Category Archives: Exegesis

Dissertation Now On-Line

Posted on Sunday: September 30, 2018 by Michael Hendry

The University of Virginia library has (with my permission) placed my dissertation, “Problems of unity and design in Propertius II” (1990) on-line. It’s a bit half-baked, but I still think my conclusions are sound. Should you read it? The best … Continue reading →

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A Missing Joke in Ovid?

Posted on Wednesday: January 31, 2018 by Michael Hendry

Unable to communicate her plight to her father and sisters in any other way, boviform Io writes a message in the dust with her hoof (Met. 1.649-50): littera pro uerbis, quam pes in puluere duxit, corporis indicium mutati triste peregit. … Continue reading →

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Martial’s Gloomy Ethiopian (7.87)

Posted on Thursday: August 3, 2017 by Michael Hendry

I have just uploaded the third of my Martial papers for August 2017, titled as above. The PDF is here. Not a conjecture this time, but an exegetical footnote.

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Catullus 33: Helping Out in the Family Business?

Posted on Wednesday: March 1, 2017 by Michael Hendry

I have just written an exegetical note (2 pages – 476 words) on Catullus 33 – one of the “few poems which for good reason are rarely read” left out of Fordyce’s edition. Rather than pasting in the whole note … Continue reading →

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Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Chicken (Pliny, Ep. 7.21)

Posted on Saturday: March 12, 2016 by Michael Hendry

(Note: a general bibliography for this and my other Pliniana will soon be uploaded and linked, and this note removed.)     Pliny’s Epistle 7.21 seems trivial at first. It is short enough to quote in full:(1) C. Plinius Cornuto suo s. … Continue reading →

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“We’ve Made It Legal, but We Can’t Make It Right” (Martial 5.75)

Posted on Friday: March 11, 2016 by Michael Hendry

    Any problems in this little poem are exegetical – there are no significant variants: Quae legis causa nupsit tibi Laelia, Quinte,     uxorem potes hanc dicere legitimam. As a punch-line, the pentameter, particularly the last word, seems rather flat. I suspect … Continue reading →

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Scholastic Humor

Posted on Tuesday: June 20, 2006 by Michael Hendry

In Martial: Select Epigrams (Cambridge ‘green and gold’, 2003), Lindsay and Patricia Watson include 4.87 (71 in their numeration): Infantem secum semper tua Bassa, Fabulle,     conlocat et lusus deliciasque uocat, et, quo mireris magis, infantaria non est.     ergo quid in … Continue reading →

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