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• Myth and philosophy: The Great Sinner’s topos in Ovid, Lucretius and Seneca

  219–231

  Simona Martorana

  Views:

  141

  In my paper I examine the occurrence of a repeated pattern, namely the catalogue of the so-called Great Sinners, in the work of three Latin authors: Ovid, Lucretius and Seneca. Through the hermeneutical category of (external) intertextuality, the paper explores how the same Leitmotiv is profitably employed by different authors across diverse genres and contexts, changing certain features while retaining the same core. Specifically, it will be shown that these Latin writers drew the list of the Great Sinners from previous sources, but that they also adapted the catalogue to the content and patterns of their own works. Finally, it is noted that these three occurrences of the catalogue should be seen more generally as a specimen for the process of imitatio/aemulatio of previous traditions brought forth by classical writers.

• Die Haut des Satyrs: Marsyas und Apollo

  39–51

  Ágnes Darab

  Views:

  111

  The essay proceeds from the observation that out of the surviving literature of antiquity only one poet, Ovid pays significant attention to the tragic fate of Marsyas. Both the Fasti and the Metamorphoses relate the tale. The narrative in Metamorphoses only focuses on the naturalistic description of the punishment, the flaying of Marsyas. The interpretation of this account within even wider contexts leads to the proposition that Marsyas’s tale is the self-reflection of the elegiac poet Ovid, and as such it becomes a key narrative within Metamorphoses.

• Phaedras Brief an Hippolytus: Ovids Brief (Her. 4) in der römischen bildenden Kunst

  59–75

  Tamás Gesztelyi

  Views:

  84

  Euripides has Paedra write a letter to Theseus in which she accuses Hippolytus of raping her. In the Heroides, Ovid has Phaedra write a letter to Hippolytus which describes her burning love for the young man. In Roman visual arts the story is usually depicted as a nurse handing over a letter to Hippolytus, which he declines. It seems obvious to identify this letter with the one composed by Ovid, i.e., it is this letter that found its way into the visual arts. The contents of the love letter gradually overshadowed the tragic outcome of the story: they represented endless spousal love in sepulchral art.

• Das Hin und Her der Blicke, Eidola in der Pupille Augenförmiger Gemmen: Liebesgeschenke mit Amulettcharakter?

  185–203

  Carina Weiss

  Views:

  43

  The presented group of late Republican to early Imperial intagli consists of round layered stones (sardonyx, cornelian onyx) with a flat reverse side, which are strongly convex on the front side. Their horizontally stacked and differently coloured plies are sanded on the front to form concentric rings around a dark centre. The motif incised in this centre looks like an eidolon in the pupil of a 'fisheye'. Most of these motifs can be interpreted against the background of Augustan love poetry. It is possible that gems of this kind were gifts of love and, due to their striking design as an eye, also had an apotropaic function.

• From Grief to Superbia: the Myth of Niobe in Greek and Roman Funerary Art

  281-296

  Bar Leshem

  Views:

  207

  The Greek myth of Niobe was known in the ancient world both by literary sources and visual representations. Both in Ancient Greece and in Ancient Rome, the myth was represented, alongside a variety forms of art, in funerary art, but in a different manner during each period of time. In Ancient Greece, the myth was represented on Apulian and South Italian vases, portraying the finale scene of the myth: Niobe’s petrification. In Ancient Rome, a shift is visible: the portrayal of the scene of the killing of Niobe’s children on sarcophagi reliefs. The aim of this paper is to follow the iconography of each culture and to understand the reason for the shift in representation, while comparing the two main media forms.

• Image, text, corpus in the stories of Narcisus and Pygmalion in Ovid's "Metamorphoses"

  107–121

  Ágnes Darab

  Views:

  141

  The article offers a comparative analysis of Ovid’s stories of Narcissus and Pygmalion. The analysis highlights the intertextual link between the two narratives, and uses it as the basis for comparison, focusing on the single aspect: who creates what, and how. The paper concludes that what is at stake in the two texts at a fundamental level can be found in the sphere of aesthetics