The Oxford Handbook of the Second Sophistic

by Daniel S. Richter

  40.Elsner 2009b. On Philostratus’s possible response to Christianity, see Swain 2009.

  41.Bowie 1978, 1663. Meyer 1917 already doubted the existence of Damis.

  42.Flinterman 1995, 85, for this possibility.

  43.Francis 1998.

  44.Schirren 2009, 177. The case is made at greater length in Schirren 2005.

  45.Gyselinck and Demoen 2009, 126–127.

  46.Whitmarsh 2004a, 2004b.

  47.Bowie 1994, 190–193; Miles 2017a.

  48.Van Dijk 2009.

  49.For instance: V A 1.22, 2.22. See Miles 2009 and 2017b, and on the production of multiple interpretations in the Gymnasticus, König 2005, 325–337.

  50.On the interest in visuality in these dialogues, see Platt 2009.

  51.On the conversion from skepticism to belief, see Kim 2010b, 201–202; Whitmarsh 2004a, 249. On the setting and Plato’s Phaedrus: Hodkinson 2011.

  52.On the relationship of the Schwindelliteratur to the Heroicus, see Grossardt 2006, 55–74; Kim 2010b, 175–215.

  53.Also visualized at Imag. 2.2.

  54.Discussed more fully in Miles 2004.

  55.For instance, Mantero 1966.

  56.Anderson 1986, 241–258.

  57.Grossardt 2006, 127–130.

  58.Hodkinson 2011, 58 takes a similar point of view, as does Kim 2010b. König 2005, 334 makes some related observations regarding the Gymnasticus.

  59.Webb 2009, 188 observes the “several levels of time involved” in the Imagines.

  60.Limitation of space prevents discussion of these second Imagines here.

  61.Newby 2009.

  62.“Rhodogoune” (2.5) is again a fine example. I discuss these aspects of the Imagines further in Miles 2017.

  63.Lehmann-Hartleben 1941. See the response of Bryson 1994.

  64.Goethe 1818. On the resistance to a final structure, see Baumann 2011.

  65.Billault 2000, 49.

  66.Somewhat similar observations have been made regarding Heliodorus: Morgan 1994.

  CHAPTER 20

  1.On the presence of historians’ writings in grammar school curricula, see Marrou 1966, 230, and more extensively Nicolai 1992, 186–233; regarding declamations of historical subjects in rhetoric schools, see the concise Bowie 1970, 4–5, and more extensively Nicolai 1992, 215–233. For an especially interesting testimony to these declamations, see Plutarch himself in the Praecepta gerendae rei publicae (Mor. 814c), about which see Desideri 2012c (= 1998a), 62ff.

  2.See Desideri 1997 and 2001 (for Plutarch’s role, 174–177).

  3.On this cultural phenomenon, see Bowersock 1969. For a concise survey of authors and themes, as listed by Philostratus, see Desideri 1992a, 59–60; and remember that it was Philostratus who defined the activity of these sophists as dedicated to developing themes “belonging to history” (VS 481). Schmitz 2014’s description of the relationships between Plutarch and the Second Sophistic is not interested in my main point, i.e., Plutarch’s and sophists’ common interest for history.

  4.Here I am thinking, first, of the History of Memnon of Heraclea, regarding whose writings I refer to my older works from the previous century (Desideri 1967 and 1970–1971), and the more recent Desideri 2007; but for a more exhaustive survey of these entire literature, see Bowie 1970, 19–22.

  5.See Bowie 1996; Habicht 1985.

  6.See at least Cordovana and Galli 2007; Walker and Cameron 1989.

  7.As shall be seen clearly later in this work, I do not share the idea of a sharp contrast between biography and history: I limit my argument on this subject to referring to Desideri 2012a (= 1992c), 247–249; 2012f (= 1995), and now 2015, sect. 6d (but see the previous work by Gentili and Cerri 1983, 65–90; Mazzarino 1983, 3, 136–138; Pelling 1990; and more recently Schepens 2007, 341ff).

