Raf G . L . M . Praet | Ghent University (original) (raw)

Papers by Raf G . L . M . Praet

thersites 15, 2022

A conspicuous feature of Tolkien’s description of the city of Minas Tirith in The Return of The K... more A conspicuous feature of Tolkien’s description of the city of Minas Tirith in The Return of The King is the depiction of two thrones in the Great Hall: one empty throne reserved for the king and one seat for the steward of Gondor. This paper aims to ascertain the late antique and mediaeval sources of inspiration behind Tolkien’s creation of the throne room in Minas Tirith. As a starting point, we shall compare the setting of the two thrones in Minas Tirith with a motive in Christian iconography, the hetoimasia, and its architectural expression in the Chrysotriklinos, the throne room in the Byzantine Great Palace in Constantinople. Next, we shall show that Tolkien intentionally obscured his appropriation of the Byzantine throne room to create a multi-layered image of rulership, in accordance with his aesthetics of applicability and allegory. In conclusion, we shall formulate some remarks on the interpretation of the association between the Byzantine Chrysotriklinos and the Gondorian Great Hall. As a
form of Tolkien’s literary process of sub-creation, the description of the throne room in Minas Tirith serves to emphasise the significance of The Return of the King as a retelling of Christ’s restoration of the fallen world, placing the work of Tolkien in the context of a strong personal Catholic piety.

Revue Belge de Philologie et d'Histoire, 2018

Dissertation, 2018

The subject of this dissertation was the assessment of the cultural meaning of antiquarianism in ... more The subject of this dissertation was the assessment of the cultural meaning of antiquarianism in the sixth century AD. Once subjected to a reasoned re-definition, the concept of antiquarianism appeared as a useful tool for the study of the attitude towards the distant past in late antiquity. During the sixth century, antiquarianism was a textual attitude towards the distant past which was marshalled for debating and coming to terms with several uneasy societal changes, such as the transfer of power and prestige from Rome to Constantinople. This transfer was discussed in sixth-century Constantinople by an extended network of educated bureaucrats, which partly transcended the political, social and linguistic barriers of the period. Antiquarianism was part and parcel of the shared repertoire of this network for debating each other and the imperial government implicitly on the role of Rome and Constantinople. The shared antiquarian lore was used by these educated bureaucrats differently in order to take different stands in this contemporary debate. The antiquarian authors tried to replace Rome partially as the framework for historical meaning by focusing on their own home region, by their own administrative department and by a focus on their personal life.

Ágora. Estudos Clássicos em Debate 23.1, 2021

This paper aims to contribute to the cultural history of late antique embryology and gynaecology,... more This paper aims to contribute to the cultural history of late antique embryology and gynaecology, by focusing on the historian John Lydus (ca. AD 490-ca. 565). In an overview of his numerous passages on gynaecology, we show that he had a coherent view on these sciences. We shall contextualise the interest of John of Lydia in a subject matter which is ostensibly far removed from his historical interests, by taking into consideration three factors: 1) the legal context of imperial policy, 2) the function of gynaecology in John's historical thinking, and 3) the personal concerns of the author.

After Constantine. Stories from the Late Antique and Early Byzantine Era., 2021

This paper focuses on the sixth-century historian John Lydus, who, next to an interest in Latin, ... more This paper focuses on the sixth-century historian John Lydus, who, next to an interest in Latin, exhibited a great interest in and knowledge of gynaecological texts. Almost all of his sources on gynaecology are Greek. However, in Mens. IV.26, Lydus vaguely mentions his use of Latin sources. We shall compare this passage to the works of the fourth-century Latin physician Helvius Vindicianus, hypothesising that he was one of Lydus’ sources. A readership of Vindicianus in Constantinople in the sixth century sheds light on the exchange of medical texts between the “Latin” West and the “Greek” East in late antiquity.

