92-640: The Venus Callipyge , also known as the Aphrodite Kallipygos ( Greek : Ἀφροδίτη Καλλίπυγος ) or the Callipygian Venus , all literally meaning "Venus (or Aphrodite) of the beautiful buttocks ", is an Ancient Roman marble statue, thought to be a copy of an older Greek original. In an example of anasyrma , it depicts a partially draped woman, raising her light peplos to uncover her hips and buttocks, and looking back and down over her shoulder, perhaps to evaluate them. The subject
184-464: A Fellow of Newnham College and the only female lecturer in the classics faculty. The book Rome in the Late Republic , which she co-wrote with Cambridge historian Michael Crawford , was published the following year. John Sturrock , classics editor of The Times Literary Supplement , approached her for a review and brought her into literary journalism. Beard took over his role in 1992 at
276-500: A Roman Town , submitting remains from the town to forensic tests, aiming to show a snapshot of the lives of the residents prior to the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. In 2011 she took part in a television series, Jamie's Dream School on Channel 4 , in which she taught classics to teenagers with no experience of academic success. Beard is a regular contributor to the BBC Radio 4 series, A Point of View , delivering essays on
368-577: A basis for coinages: anthropology , photography , telephony , isomer , biomechanics , cinematography , etc. Together with Latin words , they form the foundation of international scientific and technical vocabulary ; for example, all words ending in -logy ('discourse'). There are many English words of Greek origin . Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European language family. The ancient language most closely related to it may be ancient Macedonian , which, by most accounts,
460-609: A broad range of topics including Miss World and the Oxbridge interview. For BBC Two in 2012 she wrote and presented the three part television series, Meet the Romans with Mary Beard , which concerns how ordinary people lived in Rome, "the world's first global metropolis". The critic A. A. Gill reviewed the programme, writing mainly about her appearance, judging her "too ugly for television". Beard admitted that his attack felt like
552-558: A fairly stable set of consonantal contrasts . The main phonological changes occurred during the Hellenistic and Roman period (see Koine Greek phonology for details): In all its stages, the morphology of Greek shows an extensive set of productive derivational affixes , a limited but productive system of compounding and a rich inflectional system. Although its morphological categories have been fairly stable over time, morphological changes are present throughout, particularly in
644-412: A farm near Syracuse argued over which of them had the shapelier buttocks and accosted a young passerby to have him judge. They showed themselves off to the traveler, the son of a rich man, and he voted for the elder sister. Subsequently, he became smitten with her and fell ill with love-sickness. Learning what had happened, the man's younger brother went out to see the girls for himself and fell in love with
736-560: A faster, more convenient cursive writing style with the use of ink and quill . The Greek alphabet consists of 24 letters, each with an uppercase ( majuscule ) and lowercase ( minuscule ) form. The letter sigma has an additional lowercase form (ς) used in the final position of a word: In addition to the letters, the Greek alphabet features a number of diacritical signs : three different accent marks ( acute , grave , and circumflex ), originally denoting different shapes of pitch accent on
828-540: A foreign language. It is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, " Homeric Greek is probably closer to Demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English ". Greek is spoken today by at least 13 million people, principally in Greece and Cyprus along with a sizable Greek-speaking minority in Albania near
920-661: A letter to The Guardian expressing their hope that Scotland would vote to remain part of the United Kingdom in September's referendum on that issue . She was a member of the Labour Party until Tony Blair became leader. In July 2015, Beard endorsed Jeremy Corbyn 's campaign in the Labour Party leadership election . She said: "If I were a member of the Labour Party , I would vote for Corbyn. He actually seems to have some ideological commitment, which could get
1012-481: A list of erotic manifestations of pagan religion. From the 16th century, Athenaeus's tale circulated in Vincenzo Cartari 's retelling of stories from classical mythology, Le Imagini . Many viewers of the 17th and 18th centuries identified the statue's subject as the goddess and supposed the work to be a cult statue from the temple of Venus Kallipygos. It was thus often described at the time as Venus exiting
