Classics (2022 - 2024)

Latin

Intensive Elementary Latin
CLASS-UA 2 Open to students with no previous training in Latin and to others through assignment by placement test. Offered periodically, in the spring term only. 6 points.
Completes the equivalent of a year's elementary level in one semester.

Elementary Latin I, II
CLASS-UA 3, 4 Both terms must be completed to receive credit toward any departmental major or minor. Offered every year. 4 points per term.
Introduction to the essentials of Latin, the language of Vergil, Caesar, and Seneca. Five hours of instruction weekly, with both oral and written drills and an emphasis on the ability to read Latin rather than merely translate it. The second semester (CLASS-UA 4) introduces the student to selected readings from standard Latin authors, including Catullus, Cicero, Ovid, and Pliny.

Intermediate Latin I: Reading Prose
CLASS-UA 5 Prerequisites: Elementary Latin I and II (CLASS-UA 3 and 4), or Intensive Elementary Latin (CLASS-UA 2), or equivalent. Offered every year. 4 points.
Teaches second-year students to read Latin prose through comprehensive grammar review; emphasis on the proper techniques for reading (correct phrase division, the identification of clauses, and reading in order); and practicing reading at sight. Authors may include Caesar, Cicero, Cornelius Nepos, Livy, Petronius, or Pliny, at the instructor's discretion.

Intermediate Latin II: Vergil
CLASS-UA 6 Prerequisite: Intermediate Latin I: Reading Prose (CLASS-UA 5) or equivalent. Offered every year. 4 points.
Writings of the greatest Roman poet, focusing on his most celebrated poem, the Aeneid. Students learn to read Latin metrically to reflect the necessary sound for full appreciation of the writing. Readings in political and literary history illustrate the setting in the Augustan Age in which the Aeneid was written and enjoyed, the relationship of the poem to the other classical epics, and its influence on the poetry of later times.

Ancient Greek

Elementary Ancient Greek I, II
CLASS-UA 7, 8 Both terms must be completed to receive credit toward any departmental major or minor. Offered every year. 4 points per term.
Introduction to the complex but highly beautiful language of ancient Greece—the language of Homer, Sophocles, Thucydides, and Plato. Students learn the essentials of ancient Greek vocabulary, morphology, and syntax. Five hours of instruction weekly, with both oral and written drills and an emphasis on the ability to read Greek rather than merely translate it.

Intermediate Ancient Greek I: Plato
CLASS-UA 9 Prerequisites: Elementary Ancient Greek I and II (CLASS-UA 7 and 8) or equivalent. Offered every year. 4 points.
Readings from Plato, especially the Apology. The purpose is to develop facility in reading Attic prose. Supplemented with discussions of Socrates and the Platonic dialogues.

Intermediate Ancient Greek II: Homer
CLASS-UA 10 Prerequisite: Intermediate Ancient Greek I: Plato (CLASS-UA 9) or equivalent. Offered every year. 4 points.
Extensive readings in the Iliad or Odyssey. Proficiency in scansion is expected, as well as a good command of Homeric vocabulary. Relevant topics ranging from the Homeric question to problems of oral tradition through the archaeological evidence of Bronze Age Greece and Troy are discussed in class or developed by the student through oral or written reports.

Advanced Latin and Advanced Ancient Greek

Each term, the department offers one course in advanced Latin and one course in advanced ancient Greek. Courses are taught on a cycle; students may take up to six consecutive terms without repeating material.

Advanced Latin: Epic
CLASS-UA 871 Prerequisite: Intermediate Latin II: Vergil (CLASS-UA 6) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Extensive readings in Vergil's Aeneid and the other epics of Rome, including Ovid's Metamorphoses, Lucan's Bellum Civile, and Lucretius's De Rerum Natura. Consideration is given to the growth and development of Roman epic, its Greek antecedents, and its relationship to the Romans' construction of their past. Study of the development of the Latin hexameter is also included.

