I’ve just learned that Michael Putnam has died. What a giant to pass from the earth. What an impact he made while here. I learned so much from him in graduate school.

No, I don't want your generative summary, I don't want your overview, your simplification, your AI assistant, your AI research tool, your Co-Pilot chat, for the love of all that is holy please let me read my stuff in peace

All famines are man-made, all famines are political. Historians of empire and humanitarianism have known this forever. Gaza is not starving, Gaza is being starved, by Israel, and this starvation is enabled by our government and by every other government that does not step in to force food and aid.

Publication day! Just in time for essential summer reading (preferably by a pool with a cool drink). @bloomsburyclass.bsky.social @openthanatology.bsky.social www.bloomsbury.com/uk/roman-mou...

New issue of Classical Philology Vol. 120, No. 3 (2025) www.journals.uchicago.edu/toc/cp/2025/... @chicagojournals.bsky.social

Elephant hawk moth in the garden!!!!🦋💕 I’ve always wanted to see one in person - the pink is SO vivid

Peveril of the Peak, Manchester, painting by Yvette Earl. #WomensArt #NorthernArt.

berry proud of our crop #tinyjoys

It's going to be a warm few days in the UK. BL Harley 3469; Splendor Solis (an alchemical treatise); 1582; Germany; f.33v

Do I know anyone who has used the Archivio della Congregazione degli Affari Ecclesiastici Straordinari (and would be happy to offer some pointers on so doing)? Grazie mille!

The Next Ovid(s) | ScuolaNormaleSuperiore www.sns.it/it/evento/ne...

Please sign if you haven't already chng.it/BLjHGkMd22

A nifty, hungry feline in Boulogne-sur-Mer. Bibliothèque municipale des Annonciades, Ms. 45.

Close to TWO THOUSAND academics and educators say TRANS RIGHTS NOW. (Sorry if you've seen this (and the historians' letter!) too many times. The lack of an algorithm means we have to keep reposting it to catch people, and this really matters.)

University of Manchester's Whitworth Park student residences, known as 'the Toblerones', 1976 (MMU archive).

Buon 25 Aprile! Buona festa della Liberazione! By @maurobiani.bsky.social

Breaking News: Pope Francis is dead at 88. The first Latin American and Jesuit pontiff, he championed a more inclusive Catholic Church.

Happy to share a review I wrote for Classical Review of a compelling edited vol. on ancient 'love’ letters, curated by @owenhodkinson.bsky.social and A.T. Drago. The collection offers a nuanced exploration of the emotional textures of epistolary writing in antiquity. Here: doi.org/10.1017/S000...

It's one of the greatest things I have ever seen.

Dissertation season is starting 😬 so we are repeating our researcher training event: An Intro to Essential Resources for #Classics & #Archaeology Research 🏺 🗓️ 23 April, 2pm (London, BST) 📍 Online via Zoom Share, especially w/ UG & PG students! Info+Register: ics.sas.ac.uk/events/intro...

“…GenAI training is the absolute opposite of this. Your work is not being read in search of ideas or emotions or experiences that will be unique to reading that author and that text; on the contrary, any such uniqueness is to be filtered out or ground down into homogeneous sludge”

New 5-week course 'The Origins of Rome' by Professor Tim Cornell Starts Wednesday 2 April, 6pm-7.30pm (UK time) with online recordings available. More information and registration at: www.hellenicandromanlibrary.org/Events/Event... Image: 'Aeneas fleeing from Troy' painted by Pompeo Batoni.

One signature to go to 5,000.

Fog in Manchester turns day into night, 1.30pm in Oxford Street, November 17, 1953. (Mirrorpix/Manchester Evening News).

Please sign and share this student-led petition to save Ancient History here at Cardiff University www.change.org/p/save-cardi...

