Search Results (205)

The dynamic response of ancient multi-drum columns, commonly found in historical monuments, is characterized by complex nonlinear mechanisms including rocking, sliding, and wobbling. Unlike modern monolithic columns, these structures consist of large, unbonded stone drums that rotate and interact dynamically during ground motion, resulting in highly nonlinear behavior due to intermittent impacts and evolving contact surfaces. The objective of this study is to evaluate the influence of the friction coefficient at the interfaces on the dynamic response of multi-drum columns. Two structural configurations are considered: (i) simple free-standing multi-drum columns, and (ii) multi-drum columns connected with iron dowels, replicating ancient Greek construction techniques. The columns analyzed are representative of the colonnade system of the Gymnasium of Ancient Messene, Greece. Sinusoidal base excitations with varying characteristics are applied, and parametric study is conducted by varying the interfacial friction coefficient. The results indicate that in the first configuration, low friction promotes interfacial sliding, leading to enhanced energy dissipation, a softened rocking response, and a reduced overturning frequency range. In the second configuration, variations in friction have a limited effect on the collapse frequency range, because at lower friction levels strong excitations lead to dowel reinsertion failure over a wide frequency range. Full article

Modern Greek was spoken along the northwestern coast of Asia Minor until the early 20th century, yet neither its precise geographical extent nor its dialectal classification is well established. This paper seeks to clarify both issues by focusing on the variety of Adramytti (Edremit). The available evidence suggests that Adramyttian, despite its close relationship to and partial origin in Modern Lesbian, was essentially a mixed variety that leveled out many characteristic Modern Lesbian features, such as the raising of unstressed mid vowels and certain morphological phenomena. Such differences can be attributed to the diverse character of the speech community that led to contact between speakers of Modern Lesbian origin and speakers of other Greek dialects. In addition to providing a grammatical description of Adramyttian, which demonstrates its mixed profile, the paper offers a tentative classification of this variety in relation to Modern Lesbian and the other insular varieties of northeastern Aegean, as well as in relation to other neighboring varieties of northwestern Asia Minor (Aeolis, Mysia, northern Ionia). Full article

The prehistoric and historic Greek populations have a long and glorious history and could teach us significant lessons relevant to water resources and their management. Most Greek civilizations lived in harmony with the environment, with a profound understanding of environmental sustainability. The Minoan era, considered as Pax Minoica (or Minoan peace), was a time when palaces and other living places did not have defensive walls; in that time, human rights and power without a military aristocracy developed. During that time, hydro-structures with a high degree of security, which remained in operation for millennia, were developed, most of them established in predominantly arid areas for reasons of security, protection, and public health. The study presents important elements of the development and progress of these technological achievements provided by ancient civilizations throughout the prehistoric to modern period, in the context of revealing and highlighting potential lessons to understand and address current critical issues in the management of water resources. Furthermore, the methodology used and the technological structural advancement of water works, their infrastructure durability, and early water law principles are considered. Many modern systems are designed for operational lifespans of 50–100 years, whereas several ancient Greek hydraulic structures remained functional for centuries by relying on renewable natural resources—reflecting a fundamentally different design philosophy centered on longevity and robustness. Thus, terms such as “sustainability” and “water security/safety”, first taught by ancient civilizations, need to be reconsidered and adopted again nowadays to inspire policies, strategies, and actions against the increasing challenges. Full article

