1.
Vatican Museums
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The Vatican Museums are the museums of the Vatican City and are located within the citys boundaries. The museums contain roughly 70,000 works, of which 20,000 are on display, and currently employ 640 people who work in 40 different administrative, scholarly, Pope Julius II founded the museums in the early 16th century. The Sistine Chapel, with its ceiling decorated by Michelangelo and the Stanze di Raffaello decorated by Raphael, are on the route through the Vatican Museums. In 2013, they were visited by 6 million people, which combined makes it the 6th most visited art museum in the world, there are 54 galleries, or sale, in total, with the Sistine Chapel, notably, being the very last sala within the Museum. It is one of the largest museums in the world, in 2017, the Museums official website and social media presence was completely redone, in accord with current standards and appearances for modern websites. Pope Julius II sent Giuliano da Sangallo and Michelangelo Buonarroti, who were working at the Vatican, on their recommendation, the pope immediately purchased the sculpture from the vineyard owner. The pope put the sculpture of Laocoön and his sons on public display at the Vatican exactly one month after its discovery, the Museum Christianum was founded by Benedict XIV, and some of the Vatican collections formed the Lateran Museum, which Pius IX founded by decree in 1854. The Museums celebrated their 500th anniversary in October 2006 by permanently opening the excavations of a Vatican Hill necropolis to the public, on 1 January 2017 Barbara Jatta became the Director of the Vatican Museums, replacing Antonio Paolucci who had been director since 2007. The art gallery was housed in the Borgia Apartment until Pope Pius XI ordered construction of a proper building, the new building, designed by Luca Beltrami, was inaugurated on 27 October 1932. The museum has paintings including, Giottos Stefaneschi Triptych Olivuccio di Ciccarello, Opere di Misericordia Raphaels Madonna of Foligno, Oddi Altarpiece, the group of museums includes several sculpture museums surrounding the Cortile del Belvedere. The museum takes its name from two popes, Clement XIV and Pius VI, the pope who brought the museum to completion, Clement XIV came up with the idea of creating a new museum in Innocent VIIIs Belvedere palace and started the refurbishment work. Pope Clement XIV founded the Pio-Clementino museum in 1771, and originally it contained the Renaissance, the museum and collection were enlarged by Clements successor Pius VI. Today, the museum works of Greek and Roman sculpture. Some notable galleries are, Greek Cross Gallery, with the porphyri sarcophagi of Constance and Saint Helen, daughter and mother of Constantine the Great. Sala Rotonda, shaped like a miniature Pantheon, the room has impressive ancient mosaics on the floors, Gallery of the Statues, as its name implies, holds various important statues, including Sleeping Ariadne and the bust of Menander. It also contains the Barberini Candelabra, Gallery of the Busts, Many ancient busts are displayed. Cabinet of the Masks, The name comes from the mosaic on the floor of the gallery, found in Villa Adriana, along the walls, several famous statues are shown including the Three Graces. One wove the thread of life, second nurtured it, third cut it. The center piece is Belvedere Torso, revered by Michelangelo and other Renaissance men, sala degli Animali, So named because of the many ancient statues of animals
2.
Ancient Greek
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Ancient Greek includes the forms of Greek used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around the 9th century BC to the 6th century AD. It is often divided into the Archaic period, Classical period. It is antedated in the second millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Hellenistic phase is known as Koine. Koine is regarded as a historical stage of its own, although in its earliest form it closely resembled Attic Greek. Prior to the Koine period, Greek of the classic and earlier periods included several regional dialects, Ancient Greek was the language of Homer and of fifth-century Athenian historians, playwrights, and philosophers. It has contributed many words to English vocabulary and has been a subject of study in educational institutions of the Western world since the Renaissance. This article primarily contains information about the Epic and Classical phases of the language, Ancient Greek was a pluricentric language, divided into many dialects. The main dialect groups are Attic and Ionic, Aeolic, Arcadocypriot, some dialects are found in standardized literary forms used in literature, while others are attested only in inscriptions. There are also several historical forms, homeric Greek is a literary form of Archaic Greek used in the epic poems, the Iliad and Odyssey, and in later poems by other authors. Homeric Greek had significant differences in grammar and pronunciation from Classical Attic, the origins, early form and development of the Hellenic language family are not well understood because of a lack of contemporaneous evidence. Several theories exist about what Hellenic dialect groups may have existed between the divergence of early Greek-like speech from the common Proto-Indo-European language and the Classical period and they have the same general outline, but differ in some of the detail. The invasion would not be Dorian unless the invaders had some relationship to the historical Dorians. The invasion is known to have displaced population to the later Attic-Ionic regions, the Greeks of this period believed there were three major divisions of all Greek people—Dorians, Aeolians, and Ionians, each with their own defining and distinctive dialects. Often non-west is called East Greek, Arcadocypriot apparently descended more closely from the Mycenaean Greek of the Bronze Age. Boeotian had come under a strong Northwest Greek influence, and can in some respects be considered a transitional dialect, thessalian likewise had come under Northwest Greek influence, though to a lesser degree. Most of the dialect sub-groups listed above had further subdivisions, generally equivalent to a city-state and its surrounding territory, Doric notably had several intermediate divisions as well, into Island Doric, Southern Peloponnesus Doric, and Northern Peloponnesus Doric. The Lesbian dialect was Aeolic Greek and this dialect slowly replaced most of the older dialects, although Doric dialect has survived in the Tsakonian language, which is spoken in the region of modern Sparta. Doric has also passed down its aorist terminations into most verbs of Demotic Greek, by about the 6th century AD, the Koine had slowly metamorphosized into Medieval Greek
3.
Acoetes
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Acoetes was the name of three men in Greek and Roman mythology. The first Acoetes is known for helping the god Bacchus, another, lesser-known Acoetes was father to Laocoon, who warned about the Trojan Horse. Lastly, Acoetes was also the name of Evanders squire in Arcadia and this Acoetes was, according to Ovid, the son of a poor fisherman in Maeonia, who served as pilot in a ship. After landing at the island of Naxos, some of the sailors brought a beautiful sleeping boy on board with them and they had found him on the island and wished to take him with them. Acoetes, who recognized in the boy the god Bacchus, was unable to dissuade them from it, when the ship had reached the open sea, the boy awoke, and desired to be carried back to Naxos. The sailors promised to do so but did not keep their word, hereupon the god showed himself to them in his own majesty, Vines began to twine round the vessel, and Bacchus stood crowned with grapes, holding his thyrsus and surrounded by panthers and tigers. The sailors, seized with madness, jumped into the sea and were turned into dolphins, Acoetes alone was saved and continued on his journey with Bacchus, returning to Naxos, where he was initiated in the Bacchic mysteries and became a priest of the god. In Ovids Pentheus, Acoetes was brought before the King to determine if Bacchus was truly a god, after listening to Acoetes tale of being on the ship with Bacchus, Pentheus ordered him jailed and tortured. However, in trying to imprison Acoetes ocks exploded. oors flew open untouched and this article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Smith, William, ed. article name needed. Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology
4.
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
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Roman mythology
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Roman mythology is the body of traditional stories pertaining to ancient Romes legendary origins and religious system, as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans. Roman mythology may also refer to the study of these representations. The Romans usually treated their traditional narratives as historical, even when these have miraculous or supernatural elements, the stories are often concerned with politics and morality, and how an individuals personal integrity relates to his or her responsibility to the community or Roman state. When the stories illuminate Roman religious practices, they are concerned with ritual, augury. Romes early myths and legends also have a relationship with Etruscan religion. In particular, the versions of Greek myths in Ovids Metamorphoses, written during the reign of Augustus, because ritual played the central role in Roman religion that myth did for the Greeks, it is sometimes doubted that the Romans had much of a native mythology. This perception is a product of Romanticism and the scholarship of the 19th century. From the Renaissance to the 18th century, however, Roman myths were an inspiration particularly for European painting, the Roman tradition is rich in historical myths, or legends, concerning the foundation and rise of the city. These narratives focus on human actors, with only occasional intervention from deities, in Romes earliest period, history and myth have a mutual and complementary relationship. As T. P. Wiseman notes, The Roman stories still matter, as they mattered to Dante in 1300 and Shakespeare in 1600, what does it take to be a free citizen. Can a superpower still be a republic, how does well-meaning authority turn into murderous tyranny. Major sources for Roman myth include the Aeneid of Vergil and the first few books of Livys history as well as Dionysius s Roman Antiquities. Other important sources are the Fasti of Ovid, a six-book poem structured by the Roman religious calendar, scenes from Roman myth also appear in Roman wall painting, coins, and sculpture, particularly reliefs. The Aeneid and Livys early history are the best extant sources for Romes founding myths, material from Greek heroic legend was grafted onto this native stock at an early date. By extension, the Trojans were adopted as the ancestors of the Roman people. Rape of the Sabine women, explaining the importance of the Sabines in the formation of Roman culture, numa Pompilius, the Sabine second king of Rome who consorted with the nymph Egeria and established many of Romes legal and religious institutions. Servius Tullius, the king of Rome, whose mysterious origins were freely mythologized. The Tarpeian Rock, and why it was used for the execution of traitors, lucretia, whose self-sacrifice prompted the overthrow of the early Roman monarchy and led to the establishment of the Republic
6.
Troy
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The present-day location is known as Hisarlik. It was the setting of the Trojan War described in the Greek Epic Cycle, in particular in the Iliad, a new capital called Ilium was founded on the site in the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus. It flourished until the establishment of Constantinople and declined gradually in the Byzantine era and these excavations revealed several cities built in succession. Troy VII has been identified with the city that the Hittites called Wilusa, the origin of the Greek Ἴλιον. Today, the hill at Hisarlık has given its name to a village near the ruins. It lies within the province of Çanakkale, some 30 km south-west of the provincial capital, the map here shows the adapted Scamander estuary with Ilium a little way inland across the Homeric plain. Troy was added to the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1998, Ancient Greek historians variously placed the Trojan War in the 12th, 13th, or 14th centuries BC, Eratosthenes to 1184 BC, Herodotus to 1250 BC, Duris of Samos to 1334 BC. Modern archaeologists associate Homeric Troy with archaeological Troy VII, in the Iliad, the Achaeans set up their camp near the mouth of the River Scamander, where they had beached their ships. The city of Troy itself stood on a hill, across the plain of Scamander, recent geological findings have permitted the identification of the ancient Trojan coastline, and the results largely confirm the accuracy of the Homeric geography of Troy. In November 2001, the geologist John C, kraft from the University of Delaware and the classicist John V. Luce from Trinity College, Dublin, presented the results of investigations, begun in 1977, into the geology of the region. Besides the Iliad, there are references to Troy in the major work attributed to Homer. The Homeric legend of Troy was elaborated by the Roman poet Virgil in his Aeneid, the Greeks and Romans took for a fact the historicity of the Trojan War and the identity of Homeric Troy with the site in Anatolia. Alexander the Great, for example, visited the site in 334 BC and there made sacrifices at tombs associated with the Homeric heroes Achilles and Patroclus. After the 1995 find of a Luwian biconvex seal at Troy VII, with the rise of critical history, Troy and the Trojan War were, for a long time, consigned to the realms of legend. However, the location of ancient Troy had from classical times remained the subject of interest. The Troad peninsula was anticipated to be the location, leChavaliers location, published in his Voyage de la Troade, was the most commonly accepted theory for almost a century. In 1822, the Scottish journalist Charles Maclaren was the first to identify with confidence the position of the city as it is now known, the hill, near the city of Çanakkale, was known as Hisarlık. In 1868, Heinrich Schliemann visited Calvert and secured permission to excavate Hisarlık, in 1871–73 and 1878–79, he excavated the hill and discovered the ruins of a series of ancient cities dating from the Bronze Age to the Roman period
7.