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#17327871964721104-418: A make-over. In 2015, Beard was again a panellist on BBC's Question Time from Bath. During the programme, she praised Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn for behaving with a "considerable degree of dignity" against claims he faces an overly hostile media. She said: "Quite a lot of what Corbyn says I agree with, and I rather like his different style of leadership. I like hearing argument not soundbites. If
1196-453: A modern perspective. Fresh flowers in the piece are replaced daily, representing the throwaway, consumerist culture of modern society. 40°51′12.16″N 14°15′1.75″E / 40.8533778°N 14.2504861°E / 40.8533778; 14.2504861 Greek language Greek ( Modern Greek : Ελληνικά , romanized : Elliniká , [eliniˈka] ; Ancient Greek : Ἑλληνική , romanized : Hellēnikḗ )
1288-541: A place at Newnham College , a single-sex college. She had considered King's , but rejected it when she learned the college did not offer scholarships to women. In Beard's first year she found some men in the university still held very dismissive attitudes regarding the academic potential of women, which only strengthened her determination to succeed. She also developed feminist views that remained "hugely important" in her later life, although she later described "modern orthodox feminism" as partly cant . One of her tutors
1380-399: A punch, but swiftly responded with a counter-attack on his intellectual abilities, accusing him of being part of "the blokeish culture that loves to decry clever women". This exchange became the focus of a debate about older women on the public stage, with Beard saying she looked an ordinary woman of her age and "there are kids who turn on these programmes and see there's another way of being
1472-545: A report in The Times of Oxfam employees engaging in sexual exploitation in disaster zones, Beard tweeted "Of course one can't condone the (alleged) behaviour of Oxfam staff in Haiti and elsewhere. But I do wonder how hard it must be to sustain 'civilised' values in a disaster zone. And overall I still respect those who go in and help out, where most of us would not tread." This led to widespread criticism, in which Mary Beard
1564-487: A respectable academic, Professor Beard was presumably brought in to back up Randi, but her views are interestingly hard to define. She agrees with Picknett's suggestion that 'weird' should be reclassified as 'other', noting this is how the ancient world referred to overseas lands. This suggestion that UFOs should be bracketed with, say, Perth shows why Beard, particularly in this company, is a very modern thinker. In 2010, on BBC Two , Beard presented Pompeii: Life and Death in
1656-478: A second lecture for the same partners, entitled Women in Power: from Medusa to Merkel . It considered the extent to which the exclusion of women from power is culturally embedded, and how idioms from ancient Greece are still used to normalise gendered violence. She argues that "we don't have a model or a template for what a powerful woman looks like. We only have templates that make them men." In 2019, Beard gave
1748-529: A significant effect on later interpretations of the work. The statue was acquired by the Farnese family and was in the Palazzo Farnese by 1594; it may be the draped Venus described as being in the palace by visitors earlier that century. In the 17th century, it is known to have been kept in the palace's Sala dei Filosophi , where it stood surrounded by statues of eighteen ancient philosophers. In 1731,
1840-511: A way she deemed authentic. On 4 August 2013, she received a bomb threat on Twitter, hours after the UK head of Twitter had apologised to women who had experienced abuse on the service. Beard said she did not think she was in physical danger, but considered it harassment and wanted to "make sure" that another case had been logged by the police. She has been praised for exposing "social media at its most revolting and misogynistic". In 2017, Beard became
1932-423: A woman", without Botox and hair dye. Charlotte Higgins assessed Beard as one of the rare academics who is both well respected by her peers and has a high profile in the media. In 2013 she presented Caligula with Mary Beard on BBC Two, describing the making of myths around leaders and dictators. Interviewers continued to ask about her self-presentation, and she reiterated that she had no intention of undergoing
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#17327871964722024-804: Is also found in Bulgaria near the Greek-Bulgarian border. Greek is also spoken worldwide by the sizable Greek diaspora which has notable communities in the United States , Australia , Canada , South Africa , Chile , Brazil , Argentina , Russia , Ukraine , the United Kingdom , and throughout the European Union , especially in Germany . Historically, significant Greek-speaking communities and regions were found throughout
2116-773: Is an Indo-European language, constituting an independent Hellenic branch within the Indo-European language family. It is native to Greece , Cyprus , Italy (in Calabria and Salento ), southern Albania , and other regions of the Balkans , Caucasus , the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor , and the Eastern Mediterranean . It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system
