Just a reminder that the deadline for applications for The Desmond Conacher Scholarship is 31 March.  For information, visit http://www.unbf.ca/arts/CLAS/econache.html.

Junior Essay Contest Results
Again this year, I did not receive as many essays as I would have liked, but those that I did receive were all of excellent quality. The three winners stood out because they went beyond a solid understanding of the ancient source in question and adapted it into the modern vernacular in interesting ways.

The winners are:
First Prize
Marc Ducusin (University of Winnipeg) for “Adapting The Brothers Menaechmus.”  This was a condensed version of the play set in a 1920s jazz milieu.

Second Prize
Karyn Kibsey (University of Winnipeg) for “Odysseus: A Game of EPIC Proportions.”

Third Prize
Sarah Snyder (University of Alberta) for “A Curious Reconciliation. Late-Night Dialogue with Xenophette and Platona: On Embodied Philosophy in the Symposia.”

Senior Essay Contest Results
As in other years, I was looking for essays which were well written, made good use of both ancient and modern sources, and had an original contribution to make.

The winners are:
First Prize
Jennifer Phenix (Brock University) for “Helen as Analogy and Antithesis for Penelope in Homer’s Odyssey”

Second Prize
Michael Griffin (University of British Columbia) for “The Apodeictic Structure of Narrative in Herodotos, Book V”

Third Prize
Andrew Mason (University of Toronto) for “Libertas, Patronage and Dominatio: Political Life and Freedom under Augustus”

Honourable Mentions
Andrew Snelgrove (Memorial University of Newfoundland) for “Catullus 32: The Insolvable Problem of Ipsitilla”
Sean Dermot Lehane (University of Toronto) for “A History of Troy: Combining Archaeology and Hittite Documents”
Nancie Rideout (Memorial University of Newfoundland) for “Studies in Subjectivity: Plutarch’s Portrayals of Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar”

The Department of Classics at Queen’s University invites applications for a three-year, non-renewable, full-time position for the period July 1, 2004 to June 30, 2007.  Applicants will have their Ph.D. in hand and be able to teach both languages at all levels of the undergraduate and graduate program.  Applicants must also be experienced in teaching Classical Studies courses and demonstrate ambitious research interests. Area of specialization is open.  Rank and salary will be commensurate with qualifications and experience.  The salary floor for Assistant Professor is $50,371.00 during 2003/04.

Applications should include a full curriculum vitae, a statement of research and teaching interests, and a sample of writing.  These materials and three confidential letters of reference should be sent to Professor Dietmar K. Hagel, Head, Department of Classics, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario K7L 3N6.  Phone (613) 533-2745; fax (613) 533-6739; email <classics@post.queensu.ca>.  Consideration of applications begins February 16, 2004.

Queen’s University is committed to an employment equity programme and encourages applications from all qualified women and men, including visible minorities, aboriginal people, persons with disabilities, gay men and lesbians.  All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply; however, Canadian citizens and Permanent Residents will be given priority.  Academic staff members at Queen’s University are governed by a collective agreement, the details of which are posted at http://www.queensu.ca/qfa.

Concordia University presents an international conference on the Diniacopoulos Collection, a group of 75 Greek and Roman antiquities, on February 4-5, 2004.  The artifacts in the Diniacopoulos collection represent only a portion of their original holdings, but they nonetheless show wide geographical and chronological spans. Material from ancient cultures of the central and western Mediterranean--Egypt and Syria to Greece, Italy, and Cyprus—date from the Late Bronze Age through the Late Roman period of the 3rd-4th centuries C.E.  Artifact types include Greek vases and iconography, Greek, Roman, and Egyptian sculpture, Greek epigraphy, and the minor arts, such as terracotta figurines, small-scale bronzes, and glass.

These artifacts will be exhibited, in conjunction with the conference, alongside the permanent holdings of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts beginning February 4, 2004.

For more information on this conference, please see the conference website: http://modlang-phoneticc.concordia.ca/diniacopoulos/index.html or contact Dr. Jane Francis <janef@alcor.concordia.ca>.

