Membership Matters. This publication is paid for in part by dues-paying members of the Indiana University Alumni Association. College of Arts & Sciences Alumni Association • Vol. 12 • Summer 2008 A year in Athens From the chair PhD candidate treasures Many reasons for time at American School celebration of Classical Studies As the articles in this newsletter attest, the past school year was a rich and busy one for by Greg Sears, PhD candidate our students, faculty, and alumni. As I look back on the time I spent at the Our undergraduate program continues American School of Classical Studies at to attract some of the best and brightest Athens last year, it is true enough to say students in the College of Arts and Sciences that it was one of the most important expe- — in fact, both 2008 winners of the Col- riences of my life, both professionally and lege’s Palmer-Brandon prize, the top award personally. It is far less easy, however, to for students in the humanities, are pursuing condense all the events of that hectic year majors within our department. Our gradu- into a few short paragraphs. ate program, which has produced many My first semester was marked by a flurry fine classicists since its inception, currently of journeys — to various parts of mainland has 30 students enrolled. They are a very Greece and a few islands here and there. active and engaging group, and continue to For each trip, individual students were as- win competitive scholarships — not least, signed a site, historical event, or person on Sue Curry, who won a Rome Prize for which to report. I remember one presenta- the 2008–09 year. And, speaking of Rome, tion on ancient medicine — appropriate Professor Eleanor Leach has won National for the sanctuary of Asclepios at Epidauros. Endowment for the Humanities support These reports gave us a chance to really dig to co-direct a seminar on “Identity and in to the archaeological scholarship. Some- Self-Representation in the Subcultures of times there was quite a lot to sift through; Ancient Rome” for college and university JD Denny/Hoosier Travelers sometimes it was largely in German. After teachers at the American Academy in Rome Athens, Greece the first report, though, I started to get this summer. With support from the College, we re- my bearings, and it became a much more faces and gouged eyes and genitalia of the cently launched www.indiana.edu/~classics. focused process as I delivered reports on statues, the course did start to make a lot The new Web site provides up-to-date the Chalcidian League; the Nymphaeum of sense, and it taught me a new way of information about all facets of our program of Herodes Atticus at Olympia; the church looking at these pieces: not focusing on and even a “giving to the department” link and mosaics of Hosios Loukas; the Diolkos the craft, the finished parts, but rather the on the home page, which facilitates online at the Isthmus of Corinth; and the Palaikas- broken parts that one is usually trained to donations (we may study the distant past, tro Hymn (Crete). “unsee.” but we’re now on the cutting edge of mod- During the winter term, we took classes At the same time that semester, we ern marketing!). offered by the Whitehead professors. I took trekked around Greece to various sites in On the Web site, you will also notice that “Christian Destruction of Antiquities” Athens and Attica. We were again given we welcomed six affiliated faculty members, with John Pollini, in which we investigated sites to report on, and I gave talks on the who are based in other departments at IU the telltale signs of, and rationale behind, Library of Hadrian in Athens and the Bloomington but work closely with the the deliberate defacement of sculptures or temple of Athena at Sounion. This last one Greek and Roman worlds: David Brakke inscriptions. This involved not only read- was particularly challenging, as I had to (religious studies); Bert Harrill (religious ing up on the history of early Christianity, fill up 20 minutes on a temple whose very studies); Eric Robinson (history); Julie but also several trips to museums and sites foundations had been removed in antiqui- Van Voorhis (history of art); Edward Watts (such as Eleusis and Corinth) to inspect ty! I had a lot of fun with that one, believe (history); and Steve Weitzman (religious the statuary personally. It seemed a bit of it or not. We also had the chance to visit a monomania with Pollini at first, but after studies). Be sure to check out the “affiliated a little time spent looking at the bashed (continued on page 6) (continued on page 6) Flipping the classics Part II: Remember the Titans? In hip-hop culture, “flipping” refers to reusing old material, with a different spin, in an original work. Remember the Titans? Not the movie with Titan, a gaunt icicle-limbed figure, Volcano