Advanced Latin: Cicero
CLASS-UA 872 Prerequisite: Intermediate Latin II: Vergil (CLASS-UA 6) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Extensive selections from Cicero's speeches, letters, oratorical works, and philosophical works. Cicero's place in the development of Latin literature is considered, as is the social and political world of the late Republic that he inhabited.

Advanced Latin: Lyric and Elegy
CLASS-UA 873 Prerequisite: Intermediate Latin II: Vergil (CLASS-UA 6) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Provides extensive readings from the works of Rome's greatest lyric and elegiac poets, including Catullus, Horace, Tibullus, Propertius, and Ovid. The various lyric meters adapted by the Romans are considered, as is the development of the Latin love elegy.

Advanced Latin: Comedy
CLASS-UA 874 Prerequisite: Intermediate Latin II: Vergil (CLASS-UA 6) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
A selection of plays from Plautus and Terence. The development of Roman comedy, its relationship to Greek New Comedy, and its social and cultural place in Roman life are also discussed. Some facility in Plautine and Terentian meter is expected.

Advanced Latin: Satire
CLASS-UA 875 Prerequisite: Intermediate Latin II: Vergil (CLASS-UA 6) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
With extensive readings from Horace's, Juvenal's, and Persius's satires, traces the development of the satiric mode from its earliest beginnings in Rome to its flowering under the Empire. The relationship of satire to the social world of Rome, including its treatment of money, women, political figures, and social climbers, is also examined.

Advanced Latin: Latin Historians
CLASS-UA 876 Prerequisite: Intermediate Latin II: Vergil (CLASS-UA 6) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Readings from the three masters of Roman historiography: Sallust, Livy, and Tacitus. Also considers the rise and development of history in Rome, its relationship to myth, and its narrative structure and manner.

Advanced Individual Study in Latin
CLASS-UA 891, 892, 893, 894 Prerequisite: permission of the department. Offered every year. 1-4 points per term.

Advanced Greek: Archaic Poetry
CLASS-UA 971 Prerequisite: Intermediate Ancient Greek II: Homer (CLASS-UA 10) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Extensive readings from the lyric, elegiac, and iambic poets of Greece. Studies the use of the various lyric forms, the different meters employed by the archaic poets, and the social functions of archaic poetry.

Advanced Greek: Greek Historians
CLASS-UA 972 Prerequisite: Intermediate Ancient Greek II: Homer (CLASS-UA 10) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Readings from the two fifth-century masters of Greek historiography, Herodotus and Thucydides. Examines the themes, narrative structure, and methodology of both writers, as well as giving some consideration to the rise of history writing in Greece and its relationship to myth and epic.

Advanced Greek: Drama
CLASS-UA 973 Prerequisite: Intermediate Ancient Greek II: Homer (CLASS-UA 10) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Readings of several plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. Spoken and choral meter are studied, and the role of performance, dramaturgy, and the place of theatre in Athenian society is also examined.

Advanced Greek: Orators
CLASS-UA 974 Prerequisite: Intermediate Ancient Greek II: Homer (CLASS-UA 10) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Readings of several speeches from the major Attic orators (Lysias, Aeschines, and Demosthenes). Also examines the role of law in Athenian society, procedure in the Athenian courts, and rhetorical education and training.

Advanced Greek: Philosophy
CLASS-UA 975 Prerequisite: Intermediate Ancient Greek II: Homer (CLASS-UA 10) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Readings from Plato and Aristotle.

Advanced Greek: Hellenistic Poetry
CLASS-UA 976 Prerequisite: Intermediate Ancient Greek II: Homer (CLASS-UA 10) or equivalent. Offered every three years. 4 points.
Offers a selection of authors (including Callimachus, Theocritus, and Apollonius) and genres (pastoral, hymn, epigram, epic) from the Hellenistic era.

Advanced Individual Study in Ancient Greek
CLASS-UA 991, 992, 993, 994 Prerequisite: permission of the department. Offered every year. 2 or 4 points per term.

