̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - epic poem

Epic issues: epic poetry from the dawn of modernity

Anonymous — Thu, 02 Aug 2018 10:00:42 +0000

Maybe it was the language, architecture, codified legal system, regulated economy, military discipline – or maybe it really was public safety and aqueducts. Whatever the Romans did for us, their reputation as a civilising force who brought order to the western world has, in the public imagination, stood the test of time remarkably well. It is especially strong for an Empire that has been battered by close historical scrutiny for almost 2,000 years.

̽��ֱ��reputation, of course, has more than a grain of truth to it – but the real story is also more complex. Not only did the Empire frequently endure assorted forms of severely uncultured political disarray, but for the kaleidoscope of peoples under its dominion, Roman rule was a varied experience that often represented an unsettling rupture with the past. As Professor Mary Beard put it in her book SPQR: “there is no single story of Rome, especially when the Roman world had expanded far outside Italy.”

So perhaps another way to characterise the Roman Empire is as one of cultures colliding – a swirling melting pot of ideas and beliefs from which concepts that would define western civilisation took form. This is certainly closer to the view of Tim Whitmarsh, the A. G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture at Cambridge, who is the principal investigator on a project that has examined Greek epic poetry during this period.

“This is perhaps the most important period for thinking about where European culture comes from,” says Whitmarsh. “We really are at the dawn of modernity. To tell the story of an Empire which remains the model for so many forms of international power is to tell the story of what we became, and what we are.”

His interest in the Greek experience stems partly from the fact that few cultures under Roman rule can have felt more keenly the fissure it wrought between present and past. In political terms, Ancient Greek history arguably climaxed with the empires established in the aftermath of the conquests of Alexander the Great (356–323 BCE). In the period when this poetry was written, from the first to the sixth centuries CE, the Greek world had been annexed by the Romans.

Yet the relationship between the two cultures was ambiguous. Greek-speaking peoples were subordinate in one sense, but their language continued to dominate the eastern Empire – increasingly so as it became a separate entity centred on Byzantium, as Christianity emerged and as the Latin-speaking west declined. Greek remained the primary medium of cultural transmission through which these changes were expressed. Greek communities therefore found themselves linked closely to their past, while also coming to terms with a fast-metamorphosing future.

Epic poetry, which many associate with Homer’s tales of heroic adventure, seems an odd choice of lens through which to examine the transformation. Whitmarsh thinks its purpose has been misunderstood.

“In the modern West, we often get Greek epic wrong by thinking about it as a repository for ripping yarns,” he says. “Actually, it was central to their sense of how the world operated. This wasn’t a world of scripture; it wasn’t primarily one of the written word at all. ̽��ֱ��vitality of the spoken word, in the very distinctive hexametrical pattern of the poems, was the single way they had of indicating authoritative utterance.”

It is perhaps the most important tool available for understanding how the Greeks navigated their loss of autonomy under the Romans and during the subsequent rise of Christianity. In recent years, such questions have provoked a surge of interest in Greek literature during that time, but epic poetry itself has largely been overlooked, perhaps because it involved large, complex texts around which it is difficult to construct a narrative.

Funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, Whitmarsh and his collaborators set out to systematically analyse the poetry and its cultural history for the first time. “We would argue it’s the greatest gap in ancient cultural studies – one of the last uncharted territories of Greek literature,” he adds.

̽��ֱ��final outputs will include books and an edited collection of the poems themselves, but the team started simply by establishing “what was out there”. Astonishingly, they uncovered evidence of about a thousand texts. Some remain only as names, others exist in fragments; yet more are vast epics that survive intact. Together, they show how the Greeks were rethinking their identity, both in the context of the time, and that of their own past and its cultural legacy.

A case in point is Quintus of Smyrna, author of the Posthomerica – a deceptive title since chronologically it fills the gap between Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, even though it was written later. Quintus’ style was almost uber-Homeric, elaborately crafted to create an almost seamless connection with the past. Yet there is evidence that, having done so, he also deliberately disrupted it. “His use of similes is quite outrageous by Homer’s standards, for example,” Whitmarsh says. ̽��ֱ��reason could be Quintus’ painful awareness of a tension between the Homeric past and his own present. Conflicted identity is a theme that connects many poems of the period. ̽��ֱ��poet Oppian, for instance, who wrote an epic on fish and fishing, provides us with an excellent example of how his generation was seeking to reconceive Greek selfhood in the shadow of Rome.

