Project at AIAS

This interdisciplinary research project explores Greek Early Christian classicizing poetry of late antiquity (3^rd to 7^th centuries AD), verse written on Christian themes in the traditional language and poetic forms of Greek antiquity. The study will contextualize this poetry within the tradition of Greek poetry from Homer to late antiquity, as well as within the broader tradition of Judaeo-Christian literature, through the close comparison of language, motifs, narrative structure, and theology.

Particular attention will be given to the major poetic corpora of Saint Gregory Nazianzus (4^th century), Nonnus of Panopolis (5^th century), and a late antique hexameter paraphrase of the Septuagint Psalms. Detailed studies of individual poems or sets of poems provide the basis for a synthetic and diachronic study of the development of this poetry. Special attention will be given throughout to the modes and characteristics of interaction in the dialogue between ‘pagan’ and Judaeo-Christian tradition within the wider context of late antique literature and culture.