Rome
Rome is the capital city and a special comune of Italy. Rome serves as the capital of the Lazio region. With 2,872,800 residents in 1,285 km2, it is the country's most populated comune, it is the fourth most populous city in the European Union by population within city limits. It is the centre of the Metropolitan City of Rome, which has a population of 4,355,725 residents, thus making it the most populous metropolitan city in Italy. Rome is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, within Lazio, along the shores of the Tiber; the Vatican City is an independent country inside the city boundaries of Rome, the only existing example of a country within a city: for this reason Rome has been defined as capital of two states. Rome's history spans 28 centuries. While Roman mythology dates the founding of Rome at around 753 BC, the site has been inhabited for much longer, making it one of the oldest continuously occupied sites in Europe; the city's early population originated from a mix of Latins and Sabines.
The city successively became the capital of the Roman Kingdom, the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire, is regarded by some as the first metropolis. It was first called The Eternal City by the Roman poet Tibullus in the 1st century BC, the expression was taken up by Ovid and Livy. Rome is called the "Caput Mundi". After the fall of the Western Empire, which marked the beginning of the Middle Ages, Rome fell under the political control of the Papacy, in the 8th century it became the capital of the Papal States, which lasted until 1870. Beginning with the Renaissance all the popes since Nicholas V pursued over four hundred years a coherent architectural and urban programme aimed at making the city the artistic and cultural centre of the world. In this way, Rome became first one of the major centres of the Italian Renaissance, the birthplace of both the Baroque style and Neoclassicism. Famous artists, painters and architects made Rome the centre of their activity, creating masterpieces throughout the city.
In 1871, Rome became the capital of the Kingdom of Italy, which, in 1946, became the Italian Republic. Rome has the status of a global city. In 2016, Rome ranked as the 14th-most-visited city in the world, 3rd most visited in the European Union, the most popular tourist attraction in Italy, its historic centre is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. The famous Vatican Museums are among the world's most visited museums while the Colosseum was the most popular tourist attraction in world with 7.4 million visitors in 2018. Host city for the 1960 Summer Olympics, Rome is the seat of several specialized agencies of the United Nations, such as the Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Food Programme and the International Fund for Agricultural Development; the city hosts the Secretariat of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Union for the Mediterranean as well as the headquarters of many international business companies such as Eni, Enel, TIM, Leonardo S.p. A. and national and international banks such as Unicredit and BNL.
Its business district, called EUR, is the base of many companies involved in the oil industry, the pharmaceutical industry, financial services. Rome is an important fashion and design centre thanks to renowned international brands centered in the city. Rome's Cinecittà Studios have been the set of many Academy Award–winning movies. According to the founding myth of the city by the Ancient Romans themselves, the long-held tradition of the origin of the name Roma is believed to have come from the city's founder and first king, Romulus. However, it is a possibility that the name Romulus was derived from Rome itself; as early as the 4th century, there have been alternative theories proposed on the origin of the name Roma. Several hypotheses have been advanced focusing on its linguistic roots which however remain uncertain: from Rumon or Rumen, archaic name of the Tiber, which in turn has the same root as the Greek verb ῥέω and the Latin verb ruo, which both mean "flow". There is archaeological evidence of human occupation of the Rome area from 14,000 years ago, but the dense layer of much younger debris obscures Palaeolithic and Neolithic sites.
Evidence of stone tools 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 bronze age and the beginning of the Iron age, each hill between the sea and the Capitol was topped by a village. However, none of them had yet an urban quality. Nowadays, there is a wide consensus that the city developed through the aggregation of several villages around the largest one, placed above the Palatine; this aggregation was facilitated by the increase of agricultural productivity above the subsistence level, which allowed the establishment of secondary and tertiary activities. These in turn boosted the development of trade with the Greek colonies of southern Italy; these developments, which according to archaeological ev
Mass (liturgy)
Mass is a term used to describe the main eucharistic liturgical service in many forms of Western Christianity. The term Mass is used in the Catholic Church and Anglican churches, as well as some Lutheran churches, Western Rite Orthodox and Old Catholic churches; some Protestants employ terms such as worship service, rather than the word Mass.. For the celebration of the Eucharist in Eastern Christianity, including Eastern Catholic Churches, other terms such as Divine Liturgy, Holy Qurbana, Badarak are used instead; the English noun mass is derived from Middle Latin missa. The Latin word was adopted in Old English as mæsse, was sometimes glossed as sendnes; the Latin term missa itself was in use by the 6th century. It is most derived from the concluding formula Ite, missa est. However, there have been other explanations of the noun missa, i.e. as not derived from the formula ite, missa est. Fortescue cites older, "fanciful" etymological explanations, notably a latinization of Hebrew matzâh "unleavened bread.