Programme
Wednesday, February 4, 2004  Concordia University, Hall Building, 1455 de Maisonneuve Blvd. W. (Room 767)

Welcome
9:15 Dr. Frederick Lowy (Rector, Concordia University)

The Diniacopoulos Family and their Collection: Chair: Jane Francis (Concordia University)
 9:30 Dr. Clarence Epstein (Concordia University): A Timeless Classic: The Story of the Diniacopoulos Family Collection
10:00 Hélène Sicotte (National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa): Ars Classica et le milieu des galeries d’art, à Montréal, dans les années1950
10:30  Efie Gavaki (Concordia University, Montreal): The Socio-historical context of the Diniacopoulos Family in Quebec-Canada

11:00  Coffee/Tea Break

Greek Vase Painting I: Chair: Beaudoin Caron (Université de Montréal)
11:30 Carolyn Grainger (Queen’s University, Kingston): A Loutrophoros from the Diniacopoulos Collection: Acquisition and Attribution
12:00 Paul Denis (Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto): Scenes from a Greek Wedding
12:30 Pierre Bonnechere (Université de Montréal): La libation sur les vases: problemes d’interpretation

13:00 Lunch Break

Greek Vase Painting II: Chair: Clarence Epstein (Concordia University)
14:00 John H. Oakley (College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA): Classical Athenian Ritual Vases from the Diniacopoulos Collection
15:00 Karl Kilinski II (Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX): Attic Influences on Boiotian Cups

Maxwell-Cummings Auditorium, Musée des beaux-arts
 16:00 Keynote Lecture: Duane Roller (Ohio State University): Thirty-five years of work at Tanagra in Boiotia

Thursday, February 5th, 2004
Concordia University, Hall Building (Room 767)

Sculpture I: Chair: George W.M. Harrison (Concordia University)
9:00 Carol Mattusch (George Mason University, Washington DC): Aspects of the Metal Objects in the Diniacopoulos Collection
9:30 Eléni P. Zoïtopoulou (Musée Redpath, Université McGill): Écho du passé à travers les beautés muettes
10:00 Jane Francis (Concordia University, Montreal): Birth and Death on an Attic Stele
10:30 John M. Fossey (Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal and McGill University): A Family of Lamptrai, Attike

11:00 Coffee/Tea Break

Varia: Chair: Kathleen MacDonald (Concordia University)
11:30 Clifford Patterson (Concordia University, Montreal): Three Stirrup Jars and Mykenaian Civilisation
12:00 Beaudoin Caron (Université de Montréal, Montreal): La verrerie antique de la collection Diniacopoulos

12:30 Lunch Break

Sculpture II: Chair: Duane Roller (Ohio State University)
13:30 Ann-Marie Knoblauch (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg VA): Votives and Votaries in Ancient Kypros
14:00 Marie-Odile Jentel (Université Laval, Québec): Un hermes égyptisant en ‘giallo antico,’  Presented by Gisèle Deschênes-Wagner (Université Laval, Québec)

Conservation and Reconstruction: Chair: John M. Fossey (Musée des beaux-arts and McGill University)
14:30 Krysia Spirydowicz (Queen’s University, Kingston): The Conservation of Ancient Vases from the Diniacopoulos Collection
15:00  Janis Mandrus (Queen’s University, Kingston) and Guy Godin (National Research Council of Canada): Virtual Reconstruction of Vases using Active Optical 3-D Imaging

15:30 Reception (Room 1053)

In spite of the fundamental importance of oaths across an enormously wide range of social interactions throughout the ancient Greek world, there has been very little research dedicated to this topic. This
international conference is designed to remedy this omission and to kick off a major project on the theme intended to last several years. More than twenty papers will be presented on many aspects of the oath in Greek-speaking societies in antiquity, including the employment and functions of oaths in political, military, juridical, cultic and wider social contexts, their deployment in literary texts, theoretical discussion of them, and developments in oath practices resulting from Greeks' contacts with other cultural and religious traditions.