Homer
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Homer is the name ascribed by the ancient Greeks to the semi-legendary author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, two epic poems which are the central works of Greek literature. The Odyssey focuses on the home of Odysseus, king of Ithaca. Many accounts of Homers life circulated in classical antiquity, the most widespread being that he was a bard from Ionia. The modern scholarly consensus is that these traditions do not have any historical value, the Homeric question - by whom, when, where and under what circumstances were the Iliad and Odyssey composed - continues to be debated. Broadly speaking, modern scholarly opinion on the authorship question falls into two camps, one group holds that most of the Iliad and the Odyssey is the work of a single poet of genius. The other considers the Homeric poems to be the crystallization of a process of working and re-working by many contributors and it is generally accepted that the poems were composed at some point around the late eighth or early seventh century B. C. Most researchers believe that the poems were transmitted orally. The Homeric epics were the greatest influence on ancient Greek culture and education, to Plato, the chronological period of Homer depends on the meaning to be assigned to the word Homer. Was Homer a single person, an imaginary person representing a group of poets and this information is often called the world of Homer. The Homeric period would in that cover a number of historical periods, especially the Mycenaean Age. Considered word-for-word, the texts as we know them are the product of the scholars of the last three centuries. Each edition of the Iliad or Odyssey is a different, as the editors rely on different manuscripts and fragments. The term accuracy reveals a belief in an original uniform text. The manuscripts of the work currently available date to no earlier than the 10th century. These are at the end of a missing thousand-year chain of copies made as each generation of manuscripts disintegrated or were lost or destroyed and these numerous manuscripts are so similar that a single original can be postulated. The time gap in the chain is bridged by the scholia, or notes, on the existing manuscripts, librarian of the Library of Alexandria, he had noticed a wide divergence in the works attributed to Homer, and was trying to restore a more authentic copy. He had collected several manuscripts, which he named, the Sinopic, the one he selected for correction was the koine, which Murray translates as the Vulgate. Aristarchus was known for his selection of material
8.
Sophocles
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Sophocles is one of three ancient Greek tragedians whose plays have survived. His first plays were later than those of Aeschylus. He competed in 30 competitions, won 18, and was never judged lower than second place, Aeschylus won 14 competitions, and was sometimes defeated by Sophocles, while Euripides won 5 competitions. Sophocles influenced the development of drama, most importantly by adding a third actor and he also developed his characters to a greater extent than earlier playwrights such as Aeschylus. Sophocles, the son of Sophilus, was a member of the rural deme of Hippeios Colonus in Attica, which was to become a setting for one of his plays. Sophocles was born a few years before the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC, Sophocles was born into a wealthy family and was highly educated. Sophocles first artistic triumph was in 468 BC, when he took first prize in the Dionysia theatre competition over the master of Athenian drama. According to Plutarch, the victory came under unusual circumstances, instead of following the usual custom of choosing judges by lot, the archon asked Cimon and the other strategoi present to decide the victor of the contest. Plutarch further contends that following this loss Aeschylus soon left for Sicily, although Plutarch says that this was Sophocles first production, it is now thought that his first production was probably in 470 BC. Triptolemus was probably one of the plays that Sophocles presented at this festival, in 480 BC Sophocles was chosen to lead the paean, celebrating the Greek victory over the Persians at the Battle of Salamis. Early in his career, the politician Cimon might have one of his patrons, although if he was, there was no ill will borne by Pericles, Cimons rival. In 443/2 he served as one of the Hellenotamiai, or treasurers of Athena, in 420 BC, he welcomed and set up an altar for the image of Asclepius at his house, when the deity was introduced to Athens. For this, he was given the posthumous epithet Dexion by the Athenians and he was also elected, in 413 BC, one of the commissioners who responded to the catastrophic destruction of the Athenian expeditionary force in Sicily during the Peloponnesian War. Sophocles died at the age of ninety or ninety-one in the winter of 406/5 BC, as with many famous men in classical antiquity, his death inspired a number of apocryphal stories. The most famous is the suggestion that he died from the strain of trying to recite a long sentence from his Antigone without pausing to take a breath, another account suggests he choked while eating grapes at the Anthesteria festival in Athens. A third holds that he died of happiness after winning his final victory at the City Dionysia, one of his sons, Iophon, and a grandson, also called Sophocles, also became playwrights. Several ancient sources mention Sophocles homosexuality or bisexuality, Athenaios reported that Sophocles loved boys like Euripides loved women. The poet Ion of Chios relates an anecdote involving Sophocles seducing a serving boy at a symposium, Aeschylus, who dominated Athenian playwriting during Sophocles early career, followed suit and adopted the third character into his own work towards the end of his life
9.
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
10.
Aeneid
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The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It comprises 9,896 lines in dactylic hexameter, the hero Aeneas was already known to Greco-Roman legend and myth, having been a character in the Iliad. The Aeneid is widely regarded as Virgils masterpiece and one of the greatest works of Latin literature, the Aeneid can be divided into two halves based on the disparate subject matter of Books 1–6 and Books 7–12. These two halves are commonly regarded as reflecting Virgils ambition to rival Homer by treating both the Odysseys wandering theme and the Iliads warfare themes and this is, however, a rough correspondence, the limitations of which should be borne in mind. Virgil begins his poem with a statement of his theme and an invocation to the Muse and he then explains the reason for the principal conflict in the story, the resentment held by the goddess Juno against the Trojan people. This is consistent with her throughout the Homeric epics. Also in the manner of Homer, the story begins in medias res, with the Trojan fleet in the eastern Mediterranean. The fleet, led by Aeneas, is on a voyage to find a second home and it has been foretold that in Italy, he will give rise to a race both noble and courageous, a race which will become known to all nations. Juno is wrathful, because she had not been chosen in the judgment of Paris, also, Ganymede, a Trojan prince, was chosen to be the cup bearer to her husband, Jupiter—replacing Junos daughter, Hebe. Juno proceeds to Aeolus, King of the Winds, and asks that he release the winds to stir up a storm in exchange for a bribe, Aeolus does not accept the bribe, but agrees to carry out Junos orders, the storm then devastates the fleet. The fleet takes shelter on the coast of Africa, where Aeneas rouses the spirits of his men, There, Aeneass mother, Venus, in the form of a hunting woman very similar to the goddess Diana, encourages him and recounts to him the history of Carthage. At a banquet given in honour of the Trojans, Aeneas sadly recounts the events that occasioned the Trojans arrival. He begins the tale shortly after the war described in the Iliad, Cunning Ulysses devised a way for Greek warriors to gain entry into the walled city of Troy by hiding in a large wooden horse. The Greeks pretended to sail away, leaving a warrior, Sinon, to inform the Trojans that the horse was an offering and that if it were taken into the city, the Trojans would be able to conquer Greece. The Trojan priest Laocoön saw through the Greek plot and urged the horses destruction, then, in what would be seen by the Trojans as punishment from the gods, two serpents emerged from the sea and devoured Laocoön, along with his two sons. The Trojans then took the horse inside the walls, and after nightfall the armed Greeks emerged from it. In a dream, Hector, the fallen Trojan prince, advised Aeneas to flee with his family, Aeneas awoke and saw with horror what was happening to his beloved city. At first he tried to fight the enemy, but soon he lost his comrades and was alone to fend off the Greeks
11.
Poseidon
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Poseidon was one of the twelve Olympian deities of the pantheon in Greek mythology. His main domain was the ocean, and he is called the God of the Sea, additionally, he is referred to as Earth-Shaker due to his role in causing earthquakes, and has been called the tamer of horses. He is usually depicted as a male with curly hair. The name of the sea-god Nethuns in Etruscan was adopted in Latin for Neptune in Roman mythology, both were sea gods analogous to Poseidon. According to some folklore, he was saved by his mother Rhea, who concealed him among a flock of lambs and pretended to have birth to a colt. There is a Homeric hymn to Poseidon, who was the protector of many Hellenic cities, according to the references from Plato in his dialogues Timaeus and Critias, the island of Atlantis was the chosen domain of Poseidon. The form Ποτειδάϝων appears in Corinth, the origins of the name Poseidon are unclear. Walter Burkert finds that the second element da- remains hopelessly ambiguous, another theory interprets the second element as related to the word *δᾶϝον dâwon, water, this would make *Posei-dawōn into the master of waters. There is also the possibility that the word has Pre-Greek origin, Plato in his dialogue Cratylus gives two alternative etymologies, either the sea restrained Poseidon when walking as a foot-bond, or he knew many things. If surviving Linear B clay tablets can be trusted, the name occurs with greater frequency than does di-u-ja. A feminine variant, po-se-de-ia, is found, indicating a lost consort goddess. Poseidon carries frequently the title wa-na-ka in Linear B inscriptions, as king of the underworld, the chthonic nature of Poseidon-Wanax is also indicated by his title E-ne-si-da-o-ne in Mycenean Knossos and Pylos, a powerful attribute. In the cave of Amnisos Enesidaon is related with the cult of Eileithyia and she was related with the annual birth of the divine child. During the Bronze Age, a goddess of nature, dominated both in Minoan and Mycenean cult, and Wanax was her companion in Mycenean cult. It is possible that Demeter appears as Da-ma-te in a Linear B inscription, in Linear B inscriptions found at Pylos, E-ne-si-da-o-ne is related with Poseidon, and Si-to Po-tini-ja is probably related with Demeter. Tablets from Pylos record sacrificial goods destined for the Two Queens, the Two Queens may be related with Demeter and Persephone, or their precursors, goddesses who were not associated with Poseidon in later periods. The violated Demeter was Demeter Erinys, in Arcadia, Demeters mare-form was worshiped into historical times. Her xoanon of Phigaleia shows how the local cult interpreted her, a Medusa type with a horses head with snaky hair, holding a dove and a dolphin, probably representing her power over air and water
12.
