Susan Ford Wiltshire traces the evolution of the doctrine of individual rights from antiquity through the eighteenth century. The common thread through that long story is the theory of natural law. Growing out of Greek political thought, especially that of Aristotle, natural law became a major tenet of Stoic philosophy during the Hellenistic age and later became attached to Roman legal doctrine. It underwent several transformations during the Middle Ages on the Continent and in England, especially in the thought of John Locke, before it came to justify a theory of natural right, claimed by...

This fully annotated Latin edition, by Daniel H. Garrison, of Horace s "Epodes, Odes," and "Carmen Saeculare" is the first comprehensive English commentary on these works since 1903. The full text of the "Epodes" is included and placed before the "Odes," as it was originally written and published. Garrison offers help with meter, vocabulary, and difficult points of grammar. For advanced students, he place Horace against the background of archaic and Hellenistic Greek poetry, demonstrates the poet s debt to Catullus, and illuminates Horace s relation to his contemporaries, particularly...

Vergil s Aeneid has been considered a classic, if not the classic, of Western literature for two thousand years. In recent decades this famous poem has become the subject of fresh and searching controversy. What is the poem s fundamental meaning? Does it endorse or undermine values of empire and patriarchy? Is its world view comic or tragic? Many studies of the poem have focused primarily on selected books. The approach here is comprehensive.

An introduction by editor Christine Perkell discusses the poem s historical background, its reception from antiquity to the present, and its...

In this groundbreaking work, Elizabeth Donnelly Carney examines the role of royal women in the Macedonian Argead dynasty from the sixth century B.C. to 168 B.C. Women were excluded from the exercise of power in most of the Hellenic world. However, Carney shows that the wives, mothers, and daughters of kings played important roles in Macedonian public life and occasionally determined the course of national events. Carney assembles an exhaustive array of evidence on the political role of Argead royal women. She also presents a series of biographical sketches describing the public careers of...

Accompanying each Latin passage is an introduction that provides background on the myths and their literary history, both in Ovid and in other classical authors. The detailed notes on each selection are designed to help students read and understand the...

Euripides' Alcestis--perhaps the most anthologized Attic drama--is an ideal text for students reading their first play in the original Greek. Literary commentaries and language aids in most editions are too advanced or too elementary for intermediate students of the language, but in their new student edition, C. A. E. Luschnig and H. M. Roisman remedy such deficiencies.

The introductory section of this edition provides historical and literary perspective; the commentary explains points of grammar, syntax, and vocabulary, as well as elucidating background features such as dramatic...

In 63 b.c., Lucius Sergius Catilina, a Roman aristocrat, formed a conspiracy to overthrow the Roman Republic. Cicero, who was consul that year, exposed the plot and documented his defeat of the conspiracy in his "Orations against Catiline." The "First Catilinarian Oration" is well known and deservedly famous. Scholars are familiar with the other three speeches, but few students know them. This lapse is regrettable. The "Third Oration" is a fast-paced courtroom drama, and the "Second" and "Fourth Orations" provide critical information about this key event in Roman history. Susan O. Shapiro...

Who was Cleopatra? Who is Cleopatra? Viewed as both goddess and monster even in her own lifetime, she has become through the ages saint and sinner, heroine and victim, femme fatale and star-crossed lover, black and white. A protean figure, Cleopatra defies categorization.

Cleopatra s life story, gleaned from contemporary sources, is powerfully intriguing: Married four times, she seduced two of the most powerful men in Rome (Julius Caesar and Marc Antony), became the sole ruler of Egypt, gained legendary status for her lavish banquets, and chose to die rather than endure disgrace as the...