I will not post much on this topic, but I'm the Head of Ancient History and Religion at Cardiff University. Our staff and students are nothing short of amazing. Those who know me will know that I'm doing all I can.

www.cambridge.org/core/books/c... New Catullus 64 accessible online

Im sorry to hear of the loss of Fred Ahl today. A lion in the field of Roman literature, he as also a devoted teacher of undergraduates both in Latin and in translation. My own work in Latin lit was impacted at the early age of 18 by his teaching, in particular my love of Seneca.

"Nichts gehört der Vergangenheit an. Alles ist Gegenwart und kann wieder Zukunft werden." - Fritz Bauer, hessischer Generalstaatsanwalt und Ankläger im Auschwitz-Prozess #NieWiederIstJetzt, heute.

This episode has been released today! Listen to me with host @k8lister.bsky.social on the history of love letters and erotic letters, primarily in antiquity but looking at modern developments too. The episode is titled "The Origins of Sexting": listener discretion is advised!

Delighted to share Honor Faughnan's new article exploring the impact of the Aratean tradition on late Republican and Augustan poetry. This article stems from her undergraduate research at Galway Classics—a fantastic achievement! www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/epdf/10....

Hello! My new article is now out in Arethusa: '(Re)Producing The Egyptian: Arboricultural Cultivation Of The Roman State In Lucan’s Civil War'. I consider the epic's tree imagery as metaphor for the Roman state, pointing to the protagonists' attempts at cultivation & propagation.

Jan 17 online (Lille 12pm EST/6pm CET) International Ovidian Society (IOS) Online Discussion of Recent Books on #Ovid - Session 4: Dr Simona Martorana (ANU) on _Seeking the Mothers in Ovid's Heroides_ (Cornell 2024) - commentator Prof Carole Newlands. Zoom ovidiansociety.org/events/

Please share if you can! Deadline is approaching for our panel at the CCC and we look forward to hearing your thoughts on how to unveil of the Optimus Princeps! Feel free to get in touch if you have questions 🙂

www.theguardian.com/education/20... A letter to the Guardian on axing of Latin Excellence Programme in schools

New issue Arethusa Vol. 57, No. 3 (2024) muse.jhu.edu/issue/53371 @projectmuse.bsky.social @hopkinspress.bsky.social Visions of Egypt in Imperial Latin Literature @elainam42.bsky.social @julesadv.bsky.social @esthermeijer.bsky.social

Our special Arethusa issue, 'Visions of Egypt in Imperial Latin Literature', co-edited with the marvellous @elainam42.bsky.social, is now out. Grateful to our contributors @esthermeijer.bsky.social, Eleni Manolaraki and Bruce Gibson, and the Arethusa editorial team. muse.jhu.edu/issue/53371?...

Gisèle Pelicot stood with her head held high in a courtroom in Avignon, France, on Thursday as the verdicts in the four-month rape trial of her ex-husband and 50 other men were read. Her image has become a symbol of female strength around the world, our critic writes. Read more: nyti.ms/49MwR3U

Today more than ever ✊

historians:

Two new important publications on Statius’ Achilleis now available @joliheroics.bsky.social

New blogpost: deevybee.blogspot.com/2024/11/why-...

Had a bit of a shock when I googled Richard Heinze. I'll make sure to remember to add 'Epische Technik' next time.

"One of the last questions...put to her had to do with her choosing to keep the Pelicot name despite her divorce. [...] She wanted her grandchildren to be proud of it, because it would be associated with her and this trial, rather than her ex-husband's crimes" Unending respect for Gisèle Pelicot.

Birthday week is here! 🎉

Yet again, I see that People Magazine is too cowardly to admit who the real Sexiest Man Alive is:

A unique centre for undergraduate education - small, incredibly supportive, the psychological benefits of hearing sheep from the nearby hillside - that has been endlessly buffeted by university management fads, and is now threatened with the final blow. Please sign. chng.it/T6V9mQMPrk

every academic you meet is fighting their own battle. Make it worse by asking them how the writing is going

Almost four months since its publication! For all of those interested in All Things Flavian, and the generic interactions in Statius' remarkable final poem. doi.org/10.1093/oso/...