LEA-Sezione Monografica: Antiquity and Antiquities in the Long 18th Century. Construction and Dissemination of the Classical Past in British Dictionaries and Periodicals

The general aim of this monographic section of LEA is to investigate the notion and the representation of the distant past as it emerges from those words and contents labelled as and/or tracing back to antiquity. This approach is also crucial to highlight the relationship between past and present in 18th-c. contemporary (educated) society, and the status of antiquity in a changing world. In particular, the interest focuses on which aspects of antiquity may be found, appreciated, selected, explained, discussed, represented, magnified, and eventually popularised in the text-types under scrutiny. The studies show how dictionaries and periodicals contributed to constructing and shaping people’s knowledge of the classical past through a careful selection of words, concepts and discourse practices which were informed by the moral, ideological, and socio-cultural values of the time.