This article argues that racism did not originate with the modern invention of race but crystallized out of a much older imperial grammar that had already learned how to naturalize domination through embodied difference. Long before race emerged as a named category, ancient and medieval empires developed durable ways of converting historically produced hierarchies into features of nature, the cosmos, and divine order. Through a comparative genealogy spanning early Mesopotamian epic, Near Eastern imperial inscriptions, Egyptian visual regimes, Greek philosophy and historiography, biblical scripture, South Asian metaphysics, late antique encyclopedism, and medieval Marian devotion, the article shows how inequality was repeatedly anchored in the body, in genealogy, in geography, and in moral psychology. Across these traditions, political authority is consistently masculinized, while subordination is feminized, animalized, or rendered reproductively vulnerable. Patriarchy and racialization thus emerge as co-constitutive imperial technologies rather than as separate or sequential phenomena. Modern racism did not invent hierarchy; it rendered an ancient logic portable, inheritable, and globally scalable by fastening domination to visible human difference. By situating race within a longue durée history of empire and male domination, the article reframes contemporary debates on racism as questions of imperial continuity rather than modern deviation. Full article

The 1923 Greek–Turkish Population Exchange (Mubadele in Turkish), formalized through the Lausanne Convention, remains one of the most consequential cases of compulsory migration in modern history. This systematic review synthesizes a century of scholarship across political, legal, social, cultural, and historiographical dimensions. Findings indicate that the exchange not only legitimized forced displacement under international law but also reinforced authoritarian state-building in Turkey and exacerbated political instability in Greece. The social consequences included trauma, marginalization, and the emergence of heterogeneous refugee identities, while cultural memory oscillated between nationalist silencing and transnational remembrance. Urban landscapes and demographic structures were profoundly reshaped, producing visible legacies in contemporary cities. Furthermore, assimilation policies formalized the integration of populations, influencing the development of national identities in both Turkey and Greece. Historiographical trajectories diverged, with Greek scholarship emphasizing refugee struggles and Turkish scholarship foregrounding nation-building. Recent studies highlight hybrid identities and transgenerational redefinitions of belonging. This review underscores the necessity of integrating political, social, and memory studies to capture the multi-layered impacts of the exchange, offering a comprehensive account of its enduring relevance for migration, nationalism, and memory studies in Southeast Europe. Full article

This paper examines the evolution of modern Greek Orthodox dogmatic theology, highlighting its transition from early twentieth-century scholasticism to the diverse neo-patristic and existential approaches that shaped its later renewal. It begins with Panagiotes Trembelas, whose comprehensive but manualist synthesis safeguarded doctrinal continuity while limiting historical and experiential depth. After the Second World War, Greek theology encountered Russian émigré thought and rediscovered the Palamite tradition, inspiring a “return to the Fathers” and a search for authentic patristic expression. This movement produced multiple trajectories: John Romanides emphasized historical and experiential purification, Christos Yannaras redefined dogma as personal and relational existence, and John Zizioulas developed a Eucharistic and relational ontology grounded in communion. Rather than representing rupture, these approaches reflect a creative struggle to articulate Orthodox faith within modern intellectual contexts. Overall, this paper presents modern Greek dogmatics as a dynamic field negotiating tradition, modernity, and ecclesial identity. Full article

This study examines administrative employees’ perceptions of integrating Artificial Intelligence (AI) into the administration of Greek public universities. Using a cross-sectional online questionnaire administered across three universities (N = 127), we map perceptions across five domains: (i) perceived efficiency/effectiveness contributions, (ii) perceived automation benefits, (iii) perceived adoption challenges, (iv) perceived ethics and data protection requirements, and (v) perceived skills development needs. Results indicate a generally supportive climate for AI use in university administration, but support is conditional: ethics and data protection are prioritized most strongly, whereas perceived efficiency/effectiveness gains are closer to neutral-to-slightly positive. Respondents endorse task-level automation more than broad organizational performance claims and emphasize training and human oversight as enabling conditions for responsible deployment. These findings suggest that a governance-first and capacity-first implementation pathway may be more aligned with staff priorities in the Greek public university context. The study provides an exploratory baseline for future evaluative research on AI-enabled administrative modernization. Full article

