Ego-network of István Bocskai in the Light of His Correspondence (1576–1598)

István Bocskai (1557–1606) was an outstanding person of the Hungarian history at the turn of the 16th and 17th century, who is one of the greatest letter-writer in the early modern age. The total exchange of letters (about 500 pieces) has been scattered over 30 various source-publications and source-books, while the unpublished letters can be found in different Hungarian and foreign archives. In my paper I focus on the social network of István Bocskai in two less-known periods, using a special approach (ego-network). My research is based on the correspondence of István Bocskai, that is one group of ego documents. My aim is to present, by 134 records (letters and testimonies) clean-cut, main tendencies.

Letture e lezioni frontoniane nell’epistolario di Simmaco

This study aims to define the ways in which the work of Fronto circulated and was used in the intellectual circles of the fourth century A.D. through the testimony offered by the letters of Symmachus. In addressing illustrious members of the senatorial aristocracy of his time, Symmachus echoes Fronto’s work several times. The examination of Symm. Ep. 3.11 to Naucellius, with special reference to the expression spectator tibi veteris monetae solus supersum in Symm. Ep. 3.11.2, allows us to evaluate how Symmachus approaches the work of Fronto. The ways in which the short treatise ad M. Aurelium de orationibus is reprised lead us, further, to conclude that the lexical choices of the fourth-century letter-writer were determined by a textual variant in the text of Fronto available to him.

“MY DEAR, CLOSE AND DISTANT FRIEND”: Nina Berberova’s Letters to Sergej Rittenberg (1947–1975)

Nina Berberova (1901–1993) almost appears to have lived several lives. First, she was a young writer in the revolutionary Russia. Then she witnessed the hectic 1920s in Berlin and achieved her literary breakthrough in interwar Paris with psychologically finely-honed novels and short stories set in the Russian émigré community. Finally, she went on in the latter half of the century to a career as a Slavist in the United States. She had her eyes on Russia the whole time. As an academic she studied the cracks in the ideological wall and seems early on to have foreseen her return to her homeland. At last, as she approached the age of ninety, she had vanquished the Soviet Union and could go back in triumph in the “revolutionary” year of 1989. In addition to everything else Berberova was an avid letter writer who maintained a great many correspondences. For nearly thirty years she was friends with her Russian – and Petersburgian –countryman Sergej Rittenberg (1899–1975) in Stockholm, to whom she sent more than 150 letters and postcards between 1947 and 1975. A reflection of her thoughts and reading interests, they also provide a glimpse into the genesis of her huge memoir The Italics Are Mine (Kursiv moj). This volume presents Berberova’s letters with an introduction and extensive commentaries by Professor Magnus Ljunggren.

THE EMOTIONS OF MEDEA THE LETTER-WRITER (OVID, HEROIDES 12)

Medea fascinated Ovid more than any other female mythical figure. She features in the Ars Amatoria (1.336; 2.381–2), the Heroides (6.75, 127–8, 151; 12 passim; 17.229, 233), the Metamorphoses (7.1–424), and the Tristia (3.9). Ovid also composed a tragedy called Medea (Am. 2.18.13–16; Tr. 2.553–4), which unfortunately has not survived.1 In the Remedia amoris Medea is mentioned in a list of mythical men and women who would have been cured of their torturing love passion, if Ovid had been their praeceptor. Medea is not named, but the identification is obvious (Rem. am. 59–60): nec dolor armasset contra sua viscera matrem, / quae socii damno sanguinis ulta virum est (‘Nor would a mother's vengeance on her husband / have steeled her heart to slay their progeny’).

The Machine

A review of "Newcomb’s paradox" and "Roko’s Basilisk," asks the question, it is better to help build a super AI when failure to do so might later get you punished by it? This work of philosophical short story of fiction is written as a letter to a friend. The letter writer was told about, and is now working on, a computer program that will infiltrate and merge with other computers, eventually created a singularity of a super intelligent, conscious AI. This AI, the author argues, will have mastered time travel and will naturally want to go back in time and punish anyone who failed to help it come to life. The author concludes the letter by requesting $3,000 and making clear that failure to send the money might be viewed by the future AI (if it is ever created) as a punishable response for failing to help it get built.

“Saying thes woordes or the lyke”

This chapter examines the forms and functions of speech representation in Early Modern English correspondence using corpus-based methods. It considers how the sociopragmatic properties of speech representation are shaped by the communicative context of letter-writing, and identifies key similarities and differences with speech representation in other early modern genres. Using a sixteenth-century subset of the Parsed Corpus of Early English Correspondence, the analysis focusses on speech representation framed by the two most frequent quotatives: SAY and ANSWER. The results suggest that speech representation in letters anticipates the practices of later written genres, such as news reporting, as well as displaying characteristics associated with speech representation in spoken genres, such as conversation. Speech representation in correspondence has a predominantly interpersonal function, linked to values associated with report faithfulness, dramaticality, and the source authority. Reporting practices are informed both by the conventions of the genre and the immediate situation of the letter-writer.

Dwie wersje skargi "Proposicio Polonorum" oraz kwestia jej genezy

The article discusses the Proposicio Polonorum, which contains an accusation against the Grand Master and the Teutonic Order of harbouring a hostile attitude towards Poland, King Władysław Jagiełło, and the Christianizing mission led by him in Lithuania. The indictment was presented by the Polish delegation to the Council of Constance in February 1416. The author discusses the manuscripts and the contents of the indictment. He compares various versions and on this basis considers the question of the authorship and the genesis of the text. The “Kraków” version held in the Jagiellonian Library (Cod. 1143) contains several “Lithuanian” elements (the marriage of the daughter of Witold with the Grand Duke of Moscow; the alliance of Svidrigiello with the Tatars) that are unknown in other manuscripts. This might indicate its preparation to support Duke Witold’s interests. Any details of the genesis of the indictment are hypothetical, but several factors emerging directly from its content (quotations from the twelfth-century letter writer Pierre de Blois) indicate that Piotr Wolfram, secretary to the Archbishop of Gniezno at the Council and professor of law at Kraków University, had a fundamental influence on its writing.