Christmas presents for John Tzetzes: a new verse epistle from the letter collection

2021 ◽  
Vol 114 (3) ◽  
pp. 1303-1319
Author(s):  
Aglae Pizzone
Keyword(s):  
Rhetorical Function ◽  
Letter Collection

Abstract The corpus of Tzetzes’ epistles edited by Pietro Luigi Leone in 1972 includes 107 letters. However, two of the earliest manuscript witnesses of the collection bequeath a 108th letter consisting of 16 iambs and closing the corpus. The short missive is addressed to one Konstantinos Phyteianos. The present paper provides the first edition and translation into English of this letter, analysing its authorship and contents as well as its rhetorical function within the corpus.

Late Antique Letter Collections

2016 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Literary Genre ◽  
Late Antique ◽  
Comprehensive Overview ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
The Social ◽  
Letter Writer ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Letter Collection ◽  
Latin Letter

This volume provides the first comprehensive overview of the extant Greek and Latin letter collections of late antiquity (ca. 300-600 C.E.). Bringing together an international team of historians, classicists, and scholars of religion, it illustrates how letter collections advertised an image of the letter writer and introduces the social and textual histories of each collection. Nearly every chapter focuses on the letter collection of a different late ancient author—from the famous (or even infamous) to the obscure—and investigates its particular issues of content, arrangement, and publication context. On the whole, the volume reveals how late antique letter collections operated as a discrete literary genre with its own conventions, transmission processes, and self-presentational agendas while offering new approaches to interpret both larger letter collections and the individual letters contained within them. Each chapter contributes to a broad argument that scholars should read letter collections as they do representatives of other late antique literary genres, as single texts made up of individual components, with larger thematic and literary characteristics that are as important as those of their component parts.

scholarly journals Writing letters and chronography in parallel: the case of Michael Glykas’ letter collection and Biblos Chronike in the 12th century

2020 ◽  
Vol 113 (3) ◽  
pp. 837-852
Author(s):  
Eirini-Sophia Kiapidou
Keyword(s):  
Literary Genre ◽  
Literary Production ◽  
12Th Century ◽  
History Of ◽  
First Time ◽  
Letter Collection

AbstractThis paper focuses on the 12th-century Byzantine scholar Michael Glykas and the two main pillars of his multifarious literary production, Biblos Chronike and Letters, thoroughly exploring for the first time the nature of their interconnection. In addition to the primary goal, i. e. clarifying as far as possible the conditions in which these two works were written, taking into account their intertextuality, it extends the discussion to the mixture of features in texts of different literary genre, written in parallel, by the same author, based on the same material. By presenting the evidence drawn from the case of Michael Glykas, the paper attempts to stress the need to abandon the strictly applied taxonomical logic in approaching Byzantine Literature, as it ultimately prevents us from constitute the full mark of each author in the history of Byzantine culture.

The argumentative and rhetorical function of multimodal metonymy

Semiotica ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 2018 (220) ◽  
pp. 123-153
Author(s):  
Andrea Rocci ◽  
Sabrina Mazzali-Lurati ◽  
Chiara Pollaroli
Keyword(s):  
Theoretical Development ◽  
Integration Theory ◽  
Conceptual Integration ◽  
Complex Chain ◽  
Argument Schemes ◽  
Depth Analysis ◽  
Verbal Component ◽  
Rhetorical Function ◽  
Visual Structure ◽  
Conceptual Integration Theory

