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Diogenes Laertius

From Wikipedia, in a visual modern way
For other people named Diogenes, see Diogenes (disambiguation).

Diogenes Laërtius (/daɪˌɒdʒɪniːz leɪˈɜːrʃiəs/ dy-OJ-in-eez lay-UR-shee-əs;[1] Greek: Διογένης Λαέρτιος, Laertios; fl. 3rd century AD) was a biographer of the Greek philosophers. Nothing is definitively known about his life, but his surviving Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers is a principal source for the history of ancient Greek philosophy. His reputation is controversial among scholars because he often repeats information from his sources without critically evaluating it. He also frequently focuses on trivial or insignificant details of his subjects' lives while ignoring important details of their philosophical teachings and he sometimes fails to distinguish between earlier and later teachings of specific philosophical schools. However, unlike many other ancient secondary sources, Diogenes Laërtius generally reports philosophical teachings without attempting to reinterpret or expand on them, which means his accounts are often closer to the primary sources. Due to the loss of so many of the primary sources on which Diogenes relied, his work has become the foremost surviving source on the history of Greek philosophy.

Discover more about Diogenes Laertius related topics

Greek language

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece, Cyprus, southern Italy, southern Albania, and other regions of the Balkans, the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor, and the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet, which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic, and many other writing systems.

Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece was a northeastern Mediterranean civilization, existing from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of classical antiquity, that comprised a loose collection of culturally and linguistically related city-states and other territories. Most of these regions were officially unified only once, for 13 years, under Alexander the Great's empire from 336 to 323 BC. In Western history, the era of classical antiquity was immediately followed by the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine period.

Philosopher

Philosopher

A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term philosopher comes from the Ancient Greek: φιλόσοφος, romanized: philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek thinker Pythagoras. In the classical sense, a philosopher was someone who lived according to a certain way of life, focusing upon resolving existential questions about the human condition; it was not necessary that they discoursed upon theories or commented upon authors. Those who most arduously committed themselves to this lifestyle would have been considered philosophers.

Ancient Greek philosophy

Ancient Greek philosophy

Ancient Greek philosophy arose in the 6th century BC, marking the end of the Greek Dark Ages. Greek philosophy continued throughout the Hellenistic period and the period in which Greece and most Greek-inhabited lands were part of the Roman Empire. Philosophy was used to make sense of the world using reason. It dealt with a wide variety of subjects, including astronomy, epistemology, mathematics, political philosophy, ethics, metaphysics, ontology, logic, biology, rhetoric and aesthetics.

Life

17th-century engraving
17th-century engraving

Laërtius must have lived after Sextus Empiricus (c. 200), whom he mentions, and before Stephanus of Byzantium and Sopater of Apamea (c. 500), who quote him. His work makes no mention of Neoplatonism, even though it is addressed to a woman who was "an enthusiastic Platonist".[2] Hence he is assumed to have flourished in the first half of the 3rd century, during the reign of Alexander Severus (222–235) and his successors.[3]

The precise form of his name is uncertain. The ancient manuscripts invariably refer to a "Laertius Diogenes", and this form of the name is repeated by Sopater[4] and the Suda.[5] The modern form "Diogenes Laertius" is much rarer, used by Stephanus of Byzantium,[6] and in a lemma to the Greek Anthology.[7] He is also referred to as "Laertes"[8] or simply "Diogenes".[9]

The origin of the name "Laertius" is also uncertain. Stephanus of Byzantium refers to him as "Διογένης ὁ Λαερτιεύς" (Diogenes ho Laertieus),[10] implying that he was the native of some town, perhaps the Laerte in Caria (or another Laerte in Cilicia). Another suggestion is that one of his ancestors had for a patron a member of the Roman family of the Laërtii.[11] The prevailing modern theory is that "Laertius" is a nickname (derived from the Homeric epithet Diogenes Laertiade, used in addressing Odysseus) used to distinguish him from the many other people called Diogenes in the ancient world.[12]

His home town is unknown (at best uncertain, even according to a hypothesis that Laertius refers to his origin). A disputed passage in his writings has been used to suggest that it was Nicaea in Bithynia.[13][14]

It has been suggested that Diogenes was an Epicurean or a Pyrrhonist. He passionately defends Epicurus[15] in Book 10, which is of high quality and contains three long letters attributed to Epicurus explaining Epicurean doctrines.[16] He is impartial to all schools, in the manner of the Pyrrhonists, and he carries the succession of Pyrrhonism further than that of the other schools. At one point, he even seems to refer to the Pyrrhonists as "our school."[13] On the other hand, most of these points can be explained by the way he uncritically copies from his sources. It is by no means certain that he adhered to any school, and he is usually more attentive to biographical details.[17]

In addition to the Lives, Diogenes refers to another work that he had written in verse on famous men, in various metres, which he called Epigrammata or Pammetros (Πάμμετρος).[3]

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Neoplatonism

Neoplatonism

Neoplatonism is a strand of Platonic philosophy that emerged in the 3rd century AD against the background of Hellenistic philosophy and religion. The term does not encapsulate a set of ideas as much as a series of thinkers. Among the common ideas it does maintain is that of monism, the doctrine that all of reality can be derived from a single principle, "the One".

