Literature and History

The Roman client king Herod (c. 73-4 BCE) ruled Judea for thirty years. Learn about his rule, and the political and religious climate of Judea just before the birth of Christ. Episode 76 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-076/ Episode 76 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-076-judea-under-herod Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ijfD3Qn-Vk Bonus Content: https://lite...

A retrospective on the material we've covered thus far as we head into Early Christianity and Late Antiquity, plus some announcements. Episode 75 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-075/ Episode 75 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-075-dusk-and-starlight Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/literatureandhistory...

Marcus Aurelius'  Meditations  shows an intelligent emperor coping with the realities of an empire buckling under its own weight. Episode 74 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-074/ Episode 74 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-074-marcus-aurelius Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Y5ol6vZn7o Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon: http...

Apuleius' The Golden Ass is Ancient Rome's only novel to survive in full – a strange, often disturbing fairytale that had a huge influence on posterity. Episode 73 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-073/ Episode 73 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-073-the-golden-ass Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGKpv3xws8E Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus...

Juvenal's Satires, produced some time in the decades around 100 CE, mercilessly mock some of the more colorful aspects of Roman life. Episode 72 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-072/ Episode 72 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-072-bread-and-circuses Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X-4WYv5JIVU Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreo...

Statius'  Thebaid , Books 7-12. Six hundred years after Aeschylus, Statius once again brought the Theban epic to a thunderous conclusion. Episode 71 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-071/ Episode 71 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-071-the-gods-depart Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPrGgcJbnx8 Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patre...

Statius'  Thebaid , Books 1-6. This epic is hardly ever read or taught these days, but in 100 CE, it was as famous as anything in the Roman world. Episode 70 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-070/ Episode 70 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-070-romes-forgotten-epic Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/literat...

Petronius' Satyricon is a contender for history's first novel, a picaresque filled with sex, misadventures, and details about daily life. Episode 69 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-069/ Episode 69 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-069-romes-comic-novel Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9Ud_Qzye5Y Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Pat...

Seneca's  Phaedra  (c 50s CE) is the story of an illicit passion, a stoic cautionary tale and simultaneously vivid character study. Episode 68 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-068/ Episode 68 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-068-love-means-sin Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=am-Ga9QV05g Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon: htt...

Seneca's  Thyestes , probably written around the 50s CE, is one of the most horrifying and influential plays ever written. Episode 67 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-067/ Episode 67 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-067-jaws-dripping-blood Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFcrJGlJbHI Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon: https:/...

Stoicism, starting with Zeno in 300 BCE, was a popular philosophy by the lifetime of Seneca, perhaps even making its way into the New Testament. Episode 66 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-066/ Episode 66 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-066-stoicism-seneca-st-paul Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Azc7u5st9jo Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonu...

Seneca the Younger (c 1 BCE-65 CE) practiced the philosophy of stoicism over the course of several volatile, and very different imperial reigns. Episode 65 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-065/ Episode 65 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-065-seneca-and-the-julio-claudians Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jW4K7Ij-5fE Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.c...

For mysterious reasons, in 8 CE, Ovid was exiled from Rome. Ovid's last works were composed an ocean away from Italy, on the western shore of the Black Sea. Episode 64 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-064/ Episode 64 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-064-ovids-exile Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bj3nfzO2ZHM Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonu...

Ovid's  Metamorphoses , Books 11-15. The vast Metamorphoses draws to a resonant conclusion as Ovid brings his great poem to Rome itself. Episode 63 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-063/ Episode 63 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-063-all-is-in-flux Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMGX0cwIV2A Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon...

Ovid's  Metamorphoses , Books 6-10. In the middle portion of Ovid's great poem, psychological transformations become as gripping as physical ones. Episode 62 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-062/ Episode 62 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-062-a-curious-passion Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXZIl6DL-gY Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-co...

This book influenced thousands of years of later literature, and remains one of our best source texts on classical mythology. Episode 61 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-061/ Episode 61 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-061-changes-of-shape Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/literatureandhistory YouTube: ht...

Ovid's  Art of Love  is ancient Rome's manual of seduction – a record of the steamier side of the Augustan Age. Episode 60 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-060/ Episode 60 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-060-how-to-make-love-to-a-roman Song https://youtu.be/kfx-sjGorVM Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/l...

The love poetry of Ovid (43 BCE-17 CE) was standard Latin curriculum for hundreds of years, but it was also the product of a very specific historical moment. Episode 59 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-059/ Episode 59 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-059-early-ovid Song https://youtu.be/vE1jkidRthY Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patre...

Propertius (c. 50-1 BCE) took the Latin elegiac form to new heights of complexity and passion, even weaving subtle satire throughout his work. Episode 58 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-058/ Episode 58 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-058-she-caught-me-with-her-eyes Song https://youtu.be/BHEYVxqdztE Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Pat...

Virgil's  Aeneid , Books 10-12. The end of Rome's great epic is about something Romans of Virgil's generation knew very well indeed. War. Episode 57 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-057/ Episode 57 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-057-the-world-grows-dim-and-black Song https://youtu.be/WRZbUYwdTR0 Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreo...

Virgil's Aeneid, Books 7-9. Aeneas' arrival in Italy begins auspiciously enough, but soon things take a turn for the worse. Episode 56 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-056/ Episode 56 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-056-i-shall-release-hell Song https://youtu.be/bjqsZbGL8oM Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon: https://www.patreon....

Virgil's  Aeneid , Books 4-6. The story of Dido and Aeneas, and his subsequent journey to the underworld, is the heart of Rome's most famous poem. Episode 55 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-055/ Episode 55 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-055-among-the-shades Song https://youtu.be/Uybu1B2qq9o Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-content Patreon: h...

Virgil's  Aeneid , Books 1-3. The  Aeneid  is Rome's great epic. Learn the story of its first three books, and when and why Virgil began writing it. Episode 54 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-054/ Episode 54 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-054-out-of-troy Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcJgKUMS8k8 Bonus Content: https://literatureandhistory.com/bonus-conten...

Virgil's  Georgics  (c. 29 BCE), or agriculture poems, show the poet reaching his full strength as a writer, and using an old form to analyze the history around him. Episode 53 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-053/ Episode 53 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-053-then-came-hard-iron Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzNAutei6wA Bonus Content: https://literaturean...

Virgil's  Eclogues  (c. 38 BCE) are poems about country life. Far from being innocent celebrations, though, they are often cryptic, and filled with a haunting darkness. Episode 52 Quiz https://literatureandhistory.com/quiz-052/ Episode 52 Transcription: https://literatureandhistory.com/episode-052-white-flowers-die Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZOiQL5aJAA Bonus Content: https://literaturea...