2208-866: Is an English classicist specialising in Ancient Rome . She is a trustee of the British Museum and formerly held a personal professorship of classics at the University of Cambridge . She is a fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge , and Royal Academy of Arts Professor of Ancient Literature . Beard is the classics editor of The Times Literary Supplement , for which she also writes a regular blog, "A Don's Life". Her frequent media appearances and sometimes controversial public statements have led to her being described as "Britain's best-known classicist". In 2014, The New Yorker characterised her as "learned but accessible". Mary Beard, an only child,
2300-479: Is an Indo-European language, but also includes a number of borrowings from the languages of the populations that inhabited Greece before the arrival of Proto-Greeks, some documented in Mycenaean texts ; they include a large number of Greek toponyms . The form and meaning of many words have changed. Loanwords (words of foreign origin) have entered the language, mainly from Latin, Venetian , and Turkish . During
2392-461: Is conventionally identified as Venus ( Aphrodite ), though it may equally be a portrait of a mortal woman. The marble statue extant today dates to the late 1st century BC. The lost Greek original on which it is based is thought to have been bronze , and to have been executed around 300 BC, towards the beginning of the Hellenistic period . The provenance of the marble copy is unknown, but it
2484-519: Is protected and promoted officially as a regional and minority language in Armenia, Hungary , Romania, and Ukraine. It is recognized as a minority language and protected in Turkey by the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne . The phonology , morphology , syntax , and vocabulary of the language show both conservative and innovative tendencies across the entire attestation of the language from the ancient to
2576-868: Is sometimes called aljamiado , as when Romance languages are written in the Arabic alphabet. Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Greek: Transcription of the example text into Latin alphabet : Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in English: Proto-Greek Mycenaean Ancient Koine Medieval Modern Mary Beard (classicist) Dame Winifred Mary Beard (born 1 January 1955)
2668-526: Is spoken by at least 13.5 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey , and the many other countries of the Greek diaspora . Greek roots have been widely used for centuries and continue to be widely used to coin new words in other languages; Greek and Latin are the predominant sources of international scientific vocabulary . Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around
2760-763: Is still used internationally for the writing of Ancient Greek . In Greek, the question mark is written as the English semicolon, while the functions of the colon and semicolon are performed by a raised point (•), known as the ano teleia ( άνω τελεία ). In Greek the comma also functions as a silent letter in a handful of Greek words, principally distinguishing ό,τι ( ó,ti , 'whatever') from ότι ( óti , 'that'). Ancient Greek texts often used scriptio continua ('continuous writing'), which means that ancient authors and scribes would write word after word with no spaces or punctuation between words to differentiate or mark boundaries. Boustrophedon , or bi-directional text,
2852-650: Is the Greek alphabet , which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary . The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin , Cyrillic , Coptic , Gothic , and many other writing systems. The Greek language holds a very important place in the history of the Western world. Beginning with
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2944-495: The Eastern Mediterranean , in what are today Southern Italy , Turkey , Cyprus , Syria , Lebanon , Israel , Palestine , Egypt , and Libya ; in the area of the Black Sea , in what are today Turkey, Bulgaria , Romania , Ukraine , Russia , Georgia , Armenia , and Azerbaijan ; and, to a lesser extent, in the Western Mediterranean in and around colonies such as Massalia , Monoikos , and Mainake . It
3036-516: The Indo-Iranian languages (see Graeco-Aryan ), but little definitive evidence has been found. In addition, Albanian has also been considered somewhat related to Greek and Armenian, and it has been proposed that they all form a higher-order subgroup along with other extinct languages of the ancient Balkans; this higher-order subgroup is usually termed Palaeo-Balkan , and Greek has a central position in it. Linear B , attested as early as
3128-620: The Sigmund H. Danziger Jr. Memorial Lecture in the Humanities at the University of Chicago . She was elected Visiting Sather Professor of Classical Literature for 2008–2009 at the University of California, Berkeley , at which she delivered a series of lectures on "Roman Laughter". In 2014, Beard delivered a lecture on the public voice of women at the British Museum as part of the London Review of Books winter lecture series. It
