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• Der Mythos als Ursprache

  33–44

  Ibolya Tar

  Views:

  39

  After discussing some interpretations of myth (Burkert, Jensen, Jaspers, Eliade), the paper deals with the issue of myth’s appearance in literary works. The essential substance of a myth can appear in several treatments, according to the artist’s intention with regard to several interpretations. After a short survey of allegorical interpretations two myths (Orpheus and Eurydice, the golden age) are discussed in their several variations. In connection with the myth of the golden age Vergil’s works are examined to see whether in the Aeneid in particular he created a new myth or rather recreated the myth. In connection with this problem the distinction made between fable and sujet by the Russian formalists is discussed. In answer to the question whether a myth in its artistical appearance can be expressed verbally, Rilke and Hölderlin are cited.

• 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.

• Fleeing Sisters: the Golden Age in Juvenal 6

  271-280

  Gergő Gellérfi

  Views:

  97

  The opening of Juvenal’s longest and maybe the most well-known poem, Satire 6, is based on the ancient concept of the “Ages of Man”, starting from the reign of Saturn and ending with the flight of the two sisters, Pudicitia and Astraea. The first part of this 24-line-long passage depicts the Golden Age by making use of two different sources: the idealized Golden Age appearing in Vergil’s poetry among others and the prehistoric primitive world from Book 5 of Lucretius. The Juvenalian Golden Age, presented briefly in a naturalistic way, is a curious amalgam of these two traditions, being the only time in human history according to the poet when marital fidelity was unblemished. However, while reading Satire 6, it seems far from obvious that the lack of adultery should be attributed to higher morals.

• 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.

• 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.