Frederick E. Brenk On Plutarch, Religious Thinker and Biographer

Frederick E.
Brenk on Plutarch, Religious Thinker and Biographer

Brill’s Plutarch Studies
Editors
Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta (University of Groningen)

Delfim F. Leão (University of Coimbra)
Editorial Board
Lucia Athanassaki
Mark Beck
Ewen L. Bowie
Timothy Duff
Rainer Hirsch-Luipold
Judith Mossman
Anastasios G. Nikolaidis
Christopher Pelling
Aurelio Pérez Jiménez
Luc van der Stockt
Frances B. Titchener
Paola Volpe Cacciatore
volume 1
The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/bps

Frederick E. Brenk on Plutarch,
Religious Thinker and Biographer
“The Religious Spirit of Plutarch of Chaironeia”
and “The Life of Mark Antony”
Edited by
Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta
with the collaboration of
Luisa Lesage
leiden | boston
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Brenk, Frederick E., author. | Roig Lanzillotta, Lautaro, editor. | Lesage,
Luisa, contributor.
Title: Frederick Brenk on Plutarch, religious thinker and biographer : “The religious
spirit of Plutarch of Chaironeia” and “The Life of Mark Antony” / edited by
Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta, with the collaboration of Luisa Lesage.
Other titles: Aufstieg und Niedergang der r?omischen Welt.
Description: Leiden ; Boston : Brill, 2017. | Series: Brill's Plutarch studies,
ISSN 2451-8328, volume 1 | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: lccn 2017016212 (print) | lccn 2017027888 (ebook) |
isbn 9789004348776 (E-Book) | isbn 9789004348769 (hardback : alk. paper)
Subjects: lcsh: Plutarch. Antonius. | Plutarch. Lives. | Plutarch. Moralia.
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Contents
Abbreviations of Journals and Series vii
Introduction to Frederick E. Brenk on Plutarch, Religious Thinker and

Biographer 1
Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta and Delfim F. Leão
part 1
The Religious Spirit of Plutarch of Chaironeia
Introduction 7
1 Life 10
2 The Development of Plutarch’s Religious Ideas, and His Religious

Works 17
3 Plutarch’s Idea of God in the Light of Alexandrian Middle

Platonism 25
4 Plutarch’s Daimonology 43
5 De Iside et Osiride: Allegorical Interpretation and Syncretism 66
6 Plutarch and the Stoics 78
7 Religion in the Lives: Daimon and Tyche 81
8 Omens and Portents 96
9 Dreams 103
10 Divine Retribution 110
11 Delphi 114
12 The Mythological Lives and Roman Religion 121

vi contents
part 2
The Life of Mark Antony: A Literary and Cultural Study
1 The Neronian Background to the Life 133

1 The Nerogonia of the Antonios 133
2 Plutarch and the Rex Turned Rana 143
3 Nero and Antonius Omestes 151
4 Vice Inherited: The Rotten Tree 157
2 Antonius and Demetrios 167

1 Biographical Platonism and the Chance of Living Again 167
2 Parallels in Vice 172
3 Parallels in Assimilations 175
4 Treading the Same Ground 179
5 Fighting the Same Battles 182
6 From Battle to Banquet and Boudoir 187
7 Inimitable Livers and Inseparable in Death 189
3 Narrative 200
1 Time 200
2 The Unified Plot 208
3 The Episodic Plot 212
4 Point of View 220
4 Some Aspects of Style 229

1 The Flight of Themistokles 229
2 Escaping the Ships of Libo 243
3 The Battle of Actium 247
4 The Pageantry: Antony’s Debauchery, His Arrival at Ephesos,
Kleopatra’s Arrival at Tarsos 256
Bibliography 267
Index of Authors and Texts Cited 313
Index of Historical Persons 328
Index of Subjects 332
Abbreviations of Journals and Series
ac L’Antiquité Classique
AGLComo Annuario del Ginnasio Liceo A. Volta di Como
AJPh American Journal of Philology
Ann. ephe Annuaire de l’École Pratique des Hautes-Études
anrw Aufstieg und Niedergang der Römischen Welt
Arch. Ztg. Archäologische Zeitung
azp Allgemeine Zeitschrift für Philosophie
bics Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies
Bull. Corr. Hell. Bulletin de Correspondance Hellénique
cb Classical Bulletin
cfc Cuadernos de Filología Clásica
cj Classical Journal
cp Classical Philology
cq Classical Quarterly
cr Classical Review
crai Comptes-rendus des séances de l’Académie des Inscriptions et
Belles-Lettres
cs Critica Storica
cw Classical World
da Dissertation Abstracts
E. Clas. Études Classiques
epro Études Préliminaires aux Religions Orientales dans l’Empire
Romain
Gnom. Gnomon. Kritische Zeitschrift für die gesamte klassische Alter-
tumswissenschaft
grbs Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies
HSCPh Harvard Studies in Classical Philology
ics Illinois Classical Studies
ja Journal Asiatique
JbAC Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum
jhs Journal of Hellenic Studies
jrs Journal of Roman Studies
L’Inform. Lit. L’Information Littéraire
Nov. Test. Novum Testamentum
ocd Oxford Classical Dictionary
opiac Occasional Papers, Institute for Antiquity and Christianity
paca Proceedings of the African Classical Association
viii abbreviations of journals and series
pir² Prosopographia Imperii Romani²

pcps Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society
rag Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum
re Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft
rea Revue des Études Anciennes
reg Revue des Études Grecques
Rev. Hist. Rel. Revue de l’Histoire des Religions
Rev. Phil. Revue de Philologie
Rev. Théol. Philos. Revue de Théologie et de Philosophie
Rh. M. Rheinisches Museum für Philologie
sbl Sem. Pap. Society of Biblical Literature. Seminar Papers
so Symbolae Osloenses
Stud. It. Studi Italiani di Filologia Classica
Stud. Urb. Studi Urbinati di Storia, Filosofia e Letteratura
svf Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, coll. H. v. Arnim
tapa Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Asso-
ciation.
TrGrF Kannicht, R. & Snell, B. (eds.), Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta
ii. Fragmenta Adespota (Göttingen, 1981).
Introduction to Frederick E. Brenk on Plutarch,
Religious Thinker and Biographer
It is approximately seventy years ago that Frederick E. Brenk began his studies
at Marquette University. During his long and fruitful career, Professor Brenk
successfully combined his numerous academic duties and positions in the
usa, uk and Italy with a prolific scientific activity. Resulting of the latter is his
abundant scholarly production, which from the beginning centers on the figure
of another prolific author, Plutarch of Chaeronea. Among the large amount of
articles, edited volumes, and books devoted to the polygraph from Chaeronea
the two studies included in this book occupy a special place. To begin with,
“The Religious Spirit of Plutarch of Chaironeia” and “The Life of Mark Antony:
A Literary and Cultural Study” are, together with his study on “demonology”
from 1987,1 the only ‘book length’ articles of his scholarly production. However,
our choice to include both articles in the present volume is not only due to the
article’s length. In fact, both studies are also representative of Brenk’s integral
approach to the corpus Plutarcheum, which duly reflects his wide interest in the
two parts this corpus consists of. As to the former study, it surveys Plutarch’s
religious thought mainly (though not only) in the Moralia; as to the latter, it
provides a most interesting literary and cultural analysis of the Antonius in
particular and of the Lives in general. But what characterizes these articles the
most is that they both represent a turning point in Plutarchan studies: with his
characteristic lively style Brenk masterfully synthesizes previous scholarship,
engages in contemporary scholarly debates, and advances our knowledge of
the numerous themes dealt within them by means of a fruitful interdisciplinary
approach.
The first of the two studies included in this book were first published as “An
Imperial Heritage: The Religious Spirit of Plutarch of Chaironeia,” in W. Haase
and H. Temporini (eds.), Philosophie, Wissenschaft. Technik. ii. Philosophie (Pla-
tonismus [Forts.]; Aristotelismus). Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt
ii.36.1 (De Gruyter, Berlin/New York, 1987) 248–349. The lengthy index to the
article was included at the end of the following volume “Index,” Aufstieg und
Niedergang der römischen Welt ii.36.2 (1987) 1300–1322. Written at the end of
the 1980s, “The Religious Spirit of Plutarch of Chaironeia” represents an impor-
1 F.E. Brenk, “In the Light of the Moon: Demonology in the Early Imperial Period,” in anrw
ii.16.3 (1986) 2068–2145; Indices, anrw ii.36.2 (1987) 1283–1299.
© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2017 | doi: 10.1163/9789004348776_002