Neptune (mythology)
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Neptune was the god of freshwater and the sea in Roman religion. He is the counterpart of the Greek god Poseidon, in the Greek-influenced tradition, Neptune was the brother of Jupiter and Pluto, the brothers presided over the realms of Heaven, the earthly world, and the Underworld. Depictions of Neptune in Roman mosaics, especially those of North Africa, are influenced by Hellenistic conventions, Neptune was likely associated with fresh water springs before the sea. Like Poseidon, Neptune was worshipped by the Romans also as a god of horses, under the name Neptunus Equester, Neptune is the creator of horses and is the god of the sea as well as the owner of a powerful weapon, the Trident. Poseidon is the greek Neptune and is one of the big three gods Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon and he accidentally created horses when he had an affair with Medusa, and also created a boy who roams the seas as a pirate past the pillar of Hercules. The etymology of Latin Neptunus is unclear and disputed, the ancient grammarian Varro derived the name from nuptus i. e. covering, with a more or less explicit allusion to the nuptiae, marriage of Heaven and Earth. Among modern scholars Paul Kretschmer proposed a derivation from IE *neptu- moist substance, similarly Raymond Bloch supposed it might be an adjectival form in -no from *nuptu-, meaning he who is moist. Georges Dumézil though remarked words deriving root *nep- are not attested in IE languages other than Vedic and he proposed an etymology that brings together Neptunus with Vedic and Avestan theonyms Apam Napat, Apam Napá and Old Irish theonym Nechtan, all meaning descendant of the waters. By using the approach the Indo-Iranian, Avestan and Irish figures would show common features with the Roman historicised legends about Neptune. Dumézil thence proposed to derive the nouns from IE root *nepot-, descendant, IE root *nebh-, having the original meaning of damp, wet, has given Sanskrit nábhah, Hittite nepis, Latin nubs, nebula, German Nebel, Slavic nebo etc. The concept would be close to that expressed in the name of Greek god Όυράνος, derived from IE root *h2wórso-, to water, irrigate and *h2worsó- and this etymology would be more in accord with Varros. The district was connected to the cult of the god, Messapus and Halesus. Messapus led the Falisci and others to war in the Aeneid, nepi and Falerii have been famed since antiquity for the excellent quality of the water of their springs, scattered in meadows. Nepet is considered a hydronymic toponym of preIndoeuropean origin widespread in Europe and from an appellative meaning damp wide valley, plain, cognate with pre-Greek νάπη, such an identification may well be grounded in the strict relationship between the Latin and Greek theologies of the two deities. Servius the grammarian also explicitly states Neptune is in charge of all the rivers, springs and he also is the lord of horses because he worked with Minerva to make the chariot. He may find a parallel in Irish god Nechtan, master of the well from all the rivers of the world flow out. Poseidon on the other hand underwent the process of becoming the main god of the sea at an earlier time. For a time he was paired with Salacia, the goddess of the salt water, Neptune was also considered the legendary progenitor god of a Latin stock, the Faliscans, who called themselves Neptunia proles
13.
Trojan Horse
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The Trojan Horse is a tale from the Trojan War about the subterfuge that the Greeks used to enter the city of Troy and win the war. In the canonical version, after a fruitless 10-year siege, the Greeks constructed a wooden horse. The Greeks pretended to sail away, and the Trojans pulled the horse into their city as a victory trophy and that night the Greek force crept out of the horse and opened the gates for the rest of the Greek army, which had sailed back under cover of night. The Greeks entered and destroyed the city of Troy, ending the war, metaphorically a Trojan Horse has come to mean any trick or stratagem that causes a target to invite a foe into a securely protected bastion or place. A malicious computer program which tricks users into willingly running it is called a Trojan horse or simply a Trojan. The main ancient source for the story is the Aeneid of Virgil, the event is also referred to in Homers Odyssey. In the Greek tradition, the horse is called the Wooden Horse, according to Quintus Smyrnaeus, Odysseus thought of building a great wooden horse, hiding an elite force inside, and fooling the Trojans into wheeling the horse into the city as a trophy. Under the leadership of Epeius, the Greeks built the wooden horse in three days, odysseuss plan called for one man to remain outside the horse, he would act as though the Greeks had abandoned him, leaving the horse as a gift for the Trojans. An inscription was engraved on the reading, For their return home. Then they burned their tents and left to Tenedos by night, Greek soldier Sinon was abandoned, and was to signal to the Greeks by lighting a beacon. In Virgils poem, Sinon, the only volunteer for the role, successfully convinces the Trojans that he has left behind. Sinon tells the Trojans that the Horse was built to be too large for them to take it into their city, however, the god Poseidon sends two sea serpents to strangle him and his sons Antiphantes and Thymbraeus before any Trojan heeds his warning. According to Apollodorus the two serpents were sent by Apollo, whom Laocoon had insulted by sleeping with his wife in front of the divine image. King Priams daughter Cassandra, the soothsayer of Troy, insists that the horse will be the downfall of the city and she too is ignored, hence their doom and loss of the war. 8.487 ff The most detailed and most familiar version is in Virgils Aeneid and they secretly hide a picked body of men, chosen by lot, there, in the dark body, filling the belly and the huge cavernous insides with armed warriors. Then Laocoön rushes down eagerly from the heights of the citadel, to confront them all, a crowd with him. Do you think the enemys sailed away, or do you think any Greek gifts free of treachery. Whatever it is, Im afraid of Greeks even those bearing gifts, Book II includes Laocoön saying, Equo ne credite, Teucri
14.
Apollo
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Apollo is one of the most important and complex of the Olympian deities in classical Greek and Roman religion and Greek and Roman mythology. The ideal of the kouros, Apollo has been recognized as a god of music, truth and prophecy, healing, the sun and light, plague, poetry. Apollo is the son of Zeus and Leto, and has a twin sister, Apollo is known in Greek-influenced Etruscan mythology as Apulu. As the patron of Delphi, Apollo was an oracular god—the prophetic deity of the Delphic Oracle. Medicine and healing are associated with Apollo, whether through the god himself or mediated through his son Asclepius, yet Apollo was also seen as a god who could bring ill-health and deadly plague. Amongst the gods custodial charges, Apollo became associated with dominion over colonists, as the leader of the Muses and director of their choir, Apollo functioned as the patron god of music and poetry. Hermes created the lyre for him, and the instrument became an attribute of Apollo. Hymns sung to Apollo were called paeans, Apollo and Helios/Sol remained separate beings in literary and mythological texts until the 3rd century CE. The name Apollo—unlike the related older name Paean—is generally not found in the Linear B texts, the etymology of the name is uncertain. The spelling Ἀπόλλων had almost superseded all other forms by the beginning of the common era and it probably is a cognate to the Doric month Apellaios, and the offerings apellaia at the initiation of the young men during the family-festival apellai. According to some scholars the words are derived from the Doric word apella, apella is the name of the popular assembly in Sparta, corresponding to the ecclesia. R. S. P. Beekes rejected the connection of the theonym with the noun apellai, several instances of popular etymology are attested from ancient authors. Thus, the Greeks most often associated Apollos name with the Greek verb ἀπόλλυμι, in the ancient Macedonian language πέλλα means stone, and some toponyms may be derived from this word, Πέλλα and Πελλήνη. The role of Apollo as god of plague is evident in the invocation of Apollo Smintheus by Chryses, the Hittite testimony reflects an early form *Apeljōn, which may also be surmised from comparison of Cypriot Ἀπείλων with Doric Ἀπέλλων. A Luwian etymology suggested for Apaliunas makes Apollo The One of Entrapment, Apollos chief epithet was Phoebus, literally bright. It was very commonly used by both the Greeks and Romans for Apollos role as the god of light, like other Greek deities, he had a number of others applied to him, reflecting the variety of roles, duties, and aspects ascribed to the god. However, while Apollo has a number of appellations in Greek myth. Aegletes, from αἴγλη, light of the sun Helius, literally sun Lyceus light, the meaning of the epithet Lyceus later became associated with Apollos mother Leto, who was the patron goddess of Lycia and who was identified with the wolf
15.
Cult image
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In the practice of religion, a cult image is a human-made object that is venerated or worshipped for the deity, spirit or daemon that it embodies or represents. Cultus, the outward religious formulas of cult, often centers upon the treatment of cult images, religious images cover a wider range of all types of images made with a religious purpose, subject, or connection. In many contexts cult image specifically means the most important image in a temple, kept in an inner space, as opposed to what may be many other images decorating the temple. The term idol is often synonymous with cult image, but may be used especially of an image believed not just to depict or represent a deity or spirit. Sometimes the image is believed to have its own powers, to grant wishes or otherwise affect the world, in cultures where idolatry is not viewed negatively, the word idol is not generally seen as pejorative, such as in Indian English. Cult of images is the practice of worshipping or venerating religious or cult images representing divine figures, common in a number of ancient religions, the practice continues most prominently today in Hinduism. Assertions by others outside the group concerned that such beliefs are held by the group are however common. Cult images were a presence in Ancient Egypt, and still are in modern-day Kemetism. A common example of an image in ancient Egypt was the Apis Bull. The term is confined to the relatively small images, typically in gold. These images usually showed the god in their sacred barque or boat, the Parthenon contained a cult image of Athena, the Greek goddess of civilization and the noble side of war. This cult image, known as Athena Parthenos, was created by Phidias and this cult image was used for religious sacrifices at this Athenian temple. Hinduism allows for many forms of worship and therefore it neither prescribes nor proscribes worship of images, in Hinduism, a murti typically refers to an image that expresses a Divine Spirit. Meaning literally embodiment, a murti is a representation of a divinity, made usually of stone, wood, or metal, hindus consider a murti worthy of serving as a focus of divine worship only after the divine is invoked in it for the purpose of offering worship. The depiction of the divinity must reflect the gestures and proportions outlined in religious tradition, members of Abrahamic religions identify cult images as idols and their worship as idolatry, the worship of hollow forms. The avoidance of such a degrading paradox was expressed in the early Christian idea of miraculous icons that were not made by human hands, acheiropoietoi. Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christians make an exception for the veneration of image of saints, the word idol entered Middle English in the 13th century from Old French idole adapted in Ecclesiastical Latin from the Greek eidolon. Greek eidos was employed by Plato and the Platonists to signify perfect immutable forms, the local tribes, of the Arabian peninsula, came to this centre of commerce to place their idols in the Kaaba, in the process being charged tithes
16.
Vatican Vergil
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The Vergilius Vaticanus or Vatican Virgil is a Late Antique illuminated manuscript containing, in its form today, fragments of Virgils Aeneid and Georgics. The two other surviving illustrated manuscripts of classical literature are the Vergilius Romanus and the Ambrosian Iliad, there are 76 surviving leaves in the manuscript with 50 illustrations. If, as was common practice at the time, the manuscript contained all of the works of Virgil. The text was written by a scribe in rustic capitals. As was common at the time, there is no separation between words, the scribe worked first leaving spaces for the illustrations. The illustrations were added by three different painters, all of whom used iconographic copybooks, the illustrations are contained within frames and include landscapes and architectural and other details. The miniatures are set within the column, although a few miniatures occupy a full page. The human figures are painted in classical style with natural proportions, the illustrations often convey the illusion of depth quite well. The gray ground of the blend into bands of rose, violet. The interior scenes are based on understanding of perspective. The style of these miniatures has much in common with the miniatures of the Quedlinburg Itala fragment and have also been compared to the frescos found at Pompeii. The manuscript was made for a pagan noble. Annotations in the manuscript indicate it was in Italy until the 7th century, a French scribe made further notes around 1400. Later it reached Rome, and belonged to collectors including Pietro Bembo and Fulvio Orsini, the Vergilius Vaticanus is not to be confused with the Vergilius Romanus or the unillustrated Vergilius Augusteus, two other ancient Vergilian manuscripts in the Biblioteca Apostolica. Print Facsimile, Wright, David H. Vergilius Vaticanus, vollständige Faksimile-Ausgabe im Originalformat des Codex Vaticanus Latinus 3225 der Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, graz, Austria, Akademische Druck- u. Verlagsanstalt,1984. Digital Facsimile, Vatican Library All the illustrations are online, with commentary, in Wright, David H. The Vatican Vergil, a Masterpiece of Late Antique Art, Berkeley, University of California Press,1993, google books, full online text Calkins, ithaca, New York, Cornell University Press,1983. Walther, Ingo F. and Norbert Wolf, codices Illustres, The worlds most famous illuminated manuscripts,400 to 1600
17.
