This is the first of a series of 12 blog posts published in 2019, discussing open problems in computational diversity linguistics. It presents a list of 10 problems on computational diversity linguistics.

More detailed discussions on Thomas Biggs: Sown Men and Rome’s Civil Wars. Rethinking the End of Melinno’s Hymn to Rome (Mnemosyne 76.3) and Gerlinde Bretzigheimer: Intertextualität und Intratextualität in Ausonius’ Epitaphia heroum (Wiener Studien 135).

The Linear B administrative texts of Late Bronze Age Greece were written on clay tablets, whose production therefore formed the first stage in the process of document creation, though it generally remains unclear whether the tablets’ writers were also their makers. This study combines experimental archaeology with autopsy of the tablets from P…[Read more]

The volume under review is based on the premise that there is no real dialogue between Greek and Latin studies on the literature (and especially on the poetry) of Late Antiquity, at least not a dialogue as intense as with regard to the earlier, ‘classical’ literature. The reason for this is not least the problem that mutual dependencies between…[Read more]

The Akkadian of this lexicon was spoken by Neolithic farmers who migrated to Europe from the Middle East starting around 6500 BCE. This lexicon combined with the new genetic migration information demonstrates that Europe had its own ancient Pagan civilization just as important and innovative as any other ancient civilization. This lexicon begins…[Read more]

The early history of the study of Parthian art may be profitably divided into three overlapping phases. The first phase, ‘Ordering’, begins with Johann Joachim Winckelmann’s dismissive assessment of Parthian art, at this point known mainly from coins, as derivative and barbaric. The second phase, ‘Exploration’, begins in the mid-ninet…[Read more]

More detailed Discussions on J. van Waarden: Leafing through Pliny with Sidonius. Sidon. Ep. 1.1, Plin. Ep. 1.1, 1.2, and 1.5, and Satire, Mnemosyne 75/6, 2022, 1021–1043 (62–64) and G. Wöhrle: Fragmente im
Überfluss. Zur Problematik eines philologischen Begriffs, Hermes 150/4, 2022, 385-404 (64–67).

The Companion assembles a total of twenty chapters in English throughout, which – as explained in more detail in the Introduction by the two editors – are thematically divided into three sections (“parts”): “Isidore’s Contexts” (chapters 1-4, including the “Introduction”), “Themes in Isidore’s Works” (chapters 5-13), and “Transmission andReception…[Read more]

While the Res Gestae are understood as an important source for the life and work of Augustus, Henning Ohst presents letters of the Princeps. These have survived only in fragments and through other authors, but still offer research opportunities for new questions. The focus of the contribution is the relationship of the Princeps to poets such as…[Read more]

More detailed discussions on: Y. Brandenburg: Amare mit Infinitv. Bedeutungsentlehnung und Sprachgebrauch bei Sallust und Horaz, Glotta 98, 2022, 68–77 (362f.); A. J. Woodman: Horace’s Second Ode, MH 79, 2022, 55–76 (363f.)

The case of Cicero’s de inventione is interesting for many reasons. First, the work is an early example of the construction of cultural memory in the field of Roman rhetoric. Second, this work shows a strong connection between rhetorical theory, the Ciceronian interest in other disciplines (especially philosophy) and the oratorical formation of a…[Read more]

The Dictio 17 (= 239 Vogel) of Ennodius is a controuersia in which the declamator speaks against a son who did not provide for the care of his aged father and thus procured his death. The argument is reinforced by examples of animals – eagles and wolves – who, unlike the defendant, take care of their parents. In the example of the eagles, Enn…[Read more]

While the discipline of computational linguistics mostly deals with the modeling and the investigation of individual languages (often “big” languages such as English, German, Arabic, or Chinese), Multilingual Computational Linguistics focuses on the comparison of languages, trying to develop new methods and techniques by which languages can be com…[Read more]

This course provides a detailed examination of the life and administration of the Roman emperor Augustus (reigned 31 B.C. to A.D. 14), a time of pivotal social and economic change that forever altered the trajectory of Roman history. Augustus and his administration will be examined from a variety of viewpoints, drawing on a rich dataset that…[Read more]

This course explores the art and archaeology of the Greek world from the Late Bronze Age to the Roman period. The course focuses on architecture, sculpture, painted pottery, and wall painting as its main object classes and situates artistic and stylistic developments within their social, political, and historical context. We will consider issues…[Read more]

Since H. Humbach’s Baktrische Sprachdenkmäler (Wiesbaden, 1966) the main etymological
proposal for Bactrian χϸονο ‘(calendar) year, (regnal) year’ has been A. Thierfelder’s suggestion of a loanword from Hellenistic Greek χρόνος ‘time’. In this article the plausibility of this etymology is re-examined, and it is further argued that it should b…[Read more]

The present article examines the Corpus Leidense, the group of eight Ciceronian treatises among which the De natura deorum was also transmitted, focusing on its archetype. The second and longer section contains the first complete list of the 174 identified manuscripts of De natura deorum, with 57 new items added to the 117 already listed by Pease…[Read more]

The formalization of sound changes as finite state transducers is implicit already in the Neogrammarians. For at least six decades scholars have recognized the potential of transducers for improving the speed and rigor of research in historical linguists, but almost no historical linguists actually use them. This article identifies the obstacles…[Read more]

In the course, I give a basic introduction into some of the recent developments in the field of computational historical linguistics. While this field is predominantly represented by phylogenetic approaches with whom scholars try to infer phylogenetic trees from different kinds of language data, the approach taken here is much broader,…[Read more]

The weblog Computer-Assisted Language Comparison in Practice, published on the Hypotheses platform for scientific blogging (https://calc.hypotheses.org/), offers tutorials and discussion notes on computer-assisted approaches to the history and diversity of languages. A substantial part of its content is contributed as part of the ERC Starting…[Read more]