1.
Frederic Leighton
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Frederic Leighton, 1st Baron Leighton PRA, known as Sir Frederic Leighton between 1878 and 1896, was an English painter and sculptor. His works depicted historical, biblical, and classical subject matter, Leighton was bearer of the shortest-lived peerage in history, after only one day his hereditary peerage ended with his death. Leighton was born in Scarborough to a family in the import and export business and he was educated at University College School, London. He then received his training on the European continent, first from Eduard von Steinle. When he was 24 he was in Florence, he studied at the Accademia di Belle Arti, from 1855 to 1859 he lived in Paris, where he met Ingres, Delacroix, Corot and Millet. In 1860, he moved to London, where he associated with the Pre-Raphaelites and he designed Elizabeth Barrett Brownings tomb for Robert Browning in the English Cemetery, Florence in 1861. In 1864 he became an associate of the Royal Academy and in 1878 he became its President and his 1877 sculpture, Athlete Wrestling with a Python, was considered at its time to inaugurate a renaissance in contemporary British sculpture, referred to as the New Sculpture. American art critic Earl Shinn claimed at the time that Except Leighton and his paintings represented Britain at the great 1900 Paris Exhibition. Leighton was knighted at Windsor in 1878, and was created a baronet, of Holland Park Road in the Parish of St Mary Abbots, Kensington, in the County of Middlesex, eight years later. He was the first painter to be given a peerage, in the New Year Honours List of 1896, the patent creating him Baron Leighton, of Stretton in the County of Shropshire, was issued on 24 January 1896, Leighton died the next day of angina pectoris. Leighton remained a bachelor and rumours of his having a child with one of his models in addition to the supposition that Leighton may have been homosexual continue to be debated today. He certainly enjoyed an intense and romantically tinged relationship with the poet Henry William Greville whom he met in Florence in 1856, the older man showered Leighton in letters, but the romantic affection seems not to have been reciprocated. Enquiry is furthermore hindered by the fact that Leighton left no diaries, after his death his Barony was extinguished after existing for only a day, this is a record in the Peerage. His house in Holland Park, London has been turned into a museum, the house also features many of Leightons inspirations, including his collection of Iznik tiles. Its centrepiece is the magnificent Arab Hall, the Hall is featured in issue ten of Cornucopia. A blue plaque commemorates Leighton at Leighton House Museum, Leighton was an enthusiastic volunteer soldier, enrolling with the first group to join the 38th Middlesex Rifle volunteers on 5 October 1860. His qualities of leadership were identified, and he was promoted to command A Company within a few months. On 6 January 1869 Captain Leighton was elected to command The Artists Rifles by a meeting of the corps
2.
Greek mythology
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It was a part of the religion in ancient Greece. Greek mythology is explicitly embodied in a collection of narratives. Greek myth attempts to explain the origins of the world, and details the lives and adventures of a variety of gods, goddesses, heroes, heroines. These accounts initially were disseminated in a tradition, today the Greek myths are known primarily from ancient Greek literature. The oldest known Greek literary sources, Homers epic poems Iliad and Odyssey, focus on the Trojan War, archaeological findings provide a principal source of detail about Greek mythology, with gods and heroes featured prominently in the decoration of many artifacts. Geometric designs on pottery of the eighth century BC depict scenes from the Trojan cycle as well as the adventures of Heracles, in the succeeding Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic periods, Homeric and various other mythological scenes appear, supplementing the existing literary evidence. Greek mythology has had an influence on the culture, arts. Poets and artists from ancient times to the present have derived inspiration from Greek mythology and have discovered contemporary significance and relevance in the themes, Greek mythology is known today primarily from Greek literature and representations on visual media dating from the Geometric period from c. Mythical narration plays an important role in every genre of Greek literature. Nevertheless, the only general mythographical handbook to survive from Greek antiquity was the Library of Pseudo-Apollodorus and this work attempts to reconcile the contradictory tales of the poets and provides a grand summary of traditional Greek mythology and heroic legends. Apollodorus of Athens lived from c, 180–125 BC and wrote on many of these topics. His writings may have formed the basis for the collection, however the Library discusses events that occurred long after his death, among the earliest literary sources are Homers two epic poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey. Other poets completed the cycle, but these later and lesser poems now are lost almost entirely. Despite their traditional name, the Homeric Hymns have no connection with Homer. They are choral hymns from the part of the so-called Lyric age. Hesiods Works and Days, a poem about farming life, also includes the myths of Prometheus, Pandora. The poet gives advice on the best way to succeed in a dangerous world, lyrical poets often took their subjects from myth, but their treatment became gradually less narrative and more allusive. Greek lyric poets, including Pindar, Bacchylides and Simonides, and bucolic poets such as Theocritus and Bion, additionally, myth was central to classical Athenian drama
3.
