Plutarch

In his account of the Persian Wars, the 5th century historian Herodotus reports an exchange between the Persian monarch Xerxes and a deposed Spartan king, Demaratus, who became what Lattimore later classified as a “tragic warner” to Xerxes. On the eve of the battle of Thermopylae, Xerxes asks how a small number of free Spartiates can stand up against the massive ranks of soldiers that Xerxes has assembled. Herodotus has Demaratus reply: So is it with the Lacedaemonians; fighting singly they (...) are as brave as any man living, and together they are the best warriors on earth. Free they are, yet not wholly free; for law is their master (ἐλεύθεροι γὰρ ἐόντες οὐ πάντα ἐλεύθεροι εἰσί· ἔπεστι γάρ σφι δεσπότης νόμος), whom they fear much more than your men fear you. This is my proof—what their law bids them, that they do; and its bidding is ever the same, that they must never flee from the battle before whatsoever odds, but abide at their post and there conquer or die. (Hdt. 7.104) As the outcome of Thermopylae makes clear, Demaratus is hardly guilty of boasting. But Greek political theorists were not only fascinated by the Spartans who fought at the battle of Thermopylae in 480; they also wondered how slightly more than a century later Sparta was ignobly defeated by Thebes at the battle of Leuctra in 371, after which Spartan hegemony collapsed. How did Sparta field citizen-soldiers in the 5th century who were without parallel in their bravery and military prowess? And why did Sparta, predominantly under the same political organization, collapse just over a century later? Such are the main questions that Xenophon, Plato, Aristotle, and Plutarch—what Cartledge (1999, 313–14) has characterized as “political-theoretical” laconophiles—seek to answer in their writings about Sparta. (shrink)

Tommaso Giannini (1556-1638) was a prominent professor at the Ferrara Studium between the sixteenth and the seventeenth century. Probably influenced by Platonic sympathies nurtured by the Court and partly by the University milieu, in 1587 he published his first work titled De providentia ad sententiam Platonis et Platonicorum liber unus, which was a catalyst for his academic career. His De providentia displays a large amount of sources always tacitly used: Marsilio Ficino, Jacques Charpentier, Giulio Serina, Stefano Tiepolo, Teofilo Zimara, Bessarion, (...) Agostino Steuco, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola and amid the ancients Plotinus, Plutarch, Sirianus, Proclus (read through Teofilo Zimara and Leonico Tomeo), Iamblichus, Apuleius, Calcidius, Ammonius, Psellus. Though a compilative work, the De providentia retains nonetheless a great importance insofar as it contributes to focus the bibliotheca platonica of the time, furthermore in the same years and place of Francesco Patrizi da Cherso’s teaching. (shrink)

In his dialogue, 'Non posse suaviter vivi secundum Epicurum', Plutarch of Chaeronea criticizes Epicurus for not believing that the gods are provident over human affairs and for not believing that our souls survive death. However, Plutarch’s arguments are striking in that they do not offer any theoretical justification for believing either of these religious claims to be true; rather, they aim to establish that we are practically justified in adopting them if we follow Epicurus’s rule that the goal of belief (...) is not truth in its own right, but mental tranquility. I argue that this form of argument assumes a novel justificatory theory of religious belief, based in Epicurean thought, that I call ‘strong doxastic hedonism.’. (shrink)

Athenaeus of Attalia distinguishes two types of exercise or training (γυμνασία) that are required at each stage of life: training of the body and training of the soul. He says that training of the body includes activities like physical exercises, eating, drinking, bathing and sleep. Training of the soul, on the other hand, consists of thinking, education, and emotional regulation (in other words, 'philosophy'). The notion of 'training of the soul' and the contrast between 'bodily' and 'psychic' exercise is common (...) in the Academic and Stoic traditions Athenaeus is drawing from; however, he is the earliest extant medical author to distinguish these kinds of training and to treat them as equally important aspects of regimen. In this paper, I propose some reasons why he found this distinction useful, and I examine how he justified incorporating it into his writings on regimen, namely by attributing Plato's beliefs about regimen to Hippocrates, a strategy Galen would adopt well over a century later. (shrink)

Thanks to the work of Stephen Newmyer, Plutarch’s importance for modern philosophical debates concerning animal rationality and rights has been brought to the forefront. But Newmyer’s important scholarship overlooks Plutarch’s commitment to a range of rational functions that can be ascribed to animals of various sorts throughout the Moralia. Through an application of the ‘spectrum of animal rationality’ described in the treatise On Moral Virtue to the dialogues where his interlocutors explore the rational capacities of non-human animals (especially Whether Land (...) or Sea Animals are Smarter and Gryllus), this article argues that Plutarch’s commitment to a broad and inclusive sense of ‘reason’ conditions any positive account of animal rationality. Rather, any suggestions of the rational capacities of non-human animals are deeply implicated in Plutarch’s universal system of reason, which differentiates grades of rationality to animals based on natural difference – not unlike his contemporary Stoics. While modern proponents of animal rationality might find some of Plutarch’s ideas unpalatable, the upshot of this study is a fuller sense of Plutarch’s articulate and inclusive sense of reason, which is able to accommodate not only Platonist and Peripatetic notions, but also those of the Stoics and Epicureans, who are especially singled out in the humorous dialogue Gryllus. Thus, Plutarch’s ‘eclecticism’ can be explained as a deep commitment to a universal notion of ‘reason’, marked by a range of functions accessible to all animals – including his philosophical enemies. (shrink)

Starting with the reference to “Plato’s dictum” that Freud added in the second last page of the first edition of The Interpretation of Dreams, the author explains the convergences between the conception of dreams expounded by Plato in the Republic and Freud’s fundamental insights. The analysis of bibliographic sources used by Freud, and of his interests, allow than to suppose not only that Freud omitted to acknowledge the Plato’s theoretical genealogy of “the Via Regia to the unconscious”, but also the (...) possibility that the Republic constituted a tacit source of inspiration for the composition of The Interpretations of dreams. -/- Muovendo dal richiamo al «detto di Platone» inserito nella penultima pagina della prima edizione de "L’interpretazione dei sogni" di Freud (1899), vengono preliminarmente esposte le convergenze tra la concezione del sogno di Platone esposta ne "La Repubblica" e le intuizioni poste alla base dell’edificio freudiano. Alla luce delle fonti testuali citate e utilizzate da Freud, e dei suoi interessi, viene poi avanzata l’ipotesi che egli non soltanto abbia omesso di riconoscere la genealogia teoretica platonica della «via regia che porta alla conoscenza dell’inconscio» (p. 282), ma che l’antico dialogo abbia potuto rappresentare una fonte tacita di ispirazione per la composizione de "L’interpretazione dei sogni". (shrink)

The Predynastic Period in Ancient Egypt is the time before recorded history from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic Age and on to the rise of the First Dynasty and is generally recognized as spanning the era from c. 6000-3150 BCE (though physical evidence argues for a longer history). While there are no written records from this period, archaeological excavations throughout Egypt have uncovered artifacts which tell their own story of the development of culture in the Nile River Valley. The periods (...) of the Predynastic Period are named for the regions/ancient city sites in which these artifacts were found and do not reflect the names of the cultures who actually lived in those areas. The Predynastic Period was given its name in the early days of archaeological expeditions in Egypt before many of the most important finds were discovered and catalogued which has led some scholars to argue over when, precisely, the Predynastic Period begins and, more importantly, ends. These scholars suggest the adoption of another designation, 'Protodynastic Period', for that span of time closer to the Early Dynastic Period (c. 3150-2613 BCE) or 'Zero. (shrink)