Lemma (psycholinguistics)

Lemma (psycholinguistics)

In psycholinguistics, a lemma is an abstract conceptual form of a word that has been mentally selected for utterance in the early stages of speech production. A lemma represents a specific meaning but does not have any specific sounds that are attached to it.

Greek Anthology

Greek Anthology

The Greek Anthology is a collection of poems, mostly epigrams, that span the Classical and Byzantine periods of Greek literature. Most of the material of the Greek Anthology comes from two manuscripts, the Palatine Anthology of the 10th century and the Anthology of Planudes of the 14th century.

Caria

Caria

Caria was a region of western Anatolia extending along the coast from mid-Ionia (Mycale) south to Lycia and east to Phrygia. The Ionian and Dorian Greeks colonized the west of it and joined the Carian population in forming Greek-dominated states there. Carians were described by Herodotus as being of Minoan descent, while he reports that the Carians themselves maintained that they were Anatolian mainlanders intensely engaged in seafaring and were akin to the Mysians and the Lydians. The Carians spoke Carian, a native Anatolian language closely related to Luwian. Also closely associated with the Carians were the Leleges, which could be an earlier name for Carians.

Cilicia

Cilicia

Cilicia is a geographical region in southern Anatolia in Turkey, extending inland from the northeastern coasts of the Mediterranean Sea. Cilicia has a population ranging over six million, concentrated mostly at the Cilicia plain. The region includes the provinces of Mersin, Adana, Osmaniye, along with parts of Hatay and Antalya.

Roman Empire

Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterranean Sea in Europe, North Africa, and Western Asia, and was ruled by emperors. From the accession of Caesar Augustus as the first Roman emperor to the military anarchy of the 3rd century, it was a Principate with Italia as the metropole of its provinces and the city of Rome as its sole capital. The Empire was later ruled by multiple emperors who shared control over the Western Roman Empire and the Eastern Roman Empire. The city of Rome remained the nominal capital of both parts until AD 476 when the imperial insignia were sent to Constantinople following the capture of the Western capital of Ravenna by the Germanic barbarians. The adoption of Christianity as the state church of the Roman Empire in AD 380 and the fall of the Western Roman Empire to Germanic kings conventionally marks the end of classical antiquity and the beginning of the Middle Ages. Because of these events, along with the gradual Hellenization of the Eastern Roman Empire, historians distinguish the medieval Roman Empire that remained in the Eastern provinces as the Byzantine Empire.

Homer

Homer

Homer was a Greek poet who is credited as the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Homer is considered one of the most revered and influential authors in history.

Odysseus

Odysseus

Odysseus, also known by the Latin variant Ulysses, is a legendary Greek king of Ithaca and the hero of Homer's epic poem the Odyssey. Odysseus also plays a key role in Homer's Iliad and other works in that same epic cycle.

Nicaea

Nicaea

Nicaea, also known as Nicæa, Nicea or Nikaia, was an ancient Greek city in the north-western Anatolian region of Bithynia that is primarily known as the site of the First and Second Councils of Nicaea, the Nicene Creed, and as the capital city of the Empire of Nicaea following the Fourth Crusade in 1204, until the recapture of Constantinople by the Byzantines in 1261.

Bithynia

Bithynia

Bithynia was an ancient region, kingdom and Roman province in the northwest of Asia Minor, adjoining the Sea of Marmara, the Bosporus, and the Black Sea. It bordered Mysia to the southwest, Paphlagonia to the northeast along the Pontic coast, and Phrygia to the southeast towards the interior of Asia Minor.

Pyrrhonism

Pyrrhonism

Pyrrhonism is an Ancient Greek school of philosophical skepticism which rejects dogma and advocates the suspension of judgement over the truth of all beliefs. It was founded by Aenesidemus in the first century BCE, and said to have been inspired by the teachings of Pyrrho and Timon of Phlius in the fourth century BCE. Pyrrhonism is best known today through the surviving works of Sextus Empiricus, writing in the late second century or early third century CE. The publication of Sextus' works in the Renaissance ignited a revival of interest in Skepticism and played a major role in Reformation thought and the development of early modern philosophy.