̽��ֱ��work ostensibly praises the Emperor as master over land and sea – a very Roman formula. Oppian then sabotages his own proclamation by questioning whether anyone truly can command the sea’s depths, a feat that must surely be a journey of the intellect and imagination. Having acknowledged the Emperor’s political power, he was, in effect, implying that the Greeks were perhaps greater masters of knowledge.

̽��ֱ��researchers expected to find that this tension gave way to a clearer, moralistic tone, with the rise of Christianity. Instead, they found it persisted. Nonnus of Panopolis, for example, wrote 21 books paraphrasing the Gospel of St John, but not, it would seem, from pure devotion, since he also wrote 48 freewheeling stories about the Greek god Dionysus. Collectively, this vast assemblage evokes parallels between the two, not least because resurrection themes emerge from both. Nonnus also made much of the son of God’s knack for turning water into wine – a subject that similarly links him to Dionysus, god of winemaking.

Beyond Greek identity itself, the poetry hints at shifting ideas about knowledge and human nature. Oppian’s poetic guide to fishing, for instance, is in fact much more. “I suspect most fishermen and fisherwomen know how to catch fish without reading a Greek epic poem,” Whitmarsh observes. In fact, the poem was as much about deliberately stretching the language conventionally used to describe aquaculture, and through it blurring the boundaries between the human and non-human worlds.

Far from just telling stories, then, these epic poems show how, in an era of deeply conflicted identities, Greek communities tried to reorganise their sense of themselves and their place in the world, and give this sense a basis for future generations. Thanks to Whitmarsh and his team, they can now be read, as they were meant to be, on such terms.

“ ̽��ֱ��poetry represents a cultural statement from the time, but it is also trying to be timeless,” he adds. “Each poem was trying to say something about its topic for eternity. ̽��ֱ��fact that we are still reading them today, and finding new things to say about them, is a token of their success.”

Inset image: Wine jar made in Athens around 535 BC. © ̽��ֱ��Trustees of the British Museum.

Epic poems telling of cultures colliding, deeply conflicted identities and a fast-changing world were written by the Greeks under Roman rule in the first to the sixth centuries CE. Now, the first comprehensive study of these vast, complex texts is casting new light on the era that saw the dawn of Western modernity.

Each poem was trying to say something about its topic for eternity. ̽��ֱ��fact that we are still reading them today, and finding new things to say about them, is a token of their success

Tim Whitmarsh

Achilles killing Penthesilea, as described in the epic poem Posthomerica written by Quintus of Smyrna in the 3rd century CE; detail from a wine jar made in Athens around 535 BC

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Volcanic eruption influenced Iceland’s conversion to Christianity

sc604 — Mon, 19 Mar 2018 00:48:16 +0000

A team of scientists and medieval historians, led by the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, has used information contained within ice cores and tree rings to accurately date a massive volcanic eruption, which took place soon after the island was first settled.

Having dated the eruption, the researchers found that Iceland’s most celebrated medieval poem, which describes the end of the pagan gods and the coming of a new, singular god, describes the eruption and uses memories of it to stimulate the Christianisation of Iceland. ̽��ֱ��results are reported in the journal Climatic Change.

̽��ֱ��eruption of the Eldgjá in the tenth century is known as a lava flood: a rare type of prolonged volcanic eruption in which huge flows of lava engulf the landscape, accompanied by a haze of sulphurous gases. Iceland specialises in this type of eruption – the last example occurred in 2015, and it affected air quality 1400 kilometres away in Ireland.

̽��ֱ��Eldgjá lava flood affected southern Iceland within a century of the island’s settlement by Vikings and Celts around 874, but until now the date of the eruption has been uncertain, hindering investigation of its likely impacts. It was a colossal event with around 20 cubic kilometres of lava erupted – enough to cover all of England up to the ankles.

̽��ֱ��Cambridge-led team pinpointed the date of the eruption using ice core records from Greenland that preserve the volcanic fallout from Eldgjá. Using the clues contained within the ice cores, the researchers found that the eruption began around the spring of 939 and continued at least through the autumn of 940.

“This places the eruption squarely within the experience of the first two or three generations of Iceland’s settlers,” said first author Dr Clive Oppenheimer of Cambridge’s Department of Geography. “Some of the first wave of migrants to Iceland, brought over as children, may well have witnessed the eruption.”

Once they had a date for the Eldgjá eruption, the team then investigated its consequences. First, a haze of sulphurous dust spread across Europe, recorded as sightings of an exceptionally blood-red and weakened Sun in Irish, German and Italian chronicles from the same period.

