Benjamin Garstad
Biographic Data
| ID | 1482384 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Benjamin Garstad |
| GIVEN NAMES | Benjamin |
| FAMILY NAME | Garstad |
| SIGNATURE | GARSTAD B |
| AFFILIATIONS | MacEwan University |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-8018-3879 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 21 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 5 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 21 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2002 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
The Implications of Hephaestus’s Role as the Inventor of Metallurgy in the Chronographia of John Malalas
John Malalas presents Hephaestus as a king of Egypt who was deified as an inventor who made weapons and so provided his subjects with nourishment and strength in war. In the context of the Greco-Roman discussion of the progress of civilization and the identification of inventors, this may seem innocuous, even a commendation. But this discourse does not unite war and hunting, as Hephaestus’s inventions do. This combination seems to allude by inver…
The Location of the Candace Episode in the Alexander Romance and the Chronicle of John Malalas
The Alexander Romance is vague about Alexander's passage from India to the realm of Candace of Meroë, but seems to suggest it is accomplished swiftly and easily. The earliest versions of the Romance, moreover, indicate there were close relations between Candace's kingdom and India, even that her ancestors once held power over India. If Candace's realm is identified as Ethiopia, this is a perplexing state of affairs. But it seems to have taken on …
The Account of Perseus in Orosius
Orosius includes a note on the hero Perseus that neglects the usually prominent features of his myth, saying little more than that Perseus led an expedition into Asia and, once victorious, named the people he conquered there Persians after himself. He is the earliest of the surviving Latin authors to say either of these things about Perseus. And he is apparently the first author to combine these pieces of information - until, that is, John Malala…
Mythography in the Latin West
In the Middle Ages in western Europe mythography was intended to set out in clear narrative terms and explain the body of myth that might only be alluded to in the corpus of Classical Latin literature that was still read throughout this period. It might have had the further intention of refuting the error of pagan belief about the gods and rendering myth innocuous by subjecting its unseemly tales to interpretation, especially through allegory. Mu…
Byzantine Mythography
Byzantine education was based on a reading of Homer, and so mythological themes were of perennial interest to the learned society of Byzantium. Byzantine scholars had access to the ancient works of systematic mythography, but they also made their own contributions to the understanding of myth, even if not in a distinct genre of mythography. They had been taught by St. Basil that moral instruction might be found in myth, and by Eusebius of Caesare…
Alexander’s Comrades in the Chronicle of John Malalas
As a rule in the historical tradition, over time the larger cast of characters behind a series of events, the king and his court, is distilled down to the person of a single actor, the king, while his ministers and lieutenants are consigned to oblivion. Alexander the Great is by and large an exception to this rule. His Companions play important roles in his reign and campaigns, his character is developed to a great extent in his relations with th…
Crusade Propaganda in Word and Image in Early Modern Italy
The Destruction of Jerusalem in Early Modern English Literature
Reading the Bible with Richard Hooker
The Strait Gate
Nebuchadnezzar and Alexander in the Excerpta Latina Barbari
The late antique Christian chronicle preserved as the Excerpta Latina Barbari contains a brief, but extraordinary notice on the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar; many of its unusual details can be understood in the contexts of traditional stories about Nebuchadnezzar and the interests of the work itself. The best clue to the meaning of the passage on Nebuchadnezzar is the Excerpta 's closely parallel passage on Alexander the Great. In the Excerpta …
Nebuchadnezzar’s Siege of Tyre in Jerome’s Commentary on Ezekiel
In order to elucidate the prophecies of Ezekiel, especially those against Egypt in Book 29, Jerome reconstructed the siege of Tyre by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar. He seems to have done this not so much on the basis of the predictions recorded in the Bible (to say nothing of accurate records), as by comparison with accounts of Alexander the Great’s siege of the same city more than two hundred years later. Jerome seems particularly dependent…
Euhemerus and the Chronicle of John Malalas
In spite of Warren Treadgold's recent contention to the contrary, no new insights on the Sacred History of Euhemerus of Messene are to be gleaned from John Malalas and the account of the gods found in his chronicle. They cannot be directly connected to Euhemerus, or even to a complete version of Diodorus Siculus’ lost sixth book, which related a version of the Sacred History. We would, nevertheless, like to know the source for what Malalas says a…
Plutarchi Chaeronensis Vita Dionis et Comparatio et de Bruto ac Dione Iudicium Guarino Veronensi Interprete
Iconoclasm from Antiquity to Modernity
Byzantine Matters
Hero into General
One of the interpretive models applied by the ancient Greeks to their myths was the recasting of heroes as generals and their lonely quests as elaborate military campaigns. In the first instances, this reimagining of mythic narratives was intended to explain the esteem in which heroes were held, lend credibility to their legends, and extend the period of recorded history. Rather than “debunking,” the interpretation of heroes as generals was a pos…
Barbarian interest in the Excerpta Latina Barbari
Joseph Justus Scaliger dubbed the text of Parisinus Latinus 4884, the sole surviving witness to a Merovingian Latin translation of a now lost Greek world chronicle, the Excerpta Latina Barbari. The name was essentially a judgement on the linguistic abilities of the translator, but it is suggestive. What is there in the chronicle to appeal to the ‘barbarian’ inhabitants of Gaul? An answer to this question can offer some insight into the provenance…
Death to the Masters!’
