Han Dynasty Tomb Brick
By Lily Nesvold
Tomb bricks, as the name implies, were used to construct tomb chambers. Families would commission the bricks to be manufactured and decorated, and then the finished products would be transported to the burial location. The tomb interior would hold a wooden coffin and gifts, such as ceramic jars, clay tomb figurines, and other pottery wares — everything the occupant needed for the afterlife…
The Sounds of Sappho
By Catherine Sorrentino
When the Library of Alexandria went up in flames, so did the nine volumes of Sappho’s collected works, leaving only pieces and fragments for scholars to sift through in search of her remarkable voice. And yet, against all odds, from only a handful of lines and verses, Sappho rose from the ashes to become a cornerstone of women’s poetry and right to expression…
Classical Mythology Playlist
By Margaret Dunn
From Hozier to Eminem, modern musicians often pull from classical stories in their work, whether with a passing allusion or the complete grounding of a song in a particular figure. Below is an assemblage of favorites to get you through your Murnaghan essay, Ancient Roman history study session, or Greek translation homework. Turn up the volume, and don’t question my taste in music.
Heinrich Schliemann: Maker of History
By Danny Stein
Heinrich Schliemann was a self-made businessman and archaeologist whose excavations at Troy and Mycenae made him a founder of modern archaeology. He lived a colorful and unconventional life, starting as a worker in a grocery shop and becoming a wealthy merchant who retired and made a fortune twice over. Schliemann also traveled the globe, taught himself…
The Trippiest Places for a Classicist to Go in Italy
By Rebecca Onken
Many classicists, when they begin their careers in a Latin 100 or Greek Civilization course, have never visited the sites of their interest. American classicists even have a whole ocean separating us from the locations, monuments, and historical artifacts that we study. When we finally do visit these locations, we are both…
A Brief History of Common Latin and Greek Sayings
By Adrian Altieri
As a language rich in vocabulary, English is often able to encapsulate many complex ideas on its own. A large proportion of English vocabulary is derived from Latin via French, and many other terms are descended from Ancient Greek. However, in certain cases, it is best to leave phrases in their original languages, allowing for a faithful transmission of…
Why Classics: Antiquity Lives on in Modern Society
By Ryan Burns
Latin was a compulsory class in sixth grade, and no one was excited. “Isn’t it a dead language? What’s the point of learning Latin if we can never speak it,” my fellow students would say. I was one of these people. When we got to class, we started learning an endless list of vocabulary on body parts and animals, and…
A Case Study in How the Plague Plagues Cities:
Sickness in Oedipus Rex and The Gods Are Not To Blame
By Lily Nesvold
Many are familiar with Sophocles’s Oedipus Rex; however, fewer know its modern adaptation, Ola Rotimi’s The Gods Are Not To Blame. Published in 1971, the novel is set in the Yoruba kingdom and tells the story of Odewale, king of Kutuje, in three acts, much like the original Sophoclean play. Oedipus Rex and The Gods Are Not To Blame portray how illness plagues the respective cities of Thebes and Kutuje. Additionally, the action in these stories…
Book Review: Harper’s The Wolf Den
By Maggie Yuan
From 2018’s Circe to the Illiad retelling The Silence of the Girls, the women of antiquity have taken the literary world by storm in a recent wave of feminist mythological retellings. Though the subjects differ, the common thread is the authors’ complex reimagining of the often one-dimensional women. Surprisingly, the lives of Rome’s most mysterious, enigmatic, and real women were…
An Analysis of Fifty Days at Iliam
By Lily Nesvold
Fusing ancient storytelling and modern art, Fifty Days at Iliam is a ten-part canvas painting that uses a mixture of oil, crayon, and graphite. Based on Alexander Pope’s translation of Homer’s Iliad, it is permanently on display at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. This unique installation recalls a story that everyone knows, classicists and non-classicists alike, and its expression packs so much meaning into so few brushstrokes.