AbstractThe aim of this article is to contribute to the theoretical development of multimodal metonymy and the argumentative and rhetorical role that the trope can fulfil in multimodal advertising campaigns. A model for the analysis of multimodal tropes in page-based advertising messages is developed by drawing insights from different disciplines. This model involves the identification of the elementary and layout components of the message, the description of its multimodal structure (in terms of the visual structure and the contribution of the verbal component), the reconstruction of its meaning operation, and the reconstruction of its enthymematic structure. In particular, the meaning operation is reconstructed by the employment of Conceptual Integration Theory, which we have slightly revised in order to better account for metonymical mappings. The enthymematic structure is reconstructed following the Argumentum Model of Topics, a model of argument schemes that enables one to make explicit the contextual and the logical dimensions of arguments. Based on the tenets of the two frameworks, we claim that multimodal metonymy condenses and gives access to a complex chain of connections, which mirrors the argumentation the audience is invited to infer. This argumentation is based on causal schemes of reasoning. This claim results in the in-depth analysis of both a billboard belonging to an anti-AIDS campaign and a social campaign by Greenpeace against the use of environmental-damaging paper for toy packages by Mattel.

The Parable of the Talents (Matt 25:14–30)

2021 ◽  
Vol 63 (2) ◽  
pp. 159-176
Author(s):  
Phillip Porter
Keyword(s):  
First Century ◽  
Historical Research ◽  
Critical Reading ◽  
Metaphor Theory ◽  
Universal Expansion ◽  
Rhetorical Function

Abstract There is an unresolved tension between the parable of the Talent’s Matthean literary arrangement and readings proposed by modern scholars using socio-historical research to assess the parable’s reception by a first century audience. Drawing on metaphor theory and incorporating insights from the main interpretive trajectories found in modern scholarship on this parable, the author here proposes a new literary-critical reading that resolves this tension. He argues the parable’s rhetorical function within the Matthean narrative is to prepare the Matthean disciples to lead the universal expansion of the mission of the Matthean Jesus in the post-Easter period.

scholarly journals Let Us Assume That Gene Editing is Safe—The Role of Safety Arguments in the Gene Editing Debate

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 100-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
SØREN HOLM
Keyword(s):  
Gene Editing ◽  
Legal Principle ◽  
Rhetorical Function ◽  
Made In

Abstract:This paper provides an analysis of the statement, made in many papers and reports on the use of gene editing in humans, that we should only use the technology when it is safe. It provides an analysis of what the statement means in the context of nonreproductive and reproductive gene editing and argues that the statement is inconsistent with the philosophical commitments of some of the authors, who put it forward in relation to reproductive uses of gene editing, specifically their commitment to Parfitian nonidentity considerations and to a legal principle of reproductive liberty.But, if that is true it raises a question about why the statement is made. What is its discursive and rhetorical function? Five functions are suggested, some of which are more contentious and problematic than others. It is argued that it is possible, perhaps even likely, that the “only when it is safe” rider is part of a deliberate obfuscation aimed at hiding the full implications of the arguments made about the ethics of gene editing and their underlying philosophical justifications.

scholarly journals The Amarna Diplomacy in IR Perspective – A System of States in the Making

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 9-29
Author(s):  
Alex Aissaoui
Keyword(s):  
World Politics ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
Security Dilemma ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
International History ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Amarna Letters ◽  
Power Balancing ◽  
International Anarchy ◽  
Letter Collection

The Amarna diplomacy (ca. 1365–1330 BCE) has been of interest for specialists ever since the discovery of the Amarna letter collection in the late 19th century. While it can be considered as one of the great archaeolo-gical discoveries of all time, it has largely remained out of academic purview in the field of International Relations (IR). IR scholarship continues to turn to the Greco-Roman experience in its attempt to delineate the chronological framework of the discipline. Far from being an anecdote in international history, this article aims to analyze what the letters convey for a student of world politics. What comes out of these missives through textual analysis of the primary sources is not only the various demands, wishes and security concerns of the actors involved but also classical IR themes such as power balancing, security dilemma and international anarchy. While there are question marks and lacunas, this paper asserts that the ancient Near Eastern world constituted an international arena where we see the makings of a genuine system of states more than a millennium before the writings of Thucydides. The Amarna letters, although incomplete, are a gateway to gain deeper synergy between IR theory and international history.

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