Epicurus

Epicurus

Epicurus was an ancient Greek philosopher and sage who founded Epicureanism, a highly influential school of philosophy. He was born on the Greek island of Samos to Athenian parents. Influenced by Democritus, Aristippus, Pyrrho, and possibly the Cynics, he turned against the Platonism of his day and established his own school, known as "the Garden", in Athens. Epicurus and his followers were known for eating simple meals and discussing a wide range of philosophical subjects. He openly allowed women and slaves to join the school as a matter of policy. Of the over 300 works said to have been written by Epicurus about various subjects, the vast majority have been destroyed. Only three letters written by him—the letters to Menoeceus, Pythocles, and Herodotus—and two collections of quotes—the Principal Doctrines and the Vatican Sayings—have survived intact, along with a few fragments of his other writings. As a result of his work's destruction, most knowledge about his philosophy is due to later authors, particularly the biographer Diogenes Laërtius, the Epicurean Roman poet Lucretius and the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus, and with hostile but largely accurate accounts by the Pyrrhonist philosopher Sextus Empiricus, and the Academic Skeptic and statesman Cicero.

Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers

Dionysiou monastery, codex 90, a 13th-century manuscript containing selections from Herodotus, Plutarch and (shown here) Diogenes Laertius
Dionysiou monastery, codex 90, a 13th-century manuscript containing selections from Herodotus, Plutarch and (shown here) Diogenes Laertius

The work by which he is known, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (Greek: Βίοι καὶ γνῶμαι τῶν ἐν φιλοσοφίᾳ εὐδοκιμησάντων; Latin: Vitae Philosophorum), was written in Greek and professes to give an account of the lives and sayings of the Greek philosophers.

Although it is at best an uncritical and unphilosophical compilation, its value, as giving us an insight into the private lives of the Greek sages, led Montaigne to write that he wished that instead of one Laërtius there had been a dozen.[18] On the other hand, modern scholars have advised that we treat Diogenes' testimonia with care, especially when he fails to cite his sources: "Diogenes has acquired an importance out of all proportion to his merits because the loss of many primary sources and of the earlier secondary compilations has accidentally left him the chief continuous source for the history of Greek philosophy".[19]

Organization of the work

Diogenes divides his subjects into two "schools" which he describes as the Ionian/Ionic and the Italian/Italic; the division is somewhat dubious and appears to be drawn from the lost doxography of Sotion. The biographies of the "Ionian school" begin with Anaximander and end with Clitomachus, Theophrastus and Chrysippus; the "Italian" begins with Pythagoras and ends with Epicurus. The Socratic school, with its various branches, is classed with the Ionic; while the Eleatics and Pyrrhonists are treated under the Italic. He also includes his own poetic verse, albeit pedestrian, about the philosophers he discusses.

Books 1–7: Ionian Philosophy
Book 1: The Seven Sages
Thales, Solon, Chilon, Pittacus, Bias, Cleobulus, Periander, Anacharsis, Myson, Epimenides, Pherecydes
Book 2: Socrates, with predecessors and followers
Anaximander, Anaximenes, Anaxagoras, Archelaus, Socrates, Xenophon, Aeschines, Aristippus, Phaedo, Euclides, Stilpo, Crito, Simon, Glaucon, Simmias, Cebes, Menedemus of Eretria
Book 3: Plato
Plato
Book 4: The Academy
Speusippus, Xenocrates, Polemo, Crates of Athens, Crantor, Arcesilaus, Bion, Lacydes, Carneades, Clitomachus
Book 5: The Peripatetics
Aristotle, Theophrastus, Strato, Lyco, Demetrius, Heraclides
Book 6: The Cynics
Antisthenes, Diogenes of Sinope, Monimus, Onesicritus, Crates of Thebes, Metrocles, Hipparchia, Menippus, Menedemus
Book 7: The Stoics
Zeno of Citium, Aristo, Herillus, Dionysius, Cleanthes, Sphaerus, Chrysippus
Books 8–10: Italian Philosophy
Book 8: Pythagoreans
Pythagoras, Empedocles, Epicharmus, Archytas, Alcmaeon, Hippasus, Philolaus, Eudoxus
Book 9: (Eleatics, Atomists, Pyrrhonists)
Heraclitus, Xenophanes, Parmenides, Melissus, Zeno of Elea, Leucippus, Democritus, Protagoras, Diogenes of Apollonia, Anaxarchus, Pyrrho, Timon
Book 10: Epicurus
Epicurus

The work contains incidental remarks on many other philosophers, and there are useful accounts concerning Hegesias, Anniceris, and Theodorus (Cyrenaics);[20] Persaeus (Stoic);[21] and Metrodorus and Hermarchus (Epicureans).[22] Book VII is incomplete and breaks off during the life of Chrysippus. From a table of contents in one of the manuscripts (manuscript P), this book is known to have continued with Zeno of Tarsus, Diogenes, Apollodorus, Boethus, Mnesarchus, Mnasagoras, Nestor, Basilides, Dardanus, Antipater, Heraclides, Sosigenes, Panaetius, Hecato, Posidonius, Athenodorus, another Athenodorus, Antipater, Arius, and Cornutus. The whole of Book X is devoted to Epicurus, and contains three long letters written by Epicurus, which explain Epicurean doctrines.

