Spinning fates and the song of the loom : the use of textiles, clothing and cloth production as metaphor, symbol and narrative device in Greek and Latin literature

Format:

Book

Language:

English

Imprint:

Oxford ; Havertown, PA : Oxbow Books, 2016 and ©2016

Subject:

Weaving in literature
Clothing and dress in literature
Classical literature - History and criticism

Contributor:

Fanfani, Giovanni, editor
Harlow, Mary, editor
Nosch, Marie-Louise, editor
Center for Tekstilforskning (Denmark)

ISBN:

9781785701603 and 1785701606

Series:

Ancient textiles series

Description:

iv, 355 pages : illustrations ; 26 cm

Bibliographic Note:

Includes bibliographical references and indexes

Contents:

Of metaphorical matrices and their networks : generally speaking, and in the field of textile activities / Nicole Guilleux -- Indo-Iranian weavers of old and new hymns / Miguel Ángel Andrés-Toledo -- Clothed in shamelessness, shrouded in grief : the role of 'garment' metaphors in ancient Greek concepts of emotion / Douglas L. Cairns -- The robes of Alcman's and Pindar's Parthenoi / Thomas R.P. Coward -- (B)orders in ancient weaving and archaic Greek poetry / Ellen Harlizius-Klück and Giovanni Fanfani -- The curse as a garment in Greek tragedy / Judith Fletcher -- Textile symbolism and the 'wealth of the earth' : creation, production and destruction in the 'tapestry scene' of Aeschylus' Oresteia (Ag. 905-978) / Emmanuela Bakola -- The cloak of Deianeira or the shirt of Nessus? / Andrea Doyle -- Weaving for the people not a Peplos, but a Chlaina : wool-working, peace, and nuptial sex in Aristophanes' Lysistrata / Jennifer C. Swalec -- Clothing the self in metaphor : the Spartan Phoinikis as sign of double identity / Luca Sansone di Campobianco -- Erinna's loom / Camillo Neri -- Textual and textile poetics in context : Callimachus' 4th Iamb and Theocritus' Idyll 28 / Maria Papadopoulou -- Patterning poetry : weaving and the construction of didactic in Lucretius' De Rerum Natura, Book 1 / Ann Glennie -- Life hanging by a thread : the weaving metaphor in Lucretius / Matthew Johncock -- Colchis, wool and the spinning fates in Catullus Carmen 64 / Carmen Alfaro -- From Calathos to Carmen : metapoetics in the story of the Daughters of Minyas (Ovid Metamorphoses 4) / Magdalena Ohrman -- Redressing epic : blood and gold on the cloak of Polyneices in Statius' Thebaid / Danielle Frisby -- Lexical expressions of the texture of fabrics in Homeric poetry / Isabelle Boehm -- Textiles and clothing imagery in Greek and Latin literature : structuring, ordering and dissembling / Giovanni Fanfani, Mary Harlow and Marie-Louise Nosch

Summary:

"Textile imagery is pervasive in classical literature. An awareness of the craft and technology of weaving and spinning, of the production and consumption of clothing items, and of the social and religious significance of garments is key to the appreciation of how textile and cloth metaphors work as literary devices, their suitability to conceptualise human activities and represent cosmic realities, and their potential to evoke symbolic associations and generic expectations. Spanning mainly Greek and Latin poetic genres, yet encompassing comparative evidence from other Indo-European languages and literatures, these 18 chapters draw a various yet consistent picture of the literary exploitation of the imagery, concepts and symbolism of ancient textiles and clothing. Topics include refreshing readings of tragic instances of deadly peploi and fatal fabrics situate them within a Near Eastern tradition of curse as garment, explore female agency in the narrative of their production, and argue for broader symbolic implications of textile-making within the sphere of natural wealth The concepts and technological principles of ancient weaving emerge as cognitive patterns that, by means of analogy rather than metaphor, are reflected in early Greek mathematic and logical thinking, and in archaic poetics. The significance of weaving technology in early philosophical conceptions of cosmic order is revived by Lucretius' account of atomic compound structure, where he makes extensive use of textile imagery, whilst clothing imagery is at the centre of the sustained intertextual strategy built by Statius in his epic poem, where recurrent cloaks activate a multi-layered poetic memory"-- Provided by publisher

Collection:

BGC Monograph Stacks

Call Number:

PA3015.W48 S65 2016

Available

c.1