Survival of Ancient Texts

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

This course will examine the material and intellectual pathways by which ancient Greek and Roman literary culture has survived to the present day. We will study the evolving technology that made this transmission possible, from scroll to codex to printed book, as well as the history of writing and scripts. We will also consider how changing tastes, values, and religion impacted which texts were preserved and which would become lost forever. We will read medieval and early modern literary responses to classical texts, and we will learn how the ancient texts we can so easily access today were produced by generations of scholars working from dozens, or in some cases, hundreds of manuscripts. No knowledge of Latin or Greek is required.