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Peripatos: The Athenian Philosophical Scene—II

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2009

Extract

The fourth century saw a withdrawal of philosophy to its more secluded haunts, but it was only a partial withdrawal. There remained and developed a certain antithesis, physical and topographical as well as spiritual and philosophical, between the stoa (and the agora) and the garden.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1962

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References

page 2 note 1 This personage–man, hero, or god (accounts of him are confused)—may well be an artificial eponym derived from the obscure ancient name, which may itself be pre-Greek; see Judeich, W., Topographie von Athen 2, 413.Google Scholar

page 2 note 2 For the cults see Judeich, op. cit. 388, or Frazer's Pausanias.

page 2 note 3 Cf. Agora, iii, p. 221.

page 2 note 4 xxiv. 114. Lucian represents Solon as appearing at the Lyceum (Anacharsis 7), but of course he may be anachronistic.

page 2 note 5 Suid. τ⋯ ῾ἰππ⋯ρχου τειχ⋯ον; similarly the paroemiographers, Gregory of Cyprus, iii. 81, and Apostolios, , xvii. 8Google Scholar (Leutsch, E. and Schneidewin, F. G., Corpus Paroemiographorum Graecorum (Göttingen, 18391851), i. 374, ii. 688).Google Scholar

page 3 note 1 Harp., Hesych., s.v.; Paus. i. 29. 16, [Plut.] Vit. X Orat. 841 c.

page 3 note 2 See below, p. 14.

page 3 note 3 Kimon 13. 7.Google Scholar

page 3 note 4 Nub. 1005 ff. Note Hyp. Dem. 26—where an epimeletes of the Academy carries off a spade from the palaestra to his garden near by.

page 3 note 5 Lysis 203 a; cf. Ael. Var. Hist. ix. 29. See Hoerber, R. G., Phronesis, iv (1959). 17Google Scholar, on the scene of Lysis.

page 3 note 6 Diog. Laert. iii. 5.

page 3 note 7 See Class. Philol. xliii (1948), 130 ff.Google Scholar, a very critical review of H. Herter, 's Platons Akademie.Google Scholar Here, as in The Riddle of the Early Academy (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1945), 2Google Scholar, H. Cherniss gives salutary warnings to those who with very slight evidence profess to know all about the arrangement and teaching of the school.

page 4 note 1 Diog. Laert. iii. 7.

page 4 note 2 Ath. ii. 59 c–d; Kock, Com. Att. Frag. ii. 287, No. 11.

page 4 note 3 Var. Hist. iii. 19.Google Scholar

page 4 note 4 Cf. H. Cherniss, op. cit. 12; though opinions have differed on this point.

page 4 note 5 Diog. Laert. iv. 9. 63.

page 4 note 6 See Part I, Greece & Rome, Second Series, viii (1961), 152.Google Scholar See further on this subject Natorp, P., R.E. i. 1134 f., s.v. ‘Akademia’.Google Scholar

page 5 note 1 See Westermann, A., Βι⋯γραφοι (Brunswick, 1845), 387, 393Google Scholar; cf. Diog. Laert. iii. 25, iv. 1. 1, 3. 19.

page 5 note 2 The inner circle of a philosophical school was apt to have something of the character of a thiasos, a religious brotherhood or corporation, in which members were enrolled; cf. Brink, K. O., R.E. Suppl. vii. 906Google Scholar, s.v. ‘Peripatos’; von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, U., Antigonos von Karystos (Berlin, 1888)Google Scholar, Exkurs 2; Marrou, H., History of Education in Antiquity (London, 1956), 67.Google Scholar

page 5 note 3 i. 10.

page 5 note 4 De Plat. i. 4. Plato had other properties, too, according to his will, preserved by Diogenes Laertios, iii. 41 f.

page 5 note 5 Ibid. iii. 5.

page 5 note 6 Ibid. iii. 20, Cic. Fin. v. 2, Apuleius l.c. Plutarch, , De Exsilio 10Google Scholar, says that ‘the Academy’ was a small property bought for 3,000 drachmas. Late writers note that the Academic property, originally small, grew enormously in the course of time through bequests; see Damaskios quoted in Phot. Bibl. p. 346. 34 ff. (Bekker) and Suid. Πλ⋯των.