3220-492: The nominal and verbal systems. The major change in the nominal morphology since the classical stage was the disuse of the dative case (its functions being largely taken over by the genitive ). The verbal system has lost the infinitive , the synthetically -formed future, and perfect tenses and the optative mood . Many have been replaced by periphrastic ( analytical ) forms. Pronouns show distinctions in person (1st, 2nd, and 3rd), number (singular, dual , and plural in
3312-597: The sesquicentennial Public Lecture for the North American Society for Classical Studies , marking the 150-year anniversary of the organisation. The topic of her presentation was What do we mean by Classics now? She delivered the Gifford Lectures in May 2019 at Edinburgh University , under the title The Ancient World and Us: From Fear and Loathing to Enlightenment and Ethics. In 2020, Beard
3404-481: The 16th century. It is sometimes said to have been found in the ruins of Emperor Nero 's Domus Aurea , though this is unlikely, as fragments uncovered there contained no evidence of high-quality works of art such as the Venus. The missing head was reconstructed in the 16th century. The restorer decided to have the figure look over her shoulder at her own buttocks, a choice that gave the Venus its distinctive pose and had
3496-470: The 3rd millennium BC, or possibly earlier. The earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the world's oldest recorded living language . Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now-extinct Anatolian languages . The Greek language is conventionally divided into
3588-615: The Centre for African Studies at the University of Oxford. Their son Raphael Cormack is an author, editor and translator specialising in Arabic Cultural History and Literature. In 2000, Beard revealed in an essay for the London Review of Books reviewing a book on rape that she too had been raped, in 1978. Her blog, A Don's Life , gets about 40,000 hits a day, according to The Independent (2013). Beard
3680-799: The Farnese estate was inherited by Charles of Bourbon , who moved some of the marbles, including the Venus, across the Tiber River to the Villa Farnesina . In 1786, the Bourbons decided to move the Venus Kallipygos to Naples with the rest of the Farnese Collection . First, however, it was sent to be restored by Carlo Albacini . Responding to contemporary criticisms of some of the statue's features, Albacini replaced
3772-486: The Greek alphabet since approximately the 9th century BC. It was created by modifying the Phoenician alphabet , with the innovation of adopting certain letters to represent the vowels. The variant of the alphabet in use today is essentially the late Ionic variant, introduced for writing classical Attic in 403 BC. In classical Greek, as in classical Latin, only upper-case letters existed. The lower-case Greek letters were developed much later by medieval scribes to permit
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3864-425: The Greek language are often emphasized. Although Greek has undergone morphological and phonological changes comparable to those seen in other languages, never since classical antiquity has its cultural, literary, and orthographic tradition been interrupted to the extent that one can speak of a new language emerging. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than
3956-495: The Greek language was the Cypriot syllabary (also a descendant of Linear A via the intermediate Cypro-Minoan syllabary ), which is closely related to Linear B but uses somewhat different syllabic conventions to represent phoneme sequences. The Cypriot syllabary is attested in Cyprus from the 11th century BC until its gradual abandonment in the late Classical period, in favor of the standard Greek alphabet. Greek has been written in
4048-629: The Greek verb have likewise remained largely the same over the course of the language's history but with significant changes in the number of distinctions within each category and their morphological expression. Greek verbs have synthetic inflectional forms for: Many aspects of the syntax of Greek have remained constant: verbs agree with their subject only, the use of the surviving cases is largely intact (nominative for subjects and predicates, accusative for objects of most verbs and many prepositions, genitive for possessors), articles precede nouns, adpositions are largely prepositional, relative clauses follow
4140-685: The Greek-Albanian border. A significant percentage of Albania's population has knowledge of the Greek language due in part to the Albanian wave of immigration to Greece in the 1980s and '90s and the Greek community in the country. Prior to the Greco-Turkish War and the resulting population exchange in 1923 a very large population of Greek-speakers also existed in Turkey , though very few remain today. A small Greek-speaking community
4232-620: The Labour Party is going through a rough time, and I'm sure it is rough to be in there, it might actually all be to the good. He might be changing the party in a way that would make it easier for people like me to vote for." 2016 saw Beard present Pompeii: New Secrets Revealed with Mary Beard on BBC One in March. While May 2016, brought about a four-part series shown on BBC Two, titled Mary Beard's Ultimate Rome: Empire Without Limit . Beard's standalone documentary Julius Caesar Revealed
