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Book Review
Institutionalizing Gender: Madness, the Family, and Psychiatric Power in Nineteenth-Century France
Jessie Hewitt’s Institutionalizing Gender: Madness, the Family, and Psychiatric Power in Nineteenth-Century France ties together themes of French society, psychiatry, the family, and gender analysis into one seminal text. Hewitt works to...
Definition
Cambyses II
Cambyses II (r. 530-522 BCE) was the second king of the Achaemenid Empire. The Greek historian Herodotus portrays Cambyses as a mad king who committed many acts of sacrilege during his stay in Egypt, including the slaying of the sacred Apis...
Article
Psychological Intimidation at the Battle of Carrhae
Psychological intimidation in military conflict has been an art of war since ancient times. Employing misinformation, feigned movements, subtle messaging, and overt display of aggression, its employ is meant to unnerve the enemy before engagement...
Definition
Ino
Ino is a princess of Thebes and the wife of King Athamas of Boeotia in Greek mythology. She helped to raise Dionysos, the god of wine, but the most famous myth associated with her is her descent into madness and the tragic fate of her family...
Definition
Ajax (Play)
Ajax is a play written by the 5th-century BCE Greek poet and dramatist Sophocles. Although Sophocles wrote at least 120 plays, only seven have survived. Of his surviving plays, the best-known is Oedipus Rex (Oedipus the King) - part of a...
Definition
Parthian Warfare
Parthian warfare was characterized by the extensive use of cavalry and archers. Coming at enemy troops from all directions Parthian riders created confusion and wreaked havoc. They even developed the famous “Parthian shot.” Able to shoot...
Definition
Megara (Wife of Hercules)
Megara was the first wife of the Greek hero Herakles (better known as Hercules). She was the daughter of King Creon of Thebes who gave her in marriage to Hercules in gratitude for his help in winning back Creon's kingdom from the Minyans...
Definition
Bacchae
The Bacchae is a Greek tragedy written by the playwright Euripides (c. 484-406 BCE) in 407 BCE, which portrays Pentheus as an impious king, for the ruler of Thebes has denied the worship of Dionysus within his city walls. For Pentheus, the...
Article
The Life of Hercules in Myth & Legend
Hercules is the Roman name for the Greek hero Herakles, the most popular figure from ancient Greek mythology. Hercules was the son of Zeus, king of the gods, and the mortal woman Alcmene. Zeus, who was always chasing one woman or another...
Definition
Gorgias
Gorgias (l. c. 427 BCE) was a Greek Sophist and philosopher, considered the greatest Rhetorician of his day. He is said to have created several aspects of public speaking still in use and to have mastered the art of persuasion, commanding...