Witch-Crafting in Roman Literature and Art: New Thoughts on an Old Image

Pollard, Elizabeth Ann

doi:10.1353/mrw.0.0115

Cited by 3 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…Whilst the reproductive capabilities of the woman with the flow both pre- and post-healing are debated, during her illness her ‘utility,’ whether to a husband or enslaver, was in question. In a specific commentary on a statue of the anus ebria now housed in Munich, Elizabeth Pollard (2008: 146) sees the wine amphora in the woman’s lap as a play on the woman’s womb. Greco-Roman artistic and medical depictions of the womb figure it as an upturned jug.…”

Section: Reading the Woman With The Flow Of Blood As Anus Ebriamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Greco-Roman artistic and medical depictions of the womb figure it as an upturned jug. The off-kilter and potentially empty jug in the woman’s lap suggests that ‘this old hag’s womb is not only dried up, it is external and turned on end’ (Pollard 2008: 146). It may well have been the case that the anus ebria was broadly figured as infertile, even if this physiology of infertility sat in tension with the sodden imagery of drunkenness.…”

Section: Reading the Woman With The Flow Of Blood As Anus Ebriamentioning

confidence: 99%

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Was the Woman with the Flow of Blood Drunk? An Exploration of the Possibility that She Was Viewed as an Anus Ebria

Reed

2023

Journal for the Study of the New Testament

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This article offers a new reading of the story of the woman with the flow of blood in Mk 5:25–34 that focuses on the intersection of gender and social status. Moving away from gynaecological analysis, I use the representation of the anus ebria (drunken old woman) figure in Greco-Roman literature, drama, and art to explore how ancient readers might have responded to her conduct. Using this material, I argue that many readers would have understood the woman’s behaviour as conforming to this ancient type. The distinction is important, I contend, because, unlike widows, the anus ebria was an unsympathetic figure in ancient drama. This more intersectional reading of the woman’s social status, in turn, sharpens our reading of the revolutionary character of Jesus’s ministry in Mark.

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Section: Reading the Woman With The Flow Of Blood As Anus Ebriamentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Reading the Woman With The Flow Of Blood As Anus Ebriamentioning

confidence: 99%

Was the Woman with the Flow of Blood Drunk? An Exploration of the Possibility that She Was Viewed as an Anus Ebria

Reed

2023

Journal for the Study of the New Testament

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QVAE SAGA, QVIS MAGVS: ON THE VOCABULARY OF THE ROMAN WITCH

Paule

2014

The Class. Q.

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The Latin language is uncharacteristically rich when it comes to describing witches. A witch may be called a cantatrix or praecantrix, a sacerdos or vates. She may be docta, divina, saga, and maga, a venefica, malefica, lamia, lupula, strix, or striga. She may be simply quaedam anus. The available terms are copious and diverse, and the presence of such an abundant differential vocabulary might suggest (incorrectly, I shall argue) that Latin made clear linguistic distinctions between various witch types. It would seem a reasonable expectation that praecantrices, a word evocative of those who sing of events before they happen (prae + cantare), would be concerned with divinatory practices, while veneficae, given the term's close relationship to the word for poison (venenum), would deal in potions or philtres, leaving the lamiae (a Latinization of the Greek demon Lamia) or striges (personifications of the rapacious screech owl) to function as quasi-demonic bogeys posing threats to the lives of small children. However, this expectation of semantic and morphological concordance remains unfulfilled following any concerted attempt to correlate a witch's title with her function. Because of this disjuncture, this paper proposes to demonstrate not only the inaccuracy of the Latin vocabulary in articulating the functional differences between various witches, but also to assert the essential uniformity of witch characters in so far as each witch is, in essence, a blank canvas onto which a myriad of fears and anxieties may be mapped.

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Imágenes de la vejez femenina en los epigramas grecolatinos y en las sátiras de Juvenal

Méndez Santiago

2024

Gerión

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Este artículo estudia las imágenes de la vejez femenina en algunas obras antiguas, principalmente los Epigramas de Marcial, las Sátiras de Juvenal y los autores de la Antología palatina. En la introducción se comparan brevemente los géneros epigramático y satírico y se intenta ofrecer una breve explicación acerca de las diferentes concepciones de la vejez en la Antigüedad. El núcleo del artículo consiste en un análisis en profundidad de los distintos estereotipos asociados a las ancianas, que contrastan con las imágenes comúnmente asociadas a las mujeres jóvenes. Su decadencia física, manifestada en la ausencia total o parcial de dientes, en sus problemas oculares, canas y/o alopecia y problemas de movilidad, motivó que estas mujeres desarrollaran una serie de prácticas que, como el uso del maquillaje y pelucas, fueron fuertemente criticadas por los autores antiguos. Dentro de los rasgos psicológicos atribuidos a las ancianas, se destacan su propensión al alcoholismo y, sobre todo, su búsqueda activa del placer. Las ancianas son, así, vistas como unos seres subversivos que no aceptan las convenciones sociales y que están dispuestas a todo con tal de dar satisfacción a sus deseos sexuales.

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Witch-Crafting in Roman Literature and Art: New Thoughts on an Old Image

Cited by 3 publications

References 46 publications

Was the Woman with the Flow of Blood Drunk? An Exploration of the Possibility that She Was Viewed as an Anus Ebria

Was the Woman with the Flow of Blood Drunk? An Exploration of the Possibility that She Was Viewed as an Anus Ebria

QVAE SAGA, QVIS MAGVS: ON THE VOCABULARY OF THE ROMAN WITCH

Imágenes de la vejez femenina en los epigramas grecolatinos y en las sátiras de Juvenal

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