bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Preliminary results of the application of a silk fibroin scaffold to otology
Authors: Levin Brett , Leanne Redmond Sharon , Rajkhowa Rangam , Eikelboom Robert Henry , Marano Robert Jeffery , Atlas Marcus David
Published: September 2009

The surgical treatment to repair chronic tympanic membrane perforations is myringoplasty. Although multiple autologous grafts, allografts, and synthetic graft materials have been used over the years, no single graft material is superior for repairing all perforation types. Recently, the remarkable properties of silk fibroin protein have been studied, with biomedical and tissue engineering applications in mind, across a number of medical and surgical disciplines. The present study examines the use of silk fibroin for its potential suitability as an alternative graft in myringoplasty surgery by investigating the growth and proliferation of human tympanic membrane keratinocytes on a silk fibroin scaffold in vitro. Light microscopy, immunofluorescent staining, and confocal imaging all reveal promising preliminary results. The biocompatibility, transparency, stability, high tensile strength, and biodegradability of fibroin make this biomaterial an attractive option to study for this utility.
A CHARACTERIZATION OF THE WEAK RADON–NIKODÝM PROPERTY BY FINITELY ADDITIVE INTERVAL FUNCTIONS
Authors: BONGIORNO B. , DI PIAZZA L. , MUSIAŁ K.
Published: September 2009

A characterization of Banach spaces possessing the weak Radon–Nikodým property is given in terms of finitely additive interval functions. Due to that characterization several Banach space valued set functions that are only finitely additive can be represented as integrals.
Skinfold thicknesses: is there a need to be very precise in their location?
Authors: Durnin J. V. G. A. , de Bruin H. , Feunekes G. I. J.
Published: September 2009

Skinfold thicknesses represent a comparatively simple and reasonably accurate assessment of body fatness which is an important part of the estimation of nutritional state. However, much emphasis is placed on the necessity to be very precise in the exact position of the skinfold being measured and there is frequently concern, also, about the variability of the measurement by different observers using different types of caliper. Fifty-three women and forty-five men had four skinfolds (biceps, triceps, supra-iliac and subscapular) measured first at the standard sites (Tanner, 1953; Edwards et al. 1955), and then at deliberately chosen sites about 20 mm distant from the ‘correct’ ones. The effect on the estimation of body fatness by this manoeuvre resulted in a difference of usually less then 1% and, at a maximum, 3%. In the light of the uncertainty of the basic assumptions which are made in extrapolating from skinfolds (or indeed densitometry, total body water, total body K, and others) to body fatness, these technical errors assume comparatively little importance.
Anthropometric characteristics of healthy Italian nonagenarians and centenarians
Authors: Ravaglia Giovanni , Morini Pietro , Forti Paola , Maioli Fabiola , Boschi Federica , Bernardi Mauro , Gasbarrini Giovanni
Published: September 2009

Available anthropometric reference values for elderly people do not include specific norms for over-90-year-old subjects despite their increasing number. In the present study, weight, height and a number of anthropometric variables related to body muscle and fat mass were collected from fifty-seven nonagenarian and forty-one centenarian healthy, non-institutionalized subjects living in an Italian area. Recumbent anthropometry was used to avoid errors associated with impaired mobility. Nonagenarians and centenarian men were taller and heavier than women of corresponding age and had a greater amount of muscle and trunk fat, whereas women showed a marked peripheral adipose distribution. Anthropometric values of both age-groups were generally lower than published norms for 70–89-year-old American and European elderly people. However, differences were less marked when comparing Italian nonagenarians and centenarians with French and British people aged 85 years and over than when comparing Italian subjects with American octogenarians and younger European elderly people. Taken together these findings suggest a dramatic loss of muscle and fat mass in over-90-year-old subjects with respect to younger elderly people. However, changes between successive generations and geographical influences cannot be excluded. The need for local and age-specific norms in nutritional assessment of over-90-year-old people is emphasized. It is also suggested that current anthropometric indices may not be reliable when evaluating the oldest elderly subjects.
Fatty acid composition of an oral load affects chylomicron size in human subjects
Authors: Sakr Sana W. , Attia N. , Haourigui M. , Paul J. L. , Soni T. , Vacher D. , Girard-Globa A.
Published: September 2009