2 roig lanzillotta and leão
tant breakthrough the study of Plutarch’s Moralia, due to its exclusive focus
on the religious aspect. Professor Brenk’s overview of Plutarch’s religious views
and concepts provides an analysis of the most salient issues to understand
Plutarch’s thought. His life, the formation of his religious thought, his idea of
God and his view on daemonology roughly occupy the first half of the study,
and Brenk managed to place Plutarch in the wider religious and philosophical
context of the first two centuries ce. Equipped with these tools, the reader can
then further proceed to unravel Plutarch’s allegorical interpretation and the
syncretism behind De Iside; understand his polemics vis-à-vis the Stoics; and
the role daimon and Tyche play in the Lives. Brenks polymathia also introduces
the reader to other lesser but nevertheless important issues, such as the belief
in omens, portents, or dreams, and, of course, to Plutarch’s conviction on divine
retribution. Plutarch’s lifelong relationship with Delphi and his approach to
Roman religion close the study.
Professor Brenk’s presentation of the main aspects of Plutarch’s religious
thought is far from static. His overview introduces the reader to both the main
scholarly discussions on these aspects and to the actors behind them. In this
sense ideas and / or interpretations are not devoid of their human background.
Indeed the main protagonists of the 20th century scholarly discussion on
Plutarch populate his pages: Rudolph Hirzel, Konrat Ziegler, Robert Flacelière,
Donald Russell, Heinrich Dörrie, Cornelia J. de Vogel, Yvonne Vernière, Philip
Merlan, John Dillon, John Gwyn Griffiths, and many others. The wide range
of disciplines behind all these names already reflects the growing attraction
Plutarch exerted far beyond the narrow scope of Classical Philology: Graeco-
Roman and Egyptian Religion, Religious studies, Archaeology, History, Philos-
ophy, History of Ideas, Philology and Comparative Literature, etc. If during the
20th century Plutarch could still be seen by some as mainly an antiquarian,
Brenk’s study made sufficiently clear that Plutarch’s prolific production is a cru-
cial witness for the reconstruction of innumerable aspects of the cultural world
of the first and second centuries ce.
The second of the studies included here was published five years later than
the former, in 1992, and first saw the light as “Plutarch’s Life of Markos Anto-
nios: A Literary and Cultural Study,” in W. Haase (ed.), Aufstieg und Nieder-
gang der römischen Welt. Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren
Forschung. Teil ii. Principat. Band 33: Sprache und Literatur 6. Teilband (All-
gemeines zur Literatur des 2. Jahrhunderts und einzelne Autoren der trajan-
ishen und frühhadrianischen Zeit) (De Gruyter, Berlin/New York 1992) 4348–
4469; with the indexes in the same volume, on pages 4895–4915. To a cer-
tain extent this is a rather different kind of study than the previous one.
As its title already advances, the History of Religions approach makes room
introduction 3
for a more literary, psychological, and philosophical inquiry both of the Life
of Mark Antony in particular and of numerous other Lives and their histori-
cal contexts in general. As Brenk rightly emphasizes, “If we consider Plutarch a
philosopher by nature, vocation, and divine design (pronoia), and a biographer
only through chance (tyche or to automaton), then he deserves serious consid-
eration as a philosophical biographer or a biographical philosopher.”
In order to do so, Professor Brenk’s study provides a wide ranging analy-
sis structured in four large sections, all of which cover essential aspects of
Plutarch’s method as a biographer. While the first part, “The Neronian Back-
ground to the Life,” provides an interesting analysis of the historical context
in which the Life was written that attempts to uncover veiled references, the
second focuses on Mark Antony itself. The comparison with Demetrius allows
Brenk to analyze Plutarch’s characterization technique, and to point out the
pivotal role played in it by his notion of virtue. The third part, “Narrative,” delves
into a deep investigation of Plutarch’s narrative technique that places it in the
modern narratological discussion. The section begins by evaluating how the
notion of time is dealt with both in the Lives and in Moralia—an example
of the interdisciplinary approach referred to above—, further compares the
three notions of time of the De genio Socratis with the straightforward récit
or chronological arrangement of the Mark Antony. Literary, theoretical, and
philosophical analysis intermingle in a deep going investigation that uncovers
interesting aspects of Plutarch’s thought. The fourth section, finally, is focused
on the examination of a few passages that highlight the “baroque” aspect of
Plutarch’s style with scenes usually combining agitated or ethereal movement,
and a richness of motifs with supplementary, graceful figures. Plutarch’s ten-
dency to include theatrical grandeur, emphasizing emotional intensity and
dramatic crisis, exploiting striking contrasts, could indeed be described as “Hel-
lenistic baroque”.
The present re-edition of Frederick E. Brenk’s two seminal studies in book
format intends in the first place to make them accessible to a wider public. The
volume includes the revised and updated text of the original articles included
in anrw, in which changes were kept to the minimum. Professor Brenk has
carefully revised the whole manuscript a couple of times, updating, unifying
and adapting references to current standards. In some cases original footnotes
have also been rearranged, updated or corrected when necessary. Both articles
originally included separated bibliographies; the new edition combines them
in a single bibliographical section that includes all the references mentioned
in the book. This goes also for the original indexes of both studies that are
merged into a single section at the end of the volume. Thirty years after the
original publication, the abundant bibliographic references included by Pro-
4 roig lanzillotta and leão
fessor Brenk in both footnotes and general bibliography, even if exhaustive at

that time, ran the risk of being perceived as outdated. We decided therefore to
take the painstaking effort to update it in order to meet the high standards of
Brill’s Plutarch Studies. The letters “en” (= Editor’s Note) precedes all new mate-
rial, conveniently marking all updated bibliographic references not originally
included in the first edition.
The completion of this volume could not have been possible without the
unconditional support, help and active collaboration of Luisa Lesage Gárriga.
She diligently helped reading the manuscript, restructured the bibliography
and prepared the indexes. Warm thanks are also due to Petru Moldovan, who
gave this edition the first impetus with the preparation of the ground texts on
the basis of two scans, and to Forrest Kentwell, who helped with the indexes.
We would also like to thank the whole team of Brill Academic Publishers:
Tessel Jonquière, who helped us during the prolegomena to the series; and
Mirjam Elbers and Giulia Moriconi, who diligently facilitated our work in the
preparation of this first volume of the series.
Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta and Delfim F. Leão

part 1
The Religious Spirit of Plutarch of Chaironeia
∵
Introduction
This study is one of tracing the kaleidoscopic manifestations of Plutarch’s