Aphrodite
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Aphrodite is the Greek goddess of love, beauty, pleasure, and procreation. She is identified with the planet Venus, and her Roman equivalent is the goddess Venus, as with many ancient Greek deities, there is more than one story about her origins. According to Hesiods Theogony, she was born when Cronus cut off Uranuss genitals and threw them into the sea, according to Homers Iliad, she is the daughter of Zeus and Dione. In Plato, these two origins are said to be of hitherto separate entities, Aphrodite Ourania and Aphrodite Pandemos, Aphrodite had many lovers—both gods, such as Ares, and men, such as Anchises. She played a role in the Eros and Psyche legend, and was lover and surrogate mother of Adonis. Many lesser beings were said to be children of Aphrodite, Aphrodite is also known as Cytherea and Cypris after the two cult sites, Cythera and Cyprus, which claimed to be her place of birth. Myrtle, roses, doves, sparrows and swans were sacred to her, the ancient Greeks identified her with the Ancient Egyptian goddess Hathor. Aphrodite had many names such as Acidalia and Cerigo, each used by a different local cult of the goddess in Greece. The Greeks recognized all of these names as referring to the single goddess Aphrodite, despite the differences in what these local cults believed the goddess demanded of them. The Attic philosophers of the 4th century, however, drew a distinction between a celestial Aphrodite of transcendent principles, and a separate, common Aphrodite who was the goddess of the people, hesiod derives Aphrodite from aphrós sea-foam, interpreting the name as risen from the foam. Michael Janda, accepting this as genuine, claims the birth myth as an Indo-European mytheme. Likewise, Witczak proposes an Indo-European compound *abʰor- very and *dʰei- to shine and it has been argued that etymologies based on comparison with Eos are unlikely since Aphrodites attributes are entirely different from those of Eos or the Vedic deity Ushas. A number of improbable non-Greek etymologies have suggested in scholarship. One Semitic etymology compares Aphrodite to the Assyrian barīrītu, the name of a demon that appears in Middle Babylonian. Hammarström looks to Etruscan, comparing prϑni lord, an Etruscan honorific loaned into Greek as πρύτανις and this would make the theonym in origin an honorific, the lady. Hjalmar Frisk and Robert Beekes reject this etymology as implausible, especially since Aphrodite actually appears in Etruscan in the borrowed form Apru, the medieval Etymologicum Magnum offers a highly contrived etymology, deriving Aphrodite from the compound habrodíaitos, she who lives delicately, from habrós and díaita. The alteration from b to ph is explained as a characteristic of Greek obvious from the Macedonians. Aphrodite is usually said to have been born near her chief center of worship, Paphos, on the island of Cyprus, however, other versions of her myth have her born near the island of Cythera, hence another of her names, Cytherea
4.