HDL-phospholipids are determinants in reverse cholesterol transport. They are mostly derived from triacylglycerol (TG)-rich lipoproteins. Chylomicron size is important, therefore, because it is related to the ratio surface phospholipids: core TG and, thus, determines the availability of postprandial phospholipids for transfer to HDL. Eleven healthy young women each ingested four different fat loads supplemented with retinyl palmitate and containing 60 g sunflower oil (SO), oleic–sunflower oil (OSO), mixed oil (MO; (g/kg) linoleic acid 480, oleic acid 380, linolenic acid 13) or beef tallow (BT). At the peak of TG absorption for all loads (4 h) chylomicron diameters, determined by agarose-gel filtration, were larger after SO compared with OSO (P< 0·05) and BT (P= 0·06) and after MO compared with BT (P< 0·05). At 6 h chylomicron size was larger after the vegetable oils compared with BT (P< 0·05 in each case). After each fat load chylomicron size decreased at 6 and 8 h compared with that at 4 h (P< 0·05) except for OSO. Retinyl ester and TG concentrations were lower in chylomicrons after BT than after the other fats but not in the chylomicron-free serum (containing chylomicron remnants), suggesting absorption in the form of very small particles. Compared with the fasting value, the concentration of the Svedberg unit of flotation 20–400 fraction, which contains VLDL and chylomicron remnants, was lower 8 h after MO, the only fat to contain significant amounts of linolenic acid. We conclude that chylomicron size is dependent on the fatty acid composition of ingested fats and the time-course of digestion, being larger for polyunsaturated fatty acid-rich fats and in the early phase of digestion. On the basis of retinyl ester concentration there were no differences between fats in chylomicron-remnant clearance.
Digestive and metabolic effects of potato and maize fibres in human subjects
Authors: Cherbut C. , Aube A.-C. , Mekki N. , Dubois C. , Lairon D. , Barry J.-L.
Published: September 2009

The physiological effects of dietary fibres in humans are due to their physico-chemical properties. However, it is difficult to predict these effects simply by measuring certain characteristicsin vitro. Studies in human subjects are still required to assess the effectiveness of new substrates. The aim of the present study in healthy human subjects was to evaluate the effects of two novel fibres, potato (PF) and maize (MF), on fasting and postprandial blood concentrations of carbohydrate and lipid metabolites as well as on stool ouput and transit time. The chemical composition, water-binding capacity (WBC) and fermentative properties of the fibres were also characterized in order to determine their possible involvement in digestive and metabolic effects. Stools, as well as breath and blood samples, were collected after consumption for 1 month of either a basal diet (control) or a basal diet supplemented with fibre (15 g/d). MF resisted fermentation better than PF and had lower digestibility. However, both fibres increased faecal output of dry matter, neutral sugars and water. There was an inverse relationship between stool weight and orofaecal transit time, although only MF significantly reduced transit time. Orocaecal transit was lengthened by PF, probably because of its high WBC. PF ingestion also decreased postprandial plasma levels of total and esterified cholesterol but had no effect on fasting concentrations. In contrast, MF lowered fasting cholesterolaemia and increased free:esterified cholesterol. These particular physiological and fermentative properties suggest that PF and MF would be suitable ingredients in a healthy diet.
Anaemia is associated with reduced productivity of women workers even in less-physically-strenuous tasks
Authors: Scholz Barbara D. , Gross Rainer , Schultink Werner , Sastroamidjojo Soemilah
Published: September 2009

While many studies show reduced work output in heavy labour with poor nutritional status, data among less-physically-strenuous industrial occupations is scarce. In the present study the output of ninety-two women jute-factory workers over a 1-month period was measured together with haemoglobin, BMI, arm muscle and fat area, physical work capacity (maximum O2 consumption; ), as well as socio-economic, health and activity variables. A significant correlation was found between haemoglobin and work output, which remained significant (P < 0·005) after a multipleregression analysis with other potentially confounding factors. Anaemic workers and those with values less than 1·5 1/min were significantly less active at home than non-anaemic workers (P < 0·015). Anaemic women produced an average of 5·3% less in the factory and performed an average of 6·5 h less housework per week.
Vitamin C intake and susceptibility to the common cold
Authors: Hemilä Harri
Published: September 2009

Although the role of vitamin C in common cold incidence had been studied extensively, the level of vitamin C intake has not been unequivocally shown to affect the incidence of colds. In the present study the six largest vitamin C supplementation (≥ 1 g/d) studies, including over 5000 episodes in all, have been analysed, and it is shown that common cold incidence is not reduced in the vitamin C-supplemented groups compared with the placebo groups (pooled rate ratio (RR) 0·99; 95% CI 0·93, 1·04). Consequently these six major studies give no evidence that high-dose vitamin C supplementation decreases common cold incidence in ordinary people. Nevertheless, the analysis was continued with the hypothesis that vitamin C intake may affect common cold susceptibility in specific groups of people. It was assumed that the potential effect of supplementation might be most conspicuous in subjects with low dietary vitamin C intake. The average vitamin C intake has been rather low in the UK and plasma vitamin C concentrations are in general lower in males than in females. In four studies with British females vitamin C supplementation had no marked effect on common cold incidence (pooled RR 0·95; 95% CI 0·86, 1·04). However, in four studies with British male schoolchildren and students a statistically highly significant reduction in common cold incidence was found in groups supplemented with vitamin C (pooled RR 0·70; 95% CI 0·60, 0·81). Thus, these studies with British males indicate that vitamin C intake has physiological effects on susceptibility to common cold infections, although the effect seems quantitatively meaningful only in limited groups of people and is not very large.
The energy costs of walking on the level and on negative and positive slopes in the Granadina goat (Capra hircus)
Authors: Lachica M. , Prieto C. , Aguilera J. F.
Published: September 2009