His chief authorities were Favorinus and Diocles of Magnesia, but his work also draws (either directly or indirectly) on books by Antisthenes of Rhodes, Alexander Polyhistor, and Demetrius of Magnesia, as well as works by Hippobotus, Aristippus, Panaetius, Apollodorus of Athens, Sosicrates, Satyrus, Sotion, Neanthes, Hermippus, Antigonus, Heraclides, Hieronymus, and Pamphila.[23][24]

Oldest extant manuscripts

There are many extant manuscripts of the Lives, although none of them are especially old, and they all descend from a common ancestor, because they all lack the end of Book VII.[25] The three most useful manuscripts are known as B, P, and F. Manuscript B (Codex Borbonicus) dates from the 12th century, and is in the National Library of Naples.[a] Manuscript P (Paris) is dated to the 11th/12th century, and is in the Bibliothèque nationale de France.[27] Manuscript F (Florence) is dated to the 13th century, and is in the Laurentian Library.[28] The titles for the individual biographies used in modern editions are absent from these earliest manuscripts, however they can be found inserted into the blank spaces and margins of manuscript P by a later hand.[29]

There seem to have been some early Latin translations, but they no longer survive. A 10th-century work entitled Tractatus de dictis philosophorum shows some knowledge of Diogenes.[30] Henry Aristippus, in the 12th century, is known to have translated at least some of the work into Latin, and in the 14th century an unknown author made use of a Latin translation for his De vita et moribus philosophorum[30] (attributed erroneously to Walter Burley).

Printed editions

Title page of an edition in Greek and Latin, 1594
Title page of an edition in Greek and Latin, 1594
1611 Italian edition
1611 Italian edition

The first printed editions were Latin translations. The first, Laertii Diogenis Vitae et sententiae eorum qui in philosophia probati fuerunt (Romae: Giorgo Lauer, 1472), printed the translation of Ambrogio Traversari (whose manuscript presentation copy to Cosimo de' Medici was dated February 8, 1433[31]) and was edited by Elio Francesco Marchese.[32] The Greek text of the lives of Aristotle and Theophrastus appeared in the third volume of the Aldine Aristotle in 1497. The first edition of the whole Greek text was that published by Hieronymus Froben in 1533.[33] The Greek/Latin edition of 1692 by Marcus Meibomius divided each of the ten books into paragraphs of equal length, and progressively numbered them, providing the system still in use today.[34]

The first critical edition of the entire text, by H.S. Long in the Oxford Classical Texts, was not produced until 1964;[25] this edition was superseded by Miroslav Marcovich's Teubner edition, published between 1999 and 2002. A new edition, by Tiziano Dorandi, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2013.[35]

English translations

Thomas Stanley's 1656 History of Philosophy adapts the format and content of Laertius' work into English, but Stanley compiled his book from a number of classical biographies of philosophers.[36] The first complete English translation was a late 17th-century translation by ten different persons.[37] A better translation was made by Charles Duke Yonge (1853),[38] but although this was more literal, it still contained many inaccuracies.[39] The next translation was by Robert Drew Hicks (1925) for the Loeb Classical Library,[40] although it is slightly bowdlerized. A new translation by Pamela Mensch was published by Oxford University Press in 2018.[41]

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Herodotus

Herodotus

Herodotus was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus, part of the Persian Empire and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria (Italy). He is known for having written the Histories – a detailed account of the Greco-Persian Wars. Herodotus was the first writer to perform systematic investigation of historical events. He is referred to as "The Father of History", a title conferred on him by the ancient Roman orator Cicero.

Plutarch

Plutarch

Plutarch was a Greek Middle Platonist philosopher, historian, biographer, essayist, and priest at the Temple of Apollo in Delphi. He is known primarily for his Parallel Lives, a series of biographies of illustrious Greeks and Romans, and Moralia, a collection of essays and speeches. Upon becoming a Roman citizen, he was possibly named Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus.

Greek language

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece, Cyprus, southern Italy, southern Albania, and other regions of the Balkans, the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor, and the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet, which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic, and many other writing systems.

Michel de Montaigne

Michel de Montaigne

Michel Eyquem, Sieur de Montaigne, also known as the Lord of Montaigne, was one of the most significant philosophers of the French Renaissance. He is known for popularizing the essay as a literary genre. His work is noted for its merging of casual anecdotes and autobiography with intellectual insight. Montaigne had a direct influence on numerous Western writers; his massive volume Essais contains some of the most influential essays ever written.