The fantasy fiction of Robert E. Howard reveals a number of largely unspoken assumptions about the historical role of slavery and its consequences in Jim Crow Texas. Howard traced a trajectory that led from slavery through miscegenation and servile uprising to the destruction of civilisation. The descriptions of slave revolts in his fiction depends upon a paranoid rhetoric which developed in the South before and after Emancipation to respond to t…
Joseph as a Model for Faunus-Hermes
Faunus-who-is-also-Hermes is one of the composite god-kings dealt with in the polemical Christian 'Picus-Zeus narrative' of the fourth century. The narrative of his life is based on the Biblical account of Joseph, along with the elaborations on Joseph's life in Hellenistic Jewish fiction. Whereas Joseph is a virtuous hero, however, Faunus-Hermes is a villain who practices sorcery and usurpation and ultimately induces men to worship him as a god. …
Magnus Felix Ennodius
Felix Ennodius (474-521), deacon of Milan and bishop of Pavia in the turbulent years after the fall of the Roman Empire in the West, was a prolific writer of letters, poetry, speeches, and pamphlets on the controversies that beset the church in his day. In the Middle Ages, he was read as a model of style and source of canon law. More recently, however, Ennodius' writings have been denigrated as the vapid product of a frivolous mind more concerned…
Euhemerus and the Chronicle of John Malalas
In spite of Warren Treadgold's recent contention to the contrary, no new insights on the Sacred History of Euhemerus of Messene are to be gleaned from John Malalas and the account of the gods found in his chronicle. They cannot be directly connected to Euhemerus, or even to a complete version of Diodorus Siculus’ lost sixth book, which related a version of the Sacred History. We would, nevertheless, like to know the source for what Malalas says a…
Death to the Masters!’
The fantasy fiction of Robert E. Howard reveals a number of largely unspoken assumptions about the historical role of slavery and its consequences in Jim Crow Texas. Howard traced a trajectory that led from slavery through miscegenation and servile uprising to the destruction of civilisation. The descriptions of slave revolts in his fiction depends upon a paranoid rhetoric which developed in the South before and after Emancipation to respond to t…
The Account of Perseus in Orosius
Orosius includes a note on the hero Perseus that neglects the usually prominent features of his myth, saying little more than that Perseus led an expedition into Asia and, once victorious, named the people he conquered there Persians after himself. He is the earliest of the surviving Latin authors to say either of these things about Perseus. And he is apparently the first author to combine these pieces of information - until, that is, John Malala…
Magnus Felix Ennodius
Felix Ennodius (474-521), deacon of Milan and bishop of Pavia in the turbulent years after the fall of the Roman Empire in the West, was a prolific writer of letters, poetry, speeches, and pamphlets on the controversies that beset the church in his day. In the Middle Ages, he was read as a model of style and source of canon law. More recently, however, Ennodius' writings have been denigrated as the vapid product of a frivolous mind more concerned…
Joseph as a Model for Faunus-Hermes
Faunus-who-is-also-Hermes is one of the composite god-kings dealt with in the polemical Christian 'Picus-Zeus narrative' of the fourth century. The narrative of his life is based on the Biblical account of Joseph, along with the elaborations on Joseph's life in Hellenistic Jewish fiction. Whereas Joseph is a virtuous hero, however, Faunus-Hermes is a villain who practices sorcery and usurpation and ultimately induces men to worship him as a god. …
Death to the Masters!’
