The works of Aristotle, sometimes referred to by modern scholars with the Latin phrase Corpus Aristotelicum, is the collection of Aristotle's works that have survived from antiquity.
According to a distinction that originates with Aristotle himself,[citation needed] his writings are divisible into two groups: the "exoteric" and the "esoteric".[1] Most scholars have understood this as a distinction between works Aristotle intended for the public (exoteric), and the more technical works intended for use within the Lyceum (esoteric).[2] Modern scholars commonly assume these latter to be Aristotle's own (unpolished) lecture notes (or in some cases possible notes by his students).[3] However, one classic scholar offers an alternative interpretation. The 5th century neoplatonistAmmonius Hermiae writes that Aristotle's writing style is deliberately obscurantist so that "good people may for that reason stretch their mind even more, whereas empty minds that are lost through carelessness will be put to flight by the obscurity when they encounter sentences like these."[4]
Not all of these works are considered genuine, but differ with respect to their connection to Aristotle, his associates and his views. Some are regarded by most scholars as products of Aristotle's "school" and compiled under his direction or supervision. Other works, such as On Colors, may have been products of Aristotle's successors at the Lyceum, e.g., Theophrastus and Strato of Lampsacus. Still others acquired Aristotle's name through similarities in doctrine or content, such as the De Plantis, possibly by Nicolaus of Damascus. A final category, omitted here, includes medieval palmistries, astrological and magical texts whose connection to Aristotle is purely fanciful and self-promotional.
In several of the treatises, there are references to other works in the corpus. Based on such references, some scholars have suggested a possible chronological order for a number of Aristotle's writings. W. D. Ross, for instance, suggested the following broad chronology (which of course leaves out much): Categories, Topics, Sophistici Elenchi, Analytics, Metaphysics Δ, the physical works, the Ethics, and the rest of the Metaphysics.[5] Many modern scholars however, based simply on lack of evidence, are skeptical of such attempts to determine the chronological order of Aristotle's writings.[6]
Some time later, the Kingdom of Pergamon began conscripting books for a royal library, and the heirs of Neleus hid their collection in a cellar to prevent it from being seized for that purpose. The library was stored there for about a century and a half, in conditions that were not ideal for document preservation. On the death of Attalus III, which also ended the royal library ambitions, the existence of the Aristotelian library was disclosed, and it was purchased by Apellicon and returned to Athens in about 100BCE.[8]:5–6
Apellicon sought to recover the texts, many of which were seriously degraded at this point due to the conditions in which they were stored. He had them copied out into new manuscripts, and used his best guesswork to fill in the gaps where the originals were unreadable.[8]:5–6
When Sulla seized Athens in 86BCE, he seized the library and transferred it to Rome. There, Andronicus of Rhodes organized the texts into the first complete edition of Aristotle's works (and works attributed to him).[9] The Aristotelian texts we have today are based on these.[8]:6–8
Diogenes Laërtius lists, in his Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (c.230CE), works of Aristotle comprising 156 titles divided into approximately 400 books, which he reports as totaling 445,270 lines of writing;[10] however, many of these are lost or only survive in fragments, and some may have been incorrectly attributed.[8]:9–11
Bekker numbers, the standard form of reference to works in the Corpus Aristotelicum, are based on the page numbers used in the Prussian Academy of Sciences edition of the complete works of Aristotle (Aristotelis Opera edidit Academia Regia Borussica, Berlin, 1831–1870). They take their name from the editor of that edition, the classical philologistAugust Immanuel Bekker (1785–1871).