Ionian School (philosophy)

Ionian School (philosophy)

The Ionian school of Pre-Socratic philosophy was centred in Miletus, Ionia in the 6th century B.C. Miletus and its environment was a thriving mercantile melting pot of current ideas of the time. The Ionian School included such thinkers as Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Heraclitus, Anaxagoras, and Archelaus. The collective affinity of this group was first acknowledged by Aristotle who called them physiologoi (φυσιολόγοι), meaning 'those who discoursed on nature'. The classification can be traced to the second-century historian of philosophy Sotion. They are sometimes referred to as cosmologists, since they were largely physicalists who tried to explain the nature of matter.

Doxography

Doxography

Doxography is a term used especially for the works of classical historians, describing the points of view of past philosophers and scientists. The term was coined by the German classical scholar Hermann Alexander Diels.

Anaximander

Anaximander

Anaximander was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher who lived in Miletus, a city of Ionia. He belonged to the Milesian school and learned the teachings of his master Thales. He succeeded Thales and became the second master of that school where he counted Anaximenes and, arguably, Pythagoras amongst his pupils.

Clitomachus (philosopher)

Clitomachus (philosopher)

Clitomachus or Cleitomachus was a Greek philosopher, originally from Carthage, who came to Athens in 163/2 BC and studied philosophy under Carneades. He became head of the Academy around 127/6 BC. He was an Academic skeptic like his master. Nothing survives of his writings, which were dedicated to making known the views of Carneades, but Cicero made use of them for some of his works.

Chrysippus

Chrysippus

Chrysippus of Soli was a Greco-Phoenician Stoic philosopher. He was a native of Soli, Cilicia, but moved to Athens as a young man, where he became a pupil of the Stoic philosopher Cleanthes. When Cleanthes died, around 230 BC, Chrysippus became the third head of the Stoic school. A prolific writer, Chrysippus expanded the fundamental doctrines of Cleanthes' mentor Zeno of Citium, the founder and first head of the school, which earned him the title of the Second Founder of Stoicism.

Epicurus

Epicurus

Epicurus was an ancient Greek philosopher and sage who founded Epicureanism, a highly influential school of philosophy. He was born on the Greek island of Samos to Athenian parents. Influenced by Democritus, Aristippus, Pyrrho, and possibly the Cynics, he turned against the Platonism of his day and established his own school, known as "the Garden", in Athens. Epicurus and his followers were known for eating simple meals and discussing a wide range of philosophical subjects. He openly allowed women and slaves to join the school as a matter of policy. Of the over 300 works said to have been written by Epicurus about various subjects, the vast majority have been destroyed. Only three letters written by him—the letters to Menoeceus, Pythocles, and Herodotus—and two collections of quotes—the Principal Doctrines and the Vatican Sayings—have survived intact, along with a few fragments of his other writings. As a result of his work's destruction, most knowledge about his philosophy is due to later authors, particularly the biographer Diogenes Laërtius, the Epicurean Roman poet Lucretius and the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus, and with hostile but largely accurate accounts by the Pyrrhonist philosopher Sextus Empiricus, and the Academic Skeptic and statesman Cicero.

Eleatics

Eleatics

The Eleatics were a group of pre-Socratic philosophers in the 5th century BC centered around the ancient Italian Greek colony of Elea, located in present-day Campania in southern Italy.

Pyrrhonism

Pyrrhonism

Pyrrhonism is an Ancient Greek school of philosophical skepticism which rejects dogma and advocates the suspension of judgement over the truth of all beliefs. It was founded by Aenesidemus in the first century BCE, and said to have been inspired by the teachings of Pyrrho and Timon of Phlius in the fourth century BCE. Pyrrhonism is best known today through the surviving works of Sextus Empiricus, writing in the late second century or early third century CE. The publication of Sextus' works in the Renaissance ignited a revival of interest in Skepticism and played a major role in Reformation thought and the development of early modern philosophy.

Legacy and assessment

The Italian Renaissance scholar, painter, philosopher, and architect Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472) modeled his own autobiography on Diogenes Laërtius's Life of Thales.[42]
The Italian Renaissance scholar, painter, philosopher, and architect Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472) modeled his own autobiography on Diogenes Laërtius's Life of Thales.[42]

Henricus Aristippus, the archdeacon of Catania, produced a Latin translation of Diogenes Laertius's book in southern Italy in the late 1150s, which has since been lost or destroyed.[42] Geremia da Montagnone used this translation as a source for his Compedium moralium notabilium (circa 1310) and an anonymous Italian author used it as a source for work entitled Liber de vita et moribus philosophorum (written c. 1317–1320), which reached international popularity in the Late Middle Ages.[42] The monk Ambrogio Traversari (1386–1439) produced another Latin translation in Florence between 1424 and 1433, for which far better records have survived.[42] The Italian Renaissance scholar, painter, philosopher, and architect Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472) borrowed from Traversari's translation of the Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers in Book 2 of his Libri della famiglia[42] and modeled his own autobiography on Diogenes Laërtius's Life of Thales.[42]