  8.Duff 1999, 3–5; regarding Late Antiquity, also see Jones 1971, 81n1.

  9.Only the first pair, Epaminondas and Scipio, was lost.

  10.For a general bibliography on biography, see now Desideri 2015, sect. 5.

  11.For a list (from the Catalog, but also from Plutarch’s self-references) of the individual Lives that were lost (not many, truthfully), among which the Life of a politician and captain such as the great Scipio Africanus; see Ziegler 1965, 307ff.

  12.See Desideri 2015, sect. 6e (and the earlier Jones 1982, 968). Here the main reference is naturally Cornelius Nepos, on whose relations with Plutarch see Ramón Palerm 2009, 42–46.

  13.See Jones 1971, 104ff: “P. appears to have added one pair after another haphazardly . . . ; lack of plan . . . ; random accumulation of instances.”

  14.On the technical and rhetorical aspects of Plutarch’s biographical writings, see Ramón Palerm 2009, 48ff.

  15.Its theme was in fact “The Unity of Plutarch’s Work” (for the Proceedings, see Nikolaidis 2008); for the history of the composition of the two great and distinct corpora of the Byzantine era, see therein Geiger 2008.

  16.See Desideri 2012h (= 2012g); I later dealt with this theme again in Desideri 2016.

  17.Dario Del Corno (1983, 12) spoke of “afflatus of anguish” (see Desideri 2011, 100ff)

  18.All of Plutarch’s life and works demonstrate the strength of this conviction of his: see especially Stadter 2002, 5–6.

  19.Mor. 422b (this translation of Plutarch, like all the others in this chapter, comes from the Loeb volumes).

  20.Mor. 422bc (καὶ περὶ αὐτὰ τοῦ αἰῶνος ὄντοςοἷον ἀπορροὴν ἐπὶ τοὺςκόσμουςφέρεσθαιτὸνχρόνον).

  21.Mor. 432ab

  22.Mor. 432b.

  23.Mor. 387b.

  24.Mor. 408bc; the same idea, in terms which are just as covertly ironic, is expressed in the Praecepta rei publicae gerendae (Mor. 824c).

  25.This was apparently a widespread opinion (Mor. 408d): see Desideri 2012h (= 2012g), 363ff.

  26.The dating in particular of the De E has been a subject of much debate: see Stadter 2002, 12; in any case, its attribution to the age of Hadrian cannot be proven (Jones 1966, 63–65).

  27.Jones 1966, 70 (perhaps in 99 CE, year of the first consulate of his friend Sosius Senecio, whom the work addresses); 1971, 31; Stadter 2002, 6.

  28.The pair Aemilius Paullus and Timoleon could be positioned at the eleventh (Nikolaidis 2005, 296), or thirteenth to fourteenth place (Jones 1966, 67) in the series of the Parallel Lives.

  29.Aem. 1. For further analysis of this proem, see Desideri 2012j (= 1989), 201–202.

  30.Mor. 84d ff.; the image of the mirror also appears in the above-mentioned proem of Aemilius Paullus (see Desideri 2012b [= 1992b], 232).

  31.Per. 2.4 (see Desideri 2012j [= 1989], 202–203 and 2013, 24).

  32.For a more in-depth analysis of the reasons why the biographical model of historical writing emerged in the imperial age, see Desideri 2001, 176; 2015, sect. 6e; Swain 1997.

  33.On the relationship between the two passages, see Giua 1985.

  34.Pelling 1997b, 118ff; 2006, 258.

  35.Jones 1982, 968. Bowersock 1998 supports the Plutarchan originality of the plan and attributes the writing of these Lives to the age of Domitian (see, previously, Jones 1966, 71; 1971, 27 and 72–73); Geiger 2002, 93ff. reaffirms his preference for the age of Nerva. On these Lives, see now Georgiadou 2014.

  36.Desideri 2015, 14.

  37.For a stimulating approach to the Parallel Lives—one both comprehensive and concise—see now Geiger 2014.