timid but creeping transcendentalism and theism through the great variety of
his Moralia and Lives. The complex and separate divine elements of earlier
Platonism and the manifestations of the supernatural in Greek culture and
literature become in him subordinated to central ideas of a providential God,
apparently assimilated to Plato’s Ideas and Demiourgos, if not One, who is also
the destiny of the soul.1 Plutarch belongs rightly in his time, the transition from
1 An extensive bibliography on studies of Plutarch’s religion, and related studies, up to 1977 can
be found in my book, F.E. Brenk, In Mist Apparelled. Religious Themes in Plutarch’s Moralia
and Lives (Leiden, 1977). The books by Hamilton, Griffiths, Corlu, Hani, Flacelière’s introduc-
tions to the Pythian dialogues, and D. Babut, Plutarque et le stoïcisme (Paris, 1969), contain a
great amount on Plutarch’s religious attitudes. Among studies concentrating on this aspect
of his thought are: K.J.L.M. Eichhoff, Über Plutarchs religiös-sittliche Weltansicht (Elberfeld,
1833); T. Schreiter, De doctrina Plutarchi theologica et morali (Leipzig, 1838); G.G. Nitzsch,
De Plutarcho Theologo et Philosopho Populari (Kiel, 1849); J.K. Pohl, Die Dämonologie des
Plutarch (Breslau, 1860); O. Gréard, De la morale de Plutarque (Paris, 1866); R. Fabricius, Zur
religiösen Anschauungsweise des Plutarch (Königsberg, 1879); R. Schmertosch, De Plutarchi
sententiarum quae ad divinationem spectant origine (Leipzig, 1889); J.D. Bierens de Haan,
Plutarchus als godsdienstig Denker (The Hague, 1902); J. Oakesmith, The Religion of Plutarch
(London, 1902); T. Eisele, “Zur Dämonologie des Plutarch von Chäronea,” Arch. für Gesch.
der Philos. 17 (1904) 29–51; W. Schaefer, Der Gottesbegriff Plutarchs im Lichte der christlichen
Weltanschauung (Regensburg, 1908); G. Abernetty, De Plutarchi Qui Fertur de Superstitione
Libello (Regensburg, 1911); L. Valentin, “L’idée de dieu dans Plutarque,” Rev. Thomiste 14 (1914)
313–327; R.M. Jones, The Platonism of Plutarch (Menasha, Wisconsin 1916); B. Latzarus, Les
idées religieuses de Plutarque (Paris, 1920); P. Geigenmüller, “Plutarchs Stellung zur Religion
und Philosophie seiner Zeit,” Neue Jb. klass. Alt. 47 (1921) 251–270; H. von Arnim, Plutarch
über Dämonen und Mantik (Amsterdam, 1921); H.J. Rose, The Roman Questions of Plutarch
(Oxford, 1924); idem, The Greek Questions of Plutarch (Oxford, 1928); G. Méautis, “Plutarque et
l’ orphisme,” in Mélanges Gustave Glotz i (Paris, 1932) 575–585; M. Codignola, “La formazione
spirituale di Plutarco e la sua personalità filosofico-religiosa,” Civiltà Moderna 9 (1934) 471–
490; A. Ferro, “Le idee religiose di Plutarco,” Arch. della Cult. Ital. 2 (1940) 173–232; M. Hadas,
“The Religion of Plutarch,” Rev. of Rel. 6 (1941–1942) 270–282; G. Soury, La démonologie de
Plutarque (Paris, 1942); A.M. Pizzagalli, “Plutarco e il cristianismo,” Atene e Roma 10 (1943)
97–102; R. del Re, “Il pensiero metafisico di Plutarco: Dio, la natura, il male,” Stud. Ital. di Filol.
Class. 24 (1950) 33–64; H. Erbse, “Plutarchs Schrift Περὶ δεισιδαιμονίας,” Hermes 80 (1952) 295–
314; H. Cherniss and W.C. Helmbold, Plutarch’s Moralia xii, 2–223 (The Face on the Moon);
S. Szydelski, “The Divinity according to Plutarch” (in Polish), Rocz. i Teol. Kanon. 7 (1960)
93–101; J. Moellering, Plutarch on Superstition (Boston, 1963); B. Mackay, “Plutarch and the
Miraculous,” in C.F.D. Moule (ed.), Miracles. Studies in Their Philosophy and History (Lon-

8 part 1, introduction
the primarily immanentist intellectual models of the Hellenistic world to the