Diogenes Laërtius's work has had a complicated reception in modern times.[43] The value of his Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers as an insight into the private lives of the Greek sages led the French Renaissance philosopher Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592) to exclaim that he wished that, instead of one Laërtius, there had been a dozen.[44] Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) criticized Diogenes Laërtius for his lack of philosophical talent and categorized his work as nothing more than a compilation of previous writers' opinions.[42] Nonetheless, he admitted that Diogenes Laërtius's compilation was an important one given the information that it contained.[42] Hermann Usener (1834–1905) deplored Diogenes Laërtius as a "complete ass" (asinus germanus) in his Epicurea (1887).[42] Werner Jaeger (1888–1961) damned him as "that great ignoramus".[45] In the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, however, scholars have managed to partially redeem Diogenes Laertius's reputation as a writer by reading his book in a Hellenistic literary context.[43]

Nonetheless, modern scholars treat Diogenes's testimonia with caution, especially when he fails to cite his sources. Herbert S. Long warns: "Diogenes has acquired an importance out of all proportion to his merits because the loss of many primary sources and of the earlier secondary compilations has accidentally left him the chief continuous source for the history of Greek philosophy."[19] Robert M. Strozier offers a somewhat more positive assessment of Diogenes Laertius's reliability, noting that many other ancient writers attempt to reinterpret and expand on the philosophical teachings they describe, something which Diogenes Laërtius rarely does.[46] Strozier concludes, "Diogenes Laertius is, when he does not conflate hundreds of years of distinctions, reliable simply because he is a less competent thinker than those on whom he writes, is less liable to re-formulate statements and arguments, and especially in the case of Epicurus, less liable to interfere with the texts he quotes. He does, however, simplify."[46]

Despite his importance to the history of western philosophy and the controversy surrounding him, according to Gian Mario Cao, Diogenes Laërtius has still not received adequate philological attention.[42] Both modern critical editions of his book, by H. S. Long (1964) and by M. Marcovich (1999) have received extensive criticism from scholars.[42]

He is criticized primarily for being overly concerned with superficial details of the philosophers' lives and lacking the intellectual capacity to explore their actual philosophical works with any penetration. However, according to statements of the 14th-century monk Walter Burley in his De vita et moribus philosophorum, the text of Diogenes seems to have been much fuller than that which we now possess.

Reliability

Although Diogenes had a will to objectivity and fact-checking, Diogenes's works are today seen as generally unreliable from a historical perspective.[47][48][49] He is neither consistent nor reliable in some of his reports and some of the details he cites contain obvious errors.[48] Some of them were probably introduced by copyists in the transmission of the text from antiquity, but some errors are undoubtedly due to Diogenes himself.[50] The reliability of Diogenes' sources have also been questioned, since he uses comic poets as sources.[50] Professor Brian Gregor suggests that readers will benefit from modern scholarly assistance while reading Diogenes' biographies, since they are "notoriously unreliable".[49] Some scholars (e.g. Delfim Leão) state that Diogenes' unreliability is not entirely his responsibility and blame his sources instead.[48]

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Italian Renaissance

Italian Renaissance

The Italian Renaissance was a period in Italian history covering the 15th and 16th centuries. The period is known for the initial development of the broader Renaissance culture that spread across Western Europe and marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity. Proponents of a "long Renaissance" argue that it started around the year 1300 and lasted until about 1600. In some fields, a Proto-Renaissance, beginning around 1250, is typically accepted. The French word renaissance means "rebirth", and defines the period as one of cultural revival and renewed interest in Classical antiquity after the centuries during what Renaissance humanists labelled as the "Dark Ages". The Italian Renaissance historian Giorgio Vasari used the term rinascita ("rebirth") in his Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects in 1550, but the concept became widespread only in the 19th century, after the work of scholars such as Jules Michelet and Jacob Burckhardt.