Iliad
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The Iliad is an ancient Greek epic poem in dactylic hexameter, traditionally attributed to Homer. Then the epic narrative takes up events prophesied for the future, such as Achilles imminent death and the fall of Troy, although the narrative ends before these events take place. However, as events are prefigured and alluded to more and more vividly. The Iliad is paired with something of a sequel, the Odyssey, along with the Odyssey, the Iliad is among the oldest extant works of Western literature, and its written version is usually dated to around the 8th century BC. Recent statistical modelling based on language evolution gives a date of 760–710 BC, in the modern vulgate, the Iliad contains 15,693 lines, it is written in Homeric Greek, a literary amalgam of Ionic Greek and other dialects. Note, Book numbers are in parentheses and come before the synopsis of the book, after an invocation to the Muses, the story launches in medias res towards the end of the Trojan War between the Trojans and the besieging Greeks. Chryses, a Trojan priest of Apollo, offers the Greeks wealth for the return of his daughter Chryseis, held captive of Agamemnon, although most of the Greek army is in favour of the offer, Agamemnon refuses. Chryses prays for Apollos help, and Apollo causes a plague to afflict the Greek army, after nine days of plague, Achilles, the leader of the Myrmidon contingent, calls an assembly to deal with the problem. Under pressure, Agamemnon agrees to return Chryseis to her father, angered, Achilles declares that he and his men will no longer fight for Agamemnon but will go home. Odysseus takes a ship and returns Chryseis to her father, whereupon Apollo ends the plague, in the meantime, Agamemnons messengers take Briseis away. Achilles becomes very upset, sits by the seashore, and prays to his mother, Achilles asks his mother to ask Zeus to bring the Greeks to the breaking point by the Trojans, so Agamemnon will realize how much the Greeks need Achilles. Thetis does so, and Zeus agrees, Zeus sends a dream to Agamemnon, urging him to attack Troy. Agamemnon heeds the dream but decides to first test the Greek armys morale, the plan backfires, and only the intervention of Odysseus, inspired by Athena, stops a rout. Odysseus confronts and beats Thersites, a soldier who voices discontent about fighting Agamemnons war. After a meal, the Greeks deploy in companies upon the Trojan plain, the poet takes the opportunity to describe the provenance of each Greek contingent. When news of the Greek deployment reaches King Priam, the Trojans too sortie upon the plain, in a list similar to that for the Greeks, the poet describes the Trojans and their allies. The armies approach each other, but before they meet, Paris offers to end the war by fighting a duel with Menelaus, urged by his brother and head of the Trojan army, Hector. While Helen tells Priam about the Greek commanders from the walls of Troy, Paris is beaten, but Aphrodite rescues him and leads him to bed with Helen before Menelaus can kill him
18.
Sinon
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In Greek mythology, Sinon a son of Aesimus, or of the crafty Sisyphus, was a Greek warrior during the Trojan War. He told them that the horse was made so big that the Trojans would not be able to move it into their city, because if they did they would be invincible to later Achaean invasion. His story convinced the Trojans because it included the details as well as an explanation that he was left behind to die by the doing of Odysseus. The Trojans brought the Trojan Horse into their city against the advice of Cassandra, inside the giant wooden horse were Greek soldiers, who, as night fell, disembarked from the horse and opened the city gates, thus sealing the fate of Troy. He was also an Achaean spy who told the Greeks when the soldiers in the horse had begun their fight, in Quintus of Smyrna, the Trojans, ready to attack the Greek camp, see smoke coming from the Greek camp and cautiously approach. When they arrive at the camp they find only Sinon alongside the Trojan Horse, the reader later finds out that it was Sinon who started the fire signal that drew the Trojans to the Greek camp. The rest of the camp is deserted, the Trojans circle him and gently ask him questions but when he does not answer they grow angry and begin to threaten to stab him. When he still does not answer, the Trojans cut off his ears, finally he tells them that the Greeks have fled and they built the Trojan Horse to honor Athena. Sinon claims that Odysseus wanted to him but he managed to escape. When they gave up looking for him and left he returned to the Trojan Horse, Sinon claims that the Greeks stopped looking for him out of respect for Zeus. All the Trojans believe this story, except Laocoön who, along with his two sons, is attacked by a giant sea serpent. Following this, believing that Laocoön was attacked because he offended the gods, feeling bad for Sinon, and fearing wrath from the gods, the Trojans bring Sinon and the Trojan Horse into Troy. Sinon is here rather than the Evil Counselors Bolgia because his advice was false as well as evil, the word Sinonical was coined by Lewes Lewkenor in his 1595 work The Estate of English Fugitives. William Shakespeare referred to Sinon on several occasions in his work, using him as a symbol of treachery
19.
Euphorion of Chalcis
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Euphorion of Chalcis was a Greek poet and grammarian, born at Chalcis in Euboea about 275 BC. Euphorion spent much of his life in Athens, where he amassed great wealth, after studying philosophy with Lacydes and Prytanis, he became the student and eromenos of the poet Archeboulus. About 221 he was invited by Antiochus the Great to the court of Syria and he assisted in the formation of the royal Library of Antioch, of which he held the post of librarian till his death. He wrote mythological epics, amatory elegies, epigrams and a poem after the manner of the Ibis of Callimachus. Prose works on antiquities and history are also attributed to him, like Lycophron, he was fond of using archaic and obsolete expressions, and the erudite character of his allusions rendered his language very obscure. His elegies were highly esteemed by the Romans—they were imitated or translated by Cornelius Gallus, fragments published in Meineke, De Euphorionis Chalcidensis vita et scriptis, in his Analecta Alexandrina began the modern editions of the surviving fragments of Euphorion. Further lines have been recovered from papyri of Oxyrhynchus and elsewhere, Euphorion – Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. article name needed. Euphorion Whos Who in the Greek World by John Hazel, studi su Euforione Powell, Johannes U. 1981. Collectanea Alexandrina, Reliquiae minores poetarum Graecorum aetatis Ptolemaicae 323–146 A. C. (Oxford, Oxford University Press,1925, der Thrax des Euphorion, Philologus 44 129–55, reprinted in Latte, Kleine Schriften Munich 1968, pp 562–84. Studi su Euforione Franz Skutsch, Euphorion, in, Pauly Realencyclopädie of classical archeology. Volume VI,1, Stuttgart,1907, 1174–1190 Sp
20.
John Dryden
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John Dryden was an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who was made Englands first Poet Laureate in 1668. He is seen as dominating the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the period came to be known in circles as the Age of Dryden. Walter Scott called him Glorious John, Dryden was born in the village rectory of Aldwincle near Thrapston in Northamptonshire, where his maternal grandfather was rector of All Saints. He was a cousin once removed of Jonathan Swift. As a boy Dryden lived in the village of Titchmarsh. In 1644 he was sent to Westminster School as a Kings Scholar where his headmaster was Dr. Richard Busby, having recently been re-founded by Elizabeth I, Westminster during this period embraced a very different religious and political spirit encouraging royalism and high Anglicanism. Whatever Drydens response to this was, he respected the headmaster. As a humanist public school, Westminster maintained a curriculum which trained pupils in the art of rhetoric and this is a skill which would remain with Dryden and influence his later writing and thinking, as much of it displays these dialectical patterns. The Westminster curriculum included weekly translation assignments which developed Drydens capacity for assimilation and this was also to be exhibited in his later works. Busby had first prayed for the King and then locked in his schoolboys to prevent their attending the spectacle, in 1650 Dryden went up to Trinity College, Cambridge. Though there is specific information on Drydens undergraduate years, he would most certainly have followed the standard curriculum of classics, rhetoric. In 1654 he obtained his BA, graduating top of the list for Trinity that year, in June of the same year Drydens father died, leaving him some land which generated a little income, but not enough to live on. Returning to London during the Protectorate, Dryden obtained work with Cromwells Secretary of State and this appointment may have been the result of influence exercised on his behalf by his cousin the Lord Chamberlain, Sir Gilbert Pickering. At Cromwells funeral on 23 November 1658 Dryden processed with the Puritan poets John Milton, shortly thereafter he published his first important poem, Heroic Stanzas, a eulogy on Cromwells death which is cautious and prudent in its emotional display. In 1660 Dryden celebrated the Restoration of the monarchy and the return of Charles II with Astraea Redux, in this work the interregnum is illustrated as a time of anarchy, and Charles is seen as the restorer of peace and order. After the Restoration, as Dryden quickly established himself as the poet and literary critic of his day. Along with Astraea Redux, Dryden welcomed the new regime with two more panegyrics, To His Sacred Majesty, A Panegyric on his Coronation and To My Lord Chancellor and these, and his other nondramatic poems, are occasional—that is, they celebrate public events. Thus they are written for the rather than the self
21.
Pliny the Elder
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In the latter number will be my uncle, by virtue of his own and of your compositions. Pliny is referring to the fact that Tacitus relied on his uncles now missing work on the History of the German Wars. The wind caused by the sixth and largest pyroclastic surge of the eruption would not allow his ship to leave the shore, and Pliny probably died during this event. Plinys dates are pinned to the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD79 and a statement of his nephew that he died in his 56th year, Pliny was the son of an equestrian, Gaius Plinius Celer, and his wife, Marcella. Neither the younger nor the elder Pliny mention the names and their ultimate source is a fragmentary inscription found in a field in Verona and recorded by the 16th century Augustinian monk Onofrio Panvinio at Verona. The reading of the inscription depends on the reconstruction, but in all cases the names come through, whether he was an augur and whether she was named Grania Marcella are less certain. Jean Hardouin presents a statement from a source that he claims was ancient, that Pliny was from Verona. Hardouin also cites the conterraneity of Catullus, additional efforts to connect Celer and Marcella with other gentes are highly speculative. Hardouin is the scholar to use his unknown source. He kept statues of his ancestors there, a statue of Pliny on the facade of the Duomo of Como celebrates him as a native son. He had a sister, Plinia, who married into the Caecilii and was the mother of his nephew, Pliny the Younger, whose letters describe his work and study regimen in detail. In one of his letters to Tacitus, Pliny the Younger details how his uncles breakfasts would be light and simple following the customs of our forefathers. This shows that Pliny the Younger wanted it to be conveyed that Pliny the Elder was a good Roman and this statement would have pleased Tacitus. Two inscriptions identifying the hometown of Pliny the Younger as Como take precedence over the Verona theory, one commemorates the youngers career as imperial magistrate and details his considerable charitable and municipal expenses on behalf of the people of Como. Another identifies his father Lucius village as Fecchio near Como and it is likely therefore that Plinia was a local girl and Pliny the Elder, her brother, was from Como. Gaius was a member of the Plinii gens and he did not take his fathers cognomen, Celer, but assumed his own, Secundus. As his adopted son took the same cognomen, Pliny founded a branch, no earlier instances of the Plinii are known. In 59 BC, only about 82 years before Plinys birth, Julius Caesar founded Novum Comum as a colonia to secure the region against the Alpine tribes, whom he had been unable to defeat
22.