transcendental ones which were to characterize much of the thought of the
Roman Empire.2 A great debt is owed to two scholars of recent memory, Robert
don, 1965) 93–113; M.L. Danieli, “Plutarco a Delfi: Note sulla religiosità plutarchea,” Nuovo
Didaskaleion 15 (1965) 5–23; R. del Re, “De Plutarcho Chaeronensi immortalitatis animo-
rum assertore,” Latinitas 13 (1965) 184–192; P. Merlan, “The Later Academy and Platonism,”
in A.H. Armstrong (ed.), The Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy
(Cambridge, 1967) 53–64; E.D. Phillips, “Plutarque, interprête de Zoroastre,” in Association
Guillaume Budé, Actes du viiie Congrès (Paris, 1969) 506–511; F.E. Brenk, “Le songe de Bru-
tus,” ibid., 588–594; J.G. Griffiths, Plutarch. De Iside et Osiride (Cambridge, 1970); F.E. Brenk,
“ ‘A Most Strange Doctrine’, Daimon in Plutarch,” cj 69 (1973) 1–11; idem, “From Mysticism
to Mysticism: The Religious Development of Plutarch of Chaironeia,” sbl Sem. Papers 1
(1975) 193–198; R. Flacelière, “La théologie selon Plutarque,” in P. Gros & J.-P. Morel (eds.),
Mélanges de philosophie, de littérature et d’histoire ancienne (Rome, 1974) 273–280; J. Hani,
La religion égyptienne dans la pensée de Plutarque (Paris, 1976); H. Dörrie, Platonica Minora
(Munich, 1976); M. Baltes, Die Weltentstehung des Platonischen Timaios nach den antiken Inter-
preten i (Leiden, 1976); Y. Vernière, Symboles et mythes dans la pensée de Plutarque. Essai
d’ interprétation philosophique et religieuse des Moralia (Paris, 1977); H. Dörrie, “Gnostische
Spuren bei Plutarch,” in R. Van den Broek and M.J. Vermaseren (eds.), Studies in Gnosti-
cism and Hellenistic Religions (Leiden, 1981) 92–117; J. Whittaker, “Plutarch, Platonism and
Christianity,” in H.J. Blumethal and R.A. Markus (eds.), Neoplatonism and Early Christian
Thought (London, 1981) 64–78; P.G. Walsh, “Apuleius and Plutarch,” ibid., 20–31; A. Aloni
and G. Guidorizzi, Il demone di Socrate, I ritardi della punizione divina (De genio Socratis, De
sera numinis vindicta) (Milan, 1982); C.J. De Vogel, “Der sogennante Mittelplatonismus, über-
wiegend eine Philosophie der Diesseitigkeit?,” in H.-D. Blume & F. Mann (eds.), Platonismus
und Christentum (Münster, 1983) 277–302.
2 H. Dörrie, “ ‘Der Weise vom Roten Meer:’ Eine okkulte Offenbarung durch Plutarch als Plagiat
entlarvt,” in P. Händel and W. Meid (eds.), Festschrift für R. Muth (Innsbruck, 1983) 95–110;
P. Borgeaud, “La mort du grand Pan,” Rev. Hist. Rel. 200 (1983) 3–39; V. Citti, “Plutarco, Nic.
1.5,” in A. Mastrocinquie (ed.), Storiografia e biografia (Padua, 1983) 99–110; D. Babut, “La
doctrine démonologique dans le De Genio Socratis de Plutarque: cohérence et fonction,”
L’ Inform. Lit. 35 (1983) 201–205. The new index to the Teubner volumes of the Lives contains
a bibliography to the Lives and an index of names of gods, men, and places, besides an
index correlating the listing of the Lives with the Teubner volumes: K. Ziegler and H. Gartner,
Plutarchus. Vitae Parallelae iv: Indices (Leipzig, 1980). Of the two volumes edited by H.D. Betz,
Plutarch’s Theological Writings and Early Christian Literature (Leiden, 1975) and Plutarch’s
Ethical Writings and Early Christian Literature (Leiden, 1978), the first contains, besides the
studies mentioned in the notes, the following pertinent ones: H.D. Betz & E.W. Smith, “De
Iside et Osiride (Moralia 351c–384c),” 36–84; idem, “De E apud Delphos (Moralia 384c–394c),”
85–102; W.G. Rollins, “De Pythiae oraculis (Moralia 394d–409d),” 103–130; K.O. Wicker, “De
defectu oraculorum (Moralia 409e–438e),” 131–180; H.D. Betz, P.A. Dirkse, & E.W. Smith, “De
sera numinis vindicta (Moralia 548a–568a),” 181–235; W.A. Beardslee, “De facie quae in orbe
lunae apparet (Moralia 920a–945d),” 286–300; D.E. Aune, “De esu carnium orationes i and ii
part 1, introduction 9
Flacelière of France and Heinrich Dörrie of Germany, who lately did most
for the humanistic understanding and scholarly interpretation of Plutarch.
The latter through his great love of France not only won the respect of his
countrymen but the hearts of fellow classicists across the Rhine.3
(Moralia 993a–999b),” 301–316; H.D. Betz, “Fragmenta 21–23, 157–158, 176–178,” 317–324. As for
the second volume, it includes H.D. Betz, “De tranquillitate animi (Moralia 464e–477f),” 198–
230; and H. Martin & J.E. Phillips, “Consolatio ad uxorem (Moralia 608a–612b),” 394–441; and
H. Martin, “Amatorius (Moralia 748e–771e),” 442–537.
3 [en: after Brenk’s article the following studies of different aspects of Plutarch’s religion have
been published: F.E. Brenk, “Lo Scrittore Silenzioso: Giudaismo e Cristianesimo in Plutarco,”
in I. Gallo (ed.), Plutarco e la Religione, 239–262; W. Burkert, “Plutarco: Religiosità Personale
e Teologia Filosofica,” in I. Gallo (ed.), Plutarco e la religione. Atti del vi Convegno plutarcheo
(Ravello, 29–31 maggio 1995) (Naples, 1996), 11–28; F.E. Brenk, “Plutarch, Judaism and Chris-
tianity,” in M. Joyal (ed.), Studies in Plato and the Platonic Tradition: Essays Presented to John
Whittaker (Aldershot, Hampshire: Ashgate, 1997) 97–117; A. Pérez Jiménez, “Ciencia, Religión
y Literatura en El ‘Mito De Sila’ De Plutarco,” in M. Brioso Sánchez & F.J. González Ponce (eds.),
Actitudes literarias en la Grecia romana (Sevilla: Libros Pórtico, 1998) 283–294; F.E. Brenk, “‘Isis
Is a Greek Word’: Plutarch’s Allegorization of Egyptian Religion,” in A. Pérez, Jiménez, J. García
López, & R. Aguilar Fernández (eds.), Plutarco, Platón y Aristóteles: Actas del v Congreso Inter-
national de la i.p.s. (Madrid-Cuenca, 4–7 de Mayo De 1999) (Madrid: Ediciones Clásicas, 1999)
227–238; F.E. Brenk, Relighting the Souls: Studies in Plutarch, in Greek Literature, Religion and
Philosophy, and in the New Testament Background (Stuttgart: Steiner, 1998); R. Hirsch-Luipold
(ed.), Gott und die Götter bei Plutarch: Götterbilder—Gottesbilder—Weltbilder (Berlin; New
York: Walter de Gruyter, 2005); F.E. Brenk, With Unperfumed Voice: Studies in Plutarch, in Greek
Literature, Religion and Philosophy, and in the New Testament Background (Stuttgart: Steiner,
2007); L. van der Stockt, F. Titchener, H.G. Ingenkamp, & Pérez Jiménez, A. (eds.), Gods, Dai-
mones, Rituals, Myths and History of Religions in Plutarch’s Works. Studies Devoted to Professor
Frederick E. Brenk by the International Plutarch Society (Málaga: Universidad de Málaga, 2010);
F.E. Brenk, “Religion under Trajan: Plutarch’s Resurrection of Osiris,” in P. Stadter & L. van
der Stockt (eds.), Sage and Emperor. Plutarch, Greek Intellectuals, and Roman Power in the
Time of Trajan (98–117a.d.) (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2002) 72–92; D. Olster, “Why
the Oracles Do Not Speak (Like Before): Plutarch and the Riddle of Second-Century Reli-
gion,” Ploutarchos 22 (2005) 55–70; P.T.R. Gray, “Humor and Religion in Plutarch’s Writtings,”
in A. Pérez Jiménez et al. (eds.), Valori letterari delle opere di Plutarco: studi offerti al professore
Italo Gallo dall’International Plutarch Society (Málaga: Universidad de Málaga; Logan (Utah):
Utah State University, 2005) 197–205; R. Hirsch-Luipold, “Aesthetics and Religious Hermeneu-
tics in Plutarch,” ibidem, 207–213; P. Green, “Possession and Pneuma: The Essential Nature of
the Delphic Oracle,” in M. Stefanou, & K. Bourazelis (eds.), Πρακτικά του Συμποσίου “Μύθος μετά
λόγου: διάλογοι για την ουσία και τη διαχρονική αξία του αρχαίου Ελληνικού μύθου”: Αγ. Κήρυκος, Ικαρία,
17–20 Ιουνίου 2005 (Athens: Festival Ikarias, 2007) 159–176; F. Frazier, “Philosophie et religion
dans la pensée de Plutarque: quelques réflexions autour des emplois du mot Πίστις,” Études
Platoniciennes 5 (2008) 41–61; F.E. Brenk, “Plutarch and ‘Pagan Monotheism’,” in L. Roig Lanzil-
lotta & I. Munoz Gallarte (eds.), Plutarch in the Religious and Philosophical Discourse of late
Antiquity (Leiden: Brill, 2012) 73–84.]
chapter 1
Life
Surprisingly little of exactitude is known about the life of the greatest ancient
biographer. Scholars debate both the date of his birth (between 40 and 45 ad),
and death (between 120 and 125 ad). For the most part what we know of
him must be gleaned from his writings.1 He was born in the small town of
Chaironeia, for which he professed great loyalty, and was partial to the neigh-
boring Boiotian city of Thebes. The plain, with its natural suitability for war,
must have encouraged a sense of history in the young Plutarch, who later
recalled with emotion the defeat of Athens there under Philip of Macedon and
the armies of the imperator Sulla. Any admiration for Mark Antony would have
been tempered by his great-grandfather’s recollections of being forced to carry
grain down to Antikyra on the Corinthian gulf, under the whips of Antony’s
agents (Antonius 68).
His family, which kept horses, was reasonably wealthy, having connections
with the local aristocracy, and attached to the famous shrine at Delphi. In his
earlier years he seems to have traveled extensively in Greece, possibly having
visited Smyrna, as Christopher P. Jones suggests (Anim. an corp. 501ef), but
certainly Alexandria (Quaest. conv. 678c). While a young man he took part in a
deputation, probably to represent Chaironeia, before the proconsul of Achaia
(Praec. ger. 816c). Around 66 or 67ad he was “soon to join the Academy” after
passing through training in mathematics, as a pupil of Ammonios. Just who this
1 The standard reference work for Plutarch’s life and writings is the re article, “Plutarchos,”
xxi. 1 (1951) 636–962, by K. Ziegler, which appeared first in 1949 and then received some
corrections and additions in the Stuttgart, 1964, 2nd edition, Plutarchos von Chaironeia.
Since that time a somewhat unreliable and more popular study, although with some good
observations, was produced by R.H. Barrow, Plutarch and His Times (London, 1967), largely
based on Ziegler. An excellent contribution is C.P. Jones, Plutarch and Rome (Oxford, 1971).
A.E. Wardman, Plutarch’s Lives (London, 1974), is a specialized study for the most part of
ethical values of the heroes as they appear in the Lives. J.M. Dillon, The Middle Platonists
(London, 1976), has an excellent chapter on Plutarch and his philosophical milieu. F.J. Frost,
Plutarch, is to appear in Major World Writers (London, 1984). The Thesaurus Linguae Graecae
computer project at Irvine, California now has the entire Plutarch on computer. For an
index see E. Simon, Plutarque, Vies xvi. Index des noms propres (Paris, 1983). J. Barthelmess is
preparing a critical bibliography for Classical World. [en: J. Barthelmess, “Recent Work on the
Moralia,” in F.E. Brenk & I. Gallo (eds.), Miscellanea Plutarchea, Atti del I Convegno di Studi su
Plutarco (Roma, 23 novembre 1985) (Ferrara, 1986).]