Literature in Translation

Greek Drama: Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides
CLASS-UA 143 Identical to DRLIT-UA 210. Offered periodically. 4 points.
Of the ancient Greeks' many gifts to Western culture, one of the most celebrated and influential is the art of drama. We cover, through the best available translations, the masterpieces of the three great Athenian dramatists. Analysis of the place of the plays in the history of tragedy and the continuing influence they have had on serious playwrights, including those of the 20th century.

The Comedies of Greece and Rome
CLASS-UA 144 Identical to DRLIT-UA 211. Offered periodically. 4 points.
Study of early comedy, its form, content, and social and historical background. Covers the Old Comedy of fifth-century B.C.E. Athens through later Attic New Comedy and Roman comedy. Authors include Aristophanes (all 11 plays, one of which may be staged); Euripides, whose tragedies revolutionized the form of both comedy and tragedy; Menander, whose plays have only recently been discovered; and Plautus and Terence, whose works profoundly influenced the development of comedy in Western Europe.

Greek and Roman Epic
CLASS-UA 146 Offered periodically. 4 points.
Detailed study of the epic from its earliest form, as used by Homer, to its use by the Roman authors. Concentrates on the Iliad and the Odyssey of Homer and on Vergil's Aeneid, but may also cover the Argonautica of the Alexandrian poet Apollonius of Rhodes and Ovid's Metamorphoses, as well as the epics representative of Silver Latin by Lucan, Silius Italicus, and Valerius Flaccus.

The Novel in Antiquity
CLASS-UA 203 Identical to COLIT-UA 203. Offered periodically. 4 points.
Survey of Greek and Roman narrative fiction in antiquity, its origins and development as a literary genre, and its influence on the tradition of the novel in Western literature. Readings include Chariton's Chaereas and Callirhoe, Longus's Daphnis and Chloe, Heliodorus's Ethiopian Tale, Lucian's True History, Petronius's Satyricon, and Apuleius's Golden Ass. Concludes with the Gesta Romanorum and the influence of this tradition on later prose, such as Elizabethan prose romance.

Greek and Roman Mythology
CLASS-UA 404 Formerly Classical Mythology. Identical to RELST-UA 404. Offered every year. 4 points.
Discusses the myths and legends of Greek and Roman mythology and the gods, demigods, heroes, nymphs, monsters, and everyday mortals who played out their parts in this mythology. Begins with creation, as vividly described by Hesiod in the Theogony, and ends with the great Trojan War and the return of the Greek heroes, especially Odysseus. Roman myth is also treated, with emphasis on Aeneas and the foundation legends of Rome.

Greek and Roman History and Culture

Sexuality and Gender in Greece and Rome
CLASS-UA 210 Offered periodically. 4 points.
Deals with constructions of gender and experiences of sexuality in ancient Greece and Rome. Working with texts and representations from varied discourses such as medicine, law, literature, visual art, and philosophy, students explore the ways in which the ancient Greeks and Romans perceived their own bodies in such a way as to differentiate gender and understand desire. Also discusses how eroticism and gender support and subvert political and social ideologies.

Everyday Life in Ancient Rome
CLASS-UA 212 Offered periodically. 4 points.
Study of daily life as it was lived by the Romans in the period of the late Republic and early Empire: how they worked, worshipped, dressed, fed, and entertained themselves. Looks at questions of family life and social status, at rich and poor, at slaves and free, and at the lives of men, women, and children. Also considers marriage and divorce, crime and punishment, and law and property. All of these issues are examined primarily through original texts such as ancient documents, legal sources, and literary texts in which such Roman authors as Horace, Martial, and Juvenal describe their own lives and those of their contemporaries.

Greek History from the Bronze Age to Alexander
CLASS-UA 242 Identical to HIST-UA 200. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Until a few decades ago, Greek history began with Homer and dealt narrowly with the Greek world. Thanks to archaeology, the social sciences, and other historical tools, the chronological and geographical horizons have been pushed back. The history of the Greeks now starts in the third millennium B.C.E. and is connected to the civilization that lay to the east, rooted in Egypt and Mesopotamia. We trace Greek history from the Greeks' earliest appearance to the advent of Alexander.