Rhodes
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Rhodes is the largest of the Dodecanese islands in terms of land area and also the island groups historical capital. Administratively the island forms a municipality within the Rhodes regional unit. The principal town of the island and seat of the municipality is Rhodes, the city of Rhodes had 50,636 inhabitants in 2011. It is located northeast of Crete, southeast of Athens and just off the Anatolian coast of Turkey, Rhodes nickname is The island of the Knights, named after the Knights of Saint John of Jerusalem, who once conquered the land. Historically, Rhodes was famous worldwide for the Colossus of Rhodes, the Medieval Old Town of the City of Rhodes has been declared a World Heritage Site. Today, it is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Europe, the island has been known as Ρόδος in Greek throughout its history. In addition, the island has been called Rodi in Italian, Rodos in Turkish, and Rodi or Rodes in Ladino. The island of Rhodes is shaped like a spearhead,79.7 km long and 38 km wide, with an area of approximately 1,400 square kilometres. The city of Rhodes is located at the tip of the island, as well as the site of the ancient. The main air gateway is located 14 km to the southwest of the city in Paradisi, the road network radiates from the city along the east and west coasts. There are mineral-rich spring water used to give medicinal baths and the spa resorts offer various health treatments, Rhodes is situated 363 km east-south-east from the Greek mainland, and 18 km from the southern shore of Turkey. The interior of the island is mountainous, sparsely inhabited and covered with forests of pine, while the shores are rocky, the island has arable strips of land where citrus fruit, wine grapes, vegetables, olives and other crops are grown. The Rhodian population of deer was found to be genetically distinct in 2005. In Petaloudes Valley, large numbers of tiger moths gather during the summer months, mount Attavyros, at 1,216 metres, is the islands highest point of elevation. Earthquakes include the 226 BC earthquake that destroyed the Colossus of Rhodes, one on 3 May 1481 which destroyed much of the city of Rhodes, and one on 26 June 1926. On 15 July 2008, Rhodes was struck by a 6.3 magnitude earthquake causing minor damage to a few old buildings, Rhodes has a hot-summer Mediterranean climate. The island was inhabited in the Neolithic period, although remains of this culture. In the 16th century BC, the Minoans came to Rhodes, later Greek mythology recalled a Rhodian race called the Telchines and associated the island of Rhodes with Danaus, it was sometimes nicknamed Telchinis
23.
Agesander
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Agesander was a or, more likely, several Greek sculptors from the island of Rhodes, working in the first centuries BC and AD, in a late Hellenistic baroque style. If there was more than one sculptor called Agesander they were likely related to each other. The very important works of the groups of Laocoön and his Sons, in the Vatican Museums, the name Agesander is only found in ancient literature in Pliny the Elder, but occurs in several inscriptions, though between them these certainly refer to a number of different individuals. Until the discovery at Sperlonga in 1959, only one work which Agesander executed was known, in 1959 a very large set of sculptures were discovered at Sperlonga, and are now in a museum there created for them. One section, the prow of the Scylla group, was signed by the same three names, this time with the names of their fathers, but in a different order. Sperlonga is the classical Spelunca mentioned by Tacitus and others, on the coast between Rome and Naples, where the emperor Tiberius had a celebrated villa. Tiberius was nearly killed when the containing the statues collapsed in 26 AD, as Tacitus recounts. The sculptures were in thousands of fragments, and reconstruction of the smaller pieces continues, the others are Agesandros, son of Paionios and Polydoros, son of Polydoros. It is thought that strict seniority governed the sequence of names in such cases and, barring a simple mistake by Pliny and it was common for Rhodians to be named after their grandfathers, with the same names alternating over many generations for as long as several centuries. In some he is again Athenodorus, son of Agesander, Agesandros, son of Paionios occurs in other honorific inscriptions, including a very grand one on Rhodes listing over twenty related individuals, and Paionioss own father is another Agesander. E. E. Rice says this inscription can be dated fairly closely to c. 60–50 BC, probably closer to 50 BC, and identifies Agesandros with the Sperlonga sculptor. One possibility is that either or both of the trios containing Agesander possessed the names as sculptors from an earlier period. The death of Pliny in the eruption that destroyed Pompeii in 79 AD provides an ante quem for the Laocoön. Reconstructing his proposed and putative career as a sculptor, Athenodoros flourished up to perhaps about 10 BC. Some time before about 10 BC he was first the second sculptor of the Laocoön, probably under his father Agesandros, and at a later date was the lead sculptor of Sperlonga. He was probably related to the Sperlonga Agesander, son of Paionios, although this Agesander was not his father. The Oxford History of Classical Art,1993, OUP, ISBN0198143869 Rice, E. E. Prosopographika Rhodiaka, The Annual of the British School at Athens, Vol.81, pp. 209–250, JSTOR
24.
Rome
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Rome is a special comune and the capital of Italy. Rome also serves as the capital of the Lazio region, with 2,873,598 residents in 1,285 km2, it is also the countrys largest and most populated comune and fourth-most populous city in the European Union by population within city limits. It is the center of the Metropolitan City of Rome, which has a population of 4.3 million residents, the city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, within Lazio, along the shores of the Tiber. Romes history spans more than 2,500 years, while Roman mythology dates the founding of Rome at only around 753 BC, the site has been inhabited for much longer, making it one of the oldest continuously occupied sites in Europe. The citys early population originated from a mix of Latins, Etruscans and it was first called The Eternal City by the Roman poet Tibullus in the 1st century BC, and the expression was also taken up by Ovid, Virgil, and Livy. Rome is also called the Caput Mundi, due to that, Rome became first one of the major centres of the Italian Renaissance, and then the birthplace of both the Baroque style and Neoclassicism. Famous artists, painters, sculptors and architects made Rome the centre of their activity, in 1871 Rome became the capital of the Kingdom of Italy, and in 1946 that of the Italian Republic. Rome has the status of a global city, Rome ranked in 2014 as the 14th-most-visited city in the world, 3rd most visited in the European Union, and the most popular tourist attraction in Italy. Its historic centre is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site, monuments and museums such as the Vatican Museums and the Colosseum are among the worlds most visited tourist destinations with both locations receiving millions of tourists a year. Rome hosted the 1960 Summer Olympics and is the seat of United Nations Food, however, it is a possibility that the name Romulus was actually derived from Rome itself. As early as the 4th century, there have been alternate theories proposed on the origin of the name Roma. There is archaeological evidence of occupation of the Rome area from approximately 14,000 years ago. Evidence of stone tools, pottery and stone weapons attest to about 10,000 years of human presence, several excavations support the view that Rome grew from pastoral settlements on the Palatine Hill built above the area of the future Roman Forum. Between the end of the age and the beginning of the Iron age. However, none of them had yet an urban quality, nowadays, there is a wide consensus that the city was gradually born through the aggregation of several villages around the largest one, placed above the Palatine. All these happenings, which according to the excavations took place more or less around the mid of the 8th century BC. Despite recent excavations at the Palatine hill, the view that Rome has been indeed founded with an act of will as the legend suggests in the middle of the 8th century BC remains a fringe hypothesis. Traditional stories handed down by the ancient Romans themselves explain the earliest history of their city in terms of legend and myth
25.
Bartolommeo Bandinelli
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Bartolommeo Bandinelli, actually Bartolommeo Brandini, was a Renaissance Italian sculptor, draughtsman and painter. Bandinelli was the son of a prominent Florentine goldsmith, and first apprenticed in his shop, as a boy, he was apprenticed under Giovanni Francesco Rustici, a sculptor friend of Leonardo da Vinci. Among his earliest works was a Saint Jerome in wax, made for Giuliano de Medici, having counterfeited the key of the chamber. 1512, Piero Soderini was deposed and the, in the tumult, therefore, Baccio, being by himself, secretly cut the cartoon into several pieces. The loss anyhow to the city was no one. Bandinellis lifelong obsession with Michelangelo is a theme in assessments of his career. A brilliant draughtsman and excellent small-scale sculptor, he had a fascination for colossi which he was ill-equipped to execute. His failure as a sculptor on a scale was accentuated by his desire to imitate Michelangelo. Hercules and Cacus was commissioned by the Medici pope Clement VII, the supplied block of Carrara marble was not big enough to execute Bandinellis wax model. He had to make new wax models, one of which was chosen by the pope as the final draft, Bandinelli had already carved the sculpture as far as the abdomen of Hercules, when during the 1527 Sack of Rome, the pope was taken prisoner. Meanwhile, in Florence, republican enemies of the Medici took advantage of the chaos to exile Ippolito de Medici, Bandinelli, a supporter of the Medici, was also exiled. In 1530 Emperor Charles V retook Florence after a long siege, Pope Clement VII subsequently installed his illegitimate son Alessandro de Medici as duke of Tuscany. Bandinelli then returned to Florence and continue work on the statue completed in 1534. But from the moment it was unveiled, it faced ridicule, afterwards, the Bandinelli tried to sabotage Cellinis career. The statue was restored between February and April 1994, Bandinellis drawings, which have in the past masqueraded as Michelangelos in connoisseurs collections, have come into their own in the later twentieth century. Among Bandinellis pupils were Vasari and Francesco de Rossi and his sons Clemente, a collaborator in his studio, and Michelangelo Bandinelli were also sculptors. Baccio Bandinellis works include, copy of Laocoon, at the time in the Cortile del Belvedere, tombs of the Medici popes Leo X and Clement VII in Santa Maria sopra Minerva. Bust of Cosimo I de Medici This had been locked away in a vault in a Swiss bank until a tip led the curator Olga Raggio to its rediscovery
26.
Uffizi
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The Uffizi Gallery is a prominent art museum located adjacent to the Piazza della Signoria in central Florence, region of Tuscany, Italy. The building of Uffizi complex was begun by Giorgio Vasari in 1560 for Cosimo I de Medici so as to accommodate the offices of the Florentine magistrates, hence the name uffizi, the construction was later continued by Alfonso Parigi and Bernardo Buontalenti and completed in 1581. The niches in the piers that alternate with columns filled with sculptures of artists in the 19th century. The Uffizi brought together under one roof the administrative offices, the Tribunal and the Archivio di Stato, the state archive. He commissioned from the architect Buontalenti the design of the Tribuna degli Uffizi that collected a series of masterpieces in one room, over the years, more sections of the palace were recruited to exhibit paintings and sculpture collected or commissioned by the Medici. The gallery had been open to visitors by request since the sixteenth century, because of its huge collection, some of its works have in the past been transferred to other museums in Florence—for example, some famous statues to the Bargello. A project was finished in 2006 to expand the exhibition space some 6,000 metres² to almost 13,000 metres². On 27 May 1993, a car exploded in Via dei Georgofili and damaged parts of the palace. The most severe damage was to the Niobe room and classical sculptures and neoclassical interior, the identity of the bomber or bombers are unknown, although it was almost certainly attributable to the Sicilian Mafia who were engaged in a period of terrorism at that time. Today, the Uffizi is one of the most popular tourist attractions of Florence, in high season, waiting times can be up to five hours. In early August 2007, Florence experienced a heavy rainstorm, the Gallery was partially flooded, with water leaking through the ceiling, and the visitors had to be evacuated. There was a more significant flood in 1966 which damaged most of the art collections in Florence severely. Here is a selection from the collection, The collection also contains some ancient sculptures, such as the Arrotino. Collections of the Uffizi Official website Uffizi – Google Art Project
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Florence
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Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the Metropolitan City of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants, Florence was a centre of medieval European trade and finance and one of the wealthiest cities of the time. It is considered the birthplace of the Renaissance, and has called the Athens of the Middle Ages. A turbulent political history includes periods of rule by the powerful Medici family, from 1865 to 1871 the city was the capital of the recently established Kingdom of Italy. The Historic Centre of Florence attracts 13 million tourists each year and it was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1982. The city is noted for its culture, Renaissance art and architecture, the city also contains numerous museums and art galleries, such as the Uffizi Gallery and the Palazzo Pitti, and still exerts an influence in the fields of art, culture and politics. Due to Florences artistic and architectural heritage, it has been ranked by Forbes as one of the most beautiful cities in the world, in 2008, the city had the 17th highest average income in Italy. Florence originated as a Roman city, and later, after a period as a flourishing trading and banking medieval commune. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, it was politically, economically, and culturally one of the most important cities in Europe, the language spoken in the city during the 14th century was, and still is, accepted as the Italian language. Starting from the late Middle Ages, Florentine money—in the form of the gold florin—financed the development of all over Europe, from Britain to Bruges, to Lyon. Florentine bankers financed the English kings during the Hundred Years War and they similarly financed the papacy, including the construction of their provisional capital of Avignon and, after their return to Rome, the reconstruction and Renaissance embellishment of Rome. Florence was home to the Medici, one of European historys most important noble families, Lorenzo de Medici was considered a political and cultural mastermind of Italy in the late 15th century. Two members of the family were popes in the early 16th century, Leo X, catherine de Medici married king Henry II of France and, after his death in 1559, reigned as regent in France. Marie de Medici married Henry IV of France and gave birth to the future king Louis XIII, the Medici reigned as Grand Dukes of Tuscany, starting with Cosimo I de Medici in 1569 and ending with the death of Gian Gastone de Medici in 1737. The Etruscans initially formed in 200 BC the small settlement of Fiesole and it was built in the style of an army camp with the main streets, the cardo and the decumanus, intersecting at the present Piazza della Repubblica. Situated along the Via Cassia, the route between Rome and the north, and within the fertile valley of the Arno, the settlement quickly became an important commercial centre. Peace returned under Lombard rule in the 6th century, Florence was conquered by Charlemagne in 774 and became part of the Duchy of Tuscany, with Lucca as capital. The population began to again and commerce prospered
28.