The French historian Du Cange in 1678 reported "various opinions on the origin" of the noun missa "mass", including the derivation from Hebrew matzah, here attributed to Caesar Baronius. The Hebrew derivation is learned speculation from 16th-century philology. Thus, De divinis officiis explains the word as a mittendo, quod nos mittat ad Deo, while Rupert of Deutz derives it from a "dismissal" of the "enmities, between God and men"; the Catholic Church sees the Mass or Eucharist as "the source and summit of the Christian life", to which the other sacraments are oriented. The Catholic Church believes that the Mass is the same sacrifice that Jesus Christ offered on the Cross at Calvary; the ordered celebrant is understood to act in persona Christi, as he imitates the words and gestures of Jesus Christ at the Last Supper. By virtue of the mediation of the Holy Spirit, said to be present in the apostolic church, through the words proffered by the celebrant, similar to the Word of God the Son, there takes place a transubstantiation of: the wine into the Precious Blood, the sacramental bread into the Holy Body of Jesus Christ.
Hence, Roman Catholic and Orthodox believe that the Holy Trinity is in the host, celebrated during the Holy Mass and in the previous context of the Christian consecrations. The Holy Mass renews, makes alive at any time the innocent sacrifice of Jesus Christ, as He is "the Holy One of God", thus the unique door of salvation for the human sins; the term "Mass" is used only in the Roman Rite, while the Byzantine Rite Eastern Catholic Churches use the analogous term "Divine Liturgy" and other Eastern Catholic Churches have terms such as Holy Qurbana. Although similar in outward appearance to the Anglican Mass or Lutheran Mass, the Catholic Church distinguishes between its own Mass and theirs on the basis of what it views as the validity of the orders of their clergy, as a result, does not ordinarily permit intercommunion between members of these Churches. In a 1993 letter to Bishop Johannes Hanselmann of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria, Cardinal Ratzinger affirmed that "a theology oriented to the concept of succession, such as that which holds in the Catholic and in the Orthodox church, need not in any way deny the salvation-granting presence of the Lord in a Lutheran Lord's Supper."
The Decree on Ecumenism, produced by Vatican II in 1964, records that the Catholic Church notes its understanding that when other faith groups "commemorate His death and resurrection in the Lord's Supper, they profess that it signifies life in communion with Christ and look forward to His coming in glory."Within the fixed structure outlined below, specific to the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite, the Scripture readings, the antiphons sung or recited during the entrance procession or communion, certain other prayers vary each day according to the liturgical calendar. The priest enters, with a deacon, if there is one, altar servers. After making the sign of the cross and greeting the people liturgically, he begins the Act of Penitence; this concludes with the priest's prayer of absolution, however, lacks the efficacy of the Sacrament of Penance. The Kyrie, eleison, is sung or said, followed by the Gloria in excelsis Deo, an ancient praise, if appropriate for the liturgical season; the Introductory Rites are brought to a close by the Collect Prayer.
On Sundays and solemnities, three Scripture readings are given. On other days there are only two. If there are three readings, the first is from the Old Testament, or the Acts of the Apostles during Eastertide; the first reading is sung responsorially or recited. The second reading is from the New Testament from one of the Pauline e
Loeb Classical Library
The Loeb Classical Library is a series of books published by Heinemann in Londen, today by Harvard University Press, which presents important works of ancient Greek and Latin literature in a way designed to make the text accessible to the broadest possible audience, by presenting the original Greek or Latin text on each left-hand page, a literal translation on the facing page. The General Editor is Jeffrey Henderson, holder of the William Goodwin Aurelio Professorship of Greek Language and Literature at Boston University; the Loeb Classical Library was conceived and funded by the Jewish-German-American banker and philanthropist James Loeb. The first volumes were edited by T. E. Page, W. H. D. Rouse, Edward Capps, published by William Heinemann, Ltd. in 1912 in their distinctive green and red hardcover bindings. Since scores of new titles have been added, the earliest translations have been revised several times. In recent years, this has included the removal of earlier editions' bowdlerization, which habitually extended to reversal of gender to disguise homosexual references or translated sexually explicit passages into Latin, rather than English.