page 5 note 7 Diog. Laert. iv. 8. 60.

page 5 note 8 Beside the garden, in which Polemon spent his time in withdrawal (Diog. Laert. iv. 3. 19). Plato, Xenokrates, and Polemon lived at the Academy, according to Plutarch, l.c.; on the other hand, it appears that Speusippos when infirm was transported to the Academy in a small carriage (Diog. Laert. iv. 1. 3).

page 6 note 1 Cicero says it was six stades from the Dipylon (Fin. v. i); Livy makes it about a Roman mile (mille ferme passus, xxxi. 24. 10), a good deal more; but of course such distances are approximate, and in any case the Academy must have been very extensive. One went down to it from the city (Ar. Nub. 1005; Philostr. Vit. Soph. ii. 1. 5, 22; cf. Diog. Laert. iv. 1. 6); on the other hand, Plutarch (l.c.) speaks of going down to the city. Perhaps in spite of its being on lower ground one could think of the Academy as being farther ‘up country’, i.e. inland.

page 6 note 2 Pausanias's Description of Greece (London, 1898), ii. 388.Google Scholar

page 6 note 3 e.g. Prakt. Akad. Ath. 1930, pp. 420–4Google Scholar, 1933, pp. 70–71, 243–8; J.H.S. liii (1933), 272Google Scholar, liv (1934). 188, lv (1935). 153; A.J.A. xxxvii (1933), 491Google Scholar, xxxviii (1934), 602, xli (1937), 138–9. Hill, I. T., The Ancient City of Athens (London, 1953), 221CrossRefGoogle Scholar, gives a brief and somewhat confusing account.

page 8 note 1 Cf. reports in Ἔργοντ⋯ς Ἀρχ. Ἑτ. for 1955 (publ. 1956), p. 14, for 1956 (1957). p. 10, for 1958 (1959), p. 5, and for 1959 (1960), p. 1. Meanwhile A. Papagiannopoulos-Palaios has argued (⋯ ⋯κριβ⋯ς θ⋯σις τ⋯ς Ἀκαδημε⋯ας (Athens, 1937); Polemon, v (1952/3), 74 ff.), largely from a consideration of the direction of the road from the city, that the street with tombs which has been discovered is not in fact the farther end of this road, and that only the area of the so-called ‘peripatos’ really belongs to the Academy. I believe this is too narrow a view. After going over the site carefully with much help from Professor E. Vanderpool and Mr. J. Travlos, I feel convinced that the remains near St. Tryphon too belong to the Academy. Probably in the area was the entrance to the Academy from the road from the Dipylon.

page 8 note 2 The names (or parts of names) preserved are: Char …, Aris…, Menekr …, Kriton. Some early reports gave the list as Charm[ides], Arist[on], Axi[ochos], Kriton. The third name here was quite mistaken; Mr. Stavropoullos gives an accurate transcription in the Enkyklopaideia article. And the date, Professor Vanderpool and Mr. A. G. Woodhead tell me, may be Hellenistic, not fifthcentury as formerly stated, to judge by certain letter-forms (see the forthcoming publication of the list in Suppl. Epigr. Graec).

page 9 note 1 A larger and more elaborate house, of Geometric times, with a number of rooms on either side of a long narrow diadromos, has also been found near by; because of many traces of cults Stavropoullos calls it the Hiera Oikia. The most recent finds include a magnificent well, of great width and splendidly constructed of large terra-cotta segments, found some distance to the north but now removed to a site within the ‘wall of Hipparchos’ (its contents indicated a fourth-century date); and a series of very curious thin slate-like stones with scratched inscriptions, dated in the late fifth century, found near the wall and thought to emanate from a primary school in the vicinity.

