Reed College
Reed College

Humanities 110

Introduction to the Humanities

Paper Topics | Spring 2010 | Paper 5

Due Saturday, February 13th, 5 p.m., in your conference leader's Eliot Hall mailbox.
Maximum Length 1500 words

  1. "In my sixth and seventh consulships, after I had put an end to the civil wars, having attained supreme power by universal consent, I transferred the state from my own power to the control of the Roman senate and the people. … After that time I excelled all in authority, but I possessed no more power than the others who were my colleagues in each magistracy" (Accomplishments, 34). Explore the relations between power and authority in the self-representation of Augustus in the Accomplishments and in Livy's representation of Camillus and/or Romulus.

  2. Compare the representation of family in Livy and on the Ara Pacis Augustae.

  3. In Book 3 of On the Nature of Things, Lucretius claims that the fear of death is unreasonable. What are his arguments for this view? Are they good arguments?

  4. Natural imagery pervades both Lucretius' On the Nature of Things and the Ara Pacis Augustae. How do these works represent the relationship between what is "human" and what is "natural"?

  5. In the conclusion to Book VI, Polybius argues that "There being two agencies by which every kind of state is liable to decay, the one external and the other a growth of the state itself, we can lay down no fixed rule about the former, but the latter is a regular process" (VI.57.2). Reconstruct Polybius' argument that the "growth of the state itself" is a cause for the state's decline and evaluate whether Livy would agree.

  6. What role does Lucretius think mythology should play in our everyday lives? Compare his conception to that of Plato in the Republic.

  7. Compare how Polybius and either Plato or Aristotle describe and evaluate different forms of government.

  8. In consultation with your instructor, devise a topic of your own.