The Greek World from Alexander to Augustus
CLASS-UA 243 Identical to HIST-UA 243. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Continuation of the history of ancient Greece from the age of Alexander the Great in the fourth century B.C.E. until Emperor Augustus consolidated the Roman hold over the eastern Mediterranean in the first century B.C.E. These three centuries saw the relationship between Rome and the Near East become most meaningful. This course examines Alexander's conquests, the states established by his successors (Ptolemies of Egypt and Seleucids of Syria), and the increasing intervention of Rome.

History of the Roman Republic
CLASS-UA 267 Identical to HIST-UA 205. Offered every other year. 4 points.
In the sixth century B.C.E., Rome was an obscure village. By the end of the fourth century B.C.E., Rome was master of Italy, and within another 150 years, it dominated almost all of the Mediterranean world. Then followed a century of unrest involving some of the most famous events and men—Caesar, Pompey, and Cato—in Western history. We survey this vital period with a modern research interpretation.

History of the Roman Empire
CLASS-UA 278 Identical to HIST-UA 206. Offered every other year. 4 points.
In the spring of 44 B.C.E., Julius Caesar was murdered by a group of senators disgruntled with his monarchic ways. However, Caesar's adoptive son and heir, Gaius Octavius, was quickly on the scene, and over the course of the next half-century managed to establish himself as Rome's first emperor. About three centuries later, Constantine the Great would rise to imperial power and with him came a new state religion—Christianity. We examine the social and political history of the Roman Empire from the time of Augustus to that of Constantine and also closely observe the parallel growth of Christianity.

History of Ancient Law
CLASS-UA 292 Offered periodically. 4 points.
Examines the development of law and legal systems and the relationships of these to the societies that created them, starting with some ancient Near Eastern systems and working down to the Roman period. The main focus is on the fully developed system of Roman law.

Art and Archaeology

Ancient Art at Risk: Conservation, Ethics, and Cultural Property
CLASS-UA 100 Prerequisite: permission of the instructor. 4 points.
Examines the environmental, material, social, and political forces that put ancient art at risk, including exposure to natural elements, acid rain, pollution, dam building, tourism, urban development, armed conflict, looting, theft, and the illicit trade in antiquities. Considers issues of conservation, preservation, and ethics, as well as authenticity and forgery, dating and provenance, and the sourcing of ancient materials. Reviews a range of applied technologies used in the analysis of ancient objects, including radiocarbon dating. Tracks developments in global cultural property laws, international conventions, and the repatriation of cultural materials.

The Parthenon and Its Reception: From Antiquity to the Present
CLASS-UA 150 Identical to ARTH-UA 150. Prerequisite: permission of the instructor. 4 points.
Traces the history of the Parthenon and its reception through its transformations from the temple of Athena, to Christian church, to mosque, to ruin, to icon of Western art and culture. The landscape, topography, and topology of the Athenian Acropolis are examined with an eye toward understanding the interrelation of place, myth, cult, and ritual. The architectural phases of the Parthenon, its program of sculptural decoration, its relationship to other monuments on the Acropolis, and the foundation myths that lie behind its meaning are scrutinized. Issues of reception, projection, and appropriation are considered, as well as interventions through conservation and reconstruction. Efforts to secure the repatriation of the Parthenon sculptures are reviewed within the broader context of global cultural heritage law and the opening of the New Acropolis Museum.

Introduction to Classical Archaeology: Constructions of the Greek and Roman Past
CLASS-UA 305 Offered periodically. 4 points.
An introduction to the archaeology of the Mediterranean world, examining the history and contexts of sites and monuments, as well as the methods, practices, and research models through which they have been excavated and studied. From Bronze Age palaces of the Aegean, to the Athenian Acropolis, to the cities of Alexander the Great, the Roman forum, Pompeii, and the Roman provinces, we consider the ways in which art, archaeology, architecture, everyday objects, landscape, urbanism, technology, and ritual teach us about ancient Greek and Roman societies. Special focus is placed on reception, the origins of archaeology in the Renaissance, 19th- to 20th-century humanistic and social scientific approaches, and postmodern social constructions of knowledge.