Greece exhibits a continuous and exceptionally well-documented tradition of water management extending from prehistoric times to the modern era. This review critically examines the evolution of Greek hydro-technologies within their historical, environmental, and socio-political contexts, highlighting their enduring relevance to contemporary water resource management. Beginning with the advanced hydraulic systems of the Minoan civilization, the study traces the development, transformation, decline, and rediscovery of water management practices across successive periods, including the Mycenaean, Classical, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Venetian, Ottoman, and modern Greek eras. The analysis is based on a synthesis of archeological evidence, historical sources, and technical studies from approximately 200 documented sites throughout Greece. Particular emphasis is placed on water supply, drainage, sanitation, irrigation, and governance systems, as well as on periods during which hydraulic knowledge was partially lost and later reintroduced or adapted. Representative case studies illustrate the spatial and technological diversity of Greek hydro-technological solutions, ranging from monumental aqueducts and dams to decentralized cisterns, wells, and communal irrigation systems. The review demonstrates that Greek hydro-technologies consistently integrated technical innovation with environmental adaptation, social organization, and institutional regulation. This diachronic synthesis provides transferable lessons for modern water governance, infrastructure resilience, and climate adaptation, offering a conceptual framework for addressing contemporary challenges related to water scarcity, climate variability, and sustainable water management in Mediterranean and semi-arid regions. Full article

This study examines the vocal directivity of singing in Greek across three stylistically diverse genres—operatic/classical, modern/pop, and Byzantine chant—performed under realistic, unconstrained conditions. Directivity data was captured in a hemi-anechoic environment using a 29-microphone hemispherical array, in a setup that allowed singers to make natural, performance-related micro-movements. The applied analysis framework combined sound projection (magnitude of radiated energy across space and frequency) and radiation patterns (normalized spatial distribution) with three established directivity metrics: Horizontal Directivity Index, Front-to-Back Ratio, and Upward-to-Downward Ratio. Results show that while directional shape remains largely consistent across styles and sexes, projection intensity varies systematically as a function of both. Male pop singers exhibit the strongest low-frequency output (125–500 Hz), while female classical and male pop/Byzantine singers display greater frontal focus in the 1–2 kHz range. Classical singers tend toward more balanced projection profiles. Beyond the release of publicly available datasets—including the first directivity measurements of Byzantine chant—this study introduces a structured analysis framework and offers comparative findings that inform vocal science, pedagogy, and spatial audio applications. Full article

This article rereads Odysseus’s encounter with the Sirens in the Odyssey through the lens of sound, arguing that the episode stages a foundational tension between knowledge and alterity in Western thought. Drawing on Emmanuel Levinas’s notion of the “temptation of temptation,” the essay shows how Odysseus’s famous stratagem—hearing the Sirens while bound to the mast—models a form of mediated proximity that allows sound to be collected without ethical exposure. Close readings of Homeric Greek, especially the Sirens’ claim to knowledge of ὅσσα γένηται, reveal that their song gestures not merely toward retrospective epic knowledge but toward natality and coming-into-being, a dimension Homer pointedly withholds. By placing the Sirens alongside early colonial soundscapes and modern reflections on cartography, the article argues that Western listening practices privilege mastery over vulnerability. Against this tradition, the Sirens’ unheard song marks a suppressed alternative: listening as openness, risk, and ethical relation. Full article

The role of metapragmatics in maintaining interactional coherence and achieving intersubjectivity has been variously underscored in the last three decades. In particular, raising metapragmatic awareness has become increasingly salient in research on intercultural communication and foreign/second language teaching. However, the topic has not been hitherto discussed in connection with heritage languages, and this is a gap that the present paper aims to fill. Based on interviews with Greek Melburnians who belong (in triads or dyads) to the same family but to different generations, a typology of metapragmatic awareness indicators encountered in the data is presented. Quantitative examination of one type of indicators—those oriented towards the addressee—indicates a decrease in their use across three generations. Similarly, examination of the variants of second-person pronouns and/or verb endings (the T/V distinction) brought to the fore alternations in the T and V forms, indicative of linguistic insecurity, as well as an increasing preference for the informal variants across three generations. The qualitative analysis of extracts from the interviews shed further light on the insecurity regarding the T/V distinction. Overall, the results point to changes in the communicative style of Greek Melburnians, namely away from positive politeness features (typical of the Greek society) towards English interactional norms, and the fostering of a hybrid communicative style—in alignment with their hybrid identities. It is suggested that politeness issues be integrated into the teaching of Greek as a heritage language. Full article