Surviving fragments of the many lost works of Aristotle were included in the fifth volume of Bekker's edition, edited by Valentin Rose. These are not cited by Bekker numbers, however, but according to fragment numbers. Rose's first edition of the fragments of Aristotle was Aristoteles Pseudepigraphus (1863). As the title suggests, Rose considered these all to be spurious. The numeration of the fragments in a revised edition by Rose, published in the Teubner series, Aristotelis qui ferebantur librorum fragmenta, Leipzig, 1886, is still commonly used (indicated by R3), although there is a more current edition with a different numeration by Olof Gigon (published in 1987 as a new vol. 3 in Walter de Gruyter's reprint of the Bekker edition), and a new de Gruyter edition by Eckart Schütrumpf is in preparation.[11]
For a selection of the fragments in English translation, see W. D. Ross, Select Fragments (Oxford 1952), and Jonathan Barnes (ed.), The Complete Works of Aristotle: The Revised Oxford Translation, vol. 2, Princeton 1984, pp.2384–2465. A new translation exists of the fragments of Aristotle's Protrepticus, by Hutchinson and Johnson (2015).[12]
The works surviving only in fragments include the dialogues On Philosophy (or On the Good), Eudemus (or On the Soul), On Justice, and On Good Birth. The possibly spurious work, On Ideas survives in quotations by Alexander of Aphrodisias in his commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics. For the dialogues, see also the editions of Richard Rudolf Walzer, Aristotelis Dialogorum fragmenta, in usum scholarum (Florence 1934), and Renato Laurenti, Aristotele: I frammenti dei dialoghi (2 vols.), Naples: Luigi Loffredo, 1987.
Printed editions
Aristotle's works have been published in many printed editions, either as complete editions of all surviving writings or as partial collections. English complete editions include:
W. D. Ross translation, 12 vols. (Oxford University Press, 1955)
Jonathan Barnes translation, 2 vols., 1984
Notes
↑ Barnes 1995, p.12; Aristotle himself: Nicomachean Ethics 1102a26–27. Aristotle himself never uses the term "esoteric" or "acroamatic". For other passages where Aristotle speaks of exōterikoi logoi, see W. D. Ross, Aristotle's Metaphysics (1953), vol. 2, pp. 408–410. Ross defends an interpretation according to which the phrase, at least in Aristotle's own works, usually refers generally to "discussions not peculiar to the Peripatetic school", rather than to specific works of Aristotle's own.
↑ Ammonius (1991). On Aristotle's Categories. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. ISBN0-8014-2688-X. p. 15
↑ W. D. Ross, Aristotle's Metaphysics (1953), vol. 1, p. lxxxii. By the "physical works", Ross means the Physics, On the Heavens, On Generation and Corruption, and the Meteorology; see Ross, Aristotle's Physics (1936), p. 3.
Lazaris, S. "L’image paradigmatique: des 'Schémas anatomiques' d’Aristote au 'De materia medica' de Dioscoride", Pallas, 93 (2013), p.131-164 ext. link
Oxford Translation of The Works of Aristotle at Archive.org
Aristotle was an Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, and the arts. As the founder of the Peripatetic school of philosophy in the Lyceum in Athens, he began the wider Aristotelian tradition that followed, which set the groundwork for the development of modern science.
Alexander of Aphrodisias was a Peripatetic philosopher and the most celebrated of the Ancient Greek commentators on the writings of Aristotle. He was a native of Aphrodisias in Caria and lived and taught in Athens at the beginning of the 3rd century, where he held a position as head of the Peripatetic school. He wrote many commentaries on the works of Aristotle, extant are those on the Prior Analytics, Topics, Meteorology, Sense and Sensibilia, and Metaphysics. Several original treatises also survive, and include a work On Fate, in which he argues against the Stoic doctrine of necessity; and one On the Soul. His commentaries on Aristotle were considered so useful that he was styled, by way of pre-eminence, "the commentator".
Andronikos of Rhodes was a Greek philosopher from Rhodes who was also the scholarch (head) of the Peripatetic school. He is most famous for publishing a new edition of the works of Aristotle that forms the basis of the texts that survive today.
Theophrastus was an ancient Greek philosopher and naturalist. A native of Eresos in Lesbos, he was Aristotle's close colleague and successor as head of the Lyceum, the Peripatetic school of philosophy in Athens. Theophrastus wrote numerous treatises across all areas of philosophy, working to support, improve, expand, and develop the Aristotelian system. He made significant contributions to various fields, including ethics, metaphysics, botany, and natural history. Often considered the "father of botany" for his groundbreaking works "Enquiry into Plants" and "On the Causes of Plants," Theophrastus established the foundations of botanical science. His given name was Tyrtamos ; the nickname Theophrastus was reputedly given to him by Aristotle in recognition of his eloquent style.