life 11
Ammonios was, what his exact relationship to the Academy—if the Academy
really existed then—and where he came from, are matters of some speculation.
We are grateful to Christopher P. Jones and John Dillon for unraveling many
of these knots and for illuminating the intellectual and political background
of our hero.2 Later travels are difficult to determine. He indicates that he
had visited Rome several times, but it is impossible to date these trips. In De
curiositate 522de he relates an incident about a certain Rusticus refusing to
open a letter delivered him from the emperor until the lecture was over. Jones
believes that this Rusticus was probably the consul of 92 ad who was executed
in 93 (for having in his biography of Paetus Thrasea—or Thrasea Paetus—
called his subject sanctus (ἱερός), Dio 67.13.2; though Tacitus does not mention
the sanctus part [Agricola 2] and Plutarch puts the matter more strongly, that
Domitian liter killed him out of envy of his reputation τῇ δόξῃ φθονήσας, 522e).3
As A. Momigliano points out, Rusticus would have been influenced by the
new school of Roman humanistic biography which had centered around Cor-
nelius Nepos at the end of the Republic.4 D. Babut felt that Plutarch may have
been strongly influenced by Rusticus in his life of Cato, and that his personal
friendship with this Stoic moderated his antagonistic attitude toward the phi-
2 C.P. Jones, “The Teacher of Plutarch,” HSCPh 71 (1966) 205–213; idem, Plutarch and Rome, 9,
13, 16–18, 67; Dillon, The Middle Platonists, 189–192. Ziegler, Plutarchos, 15, without implying
Alexandrian connections. See also L. Pearson & F.H. Sandbach, Plutarch, Moralia xi (London
/ Cambridge, Mass. 1965) 219.
3 On this see Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 23; Barrow, Plutarch and His Times, 38; A.N. Sherwin-
White, The Letters of Pliny (Oxford, 1966) 95; D.A. Russell, “On Reading Plutarch’s Moralia,”
Greece and Rome 15 (1968) 130–146, here 132, note 7. J. Glucker, Antiochus and the Late Academy
(Göttingen, 1978), believes that Plutarch learned his Platonism from Ammonios as a private
tutor, before he and his brother Lamprias entered the Academy. He notes that Plutarch never
mentions his own personal connection with the Academy where we would expect him to,
rather drawing upon the sceptical Academy for arguments against the Stoics and Epicureans.
Glucker suggests that the Academy was a gymnasion at the time of Plutarch, that Plutarch and
his brother joined it not for philosophical purposes but for the ephebeia (Athenian training for
youths between 18 and 20) (270–271). He also discounts the possibility of any kind of school
of Antiochos in Alexandria which could have been a direct influence on Eudoros (96–97).
However, he seems unnecessarily to play down the transmission of Antiochos’ ideas into
Alexandria. J. Geiger, “Munatius Rufus and Thrasea Paetus on Cato the Younger,” Athenaeum
67 (1979) 48–72, has tried to reconstruct from the pages of Plutarch’s Life of Cato, the works
dedicated to the hero by Curtius Rufus and Thrasea.
4 A. Momigliano, The Development of Greek Biography (Cambridge, Mass. 1971) 97–99, mentions
the circle of Nepos. He finds Valerius Maximus and Plutarch “unthinkable” without Nepos
(98).
12 part 1, chapter 1
losophy of that school.5 Perhaps one might say that this friendship was not
incompatible with a dislike for Stoic philosophy. Plutarch, like Suetonius and
Tacitus—as Momigliano noted—refused to become a lackey of the felicitas
temporum. Besides the possibility that he stimulated Plutarch’s interest in biog-
raphy, his execution under Domitian would have contributed to Plutarch’s con-
tempt for that emperor. Yet it must be noted that all we know for certain is that
Plutarch attended a lecture by Rusticus. Plutarch’s friend Avidius Quietus, also
a follower of Thrasea, escaped punishment, but Domitian followed the trials of
this circle with the expulsion of the philosophers from Rome and Italy. Among
them may have been Plutarch.
The enormous importance of Cornelius Nepos on the composition of the
Parallel Lives has recently been studied by J. Geiger.6 He argues convincingly
that the Hellenistic lives in the series were “stepchildren,” that Plutarch began
with lives from the classical period, most and perhaps all contained in Nepos’
De Viris Illustribus, and that Plutarch’s heavy selection of Roman lives from the
late Republican period was due to Nepos. Geiger finds it especially significant
that the last of the Lives from a historical perspective is that of Antony, “one of
his most splendid achievements of character drawing and description,” and he
suggests that the conception and many details were inspired by a life of Antony
by Nepos.
C.B.R. Pelling, in a very penetrating study on the sources of the Roman lives
in the parallel series, asserts that Plutarch became heavily dependent upon
Asinius Pollio, who became his principal source for the fifties, forties, and
thirties.7 Once he discovered Pollio, sometime after writing Cicero and Lucullus,
the detail and quality of the Lives improved enormously. Pelling thinks it
impossible to determine whether he ever read Pollio at first hand, or even found
him in translation, but that his material certainly came from an historical, not
biographical source.8
5 Babut, Plutarque et le stoïcisme, 239.

6 J. Geiger, “Plutarch’s Parallel Lives: The Choice of the Heroes,” Hermes 109 (1981) 85–104.
7 C.B.R. Pelling, “Plutarch’s Method of Work in the Roman Lives,” jhs 99 (1979) 74–96, esp. 84–
85. See also idem, “Plutarch’s Adaptation of His Source Material,” jhs 100 (1980) 127–140. In
his review of B. Scardigli, “Die Römerbiographien Plutarchs,” jrs 72 (1982) 216–217, however,
Pelling suggests the great cultural gap between Greeks and Romans in Plutarch’s time, in spite
of the political unification. Plutarch’s relationship to the Roman world of his time is discussed
at some length in G.J.D. Aalders, Plutarch’s Political Thought (Amsterdam, 1982).
8 [en: more recent work on the Lives by C.B.R. Pelling: “Is Death the End?: Closure in Plutarch’s
Lives,” in D. Roberts, F.M. Dunn, & D. Fowler (eds.), Classical Closure: Endings in Ancient Lit-
erature (Princeton, 1997) 228–250; idem, “Dionysiac Diagnostics: Some Hints of Dionysus in
life 13
Plutarch, as Jones notes, lived in a world which was truly a commingling of

Greek and Roman. Among his Roman friends were Avidius Quietus, proconsul
of Achaia in 91/92 ad, L. Mestrius Florus, suffect consul and proconsul of Asia
(It is noteworthy that Plutarch’s Roman name was Mestrius.), Julius Secundus,
one of the chief speakers of the Roman forum in Vespasian’s day, Nigrinus, the
brother of Avidius Quietus, and the younger Nigrinus, who held consular com-
mand under Trajan in Dacia and was executed by Hadrian, Q. Sosius Senecio,
twice consul, to whom the Lives and Quaest. conv. were dedicated, Saturninus,
probably L. Herennius Saturninus, proconsul of Achaia in 98/99 ad, C. Minicius
Fundanus, suffect consul in 107 ad, allotted the province of Asia in 122/123ad, a
mysterious person, probably a senator, named Paccius, Terentius Priscus, most
likely the compatriot and patron of the poet Martial, Sextius Sulla of Carthage,
an eques, possibly, or a minor senator, Aufidius Modestus, probably the com-
mentator on Vergil’s Georgics. Jones takes Favorinus to be a Roman, most likely
of equestrian rank, who managed to live to a respectable old age in spite of a
quarrel with Hadrian, though Ziegler identified him with the famous sophist
of Arelate, the disciple of Dion of Prousa. Among non-Romans was Philoppa-
pos, grandson of the last king of Commagene, suffect consul in 109 ad, whose
tomb still stands on the Hill of the Muses at Athens. His bilingual monument,
on the left Latin, on the right Greek, name, tribe, and honors as a Roman on
the one, royal titles and ancestors on the other, truly symbolizes Plutarch’s
world.
There are some links with the world of Roman literature, though outside
of the historical writings and antiquarian literature Plutarch seems strangely
ignorant of it. There was Rusticus, and Julius Secundus, whose pupil was Tac-
itus, and C. Minicius Fundanus, a correspondent of the younger Pliny, then
Terentius Priscus, and Aufidius Modestus, commentator on Vergil, concern-
ing whom Plutarch seems ignorant. If his Roman friends did introduce him to
something of Roman poetry, there is little evidence of this in his work. Once he
Plutarch’s Lives,” in J.G. Montes Cala, M. Sánchez Ortiz De Landaluce, & R.J. Gallé Cejudo
(eds.), Plutarco, Dioniso y el vino: Actas del vi simposio español sobre Plutarco, Cádiz, 14–16
de mayo de 1998 (Cádiz, 1999) 359–368; idem, “Parallel Narratives: the Liberation of Thebes
in De Genio Socratis and in Pelopidas,” in A.G. Nikolaïdis (ed.), The Unity of Plutarch’s Work:
Moralia Themes in the Lives. Features of the Lives in the Moralia (Berlin; New York: de Gruyter,
2008) 539–556; idem, “ ‘With Thousand such Enchanting Dreams: The Dreams of the Lives
Revisited’,” in L. van der Stockt et al. (eds.), Gods, Daimones, Rituals, Myths, 315–331; idem,
“Plutarch’s Tale of Two Cities: Do the Parallel Lives Combine as Global Histories?,” in N. Hum-
ble (ed.), Plutarch’s Lives: Parallelism and Purpose (Swansea: Classical Press of Wales, 2010)
217–235.]
quotes it (Horace in Lucullus 39), and this may be at second hand. He apolo-
gizes for his poor Latin, and whatever amount he possessed undoubtedly had
to do double duty in the service of his Bioi and investigations into Roman
religion, a matter sensibly treated in D.A. Russell’s excellent general study of
Plutarch.9
Sometime in mature life, perhaps under Domitian, Plutarch became one of
the two permanent priests at Delphi, probably before, like his friends, serving in
other official capacities associated with the shrine. From this time on we can
presume that he devoted much effort to propaganda on behalf of the shrine,
something evidenced by his Pythian dialogues and numerous references to Del-
phi in the Lives. With the assassination of Domitian in September 96, as Jones
suggests, he might breathe easier, and in this period he reached the height of his
career, being elected epimelete of the Amphiktyons, supervising the erection of
Hadrian’s statue, and, already having received the ornamenta consularia under
Trajan, perhaps recipient of the procuratorship of Greece under Hadrian. If
we can believe Artemidoros, he died of a painful illness as he approached his
eightieth year, and the citizens of Delphi and Chaironeia dutifully erected a
monument to honor him, a humane man who hated bloodshed and tempered
a realistic attitude toward the world of politics with a search for the best in men
and society, and exercised tolerant indulgence when for the most part he could
not find it.10
The chronology of Plutarch’s writings has been attacked by numerous schol-
ars as an interesting problem with which to exercise ingenuity and scholarly
method. The most successful and ample attempt is that by Jones, though at the
most crucial moments he lets us down through lack of information.11 In general
the Lives and major religious treatises belong to his mature period. Most schol-
ars, with some stylistic help, hold his more rhetorical works to be early, place
the philosophical in a middle position, and regard the major religious treatises
as late. However, there are difficulties. His religious works can be divided into
the following classifications:
9 D.A. Russell, Plutarch (London, 1973), is particularly good on Plutarch’s style in the broad
sense. [en: F. Graf, “Plutarco e la Religione Romana,” in Gallo (ed.), Plutarco e la religione,
269–283.]
10 I am indebted to C.P. Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 1–64, for this section. On the ornamenta
see 34 and note 44; on Roman friends, 51–62.
11 C.P. Jones, “Towards a Chronology of Plutarch’s Works,” jrs 56 (1966) 51–74.
life 15
i. Early’ Pythagorean type works: De sollertia,12 Gryllos, De esu carnium.

