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Classics Matters

@classicsmatters / classicsmatters.tumblr.com

A Tumblr account dedicated to the idea that the culture of Ancient Greece and Rome is awesome and still relevant!
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classicsmatters
thoodleoo
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thoodleoo

this is from the wikipedia page for hades and have no idea if it’s true or not but i really hope it is because there are few things funnier to me than the idea of hades in the underworld banging on the ceiling with a broomstick because the mortals upstairs are slapping the earth at 3 am to get his attention

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classicsmatters

Hades - worried about damage caused by the upstairs neighbors since Metamorphoses 5

classicsmatters
lionofchaeronea
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lionofchaeronea

If a Tree Falls...

Martial, Epigrams 3.9 The word on the street is that Cinna is writing     Little verses that attack me. But a man whose poems nobody reads?       He doesn’t “write” at all! Versiculos in me narratur scribere Cinna:     Non scribit, cuius carmina nemo legit.

The Florentine Poet, Alexandre Cabanel, 1861

classicsmatters
commonsenseismydumpstat
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thoodleoo

how to become a classicist

talk about feeling dead on the inside: +4 hellenist and latinist

read some suetonius or herodotus: +5 ancient historian, -10 modern historian

own a replica bust: +3 archaeologist

own an authentic bust: -3 archaeologist, +50 schliemann

find a hideously mistranslated latin phrase in a tv show and complain: +2 latinist for every minute spent complaining

cry about how you’ll never meet your favorite greek or roman: +10 historian, -10 dignity

stare into the unseeing eyes of an archaic greek kouros, contemplating the nightmare world in which it must live: +15 archaeologist

look at a full synopsis of a regular greek verb and try not to cry: +10 hellenist if you succeed, +10 latinist if you fail

watch hbo rome: -20 all around because hbo rome is Bad, but +30 historian if you pause it every 5 seconds to point out inaccuracies

deal with someone asking you what you can even do as a classicist: +50 all around, +100 bitter classicist rage

classicsmatters
thoodleoo
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thoodleoo

things you can do to celebrate rome’s birthday

  • host a toga party. make sure to serve such delicious delicacies as flamingo tongue and rotten fish gut sauce
  • discard any pants you own, as only barbaric celts and easterners wear them
  • find a she-wolf. she is your mother now. make sure you send her cards at mother’s day and on her birthday, or she will eat your face off
  • go into somebody else’s house. claim that it is now your house. tell them they can keep their possessions and culture as long as they pay tribute to your house-empire and worship you as a god
  • end everyone conversation you have with an exhortation that your enemies must be destroyed
  • speaking of which
  • carthage must be destroyed
classicsmatters
renacethemenace
Latin: We don't need a definite article!
English: We'll just use the. Simple.
French: Le, la, les. For a bit of variety.
Ancient Greek: :)
Latin: Oh no.
Ancient Greek: :) :)
English: Don't do it.
Ancient Greek: :) :) :)
French: Why are you like this?
Ancient Greek: ο, του, τω, τον, οι, των, τοις, τους, η, της, τη, την, αι, ταις, τας, το, τα, τω, τοιν
Ancient Greek: :)
classicsmatters
skeleton-richard
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natamoriensque

“The denarius of Brutus commemorating the assassination of Caesar is one of the very few coins to be described in the ancient  literature. Cassius Dio relates that “Brutus stamped upon the coins which were being minted his own likeness and a cap and two daggers, indicating by this and by the inscription that he and Cassius had liberated the fatherland” (Roman  History, XLVII.25.3). Minted in 42 BC, while Brutus  and his fellow conspirators were on the march in northern Greece, the coin type was recalled by the victorious Mark Antony and Octavian  and melted down. Approximately seventy-five examples are known to exist, from 7 obverse and 25 reverse dies (8 obverse and 26 reverse dies also have been cited). In 2008, the finest example sold at auction for 350,000 Swiss francs (approximately $335,000); in 2011, another  coin struck slightly off center realized $546,250, a record for a silver Roman coin. The coin pictured above, which shows some porosity,  sold for $97,500. “

classicsmatters
toccata-carpimusnoctem
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thewatermelonmag-blog
Image
Time to pull out again: The 14 Points of Fascism
Remember when Sarah Palin came into the political arena in 2008 and turned the right-wing rhetoric up to 10? Well, the leading GOP candidate for president in 2016, Donald Trump, is cranking it up to
www.dailykos.com

The 14 points of Fascism

  1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.
  2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of “need.” The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
  3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
  4. Supremacy of the Military Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
  5. Rampant Sexism The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy.
  6. Controlled Mass Media Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.
  7. Obsession with National Security Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
  8. Religion and Government are Intertwined Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government’s policies or actions.
  9. Corporate Power is Protected The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
  10. Labor Power is Suppressed Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.
  11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts.
  12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
  13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.
  14. Fraudulent Elections Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.
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angry-old-asian-man

Do a mental survey here.

classicsmatters
classiciststudy-blog
what she says: i'm fine
what she means: the library of alexandria contained thousands of volumes of ancient works, including things which are now most likely eternally lost to us- the rest of sappho's nine volumes of poetry, ancient encyclopedias that could tell us so much that we don't know about the ancient world, religious texts necessary to understand cults we know nothing of besides their names. thanks to the destruction of one library, we can no longer access a great sum of human knowledge and experience. history truly is one of the cruelest fields, teasing us with hints of things we will never get to know, obliterating texts in full but leaving behind their names to make us wonder at what could have been.