The ancient city of Gela (built in the 7th century BCE) is located in the southern sector of the Sicily Island (Southern Italy) on a Pleistocene marine terrace near the mouth of the Gela River. Gela was one of the most important Greek colonies in the Mediterranean Sea, strategically positioned at the crossroads of the major maritime trade routes and with a rich production of cereals thanks to the fertile Gela River alluvial plain. To reconstruct the coastal and environmental configuration during the Greek period and to improve the understanding of the location of the harbour basin, a multidisciplinary approach was applied to a sector of the Gela River alluvial–coastal plain. This area, located very close to the ancient city, is known as Conca (Italian for “Basin”) and was identified through the analysis of historical and modern maps as well as aerial photographs. The multidisciplinary approach includes geomorphology (derived from maps and aerial photos), stratigraphy (boreholes and archeological trench), paleoecology (ostracoda, foraminifera and fossil contents of selected layers), geochronology (¹⁴C dating of selected organic materials) and archeology (historical sources and maps, pottery fragments extracted from boreholes and trench layers). The main results show that this area was occupied by lower shoreface environments in the time intervals between 4.4 and 2.8 ka, which progressively transitioned to upper shoreface environments until the Greek age. During the Roman period, these environments were significantly reduced due to repeated alluvial sedimentation of the Gela River transforming the area into fluvial–marshy environments. A time interval of aeolian sand deposition was recorded in the upper part of the coastal stratigraphical succession, which can be related to climatic conditions with high aridity. Available data show that marine environments persisted in the Conca sector during the Greek age, allowing hypothesizing the presence of an ancient harbour in this area. The depth of the Greek age marine environments is estimated to be between 4.5 and 7 m below the current ground level. Further investigation, mainly based on geophysical and stratigraphical methods, will be planned aimed at identifying the presence of buried archeological targets. Full article

Roses held profound cultural and economic significance in ancient Greece and Rome, yet comprehensive documentation of their species diversity, cultivation practices, and horticultural innovations remains fragmented across archaeological, iconographic, and textual sources. This multidisciplinary study synthesizes evidence from classical texts, archaeological remains including recently identified rose stem fragments from Oplontis, and iconographic materials—including frescoes, coins, and mosaics—to reconstruct the horticultural systems and cultural landscape of roses in classical antiquity. Analysis of literary sources, particularly Theophrastus’s fourth-century BCE taxonomic descriptions, reveals systematic cultivation of diverse rose varieties with flowers ranging from white to deep crimson, including yellow variants, characterized by morphologies from simple to double forms and valued for fragrance intensity and re-blooming capacity. Archaeological evidence from sites such as Paestum, Pompeii, and Oplontis, including pollen samples, preserved wood fragments with diagnostic prickle patterns, and fresco representations, documents commercial rose production and specialized cultivation techniques that demonstrate significantly greater morphological diversity than textual sources alone indicate. Field research and collection documentation establish the origins of Mediterranean rose cultivation, while iconographic analysis identifies roses in religious ceremonies, festivals, and daily life contexts. Textual sources provide detailed propagation methods, seasonal management practices, and evidence of Mediterranean hybridization events, alongside extensive documentation of medicinal and cosmetic applications. Economic analysis reveals specialized trade networks, commercial production centers, and diverse applications in perfumery, garland making, and pharmaceutical industries. This research establishes that Greek and Roman civilizations developed sophisticated rose cultivation systems integrating botanical selection, horticultural innovation, and cultural symbolism that directly influenced medieval and Renaissance practices and informed modern trait categorization systems. These findings demonstrate the foundational role of classical antiquity in European rose heritage, revealing how ancient horticultural knowledge, species diversification through hybridization, and cultivation techniques created an unbroken transmission that shaped contemporary rose industries and established conservation priorities for this horticultural heritage. Full article

