Where's the (Greek and Roman) love?

Having originally came into the Logos universe a few months ago to access the Perseus texts, I've been surprised by how many non-classical books I've bought (NT Wright, Carson, IVP Reference Collection, etc.). Perseus has become something of a gateway drug for me, and now I've purchased the Verbum Starter and Biblical Language packages (who knew how interesting Judaism and Early Christian history could be!)

Now, as a classicist, there are a few resources available on Community Pricing that have made my mouth water since I got here, but I haven't seen them budge in months. My question to you: are there enough people here who might be interested in going the opposite direction as I have, that is, delving into topics that are only tangentially related to the Judeo-Christian world, for the general edification and intellectual well-roundedness of the Logos community?

Anyone interested in classics studies or the Greco-Roman world will either know these titles, or should know them, and will want them in their library. They're the big, thick classic texts that people still reach for today, and that would be even more useful in a digital format:

Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities

Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography

E.A. Sophocles Collection

Great resources with rich content that isn't really covered as well as it should be, as far as I can tell, in other resources. And at those prices, they're really quite a steal. I've put in my bid at twice the given price for each item, and would like to ask some of you to join me.

And finally, there's the Lewis and Short's Latin Dictionary, which is the Latin equivalent of the LSJ. Imagine getting a dictionary like that for $24! (And please go and bid $40 ).

In any case, I'm very very happy to have entered into this little world, I'm still amazed at everything I can do with this software and the resources I've acquired!

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Comments

Mark Smith

I was already in for Sophocles and am now in the for the Dictionaries you mentioned. L&S probably not so helpful to someone like me who last took Latin in 9th grade.

Greg F

Thanks Mark, I appreciate it!

For the others, need I mention that the Smith dictionaries, all together, represent about 3,600 pages of very small print? There's a lot of information packed into those three volumes alone.

I wonder if dictionaries like these are more expensive to produce than other types of resources, and whether the production prices are therefore substantially higher?

fgh

Having originally came into the Logos universe a few months ago to access the Perseus texts, I've been surprised by how many non-classical books I've bought (NT Wright, Carson, IVP Reference Collection, etc.). Perseus has become something of a gateway drug for me, and now I've purchased the Verbum Starter and Biblical Language packages (who knew how interesting Judaism and Early Christian history could be!)

Bob (CEO) and Dan (Vice President) are going to love reading that (I do hope they see it!). I presume that's exactly what they hoped Perseus would do, but I think you're the first clear example of it I've seen here on the forums.

Biblical Language

(Hint for Bob and Dan:) You're a lucky guy who's allowed to buy that. I wish I was...

are there enough people here who might be interested in going the opposite direction as I have, that is, delving into topics that are only tangentially related to the Judeo-Christian world, for the general edification and intellectual well-roundedness of the Logos community?

I think most of us regulars already do that all the time, but you are more than welcome to help us push CP's into production.[:)] If you know these resources well, something like a review, perhaps with examples of how they might be useful to us theologians, will almost certainly bring more orders than a simple reminder that they exist.

I also think that -- since most of the people here who might bid have probably already done so -- your best bet would be to recruit more classicists. That's something we can't really do, and you can, and because Perseus is free, it ought to be a lot easier than to get Christians to buy expensive base packages.

The broader the user base, the better for all of us. The Catholic user base is growing fast, which will help Latin resources. There's a very new Orthodox Product Manager, which will (presumably) increase the Orthodox user base and help Greek resources. And more classicists will help both those groups, as well as lovers of philosophy and the Loeb Library. But it will take a little time. 2,5 years ago when I bought, Logos essentially had two books about Orthodoxy, and a couple of dozen Catholic ones, mostly very old. From one perspective, a lot has happened in that time; from another, we're nowhere near there yet.

I wonder if dictionaries like these are more expensive to produce than other types of resources

Dictionaries are normally more expensive to produce than monographs, especially if they have to be typed in, include a lot of non-Bible references that need to be manually linked, and perhaps Greek as well, or, worse, Hebrew, or, still worse, Syriac, Coptic, or the like.

-- And talking about Greek and Syriac, I hope you haven't missed to place bids for the Patrologiae Cursus Completus: Series Latina (221 vols.), the Patrologiae Cursus Completus: Series Graeca (167 vols.), and the Patrologia Syriaca (vols. 1–2) and Orientalis (vols. 1–14, 16).[:D]