Aristotelianism is a philosophical tradition inspired by the work of Aristotle, usually characterized by deductive logic and an analytic inductive method in the study of natural philosophy and metaphysics. It covers the treatment of the social sciences under a system of natural law. It answers why-questions by a scheme of four causes, including purpose or teleology, and emphasizes virtue ethics. Aristotle and his school wrote tractates on physics, biology, metaphysics, logic, ethics, aesthetics, poetry, theatre, music, rhetoric, psychology, linguistics, economics, politics, and government. Any school of thought that takes one of Aristotle's distinctive positions as its starting point can be considered "Aristotelian" in the widest sense. This means that different Aristotelian theories may not have much in common as far as their actual content is concerned besides their shared reference to Aristotle.
The Peripatetic school was a philosophical school founded in 335 BC by Aristotle in the Lyceum in ancient Athens. It was an informal institution whose members conducted philosophical and scientific inquiries. After the middle of the 3rd century BC, the school fell into decline, and it was not until the Roman Empire that there was a revival.
Porphyry of Tyre was a Neoplatonic philosopher born in Tyre, Roman Phoenicia during Roman rule. He edited and published The Enneads, the only collection of the work of Plotinus, his teacher.
The Physics is a named text, written in ancient Greek, collated from a collection of surviving manuscripts known as the Corpus Aristotelicum, attributed to the 4th-century BC philosopher Aristotle.
Apellicon, a wealthy man from Teos, afterwards an Athenian citizen, was a famous book collector of the 1st century BC.
Alcinous was a Middle Platonist philosopher. He probably lived in the 2nd century AD, although nothing is known about his life. He is the author of The Handbook of Platonism, an epitome of Middle Platonism intended as a manual for teachers. He has, at times, been identified by some scholars with the 2nd century Middle Platonist Albinus.
Metaphysics is one of the principal works of Aristotle, in which he develops the doctrine that he calls First Philosophy. The work is a compilation of various texts treating abstract subjects, notably substance theory, different kinds of causation, form and matter, the existence of mathematical objects and the cosmos, which together constitute much of the branch of philosophy later known as metaphysics.
Eudemus of Rhodes was an ancient Greek philosopher, considered the first historian of science. He was one of Aristotle's most important pupils, editing his teacher's work and making it more easily accessible. Eudemus' nephew, Pasicles, was also credited with editing Aristotle's works.
Neleus of Scepsis, was the son of Coriscus of Scepsis. He was a disciple of Aristotle and Theophrastus, the latter of whom bequeathed to him his library, and appointed him one of his executors. Neleus supposedly took the writings of Aristotle and Theophrastus from Athens to Scepsis, where his heirs let them languish in a cellar until the 1st century BC, when Apellicon of Teos discovered and purchased the manuscripts, bringing them back to Athens.
Physiognomonics is an Ancient Greek pseudo-Aristotelian treatise on physiognomy attributed to Aristotle. It is a Peripatetic work, dated to the 4th/3rd century BC.
David was a Greek scholar and a commentator on Aristotle and Porphyry.
The Situations and Names of Winds is a spurious fragment traditionally attributed to Aristotle. The brief text lists winds blowing from twelve different directions and their alternative names used in different places. According to the manuscript version of the work, The Situations and Names of Winds is an extract from a larger work entitled On Signs likely written by a pseudo-Aristotle of the peripatetic school. Situations is notable as an ancient text which reproduces the concepts of the Anemoi or "wind gods" and classical compass winds, both of which have been historical components of western culture.
The Lyceum was a temple in Athens dedicated to Apollo Lyceus.
On Plants is a botanical treatise included in the Corpus Aristotelicum but usually regarded as Pseudo-Aristotle. In 1923, a manuscript containing the original Arabic translation from Greek, as done by Ishaq ibn Hunayn, was discovered in Istanbul, which led scholars to conclude the work was likely an exegesis/commentary by philosopher Nicolaus of Damascus on a treatise by Aristotle which is now lost. On Plants describes the nature and origins of plants.
On Breath is a philosophical treatise included in the Corpus Aristotelicum but usually regarded as spurious. Its opening sentence raises the question: "What is the mode of growth, and the mode of maintenance, of the natural vital spirit (pneuma)?"
Bekker numbering or Bekker pagination is the standard form of citation to the works of Aristotle. It is based on the page numbers used in the Prussian Academy of Sciences edition of the complete works of Aristotle (1831–1837) and takes its name from the editor of that edition, the classical philologist August Immanuel Bekker (1785–1871); because the academy was located in Berlin, Germany, the system is occasionally referred to by the alternative name Berlin numbering or Berlin pagination.
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