Thoughts on Antiquity

I’ve today discovered the following database site which has the text of almost all Latin inscriptions in it:
 http://www.manfredclauss.de/gb/index.html
A search for ‘invicto’ brought up quite a few!

I’ve been reading some reports that Microsoft is to dump this initiative, to stop scanning and just merge the results into its general (useless) search engine.  The site was blocked from access outside the US until a few weeks ago, but is now accessible — while it lasts.
It’s quite a triumph for the British Library, […]

It was reported by Dave Meadows that a bust of Caesar was found:

A BUST of Julius Caesar, believed to be the oldest representation of the Roman emperor yet known, has been found at the bottom of the River Rhone.
The life-sized bust showing the Roman ruler as a balding and ageing man with wrinkles and hollows […]

Regular readers will know that I have commissioned a gentleman whom I refer to as Mr. A to translate all the remains of Eusebius of Caesarea’s Quaestiones ad Stephanum et Marinum.  This work contains a series of ‘problems’ – differences between the gospels — and Eusebius’ ’solutions’ to them.  The problems ‘for Stephanus’ all come from […]

(I want to thank those who sent me certain articles for the preparation of the original paper, and especially Mark Munn, whose article I used will be read by him in the upcoming conference on Anatolian studies in September. Nota Bene: The names of authors in the in-text citations are left out if the author […]

From Augustine, ‘De genesi ad litteram’ (The literal meaning of Genesis), book 2, chapter 9 (tr. J.H.Taylor, 1982):
“It is frequently asked what our belief must be about the form and shape of heaven according to Sacred Scripture. Many scholars engaged in lengthy discussions on these matter, but the sacred writers with their deeper wisdom have […]

In the Guardian online today is a piece on this eccentric English book-collector of the last century, whose collection of manuscripts was a wonder and which is still being sold off even today.  References to manuscripts once in his collection are common in editions.  Most of them are now in Berlin.

From the BBC article here:

Campaigners on the Greek island of Lesbos are to go to court in an attempt to stop a gay rights organisation from using the term “lesbian”.
The islanders say that if they are successful they may then start to fight the word lesbian internationally.

What I found curious was this:

The term lesbian […]