  38.But we cannot rule out the joint publication of several pairs: Mewaldt 1907 (see Jones 1966, 66–67; Nikolaidis 2005, 296ff).

  39.Thes. 1.2; Cim. 2.2; Dem. 3.1; Dio 2.7.

  40.For example, see Cim. 3; Rom. 1.4–5. On Plutarchan parallelism, see still Hirzel 1912, chapter 7 (“Der Historiker”); and later Desideri 2012b (= 1992b); 233ff; Duff 1999, 287–309; Pelling 2010; Tatum 2010; and in general the collected works in Humble 2010.

  41.Desideri 2012d (= 1998b), 38ff; previously Jones 1971, 107ff. had observed that “the Parallel Lives do not
reveal a cleavage between Greeks and Romans, but rather their unity.”

  42.Desideri 2012d (= 1998b), 33ff.

  43.Jones 1966, 67; Nikolaidis 2005, 299; Ziegler 1965, 308.

  44.I maintain my position (Desideri 2012b [= 1992b], 240–245); for a different perspective, Geiger 2014, 298; Van der Stockt 2014, 323.

  45.Stadter 1965, 9–11. See the later Jones 1982, 964 (though previously, he had claimed that “the primary purpose . . . is artistic,” and that, as in Nepos, “his aim was delectation and not demonstration,” despite admitting an ethical intention as well; Jones 1971, 105–106); Desideri 2012a (= 1992c), 234; Tatum 2010, 4ff.

  46.This difficulty has now been explored very well by Tatum 2010.

  47.Pelling 2010.

  48.As we know, Plutarch sometimes refers to Lives which will never actually be written.

  49.For the group of Late Republic Lives in particular, see Pelling 1979; Stadter 2010 thinks that the pairs included in these six Lives actually form a larger unit, in which Plutarch may have focused on certain specific themes.

  50.The problem of the work’s internal timeline has been discussed most in depth in Jones 1966 and Nikolaidis 2005; but also see Piccirilli 1977, 999–1003.

  51.Nikolaidis 2005 made a noteworthy attempt at reconstructing the order of the themed explorations connected to the order in which the individual pairs were published over time.

  52.See Desideri 2012e (= 2005), 142.

  53.Comp. Arist./Cato 1.2–3 (see Desideri 2012b (= 1992b), 236).

  54.Phoc. 3.1–3 (see Desideri 2012b (= 1992b), 235–236).

  55.I recall, for example, the beginning of the Comparison between Solon and Publicola (1.1), in which Plutarch writes of the “very particular aspect” of this comparison, consisting of the fact that the “latter figure imitated the former, and the former proved the value of the latter.”

  56.Desideri 2012d (= 1998b), 35–38.

  57.On the centrality of the theme of freedom in Philopoemen (and in Flamininus), see Pelling 1997a, 137–153; 300ff.

  58.Cic. 24.6.

  59.Plutarch explicity declares (Dem. 3.1–2) that it is not his intention (nor is he able) to compare the two in terms of their oratorical skills.

  60.Nic. 1.5.

  61.Nietzsche 2010, 41–42. I discussed the connection between Plutarch and Nietzsche in Desideri 2016.

  62.It is interesting to note that a great Greek contemporary intellectual, such as the orator Dio Chrysostom, who shared Plutarch’s constant use of the Greek past for argumentative purposes, displays a nearly complete ignorance of the Roman past.

  63.See Desideri 2012c (= 1998a), 63–68.

  CHAPTER 21

  1.On the reception of Lucian in general, see Baumbach 2002 and Robinson 1979.

  2.LUKINOS: The Lapiths; Essays in Portraiture; Essays in Portraiture Defended; The Dance; Lexiphanes; The Eunuch; Hesiod; Hermotimus; The Ship; The Cynic. LUKIANOS: Verae Historiae; Peregrinus Proteus; The Solecist (probably inauthentic); Affairs of the Heart. LUKIUS: The Ass. THE SYRIAN: Dead Come to Life; Bis Accusatus; Adversus Indoctum; De Syria Dea; Mistaken Critic.