ii. De superstitione, puzzling for its criticism of the superstitious practices
later tolerated by the author, but meant to represent a balance between
atheism and superstition.
iv. A number of highly rhetorical works on tyche: De fortuna, De fortuna Rom.,
De Alexandri fortuna, De gloria Ath.
v. Philosophical works which touch on religion: for example, De animae
procreatione, De stoic. repugn., Non posse, De lat. viv.
vi. Works showing a general interest in religious topics, often of a compar-
ative nature: Quaest. Rom., Quaest. Graec., Quaest. conv. (probably quite
late, representing at times the same line of thought as De Iside).
vii. Delphic dialogues: De defectu, De E, De Pythiae oraculis.
viii. Dialogues with strong eschatological overtones: De sera, De genio, De
facie.
In general, chronology is not all that important, nor can we know if a work
was immediately “published” after it was written. Cross references, for example,
in the Lives may be as confusing and misleading as helpful. We would like to
know which of the Pythian dialogues came first or second, and the order of
the ‘eschatological’ treatises. These are subject to much debate, but Flacelière’s
12 [en: on De sollertia see H. Martin, “Plutarch’s De sollertia animalium 959 b.c. the Dis-
cussion of the Encomium of Hunting,” American Journal of Philology 100 (1979) 99–106;
F.J. Tovar Paz, “Motivos de Ambientación Geográfica y Social en De Sollertia Animalium
de Plutarco,” Estudios clásicos 36 (1994) 81–89; T. Silva Sánchez, “Ribetes Paradoxográficos
en De Sollertia Animalium De Plutarco,” in Montes Cala et al. (eds.), Plutarco, Dioniso y
el vino, 471–479; K.A. Jazdzewska, “Not an ‘innocent Spectacle’: Hunting and uenationes in
Plutarch’s De Sollertia Animalium,”Ploutarchos 7 (2010) 35–45; P. Li Causi, “Granchi, uomini
e altri animali: la genesi della violenza nel de Sollertia animalium di Plutarco,” V. Andò
& N. Cusumano (eds.), Come bestie? Forme e paradossi della violenza tra mondo antico e
disagio contemporaneo (Caltanissetta: Salvatore Sciascia editore, 2010) 189–208; T. Silva
Sánchez, “Sobre el Monólogo de Fédimo en De sollertia animalium,” in A. Pérez Jiménez
& F. Bordoy Casadesús (eds.), Estudios sobre Plutarco, misticismo y religiones mistéricas en
la obra de Plutarco: Actas del vii Simposio español sobre Plutarco: Palma de Mallorca, 2–4
de Noviembre de 2000 (Madrid: Ediciones Clásicas, 2001) 565–577; J.M. Mossman, “Plutarch
on Animals: Rhetorical Strategies in De Sollertia Animalium,” Hermathena 179 (2005) 141–
163; K.A. Jazdzewska, “ ‘Like a Married Woman’: The Kingfisher in Plutarch’s De Sollertia
Animalium and in the Ps.-Platonic Halcyon,” Mnemosyne 68 (2015) 424–436.]
attempt to put De Pythiae oraculis last in the Delphic series makes sense, and
De genio in the matter of “hypostases” seems to be an advance over the other
dialogues of this type.13
13 Ziegler, Plutarchos, 194, and R. del Re, Il dialogo sull’estinzione degli oracoli (Naples, 1934),
and idem, De E delphico (Naples, 1936), preferred a relatively short time between the
Delphic works, while R. Flacelière, “Plutarque et la Pythie,” reg 56 (1943) 72–111 at 72, and
idem, Plutarque. Œuvres morales vi, 40, prefers a later date (around 125 ad) for De Pythiae
oraculis.
chapter 2
The Development of Plutarch’s Religious Ideas, and

His Religious Works
Nineteenth century German scholars sketched for Plutarch a period of youth-

ful skepticism (flowing from the pages of De superstitione) to one in later life
of religiöser Tiefsinn und Hang zur Mystik.1 Such a development is still reflected
in the pages of Ziegler and Flacelière.2 Such a treatment overlooks the Neopy-
thagorean elements of the “youthful” De esu, so similar in tone to the fifteenth
book of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, if we can substitute youthful ardor for estab-
lished wit, or the Gryllos, where Plutarch is as witty as Ovid, De sollertia and De
amore prolis, where Pythagorean sympathy for animals emerges again, and his
own testimony and description of himself in De E as interested in number mys-
ticism along Pythagorean lines before entering the Academy (387f). In two of
his Symposiacs (Quaest. conv. 8.8 and 2.3) there are indications that he always
had leanings toward vegetarianism. In the first (728d–730d) he expresses the
opinion that the Delphic oracle gave a divine sanction for eating flesh only after
mankind was threatened with starvation when animals threatened crops, and
that it still is difficult to justify eating fish, a “luxurious food.” In the other, a
discussion of whether the bird or the egg came first (635e–638a), with humor-
ous Orphic and Pythagorean overtones, his friends suspect him of abstaining
from eggs on religious grounds, though he explains his practice as an attempt
to prevent the recurrence of a bothersome dream.
There are indications also that he was brought up in an environment in
which Neopythagoreanism was familiar. His father, Autoboulos, is given the
role of main speaker in defense of Pythagoreanism in De sollertia, reflecting the
spirit of Neopythagoreanism of that time, such as we find it in the 15th book of
Ovid’s Metamorphoses, where the slaughter of innocent animals has led even-
tually to the slaughter of men. There are similarities here with Plutarch’s De
esu, though in the latter, the possibility that human souls may be reincarnated
1 So Hirzel, Plutarch (Leipzig, 1912) 8–10. Hirzel puts two focal points in Plutarch’s life, at Athens
learning scepticism, at Delphi “religiöser Tiefsinn und Hang zur Mystik.”
2 For example in “Plutarque et la Pythie,” 111, “il en vint à sentir plus ‘théologien’ encore que
‘philosophe’ et sans renier à la ‘philosophie’ à ne plus voir en elle que l’humble servante de la
théologie, ancilla theologiae.” On this see my article Brenk, “From Mysticism to Mysticism,”
193–198.