Dardanelles
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Together with the Bosphorus, the Dardanelles forms the Turkish Straits. The English name Dardanelles derives from Dardanus, an ancient city on the Asian shore of the strait which in turn takes its name from Dardanus, the ancient Greek name Ἑλλήσποντος means Sea of Helle, and was the ancient name of the narrow strait. It was variously named in classical literature Hellespontium Pelagus, Rectum Hellesponticum and it was so called from Helle, the daughter of Athamas, who was drowned here in the mythology of the Golden Fleece. The Marmara further connects to the Black Sea via the Bosphorus, the strait is located at approximately 40°13′N 26°26′E. The strait is 61 kilometres long, and 1.2 to 6 kilometres wide, water flows in both directions along the strait, from the Sea of Marmara to the Aegean via a surface current, and in the opposite direction via an undercurrent. The Dardanelles is unique in many respects, the very narrow and winding shape of the strait is more akin to that of a river. It is considered one of the most hazardous, crowded, difficult, the currents produced by the tidal action in the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmara are such that ships under sail must await at anchorage for the right conditions before entering the Dardanelles. It is a sea access route for numerous countries, including Russia. The ancient city of Troy was located near the entrance of the strait. Troy was able to control the traffic entering this vital waterway. Herodotus tells us that, circa 482 BC, Xerxes I had two bridges built across the width of the Hellespont at Abydos, in order that his huge army could cross from Persia into Greece. This crossing was named by Aeschylus in his tragedy The Persians as the cause of divine intervention against Xerxes, according to Herodotus, both bridges were destroyed by a storm and Xerxes had those responsible for building the bridges beheaded and the strait itself whipped. The Histories of Herodotus vii. 33–37 and vii. 54–58 give details of building and crossing of Xerxes Pontoon Bridges. Xerxes is then said to have thrown fetters into the strait, Herodotus commented that this was a highly presumptuous way to address the Hellespont but in no way atypical of Xerxes. Harpalus the engineer eventually helped the invading armies to cross by lashing the ships together with their bows facing the current and, so it is said, two additional anchors. From the perspective of ancient Greek mythology, it was said that Helle, the Dardanelles were vital to the defence of Constantinople during the Byzantine period. Also, the Dardanelles was an important source of income for the ruler of the region, at the Istanbul Archaeological Museum a marble plate contains a law by the Byzantine Emperor Anastasius I, that regulated fees for passage through the customs office of the Dardanelles. Whoever dares to violate these regulations shall no longer be regarded as a friend, besides, the administrator of the Dardanelles must have the right to receive 50 golden Litrons, so that these rules, which we make out of piety, shall never ever be violated
5.
Septimius Severus
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Septimius Severus, also known as Severus, was Roman emperor from 193 to 211. Severus was born in Leptis Magna in the Roman province of Africa, as a young man he advanced through the cursus honorum—the customary succession of offices—under the reigns of Marcus Aurelius and Commodus. Severus seized power after the death of Emperor Pertinax in 193 during the Year of the Five Emperors, after deposing and killing the incumbent emperor Didius Julianus, Severus fought his rival claimants, the generals Pescennius Niger and Clodius Albinus. Niger was defeated in 194 at the Battle of Issus in Cilicia, later that year Severus waged a short punitive campaign beyond the eastern frontier, annexing the Kingdom of Osroene as a new province. Severus defeated Albinus three years later at the Battle of Lugdunum in Gaul, furthermore, he enlarged and fortified the Limes Arabicus in Arabia Petraea. In 202, he campaigned in Africa and Mauretania against the Garamantes, capturing their capital Garama, late in his reign he travelled to Britain, strengthening Hadrians Wall and reoccupying the Antonine Wall. In 208 he invaded Caledonia, but his ambitions were cut short when he fell ill in late 210. Severus died in early 211 at Eboracum, succeeded by his sons Caracalla, with the succession of his sons, Severus founded the Severan dynasty, the last dynasty of the empire before the Crisis of the Third Century. Born on 11 April 145 at Leptis Magna as the son of Publius Septimius Geta and Fulvia Pia, Septimius Severus came from a wealthy and he had Italian Roman ancestry on his mothers side and descended from Punic - and perhaps also Libyan - forebears on his fathers