4324-569: The National Archaeological Museum, Naples is a Roman work in marble , dating to the late 1st century BC. It is considered to be a copy or "paraphrase" of an older Greek statue, probably bronze . This lost original is thought to have been created around 300 BC, near the inception of the Hellenistic period. The marble version's sculptor and provenance are unknown. It was rediscovered, missing its head, in Rome by at least
4416-584: The Strong ordered a copy, which was executed by Pierre de l'Estache in Rome between 1722 and 1723, for the Grosser Garten , Dresden. However, it was destroyed in 1945. Sir Henry Hoare, 5th Baronet commissioned a copy of the Venus (likely by John Cheere ) to be embedded in the niches of the newly constructed Pantheon on the Stourhead Estate in 1753–1754. The 19th-century identification
4508-404: The acute during the late 20th century, and it has only been retained in typography . After the writing reform of 1982, most diacritics are no longer used. Since then, Greek has been written mostly in the simplified monotonic orthography (or monotonic system), which employs only the acute accent and the diaeresis. The traditional system, now called the polytonic orthography (or polytonic system),
4600-402: The ancient language; singular and plural alone in later stages), and gender (masculine, feminine, and neuter), and decline for case (from six cases in the earliest forms attested to four in the modern language). Nouns, articles, and adjectives show all the distinctions except for a person. Both attributive and predicative adjectives agree with the noun. The inflectional categories of
4692-459: The attitudes, context and beliefs of their authors, not as reliable sources for the events they address. The other is that she argues that modern histories of Rome must be contextualised within the attitudes, world views and purposes of their authors. In 1994 she made an early television appearance on an Open Media discussion for the BBC, Weird Thoughts , alongside Jenny Randles among others. This
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#17327871964724784-442: The bath. Others identified it instead with one of the "beautiful-buttocked" girls from Athenaeus's story, and as such it was alternatively known as "La Belle Victorieuse" or "La Bergère Grecque". In 1836, Famin [ fr ] called it a "charming statuette" but noted that it was "placed in a reserved hall, where the curious are only introduced under the surveillance of a guardian, though even this precaution has not prevented
4876-659: The development of her personal feminism. Beard graduated from Cambridge with a Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree. As was traditional, her BA was later promoted to a Master of Arts (MA Cantab) degree. She remained at Cambridge for her Doctor of Philosophy ( PhD ) degree, completing it in 1982 with a doctoral thesis titled The State Religion in the Late Roman Republic: A Study Based on the Works of Cicero . Between 1979 and 1983, Beard lectured in classics at King's College, London ; she returned to Cambridge in 1984 as
4968-404: The early 19th century that was used for literary and official purposes in the newly formed Greek state. In 1976, Dimotiki was declared the official language of Greece, after having incorporated features of Katharevousa and thus giving birth to Standard Modern Greek , used today for all official purposes and in education . The historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of
5060-470: The end pay the price". In a November 2007 interview, she stated the hostility these comments provoked had still not subsided, though she believed it had become a standard viewpoint that terrorism was associated with American foreign policy . By this point she was described by Paul Laity of The Guardian as "Britain's best-known classicist". In 2004, Beard, through internal promotion, became Professor of Classics at Cambridge . In 2007–2008, Beard gave
5152-618: The epics of Homer , ancient Greek literature includes many works of lasting importance in the European canon . Greek is also the language in which many of the foundational texts in science and philosophy were originally composed. The New Testament of the Christian Bible was also originally written in Greek. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world , the Greek texts and Greek societies of antiquity constitute
5244-410: The famous buttocks: c'eût été le temple de la Grèce/ Pour qui j'eusse eu plus de dévotion this would have been the temple of Greece/ For which I would have professed the most devotion. Metallic Venus , Jeff Koons 's modern interpretation made of polished steel, is from his Antiquity Series . The chrome-finished sculpture celebrates the original themes of beauty, fertility, and innocence but with
5336-452: The following periods: In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia : the coexistence of vernacular and archaizing written forms of the language. What came to be known as the Greek language question was a polarization between two competing varieties of Modern Greek: Dimotiki , the vernacular form of Modern Greek proper, and Katharevousa , meaning 'purified', a compromise between Dimotiki and Ancient Greek developed in
