About

Yvona Trnka-Amrhein is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Classics at the University of Colorado Boulder. She earned her Ph.D. from Harvard University in 2013. Her research focuses on Greek literature of the Hellenistic and Imperial periods, with particular interest in the novel, biography, and history. She studies the interactions between Greek, Latin, and Egyptian literature and culture, as well as the influence of empire on literary production. Trnka-Amrhein is trained as a literary papyrologist and has edited several Oxyrhynchus papyri, often interpreting fragmentary texts on papyrus. Her current book project, 'Portraits of Pharaoh: the Sesostris Tradition in Ancient Literature and Culture,' explores the multifaceted traditions surrounding the pharaoh Sesostris across different times, genres, and cultures. Her future projects include a study of multi-cultural hymns in the Hellenistic world and an investigation into the links between the novel, mime, and satire.

Research topics

• Classics
• History
• Ancient history
• Art
• Humanities
• Archaeology
• Literature

Selected publications

• Plotting Plotina? The reception of an empress in Roman provincialprose (fiction)

  IVITRA research in linguistics and literature · 2023

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Literature
  • History
  • Art

  Abstract This chapter explores the reception of the empress Plotina in three texts from three literary traditions within the Roman Empire: the Acta Hermaisci , the Talmud, and Apuleius’ Metamorphoses . It argues that the Plotina character we see in these texts is based on an idea of the Roman empress’ ability to influence the emperor to the detriment of provincial groups. This ‘plotting Plotina’ figure is the opposite of the official ideal found in Pliny’s Panegyricus and may develop the suspicion we see in Roman historical texts that Plotina exercised improper influence on Hadrian’s succession. Indeed, the motherhood of the ‘plotting Plotina’ character may respond to the problematic childlessness of the real empress. In addition to exploring how provincial texts fictionalized a historical woman to articulate the powerlessness of being a Roman subject, this chapter provides an example of how one theme could be deployed in texts from different cultures written in the same empire. It thus offers a perspective on how a broad understanding of ‘imperial literature’ can inform our knowledge of connections between the literary cultures that coexisted under Roman rule.

  PublisherDOI

• THE STATUS OF ‘DOCUMENTS’ - (J.) Arthur-Montagne, (S.J.) Digiulio, (I.N.I.) Kuin (edd.) Documentality. New Approaches to Written Documents in Imperial Life and Literature. (<i>Trends in Classics</i> Supplementary Volume 132.) Pp. xii + 290, fig., b/w &amp; colour ills, map. Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, 2022. Cased, £110, €124.95, US$126.99. ISBN: 978-3-11-079177-8.

  The Classical Review · 2023

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Humanities
  • History
  • Classics

  THE STATUS OF ‘DOCUMENTS’ - (J.) Arthur-Montagne, (S.J.) Digiulio, (I.N.I.) Kuin (edd.) Documentality. New Approaches to Written Documents in Imperial Life and Literature. (Trends in Classics Supplementary Volume 132.) Pp. xii + 290, fig., b/w &amp; colour ills, map. Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, 2022. Cased, £110, €124.95, US$126.99. ISBN: 978-3-11-079177-8. - Volume 74 Issue 1

  PublisherDOI

• The Alexandria Effect. City Foundation in Ptolemaic Culture and the Egyptian Histories of Manetho and Diodorus

  HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe) · 2022 · 15 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Ancient history
  • Classics
  • History

  Cet article examine le discours ptolémaïque sur les fondations de cités à travers les récits de fondation de cités égyptiennes anciennes tels qu’on les trouve dans les Aigyptiaca de Manéthon et dans le premier livre de la Bibliothèque historique de Diodore de Sicile. Il montre comment les manières grecques et égyptiennes de raconter les fondations de cités ont été modifiées pour s’adapter au contexte ptolémaïque. Il soutient que l’ascension fulgurante d’Alexandrie et les différentes réactions qu’elle suscita influencèrent les récits composés pour trois villes égyptiennes antérieures : Thèbes, Memphis et Avaris.

  PublisherOA PDF

• Do Alexandrians Dream of Electric Sound?

  Cambridge University Press eBooks · 2021-09-30

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  This chapter explores two strategies for preserving the memory of live music in early Ptolemaic Egypt by reading Posidippus’ epigram (37 AB) on Arion’s lyre next to Hedylus’ epigram (4 GP) on an automated rhyton in the shape of the Egyptian god Bes. While Arion’s lyre captures the essence of a classic but long-dead virtuoso in amber, the rhyton performs its song on endless repeat. I suggest that the automated rhyton, as interpreted by Hedylus, represents an attempt to create an eternal first performance of a type of song that could represent the Graeco-Egyptian Ptolemaic empire: a hymn to the Nile.

  PublisherDOI

• NEW STUDIES ON THE GREEK NOVEL - (S.) Schwartz From Bedroom to Courtroom. Law and Justice in the Greek Novel. (<i>Ancient Narrative</i> Supplementum 21.) Pp. xiv + 270. Groningen: Barkhuis &amp; Groningen University Library, 2016. Cased, €90. ISBN: 978-94-92444-08-0. - (T.) Whitmarsh Dirty Love. The Genealogy of the Ancient Greek Novel. Pp. xviii + 201. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018. Cased, £32.99, US$44.95. ISBN: 978-0-19-974265-3.

  The Classical Review · 2019-06-03

  article1st authorCorresponding

  NEW STUDIES ON THE GREEK NOVEL - (S.) Schwartz From Bedroom to Courtroom. Law and Justice in the Greek Novel. (Ancient Narrative Supplementum 21.) Pp. xiv + 270. Groningen: Barkhuis &amp; Groningen University Library, 2016. Cased, €90. ISBN: 978-94-92444-08-0. - (T.) Whitmarsh Dirty Love. The Genealogy of the Ancient Greek Novel. Pp. xviii + 201. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018. Cased, £32.99, US$44.95. ISBN: 978-0-19-974265-3. - Volume 69 Issue 2

  PublisherDOI

• Interpreting<i>Sesonchosis</i>as a Biographical Novel

  Classical Philology · 2019-12-26 · 9 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Anonymous, On Plato’s Dialogues (P. Oxy. XLV 3219) (1134)

  2018-10-01

  articleSenior author
  Publisher

• The fantastic four:

  Barkhuis eBooks · 2018-10-22 · 17 citations

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• A Study of The Sesonchosis Novel

  Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) (Harvard University) · 2013-09-04

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  This dissertation presents a comprehensive study of a fragmentary text of Greek prose fiction generally known as The Sesonchosis Novel (2nd century CE). It provides a new picture of the scope, character, and date of the work with the help of two new papyrus fragments and explores its relationship to both the complex tradition of the Greco-Roman Sesostris legend and the genre of the ancient novel. Thus the first part of the dissertation focuses on the Sesostris legend by tracing the position of the character Sesostris in Egypt, surveying the nature and development of the legend in Greek and Roman texts, and analyzing in detail two episodes from the legendary material (the attempted coup and the royal chariot). It explores how Sesostris held almost semi-divine status in Egypt as well as how useful and potent a symbol of Egyptian kingship he became in Greco-Roman culture. The second part focuses on The Sesonchosis Novel, arguing that the novel's plot may have covered the whole life of its main character and that the text may thus be best described as a biographical novel or "ruler novel." The implications of this hypothesis for the ancient novel genre as a whole are discussed in some detail, particularly in relation to The Ninos Novel.

  Publisher

Frequent coauthors

• Thomas Miller

  1 shared