Odessa
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Odessa or Odesa is the third most populous city of Ukraine and a major seaport and transportation hub located on the northwestern shore of the Black Sea. Odessa is also a center of the Odessa Oblast and a multiethnic cultural center. Odessa is sometimes called the pearl of the Black Sea, the South Capital, the predecessor of Odessa, a small Tatar settlement, was founded by Hacı I Giray, the Khan of Crimea, in 1440 and originally named after him as Hacıbey. After a period of Lithuanian control, it passed into the domain of the Ottoman Sultan in 1529, in 1794, the city of Odessa was founded by a decree of the Empress Catherine the Great. From 1819 to 1858, Odessa was a free port, during the Soviet period it was the most important port of trade in the Soviet Union and a Soviet naval base. On 1 January 2000, the Quarantine Pier at Odessa Commercial Sea Port was declared a free port, during the 19th century, it was the fourth largest city of Imperial Russia, after Moscow, Saint Petersburg and Warsaw. Its historical architecture has a style more Mediterranean than Russian, having heavily influenced by French. Some buildings are built in a mixture of different styles, including Art Nouveau, Renaissance, the city of Odessa hosts both the Port of Odessa and Port Yuzhne, a significant oil terminal situated in the citys suburbs. Another notable port, Chornomorsk, is located in the same oblast, together they represent a major transport hub integrating with railways. Odessas oil and chemical processing facilities are connected to Russian and European networks by strategic pipelines, the city was named in compliance with the Greek Plan of Catherine the Great. It was named after the ancient Greek city of Odessos, which was believed to have been located here. Although Odessa is located in between the ancient Greek cities of Tyras and Olbia, Odessos is believed to be the predecessor of the present day city of Varna, Catherines secretary of state Adrian Gribovsky claimed in his memoirs that the name was his suggestion. Some expressed doubts about this claim, while others noted the reputation of Gribovsky as an honest and modest man, Odessa was the site of a large Greek settlement not later than the middle of the 6th century BC. Some scholars believe it to be a settlement established by Histria. Whether the Bay of Odessa is the ancient Port of the Histrians cannot yet be considered a settled question based on the available evidence, archaeological artifacts confirm extensive links between the Odessa area and the eastern Mediterranean. In the Middle Ages successive rulers of the Odessa region included various nomadic tribes, the Golden Horde, the Crimean Khanate, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Yedisan Crimean Tatars traded there in the 14th century. During the reign of Khan Hacı I Giray of Crimea, the Khanate was endangered by the Golden Horde and the Ottoman Turks and, in search of allies, the site of present-day Odessa was then a fortress known as Khadjibey. It was part of the Dykra region, however, most of the rest of the area remained largely uninhabited in this period
29.
Ukraine
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Ukraine is currently in territorial dispute with Russia over the Crimean Peninsula which Russia annexed in 2014 but which Ukraine and most of the international community recognise as Ukrainian. Including Crimea, Ukraine has an area of 603,628 km2, making it the largest country entirely within Europe and it has a population of about 42.5 million, making it the 32nd most populous country in the world. The territory of modern Ukraine has been inhabited since 32,000 BC, during the Middle Ages, the area was a key centre of East Slavic culture, with the powerful state of Kievan Rus forming the basis of Ukrainian identity. Following its fragmentation in the 13th century, the territory was contested, ruled and divided by a variety of powers, including Lithuania, Poland, the Ottoman Empire, Austria-Hungary, and Russia. A Cossack republic emerged and prospered during the 17th and 18th centuries, two brief periods of independence occurred during the 20th century, once near the end of World War I and another during World War II. Before its independence, Ukraine was typically referred to in English as The Ukraine, following independence, Ukraine declared itself a neutral state. Nonetheless it formed a limited partnership with the Russian Federation and other CIS countries. In the 2000s, the government began leaning towards NATO, and it was later agreed that the question of joining NATO should be answered by a national referendum at some point in the future. Former President Viktor Yanukovych considered the current level of co-operation between Ukraine and NATO sufficient, and was against Ukraine joining NATO and these events formed the background for the annexation of Crimea by Russia in March 2014, and the War in Donbass in April 2014. On 1 January 2016, Ukraine applied the economic part of the Deep, Ukraine has long been a global breadbasket because of its extensive, fertile farmlands and is one of the worlds largest grain exporters. The diversified economy of Ukraine includes a heavy industry sector, particularly in aerospace. Ukraine is a republic under a semi-presidential system with separate powers, legislative, executive. Its capital and largest city is Kiev, taking into account reserves and paramilitary personnel, Ukraine maintains the second-largest military in Europe after that of Russia. Ukrainian is the language and its alphabet is Cyrillic. The dominant religion in the country is Eastern Orthodoxy, which has strongly influenced Ukrainian architecture, literature, there are different hypotheses as to the etymology of the name Ukraine. According to the older and most widespread hypothesis, it means borderland, while more recently some studies claim a different meaning, homeland or region. The Ukraine now implies disregard for the sovereignty, according to U. S. ambassador William Taylor. Neanderthal settlement in Ukraine is seen in the Molodova archaeological sites include a mammoth bone dwelling
30.
Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
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Gotthold Ephraim Lessing was a German writer, philosopher, dramatist, publicist and art critic, and one of the most outstanding representatives of the Enlightenment era. His plays and theoretical writings substantially influenced the development of German literature and he is widely considered by theatre historians to be the first dramaturg in his role at Abel Seylers Hamburg National Theatre. Lessing was born in Kamenz, a town in Saxony, to Johann Gottfried Lessing. His father was a Lutheran minister and wrote on theology, Young Lessing studied at the Latin School in Kamenz from 1737 to 1741. With a father who wanted his son to follow in his footsteps, after completing his education at St. Afras, he enrolled at the University of Leipzig where he pursued a degree in theology, medicine, philosophy, and philology. It was here that his relationship with Karoline Neuber, a famous German actress and he translated several French plays for her, and his interest in theatre grew. During this time, he wrote his first play, The Young Scholar, Neuber eventually produced the play in 1748. From 1748 to 1760, Lessing lived in Leipzig and Berlin and he began to work as a reviewer and editor for the Vossische Zeitung and other periodicals. Lessing formed a connection with his cousin, Christlob Mylius. In 1750, Lessing and Mylius teamed together to begin a periodical publication named Beitrage zur Historie und Aufnahme des Theatres, the publication ran only four issues, but it caught the publics eye and revealed Lessing to be a serious critic and theorist of drama. In 1752 he took his masters degree in Wittenberg, from 1760 to 1765, he worked in Breslau as secretary to General Tauentzien during the Seven Years War between Britain and France, which had effects in Europe. It was during this time that he wrote his famous Laokoon, in 1765 Lessing returned to Berlin, leaving in 1767 to work for three years at the Hamburg National Theatre. Actor-manager, Konrad Ackermann, began construction on Germanys first permanent theatre in Hamburg, Johann Friedrich Löwen established Germanys first national theatre, the Hamburg National Theatre. The owners hired Lessing as the critic of plays and acting. The theatres main backer was Abel Seyler, a former currency speculator who since became known as the patron of German theatre. There he met Eva König, his future wife and his work in Hamburg formed the basis of his pioneering work on drama, titled Hamburgische Dramaturgie. Unfortunately, because of losses due to pirated editions of the Hamburgische Dramaturgie. In 1770 Lessing became librarian at the library, now the Herzog August Library
31.
Johann Joachim Winckelmann
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Johann Joachim Winckelmann was a German art historian and archaeologist. He was a pioneering Hellenist who first articulated the difference between Greek, Greco-Roman and Roman art, many consider him the father of the discipline of art history. His would be the influence on the rise of the neoclassical movement during the late 18th century. His writings influenced not only a new science of archaeology and art history but Western painting, sculpture, literature, Winckelmanns History of Ancient Art was one of the first books written in German to become a classic of European literature. His subsequent influence on Lessing, Herder, Goethe, Hölderlin, Heine, Nietzsche, George, today, Humboldt University of Berlins Winckelmann Institute is dedicated to the study of classical archaeology. Winckelmann was homosexual, and open homoeroticism informed his writings on aesthetics and this was recognized by his contemporaries, such as Goethe. Winckelmann was born in poverty in Stendal in the Margraviate of Brandenburg and his father, Martin Winckelmann, worked as a cobbler, while his mother, Anna Maria Meyer, was the daughter of a weaver. Winckelmanns early years were full of hardship, but his academic interests pushed him forward, later in Rome, when he had become a famous scholar, he wrote, One gets spoiled here, but God owed me this, in my youth I suffered too much. Winckelmann attended the Köllnisches Gymnasium in Berlin and the Altstädtisches Gymnasium at Salzwedel and he nonetheless devoted himself privately to Greek art and literature and followed the lectures of Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten, who coined the term aesthetics. With the intention of becoming a physician, in 1740 Winckelmann attended medical classes at Jena, from 1743 to 1748, he was the deputy headmaster of the gymnasium of Seehausen in the Altmark but Winckelmann felt that work with children was not his true calling. Moreover, his means were insufficient, his salary was so low that he had to rely on his students parents for free meals and he was thus obliged to accept a tutorship near Magdeburg. While tutor for the powerful Lamprecht family, he fell into unrequited love with the handsome Lamprecht son and this was one of a series of such loves throughout his life. His enthusiasm for the male form excited Winckelmanns budding admiration of ancient Greek, in 1748, Winckelmann wrote to Count Heinrich von Bünau. Little value is set on Greek literature, to which I have devoted myself so far as I could penetrate, in the same year, Winckelmann was appointed secretary of von Bünaus library at Nöthnitz, near Dresden. The library contained some 40,000 volumes, Winckelmann had read Homer, Herodotus, Sophocles, Xenophon, and Plato, but he found at Nöthnitz the works of such famous Enlightenment writers as Voltaire and Montesquieu. To leave behind the spartan atmosphere of Prussia came as a relief for him. Winckelmanns major duty involved assisting von Bünau in writing a book on the Holy Roman Empire, during this period he made several visits to the collection of antiquities at Dresden, but his description of its best paintings remained unfinished. The work won warm admiration not only for the ideas it contained and it made Winckelmann famous, and was reprinted several times and soon translated into French
32.