page 9 note 2 Jannoray, J. and Ducoux, H., Fouilles de Delphes, tome ii (Paris, 1953)Google Scholar, Topographie et Architecture: Le Gymnase. Though quite extensive, the gymnasium was within the city of Delphi. The main period of its architectural construction is thought to be about 334–326 b.c. For a summary see J.H.S. lxxv (1955), 185.Google Scholar R. Scranton, describing certain buildings north of the archaic temple at Corinth, a stoa with a terrace in front, and an adjacent building which was apparently a bathing-place, with arrangements for heating the water, tentatively suggests that they were elements in an early gymnasium, in Corinth, 1. iii (Princeton, 1951), 179.Google Scholar

page 9 note 3 iii. 41.

page 9 note 4 i. 30. 3. One of the Lives of Aristotle quotes Ammonios of Lamptrai for the statement that an altar of Plato was dedicated by Aristotle, but this is open to doubt; cf. A. Westermann, op. cit. 399; Wachsmuth, C., Die Stadt Athen im Altertum (Leipzig, 18741890), i. 271, n. 2).Google Scholar

page 10 note 1 i. 29. 15. Philostratos, Vit. Soph. ii. 22Google Scholar, says that Phoinix the Thessalian, having died at Athens, was buried ‘near those killed in war, on the right of the road down to the Academy’; and that Philiskos, another Thessalian sophist, was buried ‘in the Academy’ (ii. 30); cf. Cic. Fam. iv. 12. 3.

page 10 note 2 Or less probably ‘light-god’.

page 10 note 3 W. Judeich, op. cit. 142.

page 10 note 4 [Plut.] Vit. X Orat. 841Google Scholar c–d; cf. I.G. ii2. 457. 68. Plato, Euthyd. 272 e, 273 a, 303 b, mentions ⋯ποδυτ⋯ριον, κατ⋯στεγος δρ⋯μος, and columns. The words μεχρ⋯ ⋯λε⋯μματος have been suspected by editors, unnecessarily; they seem to be supported by the fragment of Apollodoros, quoted below, p. 19, and by Diog. Laert. v. 4. 71.

page 10 note 5 Ibid. v. 1. 2.

page 10 note 6 Ath. v. 214 d.

page 10 note 7 v. 2. 37. The interpretation of this word has been disputed; but the basic meaning of the word, and its tense, are hardly appropriate to a statement about the final total of his pupils.

page 11 note 1 Ibid. v. 2. 51 ff.

page 11 note 2 Ibid. v. 3. 62.

page 11 note 3 Ibid. v. 4. 70.

page 11 note 4 I.G. ii2. 2613; it was found in digging the foundations of a house on the north side of Syntagma Square; a precisely similar marker, 2614, was found south of the Acropolis, but since other indications point to the eastern site one can perhaps best assume that it is 2614 which has wandered farther. Stones found in the same area as 2613, Mr. G. Stamires tells me, are likely to be local, being mostly grave-stones from the cemetery outside the gate. On 2613 and 2614 see also Peek, W., Ath. Mitt. lxvii (1942), 33, No. 34.Google Scholar

page 11 note 5 In Arch. Eph., 1953–4, Part II (published 1958), 126 ff. I.G. ii2. 2613 and 2614, Professor Vanderpool shows, were originally one single block bearing the older inscription. He suggests that the original block may have stood in the lifetime of Theophrastos, and that the construction of the garden and shrine may have ‘suffered a set-back through damage inflicted in the wars of the early third century’.

page 12 note 1 I owe information about this to Professor Vanderpool, and to Mr. G. Stamires, who showed me a long newspaper report by M. Paraskeuaides in Kathemerine for 16 March 1958.

page 12 note 2 Hell. ii. 4. 27.Google Scholar Note also Hipparch. iii. 6 f., where a dromos in the Lyceum is mentioned, up which the cavalry are to ride ‘to the top of the facing theatre’, i.e., probably, the slope rising to the east, on which the spectators would stand. Perhaps these dromoi were continuous, forming a ceremonial street leading from the gate and on through the parade-ground.

