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CFP: Nox erat: Night and Nocturnal Activities in the Ancient World
17th Annual Classics Graduate Student Colloquium
University of Virginia
March 23, 2012
From lovers’ trysts to covens of witches, from all-night parties to midnight raids, from dreams to insomnia, night in the ancient world is far from an empty darkness that merely marks the interval between sunset and sunrise. This colloquium aims to consider the characteristics and depictions of night both as mythological figure and temporal experience, while also exploring the social and cultural aspects of nighttime events. Professor Catherine Keane of Washington University in St. Louis will deliver the keynote address. We welcome submissions from diverse fields and disciplines. Possible areas of investigation include, but are not limited to:
- Night as a deity or personification depicted in literature and/or art
- Night as a social construction, e.g. as holy or unholy, as a time for transgressive activities; the way that night affects conceptions of time
- Dreams, whether true or false, and inspiration that comes at night; poets, philosophers, storytellers, and others who work through the night
- Religious aspects of night: for example, rites which only happen at night, incubation
- Nighttime activities such as symposia and paraclausithyra
- Practical advantages and disadvantages of night: night raids, banditry, intrigue
- Means of illuminating the night both natural and artificial: streetlamps, constellations, the moon
- Night in similes and metaphors
- Transitions into and out of night at dusk and dawn; the false night which occurs during eclipses and storms
Papers should be 15-20 minutes in length. Please send abstracts of no more than 300 words to Jennifer LaFleur (jll4x@virginia.edu) by January 15, 2013.