  3.I use the word “Lucian” in this chapter to refer to both the author of the texts and the authorial persona within the text.

  4.E.g., Dead Come to Life 19; Dionysus 5; Heracles; Zeus the Tragedian 8; Mistaken Critic 14–29; Twice Accused 33; Ignorant Book Collector 19; Dream 8; Anacharsis 16; How to Write History 24; Dipsads; Herodotus 1; Zeuxis 12; Scythian 9; You are a Prometheus in Words 4.

  5.Cf. Twice Accused 31 for a brilliant reworking of the preface of Dionysius of Halicarnassus’s Lives of the Orators. See below.

  6.The Anacharsis of Lucian’s Anacharsis hews more closely to the Herodotean and Hellenistic models.

  7.Cf. the remark of Apollonius of Tyana to his companion Damis about the absolute ethical behavior of the wise man whether or not he is among the Hellenes: “for the wise man, Hellas is everywhere” [VA 1.35].

  8.See the excellent analyses of both Kim 2010, 140–174, and Ní Mheallaigh 2014, 206–260.

  9.Lucian speaks often of the importance of teachers: for good philosophical training, see: Nigrinus, Demonax—bad philosophical training is satirized in Runaways. For various perspectives on good and bad rhetorical training, see Teacher of Public Speaking, Lexiphanes, The Dream, The Mistaken Critic, Twice Accused.

  10.See the critique of Helm in McCarthy 1934.

  11.I’ve borrowed the Loeb’s evocative translation of these excessively archaic terms.

  12.Jones 1986, 41, accepts Lucianic authorship but sees no satirical intent.

  13.See Kim’s chapter 4, in this volume, about the tendency of Atticizers to distinguish their own diction from the “learned koinê” of the Hellenistic and early Imperial periods.

  14.E.g., Gell NA 12.11: Philosophum nomine Peregrinum, cui postea cognomentum Proteus factum est, virum gravem atque constantem, vidimus, cum Athenis essemus, deversantem in quodam tugurio extra urbem. Cumque ad eum frequenter ventitaremus, multa hercle dicere eum utiliter et honeste audivimus.

  15.non uideo quid mihi sit in ea re pudendum, haud minus quam Cyro maiori, quod genere mixto fuit Semimedus ac Semipersa. non enim ubi prognatus, sed ut moratus quisque sit spectandum, nec qua regione, sed qua ratione uitam uiuere inierit, considerandum est.

  CHAPTER 23

  1.Athenaeus: Hutton 2005, 254n49; Lucian: Lightfoot 2003, 218; Pollux: Hanell 1938, 1560; Philostratus: Dickey 1997, 11–20; Athenagoras: Snodgrass 2003.

  2.I would like to thank the editors of this volume for their many constructive suggestions for improvements to this chapter.

  CHAPTER 24

  1.On this point see Schöne 1917 and Richardson 1992, s.v. gymnasium Neronis.

  2.Pausanias called a “sophist”: De anat. Admin. 3.1 (2.343K), De loc. aff. 3.14 (8.213K). Galen mentions Aristides in In Plat. Tim. comm. 33 Schröder. Note that Aristides refers to Galen’s teacher Satyrus as a “sophist of no humble birth” (Orat. 49.8).

  3.Thessalus is attacked throughout Galen’s work but especially in the first book of On the Method of Healing. A commentary is available in Hankinson 1991 and a new translation of all of Meth. Med. in Johnston and Horsley 2011.

  4.Home-schooling: De libr. propr. 14 (19.39–40K); De an. aff. dign. et cur. 8 (5.41–43K). Proper Greek: De puls. differ. 2.5 (8.587K); De ord. libr. suor. 4 (19.59K).

  5.De an. aff. dign. et cur. 8.3 (5.41–43K); De libr. propr. 14 (19.43K).