Revue Belge de Philologie et d'Histoire / Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Filologie en Geschiedenis, 96, 2018, p. 913-924, 2018, 2018

Revue Belge de Philologie et d'Histoire / Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Filologie en Geschiedenis, 96, 2018, p. 1011-1032 , 2018

SUMMARY One of the fundamental sources of cultural unease in Late Antiquity was the fall of the ... more SUMMARY

One of the fundamental sources of cultural unease in Late Antiquity was the fall of the western Roman Empire and the transmission of imperial power and prestige from Rome to Constantinople. This paper shall analyse, through a close reading of the antiquarianism of three authors - John of Lydia (c. 490 – c. 565 AD), Cassiodorus (c. 485 – c. 585) and John Malalas (c. 490 – c. 570 AD) - how the distant past is used in sixth century sources as a platform to compare and discuss the moral legitimacy of Rome and Constantinople as capitals of the Roman empire. The paper shall present two case studies; the antiquarian scrutiny of the questionable character of Romulus, who founded Rome on the blood of his brother Remus, and the antiquarian analyses of the fate of the statues in Rome and Constantinople.

SOMMAIRE

Une source fondamentale du malaise culturel de l'Antiquité tardive fut la chute de l'Empire romain et la transmission du pouvoir et du prestige impérial de Rome à Constantinople. Cet article analyse, à travers d’une lecture attentive des textes antiquaires de trois auteurs - Jean le Lydien (c. 490 - c. 565 ap. J.-C.), Cassiodore (c. 485 - c. 585 ap. J.-C.) et Jean Malalas (c. 490 - c. 570 ap. J.-C.) - comment le passé lointain est utilisé dans les sources du sixième siècle comme une plate-forme pour comparer et discuter la légitimité morale de Rome et de Constantinople comme les capitales de l'Empire romain. La contribution présentera deux études de cas; l'examen antiquaire du caractère douteux de Romulus, qui a fondé Rome sur le sang de son frère Remus, et les analyses antiquaires du sort des statues à Rome et à Constantinople.

SAMENVATTING

De val van het West-romeinse rijk was, samen met de overdracht van keizerlijke macht en prestige van Rome naar Constantinopel, een fundamentele bron van cultureel ongenoegen in de late oudheid. Deze bijdrage zal, door middel van een detaillezing van de antiquarische teksten van drie auteurs -Johannes van Lydië (ca. 490 – ca. 565 NC), Cassiodorus (ca. 485 – ca. 585 NC) en Johannes Malalas (c. 490 – c. 570 NC) -, analyseren hoe het verre verleden in zesde-eeuwse historische bronnen werd gebruikt als een arena waarin de morele legitimiteit van Rome en Constantinopel werden vergeleken en bediscussieerd. Deze bijdrage zal deze analyse maken door middel van twee casussen: de antiquarische bevraging van het twijfelachtig personage Romulus, dat Rome stichtte in het bloed van zijn broer Remus, en de antiquarische analyses van de lotsbestemming van de standbeelden van Rome en Constantinopel.

Sacris Erudiri: Journal of Late Antique and Medieval Christianity, 2016

This paper uses the conceptual framework of “Anchoring Innovation”, which is being developed by O... more This paper uses the conceptual framework of “Anchoring Innovation”, which is being developed by OIKOS, the Dutch National Research School in Classical Studies, in order to assess matters of religious continuity and change in the late antique and Byzantine attitudes towards the pignora imperii, or talismans which vouched for the safety of the Roman Empire. Notable pignora are the Palladium, the ancilia, and the stone of Cybele. The paper focuses on two periods. In the first section, a close reading of a passage of Servius from the early fifth century AD discloses how the author re-anchored the pignora in the contemporary context of anxieties over the preservation of pagan heritage and the imminent shift of power and prestige from Rome to Constantinople. The second section focuses on the works of John Malalas and John of Lydia in order to trace the vicissitudes of the pignora in sixth century Constantinople. Servius’ pignora are re-anchored in the context of an Empire which saw itself increasingly as Christian and centred on Constantinople. Also new pignora, such as the Latin language and statues in Constantinople are being construed in the sixth century. The paper concludes with a short sketch of a field which merits further research; the continuity in religious attitudes towards pignora between late antiquity and the Byzantine period. It will be argued that icons of the Theotokos or Virgin Mary in Byzantium gradually usurp the role and function of the antique pignora. The paper has in two appendices 1) a list of testimonies to the Palladium, and 2) a list of transfers of Hero remains in antiquity.

