Thijs Kersten (Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen) Writing to one of his pen pals on January 21, 1605, the Lowlandish scholar Justus Lipsius (1547–1606) could not help but address the elephant in the room. However pleasant his contact with the Spaniard Francisco Quevedo (1580–1645) had been, Lipsius felt the need to mention the wars Quevedo’s king hadContinue reading “Trojan Heroes of the Eighty Years’ War (1568–1648): New Ancient Greek, Liberty and Remembrance”
Author Archives: hermes1517
A Woman Writing New Ancient Greek Poetry for a Leiden Disputation (1686)
Dries Nijs (KU Leuven) Leiden University library houses an extensive collection of printed disputationes. These broadsheets and pamphlets present the theses that university students — the respondentes — defended against opponentes, under the supervision of a professor acting as praeses. This corpus extends from shortly after the founding of Leiden University (1575) into the 20thContinue reading “A Woman Writing New Ancient Greek Poetry for a Leiden Disputation (1686)”
Laonikos Chalkokondyles: The Last Byzantine Historian and the Dawn of Ottoman Historiography
Riccardo Stigliano (Universität Innsbruck) Should the last Byzantine historian be considered an early modern Hellenist? Yes, because he lived through the crucial years of the fall of Constantinople. After all, he started writing as soon as Constantinople fell, which was at the very beginning of the Modern Age. Yes, if we consider the literary genreContinue reading “Laonikos Chalkokondyles: The Last Byzantine Historian and the Dawn of Ottoman Historiography”
Laudes urbium, ἐγκώμια φίλων: Two friends writing city encomia and congratulating each other
Adriaan Demuynck (KU Leuven / FWO) On 27 February 1565, the new city hall of Antwerp was formally inaugurated, exactly four years after the first stone was laid. To adorn the opening of this prestigious Renaissance building, two young poets joined forces and wrote a collection of city encomia or laudes urbis on the cityContinue reading “Laudes urbium, ἐγκώμια φίλων: Two friends writing city encomia and congratulating each other”
On the Hem of Daniel Heinsius’ ‘Peplus Graecorum epigrammatum’: Poetry, Philosophy, and Paratexts in New Ancient Greek
Domenico Graziano (Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II – Universität Innsbruck) In 1613, Jan Jacobszoon Paets, Leiden University’s printer (1603-1619), published a mature fruit of Daniel Heinsius’ (1580–1655) ‘Hellenizing Muse’: the Peplus Graecorum epigrammatum. Aside from an appendix of ἐρωτικά, which fills the final pages of the last gathering (removed in subsequent editions), theContinue reading “On the Hem of Daniel Heinsius’ ‘Peplus Graecorum epigrammatum’: Poetry, Philosophy, and Paratexts in New Ancient Greek”
Στεναγμοὶ τῶν ναυτῶν: Traveling from France to Greece in the 1830s
Lev Shadrin (Universität Innsbruck) <…> καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα, καίπερ μαλακὸν ὂν, ὤθησεν ἡμᾶς πρὸς Ἄνδρον. Στεναγμοὶ τῶν ναυτῶν.“<…> and the wind, as gentle as it was, pushed us towards the Andros island.Sailors groan.”GSA 108/2922, Goethe- und Schiller-Archiv Weimar, f.51v In 1837, Karl Benedikt Hase, a Franco-German Hellenist working in Paris, made a two-month long tripContinue reading “Στεναγμοὶ τῶν ναυτῶν: Traveling from France to Greece in the 1830s”
Erasmus and Budé: Frenemies forever!
Liese Dictus (KU Leuven) Erasmus’ sharp pen was a force to be reckoned with by his contemporaries. In his famous Praise of Folly the humanist author spared no one in society, including himself. Similarly, Erasmus proved in his letters that he could deal harsh blows with his pen strokes. A letter to the French humanistContinue reading “Erasmus and Budé: Frenemies forever!”
A Hellenic Voice from the Tyrolean Lowlands
Tobias Heiss (Universität Innsbruck) A few years before the Austrian secondary education system underwent a structural reform in 1849, which established Ancient Greek as a mandatory subject, a Franciscan monk named Bern(h)ard Niedermühlbichler (1798–1850) already published two works of exemplary New Ancient Greek versification with a pedagogical goal in mind. As a teacher of classicsContinue reading “A Hellenic Voice from the Tyrolean Lowlands”
At the Dawn of Early Modern Hellenism: Manuel Chrysoloras and the Revival of Greek Studies in Renaissance Europe
Chiara Gazzini (University of Oslo) The Steigenberger Inselhotel on Lake Constance, formerly a Dominican monastery, holds a copy of an epitaph ascribed to the Italian humanist Pier Paolo Vergerio (1370–1444/45). Originally placed near the altar of the monastery, the inscription was on the gravestone of a Greek who died in Constance on 15 April 1415Continue reading “At the Dawn of Early Modern Hellenism: Manuel Chrysoloras and the Revival of Greek Studies in Renaissance Europe”
Hermes 