Leon Battista Alberti

Leon Battista Alberti

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Late Middle Ages

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Editions and translations

  • Diogenis Laertii Vitae philosophorum edidit Miroslav Marcovich, Stuttgart-Lipsia, Teubner, 1999–2002. Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana, vol. 1: Books I–X ISBN 9783598713163; vol. 2: Excerpta Byzantina; v. 3: Indices by Hans Gärtner.
  • Lives of Eminent Philosophers, edited by Tiziano Dorandi, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013 (Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries, vol. 50, new radically improved critical edition).
  • Laërtius, Diogenes (1688). The lives, opinions, and remarkable sayings of the most famous ancient philosophers. The first volume written in Greek, by Diogenes Laertius ; made English by several hands. Vol. 1. Translated by Fetherstone, T.; White, Sam.; Smith, E.; Philips, J.; Kippax, R.; Baxter, William; M., R. (2 volumes ed.). London: Edward Brewster.
  • Laërtius, Diogenes (1853). Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers. Translated by Yonge, Charles Duke. London: G.H. Bohn.
  • Translation by R.D. Hicks:
  • Translations based on the critical edition by Tiziano Dorandi:
    • Lives of Eminent Philosophers. Translated by Pamela Mensch. Oxford University Press. 2018. ISBN 978-0-19-086217-6.
    • Lives of Eminent Philosophers. Translated by Stephen White. Cambidge University Press. 2020. ISBN 978-0-521-88335-1.

Discover more about Editions and translations related topics

Miroslav Marcovich

Miroslav Marcovich

Miroslav Marcovich was a Serbian-American philologist and university professor.

Robert Drew Hicks

Robert Drew Hicks

Robert Drew Hicks was a classical scholar, and a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.

Harvard University Press

Harvard University Press

Harvard University Press (HUP) is a publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University, and focused on academic publishing. It is a member of the Association of University Presses. After the retirement of William P. Sisler in 2017, the university appointed as George Andreou as director.

Source: "Diogenes Laertius", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2023, March 20th), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diogenes_Laertius.

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Further Reading

Crates of Thebes

Metrodorus of Lampsacus (the younger)

