Schicksalsmächte

In the first and longer part of his study (I)? the author seeks to reassess both the word‐for‐word meaning and the contextual function of the much debated line 183 nee nulla interea est inaratae gratia terrae. He sees the reason for the impasse of commentators (recently Mynors) in the fact that inaratus is wrongly taken as a negated adj. ("unploughed") whereas it makes better sense taking it as the past participle of inarare (i.e. “ploughed"). St. Ambrose may have read the line in this way. In the second part (II) the author tries to find out how the controversial nullo tantum se Mysia cultu / iactat et ipsa suas mirantur Gargara messis (I 102–103) makes sense in its context. Basing his understanding on the parallel at Aen. 6,876f. he ends up with pleading that cultus should be understood in a more general way ‐ something in the vein of “beautiful quality”;, “refined condition”;.     

Zur Deisidämonie

Petitmengin has recently proposed two new passages for addition to the growing dossier of Jeromes borrowings from Tertullian. Investigation of a hitherto undocumented sense of ruere would seem to show that in the first case Petitmengin is mistaken to posit Tertullianic influence, while in the second Jeromes debt turns out to be rather more substantial than Petitmengin supposed; the same Tertullianic text can also be shown to have inspired two later passages of Jerome.     

Les inscriptions des casques de Negau,Styrie

This article is chiefly a sceptical critique of two recent interpretations of the Epicurean doctrine on the relevance of the atomic swerve to free will, by D. N. Sedley and T. J. Saunders. Against the latter, it argues that the role of the swerve is to be found not in the execution of the will but in its formation; against the former, that to ascribe to Epicurus an explanation of free will in terms of ‘emergence’ theory renders the swerve redundant as an condition of the will's freedom. A concluding analysis of the Epicurean theory suggests that it is seriously flawed by internal inconsistencies of principle.