The energy expenditure of six goats averaging 35 (SE 0·3) kg was measured when the animals were standing or walking on a treadmill enclosed in a confinement-type respiration chamber at different speeds (0·167, 0·333 and 0·500 m/s) and slopes ( — 10, — 5, 0, +5 and +10%). The energy costs of locomotion, estimated from the coefficients of linear regressions of heat production (HP) per kg body weight v. distance travelled were 1·91, 2·33, 3·35, 4·68 and 6·44 J/kg BW per m for — 10, — 5, 0, +5 and +10% inclines respectively, indicating that the energy expenditure of walking over standing changes with slope according to a slightly curvilinear relationship. The energy cost of raising 1 kg body weight one vertical metre was found to be 31·7 J, giving an average efficiency for upslope locomotion of 30·9%. The energy recovered on vertical descent was estimated as 13·2 J/kg per m, indicating an efficiency of the energy recovered above the theoretical maximum.
Digestion of feed amino acids in the rumen and small intestine of dairy cows measured with nylon-bag techniques
Authors: van Straalen W. M. , Odinga J. J. , Mostert W.
Published: September 2009

The disappearance of total N, non-protein-N and amino acid-N after washing, rumen incubation and intestinal passage of sugarbeet pulp, maize-gluten feed, maize feed meal, palm kernel meal, soyabean hulls, soyabean meal, grass silage, maize silage and concentrate was measured in four dairy cows using nylon-bag techniques. Disappearance of amino acid-N after washing varied between feedstuff's from 14 to 69% of feed amino acid-N, and was lower than disappearance of non-protein-N. For sugarbeet pulp, grass silage and maize silage, washing had a considerable effect on the amino acid profile. Disappearance of amino acid-N after rumen incubation was also lower than non-protein-N and varied between feedstuffs from 25 to 73% of feed amino acid-N. Rumen incubation had only a small effect on the amino acid profile of the residue after washing. Disappearance of amino acid-N in the intestine varied between feedstuffs from 70 to 99% of rumen undegraded amino acid-N, and was higher than the disappearance of non-protein-N. Intestinal incubation showed a considerable effect on the amino acid profile for all feedstuffs. It was concluded that protein that was assumed to escape rumen degradation and was absorbable in the intestine was higher in amino acids and methionine, and lower in non-amino acid-N and glutamic acid and proline compared with protein in the feedstuff.
Energy balance and liver respiratory activity in rats fed on an energy-dense diet
Authors: Iossa Susanna , Mollica Maria P. , Lionetti Lillà , Barletta Antonio , Liverini Giovanna
Published: September 2009

In the present study energy balance and liver respiratory activity were studied in rats fed on either a control diet or an energy-dense diet. Liver respiration was assessed both without added substrates and after the addition of hexanoate, glycerol, or sorbitol. The effect of ouabain on hexanoate-supported respiration was also determined. Metabolizable energy intake and energy expenditure increased in rats fed on an energy dense diet, but body-weight gain, as well as lipid and protein content, remained unchanged. When net energy expenditure, obtained excluding the total cost of storage, was expressed as a percentage of metabolizable energy, significant differences were found between the two groups of rats. This finding supports the presence of regulatory mechanisms in rats fed on an energy-dense diet, which are useful to counteract development of obesity. In addition, a significant increase in liver respiratory activity was found in rats fed on an energy-dense diet, both in the basal state and in that stimulated by added substrates. Na/K-pump-dependent O2consumption also increased in rats fed on an energy-dense diet. The results indicate that a greater production of metabolic heat by the liver can contribute to the increased energy expenditure found in rats fed on an energy-dense diet.
Dietary flavonoid intake and colorectal cancer: a case–control study
Authors: Kyle Janet A. M. , Sharp Linda , Little Julian , Duthie Garry G. , McNeill Geraldine
Published: September 2009

Diets rich in flavonoids may reduce the risk of developing colorectal cancer. Flavonoids are widely distributed in foods of plant origin, though in the UK tea is the main dietary source. Our objective was to evaluate any independent associations of total dietary and non-tea intake of four flavonoid subclasses and the risk of developing colorectal cancer in a tea-drinking population with a high colorectal cancer incidence. A population-based case–control study (264 cases with histologically confirmed incident colorectal cancer and 408 controls) was carried out. Dietary data gathered by FFQ were used to calculate flavonoid intake. Adjusted OR and 95 % CI were estimated by logistic regression. No linear association between risk of developing colorectal cancer and total dietary flavonol, procyanidin, flavon-3-ol or flavanone intakes was found, but non-tea flavonol intake was inversely associated with colorectal cancer risk (OR 0·6; 95 % CI 0·4, 1·0). Stratification by site of cancer and assessment of individual flavonols showed a reduced risk of developing colon but not rectal cancer with increasing non-tea quercetin intake (OR 0·5; 95 % CI 0·3, 0·8; Ptrend < 0·01). We concluded that flavonols, specifically quercetin, obtained from non-tea components of the diet may be linked with reduced risk of developing colon cancer.
Hidden Archaean and Palaeoproterozoic crust in NW Ireland? Evidence from zircon Hf isotopic data from granitoid intrusions
Authors: FLOWERDEW M. J. , CHEW D. M. , DALY J. S. , MILLAR I. L.
Published: September 2009

