the Greek gnomologia. These were exploited by K. Funk in his major study of 1907, but Funk was ill informed about the nature of the gnomological sources. The present article gives a concise overview of modern scholarship regarding Lucian's Demonax and the debate on Demonax's historical existence. It then presents the gnomological sources and provides a new and improved edition of the Greek gnomological material along with an English translation.     

“SEEING” THE PAST: TEXT AND QUESTIONS OF HISTORY IN THE RĀJATARAṄGIṆĪ

Traditional scholarly opinion has regarded Kalha?a's Rājatara?gi?ī, the twelfth‐century Sanskrit chronicle of Kashmiri kings, as a work of history. This essay proposes a reinvestigation of the nature of the iconic text from outside the shadow of that label. It first closely critiques the positivist “history hypothesis,” exposing its internal contradictions over questions of chronology, causality, and objectivity as attributed to the text. It then argues that more than an empiricist historical account that modern historians like to believe it is—in the process bracketing out integral rhetorical, mythic, and didactic parts of the text—the Rājatara?gi?ī should be viewed in totality for the kāvya (epic poem) that it is, which is to say, as representing a specific language practice that sought to produce meaning and articulated the poet's vision of the land and its lineages. The essay thus urges momentarily reclaiming the text from the hegemonic but troubled understanding of it as history—only to restore it ultimately to a more cohesive notion of historicality that is consistent with its contents. Toward this end, it highlights the concrete claim to epistemic authority that is asserted both by the genre of Sanskrit kāvya generally and by the Rājatara?gi?ī in particular, and their conception of the poetic “production” of the past that bears a striking resonance with constructivist historiography. It then traces the intensely intertextual and value‐laden nature of the epistemology that frames the Rājatara?gi?ī into a narrative discourse on power and ethical governance. It is in its narrativity and discursivity—its meaningful representation of what constitutes “true” knowledge of time and human action—that the salience of the Rājatara?gi?ī may lie.     

Contributors' Addresses

The author presents a progress report on his computer‐based research on Hellenistic Greek texts and summarizes practical procedures he developed in the course of his study of the Pseudo‐Philonic De aetemitate mundi. He discusses word‐length as a chronological criterion, the formation of testable hypotheses concerning matters of style, and ways to display a text so as to expose its structure. He seeks to promote the use of quantitative methods in Greek philology and to encourage the use of computers in the study and teaching of Greek but is also at pains to point out limitations inherent in the techniques he advocates.     

Miloš Obrenović and the deposition of a Constantinopolitan Patriarch

Abstract

In my limited study of the Greek and Serbian Churches in the nineteenth century, I had found numerous cases of Greek meddling in Serbian affairs, but never a reverse case. Then I came across a passing reference in Gavrilovic´s fine biography of Prince Milo? Obrenovi? of Serbia (who ruled from 1815 to 1839) to Milo?’ playing a major part in ousting a Patriarch of Constantinople. Following up Gavrilovi?'s citation led me to the following letter written by Prince Milo? during his triumphal visit to Constantinople in 1835. It was written (and it should be noted this means dictated since Milo? was illiterate) to his wife Ljubica on 28 September 1835. Since I have never come across any reference to the events Milos describes in any work I have made use of on the patriarchate in the 19th century, I have taken the liberty of translating the letter from Milo?’ Serbian both to call attention to it and to make the text available to a wider range of scholars. The original text is to be found in Mita Petrovi?, Financije i Ustanove obnovljene Srbije do 1842, Beograd, 1901, pp.336–37.     

Reviews

Book reviewed in this article: The Encircled Sea: The Mediterranean Maritime Civilization. SARAH ARENSON Le Navire Genois de Villefranche—un naufrage de 1516(?)—Archaeonautica no. 9. MAX GUÉROUT, E. RIETH, J.-M. GASSEND and B. LIOU The Periplus Maris Erythraei Greek text with introduction, translation, and commentary by LIONEL CASSON Trafalgar. Countdown to Battle 1803–1805. ALAN SCHOM The Giglio Wreck: A wreck of the Archaic period (c. 600 BC) off the Tuscan island of Giglio. An account of its discovery and excavation: a review of the main finds. MENSUN BOUND Archaeonautica 7. BERNARD LIOU (Ed.)     

Can silence speak volumes? Widukind's Res Gestae Saxonicae and the coronation of Otto I reconsidered

The Res Gestae Saxonicae, Widukind of Corvey's chronicle of the rise of the Ottonian kings, waxes lyrical about Otto I's coronation as king at Aachen in 936 but passes in silence over his coronation as emperor at Rome in 962. This causes difficulties of interpretation, because the text is generally considered to constitute a unified narrative up to the end of its shortest surviving recension, dated to 967 or 968; scholars have previously dealt with these difficulties by claiming that Widukind's work was a ‘subtle polemic’ against the role of the pope in the making of an emperor. This article suggests instead that only the sections documenting events up to c.961 constitute a unified text, subsequent chapters being no more than hastily compiled addenda. Widukind's notorious omission of the imperial coronation was thus an accidental feature of the text, not the cornerstone of an ideological claim about the emperor's direct connection to God. His portrayal of the Aachen coronation establishes Otto's multiple claims to be the rightful king without differentiating qualitatively between them.     

