CLS 239 ROMAN WOMEN: PUELLA, MATRONA, MERETRIX

Commentary Assignment

This final project for this course has three goals:

• a personal one, of increasing your competence in the language, specifically in the areas of vocabulary, grammar, and syntax, by applying your study of Latin to a real teaching situation,
• an academic one, of providing an assessment of your ability to read Latin independently and to do research on a substantial passage of Latin from the Matrona unit of the course,
• a broader one, of contributing material to the available resources for the teaching of Latin at the intermediate level.

You are asked to develop a commentary to an approved Latin passage, targeted to the abilities of an intermediate level Latin student (imagine a 4th year student in AP Latin). Follow the model of one of your course texts: Cicero: Pro Caelio, edited by Stephen Ciraolo. Consider that your commentary has a good chance of appearing on a website such as De Feminis Romanis, Iona Intermediate Latin Readings, or VRoma.

Your commentary will contain the following parts:

1. An introduction to the passage (minimum 3 pages) with information about the author, his life, his work, the genre in which he is writing, and, if the work you have chosen is a large one, an overview or outline of the entire opus (in the case of the Pliny letters, choose a research focus on his letters about women)
2. A copy of the Latin text with the line numbers indicated (go to Latin Library or Perseus or to a recent, reputable printed edition)
3. A translation of the Latin passage in your own words
4. A line by line commentary in which there is:

• a glossary for less-common words (give complete forms and indicate the scope of definitions, but forefront the meaning appropriate to your context)
• explanations of grammatical forms and syntax
• allusions to history, mythology, contemporary events
• analysis, observation, interpretation of the passage

5. A reflection on the text from the perspective of our study this semester of Roman women and more particularly of the matrona, i.e., what does this text tell us about Roman women in general and your particular woman specifically?

6. A bibliography of print and internet sources used

Submit the final draft of this assignment in both hard copy and digital form.
The first draft of your Commentary is due on December 3.

Dr. Ann R. Raia
Associate Professor of Classics
The College of New Rochelle