in animal form is proposed as a deterrent to eating flesh, even if the doctrine

cannot be proved. If we can judge by Quaest. conv. 1.2 (615d–619b), where a dis-
pute occurs within the family over seating people by rank, and a more general
discussion on taxis, Plutarch was closer to his father than his brothers. Ziegler,
at any rate, felt that he may have inherited Pythagorean leanings from his father.
Finally, among his close friends was Philinos, a vegetarian, who grew up with
him in Chaironeia, traveled with him to Rome on his second journey, possibly
was on his Egyptian tour, and was a life-long friend (Quaest. conv. 728b). A sam-
ple of this mentality can be seen in the opening of De esu, where the description
of the carnage is similar to that describing the innocent children slaughtered by
the Carthaginians, who are in fact in De superstitione (171d) depicted in terms of
so many lambs and birds, done in a highly rhetorical style which is considered
characteristic of Plutarch’s youthful writings: Pythagoras’ horror of flesh-eating,
the bellowing and cries of the animals, the horror of the first man “touching
his mouth to gore,” “the eating of dead, stale, bodies,” the slitting of throats
and tearing limb from limb, the stench, pollution, and “contact with the sores
and wounds of others.” Ovid seems to parody this type of description in the
Pythagorean book of the Metamorphoses (15).
Plutarch’s early life would then have been immersed in that stream of the
Platonic-Pythagorean revival prominent in those cities he visited, Alexandria
and Rome. This strain of thought infiltrates a great amount of his work and
led Zeller to characterize him long ago as a pythagorisierender Platoniker, an
insight which modern scholars are beginning to appreciate more and more.3
Even before he met his teacher Ammonios, who apparently had similar though
3 Philosophie der Griechen (Leipzig; 3rd ed., 1909 [1852]) 193. For comparison with other con-
temporary writers see J. Whittaker, “Ammonius on the Delphic E,” cq 19 (1969) 185–192, who
shows close parallels, as for example in the ages of man. For more on De E, see H.D. Betz
and E.W. Smith, “Plutarch, De E apud Delphos,” Nov. Test. 13 (1971) 217–235. Plutarch’s horror
of human sacrifice, influenced by his Pythagorean tendencies, reveals itself in his Lives. The
historical accuracy of the account of the sacrifice of the Persians at Salamis in Themistokles 13,
and its relationship to Greek ritual is treated by A. Henrichs, “Human Sacrifice in Greek Reli-
gion,” in Le sacrifice dans l’ antiquité (Vandœuvres-Geneva, 1981) 195–235 (208–224). Henrichs,
who regards Plutarch’s account (from Phainias) as a fiction, believes most accounts of human
sacrifice in Greek history are fictional, and that where it occurred it was directed against
marginal persons. For the sacrifice at Leuktra, Pelopidas 20–22, see J. Buckler, “Plutarch on
Leuktra,” so 55 (1980) 75–93; W. Burkert, Structure and History in Greek Mythology and Ritual
(Berkeley, 1979) 74–75; A. Henrichs, “Human Sacrifice,” 206; J. Fontenrose, The Delphic Oracle
(Berkeley, 1978) 147, and Brenk, In Mist Apparelled, 49–64, esp. 55–56. [en: now see also F. Fer-
rari, “La Costruzione del Platonismo nel De E apud Delphos di Plutarco,” Athenaeum 98 (2010)
71–87.]
the development of plutarch’s religious ideas 19
more sophisticated training in philosophical speculation along the lines of

Pythagorean Platonism, Plutarch was emotionally well advanced in this direc-
tion.4
The exact nature of Plutarch’s philosophical training is unknown. Recently
Dörrie, Whittaker, and Dillon have suggested that Plutarch’s teacher, Ammo-
nios, brought with him from Alexandria a Pythagorean type of Platonism in
which God becomes the supreme reality, described in terms of the Platonic
Forms, contrasting with the flux of the phenomenal world, and in which the
goal of life, or telos, for man is assimilation to God as far as possible (ὁμοίωσις
θεῷ κατὰ τὸ δυνατόν).5 Where Dörrie and Dillon differ in their interpretation
of Plutarch’s training is in their conception of its orthodoxy. Dörrie doubts
whether Plutarch and Ammonios were ever in the Academy.6 Dillon doubts
whether the Academy really existed in Plutarch’s day. But while Dörrie finds
Plutarch’s brand of Platonism a radical departure from traditional Platonic
teaching and in contrast to that of other Middle Platonists, Dillon finds him
quite orthodox, making the natural systematizations and following the natural
development of other Middle Platonists.7 In fact the very points which Dörrie
4 [en: see A. Eunyoung Ju, “Posidonius as Historian of Philosophy: An Interpretation of Plu-

tarch, De animae procreatione in Timaeo 22, 1023b–c,” in Malcolm Schofield (ed.), Aristotle,
Plato and Pythagoreanism in the First Century bc: New Directions for Philosophy (Cambridge
University Press, 2013) 95–117.]
5 [en: See F. Becchi, “Plutarco e la dottrina dell’ Ὁμοίωσις Θεῷ tra Platonismo e Aristotelismo,”
I. Gallo (ed.), Plutarco e la religione 321–335.]
6 [en: On Ammonius, see now J. Opsomer, “M. Annius Ammonius, a Philosophical Profile,”
Mauro Bonazzi & Jan Opsomer (eds.), The Origins of the Platonic System: Platonisms of the
Early Empire and their Philosophical Contexts (Louvain/Namur/Paris/Walpole, ma: Éditions
Peeters; Société des Études Classiques, 2009) 123–186.]
7 H. Dörrie, “Die Stellung Plutarchs im Platonismus seiner Zeit,” in R.B. Palmer and R. Hamer-
ton-Kellyn (eds.), Philomathes. Studies and Essays in the Humanities in Memory of Philip
Merlan (The Hague, 1971) 36–56, an enlarged version of his talk at the Budé Congrès (“Le
platonisme de Plutarque,” 519–529): J. Whittaker, “Ammonius,” 185–192; Dillon, The Middle
Platonists, 189–191. See also H. Dörrie, “Der Platoniker Eudoros von Alexandreia,” Hermes 79
(1944) 25–38; and idem, “Le renouveau du platonisme à l’époque de Cicéron,” Rev. Théol.
Philos. 24 (1974) 1–29; and idem, “Die Erneuerung des Platonismus im ersten Jahrhundert vor
Christus,” in Act. du Coll. Royaumont (Paris, 1971) 17–33 (the first and the third article reprinted
in idem, Platonica Minora ([Munich, 1976]) 297–309 and 154–165). Hani and Griffiths in
their commentaries on De Iside note the Pythagorean tendencies in this essay, but Hani,
163, observes that the a-pollon etymology for the sun, goes back to Chrysippos (Macrob.
1.17.7 [svf ii, 1095, 31]). H.J. Krämer, Der Ursprung der Geistmetaphysik. Untersuchungen zur
Geschichte des Platonismus zwischen Platon und Plotin (Amsterdam, 1964) 92–126, and in
scattered references through his Platonismus und hellenistische Philosophie (Berlin, 1971), sees
takes to be most “heretical” are often points of “orthodoxy” for Dillon, and one
might ask whether the question of orthodoxy is the best one to raise.8
In analyzing Plutarch’s philosophical position Dörrie finds the following
ideas a deviation from Schulplatonismus: the soul as not just created by God
but as part of him and out of him, thus destroying the doctrine of principles
(Quaest. Plat. 1001bc) (the principles being God, Ideas, Matter), God as the
paradeigma (De sera 550d), God among the intelligibles (Quaest. Plat. 1002b),
and the final ascent of the soul after death (a second death here, the separation
of psyche and nous) to join the world of Ideas, going off to become as pure
intelligible, the intelligible central fire (De facie 944e). Dillon concentrates
mainly on Ammonios’ speech at the end of De E, De Iside, and De genio.9
In his view all Middle Platonists after Eudoros—whom, like Dörrie, he feels
to be an important link in the new development reflected in Plutarch—held
the supreme object (telos) of human life to be likeness to God rather than
conformity with nature.
Authors have used Plutarch’s text on the telos in De sera (550d) in differ-
ent ways. Here Plutarch claims that God in Plato (Theaitetos 176e) offers Him-
self as a pattern (paradeigma) of all good things (πάντα καλά, translated as
“excellence” by De Lacy and Einarson),10 thus rendering human excellence (or
Plutarch as important for the movement of which he was a part, an innovative thinker,
not just a systematizer. [en: See now L. Roig Lanzillotta, “Plutarch at the Crossroads of
Religion and Philosophy,” in idem & Israel Muñoz Gallarte (eds.), Plutarch in the Religious
and Philosophical Discourse of Late Antiquity (Leiden: Brill, 2012) 1–21]. He would see his
influence most strongly upon De Iside (strangely omitting a discussion of the end of De E).
Ideas in Plutarch such as that of God, Nous, the One, Logos, World Soul, Ideas, the Kosmos,
etc., not to speak of the demonology, he would see as strongly influenced by Xenokrates.
His interpretation is somewhat different, then, from that of Dörrie and others. They would
see a slower development, and more Alexandrian influence in Plutarch’s “Neo-platonic”
ideas regarding the relationship between the divinity and the world.
8 [en: On Plutarch’s Platonism, see now F.E. Brenk, “Plutarch’s Middle-Platonic God: About
to Enter (Or Remake) the Academy,” in Hirsch-Luipold (ed.), Gott und die Götter bei
Plutarch, 27–49; and the chapter on Plutarch in G.E. Karamanolis, Plato and Aristotle in
Agreement: Platonists on Aristotle from Antiochus to Porphyry (Oxford: Clarendon, 2006)
85–126].
9 [en: T. Thum, “ ‘Welche Fülle von Reden’: Plutarchs Schrift De E Apud Delphos,” in
R. Hirsch-Luipold, H. Görgemanns, M. von Albrecht (eds.), Religiöse Philosophie und philo-
sophische Religion der frühen Kaiserzeit. Literaturgeschichtliche Perspektiven (Tübingen:
Mohr Siebeck, 2009) 237–250.]
10 De sera 550d: Ἀλλὰ σκοπεῖτε πρῶτον, ὅτι κατὰ Πλάτωνα πάντων καλῶν ὁ θεὸς ἑαυτὸν ἐν
μέσῳ παράδειγμα θέμενος τὴν ἀνθρωπίνην ἀρετήν, ἐξομοίωσιν οὖσαν ἁμωσγέπως πρὸς αὑτόν,
virtue [arete]) in some way an assimilation (ἐξομοίωσις) to Himself (Politeia

