Intellectual and Empire in Greco-Roman Antiquity

Description

This volume deals with the interaction between public intellectuals of the late Hellenistic and Roman era, and the powerful individuals with whom they came into contact. How did they negotiate power and its abuses? How did they manage to retain a critical distance from the people they depended upon for their liveli-hood, and even their very existence? These figures include a broad range of prose and poetry authors, dramatists, historians and biographers, philosophers, rhetoricians, religious and other figures of public status. The contributors to the volume consider how such individuals positioned themselves within existing power matrices, and what the approaches and mechanisms were by means of which they negotiated such matrices, whether in the form of opposition, compromise or advocacy. Apart from cutting-edge scholarship on the figures from antiquity investigated, the volume aims to address issues of pertinence in the current political climate, with its manipulation of popular media, and with the increasing interference in the affairs of institutions of higher learning funded from public coffers. Cover Half Title Title Page Copyright Page Contents List of figures List of contributors Preface 1 Enlightened Kings or Pragmatic Rulers? Ptolemaic Patronage of Scholarship and Sciences in Context Libraries Recruitment and retention of scholars Research institutions and experiments The ruler and the scientists Supporting science and scholarship: Convenient political business – up to a point Conclusions Notes Bibliography 2 How (not?) to Talk to Monarchs: The Case of the Epicurean Diogenes of Seleucia The Diogenes Anecdote The Epicurean philosopher at court Talking to kings Priest of Virtue The lysiodos Notes Bibliography 3 A Disillusioned Intellectual: Timagenes of Alexandria The local response to the Roman conquest of Egypt Didymus Chalcenterus and Timagenes: Augustus’ intelligentsia? A bonfire of books Echoes of Timagenes? Timagenes in the papyri Conclusion Notes Bibliography 4 Reassessing Ovid’s Image of Tiberius and his Principate Introduction Tiberius, the reluctant princeps Tiberius’ other appearances in the Fasti and Epistulae ex Ponto Further context: Tiberian decrees Conclusion Notes Bibliography 5 Entangled Imperial Identities: Citizen, Subject, and Mentor in Plutarch’s Aratus Introduction: Citizen, subject and mentor Features of the Aratus: literary and historical context Aratus and Philip Conclusion Notes Bibliography 6 The Misleading Representation of Dion as Philosopher-General in Plutarch’s Life The main sources for Dion’s life Historical outline Dion, Plato and Philosophy Dion’s career and military ability Dion’s personal ambitions Conclusion Notes Bibliography 7 Magister Domino: Intellectual and Pedagogical Power in Fronto’s Correspondence Notes Bibliography 8 Marcus Aurelius, Greek Poets, and Greek Sophists: Friends or Foes? Poets Sophists Conclusions Notes Bibliography 9 Entertainers, Persuaders, Adversaries: Interactions of Sophists and Rulers in Philostratus’ Lives of Sophists Sophists as entertainers and enchanters: The (deceitful) charm of sophistic logos Persuaders: Sophists and political engagement Dangerous encounters: The sophist as adversary Conclusion Notes 10 Lucian on Roman Officials Lucian – Greek nationalist, social revolutionary, playful sophist, or what? Conspicuous absences: Roman officials in The Hirelings in Great Houses, Nigrinus, and How to write history Intermittent presences: Roman officials in the Demonax, On the Death of Peregrinus, and Alexander Lucian – a Roman official himself? Apology and Defense for a slip of the tongue Conclusions Notes 11 How to Flatter an Imperial Mistress: The Image of Panthea in Lucian’s Imagines Introduction Artists and artworks in Lucian’s Imagines Taste and eclecticism Lucian’s Imagines: an έκφρασις or something more devious? Notes 12 Speaking Truth to Power: Julian, the Cynics, and the Ethiopian Gymnosophists of Heliodorus Introduction Julian and the Cynics Hydaspes and the gymnosophists in Heliodorus’ Aethiopica Conclusion Notes Index