5428-677: The head, the arms, and one leg; he followed the previous restoration fairly faithfully in having the figure look back over her shoulder. By 1792, the statue was at the Museo di Capodimonte in Naples, and by 1802 it was in the Museo degli Studi , now the Naples National Archaeological Museum, where it remains. The restorers' decision to have the figure look over her back greatly affected subsequent interpretations, to
5520-439: The infinitive entirely (employing a raft of new periphrastic constructions instead) and uses participles more restrictively. The loss of the dative led to a rise of prepositional indirect objects (and the use of the genitive to directly mark these as well). Ancient Greek tended to be verb-final, but neutral word order in the modern language is VSO or SVO. Modern Greek inherits most of its vocabulary from Ancient Greek, which in turn
5612-467: The late 15th century BC, was the first script used to write Greek. It is basically a syllabary , which was finally deciphered by Michael Ventris and John Chadwick in the 1950s (its precursor, Linear A , has not been deciphered and most likely encodes a non-Greek language). The language of the Linear B texts, Mycenaean Greek , is the earliest known form of Greek. Another similar system used to write
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#17327871964725704-640: The membership of Greece and Cyprus in the European Union, Greek is one of the organization's 24 official languages . Greek is recognized as a minority language in Albania, and used co-officially in some of its municipalities, in the districts of Gjirokastër and Sarandë . It is also an official minority language in the regions of Apulia and Calabria in Italy. In the framework of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages , Greek
5796-441: The modern period. The division into conventional periods is, as with all such periodizations, relatively arbitrary, especially because, in all periods, Ancient Greek has enjoyed high prestige, and the literate borrowed heavily from it. Across its history, the syllabic structure of Greek has varied little: Greek shows a mixed syllable structure, permitting complex syllabic onsets but very restricted codas. It has only oral vowels and
5888-399: The noun they modify and relative pronouns are clause-initial. However, the morphological changes also have their counterparts in the syntax, and there are also significant differences between the syntax of the ancient and that of the modern form of the language . Ancient Greek made great use of participial constructions and of constructions involving the infinitive, and the modern variety lacks
5980-536: The objects of study of the discipline of Classics . During antiquity , Greek was by far the most widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world . It eventually became the official language of the Byzantine Empire and developed into Medieval Greek . In its modern form , Greek is the official language of Greece and Cyprus and one of the 24 official languages of the European Union . It
6072-706: The older periods of Greek, loanwords into Greek acquired Greek inflections, thus leaving only a foreign root word. Modern borrowings (from the 20th century on), especially from French and English, are typically not inflected; other modern borrowings are derived from Albanian , South Slavic ( Macedonian / Bulgarian ) and Eastern Romance languages ( Aromanian and Megleno-Romanian ). Greek words have been widely borrowed into other languages, including English. Example words include: mathematics , physics , astronomy , democracy , philosophy , athletics , theatre, rhetoric , baptism , evangelist , etc. Moreover, Greek words and word elements continue to be productive as
6164-570: The point that the classicists Mary Beard and J. G. W. Henderson describe it as having "created a 'masterpiece' in place of a fragment". The restored statue's pose draws further attention to the naked buttocks and gives the figure a distinctly erotic aspect. The restoration recalled in the minds of viewers a story recorded in Athenaeus 's Deipnosophistae about the founding of a temple of "Aphrodite Kallipygos" in ancient Syracuse, Sicily . According to Athenaeus, two beautiful sisters from
6256-401: The request of Ferdinand Mount . Shortly after the 11 September 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center , Beard was one of several authors invited to contribute articles on the topic to the London Review of Books . She opined that many people, once "the shock had faded", thought "the United States had it coming", and that "[w]orld bullies, even if their heart is in the right place, will in
6348-417: The rounded forms which won for the goddess the name of Callipyge, from being covered with a dark tint, which betrays the profane kisses that fanatic admirers have every day impressed there. We ourselves knew a young German tourist smitten with a mad passion for this voluptuous marble; and the commiseration his state of mind inspired set aside all idea of ridicule." A marble copy by Jean-Jacques Clérion (1686)