  6.Nicon’s dreams: De ord. libr. suor. 4 (19.59K); De meth. med. 9.4 (10.609K); and De praecogn. 2 (14.608K).

  7.For a recent, sympathetic history of Methodism, Nutton 2004, chap. 13. Galen mentions Soranus several times, and one of his most entertaining stories recounts his own humiliation of Attalus, a student of Soranus: De meth. med. 13.15 (10.910K).

  8.De anat. admin. 14.1, 230–233 Simon; In Hipp. Nat. Hom. comment. 2.6, 15.136K.

  9.For the story of the demonstration, De libr. propr. 2 (19.20–23K); also De anat. admin. 4.10 (2.469–70K).

  10.The authenticity of Ther. Pis. is defended by Swain 1996, appendix D, and Nutton 1997, but doubted by Strohmeier 2007. Recent editors Leigh 2015, 19-60, and Boudon-Millot 2016, chap. 4, make thorough and convincing arguments against authenticity.

  11.De praecogn. 1 (14.599–605K), 2 (14.620–624K); cf. De opt. med. cogn. 1 (46 Iskandar).

  CHAPTER 25

  1.Perry 1967, 108–124, and, for example, the standard English introductions: Hägg 1983, 34, and Holzberg 1995.

  2.P. Michaelidae 1 in Crawford 1955, 1–4.

  3.Papanikolaou 1973; but see now Hernández Lara 1990 and Ruiz-Montero 1991.

  4.Pers.1.134, on which see Tilg 2010, 69–78. Persius is a notoriously opaque author, but the logic of the passage suggests to me that his Callirhoe is a slapstick comedy.

  5.Philostr. VS 521–526. The connection is made by Jones 1992; Bowie 2002 and Tilg 2010, 44–46, are unduly skeptical.

  6.5.6.1–10. See Doulamis 2011 for full analysis.

 
7.Philostr. Ep.66.

  8.This is how the narrative begins: “The Syracusan general Hermocrates, the man who defeated the Athenians, had a daughter called Callirhoe” (1.1.2, trans. Reardon)

  9.On the “historical” setting see Hunter 1994; Reardon 1996, 325–330; and on Callirhoe as historical novel, see Hägg 1987.

  10.1.1.1: “My name is Chariton, of Aphrodisias, and I am clerk to the attorney Athenagoras. I am going to tell you the story of a love affair that took place in Syracuse.”

  11.On the construction of the narrator, see Morgan 2004.

  12.Callirhoe is not an isolated case in this respect. The fragmentary novel known as Metiochus and Parthenope (translated in Reardon 1989, 813–815) seems to have been engaged in a similar romantic elaboration of bare historical fact, this time based around the daughter of the tyrant Polycrates of Samos and the son of the Athenian general Miltiades.

  13.Athens figures only in an episode where tomb robbers decide not to sell the heroine there because it is a city of busybodies and informers (1.11.4–7).

  14.Morgan 2007, and now, indispensably, Whitmarsh 2011, esp. 50–58.

  15.For full discussion of paideia in the novels as a marker of elite masculinity, see Jones 2012, 20–91.

  16.Tilg 2010, 24–36, provides information on Aphrodisias; and 240–297 argues for Chariton’s acquaintance with the Aeneid.

  17.On this and the novel’s intertextuality in general, see Morgan 2008.

  18.For the argument that the hearing reflects Roman legal practice, see Schwartz 2003.

  19.So, for example, Xenophon of Ephesus is included in Hansen 1998.

  20.The oralist case is argued forcefully by O’Sullivan 1995.

  21.Argued at length by Tagliabue 2013.

  22.See Capra 2009 for development of this idea.

  23.Particularly striking are the sequences where the heroine is wrongly believed dead, buried, revives in the tomb, and is taken by tomb robbers.

  24.For example, Doulamis 2007; De Temmerman 2014, 118–123.

  25.Details in Rife 2002.

  26.The people of Tyre are characterized as “barbarians” who have never seen beauty such as that of the protagonists (2.2.4).