V. The Second Sophistic and Imperial Greek Literature

2005 ◽  
Vol 35 ◽  
pp. 74-89
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Literary Culture ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
The Self ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Second Sophistic ◽  
Roman Greece ◽  
Fourth Century Bce

This book has focused so far upon the extraordinary popularity of epideictic oratory in the first three centuries of the Roman empire, the ‘Second Sophistic’ in Philostratus’ sense (notwithstanding its distant roots in the fourth century BCE). We have seen that these declamations were performance pieces, and that issues of identity were explored through the observation of the sophist’s body; that language and style were heavily theorized, but also highly experimental; and that the interpretation of these ingenious, mobile texts demands considerable resourcefulness and attentiveness. What I want to explore in this final chapter is the points of intersection between these aspects of sophistic literature and the wider literary culture of Roman Greece. I shall focus particularly on two areas, which are central to both oratorical declamation and wider literary culture: ‘the self and exotic narrative.

Rhetoric in mid-antiquity

2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malcolm Heath
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Literary Culture ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Rhetorical Theory ◽  
Rhetorical Education ◽  
Fourth Section ◽  
The Third

The book's concluding study presents the rhetorical education of the fourth century ad, not as the end but as only midway in the literary culture of Hellas, between Homer and the Byzantine emperor Manuel Palaeologus. The first section of this chapter examines the rhetoric from Homer to Byzantium, from the Iliad to Emperor Manuel II. The second section considers mid-antiquity's pivotal significance, when the Roman empire of Manuel — Greek, Christian and detached from Rome — began to take root. The third section examines a lengthy passage from the scholia to Demosthenes' speech On the False Embassy. The lecturer deploys, in what may seem obsessive detail, the formidably elaborate apparatus of contemporary rhetorical theory. The fourth section notes that his contemporaries and successors saw Menander primarily as a specialist in the kind of minute analysis of forensic and deliberative oratory.

Rabbinic Authority, Medical Rhetoric, and Body Hermeneutics in Mishnah Nega‘im

AJS Review ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 323-346 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mira Balberg
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Medical Knowledge ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The Body ◽  
Second Century ◽  
The Self ◽  
Second Sophistic ◽  
Medical Rhetoric ◽  
Self Presentation ◽  
Roman World

The second century CE has long been recognized as a time of intense preoccupation with medicine and health in the Graeco-Roman world. Medicine had always been a part of the Greek paideia, and acquaintance with it was traditionally required of every aristocrat, but it was during the second Sophistic period that a new form of medical self-presentation emerged in which the knowledge of medicine was hailed not only as one of the apices of the intellectual habitus, but also as indispensable to everyday life. As Michel Foucault observed, the literature of this period placed an enormous emphasis on the body not just as a tool to be used but also as an end in itself, and the classic philosophical ideal of “caring for the Self” (epimeleia heautou) came to entail unrelenting attention to one's health and physical well-being. In this setting, the doctor—the bearer of medical knowledge and the ultimate caretaker of the Self—was seen as offering more than physical relief: The doctor was both a healer and a mentor, and functioned as a watchperson and a guide to right living. Indeed, it is in this period that we first come across the appellations iatrophilosophos (doctor-philosopher) and iatrosophistes (doctor-sophist). Medical knowledge had thus become a most esteemed form of knowledge during the Antonine period of the Roman Empire, and doctors, as its guardians, interpreters, and practitioners, were invested with substantial power and authority.

Atticism and Asianism

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence Kim
Keyword(s):  
Fourth Century ◽  
Second Sophistic ◽  
Essential Component ◽  
Greek Culture ◽  
Prose Style ◽  
Fourth Century Bce ◽  
Positive Light

This chapter treats two imperial Greek phenomena that have often been paired, usually in opposition: Atticism and Asianism. It first describes the theory, practice, and development of Atticism, the attempt by imperial Greeks to write in the language of the fifth and fourth century bce, treating its stylistic and grammatical variants and outlining its relation to imperial classicism. The second part treats the so-called “Asian” prose style associated primarily with the Hellenistic writer Hegesias of Magnesia and reminiscent of Gorgias and the first sophistic. The term itself is not current in the Second Sophistic, but the chapter argues that the style and aesthetic to which it refers are not only present in the work of many writers, but are also portrayed in a positive light by Philostratus. The tension between the classicizing tendencies of Atticism and the unclassical flavor of Asianism is an essential component of imperial Greek culture.