Die Weltchronik des Johannes Malalas im Kontext spätantiker Memorialkultur, 2018

This paper places the Chronographia of John Malalas in the context of the historiographical and e... more This paper places the Chronographia of John Malalas in the context of the historiographical and erudite production of sixth-century Constantinople. In order to do this, this paper addresses possible social connections between Malalas and two contemporary historians: Cassiodorus and John the Lydian. Their common bureaucratic and erudite networks are not their only resemblances. Their treatments of different aspects of the history of Rome and the Roman Empire also exhibit striking parallels, as one case study, on the colour purple, shows. The paper concludes with an assessment of this coincidence in textual resemblances and networks between the three authors. Although the attractive hypothesis of an erudite school around the university of Constantinople with John the Lydian as one of its professors remains in the realm of speculation for want of conclusive evidence, the work of Malalas is clearly an exponent of a continued common culture of Roman erudition in the sixth century.

This article provides the editio princeps of a cycle of eight dodecasyllabic poems on the Psalms ... more This article provides the editio princeps of a cycle of eight dodecasyllabic poems on the Psalms preserved in Bodleian Baroccianus 194 (15th century). Four of these poems are also present in other manuscripts and enjoyed a certain degree of popularity as book epigrams. The four others are found in this manuscript only. The cycle contains an acrostic: ΜΑΚΑΡΙΟΥ. This Makarios is likely to have compiled the cycle and to have composed the otherwise unknown poems. The Psalms themselves are not included in the manuscript. Only two short commentaries on the Psalms precede and follow the cycle. This implies that at least the four known book epigrams lost their original function as poems referring deictically to the Psalms. A verse prayer to the Trinity that was preserved on the same folio is edited in an appendix.

Continuous space representations of words are currently at the core of many state-of-the-art appr... more Continuous space representations of words are currently at the core of many state-of-the-art approaches in computational linguistics. The distributional hypothesis, summarised as: ‘You shall know a word by the company it keeps’ [Firth, 1957] is the basis of many such methods. In this paper we use this type of representation, which has seen little to no use in digital humanities, to rethink the concept of intertextuality. We present and use an alternative conceptual concept of intertextuality to ascertain how different persons are portrayed in a late antique letter collection, the Variae of Cassiodorus (ca. 485–585 AD). We combine this approach with the well-explored method of network analysis.

‘The study of intertextuality is the study of a certain kind of relation between texts: One text quotes another or others.’ [Edmunds, 2001]. Until recently, intertextuality has been pictured as an interaction between different texts, which has been restricted to the surface forms. We want to transcend this rather limited, one-dimensional concept of intertextuality by using high-dimensional word representations which effectively abstract away from such surface forms. Instead of conceptualising, e.g. Vergil, as the sum of his transmitted oeuvre, we represent him both as a node in a network, and a vector in high-dimensional space. In this way we overcome the border between text and historical person; a border which impedes the ascertaining of the intertextual impact of authors which are partially or not at all preserved. We create word-space representations based on the letters in the Variae, using methods based on distributional semantics [Mikolov et al., 2013a, Levy et al., 2015].