Since 1934, it has been co-published with Harvard University. Profit from the editions continues to fund graduate student fellowships at Harvard University; the Loebs have only a minimal critical apparatus. They are intended for the amateur reader of Greek or Latin, are so nearly ubiquitous as to be recognizable. In 1917 Virginia Woolf wrote: The Loeb Library, with its Greek or Latin on one side of the page and its English on the other, came as a gift of freedom.... The existence of the amateur was recognised by the publication of this Library, to a great extent made respectable.... The difficulty of Greek is not sufficiently dwelt upon, chiefly because the sirens who lure us to these perilous waters are scholars have forgotten... What those difficulties are, but for the ordinary amateur they are real and great. Harvard University assumed complete responsibility for the series in 1989 and in recent years four or five new or re-edited volumes have been published annually. In 2001, Harvard University Press began issuing a second series of books with a similar format.
The I Tatti Renaissance Library presents key Renaissance works in Latin with a facing English translation. A third series, the Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library, was introduced in 2010 covering works in Byzantine Greek, Medieval Latin, Old English. Volumes with a brown cover; the Clay Sanskrit Library, bound in teal cloth, was modeled on the Loeb Classical Library. As the command of Latin among generalist historians and archaeologists shrank in the course of the 20th century, professionals came to rely on these texts designed for amateurs; as Birgitta Hoffmann remarked in 2001 of Tacitus' Agricola, "Unfortunately the first thing that happens in bilingual versions like the Loebs is that most of this apparatus vanishes and, if you use a translation, there is no way of knowing that there were problems with the text in the first place."In 2014, the Loeb Classical Library Foundation and Harvard University Press launched the digital Loeb Classical Library, described as "an interconnected searchable, perpetually growing, virtual library of all, important in Greek and Latin literature."
The listings of Loeb volumes at online bookstores and library catalogues vary and are best navigated via ISBN numbers. L170N) Iliad, Second Edition: Volume I. Books 1–12 L171N) Iliad: Volume II. Books 13–24 L104) Odyssey: Volume I. Books 1–12 L105) Odyssey: Volume II. Books 13–24 L057N) Volume I. Theogony. Works and Days. Testimonia L503) Volume II; the Shield. Catalogue of Women. Other Fragments L344) Dionysiaca: Volume I. Books 1–15 L354) Dionysiaca: Volume II. Books 16–35 L356) Dionysiaca: Volume III. Books 36–48 L496) Homeric Hymns. Homeric Apocrypha. Lives of Homer L497) Greek Epic Fragments L001) Apollonius Rhodius: Argonautica L019N) Quintus Smyrnaeus: Posthomerica L219) Oppian and Tryphiodorus L142) Greek Lyric Poetry: Volume I. Sappho and Alcaeus L143) Greek Lyric Poetry: Volume II. Anacreon, Choral Lyric from Olympus to Alcman L476) Greek Lyric Poetry: Volume III. Stesichorus, Ibycus and Others L461) Greek Lyric Poetry: Volume IV. Bacchylides and Others L144) Greek Lyric Poetry: Volume V; the New School of Poetry and Anonymous Songs and Hymns L258N) Greek Elegiac Poetry: From the Seventh to the Fifth Centuries BC.
