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Olympism, Culture, and Society: On Pindar’s poetic lessons about heroic Olympism in myths about Herakles

2021.03.12 | By Gregory Nagy §0. In our modern world—or, as some would think of it, in our postmodern world—we find it difficult to achieve any consensus about the meaning of the term “culture” as featured in the title of this essay. As for the term “society,” even experts in the social sciences cannot seem to agree on a unified definition. Nevertheless, most of us can at least sense, however… Read more

A working translation of Pindar Olympian 14

2021.03.08 | By Maša Ćulumović 1     Καφιϲίων ὑδάτων        λαχοῖϲαι αἵτε ναίετε καλλίπωλον ἕδραν,        ὦ λιπαρᾶϲ ἀοίδιμοι βαϲίλειαι        Χάριτεϲ Ἐρχομενοῦ, παλαιγόνων Μινυᾶν ἐπίϲκοποι, 5     κλῦτ᾿, ἐπεὶ εὔχομαι· ϲὺν γὰρ ὑμῖν τά ‹τε› τερπνὰ καί        τὰ γλυκέ᾿ ἄνεται… Read more

A sampling of comments on Pindar Olympian 14: highlighting Thalia as one of the three ‘Graces’

2021.03.06 | By Gregory Nagy §0. The Three ‘Graces’ or Khárites, personifications of kháris, a noun often translated in a generalizing way as ‘grace’, are reverently addressed in a victory ode of Pindar, Olympian 14, as presiding goddesses of the city of Orkhomenos in Boeotia, named Erkhomenós (feminine gender) in the local dialect (Ἐρχομενοῦ, line 3). A young man named Asōpikhos (line 17), a native son of this city, is… Read more