side. His mothers ancestors had moved from Italy to North Africa, they belonged to the gens Fulvia, Septimius Severus had two siblings, an older brother, Publius Septimius Geta, and a younger sister, Septimia Octavilla. Severuss maternal cousin was Praetorian prefect and consul Gaius Fulvius Plautianus, Septimius Severus grew up in the town of Leptis Magna. He spoke the local Punic language fluently, but he was educated in Latin and Greek. Little else is known of the young Severus education, but according to Cassius Dio the boy had been eager for education than he had actually got. Presumably Severus received lessons in oratory, at age 17 he gave his first public speech, sometime around 162 Septimius Severus set out for Rome seeking a public career. At the recommendation of his relative Gaius Septimius Severus, the emperor Marcus Aurelius granted him entry into the senatorial ranks, membership of the senatorial order was a prerequisite to attain positions within the cursus honorum and to gain entry into the Roman Senate. Nevertheless, it appears that Severus career during the 160s met with some difficulties and it is likely that he served as a vigintivir in Rome, overseeing road maintenance in or near the city, and he may have appeared in court as an advocate. At the time of Emperor Marcus Aurelius he was the State Attorney, however, he omitted the military tribunate from the cursus honorum and had to delay his quaestorship until he had reached the required minimum age of 25. To make matters worse, the Antonine Plague swept through the capital in 166, with his career at a halt, Severus decided to temporarily return to Leptis, where the climate was healthier
6.
Caracalla
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Caracalla, formally Marcus Aurelius Severus Antoninus Augustus, was Roman emperor from AD198 to 217. A member of the Severan Dynasty, he was the eldest son of Septimius Severus, Caracalla reigned jointly with his father from 198 until Severus death in 211. Caracalla then ruled jointly with his younger brother Geta, with whom he had a fraught relationship, Caracallas reign was marked by domestic instability and external invasions from the Germanic people. Caracallas reign was notable for the Antonine Constitution, also known as the Edict of Caracalla, the edict gave all the enfranchised men Caracallas adopted praenomen and nomen, Marcus Aurelius. Towards the end of his rule, Caracalla began a campaign against the Parthian Empire and he did not see this campaign through to completion due to his assassination by a disaffected soldier in 217. He was succeeded as emperor by Macrinus after three days, Caracalla is presented in ancient sources as a tyrant and cruel leader, an image that has survived into modernity. Dio Cassius and Herodian present Caracalla as a soldier first and emperor second, in the 12th century, Geoffrey of Monmouth started the legend of Caracallas role as the king of Britain. Later, in the 18th century, Caracallas memory was revived in the works of French artists due to the parallels between Caracallas apparent tyranny and that of King Louis XVI, Modern works continue to portray Caracalla as a psychopathic and evil ruler. His rule is remembered as being one of the most tyrannical of all Roman emperors, Caracalla was born Lucius Septimius Bassianus. He was renamed Marcus Aurelius Antoninus at the age of seven as part of his fathers attempt at union with the families of Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. According to Aurelius Victor in his Epitome de Caesaribus, he became known by the agnomen Caracalla after a Gallic hooded tunic that he habitually wore and he may have begun wearing it during his campaigns on the Rhine and Danube. Dio generally referred to him as Tarautas, after a famously diminutive, Caracalla was born in Lugdunum, Gaul, on 4 April 188 to Septimius Severus and Julia Domna. He had a younger brother, Geta, who would briefly rule as co-emperor alongside him. Caracallas father, Septimius Severus, appointed Caracalla joint Augustus and full emperor from the year 198 onwards and his brother Geta was granted the same title in 210. In 202 Caracalla was forced to marry the daughter of Gaius Fulvius Plautianus, Fulvia Plautilla, by 205 Caracalla had succeeded in having Plautianus executed for treason, though he had probably fabricated the evidence of the plot himself. It was then that he banished his wife, whose later killing might have carried out under Caracallas orders. Caracallas father, Septimius Severus, died on 4 February 211 at Eboracum while on campaign in Caledonia, Caracalla and his brother, Publius Septimius Antoninus Geta, jointly inherited the throne upon their fathers death. Caracalla and Geta ended the campaign in Caledonia after concluding a peace with the Caledonians that returned the border of Roman Britain to the line demarcated by Hadrians Wall
7.