Tyrtaeus, Solon and Others L259N) Greek Iambic Poetry: From the Seventh to the Fifth Centuries BC. Archilochus, Semonides and Others L056) Pindar: Volume I. Olympian Odes. Pythian Odes L485) Pindar: Volume II. Nemean Odes. Isthmian Odes. Fragments L129) Callimachus: Hymns, Epigrams. Phaenomena. Alexandra L421) Callimachus: Aetia, Iambi and Other Fragments. Hero and Leander L028) Greek Bucolic Poets: Theocritus. Bion. Moschus L508) Hellenistic Collection: Philitas. Alexander of Aetolia. Hermesianax. Euphorion. Parthenius L067) Volume I. Book 1: Christian Epigrams. Book 2: Christodorus of Thebes in Egypt. Book 3: The Cyzicene Epigrams. Book 4: The Proems of the Different Anthologies. Book 5: The Amatory Epigrams. Book 6: The Dedicatory Epigrams L068
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Clermont
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Clermont is an Archdiocese of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church in France. The diocese comprises the department of Puy-de-Dôme, in the Region of Auvergne; the Archbishop's seat is Clermont-Ferrand Cathedral. Throughout its history Clermont was the senior suffragan of the Archdiocese of Bourges, it became a metropolitan see itself, however, in 2002. The current Archbishop is François Kalist. At first extensive, the diocese lost Haute-Auvergne in 1317 through the reorganization of the structure of bishoprics in southern France and Aquitaine by Pope John XXII, resulting in the creation of the diocese of Saint-Flour. In 1822, in the reorganization of French dioceses by Pope Pius VII, following the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy, the diocese of Clermont lost the Bourbonnais, on account of the erection of the diocese of Moulins. Since the reorganization in 2002 by Pope John Paul II, there are now four dioceses in the Province of Clermont: Clermont, Le Puy-en-Velay and Saint-Flour.
The first Bishop of Clermont was Saint Austremonius. According to local tradition he was one of the seventy-two Disciples of Christ, by birth a Jew, who came with Saint Peter from Palestine to Rome and subsequently became the Apostle of Auvergne, Berry and Limousin. At Clermont he is said to have converted the senator Cassius and the pagan priest Victorinus, to have sent Saint Sirenatus to Thiers, Saint Marius to Salers, Saint Nectarius and Saint Antoninus into other parts of Auvergne, to have been beheaded in 92; this tradition is based on a life of Saint Anstremonius written in the tenth century in the Mozac Abbey, where the body of the saint had rested from 761, rewritten by the monks of Issoire, who retained the saint's head. Gregory of Tours, born in Auvergne in 544 and well versed in the history of that country, looks upon Austremonius as one of the seven envoys who, about 250, evangelized Gaul. Among the Bishops of Clermont should be mentioned: Pierre de Cros, engaged by Thomas Aquinas to complete his Summa.
Several famous Jansenists were natives of Clermont: author of the Pensées. On the other hand, the city of Riom in the diocese of Clermont was the birthplace of Jacques Sirmond, the learned Jesuit, Confessor to Louis XIII and editor of the volumes on the ancient councils of Gaul. Other natives worth mention were the Abbé Jacques Delille and Academician; the famous Jesuit paleontologist and philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was born only seven miles from Clermont, in the Château d'Orcines. Undoubtedly, by far, the most famous native sons of the diocese of Clermont were Édouard Michelin and his elder brother André Michelin, who perfected the pneumatic tire; the Diocese of Clermont can claim a number of monks whom the Church honours as saints, viz: St. Calevisus, a pupil in the monastery of Menat near Riom, whence he retired to Maine, where he founded the Abbey of Anisole. In the diocese of Clermont, the King of France enjoyed the right of nomination of the head of numerous houses; these included the Benedictine abbeys of Saint-Austremoine d'Issiore, Ebrulles, La Chaise-Dieu, Saint-Allire-les-Clermont, Mauzac près de Riom, Saint Symphorien and Aurillac.
Cistercian abbeys included: Bellaigue, Mont-Peyroux, Val-honneste. The king nominated the Abbot of the Augustinian house at Chantoin, as well as the Premonstratensian Abbots of Saint-André-lez-Clermont, Saint-Gilbert-de-Neuf-fontaines, the abbeys of Beaumont, La Boissie, L'Eschelle. Priories which were royal benefices were: Bragat, Cusset and Sallignac, he held the nomination of the Collegiate Churches of Arthonne and the Dean of Saint-Amable de Rion. Other abbeys in the diocese included Saint-Pourçain, between Moulins; the mendicant orders began to appear in the diocese of Clermont at an early date. The Franciscans were installed in Montferrand around 1224, shortly thereafter at Le Puy; the Dominicans were in evidence in Clermont itself by 1227 and the Franciscans in 1241. The Dominicans settled in Aurillac ca 1230, at Riom and at Brioude. Clermont had houses of Clarisses and Carmelites; the Augustinians settled at Ennezat in 1352 and the
Clermont-Ferrand
Clermont-Ferrand is a city and commune of France, in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, with a population of 141,569. Its metropolitan area had 467,178 inhabitants at the 2011 census, it is the prefecture of the Puy-de-Dôme department. Olivier Bianchi is its current mayor. Clermont-Ferrand sits on the plain of Limagne in the Massif Central and is surrounded by a major industrial area; the city known for the chain of volcanoes, the Chaîne des Puys surrounding it, including the dormant volcano Puy de Dôme (10 kilometres, one of the highest, topped by communications towers, visible from the city. Clermont-Ferrand hosts the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival, one of the world's leading international festivals for short films, it is home to the corporate headquarters of Michelin, the global tyre company founded there more than 100 years ago. Clermont-Ferrand's most famous public square is Place de Jaude, on which stands a grand statue of Vercingetorix sitting imperiously on a horse and holding a sword.