The presence of major crystalline basement provinces at depth in NW Ireland is inferred from in situ Hf isotope analysis of zircons from granitoid rocks that cut structurally overlying metasedimentary rocks. Granitoids in two of these units, the Slishwood Division and the Tyrone Central Inlier, contain complex zircons with core and rim structures. In both cases, cores have average ϵHf values that differ from the average ϵHf values of the rims at 470 Ma (the time of granitoid intrusion). The Hf data and similarity in U–Pb age between the inherited cores and detrital zircons from the host metasedimentary rocks suggests local contamination during intrusion rather than transport of the grains from the source region at depth. Rims from the Slishwood Division intrusions have average ϵHf470 values of −7.7, consistent with a derivation from juvenile Palaeoproterozoic crust, such as the Annagh Gneiss Complex or Rhinns Complex of NW Ireland, implying that the deep crust underlying the Slishwood Division is made of similar material. Rims from the Tyrone Central Inlier have extremely negative ϵHf470 values of approximately −39. This isotopic signature requires an Archaean source, suggesting rocks similar to the Lewisian Complex of Scotland, or sediment derived wholly from it, occurs at depth in NW Ireland.
Ephialtes the Moderate?
Authors: Marr J. L.
Published: September 2009

The political significance of Ephialtes’ reforms as a constitutional watershed in Athenian history is a theme stressed in much of the later source material. He is presented as a man who significantly changed the nature of the existing, Cleisthenic, constitution in the direction of a more radical form of democracy.
Demosthenes the General - Protagonist in a Greek Tragedy?
Authors: Wylie Graham
Published: September 2009

Demosthenes is a curiously shadowy figure in Thucydides. Few of his speeches are recorded, and although Thucydides gives abundant information about his actions – possibly obtained from the general himself, who may have been a relation by marriage – few personal details are included, and Demosthenes never comes to life as Brasidas does. We know little of his origins, his friends, or his associates; nor of what he did between 424 and 415, while he was out of favour. Despite the putative relationship, Thucydides' attitude towards him is unsympathetic, even disapproving, and does not suggest personal intimacy between the two. Though a better general than Brasidas, in my view – more innovative, less reckless – he was never specially honoured, as Brasidas was, by his own or any other city.
Multiple Personalities and Dionysiac Festivals: Dicaeopolis in Aristophanes' Acharnians
Authors: Fisher N. R. E.
Published: September 2009

A great deal has been written recently on Aristophanes, and theAchamiansin particular; inevitably, this has not produced agreement on how to interpret the plays. Among the questions to which different answers are still being given, and probably always will be, are the following: How far did Aristophanes seek to persuade the Athenians of his own political views, whatever they may have been? If there was a conflict between the presentation of his political views and the development of comic inventions or the desire to win the prize, which took precedence? Did the Athenians expect serious political persuasion in their comedies, and was Aristophanes innovative or traditional in these respects? More particularly, what were Aristophanes' attitudes to the Peloponnesian War? Did they change? How far did he seek to push a particular view in favour of making peace in any of the surviving three so-called peace plays?
Empty Shelves on the Palatine
Authors: Horsfall Nicholas
Published: September 2009

The way we study Augustus’ Rome has been changing dramatically: I do not mean so much new discoveries of monuments or inscriptions, exciting though they have been, as the new-found disposition of archaeologists, art-historians, epigraphists, and Latinists to talk to each other and to admit cross-fertilization into their work; this spirit of co-operation has engendered a large bibliography, and one only regrets that the sort of multidisciplinary approach that was self-evident to the best Hellenists in Germany 150 years ago has been so painfully slow in reaching Latin studies!
Aeternus Lepos: Venus, Lucretius, and the Fear of Death
Authors: Edwards M. J.
Published: September 2009

In a recent article and a subsequent book Charles Segal finds a paradox in the writing of Lucretius, a paradox which, it might appear, was not to be evaded if the author wished to be both an Epicurean and a poet. On the one hand, his creed makes death as certain for the world as for its denizens and the hope of immortal glory an ignis fatuus; on the other hand, the poet has all the mortal frailties and as much desire as any Roman author for the survival of his name. These longings are both ‘vehement’ and ‘intense’, and, though the reader is to be made aware of their futility, they are latent in the first half of his opening book, until they are brought to light in his ‘second proem’.
Philomel and pericles: Silence in the funeral speech
Authors: Hardwick Lorna
Published: September 2009

This comment occurs in the closing sequence of theepitaphiosof 431/0 attributed to Pericles. The speech was delivered at the public funeral held for Athenian casualties in the first year of the Archidamian War. The earlier part of the speech was devoted to praise of the characteristics, practices, and values of the Athenians as a democratic and imperial community. The features which Pericles is reported as stressing were those which ‘made Athens great’, those by which her dominance was shown. From these is derived the glory achieved by those who died ‘as became Athenians’ (2.43).
Reading Greek Like a Man of the World: Reading Greek Like a Man of the World: Macaulay and the Classical Languages
Authors: Williams Wynne
Published: September 2009