Then the climate cooled as the dust layer reduced the amount of sunlight reaching the surface, which is evident from tree rings from across the Northern Hemisphere. ̽��ֱ��evidence contained in the tree rings suggests the eruption triggered one of the coolest summers of the last 1500 years. “In 940, summer cooling was most pronounced in Central Europe, Scandinavia, the Canadian Rockies, Alaska and Central Asia, with summer average temperatures 2°C lower,” said co-author Professor Markus Stoffel from the ̽��ֱ�� of Geneva’s Department of Earth Sciences.

̽��ֱ��team then looked at medieval chronicles to see how the cooling climate impacted society. “It was a massive eruption, but we were still amazed just how abundant the historical evidence is for the eruption’s consequences,” said co-author Dr Tim Newfield, from Georgetown ̽��ֱ��’s Departments of History and Biology. “Human suffering in the wake of Eldgjá was widespread. From northern Europe to northern China, people experienced long, hard winters and severe spring-summer drought. Locust infestations and livestock mortalities occurred. Famine did not set in everywhere, but in the early 940s we read of starvation and vast mortality in parts of Germany, Iraq and China.”

“ ̽��ֱ��effects of the Eldgjá eruption must have been devastating for the young colony on Iceland – very likely, land was abandoned and famine severe,” said co-author Professor Andy Orchard from the ̽��ֱ�� of Oxford’s Faculty of English. “However, there are no surviving texts from Iceland itself during this time that provide us with direct accounts of the eruption.”

But Iceland’s most celebrated medieval poem, Vǫluspá (‘ ̽��ֱ��prophecy of the seeress’) does appear to give an impression of what the eruption was like. ̽��ֱ��poem, which can be dated as far back as 961, foretells the end of Iceland’s pagan gods and the coming of a new, singular god: in other words, the conversion of Iceland to Christianity, which was formalised around the turn of the eleventh century.

Part of the poem describes a terrible eruption with fiery explosions lighting up the sky, and the Sun obscured by thick clouds of ash and steam:

“ ̽��ֱ��sun starts to turn black, land sinks into sea; the bright stars scatter from the sky.
Steam spurts up with what nourishes life, flame flies high against heaven itself.”

̽��ֱ��poem also depicts cold summers that would be expected after a massive eruption, and the researchers link these descriptions to the spectacle and impacts of the Eldgjá eruption, the largest in Iceland since its settlement.

̽��ֱ��poem’s apocalyptic imagery marks the fiery end to the world of the old gods. ̽��ֱ��researchers suggest that these lines in the poem may have been intended to rekindle harrowing memories of the eruption to stimulate the massive religious and cultural shift taking place in Iceland in the last decades of the tenth century.

“With a firm date for the eruption, many entries in medieval chronicles snap into place as likely consequences – sightings in Europe of an extraordinary atmospheric haze; severe winters; and cold summers, poor harvests; and food shortages,” said Oppenheimer. “But most striking is the almost eyewitness style in which the eruption is depicted in Vǫluspá. ̽��ֱ��poem’s interpretation as a prophecy of the end of the pagan gods and their replacement by the one, singular god, suggests that memories of this terrible volcanic eruption were purposefully provoked to stimulate the Christianisation of Iceland.”

Reference:
Clive Oppenheimer et al “ ̽��ֱ��Eldgjá eruption: timing, long-range impacts and influence on the Christianisation of Iceland.” Climatic Change (2018). DOI: 10.1007/s10584-018-2171-9

Inset image: Codex Regius, which contains a version of the Vǫluspá.

Memories of the largest lava flood in the history of Iceland, recorded in an apocalyptic medieval poem, were used to drive the island’s conversion to Christianity, new research suggests.

With a firm date for the eruption, many entries in medieval chronicles snap into place as likely consequences.

Clive Oppenheimer

Eldgjá fissure in southern Iceland

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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Project seeks nation’s most memorised poems to investigate power of poetry ‘by heart’

fpjl2 — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 09:56:11 +0000

On this year’s National Poetry Day (2 October), themed ‘Remember!’, the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge will launch the first nationwide survey to find the UK’s most memorised poems. ̽��ֱ��survey is part of a research project investigating how our relationship to poetry changes when it’s committed to memory.

̽��ֱ��Poetry and Memory Project, supported by former Poet Laureate Sir Andrew Motion, aims to investigate how memorisation and recitation affect our understanding and appreciation of poetry – how, for example, poems might act as an emotional resource, develop an ear for language, and play a role in memories of a personal or communal past.