Hermarchus

Crates of Athens

Lyco of Troas
See also
Notes
  1. ^ The statement by Robert Hicks (1925) that "the scribe obviously knew no Greek",[26] was later rejected by Herbert Long. The more recent opinion of Tiziano Dorandi, however, is that the scribe had "little knowledge of Greek ... and limited himself to reproducing it in a mechanical way exactly as he managed to decipher it". A few years later an "anonymous corrector" with good knowledge of Greek rectified "many errors or readings that, rightly or wrongly, he considered erroneous" (Dorandi 2013, p. 21).
  1. ^ "Diogenes Laërtius", The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 2013
  2. ^ Laërtius 1925a, § 47.
  3. ^ a b Chisholm1911, p. 282.
  4. ^ Sopater, ap. Photius, Biblioth. 161
  5. ^ Suda, Tetralogia
  6. ^ Stephanus of Byzantium, Druidai
  7. ^ Lemma to Anthologia Palatina, vii. 95
  8. ^ Eustathius, on Iliad, M. 153
  9. ^ Stephanus of Byzantium, Enetoi
  10. ^ Stephanus of Byzantium, Cholleidai
  11. ^ Smith 1870, p. 1028.
  12. ^ Long 1972, p. xvi.
  13. ^ a b Laërtius 1925b, § 109. Specifically, Diogenes refers to "our Apollonides of Nicaea". This has been conjectured to mean either "my fellow-citizen" or "a Sceptic like myself".
  14. ^ Craig 1998, p. 86.
  15. ^ Laërtius 1925c, § 3–12.
  16. ^ Laërtius 1925c, § 34–135.
  17. ^ Long 1972, pp. xvii–xviii.
  18. ^ Montaigne, Essays II.10 "Of Books" Archived 2009-02-14 at the Wayback Machine.
  19. ^ a b Long 1972, p. xix.
  20. ^ Laërtius 1925b, § 93–104.
  21. ^ Laërtius 1925c, § 36.
  22. ^ Laërtius 1925d, § 22–26.
  23. ^ Friedrich Nietzsche, Gesammelte Werke, 1920, p. 363.
  24. ^ Long 1972, p. xxi.
  25. ^ a b Long 1972, p. xxv.
  26. ^ Hicks 1925, p. .
  27. ^ Dorandi 2013, p. 2.
  28. ^ Dorandi 2013, p. 3.
  29. ^ Dorandi 2013, p. 52.
  30. ^ a b Long 1972, p. xxvi.
  31. ^ de la Mare 1992, p. .
  32. ^ Tolomio 1993, pp. 154, ff.
  33. ^ Long 1972, p. xxiv.
  34. ^ Dorandi 2013, pp. 11–12.
  35. ^ "Diogenes Laertius: Lives of Eminent Philosophers". Cambridge University Press. Retrieved 14 March 2014.
  36. ^ Stanley, Thomas (1656). The History of Philosophy. London: J. Mosely and T. Dring.
  37. ^ Fetherstone et al 1688, Volume 1, Volume 2 (published 1696).
  38. ^ Yonge 1853.
  39. ^ Long 1972, p. xiii.
  40. ^ Laërtius 1925.
  41. ^ Lives of the Eminent Philosophers - Diogenes Laertius. Oxford University Press. 14 May 2018. ISBN 978-0-19-086217-6. Retrieved 22 May 2018.
  42. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Cao 2010, p. 271.
  43. ^ a b Cao 2010, pp. 271–272.
  44. ^ Montaigne, Essays II.10 "Of Books" Archived February 14, 2009, at the Wayback Machine.
  45. ^ Jaeger 1947, p. 330 n.2.
  46. ^ a b Strozier 1985, p. 15.
  47. ^ Crowe, Michael Bertram (1977). The Changing Profile of the Natural Law. Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer. p. 50. doi:10.1007/978-94-015-0913-8. ISBN 978-94-015-0354-9.
  48. ^ a b c Leão, Delfim (2019). "Can we trust Diogenes Laertius? The Book I of the Lives of Eminent Philosophers as source for the poems and the laws of Solon". Dike. Essays on Greek Law in Honor of Alberto Maffi. Giuffrè Francis Lefebvre: 227–242. ISBN 978-88-288-0303-4.
  49. ^ a b Gregor, Brian (2022). "Diogenes Laertius, "Lives of the Eminent Philosophers"". Philosophy in Review. 42 (1): 23–25. doi:10.7202/1088001ar. ISSN 1206-5269. S2CID 252810587.
  50. ^ a b Swift, Paul (2007). "The History and Mystery of Diogenes Laertius". Prajñā Vihāra: Journal of Philosophy and Religion. 8 (1): 38–49. ISSN 2586-9876.
References
Further reading
  • Barnes, Jonathan. 1992. "Diogenes Laertius IX 61–116: The Philosophy of Pyrrhonism." In Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung. Vol. 2: 36.5–6. Edited by Wolfgang Haase, 4241–4301. Berlin: W. de Gruyter.
  • Barnes, Jonathan. 1986. "Nietzsche and Diogenes Laertius." Nietzsche-Studien 15:16–40.
  • Dorandi, Tiziano. 2009. Laertiana: Capitoli sulla tradizione manoscritta e sulla storia del testo delle Vite dei filosofi di Diogene Laerzio. Berlin; New York: Walter de Gruyter.
  • Eshleman, Kendra Joy. 2007. "Affection and Affiliation: Social Networks and Conversion to Philosophy." The Classical Journal 103.2: 129–140.
  • Grau, Sergi. 2010. "How to Kill a Philosopher: The Narrating of Ancient Greek Philosophers' Deaths in Relation to the Living. Ancient Philosophy 30.2: 347-381
  • Hägg, Tomas. 2012. The Art of Biography in Antiquity. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
  • Kindstrand, Jan Frederik. 1986. "Diogenes Laertius and the Chreia Tradition." Elenchos 7:217–234.
  • Long, Anthony A. 2006. "Diogenes Laertius, Life of Arcesilaus." In From Epicurus to Epictetus: Studies in Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy. Edited by Anthony A. Long, 96–114. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
  • Mansfeld, Jaap. 1986. "Diogenes Laertius on Stoic Philosophy." Elenchos 7: 295–382.
  • Mejer, Jørgen. 1978. Diogenes Laertius and his Hellenistic Background. Wiesbaden: Steiner.
  • Mejer, Jørgen. 1992. "Diogenes Laertius and the Transmission of Greek Philosophy." In Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung. Vol. 2: 36.5–6. Edited by Wolfgang Haase, 3556–3602. Berlin: W. de Gruyter.
  • Morgan, Teresa J. 2013. "Encyclopaedias of Virtue?: Collections of Sayings and Stories About Wise Men in Greek." In Encyclopaedism from Antiquity to the Renaissance. Edited by Jason König and Greg Woolf, 108–128. Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press.
  • Sassi, Maria Michela. 2011. Ionian Philosophy and Italic Philosophy: From Diogenes Laertius to Diels. In The Presocratics from the Latin Middle Ages to Hermann Diels. Edited by Oliver Primavesi and Katharina Luchner, 19–44. Stuttgart: Steiner.
  • Sollenberger, Michael. 1992. The Lives of the Peripatetics: An Analysis of the Content and Structure of Diogenes Laertius’ “Vitae philosophorum” Book 5. In Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung. Vol. 2: 36.5–6. Edited by Wolfgang Haase, 3793–3879. Berlin: W. de Gruyter.
  • Vogt, Katja Maria, ed. 2015. Pyrrhonian Skepticism in Diogenes Laertius. Tübingen, Germany: Mohr Siebeck.
  • Warren, James. 2007. "Diogenes Laertius, Biographer of Philosophy." In Ordering Knowledge in the Roman Empire. Edited by Jason König and Tim Whitmars, 133–149. Cambridge; New York : Cambridge University Press.

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