Appetitive: The Aleppo Codex

I thought I would repost another one of the wonderful discoveries I have made on AWOL. I had never heard of the Aleppo Codex until this post. The codex is the oldest complete manuscript of the Hebrew Bible. It appears to have been written in 930 CE by a scribe named Salomon is beautiful Hebrew calligraphy. AWOL posted an incredible website that has a complete text of the Aleppo Codex along with a searchable interface and introductory notes. Absolutely fantastic.

More discussion of the Μήδεια coming tomorrow!

Reasoning: Doctoral Theses

My mother pointed me to a set of theses on AWOL, and specifically one called "Astronomy and Ancient Greek Cult" by Efronsyni Boutsikas. It looks excellent and I am going to download it on my kindle to read.

One of my best friends was in town for the last two weeks (the one with whom I am planning to learn Sanskrit) and I spent a lot of time catching up with her in between relapsing on my horrible cold that I've had all month and talking about classics rather than doing any work. I have been so distracted I even forgot to translate my Μήδεια for tomorrow! Anyway, nose should go back to the grindstone as I translate Greek and review my Latin so I can finally meet with Propertius II again.

Reasoning/Appetitive: Illuminated Manuscripts and Socratic Logic

Today I saw the "Imagining the Past in France" exhibit at the Getty. I meant to go earlier-- and had, in fact, been to a lecture on the exhibit already[1]-- but due to various complications did not manage to go until today. The exhibit was amazing and I highly recommend it. When I go into illuminated manuscript exhibits, I often play a game with myself to see whether I can identify the era of a work before I check the plate underneath it. I found this exhibit more difficult that most because there was a greater diversity in artistic style within eras than in other collections I have been. I thought it might be because these were primarily secular and historical texts. There is a great slideshow of images on the Getty website.

 

The curator did a brief video introduction to the exhibit as well.

Socratic Logic

The book that I decided to read yesterday during the exam I was proctoring is Gregory Vlastos' Socratic Studies. Vlastos' work, Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher, was my first introduction to Plato scholarship. Although I dislike some of his methodology and conclusions, I still have a soft-spot for Vlastos' work. I will review it when I am finished (I am about 1/3 of the way through).

Endnotes

1. The lecture I went to was "How the French Made History: Manuscripts and Images of the Past in Medieval France." I reviewed the lecture on Fragments of Sulpicia.

Appetitive: Marginalia and Things to Come

I have not been feeling particularly well over the past few days and so I have not been as diligent as I had originally planned, in either posting or in working on translating. However, I go back to proctoring exams again tomorrow, and I am going to bring some classically-related material to read in the hope that I might jumpstart my work again.

In the meantime, Got Medieval has started posting again and posted a rather amusing piece of marginalia yesterday. Enjoy!

Appetitve/Spirited: To Learn Sanskrit (and German)?

One of my friends just decided we should learn Sanskrit together. Our plan is to work through William Dwight Whitney's Sanskrit Grammar[1], which Propertius II used two summers ago and possibly the supplement that goes with it (Roots, Verb-forms and Primary Derivatives of the Sanskrit Language) that I discovered as a free Google edition.

We will probably begin in late January. If anyone has any tips for books or on how to work through a Sanskrit grammar, let me know.

Endnotes

1. Free Google edition of the Grammar. To get to it, "buy" the book (it's free), click "read it now" then find the "i" (about this book) icon and click on it. Click "read on your device," scroll to the bottom and download the PDF.

Appetitive: The Reconstruction of Babylon

In Iraq, the Babylon site faces challenges both from natural forces, and from the war in Iraq.

I think the video is fascinating. I had never seen pictures of this site before, and it is quite cool. Enjoy!

Spirited: All the Greek Verbs

So it seems my resolutions are not going very well so far as I have done no Greek or Latin as of yet and did not begin my blogpost until now. I also spent much of the day reading a book not on my reading list: Jeff Sharlet's The Family. It's just been one of those days.

However, I have been flipping through a gift I received: Nino Marinone's All the Greek Verbs. I have spoken before of my unintentional reliance on Perseus for the sake of efficiency in translating Latin and especially Greek. Part of this is because I do not know irregular verb conjugations (and sometimes cannot identify regular or common verb conjugations) off the top of my head. All the Greek Verbs is a list of verb forms, which tell you the person, number, tense, voice, and mood of each verb, as well as the verb itself so that one can look up a translation. I think this will help to ween me off of my Perseus addiction, because I can use a book instead of the computer and constantly looking up the verbs in paper dictionary will help not only to ingrain the verb forms but also the meanings in my head. I will update this review when I try it out on the next section of the Μήδεια.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Does anyone know if there is a similar book for Latin?