̽��ֱ��researchers are asking the public to contribute to their research through a national online survey (with a print-and-post option available). Participants are asked what poem they know by heart, and what it means for them. To take part, visit: www.poetryandmemory.com.

̽��ֱ��site contains audio clips of poetic reflections, such as a poet remembering his mother reciting John Masefield and a comedian finding a life manual in T S Eliot.

Poetry memorisation, once a staple of British education, declined dramatically over the last century, and was controversially reinstated on the English primary curriculum by Michael Gove – the then Secretary of State for Education – in 2012. But researchers from the ̽��ֱ��’s Faculty of Education say that how these changes have affected our relationship with poetry remains largely unexamined.

“Whilst there is evidence of reviving interest in memorising and reciting poems, both within and outside education, there is practically no research on the particular value of these embodied experiences of poetry. And whilst many – notably poets themselves – argue that poems communicate much of their meaning through sound, classroom activities tend to focus on the poem on the page, and on poetry as a textual construct, particularly once you get to GCSE stage. It’s like studying music by only reading the score,” said project researcher Dr Debbie Pullinger.

“In an age where we can summon thousands of poems onto a smartphone in seconds, the idea of keeping a sonnet in our head may appear rather pointless. So this research also feeds into a wider debate about locations of knowledge, the short-circuiting of learning and the ‘out-sourcing’ of human memory to digital devices.”

Sir Andrew Motion said: “This project is fascinating and important. And it reveals a web of truths that we too often fail to notice: that our pleasure in poetry is as natural as breathing, that it forms a part of our foundation as individuals, that the poems we commit to memory stay with us for ever, and grow as we grow.”

Pullinger says that the researchers are not looking for ‘GCSE English answers’ or an analysis of what the poem is ‘supposed to be about’:

“We want to know what significance this particular poem holds for you. This might be something to do with the meaning, but it could also be to do with the sound. It may be that there’s one line which is particularly special. It may be that you associate the poem with a particular occasion or period of your life. Or it could have no significance for you at all – and we want to know about that, too.

“We really want to hear from anyone at all who has a poem in their head.”

̽��ֱ��team hope to reveal the UK’s by-heart ‘top ten’, and will be combining survey data with other research approaches as part of the wider investigation – including an analysis of the past 100 years of educational literature, in-depth participant interviews, and studies in schools adopting these practices.

̽��ֱ��researchers believe their findings may have particular relevance at a time when teaching of poetry is seen as problematic. A number of reports towards the end of the 2000s, such as the Ofsted report Poetry in Schools, found that poetry was the worst taught of all literary forms, with many teachers having difficulty teaching it and feeling deeply unconfident.

A similar picture emerged from a small-scale Cambridgeshire study, conducted in 2012 in primary and secondary schools by the same project team, which indicated that – although a few classes benefitted from inspirational teachers – the overall poetry picture was extremely patchy.

So if knowing and speaking are found to be vital modes for understanding and appreciating poetry, a reassessment of their place within poetry teaching may be part of the answer.

That, the researchers say, is why research in this area is so important – because at the moment, opinion is divided.

“For some people, there is nostalgia for a shared poetic repertoire within public memory, but for others, negative associations with rote learning and the stress of enforced performance is very strong,” said Pullinger.

“Had we been doing this research a hundred or even fifty years ago, the results would have been more predictable. Up until 1944, children memorised ‘staple poems’. But in the second half of the century, poetry learning became deeply unfashionable within education – the baby thrown out with the rote-learning bathwater.

“And yet, many people do still know a poem or two, for all sorts of reasons. So that’s what we’d like to know: what are the poems that live in people’s memories, at this moment, in October 2014? What poem or poems beat most strongly at the heart of the nation?”

By aiming to discover the UK’s most memorised poems, a new research project – backed by a former Poet Laureate – will explore the poems that live in our collective memory, and the value of keeping poetry in our heads and hearts instead of just the page and screen. Is there a poem inside your head?

This research feeds into a wider debate about locations of knowledge, the short-circuiting of learning and the ‘out-sourcing’ of human memory to digital devices

Debbie Pullinger

Alexcoitus via Flickr

Thought

Is there a poem inside your head? Get involved:

• For more details and to do the survey, visit: www.poetryandmemory.com
• Hear people reflecting on poems they know by heart for the project on Soundcloud
• Follow the project on Twitter and Facebook, and help spread the word

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