Anne Claude de Caylus
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Anne Claude de Tubières-Grimoard de Pestels de Lévis, comte de Caylus, marquis dEsternay, baron de Bransac, French antiquarian, proto-archaeologist and man of letters, was born at Paris. He was the eldest son of Lieutenant-General Anne de Tubières, comte de Caylus and his mother, Marthe-Marguerite de Villette de Mursay, comtesse de Caylus, was the daughter of vice-admiral Philippe, Marquis de Villette-Mursay. He was a cousin of Mme de Maintenon, who brought Marthe-Marguerite up like her own daughter, Marthe-Marguerite wrote valuable Souvenirs of the court of Louis XIV, these were edited by Voltaire, and by many later editors. While a young man, Caylus distinguished himself in the campaigns of the French army, after the peace of Rastatt he spent some time in travelling in Italy, Greece, the Levant, England and Germany, and devoted much attention to the study and collection of antiquities. He became a member of the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture. His Numismata Aurea Imperatorum Romanorum, treats only the gold coinage of the Roman emperors, diderot, who was no friend to Caylus, maintained that the proper method had been found by J. -B. Caylus was an etcher, and copied many paintings of the great masters. His cultural interests were not confined to the arts of Classical Antiquity but extended to Gallic monuments, such as the megaliths of Aurille, diderot expressed this fact in an epigram in his Salon of 1765, La mort nous a délivré du plus cruel des amateurs. Caylus had quite another side to his character and he had a thorough acquaintance with the gayest and most disreputable sides of Parisian life, and left a number of more or less witty stories dealing with it. These were collected as his Œuvres badines complètes, the best of them is the Histoire de M. Guillaume, cocher. His Contes, hovering between French fairy tales and oriental fantasies, between conventional charm and moral satire, have collected and were published in 2005. The Souvenirs du comte de Caylus, published in 1805, is of doubtful authenticity. This article incorporates text from a now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Caylus. Comte de Caylus, Contes in series Sources classiques. ISBN 2-7453-1198-0 Notice [Three of his essays were anthologized in Charles Harrison, art In Theory 1648-1815, An Anthology of Changing Ideas, On Drawings (1732, The Life of Antoine Watteau (1748, and On Composition
33.
Aesthetics
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Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy that explores the nature of art, beauty, and taste, with the creation and appreciation of beauty. It is more defined as the study of sensory or sensori-emotional values, sometimes called judgements of sentiment. More broadly, scholars in the field define aesthetics as critical reflection on art, in modern English, the term aesthetic can also refer to a set of principles underlying the works of a particular art movement or theory, one speaks, for example, of the Cubist aesthetic. The word aesthetic is derived from the Greek αἰσθητικός, which in turn was derived from αἰσθάνομαι, for some, aesthetics is considered a synonym for the philosophy of art since Hegel, while others insist that there is a significant distinction between these closely related fields. In practice, aesthetic judgement refers to the sensory contemplation or appreciation of an object, philosophical aesthetics has not only to speak about art and to produce judgments about art works, but has also to give a definition of what art is. Art is an entity for philosophy, because art deals with the senses. Hence, there are two different conceptions of art in aesthetics, art as knowledge or art as action, any aesthetic doctrines that guided the production and interpretation of prehistoric art are mostly unknown. Western aesthetics usually refers to Greek philosophers as the earliest source of aesthetic considerations. Plato believed in beauty as a form in which beautiful objects partake and he felt that beautiful objects incorporated proportion, harmony, and unity among their parts. Similarly, in the Metaphysics, Aristotle found that the elements of beauty were order, symmetry. From the late 17th to the early 20th century Western aesthetics underwent a revolution into what is often called modernism. German and British thinkers emphasized beauty as the key component of art and of the aesthetic experience, and saw art as necessarily aiming at absolute beauty. For Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten aesthetics is the science of the experiences, a younger sister of logic. For Immanuel Kant the aesthetic experience of beauty is a judgment of a subjective but similar human truth, however, beauty cannot be reduced to any more basic set of features. For Friedrich Schiller aesthetic appreciation of beauty is the most perfect reconciliation of the sensual and rational parts of human nature, for Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, the philosophy of art is the organon of philosophy concerning the relation between man and nature. So aesthetics began now to be the name for the philosophy of art, Friedrich von Schlegel, August Wilhelm Schlegel, Friedrich Schleiermacher and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel also gave lectures on aesthetics as philosophy of art after 1800. For Hegel, all culture is a matter of absolute spirit coming to be manifest to itself, stage by stage, Art is the first stage in which the absolute spirit is manifest immediately to sense-perception, and is thus an objective rather than subjective revelation of beauty. It is thus for Schopenhauer one way to fight the suffering, the British were largely divided into intuitionist and analytic camps
34.
R.E.M.
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R. E. M. was an American rock band from Athens, Georgia, that was formed in 1980 by drummer Bill Berry, lead guitarist Peter Buck, bassist/backing vocalist Mike Mills, and lead vocalist Michael Stipe. Released its first single—Radio Free Europe—in 1981 on the independent record label Hib-Tone, the single was followed by the Chronic Town EP in 1982, the bands first release on I. R. S. Following years of success, R. E. M. Achieved a mainstream hit in 1987 with the single The One I Love, the group signed to Warner Bros. Records in 1988, and began to espouse political and environmental concerns while playing large arenas worldwide. By the early 1990s, when alternative rock began to experience mainstream success, R. E. M. was viewed by subsequent acts such as Nirvana. The band then released its two most commercially successful albums, Out of Time and Automatic for the People, which veered from the established sound. R. E. M. s 1994 release, Monster, was a return to a more rock-oriented sound, the band began its first tour in six years to support the album, the tour was marred by medical emergencies suffered by three of the band members. Re-signed with Warner Bros. for a reported US$80 million, at the time the most expensive recording contract in history and its 1996 release, New Adventures in Hi-Fi, though critically acclaimed, fared worse commercially than expected. The following year, Bill Berry left the band, while Stipe, Buck, in 2007, the band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, in their first year of eligibility. Disbanded amicably in September 2011, announcing the split on its website, in January 1980, Michael Stipe met Peter Buck in Wuxtry Records, the Athens record store where Buck worked. The pair discovered that they shared similar tastes in music, particularly in rock and protopunk artists like Patti Smith, Television. Stipe said, It turns out that I was buying all the records that was saving for himself, Stipe and Buck soon met fellow University of Georgia students Mike Mills and Bill Berry, who had played music together since high school and lived together in Georgia. The quartet agreed to collaborate on songs, Stipe later commented that there was never any grand plan behind any of it. Their still-unnamed band spent a few months rehearsing and played its first show on April 5,1980, at a friends birthday party held in a converted Episcopal church in Athens. After considering names like Twisted Kites, Cans of Piss, and Negro Wives, the band members eventually dropped out of school to focus on their developing group. They found a manager in Jefferson Holt, a store clerk who was so impressed by an R. E. M. performance in his hometown of Chapel Hill, North Carolina. R. E. M. s success was almost immediate in Athens and surrounding areas, the band drew progressively larger crowds for shows, over the next year and a half, R. E. M. Toured throughout the Southern United States, touring was arduous because a touring circuit for alternative rock bands did not then exist
35.
Asterix and the Laurel Wreath
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Asterix and the Laurel Wreath is the eighteenth volume of the Asterix comic book series, by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo. It was originally serialized in the magazine Pilote, issues 621-642, in 1971 and translated into English in 1974. In Rome, Asterix and Obelix see a man coming out of Caesars palace, and upon discovering that he is a kitchen slave there, offer themselves to the slave trader Typhus, who supplies Caesars palace. Upon discovery of their mistake, the Gauls are placed under the supervision of Goldendelicius, Humerus chief slave, Goldendelicius soon expresses dislike of the two Gauls on grounds that they come from Typhus, and fears that they might usurp his office. As a result, Humerus suffers a headache and sends the Gauls to Caesars palace to justify his absence to a secretary there, Goldendelicius, fearing that Asterix and Obelix will usurp his job, tells the palaces guards that the Gauls intend to kill Caesar. As a result, Asterix and Obelix are thrown into the prison upon arrival. Frustrated and tired, they return to their cell, much to the confusion of the palace guards, when the prosecutor announces the same initial speech intended by the defense lawyer, the latter calls for a suspension in proceedings. Anxious to be sentenced to the Circus in order to catch Caesar, Asterix himself speaks for the prosecution, outlining all the wrongdoings committed by himself and Obelix. The whole audience, including Typhus and the Humerus family, is moved by this plea, and the Gauls are sentenced to death in the Circus. In the cells, they enjoy luxurious food funded by Typhus and Humerus, but as they are about to enter the arena, Asterix and Obelix learn that Caesar is not present, having gone off to fight pirates. Therefore, the Gauls refuse to go into the arena until he returns, which results in the big cats in the arena eating each other, a riot of the audience. That night, Asterix and Obelix sleep at a doorway, where they are woken by brigands, when the latter are defeated in the resulting fight, their chief Habeascorpus offers Asterix and Obelix shelter in return for their participation in their raids. The next night, the gang discover the drunken Metatarsus, and refusing to attack an innocent, from Metatarsus, the two Gauls learn that Goldendelicius has been appointed as Caesars personal slave, and Caesar himself is due to hold a triumph for his victory over the pirates. Asterix and Obelix corner Goldendelicius in a tavern and coerce him to exchange Caesars laurel wreath for one of parsley. The next day, during the triumph, Goldendelicius holds the wreath over Caesars head, and Caesar does not acknowledge the switch, homeopathix agrees by sarcastically pointing out that it is overcooked and of poor quality, which provokes Vitalstatistix to strike him senseless. The album ends with the note that, with Asterixs cure for drunkenness now available to the Romans, at Typhuss store, a male slave makes poses based on famous statues, Auguste Rodins The Thinker, Apollon of Olympia, the Laocoon, and the Discobolus. The lawyers in Asterix and Obelix trial intend to use of the phrase Delenda Carthago for dramatic effect. This sentence was a favorite finishing sentence of Cato the Elder in each of his senate speeches, the Circus Maximus jailer makes a cameo appearance in The Twelve Tasks of Asterix
36.