6440-400: The statue was identified as Venus and associated with a temple to Aphrodite Kallipygos at Syracuse , discussed by Athenaeus in his Deipnosophistae . The statue was copied a number of times, including by Jean-Jacques Clérion and François Barois . It is part of the Farnese Collection in the National Archaeological Museum, Naples ( Inv. numb. 6020). The "Venus Kallipygos" in
6532-437: The stressed vowel; the so-called breathing marks ( rough and smooth breathing ), originally used to signal presence or absence of word-initial /h/; and the diaeresis , used to mark the full syllabic value of a vowel that would otherwise be read as part of a diphthong. These marks were introduced during the course of the Hellenistic period. Actual usage of the grave in handwriting saw a rapid decline in favor of uniform usage of
6624-557: The target of considerable online abuse after she made the case that Roman Britain was more ethnically diverse than is often assumed. The source of the controversy was a BBC educational video depicting a senior Roman soldier as a black man, which Beard defended as entirely possible after the video received backlash. There followed, according to Beard, "a torrent of aggressive insults, on everything from my historical competence and elitist ivory tower viewpoint to my age, shape and gender [batty old broad, obese, etc etc]." In 2018, in response to
6716-451: The younger sister. Thereafter the brothers refused to consider any other brides, so their father arranged for the sisters to come marry them. The citizens dubbed the sisters "Kallipugoi" ("Women with Beautiful Buttocks"), and with their new-found prosperity, they dedicated a temple to Aphrodite, calling her Kallipygos. Other sources mention the cult of Aphrodite Kallipygos at Syracuse. The Christian writer Clement of Alexandria includes it in
6808-441: Was Joyce Reynolds . Beard has since said that "Newnham could do better in making itself a place where critical issues can be generated" and has also described her views on feminism, saying "I actually can't understand what it would be to be a woman without being a feminist." Beard has cited Germaine Greer 's The Female Eunuch , Kate Millett 's Sexual Politics , and Robert Munsch 's The Paper Bag Princess as influential on
6900-574: Was a distinct dialect of Greek itself. Aside from the Macedonian question, current consensus regards Phrygian as the closest relative of Greek, since they share a number of phonological, morphological and lexical isoglosses , with some being exclusive between them. Scholars have proposed a Graeco-Phrygian subgroup out of which Greek and Phrygian originated. Among living languages, some Indo-Europeanists suggest that Greek may be most closely related to Armenian (see Graeco-Armenian ) or
6992-488: Was accused of racism. In response, Beard posted a picture of herself crying, explaining that she had been subjected to a "torrent of abuse" and that "I find it hard to imagine that anyone out there could possibly think that I am wanting to turn a blind eye to the abuse of women and children". Beard married Robin Cormack , a classicist and art historian, in 1985. Their daughter Zoe is an anthropologist and historian based at
7084-568: Was also used as the official language of government and religion in the Christian Nubian kingdoms , for most of their history. Greek, in its modern form, is the official language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population. It is also the official language of Cyprus (nominally alongside Turkish ) and the British Overseas Territory of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (alongside English ). Because of
7176-557: Was also used in Ancient Greek. Greek has occasionally been written in the Latin script , especially in areas under Venetian rule or by Greek Catholics . The term Frankolevantinika / Φραγκολεβαντίνικα applies when the Latin script is used to write Greek in the cultural ambit of Catholicism (because Frankos / Φράγκος is an older Greek term for West-European dating to when most of (Roman Catholic Christian) West Europe
7268-569: Was appointed a trustee of the British Museum. In 2023, Profile Books published Emperor of Rome: Ruling the Ancient Roman World . Writing for Literary Review , Harry Sidebottom called it "her best book so far". University of Chicago classicist Clifford Ando described Beard's scholarship as having two key aspects in its approach to sources. One is that she insists that ancient sources be understood as documentation of
7360-550: Was born on 1 January 1955 in Much Wenlock , Shropshire. Her mother, Joyce Emily Beard, was a headmistress and an enthusiastic reader. Her father, Roy Whitbread Beard, worked as an architect in Shrewsbury . She recalled him as "a raffish public-schoolboy type and a complete wastrel, but very engaging". Beard was educated at Shrewsbury High School , a girls' school then funded as a direct grant grammar school . She