In his journal for December 31st, 1851, Thomas Babington Macaulay recorded an encounter with Thomas Love Peacock: ‘I met Peacock; a clever fellow and a good scholar. I am glad to have an opportunity of being better acquainted with him. We had out Aristophanes, Aeschylus, Sophocles and several other old fellows, and tried each other's quality pretty well. We are both strong enough in these matters for gentlemen. But he is editing the Supplices: Aeschylus is not to be edited by a man whose Greek is only a secondary pursuit’ (Life II, 556). This encounter is an illustration of the fact that in nineteenth-century Britain the close study of the Greek and Latin languages was far from being the exclusive preserve of professional scholars and teachers of the classics. Macaulay once wrote that he read Greek ‘like a man of the world’ (Letters III, 111), that is, as someone actively involved in public life, not cloistered in a university or a school. This applied to Peacock as much as it did to Macaulay. By 1851 Peacock had already published six of the seven novels for which he is best known today, but he had also spent about thirty years in the service of the East India Company, during which he had risen to the rank of Examiner: he was in effect a very senior civil servant. His formal schooling had ended when he was twelve, so that he was largely self-taught as a classicist. It was perhaps characteristic of such an autodidact that ‘he delighted to ask an Oxford first-class man who Nonnus was, and to find he could get no information’, and that he should pepper his novels with recondite classical quotations.
A Lesson From The Frogs
Authors: Arnott W. Geoffrey
Published: September 2009

The world of Aristophanes’ comedies is mainly one of fantasy, where free men carry private peaces in wineskins or fly to Zeus on a dungbeetle, women introduce sex-strikes or take control of the state, and a slave rides down to Hades on a donkey. A fantastic idea is the wellspring of his plots, and its successful realization leads to equally fantastic after-effects. Yet embedded in his extant plays from the Acharnians at least to the Ecclesiazusae is a series of passages where the focus appears to be on the real world of contemporary politics, history, belief, and the arts, while advice on authentic issues is offered to the mass audiences in the theatre of Dionysus. Is that advice seriously intended, or is it as fantastic as Aristophanes’ comic plots?
Economic Conditions in Fourth-Century Athens
Authors: French A.
Published: September 2009

The flute players who in 404 B.C. celebrated the demolition of the Athenian walls with a hymn of joy for the liberation of Greece were thought to be hailing the dawn of a new era. It was an era in which Athens herself could participate, for even in defeat she had been spared the worst fate: her citizen population had not been butchered or enslaved; her land was not divided among alien colonists. Nevertheless the future which she faced was expected to be hard, in accordance with her humbled status. Her treasure was spent, her empire at an end; her losses in manpower had been terrible; the farming land which had traditionally been the economic basis of her existence, had been deliberately and extensively damaged. Thucydides in retrospect described the war as the most destructive in history: and Athens had ended as the loser. No wonder that historians have regarded the Peloponnesian War as a turning point of European history; and many have terminated their studies at this point, as if to divert their eyes from the tragic sight of Athens' decline into a new era of poverty and humiliation.
The Kremna Aqueduct and Water Supply in Roman Cities
Authors: Owens E. J.
Published: September 2009

A good supply of water was rightly regarded as one of the essential commodities for the maintenance of urban life in the ancient world. One of the major problems with which city authorities had to deal was the maintenance of adequate supplies of water to satisfy the domestic, public, recreational, and industrial demands of the inhabitants. The Romans were particularly renowned for their hydraulic technology in general and the construction of aqueducts in particular, often bringing water from great distances. The geographer Strabo praised the engineering skills of the Romans, maintaining that veritable rivers of water flowed by means of aqueducts through the city of Rome. Close on a century later the first curator of Rome's water supply and one-time military governor of Britain, Sextus Julius Frontinus stated the same, if a little more pointedly, when he compared the achievements of the Romans in the field of water supply with the ‘idle pyramids of the Egyptians or the glorious but useless monuments of the Greeks’.
Nox Erat…: Sleep and Visions in the Aeneid
Authors: Mackie C. J.
Published: September 2009

It is a common view in Vergilian scholarship that when Allecto (as Calybe) comes to rouse Turnus into battle against the Trojans (Aen. 7.4O6ff.) he is essentially predisposed to Allecto's violent point of view. His abrupt rejection of ‘Calybe's’ appeal is often taken to be the first sign of an innate and hostile arrogance on his part. Sometimes it is added that he is, by nature, a more irrational person than Amata. I provide here one such view: ‘But whereas Amata had to be made mad to make her act irresponsibly in flagrant disregard of her duty as wife and queen, Turnus is an easier case: the irrational element is already there; all Allecto needs to do is touch it off (Heroic Impulse) by representing to Turnus that his honour has been affected’. The subject of Turnus' dealings with Allecto is well-trodden ground, but I offer here two small but not unimportant points which have not drawn very much attention. The first concerns Allecto's task in Latium, the second Aeneas at Troy.
Philemon and Baucis in Ovid's Metamorphoses
Authors: Griffin Alan H. F.
Published: September 2009

The number of religious motifs found in the Philemon-Baucis tale (Met. 8.611–724) is strikingly large. Brooks Otis is right to see the story primarily as a theodicy, designed to vindicate the power and influence of the gods. He draws attention to the contrast and balance of the Philemon-Baucis and Erysichthon episodes at the centre of the Metamorphoses: the Philemon-Baucis is a story of piety and its reward, the Erysichthon is a story of impiety and its punishment. At the midpoint of the poem Ovid tells two moralistic tales. The charm of the Philemon-Baucis can be attributed in large measure to the way in which Ovid tells the story: “he is not closely involved with the characters of Philemon and Baucis and allows humour and touches of cynicism to colour his narrative about them. The tone is sympathetic [ and the edifying character of the tale makes it stand out among the I generally tragic, erotic, and vengeful stories which fill the Metamorphoses.
The Dancing Girls of Cadiz
Authors: Fear A. T.
Published: September 2009