Biblia hebraica ‐ et Septuaginta

Abstract

The article is a review of and a discussion with M.Müller, The First Bible of the Church. A Plea for the Septuagint (1996). This book holds an excellent rendering of the history of the Septuagint, beginning with the letter of Aris‐teas and ending with Augustin. It is also discussed whether the Septuagint ought to be the text translated in an authorized Christian version of the Old Testament, and it is argued that the Greek text should play as important a rôle in biblical theology as does the Hebrew text The present author answers the first question in the negative (Biblia Hebraica — and Septuaginta) and the second positively (Biblia Hebraica et Septuaginta).     

The Aramaic Levi—Comparing the Qumran fragments with the Genizah text

ABSTRACT

Among the extra-biblical texts from Qumran we find the so-called Aramaic Levi, which can be described as a somewhat different variant of the “Testament of Levi,” a part of the larger Greek text “The Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs.”

Aramaic Levi, however, was already known from the Cairo Genizah. The following article is a linguistic comparison between the Qumran text and the version from the Cairo Genizah.

As Klaus Beyer has noticed, there are a lot of non-Hasmonean spellings and words in the Genizah text, but most of Beyer’s examples are from parts of the text that are not preserved in the Qumran fragments. Comparing the two versions, we now note that the deviations are of two kinds. As expected, the Genizah text often follows a later language than Qumran. This applies in particular to orthographic features and the use of status emphaticuswithout the definite sense. But in other places the Genizah text represents a language older than Hasmonean Aramaic, which we interpret as an adaptation to Bibli-cal Aramaic and sometimes to Hebrew.     

Turning Latin into Greek: Anna Komnene and the Gesta Roberti Wiscardi

This article examines the relationship between one of the most famous Byzantine sources, the Alexiad of Anna Komnene, and the Gesta Roberti Wiscardi, written by William of Apulia at the end of the eleventh century. It shows that Anna not only had access to a substantial archive of material relating to the Normans of southern Italy, but also that the author drew extensively on William of Apulia's account of the attacks of Robert Guiscard on Epirus in 1081–5. Multiple borrowings are identified, including a crucial case of mistranslation from the Latin into Greek, demonstrating that the Gesta lay at the heart of the Alexiad's coverage of the Normans. It argues that Anna Komnene makes carefully judged variations from the southern Italian text, before suggesting that the latter was composed shortly before the Council of Bari (1098). It concludes with a suggestion that the contribution of William of Apulia is surreptitiously acknowledged by the Byzantine author.     

Eupolemus the Chronographer and 141 BCE

ABSTRACT

Eupolemus is mentioned in three separate texts: Josephus, Contra Apion; Clement, Stromateis; and Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospels. However, the references and texts associated with Eupolemus in Eusebius and two references to Eupolemus in Clement, found no earlier than the 2^nd cent CE, may be assigned to a second, or, Pseudo-Eupolemus. The earlier Jewish Hellenistic writer is referred to in Josephus but he provides no details. The only information about the original Eupolemus is found in Clement. It is clear that the original Eupolemus uses the independence of Jerusalem from Greek troops in 141 BCE as the base year for his chronology. In addition, it is probable he used the Hebrew text of Kings and not the LXX as his source. Eupolemus should not be used to support early dates for the LXX.     

«Ridges on the floors of Hell»: traces ou palimpsestes dans le désert de The Dead Heart

The Dead Heart is American author Douglas Kennedy's first novel. It was first translated into French in 1997 as Cul-de-sac. It was this translation that made Kennedy a household name in France and that gave The Dead Heart its identity as a roman noir. In the space of just 20 years the novel has been translated twice into French and adapted twice more, as a film and now as a graphic novel. Elsewhere, we have analyzed this trajectory from the perspective of retranslation and the ostensible differences between the two translation Skopoi, and the use of paratextual branding to target specific reading publics. Focusing on the graphic novel allows us here to go beyond the problematics of translation and to broaden the scope of our study of textual adaptation. It also allows us to reassess the originality of the source text.     

Śāntideva's Bodhicaryāvatāra in Translation: A Century of Interpretation of a Sanskrit Mahāyāna Text

Many translations of ?āntideva's Bodhicaryāvatāra, a Sanskrit Mahāyāna Buddhist text of seventh/eighth‐century India, have been published since 1892. ?āntideva's Bodhicaryāvatāra is one of the few Indian Mahāyāna Buddhist texts available in Sanskrit and it was influential in Tibetan Buddhist schools. This article explores how translation of the Bodhicaryāvatāra is no longer the preserve of scholars but has moved to being carried out by Buddhist practitioners influenced by Tibetan schools of Buddhism. It shows how translators’ motives for translating the text have reflected changing attitudes to Buddhism and its texts. ?āntideva's Bodhicaryāvatāra has been translated as a source of information, a literary work, an inspirational work and, with the rise of Western interest in Tibetan Buddhism in the late twentieth century, as a vehicle for the transmission of Buddhist teachings. Nevertheless, further scholarly investigation of the Sanskrit text of the Bodhicaryāvatāra remains to be done.     

The playful mode of writing in Psycharis's To Tαξíδι μoυ (1888)

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to discuss the literary qualities of Psycharis's To Tαξíδι μoυ, in particular, to analyse specific examples that demonstrate its playful mode of writing. Firstly, it will attempt to place the text in the literary context of its period by discussing its conception and significance for Modern Greek literature. Secondly, it will focus on the element of humour in the text, which can best be described as a playful mode of writing. The playfulness can be explained as raising false expectations in readers in a way that does not become obtrusive or unpleasant, but aims to entertain through the effects of surprise. This mode of writing is created mainly through intertextual allusions, incongruous juxtapositions, and comical, satirical or parodic undertones.