Ovid
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Publius Ovidius Naso, known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace, with whom he is ranked as one of the three canonical poets of Latin literature. The Imperial scholar Quintilian considered him the last of the Latin love elegists and he enjoyed enormous popularity, but, in one of the mysteries of literary history, was sent by Augustus into exile in a remote province on the Black Sea, where he remained until his death. Ovid himself attributes his exile to carmen et error, a poem and a mistake and his poetry was much imitated during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, and greatly influenced Western art and literature. The Metamorphoses remains one of the most important sources of classical mythology, Ovid talks more about his own life than most other Roman poets. Information about his biography is drawn primarily from his poetry, especially Tristia 4.10, other sources include Seneca the Elder and Quintilian. Ovid was born in Sulmo, in an Apennine valley east of Rome, to an important equestrian family and that was a significant year in Roman politics. He was educated in rhetoric in Rome under the teachers Arellius Fuscus and Porcius Latro with his brother who excelled at oratory and his father wanted him to study rhetoric toward the practice of law. According to Seneca the Elder, Ovid tended to the emotional, after the death of his brother at 20 years of age, Ovid renounced law and began travelling to Athens, Asia Minor, and Sicily. Ovids first recitation has been dated to around 25 BC, when he was eighteen and he was part of the circle centered on the patron Marcus Valerius Messalla Corvinus, and seems to have been a friend of poets in the circle of Maecenas. 4.10. 41–54, Ovid mentions friendships with Macer, Propertius, Horace, Ovid was very popular at the time of his early works, but was later exiled by Augustus in AD8. He married three times and divorced twice by the time he was thirty years old and he had one daughter, who eventually bore him grandchildren. His last wife was connected in some way to the influential gens Fabia, the first 25 years of Ovids literary career were spent primarily writing poetry in elegiac meter with erotic themes. The chronology of early works is not secure, tentative dates. 2.18. 19–26 that seems to describe the collection as a published work. The authenticity of some of these poems has been challenged, between the publications of the two editions of the Amores can be dated the premiere of his tragedy Medea, which was admired in antiquity but is no longer extant. Ovid may identify this work in his poetry as the carmen, or song. The Ars Amatoria was followed by the Remedia Amoris in the same year and this corpus of elegiac, erotic poetry earned Ovid a place among the chief Roman elegists Gallus, Tibullus, and Propertius, of whom he saw himself as the fourth member
8.
Francisco de Quevedo
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Francisco Gómez de Quevedo y Santibáñez Villegas was a Spanish nobleman, politician and writer of the Baroque era. Along with his rival, Luis de Góngora, Quevedo was one of the most prominent Spanish poets of the age. His style is characterized by what was called conceptismo and this style existed in stark contrast to Góngoras culteranismo. Quevedo was born in Madrid into a family of hidalgos from the village of Vejorís and his family was descended from the Castilian nobility. Quevedo matured surrounded by dignitaries and nobility at the royal court, intellectually gifted, Quevedo was physically handicapped with a club foot, and myopia. Since he always wore pince-nez, his name in the plural, quevedos, orphaned by the age of six, he was able to attend the Imperial School run by the Jesuits in Madrid. He then attended university at Alcalá de Henares from 1596 to 1600, by his own account, he made independent studies in philosophy, classical languages, Arabic, Hebrew, French and Italian. In 1601, Quevedo, as a member of the Court, moved to Valladolid, where the Court had been transferred by the Kings minister, the Duke of Lerma. There he studied theology, a subject that would become a lifelong interest, by this time, he was becoming noted as both a poet and a prose writer. Some of his poetry was collected in a 1605 generational anthology by Pedro Espinosa entitled Flores de Poetas Ilustres, around this time, he began a very erudite exchange of letters with the humanist