Cadiz's main claim to fame in antiquity was its situation at thes end of the known world and its temple to Hercules which was visited by many famous personalities of antiquity; however, perhaps surprisingly, given Seneca and Pliny's insistence on the sobriety of the Spanish character, Cadiz had another well known attraction, its dancing girls, leading to Martial dubbing the town ‘Laughing Cadiz’, ‘Iocosae Gades’.
Homer Sings the Blues
Authors: Whittaker A. J.
Published: September 2009

In a recent edition of this journal, G. M. Sifakis looked at possible Homeric echoes in modern Greek folksong. This paper may be regarded as a coda to that article. Like a satyr play coming after the major dramas it is not entirely serious, but it is not entirely flippant either. My aim is to offer some comparisons between the Homeric tradition and that of the blues singers of the (originally, southern) United States.
Prometheus Vinctuson the Athenian Stage
Authors: Davidson John
Published: September 2009

We know very little for certain about the staging of plays in the Theatre of Dionysus at Athens in the fifth century B.C. The evidence of archaeological remains and contemporary vase painting is difficult to interpret with confidence, the reliability of ancient post-classical commentators is questionable, and the texts of the surviving plays, our chief source of evidence, often raise more problems than they solve. Among the plays which have occasioned most controversy in modern scholarship is thePrometheus Vinctus. What was the ‘rock’ to which the hero was bound? In what part of the theatre space was it positioned? How and where did the chorus of Oceanids make their entry? How was the ending of the play staged? Questions such as these continue to perplex students of the play who also have to face the vexed question of its date and indeed authorship.
Plato on Democracy and Expertise
Authors: Sharples R. W.
Published: September 2009

In the Gorgias (463aff.) Plato makes Socrates say to Polus that rhetoric is not a skilled art (technê) at all, but one of a number of occupations collectively described as ‘flattery’ (kolakeia) and said to be based on experience. The other examples given are sophistry, cosmetics, and cookery. These practices have no understanding of what they do, or as Plato puts it they can give no account of it (465 a).
In The Wake of Aeneas (Aeneid 3.274–88, 3.500–5, 8.200–3)
Authors: West David
Published: September 2009

Aeneas is leading the shattered remnants of the Trojans to their new home in Italy. He calls at Actium, the scene of the battle which in 31 B.C. made his descendant Augustus master of the Mediterranean world. How does Virgil seize this opportunity to praise his patron Augustus?
Rumour and Communication in Roman Politics
Authors: Laurence Ray
Published: September 2009

Recently there has been considerable debate about the nature of popular politics in the Roman Republic. This debate has demonstrated that the Roman citizen was actively involved in voting, and made conscious decisions about which candidate he should vote for at elections, and whether to vote for or against a bill at the meetings of thecomitia. The results of elections and voting assemblies would seem to have been dependent upon the attendance and voting behaviour of Roman citizens. These two factors would vary according to the views and opinions of the individual citizen. This paper addresses the issue of how these views and opinions were formulated, with particular reference to the participation of Roman citizens in popular politics.
The Homeric Way of War: TheIliadand the Hoplite Phalanx (II)
Authors: van Wees Hans
Published: September 2009

Even more than the noise and the clouds of dust raised by men and horses, the flashing of bronze armour and weapons is characteristic of Homeric panoramas of battle. When the Greeks armed themselves with helmets, shields, corslets and spears, the brightness lit up the sky, and all around the earth beamed in the shine of bronze (19.359–63). It blinded eyes, the glare of bronze from shining helmets, newly-polished corslets and bright shields, as they advanced in their masses (14.340–3).
In Defence of the Greek Historians
Authors: Rhodes P. J.
Published: September 2009

I began the oral version of this paper by remarking that it was a great honour and pleasure to have been invited to visit the place in which it was delivered and to address my audience – and asking my audience to remember that I had said that.
Vergil's Aeneid: Subversion by Intertextuality Catullus 66.39–40 and Other Examples
Authors: Lyne R. O. A. M.
Published: September 2009

I think we have to accept that the term intertextuality serves a purpose. One of the terms it allows us to dispense with, allusion, has its disadvantages.