Ancient Art
CLASS-UA 310 Identical to ARTH-UA 3. No prerequisite. Offered periodically. 4 points.
Examines the arts of Egypt, Near East, Greece, and Rome within the contexts and diversities of their cultures. Special emphasis is placed on form, function, and style and on the significance of this material for later periods within the history of art. Major monuments and objects are studied within their full historiographical contexts, as well as within the frameworks of current archaeological and art historical theory and methods. Focus is placed on materiality, technique, authorship, patronage, and reception. Serves as a foundation for study of almost any branch of Western humanism.

Birth of Greek Art: From the Bronze Age to the Geometric Period
CLASS-UA 311 Identical to ARTH-UA 101. Prerequisite: Foundations of Art History (ARTH-UA 10) or a score of 5 on the AP Art History exam. Offered periodically. 4 points.
Surveys the art, archaeology, and culture of the Aegean Bronze Age and early Iron Age: from ancient Thera to the palace-based states of Minoan Crete and the Mycenaean Greek mainland, to developments within communities of the eighth century B.C.E. Architecture, wall painting, sculpture, ceramics, and narrative in early Greek art are among the topics examined, along with absolute and relative chronologies and the development of writing. Emphasis is placed on critical approaches to material culture within the contexts of religion, sociopolitical and economic organization, burial practices, trade networks, and interactions with neighboring cultures.

Archaic and Classical Art: Greek and Etruscan
CLASS-UA 312 Identical to ARTH-UA 102. Prerequisite: Foundations of Art History (ARTH-UA 10) or a score of 5 on the AP Art History exam. Offered periodically. 4 points.
Greek and Etruscan art and archaeology from the seventh century through the fourth century B.C.E., including the orientalizing and archaic styles, the emergence of the classical style, changes in art and life in the fourth century, and the impact of Macedonian court art before and during the time of Alexander the Great. Focuses on architecture, sculpture, and vase painting within their full social, religious, and political contexts, with careful attention to material, style, technique, function, iconography, authorship, and patronage. Special topics include the body, votive practice, cult statues, athletic statuary, architectural decoration, portraiture, myth, narrative, landscape, and aesthetics. Includes study of the Metropolitan Museum of Art collections.

Roman Art
CLASS-UA 313 Identical to ARTH-UA 103. No prerequisite. Offered periodically. 4 points.
Traces developments in art from the formation of the city of Rome in the early first millennium BCE to the sixth century C.E., when religion, style and imperial territory fundamentally shifted the trajectory of art and cultural interaction thereafter. Includes archaic and classical style art in Rome, the area of Rome’s expansion into Italy and the Mediterranean; interaction with Hellenistic art and culture in the east; and the art of the Roman Empire. Study of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Brooklyn Museum collections is essential.

Greek Painting: From Myth to Image
CLASS-UA 315 Prerequisite: Introduction to Classical Archaeology (CLASS-UA 305), or Archaeologies of Greece (CLASS-UA 352), or Introduction to Ancient Art (ARTH-UA 3, identical to CLASS-UA 301), or History of Western Art I (ARTH-UA 1), or permission of the instructor. 4 points.
From the house frescoes of Bronze Age Thera to the tomb paintings of Macedonia, from Minoan painted pottery to Athenian red-figured vases, Greek painting was a powerful aesthetic and narrative force within Greek art and culture.  Traces developments in monumental wall painting and the decoration of vases, with special emphasis on production, exchange, technique, style, authorship, narrative, context, function, and meanings. Issues of representation and signification are examined within the frameworks of a variety of critical approaches, including semiotics, structuralism, and formal analysis. Special emphasis on issues of reception from the Enlightenment to the present.

Archaeologies of Rome and the Empire
CLASS-UA 351 Offered periodically. 4 points.
Surveys the archaeologies of Rome and the Italian Peninsula, including the cities of Etruria and the Greek settlements of South Italy and Sicily, as well as the Roman provinces, with special focus on Asia and North Africa. Public and private buildings and monuments, including temples, marketplaces, triumphal arches, colonnaded streets, theatres amphitheatres, baths, water supply systems, luxury villas, apartment blocks, and gardens, are examined. From urban centers to rural landscapes, we consider Roman taste and technologies, identity and traditions, within their full social, cultural, religious, and economic contexts. With a focus on sculpture, wall painting, mosaics, and decorative arts, developments in Roman visual culture are tracked through the late antique period.