Justus Lipsius, in which Quevedo deplored the wars that were ravaging Europe. The Court returned to Madrid in 1606, and Quevedo followed, by then, he was a well-known and accomplished man-of-letters. He befriended and was praised by Miguel de Cervantes and Lope de Vega, Quevedos enemies included, among others, the dramatist Juan Ruiz de Alarcón for, despite his own physical handicaps, Quevedo found Alarcóns redheaded and hunchbacked physique a source of amusement. Quevedo also attacked Juan Pérez de Montalbán, the son of a bookseller with whom he had quarrelled, satirizing him in La Perinola, in 1608, Quevedo dueled with the author and fencing master Luis Pacheco de Narváez as a result of Quevedo criticizing one of Pachecos works. Quevedo took off Pachecos hat in the first encounter and they remained enemies all their lives. In Quevedos Buscón, this duel was parodied with a fencer relying on mathematical calculations having to run away from a duel with an experienced soldier. He was present at the church of San Martín in Madrid when a woman praying there was slapped on the cheek by another man who had rushed up to her, Quevedo seized the man, dragging him outside the church. The two men drew swords, and Quevedo ran his opponent through, the man, who died of his wounds some time later, was someone of importance. Quevedo thus retired temporarily to the palace of his friend and patron, Pedro Téllez-Girón, 3rd Duke of Osuna
9.
Byzantine Empire
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It survived the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist for an additional thousand years until it fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire was the most powerful economic, cultural, several signal events from the 4th to 6th centuries mark the period of transition during which the Roman Empires Greek East and Latin West divided. Constantine I reorganised the empire, made Constantinople the new capital, under Theodosius I, Christianity became the Empires official state religion and other religious practices were proscribed. Finally, under the reign of Heraclius, the Empires military, the borders of the Empire evolved significantly over its existence, as it went through several cycles of decline and recovery. During the reign of Maurice, the Empires eastern frontier was expanded, in a matter of years the Empire lost its richest provinces, Egypt and Syria, to the Arabs. This battle opened the way for the Turks to settle in Anatolia, the Empire recovered again during the Komnenian restoration, such that by the 12th century Constantinople was the largest and wealthiest European city. Despite the eventual recovery of Constantinople in 1261, the Byzantine Empire remained only one of several small states in the area for the final two centuries of its existence. Its remaining territories were annexed by the Ottomans over the 15th century. The Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 finally ended the Byzantine Empire, the term comes from Byzantium, the name of the city of Constantinople before it became Constantines capital. This older name of the city would rarely be used from this point onward except in historical or poetic contexts. The publication in 1648 of the Byzantine du Louvre, and in 1680 of Du Canges Historia Byzantina further popularised the use of Byzantine among French authors, however, it was not until the mid-19th century that the term came into general use in the Western world. The Byzantine Empire was known to its inhabitants as the Roman Empire, the Empire of the Romans, Romania, the Roman Republic, Graikia, and also as Rhōmais. The inhabitants called themselves Romaioi and Graikoi, and even as late as the 19th century Greeks typically referred to modern Greek as Romaika and Graikika. The authority of the Byzantine emperor as the legitimate Roman emperor was challenged by the coronation of Charlemagne as Imperator Augustus by Pope Leo III in the year 800. No such distinction existed in the Islamic and Slavic worlds, where the Empire was more seen as the continuation of the Roman Empire. In the Islamic world, the Roman Empire was known primarily as Rûm, the Roman army succeeded in conquering many territories covering the entire Mediterranean region and coastal regions in southwestern Europe and north Africa. These territories were home to different cultural groups, both urban populations and rural populations. The West also suffered heavily from the instability of the 3rd century AD
10.
