No CrossRef data available.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 September 2021
The fifth and fourth century bc were truly the pinnacle of Greek history and culture. In those golden days, one could deliberate on political matters with Themistocles and Pericles; discuss our human condition with Socrates and Plato and the past with Herodotus and Thucydides; watch the superb plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides; visit the brand-new Acropolis at Athens or consult Apollo at Delphi; drop in at Polyclitus’ workshop or marvel at a skilfully decorated black-figure Panathenaic amphora. It was, however, also a period in which Greeks were still Greeks, whereas the rest were conveniently despised as barbarians. Greeks confidently bashed barbarian brains in (at Marathon, for instance, or Plataea) and were even proud of it. After all, they did it in a culturally justified way. With fellow Greeks, matters were somewhat different. Their brains were likewise crushed, to be sure, and even in such cases, the slaughter was usually not devoid of a certain feeling of ideological superiority, yet to refined Greek ears, the cracking of Greek skulls must have sounded differently from the smashing of the skull of an ordinary effeminate barbarian. Athenians, Spartans, and Thebans could often drink each other's blood (in a skilfully decorated cup), no doubt, but in the end, they all remained fellow Greeks.
1 The translations, unless otherwise indicated, are borrowed from the Loeb Classical Library, often with slight modifications.
2 See esp. Alcock 1993: 25–92 and passim.
3 Quaest. conv. 622E; 669C–D; 678D–679E; 680A–B; 684A–B; 684C–D; 738A–C; see also Ant. 28.3–12.
4 E.g. Ziegler 1951: 642; C. Jones 1971: 9; Sirinelli 2000: 29; cf. Volkmann 1869: i.21. In Quaest. conv. 641F–642A, he is characterized as an expert in horse-breeding.
5 Roskam 2004a: 103 and 108–13 on Ammonius.
6 Quaest. conv. 617E–619A; 626A–C; 643E–644D; 669C–E; 670E–671C; 705B–706E; 715A–716C; 726D–727A; 740B–D.
7 In Quaest. conv. 635A–B, the character ‘Plutarch’ points out that his brother prefers The Walk (τὸν περίπατον) and The Lyceum (τὸ Λύκειον) to the Epicurean Garden. This statement, however, should be understood in its sympotic context, as an apt saying, meant to defend Lamprias against the attacks of the Epicurean Xenocles and to introduce an interesting topic for discussion. Moreover, the characterization is not at odds with Lamprias’ Platonic outlook. As a matter of fact, every Platonist would prefer Aristotle to Epicurus.
8 He may in fact have been a little bit younger. In 387F, he says that he was at that time still fond of mathematics but would soon embrace the maxim ‘avoid extremes’ when he had become a member of the Academy (ἐν Ἀκαδημείᾳ γενόμενος). This suggests that either he had only recently become a student of Ammonius or even that he was not yet a member of his school. In that case, the date of his birth may have been closer to ad 50.
9 See, e.g., Krauss 1912: 4; Ziegler 1951: 716–17; Flacelière 1964: 16; C. Jones 1971: 14–16 and 76; Lamberton 2001: 44; see also Hirzel 1895: ii.124–7.
10 On the person of Ammonius, see C. Jones 1967; on his philosophical profile, see Opsomer 2009a.
11 His grandfather Lamprias was still alive at that point: Quaest. conv. 678C–E. According to Stadter 2015b: 73 and 194–5, Plutarch went to Alexandria on an embassy to Vespasian's court in ad 69 or 70. See also Stadter 2015b: 188–98 on Plutarch's Alexandrias.
12 Eudorus of Alexandria helped to lay the foundations of Middle Platonist philosophy in the first century bc; see Dillon 1977: 115–35; Bonazzi 2007. Closer in time to Plutarch, Philo of Alexandria developed a sophisticated exegesis of the Old Testament on the basis of Platonist philosophy. Nothing suggests, though, that Plutarch was familiar with Philo's works.
13 See, e.g., C. Jones 1971: 14–15. Cf. also Russell 1972: 7, who argues that Plutarch first aimed at a brilliant career as a sophist but failed and then turned to philosophy.
14 In Con. praec. 145A, Plutarch refers to a work On love of ornament (Περὶ φιλοκοσμίας) written by Timoxena.
15 Russell 1993b; Claassen 2004. See also, however, Baltussen 2009: 85–7, for arguments in support of the sincerity of Plutarch's personal engagement in the Consolation to his wife.
16 See SIG 844A on Autobulus and IG 9.1.61.41–2 on Soclarus.
17 See esp. Glucker 1978.
18 See esp. La Matina 2000; also Roskam 2009b: 26–8.
19 Most scholars now adopt a sensible middle position, arguing that the talks are rooted in conversations that really took place but that Plutarch himself significantly elaborated and polished the original arguments. See, e.g., Ziegler 1951: 886–7; Teodorsson 1989: 12–15; Pordomingo Pardo 1999; Sirinelli 2000: 379–82; Titchener 2009; Roskam 2010: 46–8; Klotz and Oikonomopoulou 2011: 3–12; Meeusen 2016: 162–5; Nikolaidis 2017: 260–3.
