Albert Bates Lord here offers an unparalleled overview of the nature of oral-traditional epic songs and the practices of the singers who composed them. Shaped by the conviction that theory should be based on what singers actually do, and have done in times past, the essays collected here span half a century of Lord’s research on the oral tradition from Homer to the twentieth century.
Drawing on his extensive fieldwork in living oral traditions and on the theoretical writings of Milman Parry, Lord concentrates on the singers and their art as manifested in texts of performance. In thirteen essays, some previously unpublished and all of them revised for book publication, he explores questions of composition, transmittal, and interpretation and raises important comparative issues. Individual chapters discuss aspects of the Homeric poems, South Slavic oral-traditional epics, the songs of Avdo Metedovic, Beowulf and Anglo-Saxon poetry, the medieval Greek Digenis Akritas and other medieval epics, central Asiatic and Balkan epics, the Finnish Kalevala, and the Bulgarian oral epic.
The work of one of the most respected scholars of his generation, Epic Singers and Oral Tradition will be an invaluable resource for scholars and students of myth and folklore, classicists, medievalists, Slavists, comparatists, literary theorists, and anthropologists.
Originally published in 1991 by Cornell University Press
Available for purchase in print via Cornell University Press.
Use the following persistent identifier: http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:hul.ebook:CHS_LordA.Epic_Singers_and_Oral_Tradition.1991.
Copyright, Cornell University Press. Published here with permission.
Monday, March 9, 2026
Epic Singers and Oral Tradition
Eve of the Festival: Making Myth in Odyssey 19
Eve of the Festival is a study of Homeric myth-making in the first and longest dialogue of Penelope and Odysseus (Odyssey 19). This study makes a case for seeing virtuoso myth-making as an essential part of this conversation, a register of communication important for the interaction between the two speakers. At the core of the book is a detailed examination of several myths in the dialogue in an attempt to understand what is being said and how. The dialogue as a whole is interpreted as an exchange of performances that have the eve of Apollo’s festival as their occasion and that amount to activating, and even enacting, the myth corresponding within the Odyssey to the ritual event of the festival
Available for purchase in print via Harvard University Press.
Levaniouk, Olga. 2011. Eve of the Festival: Making Myth in Odyssey 19. Hellenic Studies Series 46. Washington, DC: Center for Hellenic Studies. http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:hul.ebook:CHS_Levaniouk.Eve_of_the_Festival.2011.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons 3.0 License.
Open Access Journal: Bioarchaeology of the Near East
Bioarchaeology of the Near East
Printed version ISSN: 1898-9403
Online ISSN: 1899-962X
Bioarchaeology of the Near East (printed version ISSN 1898-9403, online ISSN 1899-962X) is published annually in one volume. The aim of the journal is to promote research on the history of human populations inhabiting South-Western Asia (chiefly Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, Anatolia, Iran, and Egypt). It will publish original contributions in which methods of physical anthropology and bioarchaeology are used to answer historical questions. Three kinds of texts will be considered for publication: original papers, general review articles (especially those focussing on methodological issues), and short fieldwork reports. Papers of two first categories will be subject to peer review.
The editors welcome contributions focusing on the biological background of historical processes observed in past populations in the region where most ancient civilisations of the Old World emerged. This includes large-scale studies e.g., on migrations, secular trends, microevolution, temporal changes or regional differences in the quality of life, disease patterns or demographical profiles, but also local studies or diagnostic case studies of distinguished individuals. Papers using not only biological, but also archaeological and textual evidence are mostly appreciated. For more effective exchange of information the journal also includes short fieldwork reports on human remains excavated at archaeological sites located in the region of interest.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Volume 19:2025
Cover (small) | Cover (large)
Emily Eiseman, Abigail Taylor, Heidi Joelle Althaus, Michele R. Buzon, Katie M. Whitmore
A bioarchaeological assessment of pubertal timing at Tombos, Sudan (1400–700 BCE), pp. 1-16.
Abstract, PDF (144 KB), Supplementary File (12 KB)
Abdel Halim Al-Shiyab, Ahmad Y. Abu Dalou, Aleksandra Grzegorska
A case study of spinal pathology and degenerative joint disease in Udhruh, Jordan, pp. 17-34.
Abstract, PDF (381 KB)
Zainab A. Albshir
A critical note on the identification of horses in third-millennium BCE Mesopotamian iconography, pp. 35-40.