Archaeologies of Greece
CLASS-UA 352 Offered periodically. 4 points.
This survey of Greek landscapes, sites, monuments, and images presents the art and archaeology of the Greek world from the Neolithic to the late antique period. Architecture, painting, sculpture, and decorative arts are studied within their full social, cultural, and religious contexts. From the palaces of the Aegean Bronze Age; to the Panhellenic sanctuaries at Olympia, Delphi, Nemea, and Isthmia; to the city of Athens and the monuments of the Athenian Acropolis; to the great Hellenistic cities of Asia Minor, special focus is placed on landscape, myth, memory, materials, and ritual in shaping the visual culture of ancient Greece. The formation of the city-state and its political, economic, and religious institutions are explored within their full urban settings. The development and history of classical archaeology as a discipline are reviewed, along with issues of reception, connoisseurship, critical theory, and methods.

Greek Architecture
CLASS-UA 353 Identical to ARTH-UA 104. Prerequisite: Foundations of Art History (ARTH-UA 10) or History of Architecture from Antiquity to the Present (ARTH-UA 601) or a score of 5 on the AP Art History exam. Offered periodically. 4 points.
History of Greek architecture from the archaic through the Hellenistic periods (eighth to first centuries B.C.E.). Provides a chronological survey of the Greek architectural tradition from its Iron Age origins, marked by the construction of the first all-stone temples, to its radical transformation in the late Hellenistic period, most distinctively embodied in the baroque palace architecture reflected in contemporary theatre stage-buildings. The lectures, accompanying images, and readings present the major monuments and building types, as well as such related subjects as city planning and urbanism, building methods, and traditions of architectural patronage.

Roman Architecture
CLASS-UA 354 Identical to ARTH-UA 105. No prerequisite. Offered periodically. 4 points.
History of Roman architecture from the Hellenistic to the early Christian periods (first century B.C.E. to sixth century C.E.). Provides a chronological survey of Roman architecture from its early development against the background of the Greek and Etruscan traditions to the dramatic melding of the divergent trends of late antiquity in the great Justinian churches of Constantinople and Ravenna. The lectures, accompanying images, and readings present the major monuments and building types, as well as such related subjects as city planning and urbanism, Roman engineering, and the interaction between Rome and the provinces.

Philosophy, Religion, and Intellectual History

Ancient Political Theory
CLASS-UA 206 Offered periodically. 4 points.
Examines the foundation, interpretation, and modern reception of Athenian democracy and Roman republicanism. Readings include Plato's Republic, Thucydides's History of the Peloponnesian War, Aristotle's Politics, and Cicero's Republic and Laws.

Introduction to the New Testament
CLASS-UA 293 Identical to RELST-UA 302 and HBRJD-UA 22. Offered periodically. 4 points.
Introduces students to issues and themes in the history of the Jesus movement and early Christianity through a survey of the main texts of the canonical New Testament, as well as other important early Christian documents. Students are given the opportunity to read most of the New Testament text in a lecture-hall setting where the professor provides historical context and focuses on significant issues, describes modern scholarly methodologies, and places the empirical material within the larger framework of ancient history and the theoretical study of religion.

Ancient Religion: From Paganism to Christianity
CLASS-UA 409 Identical to RELST-UA 409. Offered periodically. 4 points.
The period from the beginnings of Greek religion until the spread of Christianity spans over 2,000 years and many approaches to religious and moral issues. We trace developments such as the Olympian gods of Homer and Hesiod; hero worship; public and private religion; views of death, the soul, and afterlife; Dionysus; Epicureanism; and Stoicism. Examines changes in Greek religion during the Roman republic and early empire and the success of Christians in converting pagans in spite of official persecution.