Up until recently I was happy with ‘allusion’: Vergil ‘alludes’ to Homer. The term was time-honoured, and, surely, unproblematical. Unproblematical, and not, so far as it went, and in the right hands, unsubtle. One meant that Vergil was not just using his source text (or his significant source text) as raw material. The source text became part of the new text, its characters and context were relevant to the new text. Thus, when in his opening speech Aeneas ‘quotes’ Homer's Odysseus, we sense that Vergil is casting Aeneas as a new Odysseus, comparing him and contrasting him with Odysseus, in a new Odyssey. And so the Aeneid proceeds: an allusive text, constantly alluding to Homer, re-forming Homer, remaking the Homeric
characters, re-forming other texts in the same significant way … What texts? What texts does it not significantly re-form?
Statius' Young Parthian King (Thebaid 8.286–93)
Authors: Hollis A. S.
Published: September 2009

In the eighth book of Statius' Thebaid the Argives meet to appoint a successor to the dead seer Amphiaraus (275 ff.). Their choice falls on Thiodamas son of Melampus (277–9); he, however, is overwhelmed by the prospect, which he regards with a mixture of joy and apprehension (281–5). There follows an eight-line simile which David Vessey rightly describes as ‘unique in the Thebaid’ Thiodamas is compared to a young Parthian king who succeeds to the throne following his father's death (286–93):

sicut Achaemenius solium gentisque paternas

excepit si forte puer, cui vivere patrem

tutius, incerta formidine gaudia librat,

an fidi proceres, ne pugnet vulgus habenis,

cui latus Euphratae, cui Caspia limina mandet.

sumere tune arcus ipsumque onerare veretur

patris equum, visusque sibi nee sceptra capaci

sustentare manu nee adhuc implere tiaram.
Addressing Oedipus
Authors: Pope Maurice
Published: September 2009

In Oedipus Tyrannus the other characters regularly call Oedipus ‘tyrannos’. My question is what we should call him. Etymologically the obvious translation is tyrant. But the word tyrant suggests a wickedness of heart, or at any rate a total disregard for the wishes of others, that is far from characteristic of the Oedipus that Sophocles portrays. Moreover Oedipus was elected ‘tyrannos’ and refers to his post as ‘tyrannis’. These are two further obstacles since no-one purposely chooses a tyrant to rule over them and in English tyrantship is not a plausible name for a government office. For these reasons – or so one imagines – translators and commentators avoid the etymological derivative. But they do not pursue the logic of usage to the point of adopting any of the standard modern terms for an elected head of state such as president. Instead the title they confer on Oedipus, virtually without exception, is king.
Virgil and The Poetry of Explanations
Authors: Horsfall Nicholas
Published: September 2009

The indebtedness of theAeneidto Homer in terms of plot and structure has been analysed in minute detail, and the hunt is indeed by no means at an end. Here and there, notably but not exclusively inAeneid4, long narrative sequences have been followed back to Apollonius Rhodius. Isolated episodes have been identified as owing much to Greek tragedy. But the pursuit of Virgil's principal narrative sources, already undertaken with furious critical acerbity in antiquity, is perhaps too heavily committed to a limited quantity of likely literary models and to certain patterns of enquiry, though these last have changed a good deal in recent years. If I seem to grumble about a narrowness of outlook that becomes at times oppressive and about the danger of conclusions ever more forced and improbable if we continue barking up the same few trees, it is because (i) I have worked on and off for nearly twenty-five years onAeneid7, where Virgil's sources are as mixed, complex and anomalous as they ever become and because (ii) I published recently a study (Vergilius35 (1989), 8–27) of narrative sequences inAeneid, which seemed to point strongly towards Virgil's attentive reading of Greek colonization stories. This is not the place to continue my one-man pursuit of Herodotus and Pindar in theAeneid?but it is high time that we looked at certain large narrative structures in the epic and asked whether we have really been framing the right questions about them.
Aeneas, Augustus, and the Theme of the City
Authors: Morwood James
Published: September 2009

The theme of the building and destruction of cities is a conspicuous one in theAeneid. The poem opens with a paragraph which summarizes the suffering that is to lead to the building of ‘the walls of lofty Rome’, and this passage is linked by verbal echoes to Aeneas' entry not much later when he bewails the fact that he has not died a heroic death beneath ‘the lofty walls of Troy’. The city which is to rise and the city which has fallen are in their very different ways inescapable features of theAeneid'sgeography.
Skeleton Games and the Technicolor Parthenon: Some Recent Educational Videos
Authors: Webster Peter
Published: September 2009

The advent of the video recorder and its rather belated legal recognition through licencing arrangements for off-air recording has opened up possibilities for the widespread use of the video in education. Not surprisingly the video revolution has encouraged the production of a wide range of films designed for (or purporting to be designed for) education, at all levels.
Isocrates and Europe
Authors: De Romilly Jacqueline
Published: September 2009

Isocrates was perhaps the first in antiquity to focus his political theories on the idea of Europe and the opposition between Europe and Asia. No doubt, if we look into his doctrines and what he said about that theme, they seem to our modern eyes terribly simple and sketchy: they just provide a beginning, a starting point. But even that is remarkable; and it seems worth going into the trouble of seeing what he meant by ‘Europe’, and what place the notion had in a programme which he never stopped defending, all through his life.
The Tradition of The Athenian Democracy A.D. 1750–1990
Authors: Hansen Mogens Herman
Published: September 2009