7452-405: Was characterised in an article in 2021 as follows: Weird Thoughts , where Tony Wilson chairs a panel of experts debating why the 1990s seem so very strange. There are a lot of familiar faces here – the late James Randi , Fortean Times founder Bob Rickard , esoteric scholar Lynn Picknett – but today the biggest name is the one hovering around the back of the gathering: a young Mary Beard. As
7544-495: Was created by a fan. Beard is known for being active on X (formerly Twitter), which she sees as part of her public role as an academic. Beard received considerable online abuse after she appeared on BBC's Question Time from Lincolnshire in January 2013 and cast doubt on the negative rhetoric about immigrant workers living in the county. She asserted her right to express unpopular opinions and to present herself in public in
7636-647: Was later renamed Inside Culture and is broadcast on BBC Two. She also released The Shock of the Nude - a two-part TV documentary tackling controversies surrounding the naked body in the arts, from ancient classics to the visual cultures of today. In April 2013 she was named as Royal Academy of Arts Professor of Ancient Literature. Beard was awarded an honorary degree from Oxford University in June 2018. She also received an honorary degree from Yale University in May 2019. In 2018, an unofficial Lego figure of Beard
7728-431: Was recorded and broadcast on BBC Four a month later under the title Oh Do Shut Up, Dear! . The lecture begins with the example of Telemachus , the son of Odysseus and Penelope , admonishing his mother to retreat to her chamber. (The title alludes to Prime Minister David Cameron telling a female MP to "Calm down, dear!", which earned widespread criticism as a "classic sexist put-down". ) Three years later, Beard gave
7820-405: Was rediscovered, missing its head, in the early modern period . The head was restored, first in the 16th century and again in the 18th century (in which case the sculptor followed the earlier restoration fairly closely); the restored head was made to look over the shoulder, drawing further attention to the statue's bare buttocks, thereby contributing to its popularity. In the 17th and 18th centuries,
7912-545: Was repopularised by the 20th-century lyrics of the French lyricist Georges Brassens , in his "Vénus Callipyge", which seems explicitly to reference Jean de La Fontaine in his Conte tiré d'Athénée , among the posthumous tales (the third under that title in the so-called contes libertins , the first two in the Première partie, published 10 January 1665), which paraphrases Athenaeus's account and ends in direct reference to
8004-598: Was sent to Versailles. Another copy was made by François Barois during his residence at the French Academy in Rome , 1683–1686. It was sent to Versailles , then to Marly-le-Roi in 1695, where it was provided with additional marble draperies by Jean Thierry, not to offend an increasingly prudish public taste; it remained at Marly until the Revolution, when it found its way to the Jardin des Tuileries . Augustus
8096-399: Was set to retire in 2022 and started a scholarship as a "retirement present" worth £80,000 in order to support two disadvantaged students' classical studies at Cambridge. Beard has been a Labour Party member and describes herself as having a socialist disposition, being a committed feminist and an anti-racist. In August 2014, Beard was one of 200 public figures who were signatories to
8188-524: Was shown on BBC One in 2018. In March, she wrote and presented "How Do We Look?" and "The Eye of Faith", two of the nine episodes in Civilisations , a reboot of the 1969 series by Kenneth Clark . In 2019, Beard appeared in an episode of The Grand Tour , having dinner with host James May , in his effort to get his car photographed by paparazzi. In 2020, Beard became the host of the newly developed topical arts series Lockdown Culture , which
8280-500: Was taught poetry by Frank McEachran , who was teaching then at the nearby Shrewsbury School , and was the inspiration for schoolmaster Hector in Alan Bennett 's play The History Boys . During the summer she would join archaeological excavations , though the motivation was, in part, just the prospect of earning some pocket-money. At 18 she sat the then-compulsory entrance exam and interview for Cambridge University , to win
8372-580: Was under the control of the Frankish Empire ). Frankochiotika / Φραγκοχιώτικα (meaning 'Catholic Chiot') alludes to the significant presence of Catholic missionaries based on the island of Chios . Additionally, the term Greeklish is often used when the Greek language is written in a Latin script in online communications. The Latin script is nowadays used by the Greek-speaking communities of Southern Italy . The Yevanic dialect
8464-673: Was written by Romaniote and Constantinopolitan Karaite Jews using the Hebrew Alphabet . In a tradition, that in modern time, has come to be known as Greek Aljamiado , some Greek Muslims from Crete wrote their Cretan Greek in the Arabic alphabet . The same happened among Epirote Muslims in Ioannina . This also happened among Arabic-speaking Byzantine rite Christians in the Levant ( Lebanon , Palestine, and Syria ). This usage
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