Jewish Literature

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erich Gruen
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Second Sophistic ◽  
Distinctive Character ◽  
Joseph And Aseneth ◽  
Central Tension

This chapter explores a central tension in Jewish writings of the era broadly defined as Second Sophistic. Many Jewish authors were deeply immersed in and regularly employed the genres, forms, and themes that long had characterized Greek literature and thrived once more (or still) in the age of the Roman Empire. At the same time, however, the homage paid to Jewish traditions and the sense of distinctiveness, even exceptionalism, retained a strong hold. The chapter discusses four very different authors or texts, Philo, 4 Maccabees, Pseudo-Phocylides, and Joseph and Aseneth, illustrating philosophy, history, gnomic poetry, and the novel. In each case, the author utilizes the Hellenic genres that were an ingrained part of his cultural makeup while conveying the sense of his people’s own distinctive character and contribution. And in each case the blend, smooth on the surface, betrays the signs of strain beneath it.

Plutarch's Rhythmic Prose

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. O. Hutchinson
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Literary History ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Prose Rhythm ◽  
First Time

Greek literature is divided, like many literatures, into poetry and prose; but in the earlier Roman Empire, 31 BC to AD 300, much Greek (and Latin) prose was written in one organized rhythmic system. Whether most, or hardly any, Greek prose adopted this patterning has been entirely unclear; this book for the first time adequately establishes an answer. It then seeks to get deeper into the nature of prose-rhythm through one of the greatest Imperial works, Plutarch’s Lives. All its phrases, almost 100,000, have been scanned rhythmically. Prose-rhythm is revealed as a means of expression, which draws attention to words and word-groups. (Online readings are offered too.) Some passages in the Lives pack rhythms together more closely than others; the book looks especially at rhythmically dense passages. These do not occur randomly; they attract attention to themselves, and are marked out as climactic in the narrative, or as in other ways of highlighted significance. Comparison emerges as crucial to the Lives on many levels. Much of the book closely discusses particular dense moments, in commentary form, to show how much rhythm contributes to understanding, and is to be integrated with other sorts of criticism. These remarkable passages make apparent the greatness of Plutarch as a prose-writer: a side not greatly considered amid the huge resurgence of work on him. The book also analyses closely rhythmic and unrhythmic passages from three Greek novelists. Rhythm illuminates both a supreme Greek writer, Plutarch, and three prolific centuries of Greek literary history.

Hesiod and Comedy

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey Henderson
Keyword(s):  
Fourth Century ◽  
Cultural Authority ◽  
Sixth Century ◽  
Cultural Currency ◽  
Fourth Century Bce

Comic dramas, attested as early as the later sixth century bce in Sicily and from ca. 486 bce in Attica, reflect familiarity with Hesiodic poetry from the time our actual documentation begins in the 470s for Sicily and 430s for Attica and into the mid-fourth century bce. Comic poets engaged with Hesiodic poetry at the level of specific allusion or echo and (more frequently) with Hesiodic stories, thought, themes, ideas, and style, now common cultural currency. They also engaged with the poet and his poetic persona, whether bracketed with Homer as a great cultural authority, distinguished as the anti-Homer in subjects or style, or showcased as an emblematic persona of poet and (didactic) sage. Aristophanes, for one, adopted elements of the Hesiodic persona in fashioning his own.

Plato’s Hesiods

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcus Folch
Keyword(s):  
Fourth Century ◽  
Political Debates ◽  
Manuscript Tradition ◽  
Fourth Century Bce ◽  
The Status

This chapter surveys Hesiodic reception in fourth-century bce prose, with emphasis on Plato and especially the Laws. Passages of the Laws are read in context and used to illuminate the status of Hesiodic poetry in the fourth century. Topics discussed include rhapsodic performance, Hesiod’s relationship to Homer, study of Hesiodic poetry in schools, the fourth-century manuscript tradition, citation of Hesiod’s poems in conversation and Athenian courtrooms, and the politics of Hesiodic quotation. Whether understood as part of the rhapsode’s canon, a gnomic poet, a proto-sophist or proto-philosopher, or an allegorist, Hesiod remained a dynamic site for the production of the philosophical, literary, and political debates that animated fourth-century prose.

Phoenicia in the Roman Empire

2019 ◽  
pp. 110-124
Author(s):  
Julien Aliquot
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
First Century ◽  
New Order ◽  
History Of ◽  
Local Traditions

This chapter traces the history of Phoenicia from the advent of Rome in Syria at the beginning of the first century bce to the foundation of the Christian empire of Byzantium in the fourth century ce. It focuses on the establishment of Roman rule and its impact on society, culture, and religion. Special attention is paid to the establishment of Roman rule and its impact on society, culture, and religion. The focus is on provincial institutions and cities, which provided a basis for the new order. However, side trails are also taken to assess the flowering of Hellenism and the revival of local traditions in the light of the Romanization of Phoenicia and its hinterland.

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