Joyce Carol Oates
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Joyce Carol Oates is an American writer. Oates published her first book in 1963 and has published over 40 novels, as well as a number of plays and novellas, and many volumes of short stories, poetry. She has won awards for her writing, including the National Book Award, for her novel them. Her novels Black Water, What I Lived For, Blonde, Oates has taught at Princeton University since 1978 and is currently the Roger S. Berlind 52 Professor Emerita in the Humanities with the Program in Creative Writing. Oates was born in Lockport, New York and she is the eldest of three children of Carolina, a homemaker of Hungarian descent, and Frederic James Oates, a tool and die designer. She was raised Catholic but is now an atheist and her brother, Fred Jr. was born in 1943, and her sister, Lynn Ann, who is severely autistic, was born in 1956. Her paternal grandmother, Blanche Woodside, lived with the family and was close to Joyce. Oates attended the same school her mother attended as a child. This was love at first sight, in her early teens, she devoured the writing of Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë, Fyodor Dostoevsky, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, and Henry David Thoreau, whose influences remain very deep. Oates began writing at the age of 14, when Blanche gave her a typewriter, Oates later transferred to several bigger, suburban schools and graduated from Williamsville South High School in 1956, where she worked for her high school newspaper. She was the first in her family to complete high school, as a teen, Oates also received early recognition for her writing by winning a Scholastic Art and Writing Award. Oates earned a scholarship to attend Syracuse University, where she joined Phi Mu, Oates found Syracuse a very exciting place academically and intellectually, and trained herself by writing novel after novel and always throwing them out when I completed them. It was not until this point that Oates began reading the work of Franz Kafka, D. H. Lawrence, Thomas Mann, and Flannery OConnor though, she noted, at the age of 19, she won the college short story contest sponsored by Mademoiselle. Oates graduated as valedictorian from Syracuse University with a degree in English in 1960 and she was a Ph. D. student at Rice University when she made the decision to become a full-time writer. Evelyn Shrifte, president of the Vanguard Press, met Oates soon after Oates received her masters degree and she was fresh out of school, and I thought she was a genius, Shrifte said. Vanguard published Oates first book, the short-story collection By the North Gate, the Vanguard Press published Oates first novel, With Shuddering Fall, when she was 26 years old. In 1966, she published Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been, a short story dedicated to Bob Dylan and written after listening to his song Its All Over Now, Baby Blue. The story is based on the serial killer Charles Schmid
37.
Barbara W. Tuchman
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Barbara Wertheim Tuchman was an American historian and author. Tuchman focused on writing popular history and she was born January 30,1912, the Jewish daughter of the banker Maurice Wertheim and his first wife Alma Morgenthau. Her father was an individual of wealth and prestige, the owner of The Nation magazine, president of the American Jewish Congress, prominent art collector, and her mother was the daughter of Henry Morgenthau, Sr. Woodrow Wilsons ambassador to the Ottoman Empire. Wertheim was influenced at an age by the books of Lucy Fitch Perkins. Henty, as well as the novels of Alexandre Dumas. She attended the Walden School on Manhattans Upper West Side and she received her Bachelor of Arts from Radcliffe College in 1933, having studied history and literature. She also contributed to The Nation as a correspondent until her fathers sale of the publication in 1937, traveling to Valencia, a first book resulted from her Spanish experience, The Lost British Policy, Britain and Spain Since 1700, published in 1938. In 1940 Wertheim married Lester R. Tuchman, an internist, medical researcher and they had three daughters, including Jessica Mathews, who became president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. During the years of World War II, Tuchman worked in the Office of War Information, with the publication of Bible and Sword in 1956, Tuchman dedicated herself to historical research and writing, turning out a new book approximately every four years. Tuchman favored an approach to the writing of history, providing eloquent explanatory narratives rather than concentration upon discovery. In the words of one biographer, Tuchman was not a historians historian, in 1971, Tuchman received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. Tuchman received a second Pulitzer in 1972 for her biography of Joseph Stilwell, Stilwell, in 1978, Tuchman was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She became the first female president of the American Academy of Arts and she won a U. S. National Book Award in History for the first paperback edition of A Distant Mirror in 1980. Also in 1980 the National Endowment for the Humanities selected Tuchman for the Jefferson Lecture, Tuchmans lecture was entitled Mankinds Better Moments. Tuchman was a trustee of Radcliffe College and a lecturer at Harvard, the University of California, and she died in 1989 in Greenwich, Connecticut, following a stroke, at 77. A tower of Currier House, a residential division first of Radcliffe College, the fact of being on the record makes it appear continuous and ubiquitous whereas it is more likely to have been sporadic both in time and place. Besides, persistence of the normal is usually greater than the effect of the disturbance, the fact is that one can come home in the evening — on a lucky day — without having encountered more than one or two of these phenomena. This has led me to formulate Tuchmans Law, as follows, Tuchmans Law has been defined as a psychological principle of perceptual readiness or subjective probability
38.
Hector Berlioz
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Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts. Berlioz made significant contributions to the orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works, and he also composed around 50 songs. His influence was critical for the development of Romanticism, especially in composers like Richard Wagner, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Franz Liszt, Richard Strauss. Hector Berlioz was born in France at La Côte-Saint-André in the département of Isère, Louis was an agnostic, with a liberal outlook, his mother, Marie-Antoinette, was a devout Roman Catholic. He had five siblings in all, three of whom did not survive to adulthood, the other two, Nanci and Adèle, remained close to Berlioz throughout his life. Berlioz was not a prodigy, unlike some other famous composers of the time, he began studying music at age 12, writing small compositions. As a result of his fathers discouragement, he never learned to play the piano and he became proficient at guitar, flageolet and flute. He learned harmony from textbooks alone—he was not formally trained, the majority of his early compositions were romances and chamber pieces. While yet at age twelve, as recalled in his Mémoires, he experienced his first passion for a woman and he also began to visit the Paris Conservatoire library, seeking out scores of Glucks operas and making personal copies of parts of them. He recalled in his Mémoires his first encounter with Luigi Cherubini, Cherubini attempted to throw the impetuous Berlioz out of the library since he was not a formal music student at that time. Berlioz also heard two operas by Gaspare Spontini, a composer who influenced him through their friendship, and whom he later championed when working as a critic, from then on, he devoted himself to composition. He was encouraged in his endeavors by Jean-François Le Sueur, director of the Royal Chapel, in 1823, he wrote his first article—a letter to the journal Le corsaire defending Spontinis La vestale. Despite his parents disapproval, in 1824 he formally abandoned his studies to pursue a career in music. This work was rehearsed and revised after the rehearsal but not performed until the following year, Berlioz later claimed to have burnt the score, but it was re-discovered in 1991. Later that year or in 1825, he began to compose the opera Les francs-juges, the work survives only in fragments, the overture has been much recorded and is sometimes played in concert. In 1826 he began attending the Conservatoire to study composition under Jean-François Le Sueur and he also submitted a fugue to the Prix de Rome, but was eliminated in the primary round. Winning the prize would become an obsession until he won it in 1830
39.
Les Troyens
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Les Troyens is a French grand opera in five acts by Hector Berlioz. The libretto was written by Berlioz himself from Virgils epic poem the Aeneid, Les Troyens is Berliozs most ambitious work, the summation of his entire artistic career, but he did not live to see it performed in its entirety. Berlioz began the libretto on 5 May 1856 and completed it toward the end of June 1856 and he finished the full score on 12 April 1858. Berlioz had an affection for literature, and he had admired Virgil since his childhood. The Princess Carolyne zu Sayn-Wittgenstein was a motivator to Berlioz to compose this opera. At that time I had completed the dramatic work I mentioned earlier, I added that I was all too aware of the pain that such an undertaking would inevitably cause me ever to embark on it. Indeed, the replied, the conjunction of your passion for Shakespeare and your love of antiquity must result in the creation of something grand. You must write this opera, this poem, call it what you like. You must start work on it and bring it to completion and this was more than enough to decide me. Once back in Paris I started to write the lines for the poem of Les Troyens, then I set to work on the score, and after three and a half years of corrections, changes, additions etc. everything was finished. Elsewhere he wrote, The principal merit of the work is, in my view, for Berlioz, truthful representation of passion was the highest goal of a dramatic composer, and in this respect he felt he had equalled the achievements of Gluck and Mozart. In his memoirs, Berlioz described in excruciating detail the intense frustrations he experienced in seeing the work performed, for five years, the Paris Opéra – the only suitable stage in Paris – vacillated. Finally, tired of waiting, he agreed to let Léon Carvalho, director of the smaller Théâtre Lyrique and it consisted of Acts 3 to 5, redivided by Berlioz into five acts, to which he added an orchestral introduction and a prologue. As Berlioz noted bitterly, he agreed to let Carvalho do it despite the manifest impossibility of his doing it properly and he had just obtained an annual subsidy of a hundred thousand francs from the government. None the less the enterprise was beyond him and his theater was not large enough, his singers were not good enough, his chorus and orchestra were small and weak. Even with this version of the opera, many compromises and cuts were made, some during rehearsals. The new second act was the Chasse Royale et Orage, an elaborate pantomime ballet with nymphs, sylvans, and fauns and a chorus. Since the set change for this took nearly an hour, it was cut, despite the fact its staging had been greatly simplified with a painted waterfall
40.
Aeneas
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In Greco-Roman mythology, Aeneas was a Trojan hero, the son of the prince Anchises and the goddess Venus. His father was a first cousin of King Priam of Troy and he is a character in Greek mythology and is mentioned in Homers Iliad. Aeneas receives full treatment in Roman mythology, most extensively in Virgils Aeneid and he became the first true hero of Rome. Snorri Sturluson identifies him with the Norse Æsir Vidarr, Aeneas is the Latin spelling of Greek Αἰνείας. In the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, Aeneas is first introduced with Aphrodite naming him Αἰνείας for the αὶνóν ἄχος he caused her and it is a popular etymology for the name, apparently exploited by Homer in the Iliad. Later in the Medieval period there were writers who held that, as such, in the natural order, the meaning of Aeneas name combines Greek ennos and demas, which becomes ennaios, meaning in-dweller. However, there is no certainty regarding the origin of his name, in imitation of the Iliad, Virgil borrows epithets of Homer, including, Anchisiades, magnanimum, magnus, heros, and bonus. Though he borrows many, Virgil gives Aeneas two epithets of his own in the Aeneid, pater and pius. The epithets applied by Virgil are an example of a different from that of Homer, for whilst Odysseus is poikilios, Aeneas is described as pius. Likewise, Aeneas is called pater when acting in the interest of his men, the story of the birth of Aeneas is told in the Hymn to Aphrodite, one of the major Homeric Hymns. Aphrodite has caused the other gods Zeus, to fall in love with mortal women, in retaliation, Zeus puts desire in her heart for Anchises, who is tending his cattle among the hills near Mount Ida. When Aphrodite sees him she is smitten and she adorns herself as if for a wedding among the gods and appears before him. He is overcome by her beauty, believing that she is a goddess, after they make love, Aphrodite reveals her true identity to him and Anchises fears what might happen to him as a result of their liaison. Aphrodite assures him that he will be protected, and tells him that she bear him a son to be called Aeneas. However, she warns him that he must never tell anyone that he has lain with a goddess, when Aeneas is born, Aphrodite takes him to the nymphs of Mount Ida. She directs them to raise the child to age five, then take him to Anchises, according to other sources, Anchises later brags about his encounter with Aphrodite, and as a result is struck in the foot with a thunderbolt by Zeus. Thereafter he is lame in that foot, so that Aeneas has to carry him from the flames of Troy. Aeneas is a character in the Iliad, where he is twice saved from death by the gods as if for an as-yet-unknown destiny
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