Aldus Manutius
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Aldus Pius Manutius was an Italian humanist who became a printer and publisher when he founded the Aldine Press at Venice. He is sometimes called the Elder to distinguish him from his grandson Aldus Manutius the Younger, Manutius was born in Bassiano, in the Papal States, in what is now the province of Latina, some 100 km south of Rome, during the Italian Renaissance period. His family was well off and Manutius was educated as a scholar, studying Latin in Rome, under Gasparino da Verona. In 1482 he went to reside at Mirandola with his old friend and fellow student, there he stayed two years, pursuing his studies in Greek literature. Before Pico moved to Florence, he procured for Manutius the post of tutor to his nephews, Alberto and Leonello Pio, Alberto Pio supplied Manutius with funds for starting his printing press and gave him lands at Carpi. Manutius became a tutor to some of the great Italian ducal families during his early career and he commissioned Francesco Griffo to cut a slanted type known today as italic. He and his grandson Aldus Manutius, the Younger, also a printer, are credited with introducing a system of punctuation. In 1501, Aldus began to use, as his publishers device and his editions of the classics were so highly respected that almost immediately the dolphin-and-anchor device was pirated by French and Italian publishers. More recently, the device has been used by the nineteenth-century London firm of William Pickering, Aldus adapted the image from the reverse of ancient Roman coins issued during the reigns of the Emperors Titus and Domitian, AD 80–82. The dolphin and anchor emblem is associated with Festina lente, a motto that Aldus had begun to use as early as 1499, after receiving a Roman coin from Pietro Bembo, which bore the emblem and motto. For his series of pocket-sized editions of the classics, Manutius designed a new font in which the letters were inclined which he called italic in reference to classical Italy. Despite trying to have the font patented, he could not stop printers outside Venice from copying it, type designs based on work designed by Francesco Griffo and commissioned by Aldus Manutius include Bembo, Poliphilus, and Garamond. Manutius desired to preserve ancient Greek literature by printing editions of its greatest books and he introduced personal or pocket editions of the classics in Greek and Latin that all could own. Scholars admired his editions and the work that he undertook to edit these ancient texts, of these works, only three, the Milanese Theocritus and Isocrates, and the Florentine Homer, were classics. Manutius settled in Venice in 1490, the city by this time was not only a major printing center but it also had a large library of Greek manuscripts from Constantinople and a population of Greeks who could assist with their translation. He soon afterward printed editions of Hero and Leander by Musaeus Grammaticus, the Galeomyomachia, and he called these Precursors of the Greek Library. He began gathering Greek scholars and compositors around him, employing as many as 30 Greeks in his print shop, instructions to typesetters and binders were given in Greek. The prefaces to his editions were written in Greek, Greeks from Crete collated manuscripts, read proofs, and gave samples of calligraphy for casts of Greek type
11.
Virgil
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Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil /ˈvɜːrdʒᵻl/ in English, was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He wrote three of the most famous poems in Latin literature, the Eclogues, the Georgics, a number of minor poems, collected in the Appendix Vergiliana, are sometimes attributed to him. Virgil is traditionally ranked as one of Romes greatest poets and his Aeneid has been considered the national epic of ancient Rome from the time of its composition to the present day. Virgils work has had wide and deep influence on Western literature, most notably Dantes Divine Comedy, in which Virgil appears as Dantes guide through Hell, the tradition holds that Virgil was born in the village of Andes, near Mantua in Cisalpine Gaul. Analysis of his name has led to beliefs that he descended from earlier Roman colonists, modern speculation ultimately is not supported by narrative evidence either from his own writings or his later biographers. Macrobius says that Virgils father was of a background, however. He attended schools in Cremona, Mediolanum, Rome and Naples, after considering briefly a career in rhetoric and law, the young Virgil turned his talents to poetry. From Virgils admiring references to the neoteric writers Pollio and Cinna, it has been inferred that he was, for a time, according to Servius, schoolmates considered Virgil extremely shy and reserved, and he was nicknamed Parthenias or maiden because of his social aloofness. Virgil also seems to have suffered bad health throughout his life, according to the Catalepton, he began to write poetry while in the Epicurean school of Siro the Epicurean at Naples. A group of works attributed to the youthful Virgil by the commentators survive collected under the title Appendix Vergiliana. One, the Catalepton, consists of fourteen poems, some of which may be Virgils, and another. The biographical tradition asserts that Virgil began the hexameter Eclogues in 42 BC and it is thought that the collection was published around 39–38 BC, the Eclogues are a group of ten poems roughly modeled on the bucolic hexameter poetry of the Hellenistic poet Theocritus. The loss of his farm and the attempt through poetic petitions to regain his property have traditionally been seen as Virgils motives in the composition of the Eclogues. This is now thought to be an unsupported inference from interpretations of the Eclogues, the ten Eclogues present traditional pastoral themes with a fresh perspective. Eclogues 1 and 9 address the land confiscations and their effects on the Italian countryside,2 and 3 are pastoral and erotic, discussing both homosexual love and attraction toward people of any gender. Eclogue 4, addressed to Asinius Pollio, the so-called Messianic Eclogue uses the imagery of the age in connection with the birth of a child. Virgil came to many of the other leading literary figures of the time, including Horace, in whose poetry he is often mentioned, and Varius Rufus. At Maecenas insistence Virgil spent the years on the long didactic hexameter poem called the Georgics which he dedicated to Maecenas
12.