The fantasy fiction of Robert E. Howard reveals a number of largely unspoken assumptions about the historical role of slavery and its consequences in Jim Crow Texas. Howard traced a trajectory that led from slavery through miscegenation and servile uprising to the destruction of civilisation. The descriptions of slave revolts in his fiction depends upon a paranoid rhetoric which developed in the South before and after Emancipation to respond to t…
Barbarian interest in the Excerpta Latina Barbari
Joseph Justus Scaliger dubbed the text of Parisinus Latinus 4884, the sole surviving witness to a Merovingian Latin translation of a now lost Greek world chronicle, the Excerpta Latina Barbari. The name was essentially a judgement on the linguistic abilities of the translator, but it is suggestive. What is there in the chronicle to appeal to the ‘barbarian’ inhabitants of Gaul? An answer to this question can offer some insight into the provenance…
Hero into General
One of the interpretive models applied by the ancient Greeks to their myths was the recasting of heroes as generals and their lonely quests as elaborate military campaigns. In the first instances, this reimagining of mythic narratives was intended to explain the esteem in which heroes were held, lend credibility to their legends, and extend the period of recorded history. Rather than “debunking,” the interpretation of heroes as generals was a pos…
Plutarchi Chaeronensis Vita Dionis et Comparatio et de Bruto ac Dione Iudicium Guarino Veronensi Interprete
Iconoclasm from Antiquity to Modernity
Byzantine Matters
Nebuchadnezzar and Alexander in the Excerpta Latina Barbari
The late antique Christian chronicle preserved as the Excerpta Latina Barbari contains a brief, but extraordinary notice on the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar; many of its unusual details can be understood in the contexts of traditional stories about Nebuchadnezzar and the interests of the work itself. The best clue to the meaning of the passage on Nebuchadnezzar is the Excerpta 's closely parallel passage on Alexander the Great. In the Excerpta …
Nebuchadnezzar’s Siege of Tyre in Jerome’s Commentary on Ezekiel
In order to elucidate the prophecies of Ezekiel, especially those against Egypt in Book 29, Jerome reconstructed the siege of Tyre by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar. He seems to have done this not so much on the basis of the predictions recorded in the Bible (to say nothing of accurate records), as by comparison with accounts of Alexander the Great’s siege of the same city more than two hundred years later. Jerome seems particularly dependent…
Euhemerus and the Chronicle of John Malalas
In spite of Warren Treadgold's recent contention to the contrary, no new insights on the Sacred History of Euhemerus of Messene are to be gleaned from John Malalas and the account of the gods found in his chronicle. They cannot be directly connected to Euhemerus, or even to a complete version of Diodorus Siculus’ lost sixth book, which related a version of the Sacred History. We would, nevertheless, like to know the source for what Malalas says a…
Crusade Propaganda in Word and Image in Early Modern Italy
The Destruction of Jerusalem in Early Modern English Literature
Reading the Bible with Richard Hooker
The Strait Gate
Alexander’s Comrades in the Chronicle of John Malalas
As a rule in the historical tradition, over time the larger cast of characters behind a series of events, the king and his court, is distilled down to the person of a single actor, the king, while his ministers and lieutenants are consigned to oblivion. Alexander the Great is by and large an exception to this rule. His Companions play important roles in his reign and campaigns, his character is developed to a great extent in his relations with th…
Mythography in the Latin West
In the Middle Ages in western Europe mythography was intended to set out in clear narrative terms and explain the body of myth that might only be alluded to in the corpus of Classical Latin literature that was still read throughout this period. It might have had the further intention of refuting the error of pagan belief about the gods and rendering myth innocuous by subjecting its unseemly tales to interpretation, especially through allegory. Mu…
Byzantine Mythography
Byzantine education was based on a reading of Homer, and so mythological themes were of perennial interest to the learned society of Byzantium. Byzantine scholars had access to the ancient works of systematic mythography, but they also made their own contributions to the understanding of myth, even if not in a distinct genre of mythography. They had been taught by St. Basil that moral instruction might be found in myth, and by Eusebius of Caesare…
The Account of Perseus in Orosius
Orosius includes a note on the hero Perseus that neglects the usually prominent features of his myth, saying little more than that Perseus led an expedition into Asia and, once victorious, named the people he conquered there Persians after himself. He is the earliest of the surviving Latin authors to say either of these things about Perseus. And he is apparently the first author to combine these pieces of information - until, that is, John Malala…
The Implications of Hephaestus’s Role as the Inventor of Metallurgy in the Chronographia of John Malalas
John Malalas presents Hephaestus as a king of Egypt who was deified as an inventor who made weapons and so provided his subjects with nourishment and strength in war. In the context of the Greco-Roman discussion of the progress of civilization and the identification of inventors, this may seem innocuous, even a commendation. But this discourse does not unite war and hunting, as Hephaestus’s inventions do. This combination seems to allude by inver…
The Location of the Candace Episode in the Alexander Romance and the Chronicle of John Malalas
The Alexander Romance is vague about Alexander's passage from India to the realm of Candace of Meroë, but seems to suggest it is accomplished swiftly and easily. The earliest versions of the Romance, moreover, indicate there were close relations between Candace's kingdom and India, even that her ancestors once held power over India. If Candace's realm is identified as Ethiopia, this is a perplexing state of affairs. But it seems to have taken on …
History (20 works) · Art (17 works) · Philosophy (14 works) · Literature (12 works) · History (11 works) · Classics (10 works) · Classical Antiquity Studies (7 works) · Law (7 works) · Ancient history (6 works) · Byzantine Studies and History (6 works)