Adrienne Mayor ponders the question over at Wonders and Marvels:

• Ancient Puppy Chow: Dog Food in Classical Greece

Barbara Gold considers what an ancient Valentine card would have been (un)like:

• Dr. Barbara Gold, Hamilton College – Love in Ancient Rome

Interesting item from Yale Daily News:

With the help of one Yale alum, a ’90s historical comic book series is gaining a new, educational edge.

Thomas Beasley GRD ’09 said in a Tuesday talk at Sterling Memorial Library that he hopes to put a modern twist on the study of ancient Greek history with the publication of a reader’s guide to a comic book series about the Trojan War, “Age of Bronze.”

The digital media publisher Throwaway Horse is currently adapting creator Eric Shanower’s 31-issue comic series into a digital format. In reconfiguring the comic, Throwaway Horse brought in Beasley, a classics scholar, to write an embedded page-by-page reader’s guide for each issue, which acts as a didactic extension of the comics describing the Greek mythological figures referenced in the material and providing historical context for each story. Since the project’s inception in October 2011, three issues of the newly digitized comic have been made available for the iPad.

Beasley said that the comic series could be useful in academic settings, as the series seeks to represent the full length of the 10-year-long Trojan War and not just the last few years covered in the epics of Homer.

“While the books are not well-known in the academic community yet,” said Beasley. “They would be ideal for a class on the Trojan war because they are less anachronistic than [the works of] Homer.”

The guide is intended as an academic jumping-off point for those whose curiosity about Greek history and mythology is piqued by the comics, Beasley said the guide is intended as an academic jumping-off point for a reader whose curiosity about Greek history and mythology may be aroused by the comics. The guide is also equipped with a discussion forum, Beasley said, to enable readers to engage in conversations about the material.

The guide includes biographies of key characters, as well as maps of the region and descriptions of Bronze Age paintings and pottery that inspired the comic’s style.

But the series and the guide are not meant to substitute for Homer’s works, Beasley noted.

“It doesn’t seek to replace any of the texts from which it draws,” Beasley said. “I certainly wouldn’t recommend reading it instead of reading the works of Homer.”

Audience members interviewed said they appreciated Beasley’s attempt to make the classics more easily accessible to a broader audience.

“It has a wide range,” said Lindsay King, a librarian at the Robert B. Haas Family Arts Library. “You could use it just for fun or you could use it for some really serious investigations.”

Caroline Caizzi, King’s colleague at the Haas Arts Library, said that while many would typically associate the Classics Department with a traditional teaching style, she appreciated the unconventionality and visual nature of comics as a medium for education.

Beasley’s talk is a part of the Teaching with Technology lecture series held in the International Room of Sterling Memorial Library every Tuesday.

• via: Newly digitized comics teach Trojan War (Yale Daily News)

We used to mention the Age of Bronze series semi-regularly as new installments came out. Our last mention, I think, may have been an interview with the creator of the series, Eric Shanower. The official homepage of the comic will give you a taste of the work …

Assorted outlets in the Italian press are mentioning the excavation of a sculpture, identified as a maenad, from a depth of 27 metres, on the Quirinal. It is thought to date from the third century A.D. and archaeologists involved in the dig think they have found the site of the Temple of Quirinus and are sitting on a “gold mine”. This appears to be adding weight to Andrea Carandini’s suggestion some five years ago that the temple’s remains were in the gardens of the Quirinal Palace (see: Temple of Quirinus?).  It would have been kind of nice if they had held off the original reporting of this (on February 14th) to February 17th, which would have coincided with the ancient date of the Quirinalia, which presumably would have happened in the area as well, but oh well …

Il Messagero has the best coverage, including  brief (unembeddable, alas) video which show the sculpture that was brought out (not quite sure how it is being identified as a maenad, other than the fact that it seems to be nude):

• Un tesoro nascosto sotto il Quirinale: statua a 27 metri di profondità (Il Messaggero)

… the video, in case you missed it, is here.

More coverage:

• Trovata una Menade sotto il Quirinale (Il Tempo)

• Archeologia: Godart, sotto il Quirinale c’e’ una miniera d’oro (Libero)

For info on the Temple of Quirinus:

• Sacellum et Aedes Quirini (Platner and Ashby via Lacus Curtius)

• Quirinus, Aedes(Richardson)

Seen on the Classicists list:

The British School at Athens, an institute for advanced research in the Humanities and Social Sciences, seeks a fixed term (5 year), full-time Curator to manage its research centre at Knossos and to conduct original research. You will be capable of combining academic and managerial tasks in a flexible manner, of facilitating the work of resident and non-resident scholars using the Knossos facilities, and of representing the British School on Crete. Residence at the Knossos research centre is a requirement. You will have completed a doctorate or have comparable relevant experience (e.g. in conservation or collection management), and have defined an original research project which can be completed while in post (and resident) at Knossos (preference may be given to applicants proposing a project which focuses on Knossian collections). You will be able to communicate effectively in Greek, or to demonstrate how you will acquire this level of command before taking up the post.

The salary will be up to £23,000, including health insurance. The position is available from 1st July 2012. A probationary period will apply.

Further details are available at: http://www.bsa.ac.uk

Informal enquiries about the post may be addressed to the School Director, Professor
Catherine Morgan (director AT bsa.ac.uk) or the Chair of the Crete SubCommittee,
Professor Todd Whitelaw (t.whitelaw AT ucl.ac.uk).

The closing date for applications is Monday 23rd April 2012. Interviews will be held in late May.