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CLASSICS STRIKES BACK: THOMAS EVANS AND HIS MATHEMATOGONIA

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2023

Christopher Stray  and
Christopher Collard
Christopher Stray*
Affiliation:
Department of Classics, Swansea University, Swansea, UK
Christopher Collard
Affiliation:
Emeritus Professor of Classics, Swansea University, Swansea, UK
*
*Corresponding author. Email: c.a.stray@swansea.ac.uk
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Abstract

Thomas Saunders Evans’ Greek poem Mathematogonia. The mythological birth of the nymph Mathesis (1839) is one of the outstanding products of the British compositional tradition. The article begins with a brief account of Evans and of the historical context of the poem, which also belongs to the history of mathematics in Britain, and in particular, its teaching in nineteenth-century Cambridge. This is followed by a preliminary note on Mathematogonia; a reproduction of the text of the poem, with Evans’ original preface and notes; an English translation; notes detailing Evans’ sources and borrowings from Tragic texts; and an appendix listing the changes he made after its first publication. The aim is to show what Evans wrote, and to explain what prompted him to do so.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Cambridge Classical Journal , Volume 69 , December 2023 , pp. 120 - 152
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Cambridge Philological Society

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Footnotes

†

We offer our thanks for help of various kinds to Stuart Gillespie, Gregory Hutchinson, James Kirwan, Geoffrey Lloyd, Kathryn McKee and Adrian Rice. We are especially indebted to James Diggle for detailed critical comments and generous suggestions on an early draft.

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