page 12 note 3 See Part I, Greece & Rome, Second Series, viii (1961), 159.Google Scholar

page 12 note 4 Euthyphr. 2 a, Euthyd. 271 a, Symp. 223 d; cf. Phaidros (see Part I, p. 160.). and Ael. Var. Hist. ix. 29. Note also the ‘sophists of the common herd’ who frequented the Lyceum, according to Isokrates Panath. 18.

page 12 note 5 Schol. Ar. Pax 353; Suid. Λ⋯κειον. The suggested site is within the Hadrianic eastward extension of the city wall, but there is no objection to this. Remains of bathing and gymnastic establishments have been found north of the Olympieion (see Πρακτ. Ἀρχ. Ἑτ., 1889, 8 ff.; 1950, 54. These are hardly to be associated with the Lyceum.

page 12 note 6 See above, n. 2.

page 12 note 7 ix. 1. 19; in ix. i. 24 Strabo says even more vaguely that the Ilissos flows from ‘the parts above Agrai and the Lyceum’.

page 13 note 1 Paus. i. 19. 3. Pausanias mentions only altars; Suidas, s.v. ⋯ς Κυν⋯σαργες, may be wrong in mentioning a temple; most authorities use the word ἱερ⋯ν.

page 13 note 2 Schol. Dem. xxiv. 114 (p. 736. 6 Dindorf); Eustathios on Od. xiii. 408; Paus. i. 19. 3; Hesych., Phot., Steph. Byz., Suid. s.v.

page 13 note 3 W. Judeich, op. cit. 422 ff.

page 13 note 4 vi. 1. 13. The Herakleion was in Diomeia: see Ar. Ran. 651 and Schol. ad loc, Ath. xiv. 614 d–e, Harp. ⋯ν Διομε⋯οις Ἡρ⋯κλειον (quoting Hypereides); cf. W. Judeich, op. cit. 170.

page 13 note 5 B.S.A. iii (18961897), 89.Google Scholar For other reports see ibid. ii (1895–6), 23, iii (1896–7), 232 f.; J.H.S. xvi (1896), 337; A.J.A. xi (1896), 227Google Scholar; Ath. Mitt. xxi (1896), 463.Google Scholar Plans are mentioned, but these did not appear, as far as I know. Mr. P. Sherrard, Assistant Director of the School, has kindly made inquiries after them for me, but without result.

page 13 note 6 i. 18. 9.

page 13 note 7 Πολεοδομικ⋯ Ἐξ⋯λιξις τ⋯ν Ἀθην⋯ν (Athens, 1960), 54, 91.

page 13 note 8 I.G. ii2. 2119. 26.

page 13 note 9 Op. cit. 422.

page 14 note 1 I.G. ii2. 1665.

page 14 note 2 Cf. below, n. 6.

page 14 note 3 Hesperia, xvii (1948), 137 ff.Google Scholar

page 14 note 4 Deltion, viii (1923), 85 ff.Google Scholar; Suppl. Epigr. Graec. iii (1929), 26, Nos. 115–17. W. Judeich does not take into account these inscriptions or the one mentioned below, n. 5.

page 14 note 5 Deltion, viii (1923), 96Google Scholar, No. 3; Suppl. Epigr. Graec. iii (1929), 6Google Scholar, No. 18. The use of the Herakleion to define the limit is best explained if the temenos just touched the river at the point in question, where it swings southward from the city.

page 14 note 6 Isokrates was buried with all his relations ‘near Kynosarges on the hill on the left’, i.e. probably on the left as you face Kynosarges, going from the city, on the rising ground to the east of our site ([Plut.] Vit. X Orat. 838 b; cf. W. Judeich, op. cit. 423). Kynosarges was a point of strategic importance on the south of the city. The Athenians encamped there after Marathon (Hdt. vi. 116), and later Philip V encamped there (Diod. Sic. xxviii. 7, Livy xxxi. 24. 18). The gymnasia were only too apt to suffer badly in operations against the city. The site of the deme Alopeke has been thought to raise a difficulty. Herodotos says that Anchimolios was buried at Alopeke, near the Herakleion at Kynosarges (v. 63). Aischines (i. 99) speaks of an estate at Alopeke eleven or twelve stades from the wall. But Alopeke may well have extended citywards up to the proposed site of Kynosarges (cf. W. Judeich, op. cit. 170).