20 Cf. the phrase διαλέγεσθαι καὶ συμφιλοσοφεῖν (‘converse and philosophize together’) in Brut. 12.3. For the term συμφιλοσοφεῖν, which expresses the activities in Plutarch's school very well, see also De prof. in virt. 77C; De tuenda 122B; De genio Socr. 578F; Dion 20.3; Brut. 24.1; Sol. 26.1; Cic. 24.8.
21 See, e.g., Ziegler 1951: 665–96; C. Jones 1971: 39–64; Puech 1992; Sirinelli 2000: 167–98.
22 De tuenda 137C; see also Quaest. conv. 715B; Van Hoof 2010: 23. On Plutarch's conception of philology, see Van der Stockt 2019.
23 For Plutarch's readers, see, e.g., Wardman 1974: 37–48; Stadter 1988: 292–3 and 2015b: 45–55; Duff 2007–8: esp. 7–11; Muccioli 2012: 44–53 (on the Parallel Lives); and Van Hoof 2005–6 and 2010: 19–24 (on the Moralia).
24 This appears from an inscription (SIG 829A) which mentions ‘Mestrius Plutarchus the priest’.
25 He was present at the wedding of Plutarch's son; Quaest. conv. 666D.
26 Thus correctly Russell 1972: 10–11.
27 This aspect of Plutarch's persona is discussed in detail by Van Hoof 2010.
28 Barrow 1967: 38; C. Jones 1971: 23; Puech 1992: 4856; contra Russell 1968: 132 and Flacelière and Irigoin 1987: xxxi.
29 Dodds 1933: 98; C. Jones 1971: 3; Aalders 1982: 15; Titchener 2002. Plutarch's patriotism is frequently regarded as the main motivation for his attack on Herodotus. I argue against this view in Roskam 2017b.
30 On this proem to Demosthenes–Cicero, see Mossman 1999; Zadorojnyi 2005; Beneker 2016; Chrysanthou 2018.
31 He may also have been Boeotarch and Agonothete at the Pythian games (thus C. Jones 1971: 25–6, on the basis of An seni 785C; cf. Gianakaris 1970: 32), but this is beyond proof.
32 See Carrière and Cuvigny 1984: 181: ‘It is possible that Plutarch's modesty was a bit feigned, for it was very honourable, even in a small city, to take the initiative for building or to supervise works, as the inscriptions show’ (‘Il se peut que la modestie de Plutarque soit un peu feinte, car il était fort honorable, même dans une petite cité, de prendre l'initiative de constructions ou d’être le curateur des travaux, comme le montrent les inscriptions’).
33 See Wardman 1974: 102–3. Epameinondas broke the military supremacy of Sparta in the Battle of Leuctra (371 bc). As a result, his city, Thebes, for a while became the leading polis in Greece (until the Battle of Mantinea in 362 bc).
34 On Plutarch's priesthood at Delphi and its importance for his life and thinking, see Jaillard 2007; Casanova 2012; Thum 2013: 118–21; Stadter 2015b: 82–97.
35 The ‘I’ speaking here is Theon, not Plutarch (see Schröder 1990: 15–18), yet the latter would no doubt have been willing to appropriate Theon's words.
36 Again Theon speaking (see previous note). See also De fort. Rom. 317B–C; De tranq. an. 469E; An seni 784F; Praec. ger. reip. 805A and 824C; Bravo García 1973: 185–9; Boulogne 1994: 37–8. According to Dillon 1997, Plutarch even regarded this universal Roman peace as the end of history.
37 Rémy 1976. Quintilian for instance, had received them under Domitian.
38 The testimony is accepted by Ziegler 1951: 657–8; Bowersock 1969: 57, 65, and 112; C. Jones 1971: 29–30 and 34; Carrière and Cuvigny 1984: 63–4; Flacelière and Irigoin 1987: li; Lamberton 2001: 12; and others. Swain 1996: 171–2 is more sceptical. On Plutarch's possible relations with Hadrian, see also Bowie 1997.
39 The classic study is still Hirzel 1912. See also Aulotte 1965 (on Plutarch and Amyot); Konstantinovic 1989 (on Plutarch and Montaigne); and Pade 2007 (on Plutarch's Lives in fifteenth-century Italy). Also several collections of articles, including Gallo 1998; Ferreira 2002; Guerrier 2005; Aguilar and Alfageme 2006; Volpe Cacciatore 2009; Pérez Jiménez 2010; and Beck 2014a: 531–610. The most recent contribution is Xenophontos and Oikonomopoulou 2019, which contains a panorama of thorough discussions that range from late antiquity into the twentieth century.
40 Them. 18.5; trans. Scott-Kilvert 1960.