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On Thursday 11 February, Andreas Rhoby (Austrian Academy of Sciences) will inaugurate the first Speaking From the Margins lecture series. He will dedicate his presentation to the memory of Wolfram Hörandner, professor emeritus of Byzantine literature at the University of Vienna, who recently passed away.

 

Abstract

The production of verse in Byzantium was immense. What is left represents only the tip of the iceberg of the poetic production of Byzantine intellectuals. Writing verses (as opposed to writing prose) was not necessarily considered to be something special, as is the case in our modern conception of literature. In Byzantium, a considerable part of the literary production belongs to the genre of so-called paratexts, i.e. texts that accompany or refer to a main text. These paratexts, a huge amount of them composed in verse, occur in manuscripts (often in connection with images) but also as inscriptions. For example, verses accompanying portraits in fresco painting are also paratexts insofar as they accompany an image which represents the center of the composition.

In my presentation, I will discuss the interaction of images and accompanying verses in manuscripts, on fresco paintings and on other media. My lecture will reveal how carefully planned was the production and the layout of images with verses in manuscripts and other media, and how one medium influenced the other. The kosmos of Byzantine metrical paratexts is as wide and colorful as the kosmos (‘adornment’) of images and illuminations and their accompanying verses.

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Practical information

Date & time: Thursday 11 February 2021, 4:00pm (UTC+1, CET)

No registration required. The lecture is freely accessible via Zoom: https://ugent-be.zoom.us/j/98880354185?pwd=YnErNHlCWkZxTk43eVlWY0JBNnpPUT09

• Meeting ID: 988 8035 4185
• Passcode: 2Mg6Uvdt

The second lecture in the online lecture series Speaking From the Margins. DBBE Online Lectures, Spring 2021 Series will be given by Julie Boeten (Ghent University).

After finishing a Master’s degree in Classical language and literature at Ghent University, Julie Boeten started her PhD at the same alma mater under the wings of the DBBE project in 2015. In 2016, she received her own FWO grant, but remained affiliated with the Database.

 

Abstract

The book epigrams in the Database of Byzantine Book Epigrams have formed the corpus for my doctoral research in the past couple of years. Indeed, a sub-database was even designed specifically for my purposes, which is linked to the larger DBBE database. In this sub-database I have tagged a number of features, one of which are the object clitic pronouns (OCPs). These are the pronouns in their clitic form, when they are in an object position, such as με, σοι or τοι. The reason why these OCPs are an interesting word group to tag, is because they are important signallers of information structure.

The tagging in the DBBE has yielded some interesting results concerning the distribution of OCPs in the Medieval Greek language of book epigrams. It is generally agreed upon that the unmarked, ‘normal’ position of the OCP in Medieval Greek is (immediately) following the verb. However, a large amount of OCPs in the DBBE are preverbal. What exactly is going here?

The so-called focus hypothesis suggests that there may a pragmatic explanation for this. Indeed, focalized information is usually attracted into a preverbal position, which may be the reason for this distribution of OCPs in the DBBE. In this paper, we will have a closer look at this and consider the possible ramifications for Medieval Greek word order in general.

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Practical information

Date & time: Tuesday 2 March 2021, 4:00pm (UTC+1, CET)

No registration required. The lecture is freely accessible via Zoom: https://ugent-be.zoom.us/j/93997718555?pwd=MjM0MS9LSkJLY3N5V0M2Zmx2WEZBQT09

• Meeting ID: 939 9771 8555
• Passcode: P0uWgw8E

The third lecture in the online lecture series Speaking From the Margins. DBBE Online Lectures, Spring 2021 Series will be given by Jacopo Marcon (University of Birmingham).

In 2018, Jacopo Marcon obtained his MA in Classical Philology cum laude, at the University of Udine, with a thesis in Latin Palaeography (the catalogue of medieval manuscripts of Giusto Fontanini, from the Biblioteca Guarneriana in San Daniele del Friuli). Currently, he is a third-year PhD student at the department of Theology and Religion of the University of Birmingham. He is part of the ERC Project: CATENA: Commentary Manuscripts in the History and Transmission of the New Testament and is currently working on the first-ever critical edition of the Ps. Oecumenian Catena on the Romans (title of the thesis: The Edition of the Ps. Oecumenian Catena on Romans).

 

Abstract

This presentation aims to investigate the use of epigrams in the Byzantine New Testament Catenae, with a particular focus on the so-called Ps. Oecumenian Catenae on the Pauline Letters. I will analyze the position, the structure, the content, and the function of the byzantine book epigrams to reveal new interesting features in the history of Catenae and commentaries on Paul.

First, I will generally introduce the New Testament Catenae. These are biblical manuscripts with the text of the New Testament alongside the exegetical chain of comments made up of multiple extracts from the Greek Church Fathers. Second, I will consider the so-called paratextual features of the biblical Catenae on the Pauline Epistles, where most of the book epigrams are present (the Euthalian Apparatus and the set of prefaces and subscriptions).

In doing so, I will investigate different types of book epigrams. For the first typology, that of the so-called text- or author-related epigrams, I will examine the cases of Paris, BnF, Gr. 219 (GA 91), 224 (GA 1934), and Coisl. 217 (GA 1972) and Venice, BNM, Gr. Z 34 (coll. 349) (GA 1924). In these manuscripts, alongside the text of the preface on the Pauline epistles in verses (ἡ τῶν ἐπιστολῶν ὑπόθεσις διὰ ἰάμβων), short book epigrams open the text of each of the Epistles.