page 15 note 1 Diog. Laert. vi. 1. 13.

page 15 note 2 Ibid. vii. 2. 161.

page 15 note 3 Cf. Ath. xiv. 614 d.

page 15 note 4 Diog. Laert. ix. 12. 112.

page 15 note 5 Ibid. 114.

page 15 note 6 Ibid. x. 120.

page 15 note 7 Cic. Fin. v. 3, Sen. Ep. xxi. 10, Juv. xiv. 319, Plut. Mor. 1098 b.

page 15 note 8 Diog. Laert. x. 10.

page 15 note 9 Fin. i. 65.

page 15 note 10 N.H. xix. 51.

page 15 note 11 See above, p. 4, n. 6.

page 16 note 1 Diog. Laert. x. 17.

page 16 note 2 Fam. xiii. 1. 3; cf. Att. v. 19. 3.

page 16 note 3 W. Judeich, op. cit. 168, 176, and Abb. 14; cf. Young, R., Hesperia, xx (1951), 142.Google Scholar

page 16 note 4 Class. Philol. xxxv (1940), 183 ff.Google Scholar; cf. his book Epicurus and his Philosophy (Minneapolis, 1954), 92.Google Scholar

page 16 note 5 See especially Lewis, D. in B.S.A. 1 (1955), 16Google Scholar, and Schol. Ar. Av. 997.

page 16 note 6 Probably near the north end of ‘Melite Street’; see the plan in Hesperia, xx (1951), 146.Google Scholar I have discussed this problem in detail in Phoenix, xiii (1959), 73 ff.Google Scholar

page 16 note 7 Diog. Laert. vii. 1. 2 f.

page 16 note 8 Plato, , Apol. 26Google Scholar d–e; Eup. Fr. 304 (Kock).

page 17 note 1 Diog. Laert. vii. 1. 5Google Scholar; see Agora, iii, p. 31, and Phoenix, vii (1953), 33.Google Scholar

page 17 note 2 Hesperia, xix (1950), 327.Google Scholar

page 17 note 3 See Diog. Laert. vii. 1. 6, 11, 15; he was entrusted with the keys of the city, and decrees in his honour were set up at the Academy and the Lyceum—which may indicate that he was already associated with these gymnasia as well as with the stoa. For his tomb in Kerameikos see above, p. 10.

page 17 note 4 Ibid. vii. 1. 14, 22.

page 17 note 5 i. 3. 2.

page 17 note 6 Hardly the first philosopher of all; perhaps the first Stoic, unless the statement of Demetrios in his Homonymoi, quoted in Diog. Laert. vii. 7. 185, is quite incorrect. Diogenes also quotes Hermippos as speaking of Chrysippos as conducting a school (σχολ⋯зοντα) in the Odeion, i.e. the Periklean Odeion near the theatre (ibid. 184; where we also hear, on the authority of Sotion, that Chrysippos studied at the Academy). Thus one gets the impression that the Stoic philosophers tended to circulate rather than develop a sort of collegiate home; cf. below, p. 20. On the Odeion note that Plutarch (De Exsilio 14), listing the famous haunts of philosophy at Athens, mentions—in addition to the Academy, the Lyceum, and the Stoa—the Palladion, a shrine of Athena to the south-east of the city, where there was a lawcourt (W. Judeich, op. cit. 421), and the Odeion.

page 18 note 1 W. Judeich, op. cit. 92, 353; Thompson, H. A., Hesperia, xix (1950), 322Google Scholar; Agora, iii, p. 142.

page 18 note 2 Thes. 36. 2.

page 18 note 3 i. 17. 2.

