Francesco Rotiroti

"Dear etc., we are contacting you because your expertise in areas related to linguistics (if any) makes you an ideal candidate to review the manuscript entitled..."

Pseudo-academic spam couldn't be more ludicrous.

I have more articles in the works for Wiley's EAH, which will be published in future updates.

Finally, in the entry 'Gairethinx', I have especially sought to make the debate surrounding this subject -- largely shaped by German and Italian legal historiography -- better known to the international academic community.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

In 'Heretics, Roman legislation against', which covers the period from Constantine to Justinian, I have tried to touch, albeit concisely, on all the most relevant facets of this vast and important subject.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

All these entries are on subjects especially dear to me. In particular, I have thought for many years that there was a need for a fresh outline of the 'Nomos empsychos', and I'm glad the Editors gave me the opportunity to provide exactly that.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

I'm very glad to have contributed three articles to Wiley's Encyclopedia of Ancient History. They were published online a few days ago as part of the summer update.

My review of J. Awes Freeman, The Good Shepherd has been published online by Vigiliae Christianae, ahead of its inclusion in vol. 79 later this year. Unfortunately, it is not a positive review.

brill.com/view/journal...

...what remains, in my opinion, an understudied and misunderstood subject, long affected by a scholarly bias that has sought to diminish the relevance of any portrayal of emperors and kings that blurred the line between imperium and sacerdotium.

I hope this study will contribute to a better understanding of the role of the pastoral metaphor in the characterization of Christian kingship more generally...

The second and final part of my study on the pastoral characterization of Constantine in the works of Eusebius has been published on Brill's website, ahead of its inclusion in vol. 93 of Tijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis later this year.

brill.com/view/journal...

Can't say I didn't predict it.

www.bbc.com/news/article...

I have previously also written about #TLoU2 (the video game), specifically about its portrayal of violence and torture: www.ordines.it/wp-content/u...

With the second season of the adaptation of #TLoU coming out in a few hours, it seems like a good moment to re-share my article on the first season, published in the current issue of @litfilmquarterly.bsky.social

But it was at Berkeley, you're supposed to be impressed.

A bit like Plato's utopian government of philosophers—except CEOs are not scientists, scientists are not philosophers, and Plato's wishful utopia was an actual dystopia. Going great.

It's hard to hear department heads say that history is not important—unlike economics or AI (source: a real conversation)—when things like this happen.

With 'AI', they've come up with some surface-level utility, but they don't seem to actually need a good idea or strategy.

I mean, look at how much money Meta spent on the Metaverse, which was clearly a ludicrous idea. Tech companies have been where the money and power lie, for some time, so they are merely trying to perpetuate and augment themselves...

In the true Christian tradition, Trump should simply declare that he, too, is some sort of bishop. Incidentally, this might also give people with interests similar to mine something to write about in the future.

While the reception of the TV adaptation of #TLoU has been largely positive, I believe my article for LFQ (below) may resonate with many among critics and viewers who have expressed dissatisfaction with certain aspects of it. Even if you weren't dissatisfied, you may still find it interesting!

'Job opportunities for the young' does not, in fact, stand for the overwhelmingly good thing it is presented to be. It mostly means the recruitment of an exploitable, ever-replaceable workforce, with no realistic path toward job stability.

I'm on board with you on that. Traditions are always about deciding what to keep from the past, what to let go of, and what to enhance. So, sure, there's value in competing claims to the past.

At least in relation to antiquity, the tradition of Church leaders holding rulers to account is largely a florid, well-established scholarly fiction.

While this bishop did an overwhelmingly good thing, I am not a fan of romanticizing the early Church Fathers, who were as prone to criticizing emperors over disagreements as they were to supporting, and even invoking, the intervention of secular power against dissent.

On a side note, I am thrilled to see my work published in the same issue as that of @drwalkingdead.bsky.social Professor & Slayer of the Undead (on an unrelated subject)!

I do not go easy on the TV series, which I question both as an adaptation of its source material and, on aesthetic grounds, as a work of art in its own right. I'm glad to see this finally published, as I know the reception of the series has been largely positive.

My article on the TV adaptation of The Last of Us has just been published in the winter issue of Literature/Film Quarterly: lfq.salisbury.edu/_issues/53_1...

Reading in itself does not necessarily improve people, of course. I have never had sympathy for that argument, even when I was a nerdy kid who read all the time. It is the structured engagement with good works of art (whether books, films, music, video games, or otherwise) that may improve people.

Not sure if it counts as fiction, but Cass. Var. 12.12 comes to mind. It is a delightful little letter eulogizing the cheese and wine of Cassiodorus' province (which also happens to be, more or less, my province).

I tend to encounter these phrases in contexts where they mean that 'the Romans' had reached a level of 'development' that allowed some Romans to have indoor plumbing, clearly not that every single Roman had indoor plumbing.