By 1994 no less than 2,500 years will have passed since Kleisthenes (in 507 B.C.) introduced democracy to Athens, and the anniversary will undoubtedly be celebrated by all nations that call themselves democracies, i.e., practically everywhere in the western world. But during the celebrations sceptics will probably ask at least two fundamental questions: first, how much do Atheniandemokratiaand modern democracy have in common and second, to what extent were modern democratic ideas and institutions shaped by looking back upon the ancient model? Was Athensthe schoolnot onlyof Hellas– as Perikles claimed in his funeral speach – but also of the political system and ideology that are universally accepted in the western world of today? Or, alternatively, is the Athenian example just one small piece in the great jigsaw puzzle that constitutes modern democracy and even a fairly unimportant piece, one of those elusive pieces that has nothing but sky or water on it and, accordingly, is almost impossible to place correctly?
The Festival for Bona Dea and the Thesmophoria
Authors: Versnel H. S.
Published: September 2009

Long before his obsessional wish was finally fulfilled in 146 B.C, the elder Cato had yet other concerns than Carthaginem delendam esse. In his manual for the farmer, De agricultura 143, he gives ample prescriptions concerning the way the wife of the bailiff (the vilica) of an estate should behave:

‘She must visit the neighbouring and other women very seldom, and not have them either in the house or in her part of it. She must not go out to meals or be a gad-about. She must not engage in religious worship herself or get others to engage in it for her without the orders of the master or the mistress; let her remember that the master attends to the devotions for the whole household.’ (translation: W. D. Hooper & H. B. Ash. Loeb)
The Diptych of the Symmachi and Nicomachi: an Interpretation: In Memoriam Wolfgang F. Volbach 1892–1988
Authors: Simon Erika
Published: September 2009

The two ivory tablets in Paris and London, dating from late antiquity and forming parts of one diptych (Plates 1, 2), have been convincingly placed in their stylistic setting by the scholar to whom this article is dedicated. With other works in ivory from about A.D. 400 and with the Rothschild cameo, they form a ‘classicistic’ group, some manufactured in Rome, some in Milan. The cameo probably refers to the marriage in A.D. 398 of the young Emperor Honorius to Maria, daughter of Stilicho. We may assume that the diptych under consideration here also has reference to an aristocratic wedding, although its iconography is quite different. It shows not the portrait of a bridal pair, but two female figures, hitherto regarded as pagan priestesses. It is not these figures, but the tabulae ansatae at their heads that give support to the hypothesis that the diptych was made on the occasion of a marriage between the two families named on the tablets, the Symmachi and the Nicomachi. Matrimonial unions between members of the pagan aristocracy in officially Christian Rome may not only be presumed, but in the case of the Nicomachi and Symmachi may be actually shown to have happened. The following observations would seem to provide appropriate reinforcement for reference to a wedding on iconographic grounds.
The Significance of Emphasis in Latina Case Study from Caesar's Bellum Gallicum
Authors: Mollie  , Dixon John
Published: September 2009

As a contribution to the study of ‘Latin in use’, we focus in this article on the ways a writer indicates what s/he wants to emphasize within the sentence; the specific linguistic signs s/he uses to that end; and the range of effects that these may have for an alert reader. We have used, on the one hand, recent developments in the study of narrative, discourse and general linguistics and, on the other, the work of earlier pioneers in the field of word order in Latin.
Homemric Survivals in the Medíeval and Modern Greek Folksong Tradition?
Authors: Sifakis G. M.
Published: September 2009

The basis of comparison between the Homeric poetry and Modern Greek folksong is that in either case we have a body of poetic texts behind which stretches a long tradition of oral composition; they both have existed, roughly, in the same geographical area, including mainland Greece, Asia Minor, the islands of the Aegean and the Ionian Sea, Crete, and Cyprus; and they are cast in cognate language forms. But the two bodies of poetry are separated by a great time distance, though how great it is difficult to determine because whatever we can say about the origins of modern folksongs is hypothetical and uncertain.
The Latest Work on the Export of Baetican Olive Oil to Rome and the Army
Authors: Blázquez J. M.
Published: September 2009

Over the last few years much work has been carried out on the export of olive oil from the province of Baetica to both Rome itself and the rest of the Roman Empire. The key for understanding the export traffic to Rome is the material from the Monte Testaccio in Rome, which is almost completely composed of amphorae from Baetica dating from the Imperial period, where a team of Spanish and Italian archaeologists have carried out two campaigns of excavations in 1989 an 1990 under my direction (Plate 1). This article also contains some other conlusions drawn from the work done in recent years by the team of Spanish archaeologists who work on the Monte Testaccio, investigating the topic of the Baetician oil trade.
Symbols of Marginality From Early Pythagoreans to Late Antique Monks
Authors: Bremmer J. N.
Published: September 2009

One day the shepherd Apollo saw a pregnant woman in the fields. A dark thought struck him: he wanted to see how the foetus was lying in her womb. He therefore killed the woman and ripped her open. Afterwards he repented and took refuge among the monks of Scetis in Egypt, where he became a hermit (133). By contrast, Hilarion came to be a hermit in a wholly honourable manner, as related by Hieronymus in hisLife of Hilarion. He felt drawn by St. Anthony, gave away his inheritance, and embarked upon a life of solitude in the Gaza region. Apollo, Hilarion, and all other monks and hermits whose sayings and biographies have been I handed down by the early Church had in common that they abandoned the society they lived in and developed an alternative lifestyle. They were not, however, the first in antiquity to go against established norms and values.