forces, I suspect, by the important role of Denzel Washington, but the ancient Greek Titan, a mass of molten lava, and Tornado “elementals” in fantasy art, literature, and pre-Olympian generation of gods, children Titan, the familiar funnel cloud. games. “Elementals” are, naturally, crea- of Earth (Gaia) and Sky (Uranos). Can Titans also feature in the final episode of tures that have some relationship to the you? Remember them? Cronos and Rhea the television series Hercules: The Legendary classic four elements of earth, air, fire, and are parents of the older Olympians, Zeus, Journeys. Helios and Oceanos are dim-wit- water. Elementals is itself the title of a comic Hera, and company. As for the rest, some ted giants, colored red-orange (sun) and book series which featured a team of four — Oceanus, Hyperion (father of Helios), blue (water) respectively, who are exploited humans, each of whom has been granted Mnemosyne (mother of the Muses) — are by Hercules’ nemesis Ares. These Titans an elemental power. Morningstar’s abilities, fairly memorable, others — Thea, Phoebe, have been inadvertently freed from long for example, include pyrokinesis. Vortex Crius, Coeus — not so much, and all of imprisonment, but as in Disney’s film, a can fly and direct wind-blasts. Fathom can them are eclipsed by their offspring. What villain tried to use them as the agents of his morph entirely into sentient water (rather do Titans look like? Could you describe vengeance on the Olympians. As “elemen- like Oceanos in Legendary Journeys). And them to a police sketch-artist? Pick them out tals,” they morph between human and natu- Monolith, as his name suggests, can become of a line-up? Not very distinctive, are they, ral form (much as ancient Greek nymphs a huge stone/earth golem who bears a especially in comparison to their much more and river-gods do), a fact which Hercules striking resemblance to Disney’s Rock Titan. vividly individualized Olympian successors? exploits to defeat them; when he turns them Elementals also appear in such games as the Clear exceptions are the second-generation on each other, they evaporate as steam, re- classic Dungeons and Dragons, and World Titans Prometheus, chained to a rock and calling Hera’s use of Hephaestus in the Iliad of Warcraft. The latter features “elemental condemned to daily deliverings, and his to rescue Achilles when the Scamander River lieutenants” quite similar to Disney’s Titans brother Atlas, staggering under the weight is about to drown him. — Ragnora the Firelord, Therazane the of the world. As children of earth and sky, it seems Stonemother, Al’ Akir the Windlord, and In popular culture, however, Titans have logical that Titans should be depicted as Neptulon the Tidehunter. made a colorful comeback. They figure “elementals,” and yet the anthropomorphiz- The ancient Greek Titans feature promi- prominently in the video game God of War ing Greeks did not explore the possibilities nently in the creation narrative of Hesiod’s II, where they are behemoths, bulked-up of depicting them as more primitive, by con- Theogony, but even there they make up a but anthropomorphic, like the game’s pro- trast, with the more-evolved Olympians and colorless collective. A Titanomachy/Gi- tagonist Kratos himself. My favorite recent vastly larger than puny mortals. One of the antomachy is depicted in the powerfully Titanic avatars, however, appear in the Dis- famous metopes from the Temple of Zeus at energetic reliefs of the Hellenistic Great ney-animated Hercules. As you may recall, Olympia, for example, represents the Hera- Altar of Pergamum, but there too they are in that movie Hades frees the Titans from cles’ Labor of the Apples of the Hesperides not easily distinguishable from one another. Tartarus and unleashes them on Olympus with figures of the goddess Athena, the titan In the works of our contemporary pop cul- as part of his takeover plan, which is foiled Atlas, and the hero Heracles; these three ture writers and artists, however, who are no by Hercules in the film’s climactic reprise very different kinds of beings are of equal longer bound to Greek anthropomorphism, of the ancient Titanomachy. These Titans size, and the hero is distinguished from the these primal beings have been resurrected in are conceived as gigantic personifications of Titan only by props from the Labor. vividly and imaginatively allegorical terms. powerful destructive natural forces: Rock Popular culture has been influenced in — Professor Betty Rose Nagle Titan is a two-headed pile of boulders, Ice its re-imagining of the Titans as elemental Paper presentations Erin Taylor, “The Bastard and the City: ------------- “Fine Art Museum, Number Euripides’ Hippolytus as a Social and Sexual 2000.342.319: An Imperial Bronze Coin CAMWS papers 2008 Outcast” and its Background.” Evan F.