Speakers:
Arlene Allan: The broken oath in Euripides' Medeia
Evangelia Anagnostou-Laoutides: A Hellenistic oath: a Near Eastern spell?
Mary Bachvarova: Oath and allusion in Alcaeus 129
Gabriel Bodard: Self-cursing: on the effectiveness of oaths
Sarah Bolmarcich: Oaths in Greek international relations
Edwin Carawan: "Oaths and covenants" and contract
David Carter: Did a Greek oath guarantee a claim right?
Serena Connolly: The Greek oath in the Roman world
Judith Fletcher: The oath theme in the Oresteia
Michael Gagarin: The oath in Athenian law
Myrto Gkarani: Cosmological oaths: Empedocles and Lucretius
Manfred Horstmanshoff: The promise of silence in the Hippocratic oath
Leah Johnson: The oath of the Athenian boule and the fifth-century coinage decree
Vassiliki Kambourelli: Reported oaths in Sophokles' Philoktetes
Bonnie MacLachlan: Epinician swearing
David Mirhady: The dikast's oath
Jonathan Perry: Oath-taking, cheating and women in Greek athletics
Monica Ressel Giordani: Erinyes, Horkos and Styx: the underworld on earth
Julia Shear: The oath and law of Demophantos and Athenian identity
Alan Sommerstein: Cloudy swearing - when is an oath not an oath?
Tarik Wareh: The Great Oath of Syracuse as a hierophantic performance

To register for the conference, visit
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/classics/news/oath_registration.phtml, or contact <sheila.jones@nottingham.ac.uk>, telephone:  +44 (0)115 9514383.

The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies has agreed to fund eight bursaries for young researchers (postgraduates and recent PhDs) attending the conference. For information and application form, please go to http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/classics/news/oath_bursary.phtml .

Conference organizers:
Prof. Alan H. Sommerstein
Department of Classics
University of Nottingham
University Park
Nottingham NG7 2RD
UK
<alan.sommerstein@nottingham.ac.uk>

Prof. Judith Fletcher
Department of Archaeology and Classical Studies
Wilfrid Laurier University
Alvin Woods 3-205
Waterloo, Ontario
Canada
N2L 3C5
<jfletche@wlu.ca>

Keynote Address: Dr Chris Simpson, Department of Archaeology and  Classical Studies, Wilfrid Laurier University
“Where Is the Parthian? The Prima Porta Statue of Augustus Re-Visited”

The Department of Classics & Ancient History, University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, New Brunswick, invites the submission of abstracts for papers to be presented at the UNB Ancient History Colloquium, 26-27 March 2004.  This year’s colloquium will focus on the Principate of Augustus, and we invite papers on all aspects of this theme, including art, literature, propaganda, politics, warfare, prosopography.  Papers should be 20-30 minutes in length.  Abstracts should reach the committee by 31 January 2004, and should be sent to Dr William Kerr <wkerr@unb.ca> or to Dr John Geyssen <jgeyssen@unb.ca>, or the following address: Department of Classics and Ancient History, University of New Brunswick, Box 4400, Fredericton, NB, Canada E3B 5A3.

Casler, Dr. Frederick Howard passed away suddenly at his home in St. Catharines on Monday January 4, 2004. He was born near Ilion, New York, November 14, 1940, the oldest child of Howard Frederick and Eva Naomi Davis Casler. He is survived by his mother Eva Hopkins of Austin Texas, his brothers Burton D. of New Haven, Conn.; Edwin J. of Austin; William D. of Decatur, Georgia; Harry J. of Austin; and sister Janet C Hull of Milford, N.Y.

Prof. Casler won a rare scholarship that took him from a farm in the Mohawk Valley to Columbia University, where he obtained his B.A. and M.A in 1962 and 1963. He won a Founder?s Award when he finished his Ph. D. at New York University in 1971 in Classics. After teaching at the University of Connecticut, he came to the Classics Dept. at Brock University in 1968, specializing in the teaching of Latin and Greek. He produced and directed several plays in Greek and English for the students at Brock. Blessed with rare gifts for languages, he had only recently completed a three volume work analyzing over eighty ancient, exotic and modern languages, and was beginning to concentrate on the Coptic dialects of ancient Egyptian. An early convert to computers via languages such as Basic, he became adept at creating his own computer fonts to print the various scripts.

His other life-long interest was music. He sang in the choirs at the Columbia College Chapel, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, and St. Bartholomew?s in New York City. As a member of the American Guild of Organists, he loved organ music from sacred to theatre, and even produced his own arrangements on CDs, combining the organ and computer.

To commemorate his life a requiem high mass will be celebrated at St. Barnabas Anglican Church, 31 Queenston St, St. Catharines, at 10:00 a.m. Saturday January 17, 2004, and his ashes will be interred at a later date at Miller’s Mills Cemetery, New York. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Brock University Frederick H. Casler Scholarship Fund.