83249 - Latin Language and Literature 2 (LM)

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course, students will acquire the skills required to understand patterns and forms of reception of classical culture from the Antiquity to the 20th century.

Course contents

Science, technology, and perception of nature in Ancient Rome.

The course will consist of selected readings taken from Lucretius, De rerum natura, Piny, Naturalis historia, Seneca, Naturales quaestiones, Vitruvius, De architectura, and Palladius, De agricultura.

Further readings on the reception of those authors during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance will be distributed during classes, and uploaded online.

Readings/Bibliography

All texts will be put at disposal on the platform materiali didattici online.

Readings (selection):

- Entries "Science" e "Natural Sciences" in: Brill's New Pauly, online in Brill Online Reference Works, with further bibliography;

- Aude Doody,Pliny's Encyclopedia: the Reception of the Natural History, Cambridge 2010;

- Seneca e le scienze naturali, edited by Marco Beretta, Francesco Citti, Lucia Pasetti, Firenze 2012;

- Valérie Naas, Le projet encyclopédique de Pline l'Ancien, Rome 2012;

- Vitruve et la tradition des traités d'architecture, ed. Pierre Gros, Rome 2006.

Authors (in Latin):

- Cicerone, Somnium Scipionis, in: Marco Tullio Cicerone, Il sogno di Scipione, a cura di Giuseppe Solaro, Palermo 2008 (o similar editions including both the Latin text and the Italian translation).

Students belonging to the Arts curriculum or other curricula (apart from Lm 39) who wish to attend this cours in order to complete the amount of cfu required for teaching will follow a different program (see below). Otherwise, they will not be admitted to the exams. More specifically, they should add following text:

-Virgilio, Georgicorum libri, book I, in: Virgilio, Georgiche, a cura di Luca Canali, Milano 2012 (or similar editions including both the Latin text and the Italian translation).

 

Teaching methods

Classes are organized in form of lectures. During the seminars, students will be required to discuss and interact, and to pass some tests to verify their level of knowledge.

Assessment methods

The exams consist in an interview. Students should be able to demonstrate their skills in reading, translating, and interpreting the texts, in placing authors and texts, in their historical context, and in assessing their contribution within the history of scientific language and literature of the Antiquity.

Teaching tools

Texts and studies will be made available on the platform materiali didattici online.

Office hours

See the website of Iolanda Ventura