In this article, the philosophical (critical) continuity between ancient Greek skepticism (Pyrrhonism) and postmodern political theory is pointed out. This continuity (philosophical reincarnation) is demonstrated by referring to Sextus Empiricus’ writings on Pyrrhonism, as well as two different approaches that are considered to reflect postmodern political theory in its most salient features, such as anti-fundamentalism: Chantal Mouffe’s “project of radical democracy” and the “art of doubt” in Ulrich Beck’s “reflexive” modernity. The content of the identified continuity is basically the following: Just as the Pyrrhonian philosopher aspires to achieve serenity of spirit by suspending judgment through doubt (“epoche” and “ataraksia”) [epəkē –αταραξία], the postmodern theorist aims to end organized political violence by doubting all modern truth allegations. In other words, the individual hope of the Pyrrhonian philosopher is reproduced in the postmodern mind as a socio-political ideal. In Michel Foucault’s terms, the “regime of truth” or the “politics of truth” is an option that often leads to the “terror of truth”. The politics of doubt, on the other hand, is a peaceful, tolerant alternative. According to the postmodern theorist, skepticism is a highly strategic element of a pluralist (libertarian) democratic order. The intellectual way to make modern democracy even more democratic is, first and foremost, through a skepticism that makes absolutely no concessions to truth allegations. In this respect, the most uncompromising skeptic in the history of philosophy is the Pyrrhonian philosopher. Pyrrhonism is the summit of anti-dogmatism. This means that the postmodern theorist is not so much a postmodern agent. In other words, postmodern political theory is the theory of an innovation that is already obsolete. Full article

Lentil (Lens culinaris Medik. subsp. culinaris) is a Mediterranean legume crop of high value due to nutritional quality and adaptability; however, its cultivation is increasingly threatened due to climate uncertainty and reduction in genetic diversity in modern cultivars. The present research study evaluated 31 Greek lentil accessions (twenty-two landraces and nine commercial cultivars of both small and large seed types) in a semi-arid environment of Central Greece, over two cropping seasons, focusing on phenological, morphological, yield, and quality traits. The great diversity observed at the morpho-phenological and qualitative levels implies the high genotypic diversity of these genetic resources. Small-seeded landraces performed better in seed and biological yield, harvest index, and protein content, having greater phenological stability and tolerance to the Mediterranean environments. In particular, the highest seed yield was observed in LAX small-seeded landrace (1930 kg ha⁻¹), followed by TSO (1559 kg ha⁻¹), DIG (1449 kg ha⁻¹), and EGL (1437 kg ha⁻¹) small-seeded landraces. As for the regression analysis, seed yield was positively correlated with days to flowering (TF: r = 0.076, p < 0.01), plant height (PH: r = 0.143, p < 0.05), number of pods per plant (NPP: r = 0.941, p < 0.001), number of seeds per pod (NPP: r = 0.432, p < 0.001), number of branches (NPB: r = 0.234, p < 0.01), biological yield (BY: r = 0.683, p < 0.001), and harvest index (HI: r = 0.650, p < 0.001). Principal component analysis (PCA) distinguished small-seeded landraces associated with adaptive and yield traits from large-seeded cultivars associated with seed size. Greek lentil landraces, especially the small-seeded genotypes (e.g., LAX and DIG), have great potential for use in the development of climate-tolerant and high-yielding lentil varieties adapted for sustainable Mediterranean production. Breeding programs can target the crossing of landraces with large-seeded cultivars (e.g., IKAm and THEm) to develop varieties that combine stress tolerance, adaptation, and high productivity with adaptation to different seed sizes. Subsequent studies on drought tolerance and heat resistance are still important for continued improvement in lentil productivity in a changing climate. Full article