Jan van den Hoecke
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Jan van den Hoecke was a Flemish painter, draughtsman and designer of wall tapestries. He was one of the assistants in Rubens’ studio in the 1630s, later traveled to Italy where he resided for a decade and subsequently worked as a court painter in Vienna. He was born in Antwerp in an artistic family and it is believed that, like his brother Robert van den Hoecke, he first apprenticed with his father, the painter Gaspar van den Hoecke. He then worked in the studio of Peter Paul Rubens in the 1630s, while he was at Rubens’ studio he was a frequent collaborator on various major projects of Rubens. He is believed to have collaborated with Rubens on the decorations for the Banqueting Hall. Jan painted monumental representations for this occasion after designs by Rubens, of these large-scale works some have been preserved such as the Triumphal Entrance of Cardinal Prince Ferdinand of Spain and The Battle of Nördlingen,1634. It is known that the work, which celebrates the Cardinal-Infant’s victory over a Swedish army at the Battle of Nördlingen of 1634 was painted by van den Hoecke after an oil sketch by Rubens. It was placed at a position in the centre of the front of the Arch of Ferdinand during the Joyous Entry. It remained outside for a few months after the event during which it was exposed to the natural elements, as van der Hoecke was in Italy by this time, Jacob Jordaens carried out some re-touching of the canvas in 1636 before it was offered to Cardinal-Infant Ferdinand in 1637. Jan van den Hoecke travelled to Italy where he resided likely from 1635 to 1644 although some extend the period of his stay to 1646, in Italy he seems to have become familiar with the paintings of Guido Reni and studied the antique. These influences explain the classicizing trends in his later work, in 1644, the artist was accepted in Rome as a member of a select club, the Virtuosi al Pantheon. Van den Hoecke moved to Austria and entered the service of Emperor Ferdinand III in 1644 and he also painted for Ferdinand’s brother, Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria, including a Madonna and Child and a number of allegorical pieces. Van den Hoecke returned to his country with Archduke Leopold Wilhelm when the latter became the governor of the Southern Netherlands in 1647. He died in Antwerp or Brussels, van den Hoecke was a versatile artist producing historical paintings as well as portraits and designs for tapestries. His work combined the achievements of the art of Rubens with 17th-century Italian Classicism, the artist and his work have only started to attract renewed attention from art historians since the 1970s. Conversely, the knowledge of his unique style has also led to the attribution to other painters of works earlier given to van den Hoecke. His early style with its precise draughtsmanship and closeness to Rubens can be found in his oil sketch of The Triumph of David that was for a time regarded as a work by Rubens. His Hercules between Vice and Virtue shows the influence from both Rubens and Anthony van Dyck, the closeness of his style to that of Rubens may have led to the attribution in 1780 to van den Hoecke of the Massacre of the Innocents when it was in the Liechtenstein Collection
Media related to Hero and Leander at Wikimedia Commons
"Hero. A priestess of Aphrodite at Sestos.". New International Encyclopedia. 1905.
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