In antiquity, the editing and publication of letter collections was a fundamental tool for literary and cultural self-representation. Late antiquity witnessed the zenith of this practice with the publication of several such collections, both in Latin and in Greek. The Variae of Cassiodorus are an excellent example of this practice of self-representation [Bjornlie, 2012, Gillett, 1998]. In this paper, we will represent Cassiodorus, his contemporaries, and influential authors of the literary canon, such as Vergil, in one and the same network. This form of visualisation can generate a more nuanced view on how Cassiodorus constructs a cultural profile for himself and his peers. Indeed, the letters of Cassiodorus act as a meeting ground in which both the contemporaries of Cassiodorus, as well as the authors who shaped the intellectual outlook of Cassiodorus and his peers, interact with each other.

Continuous space representations of words are currently at the core of many state-of-the-art appr... more Continuous space representations of words are currently at the core of many state-of-the-art approaches to problems in natural language processing. In spite of several advantages of using such methods, they have seen little usage within digital humanities. In this paper, we show a case study of how such models can be used to ﬁnd interesting relationships within the ﬁeld of late antiquity. We use a word2vec model trained on over one billion words of Latin to investigate the relationships between persons and concepts of interest from works of the 6th-century scholar Cassiodorus. The results show that the method has high potential to aid the humanities scholar, but that caution must be taken as the analysis requires the assessment by the traditional historian.

Organised by Peter Van Nuffelen, Lorenzo Focanti (Ghent), Jan Willem Drijvers and Raf Praet (Gron... more Organised by Peter Van Nuffelen, Lorenzo Focanti (Ghent), Jan Willem Drijvers and Raf Praet (Groningen). Confirmed speakers: C. Ando, B. Bleckmann, J.W. Drijvers, M. Formisano, G. Greatrex, M. Maas, L. Perrone, S. Schorn, G. Traina, P. Van Nuffelen.

The conference will be organised at the city of Ghent, 19-21th of May 2016.

We invite proposals for individual papers (approximately 500 words) to be sent to the following e-mail addresses before the 1st of July, 2015.

Lorenzo.Focanti@ugent.be
r.g.l.praet@rug.nl

Conference Presentations by Raf G . L . M . Praet

We aim to show how the concept of cultural memory (central to several ongoing research projects w... more We aim to show how the concept of cultural memory (central to several ongoing research projects within Dutch classical studies) can offer a valuable contribution to the method of anchoring innovation. In antiquity, cultural memory does not only serve as a passive recipient of past events: rather, it influences actions of individuals and groups in the present, by anchoring present and prospective events and transformations in a coherent whole of past and present. The 'soggy' and flexible nature of cultural memory, we argue, makes it particularly fertile ground for anchoring. Our hypothesis is that the tenacious aspect of Roman cultural memory can account for the longevity and success of an anchoring device, even if that device is applied to different ends or in conflicting contexts. The omnipresence of such tenacious anchors in Roman memory forces every potential heir to the Roman legacy to engage with them. Romulus is one of these tenacious anchors. His role in the foundation of Rome figures prominently in two crucial periods of transformation in Roman history. Drawing on theories of cultural memory, invented traditions, antiquarianism and intentional history, we hope to show briefly how Rome in general, and recourses to her distant origins in particular, continued to function as important anchors for political innovations over the course of six centuries.

In this paper, we would like to show how the concept of cultural memory (central to several ongoi... more In this paper, we would like to show how the concept of cultural memory (central to several ongoing research projects within Dutch classical studies) can contribute to the method of anchoring innovation. The 'soggy' and flexible nature of cultural memory, we argue, makes it particularly fertile ground for anchoring. Our hypothesis is that the tenacious aspect of Roman cultural memory can account for the longevity and success of an anchoring device, even if that device is applied to different ends or in conflicting contexts. The omnipresence of such tenacious anchors in Roman memory forces every potential heir to the Roman legacy to engage with them.

