Volume: Volume 4, Issue 2

Sextus Empiricus in Pyr. (I, 224, cf Diog. IX, 18) describes Xenophanes of Colophon as hupatuphos, which is to mean that he was a skeptic who did not entirely free himself of dogmatic assertions. In this paper I will try to demonstrate an alternative way of understanding hupatuphos in relation to Xenophanes. In my opinion, the interpretation according to which passages can be found in Xenophanes' writings expressing both a skeptical and negative dogmatic position is possible. Thus, this thinker may be described with the adjective hupatuphos not because he did not manage to free himself of positive dogmatism, but rather because he did not free himself of negative dogmatism.

The aim of this article is to indicate the way through which the satirical persona of Horace uses the model of the epic Homeric hero in the frame of the roman satire, in order to present the human behaviour in classical Rome and blame indirectly at the same time the institution of legacy-hunting that prevailed at that time.

A discussion about a possible origin of the engravings at Newgrange Mound is given. The engravings are one of the most famous megalithic tombs in Ireland that could be evidence of ‘pinhole optics’ used for solar observations. Also, they could represent an early manifestation of the construction of a specially oriented astronomical instrument in ancient times. Newgrange’s inside chamber dimensions (orientation, depth and height) are analysed to give support to the hypothesis that the figures in the east recess at the ‘roof stone’ were made following the images produced by an array of pinholes. The instrument, we suggest, was located at several positions along the passage before it was covered by the mound; the images inspiring the engravings were observed on the day of the winter solstice at sunrise around 5000 years ago. The evidence reported here could help to relate other engravings and figures to the use of ‘pinhole optics’ by other cultures.

During the Hellenistic Age the island of Rhodes stands at a superb economic and cultural and position in the Mediterranean, while Rome is the superpower that dominates the known world of the time, being an enormous empire state, an offspring of a realistic, enforceable legal and political thought. Quite apart from a naval, economic, political and cultural significant power the island of Rhodes becomes a land of education for many eminent Roman personalities. Molon Apollonius was a truly cult figure of Rhodes, a brilliant jurist, orator and teacher of diplomacy and rhetoric. He was recognized as a remarkably distinguished scholar of law, diplomacy and rhetoric even by the supreme Romans Julius Caesar and Cicero, who travelled to Rhodes exclusively in order to become his students. The Roman politicians acknowledging his skills and faculties offered him the rostrum to address the Roman Senate in Greek language, an unprecedented honour for a foreign diplomat from their provinces. And Cicero mentions: Graeca leguntur in omnibus fere gentibus.