The inscription reads: J'ai pris les armes pour la liberté de tous. This statue was sculpted by Frédéric Bartholdi, who created the Statue of Liberty. Clermont-Ferrand's first name was Augusta Nemetum, it was born on the central knoll where the cathedral is situated today, known as Nemossos. It overlooked the capital of Gaulish Avernie; the fortified castle of Clarus Mons gave its name to the whole town in 848, to which the small episcopal town of Montferrand was attached in 1731, together taking the name of Clermont-Ferrand. The old part of Clermont is delimited by the route of the ramparts, as they existed at the end of the Middle Ages; the town of Clermont-Ferrand came about with the joining together of two separate towns and Montferrand, decreed by Louis XIII and confirmed by Louis XV. Clermont ranks among the oldest cities of France; the first known mention was by the Greek geographer Strabo, who called it the "metropolis of the Arverni". The city was at that time called Nemessos – a Gaulish word for a sacred forest, was situated on the mound where the cathedral of Clermont-Ferrand stands today.
Somewhere in the area around Nemossos the Arverni chieftain Vercingetorix was born around 72 BC. Nemossos was situated not far from the plateau of Gergovia, where Vercingetorix repulsed the Roman assault at the Battle of Gergovia in 52 BC. After the Roman conquest, the city became known as Augustonemetum sometime in the 1st century, a name which combined its original Gallic name with that of the Emperor Augustus, its population was estimated at 15,000–30,000 in the 2nd century, making it one of the largest cities of Roman Gaul. It became Arvernis in the 3rd century, taking its name, like other Gallic cities in this era, from the people who lived within its walls; the city became the seat of a bishop in the 5th century, at the time of the bishop Namatius or Saint Namace, who built a cathedral here described by Gregory of Tours. Clermont went through a dark period after the disappearance of the Roman Empire and during the whole High Middle Ages, marked by pillaging by the peoples who invaded Gaul.
Between 471 and 475, Auvergne was the target of Visigothic expansion, the city was besieged, including once by Euric. Although defended by Sidonius Apollinaris, at the head of the diocese from 468 to 486, the patrician Ecdicius, the city was ceded to the Visigoths by emperor Julius Nepos in 475 and became part of the Visigothic kingdom until 507. A generation it became part of the Kingdom of the Franks. On 8 November 535 the first Council of Clermont opened at Arvernis, with fifteen bishops participating, including Caesarius of Arles, Nizier of Lyons, Bishop of Trier, Saint Hilarius, Bishop of Mende; the Council issued 16 decrees. The second canon reiterythe principal that the granting of episcopal dignity must be according to the merits and not as a result of intrigues. In 570, Bishop Avitus ordered the Jews of the city, who numbered over 500, to accept Christian baptism or be expelled. In 848, the city was renamed Clairmont, after the castle Clarus Mons. During this era, it was an episcopal city ruled by its bishop.
Clermont was not spared by the Vikings at the time of the weakening of the Carolingian Empire: it was ravaged by the Normans under Hastein or Hastingen in 862 and 864 and, while its bishop Sigon carried out reconstruction work, again in 898. Bishop Étienne II built a new Romanesque cathedral, consecrated in 946, it was entirely replaced by the current Gothic cathedral, though the crypt survives and the towers were only replaced in the 19th century. Clermont was the starting point of the First Crusade, in which Christendom sought to free Jerusalem from Muslim domination. Pope Urban II preached the crusade at the Second Council of Clermont. In 1120, following repeated crises between the counts of Auvergne and the bishops of Clermont and in order to counteract the clergy’s power, the counts founded the rival city of Montferrand on a mound next to the fortifications of Clermont, on the model of the new cities of the Midi that appeared in the 12th and 13th centuries; until the early modern period, the two remained separate cities: an episcopal city.