Abstract, PDF (254 KB)
Short Fieldwork Reports
Human remains from Qieh-Boynou Kurgan, Iran, 2020, pp. 41-47. PDF (287 KB)
Human remains from Saqqara West, Egypt, 2023–2025, pp. 48-57. PDF (502 KB)
Human remains from ‘Marea’/Philoxenite, Egypt, 2021–2022, pp. 58-69. PDF (285 KB)
Human remains from Tell Rad Shaqrah, Syria, 1994–1995 (updated), pp. 70-75. PDF (185 KB)
Human remains from 25th Zolfaqar Street, Kashan, Iran, 2017, pp. 76-82. PDF (273 KB)
Human remains from Khramis Didi Gora, Georgia, 2025, pp. 83-90. PDF (177 KB)
Human remains from Beshtasheni, Georgia, 2012-2016, pp. 91-98. PDF (189 KB)
Animal remains from Kutaisi Fortress, Georgia, 2021-2023, pp. 99-104. PDF (132 KB)
Human remains from ‘Marea’/Philoxenite, Egypt, 2023, pp. 105-109. PDF (145 KB)
Human remains from Berenike, Egypt, 2021–2024, pp. 110-120. PDF (421 KB)
Human remains from Malhamdar, Iran, 2016, pp. 121-123. PDF (109 KB)
Human remains from Musti, Tunisia, 2022–2023, pp. 124-128. PDF (124 KB)
Animal remains from Musti, Tunisia, 2019–2023, pp. 129-135. PDF (1404 KB)
Issue date: 31 December 2025
See AWOL's full List of Open Access Journals in Ancient Studies
Pippidi, D.M. et E. Popescu, éd. (1977) : Épigraphica. Travaux dédiés au VII Congrès d’épigraphie grecque et latine (Constantza, 9-15 septembre 1977), Bucarest.
Ce recueil d’articles comporte 21 articles dont 10 consacrés à l’espace pontique. Le reste correspond pour l’essentiel à la Dacie. L’espace chronologique s’étend de l’époque archaïque à l’Antiquité tardive.
L’ouvrage en ligne : https://biblioteca-digitala.ro/?volum=8099-travaux-dedies-au-vii-congres-d-epigraphie-grecque-et-latine-constantza-9-15-septembre-1977–1977
Sunday, March 8, 2026
Blemished Kings: Suitors in the Odyssey, Blame Poetics, and Irish Satire
Each of the suitors in the Odyssey is eager to become the king of Ithaca by marrying Penelope and disqualifying Telemachus from his rightful royal inheritance. Their words are contentious, censorious, and intent on marking Odysseus’ son as unfit for kingship. However, in keeping with other reversals in the Odyssey, it is the suitors who are shown to be unfit to rule.
In Blemished Kings, Andrea Kouklanakis interprets the language of the suitors—their fighting words—as Homeric expressions of reproach and critique against unsuitable kings. She suggests that the suitors’ disparaging expressions, and the refutations they provoke from Telemachus and from Odysseus himself, rest on the ideology whereby a blemished king cannot rule. Therefore, the suitors vehemently reject Telemachus’ suggestion that they are to be blamed. She shows that in the Odyssey there is linguistic and semantic evidence for the concept that blame poetry can physically blemish, hence disqualify, rulers. In her comparative approach, Kouklanakis looks towards the regulatory role of satire in early Irish law and myth, particularly the taboo against a blemished-face king, offering thereby a socio-poetic context for the suitors’ struggles for kingship
Available for purchase in print via Harvard University Press.
Kouklanakis, Andrea. 2023. Blemished Kings Suitors in the Odyssey, Blame Poetics, and Irish Satire. Hellenic Series Studies 98. Washington, DC: Center for Hellenic Studies. http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:hul.ebook:CHS_KouklanakisA_Blemished_Kings.2023.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons 3.0 License.
Open Access Journal: Everyday Orientalism
The concept of Orientalism was developed by the literary scholar Edward Said who, in his seminal work Orientalism (1978), defined it as “the corporate institution for dealing with the Orient – dealing with it by making statements about it, authorizing views of it, describing it, by teaching it, settling it, ruling over it : in short, Orientalism [is] a Western style for dominating, restructuring, and having authority over the Orient”. Everyday Orientalism is a platform through which students, academics, and citizens can reflect on how history and power shape the way in which human societies define themselves through the “Other”. As such, we understand Said’s concept in its broader sense, that is as an analytical paradigm that can be applied to many contexts beyond the 19th century “Orient”.
We are open to guest posts in a variety of formats and languages (including, but not limited to, English, Arabic, French, Italian, Spanish, and German). All posts and events are refereed and unanimously approved by EO’s editorial team.
Editorial team
Co-founder and lead editor: Katherine Blouin (@isisnaucratis), Associate Professor of Roman History, University of Toronto. You can also read her here and here
Co-founder and co-editor: Usama Ali Gad (@usamaligad), Lecturer of Papyrology, Greco-Roman History and Civilization, Ain Shams University. You can also read him here. On leave as of July 2023.
Co-founder and co-editor: Rachel Mairs, Professor of Classics and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Reading. You can also read her here and here.
And See AWOL's full List of Open Access Journals in Ancient Studies
Scythica Minora. Recherches sur les colonies grecques du littoral roumain de la mer Noire
Pippidi, D. M. (1975) : Scythica Minora. Recherches sur les colonies grecques du littoral roumain de la mer Noire, Bucarest
L’ouvrage rassemble 25 articles de l’auteur sur l’ouest de la mer Noire qui s’appuient sur l’épigraphie pour reconstituer l’histoire de la région de l’époque classique à l’Antiquité tardive. Des index rendent la circulation dans l’ouvrage aisée.
À la fin du volume, on trouve la liste des références originelles des articles ainsi que les illustrations.
Tous les articles sont en français.
L’ouvrage en ligne : https://biblioteca-digitala.ro/?pub=9927-scythica-minora-recherches-sur-les-colonies-grecques-du-littoral-roumain-de-la-mer-noire
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