Romulus is one of these tenacious anchors. His role in the foundation of Rome figures prominently in two crucial periods of transformation in Roman history. In the Augustan age, Romulus was recongifured to anchor the ‘Roman revolution’ that transformed an aristocratic republic into a monarchic empire. Late antiquity saw fundamental shifts in the religious and political focus of the empire, shifts which were again mediated through the figure of Romulus. When Rome developed from pagan to Christian capital, Peter and Paul were reconfigured as the new Romulus and Remus. In Constantinople, the new Rome at the Bosporus, different authors debated the moral legitimacy of the old capital of the empire through a close scrutiny of the questionable character of Romulus, who had founded Rome on the blood of his brother Remus.

The tenacity of Romulus as an anchor is not impeded by the fundamental ambiguity inherent in his character. On the contrary, the multi-layeredness of Romulus proved highly potential for the anchoring of Roman identity throughout the vicissitudes of Roman history. The persistence of such a tenacious anchor may call for innovation in the use of the anchor itself – and that is exactly what this paper aims to study.

Antiquarianism in late antiquity appears as a very evasive phenomenon. This evasiveness is caused... more Antiquarianism in late antiquity appears as a very evasive phenomenon. This evasiveness is caused by the fact that it is attested in separate periods of time and in different cultures. Moreover antiquarianism was not a recognized genre as such in late antiquity. The absence of any such ‘official’ recognition makes an analysis of antiquarian elements more difficult. Simultaneously, antiquarian features are apparently found in a wide range of texts.
This disparate image of antiquarianism is reinforced by the limited and incomplete study of its history. In short, the term antiquarianism until now has been used as a convenient repository, into which all forms of scholarly activity, which we cannot categorise at first sight, are posited.
This general confusion in the secondary literature demands a new approach to antiquarianism as a cultural phenomenon. In this paper, we propose a more flexible model which can account for traditional antiquarian texts, antiquarian passages in other texts and an antiquarian attitude to the past which underlies both. We abandon the idea of ‘genre’ in favor of the concept of ‘meta-genre’ or attitude: a distinct attitude to deal with the past, which results in a set of common features. This attitude with its common features will act as a crucial tool to compare different texts which have not been associated before.
We will give a theoretical overview of the appearance of antiquarianism in different genres, based on these two factors: 1) the topics treated in antiquarian works and 2) the formal aspects of antiquarian production. These two factors will also serve as a tool to explore the relationship between antiquarian production and some classic literary genres.
The study of antiquarianism in several late antique texts will enable to trace the antiquarian attitude throughout late antiquity. In this period of fundamental changes, the antiquarian way of treating the past will be adapted many times to fit the changed circumstances of the present. As a case study, we will expound on antiquarianism in John of Lydia and Cassiodorus.

Miscellanea by Raf G . L . M . Praet

Book Reviews by Raf G . L . M . Praet

After Constantine: Stories from the Late Antique and Early Byzantine Era., 2024

B O O K R E V I E W BETWEEN STATUES AND ICONS ICONIC PERSONS FROM ANTIQUITY TO THE EARLY MIDDLE... more B O O K R E V I E W

BETWEEN STATUES AND ICONS
ICONIC PERSONS FROM ANTIQUITY
TO THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES
Ivanovici, V. (2023). Between Statues and Icons: Iconic Persons from
Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Paderborn: Brill Schöningh.

thersites 15, 2022

Revue Belge de Philologie et d'Histoire, 2018

Dissertation, 2018

Ágora. Estudos Clássicos em Debate 23.1, 2021

After Constantine. Stories from the Late Antique and Early Byzantine Era., 2021

Revue Belge de Philologie et d'Histoire / Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Filologie en Geschiedenis, 96, 2018, p. 913-924, 2018, 2018

Revue Belge de Philologie et d'Histoire / Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Filologie en Geschiedenis, 96, 2018, p. 1011-1032 , 2018

SUMMARY One of the fundamental sources of cultural unease in Late Antiquity was the fall of the ... more SUMMARY