Martyrdom, Ancient and Modern
CLASS-UA 660 Identical to RELST-UA 660. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Examines the theory and practice of martyrdom in the West. Begins with a close study of the development of the martyrological discourse in classical, early Christian, early Jewish, and Muslim literature and culture. Also traces how the concept of martyrdom is deployed in modern culture in various phenomena, such as the "Columbine martyrs," "martyrdom operations" ("suicide bombers"), political martyrdom, and modern notions of holy war.

Greek Thinkers
CLASS-UA 700 Identical to PHIL-UA 122. Offered periodically. 4 points.
The origins of nonmythical speculation among the Greeks and the main patterns of philosophical thought, from Thales and other early speculators about the physical nature of the world through Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, the Epicureans, and the Neoplatonists.

Socrates and His Critics
CLASS-UA 701 Offered every other year. 4 points.
Despite having written nothing himself, Socrates gave his name to a distinctive form of philosophical literature, the Socratic discourse, and an approach to philosophical inquiry and instruction, the so-called Socratic method. In antiquity, he inspired Plato, Xenophon, the Stoics, the Skeptics, and the Cynics and drew criticism from Aristophanes; in modernity, his life both fascinated and repelled Nietzsche. We search for the "historical Socrates" and also consider how philosophy, in its move from its origins to ethics and political philosophy, essentially created him.

Virgins, Martyrs, Monks, and Saints: Early Christianity
CLASS-UA 846 Identical to RELST-UA 846. Offered periodically. Becker. 4 points.
See description under religious studies.

Engaging Early Christian Theology
CLASS-UA 856 Identical to RELST-UA 840. Offered periodically. Becker. 4 points.
See description under religious studies.

Special Courses

Special Topics in Classical Studies I, II, III
CLASS-UA 291, 293, 294 Usually assigns readings in English translation. Offered periodically. 2 or 4 points per term.
Seminar topics vary from semester to semester, although the focus is always on a limited aspect of life, history, literature, art, or archaeology of Greco- Roman antiquity. Topics from past semesters include the Trojan War, archaeology and pottery, Alexander the Great, the Etruscans, and crime and violence in the ancient world. Future topics may include Plato and Aristotle, ancient medicine, the Age of Pericles, the Age of Augustus, and Latin love poetry.

Senior Honors Seminar and Senior Honors Thesis
CLASS-UA 295, 297 Prerequisite: permission of the department. 2 or 4 points per term.

Internship
CLASS-UA 980, 981 Prerequisite: permission of the department. Open only to juniors and seniors. Offered every year. 2 or 4 points per term.
Internships with institutions such as the Brooklyn Museum and the American Numismatic Society afford students the opportunity to work outside the University in areas related to the field of classics. Requirements for completion of such internships include periodic progress reports and a paper describing the entire project.

Independent Study
CLASS-UA 997, 998 Prerequisite: permission of the department. 2 or 4 points per term.

Summer Study Away

Archaeological Fieldwork: Yeronisos Island Excavation Field School, Cyprus
Summer Session I. 4 points.
This five-week field practicum is held on Yeronisos Island, Cyprus, a Ptolemaic sanctuary of Apollo that flourished during the final years of Cleopatra's reign. Focuses on the aims, scope, and tools of field survey and archaeology; the practice of stratigraphic excavation; and ways of dealing with archaeological evidence. Field training includes surface survey and field walking; principles of stratigraphic excavation; keeping a field book; data entry and the Yeronisos Island Expedition Database; health and safety in the field and on the boat; closing the site for the season; and writing final field reports. Afternoon seminars cover pottery washing, conservation, and analysis; drawing stratigraphic sections; drawing pottery profiles, glass, and metal objects; object photography; the history of Cyprus from the Neolithic to Byzantine periods; cult and religion; Hellenistic pottery; and reading Greek inscriptions. Numerous field trips complement the excavation and classroom experiences.

Graduate Courses Open to Undergraduates

Courses in classics offered in the Graduate School of Arts and Science are open to all undergraduates who have reached the required advanced level of Greek or Latin language instruction.