Man and animal in Severan Rome : the literary imagination of Claudius Aelianus / Steven D. Smith.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Smith, Steven D., 1974- author.

Series:

Greek culture in the Roman world.

Greek culture in the Roman world

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Aelian, active 3rd century. De natura animalium.

Aelian.

Animals in literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xii, 308 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Other Title:

Man & Animal in Severan Rome

Place of Publication:

Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2014.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

The Roman sophist Claudius Aelianus, born in Praeneste in the late second century CE, spent his career cultivating a Greek literary persona. Aelian was a highly regarded writer during his own lifetime, and his literary compilations would be influential for a thousand years and more in the Roman world. This book argues that the De natura animalium, a miscellaneous treasury of animal lore and Aelian's greatest work, is a sophisticated literary critique of Severan Rome. Aelian's fascination with animals reflects the cultural issues of his day: philosophy, religion, the exoticism of Egypt and India, sex, gender, and imperial politics. This study also considers how Aelian's interests in the De natura animalium are echoed in his other works, the Rustic Letters and the Varia Historia. Himself a prominent figure of mainstream Roman Hellenism, Aelian refined his literary aesthetic to produce a reading of nature that is both moral and provocative.

Contents:

Approaching the De natura animalium

The independent intellectual

Animals and agroikoi in Aelian's rustic letters

The hazards of variety

The Hellenized Roman

Stoicism

Animals, divinity, and myth

Egypt and India

The sexual animal

Bees, lions, eagles: Aelian and kingship

After animals: the women of the Varia historia

Conclusion: "nature produces animals with many voices and many sounds, you might say ..."

Appendix: reconstructing Aelian's Kategoria tou gunnidos.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015).

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

1-139-99014-4

1-316-01075-9

1-139-98552-3

1-316-01299-9

1-139-52405-4

1-316-00175-X

1-316-00625-5

1-316-00399-X

1-316-00849-5