page 19 note 1 Plut. Quaest. Conv. ix. 1. 1; Ammonios, a contemporary and teacher of Plutarch, holds an examination in the Diogeneion of the ephebes learning letters, geometry, rhetoric, and music; cf. Dow, S., Harv. Stud. Class. Phil. lxiii (1958), 423 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Reinmuth, O., Trans. Am. Phil. Ass. xc (1959), 209 ff.Google Scholar

page 19 note 2 W. Judeich, op. cit. 379; to the inscriptions in I.G. add Hesperia, ii (1933), 505Google Scholar, No. 17 (cf. xi (1942), 71), and xxii (1953), 178, No. 2. One sees a hopeful label erected on the site on Erechtheus Street. A. Papagiannopoulos-Palaios, however, suggests (Polemon, iii (1947), 22 ff.)Google Scholar that one should associate the Diogeneion with certain remains in northern Delorme, Athens. J., in Gymnasion (Paris, 1960), 143Google Scholar (see below, p. 21), questions this, and also doubts which Diogenes is concerned.

page 19 note 3 It has been sometimes suggested that by this time, perhaps after the sack by Sulla, the Academic school had moved lock, stock, and barrel to the urban gymnasia (cf. K. O. Brink, R.E. Suppl. vii. 905, s.v. ‘Peripatos’); but this is hardly likely, and there is no clear evidence for it; Cicero does not imply it, and Horace, Epist. ii. 2. 47, implies the contrary.

page 19 note 4 Fr. 59 (Jacoby).

page 19 note 5 I.G. ii2. 1006. 19 f.; cf. 1043. 20. For perhaps a more serious circulation of students see Diog. Laert. iv. 6. 42, where Arkesilaos recommends his pupils to go and hear other philosophers too. Note that the ephebes when passing out made gifts of books to the library in the Ptolemaion (I.G. ii2. 1029. 25 f.; Agora, iii, p. 144), which may have acquired the character of a kind of official library, as contrasted with private libraries and those of the schools.

page 20 note 1 Diog. Laert. vii. 1. 30.

page 20 note 2 The subject is fully treated by Walden, J. W. H., The Universities of Ancient Greece (New York, 1909).Google Scholar Note further J. H. Oliver's discussion of the expression ‘philosophers from the Mouseion’ in Hesperia, iii (1934), 191 ff.Google Scholar; Oliver shows that ‘Mouseion’ probably refers not to Alexandria but to the local University, now with its complement of official ‘chairs’.

page 20 note 3 See Hesperia, xix (1950), 31 ff.Google Scholar

page 20 note 4 i. 8. 6.

page 20 note 5 Vit. Soph. ii. 5. 4, 8. 4.

page 21 note 1 Note also certain large and elaborate houses very recently discovered at the northern foot of the Areopagus (ibid. xxviii (1959), 104); H. A. Thompson dates them to the fifth century a.d., and drawing attention to a particularly distinctive feature, a large room with an apsidal end which may well have been a lecture-room, suggests that they were the houses of prosperous sophists. A similar establishment has been found on the south slope of the Acropolis; see J. Meliades, Praktika, 1955 (published 1957), 46 ff. Cf. Julian's house (Eunap. Vit. Soph. 483. 5 Boissonade). On the latest phase see Thompson, H. A., ‘Athenian Twilight’, J.R.S. xlix (1959), 62 ff.Google Scholar

page 21 note 2 Acknowledgement and Addendum. This article grew out of a paper which was read at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton; I am grateful for suggestions and criticisms then received, particularly from Professor H. Cherniss and Professor H. A. Thompson. I was able to work over the sites at Athens during a visit for which I received generous assistance from the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, and I received much help from Professor E. Vanderpool and from Mr. J. Travlos, who very kindly drew for me the plan in Fig. 2. Finally I should like to draw attention to two very helpful general works which have appeared since this article took shape. One is Travlos, J., Πȯλεȯδȯμικ⋯ Ἐξ⋯λιξις τ⋯ν Ἀθην⋯ν (Athens, 1960)Google Scholar; see especially pp. 46, 90 ff., and 130ff. The other is J. Delorme, Gymnasion (see especially pp. 36–50 and 143–7). Discussing our title-word on pp. 334–5, Delorme maintains that it means a garden-walk rather than a colonnade. But any place where people walk about is in fact a peripatos, and in some contexts one assumes that a roofed structure, naturally colonnaded, was available.