SOMMAIRE

SAMENVATTING

Sacris Erudiri: Journal of Late Antique and Medieval Christianity, 2016

Die Weltchronik des Johannes Malalas im Kontext spätantiker Memorialkultur, 2018

Continuous space representations of words are currently at the core of many state-of-the-art appr... more Continuous space representations of words are currently at the core of many state-of-the-art approaches to problems in natural language processing. In spite of several advantages of using such methods, they have seen little usage within digital humanities. In this paper, we show a case study of how such models can be used to ﬁnd interesting relationships within the ﬁeld of late antiquity. We use a word2vec model trained on over one billion words of Latin to investigate the relationships between persons and concepts of interest from works of the 6th-century scholar Cassiodorus. The results show that the method has high potential to aid the humanities scholar, but that caution must be taken as the analysis requires the assessment by the traditional historian.

The conference will be organised at the city of Ghent, 19-21th of May 2016.

We invite proposals for individual papers (approximately 500 words) to be sent to the following e-mail addresses before the 1st of July, 2015.

Lorenzo.Focanti@ugent.be
r.g.l.praet@rug.nl

After Constantine: Stories from the Late Antique and Early Byzantine Era., 2024

B O O K R E V I E W BETWEEN STATUES AND ICONS ICONIC PERSONS FROM ANTIQUITY TO THE EARLY MIDDLE... more B O O K R E V I E W

Bryn Mawr Classical Review, 2023

BMCR 2023.04.34 Usages of the past in Roman historiography Aske Damtoft Poulsen, Arne Jönsson, ... more BMCR 2023.04.34

Usages of the past in Roman historiography
Aske Damtoft Poulsen, Arne Jönsson, Usages of the past in Roman historiography. Historiography of Rome and its empire, 9. Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2021. Pp. xvi, 344. ISBN 9789004445024.

Review by
Raf Praet, Ghent University and University of Groningen. rafpraet@gmail.com

REVIEW–DISCUSSION TOWARDS A NEW APPRECIATION OF MALALAS AND THE CHRONOGRAPHIA Mischa Meier, Ch... more REVIEW–DISCUSSION

TOWARDS A NEW APPRECIATION OF MALALAS AND THE CHRONOGRAPHIA

Mischa Meier, Christine Radtki, and Fabian Schulz, edd., Die Weltchronik des Johannes Malalas. Autor—Werk—Überlieferung. Malalas Studien 1. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2016. Pp. 310. Hardback, €58.00. ISBN 978-3-515-11099-0.

De Open Frontbrieven zijn een groep pamfletten waarmee de Vlaamse beweging in de loopgraven, de F... more De Open Frontbrieven zijn een groep pamfletten waarmee de Vlaamse beweging in de loopgraven, de Frontbeweging, in de laatste jaren van de Eerste Wereldoorlog haar ongenoegen uitdrukte om de schrijnende taaltoestanden en misbruiken tegen de Vlaamse soldaat in de loopgraven.

Deze teksten vormen het iconisch begin van de Vlaamse beweging in haar politieke vorm, zoals die de Belgische politiek tot op vandaag mee vorm geeft. Ondanks en misschien omwille van hun mythische status, werden de Open Frontbrieven echter nog nooit op wetenschappelijke wijze uitgegeven.

Deze uitgave doet, honderd jaar na de feiten, recht aan dit intrigerende tekstcorpus door een systematische en wetenschappelijke uitgave. De teksten werden verzorgd door drs. Raf Praet, de inleidingen op de teksten door drs. Raf Praet en dr. Luc Vandeweyer. Een team van experts levert tevens kaderende informatie bij deze teksten die onveranderlijk deel uitmaken van het collectief geheugen van de Vlamingen.

Deze uitgave is een onmisbaar historisch werk voor iedereen die geïnteresseerd is in de Eerste Wereldoorlog, de geschiedenis van Vlaanderen en de geschiedenis van het Vlaams-Nationalisme. Het is een opstap voor verdere onderzoek en een referentie voor de geïnteresseerde leek.