Clermont became a royal city in 1551, in 1610, the inseparable property of the French Crown. On 15 April 1630 the Edict of Troyes joined the two cities of Montferrand. T
Diplomat
A diplomat is a person appointed by a state to conduct diplomacy with one or more other states or international organizations. The main functions of diplomats are: representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the sending state. Seasoned diplomats of international repute are used in international organizations as well as multinational companies for their experience in management and negotiating skills. Diplomats are diplomatic corps of various nations of the world. Diplomats are the oldest form of any of the foreign policy institutions of the state, predating by centuries foreign ministers and ministerial offices, they have diplomatic immunity. The regular use of permanent diplomatic representation began between the states of fifteenth century Italy; however the terms ‘diplomacy’ and ‘diplomat’ appeared in the French Revolution. Diplomat is derived from the Greek διπλωμάτης, the holder of a diploma, referring to diplomats' documents of accreditation from their sovereign. Diplomats themselves and historians refer to the foreign ministry by its address: the Ballhausplatz, the Quai d’Orsay, the Wilhelmstraße.
For imperial Russia to 1917 it was the Choristers’ Bridge. The Italian ministry was called "the Consulta." Though any person can be appointed by the state's national government to conduct said state's relations with other states or international organisations, a number of states maintain an institutionalised group of career diplomats—that is, public servants with a steady professional connection to the country's foreign ministry. The term career diplomat is used worldwide in opposition to political appointees. While posted to an embassy or delegation in a foreign country or accredited to an international organisation, both career diplomats and political appointees enjoy the same diplomatic immunities. Ceremonial heads of state act as diplomats on behalf of their nation following instructions from their head of Government. Whether being a career diplomat or a political appointee, every diplomat, while posted abroad, will be classified in one of the ranks of diplomats as regulated by international law.
Diplomats can be contrasted with consuls and attachés, who represent their state in a number of administrative ways, but who don't have the diplomat's political functions. Diplomats in posts collect and report information that could affect national interests with advice about how the home-country government should respond. Once any policy response has been decided in the home country's capital, posts bear major responsibility for implementing it. Diplomats have the job of conveying, in the most persuasive way possible, the views of the home government to the governments to which they are accredited and, in doing so, of trying to convince those governments to act in ways that suit home-country interests. In this way, diplomats are part of the beginning and the end of each loop in the continuous process through which foreign policy develops. In general, it has become harder for diplomats to act autonomously. Diplomats have to seize secure communication systems and mobile telephones can be tracked down and instruct the most reclusive head of mission.
The same technology in reverse gives diplomats the capacity for more immediate input about the policy-making processes in the home capital. Secure email has transformed the contact between the ministry, it is less to leak, enables more personal contact than the formal cablegram, with its wide distribution and impersonal style. The home country will send instructions to a diplomatic post on what foreign policy goals to pursue, but decisions on tactics – who needs to be influenced, what will best persuade them, who are potential allies and adversaries, how it can be done - are for the diplomats overseas to make. In this operation, the intelligence, cultural understanding, energy of individual diplomats become critical. If competent, they will have developed relationships grounded in trust and mutual understanding with influential members of the country in which they are accredited, they will have worked hard to understand the motives, thought patterns and culture of the other side. The diplomat should be an excellent negotiator but, above all, a catalyst for peace and understanding between peoples.
