Browse our books below. You can also search for books.
RATKOWITSCH, Christine, Maximianus amat. Zu Datierung und Interpretation des Elegikers Mamimian. Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien, 1986. 140p. Sewn. Series: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Klasse, Sitzungsberichte, 463. Band. ‘How do we date authors? Generally on the basis of independent testimonia about their activities, citations, their citations of their predecessors, and our historical and literary perception of when their work could have been written. In the case of the poet Maximianus, the first type of evidence is lacking. R.’s monograph attempts to use the last three types of evidence to establish that M. belongs in the later 9th and not the early to mid 6th C. The prospect of an exciting result was clearly a strong incentive to reinterpret dating-evidence. (…) Her mechanical case, which occupies the first part of the book (7-58), is as follows: various features of the ‘Elegiae’ are out of place in a 6th C. context; Maximianus cites Fortunatus, Eugenius, and Corippus, not vice-versa. Furthermore Maximianus seems to share many verbal parallels with authors of the 9th C. (…) The second half of the book (59-129) is devoted to interpretation of the elegies. (…) There is much here (…) that is lively and intelligent. R. does not fall into the usual biographical traps. (…) She has added some interesting texts to the discussion of her author (…). But her thesis is untenable.’ (DANUTA SHANZER in Gnomon, 1988, pp.259-61). € 29.50 (Antiquarian)