In some other manuscripts, book epigrams (the so-called image-related epigrams) accompany miniatures of the apostle Paul, and the Greek Church Fathers, such as in the manuscripts Paris, BnF, Gr. 223 (GA 1933), and Gr. 224 (GA 1934)), or can be incorporated into the text of the colophons and notes of property (i.e. the scribe-related epigram in Vatican City, BAV, Bar. Gr. 503 (GA 1952), with the subscription of John Pepagomenos, or the patron-related epigram at the end of Athos, Mone Agiou Paulou 2 (GA 1862), regarding a βασιλισσα Μαρια).

Finally, my presentation explores the content and the textual tradition of some epigrams that have been overlooked, in Paris, BnF, Gr. 237 (GA 82), including one which seems to have been written in Arabic or Turkish but with Greek letters.

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Practical information

Date & time: Tuesday 30 March 2021, 4:00pm (UTC+2, CET)

No registration required. The lecture is freely accessible via Zoom: https://ugent-be.zoom.us/j/95155014627?pwd=NjVXWmVQeXl5MzVUWFVjSVpLUUYvQT09

• Meeting ID: 951 5501 4627
• Passcode: 57b2RkxU

The fourth lecture in the online lecture series Speaking From the Margins. DBBE Online Lectures, Spring 2021 Series will be given by Alessandra Palla (University of Hamburg).

Alessandra Palla graduated from the University of Pisa (Bachelor in “Lettere Classiche” and Master in “Scienze dell’Antichità e Archeologia”) and then received her joint PhD degree in “Scienze dell’Antichità e Archeologia” from the University of Pisa and at the University of Hamburg. She has obtained various international research grants and she is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Hamburg, where she is conducting a project that involves editing, translating, and providing a commentary on Dionysius of Halicarnassus’ Epistula ad Ammaeum II. At the same time, she is working on the upcoming publication of her PhD thesis regarding the manuscript tradition of Dionysius’ Epistula and on other researches, mainly in the fields of Greek rhetoric, classical philology and Greek literature.

 

Abstract

The aim of my research is to provide a literary and critical analysis of the epigrams AP 2, 372-376 and AP 9, 583.

The first stage of my paper focuses on an overview regarding the manuscripts in which these epigrams are transmitted, namely the manuscripts that contain Thucydides’ Historiae, the so-called Dio­ny­sius of Halicarnassus’ Opuscula Rhetorica, and (in some cases) Marcellinus’ Vita Thucydidis, along with an anonymous Vita about the historian, and the manuscripts of Anthologia Graeca.

In the second stage, I analyze and reconstruct the epigrams’ transmission, combining textual evidences with other aspects, such as the epigrams’ position within the manuscripts, the cultural context in which they are transmitted and their reception in antiquity.

This research will provide a basis from which to develop a thorough and detailed study not only of the manuscript tradition of the epigrams AP 2, 372-376 and AP 9, 583 but also of their intellectual, cultural and historical function.

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Practical information

Date & time: Tuesday 27 April 2021, 4:00pm (UTC+2, CET)

No registration required. The lecture is freely accessible via Zoom: https://ugent-be.zoom.us/j/99198629943?pwd=a0UxaXdFVmR5MXJneEgxRytCY3ZzUT09.

• Meeting ID: 991 9862 9943
• Passcode: L75La5fW

The fifth lecture in the online lecture series Speaking From the Margins. DBBE Online Lectures, Spring 2021 Series will be given by Sien De Groot (Ghent University).

After finishing her master’s degree in Classical Philology (Ghent University), Sien De Groot obtained a PhD position with the Database of Byzantine Book Epigrams. She is currently finishing a doctoral thesis on book epigrams in the Byzantine manuscripts of Ps.-Dionysius the Areopagite.

 

Abstract

When we want to understand how readers in the past approached texts, our source material is limited. We cannot simply ask ancient or medieval readers about their experience. Instead, we have to rely on what they have written about the texts they read, and on traces left in their books. Book epigrams are unique sources in this respect. As poems written to accompany certain main texts, they express the poet’s reaction to these texts. On the other hand, their presence in the manuscripts of the main texts creates a close connection between text and reception, and guides later readers through the book.

In this presentation, I will focus on book epigrams in the Greek manuscripts of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite. As we will see, book epigrams preserved in these manuscripts are usually quite short. They convey the main focus of the texts and confirm the author’s pseudonym, but they do not engage thoroughly with the theological framework expressed in the corpus. On the other hand, the book epigrams were important in structuring the manuscripts, and have, most probably, acquired this function at an early stage in the history of the texts. In order to understand how these epigrams functioned within each manuscript and within the manuscript tradition as a whole, we will take into account non-textual evidence, such as the position of epigrams in the manuscripts, the visual presentation, and the moment at which the epigrams were added to the book. With this overview, I hope to shed light on the manifold interactions between readers, texts and books that occurred around the works of Pseudo-Dionysius.

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Practical information

Date & time: Tuesday 25 May 2021, 4:00pm (UTC+2, CET)

No registration required. The lecture is freely accessible via Zoom: https://ugent-be.zoom.us/j/93448862359?pwd=TzgyajFZZWsxYXhVTm5zUU1KZ0d5dz09.

• Meeting ID: 934 4886 2359
• Passcode: JmVbX7wz