The diplomat's principal role is to foster peaceful relations between states. This role takes on heightened importance. Negotiation must continue – but within altered contexts. Most career diplomats have university degrees in international relations, political science, economics, or law. Diplomats have been considered members of an exclusive and prestigious profession; the public image of diplomats has been described as "a caricature of pinstriped men gliding their way around a never-ending global cocktail party". J. W. Burton has noted that "despite the absence of any specific professional training, diplomacy has a high professional status, due to a degree of secrecy and mystery that its practitioners self-consciously promote." The state supports the high status and self-esteem of its diplomats in order to
Statius
Publius Papinius Statius was a Roman poet of the 1st century AD. His surviving Latin poetry includes an epic in the Thebaid, he is known for his appearance as a guide in the Purgatory section of Dante's epic poem, the Divine Comedy. Information about Statius' life is entirely drawn from his Silvae and a mention by the satirist Juvenal, he was born to a family of Graeco-Campanian origin. The poet's father was a native of Velia but moved to Naples and spent time in Rome where he taught with marked success. From boyhood to adulthood, Statius' father proved himself a champion in the poetic contests at Naples in the Augustalia and in the Nemean and Isthmian games, which served as important events to display poetic skill during the early empire. Statius declares in his lament for his father that his father was in his time equal to any literary task, whether in prose or verse, he mentioned Mevania, may have spent time there, or been impressed by the confrontation of Vitellius and Vespasian in 69. Statius' father may have lost his status because of money troubles.
At Naples, he was a teacher of Greek and Roman literature who attracted many pupils who were destined for religious offices in Rome. He died in 79 AD. From Pliny the Younger's Letters, it has been deduced that Statius wrote under the pseudonym of Propertius. Less is known of the events of Statius' life, he was born c. 45 AD. From his boyhood he was victorious in poetic contests many times at his native Naples and three times at the Alban Festival, where he received the golden crown from the hand of the emperor Domitian who had instituted the contest. For the Alban Festival, Statius composed a poem on the German and Dacian campaigns of Domitian which Juvenal lampoons in his seventh satire. Statius is thought to have moved to Rome c. 90 after his father's death where he published his acclaimed epic poem the Thebaid c. 92. In the capital, Statius seems to have made many connections among the Roman aristocracy and court, he was supported through their patronage. Statius produced the first three books of occasional poetry, his Silvae, which were published in 93, which sketch his patrons and acquaintances of this period and mention his attendance at one of Domitian's Saturnalia banquets.
He competed in the great Capitoline competition, although it is not known in what year, although 94 has been suggested. Statius failed to win the coveted prize, a loss he took hard; the disappointment may have prompted his return to Naples around 94, the home of his youth. In existence is a poem he addressed to his wife, the widow of a famous singer who had a musically talented daughter by her first husband, on this occasion. Statius' first three books of the Silvae seem to have received some criticism, in response he composed a fourth book' at Naples, published in 95. During this period at Naples, Statius maintained his relations with the court and his patrons, earning himself another invitation to a palace banquet, he seems to have taken an interest in the marriage and career of his stepdaughter and he took a young slave boy under his wing, as he was childless, who died c. 95. In that same year Statius embarked on a new epic, the Achilleid, giving popular recitations of his work only to complete a book and a half before dying in 95, leaving the poem unfinished.
His fifth book of Silvae were published after his death c. 96. As a poet, Statius was versatile in his contrived to represent his work as otium. Taught by his educated father, Statius was familiar with the breadth of classical literature and displayed his learning in his poetry, densely allusive and has been described as elaborate and mannerist, he was able to compose in hexameter, hendecasyllable and Sapphic meters, to produce researched and refined epic and polished impromptu pieces, to treat a variety of themes with the dazzling rhetorical and poetic skill that inspired the support of his patrons and the emperor. Some of Statius' works, such as his poems for his competitions, have been lost. Based on Statius' own testimony, the Thebaid was written c. 80 – c. 92 AD, beginning when the poet was around 35, the work is thought to have been published in 91 or 92. The poem is divided into twelve books in imitation of Virgil's Aeneid and is composed in dactylic hexameter. In the Silvae, Statius speaks of his extensive work in polishing and revising the Thebaid and his public recitations of the poem.
From the epilogue it seems clear that Statius considered the Thebaid to be his magnum opus and believed that it would secure him fame for the future. In the poem, Statius follows Virgil as a model, but he refers to a wide range of sources in his handling of meter and episodes; the poem's theme is the myth of the Seven Against Thebes, the story of the battle between the sons of Oedipus for the throne of Thebes. The poem opens with the disgraced Oedipus' curse on his two sons and Polyneices, who have decided to hold the throne of Thebes in alternate years, one ruling, the other in exile. Jupiter plans a war between Thebes and Argos, although Juno begs him not to inc
Wace, Henry; Piercy, William C., eds. (1911). . Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature to the End of the Sixth Century (3rd ed.). London: John Murray.
Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). 