613ab, Theaitetos 176b), for all who can “follow God” (ἕπεσθαι θεῷ, a supposedly
Pythagorean saying, cf. Leges 716b, Phaidros 248a). Plutarch then compares this
to the origin of the kosmos where “universal nature” (ἡ πάντων φύσις) became
a kosmos through a certain likeness (ὁμοίωσις) (Timaios 29e–30a; Plutarch, De
animae procreatione 1014bc) and participation (μέθεξις) in the form and excel-
lence of the divine (περὶ τὸ θεῖον ἰδέας καὶ ἀρετῆς). The greatest benefit a man
can derive from God is to become established in arete through the imitation
and pursuit of good and beautiful (things) (καλὰ καὶ ἀγαθά) in Him. One should
note here that Plutarch is thinking in terms of moral imitation, not ontolog-
ical, and primarily of moral patterning after God. Particularly interesting is
Plutarch’s avoidance of the terms “the Good, the Beautiful” (τὸ καλόν, τὸ ἀγα-
θόν) which would explicitly put Plato’s main Forms in God or identify them
with God. Instead he uses plurals which disguise the innovations. One can
compare this passage with another suggesting God as the telos and appar-
ently identifying him with the Platonic Forms of the Good and Beautiful (De
facie 944e). Contrary, however, to the impression one might get at times from
some of Dörrie’s earlier writings on Plutarch’s eschatology, he does not speak
explicitly of an ascent of souls through spheres, of going off to join the realm
of the Ideas or the intelligible central fire, nor of becoming pure intelligi-
bles.
Dörrie gives great credit to Plutarch for moving a rather sterile school Platon-
ism into a position where it could give men something to live for, a direction and
goal in life, in which very old philosophical concepts were interpreted anew in
a way most satisfying to the men of his time.11 In his portrayal of Plutarch’s
position in the Platonism of his time, Dörrie long ago paid him great tribute for
being attuned to the spiritual exigencies of his time and for molding Platonism
to a new role by breaking with the sterile theorizing of the later Academy, and
thus interpreting philosophy as a magistra vitae in a new light, the assistance
to the soul in its striving after a destiny beyond this world, then by insisting on
ἐνδίδωσιν τοῖς ἕπεσθαι θεῷ δυναμένοις. καὶ γὰρ ἡ πάντων φύσις, ἄτακτος οὖσα, ταύτην ἔσχε τὴν
ἀρχὴν τοῦ μεταβάλλειν καὶ γενέσθαι κόσμος, ὁμοιότητι καὶ μεθέξει τινὶ τῆς περὶ τὸ θεῖον ἰδέας
καὶ ἀρετῆς … P.H. De Lacy and B. Einarson, Plutarch’s Moralia vii (London and Cambridge,
Mass. 1967) 194.
11 Dörrie, “Die Stellung Plutarchs,” 200. Dillon seems to read more into the idea of Logos
than Plutarch gives it. Though Eros in Amatorius 764d may play the role of a Middle
Platonic Logos, Plutarch is actually following Plato in the Symposion (Eros leads one to a
vision of Beauty itself). However, it is interesting here that he treats Eros as the intelligible
archetype of the sun, as Dillon points out.
a firm Platonic foundation for his endeavor when the “official” school was dis-
interested, creating for himself a distinctive position among the Platonists of
his time.12
De superstitione is something of an anomaly and has been an embarrassment
to those attempting to analyze Plutarch’s religious views and development.
Though M. Smith recently has had doubts about its authenticity, and his obser-
vations should not be dismissed lightly, the ideas and thought patterns in it
are reflected again and again, and it is a convenient place to begin to discuss
Plutarch’s religious mentality, as H. Erbse realized.13 The theme of the essay is
that superstition (deisidaimonia) is as bad as atheism; but the essay verges off
quickly into a discussion of it as fear of the divinity, then into the satirization
of a number of superstitious practices and beliefs. Frequently Plutarch’s writ-
ings are dominated by the topic at hand, and his youthful writings tend, like
those of many youths, to go to extremes. Although it is difficult to contemplate
him having written this at a later period, we frequently find similar criticisms
of superstition or superstitious practice, sometimes in almost identical termi-
nology throughout his works, and if his attitude changed on certain points, the
subjects remained the same. Erbse has noted the striking similarity of many
passages in this essay and in later works.
A number of these similarities and dissimilarities within Plutarch’s work can
be noted here. First there is a preoccupation with dreaming. Here the dreams
of the superstitious are ridiculed, but in the Amatorius (764f) the dream world
is described as that in which we are closest to a vision of the Forms, the true
period of consciousness, while in De defectu 432c Lamprias explains that the
faculty of prophecy appears mostly in dreams and at the hour of death when
the soul is closer to release from the body, thus releasing the rational faculties
12 Dörrie, “Die Stellung Plutarchs,” 56. See especially his “Le renouveau du platonisme,” for
the general movement.
13 M. Smith, “De superstitione, Moralia 164e–171f,” in Betz (ed.), Plutarch’s Theological Writ-
ings, 1–8; H. Erbse, “Plutarchs Schrift Περὶ δεισιδαιμονίας,” 295–314. See also H. Braun,
“Plutarch’s Critique of Superstition in the Light of the New Testament,” opiac 5 (1972)
193–198. E.R. Dodds’ picture of Greek religion was one of continuing accumulation of
guilt feeling and anxiety leading to the acceptance of Christianity as an escape from
rational responsibility. He made much of Plutarch’s De superstitione, contrasting it with
Theophrastos’ “superstitious man,” The Greeks and the Irrational (Berkeley, 1951); see also
idem, Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety (Cambridge, 1968). One cannot entirely
support this picture, which is much more complex, from Plutarch. For a corrective to
Dodds, see R. Gordon, “Fear of Freedom? Selective Continuity in Religion during the Hel-
lenistic Period,” Didaskalos 4 (1972) 48–60. See also the new introduction, text, translation
and commentary, G. Lozza, Plutarco. De Superstitione (Milan, 1980).
so they may turn into “the irrational and visionary.” It is significant that dreams
are very important in the Lives and many come just before death.
At De superstitione 166f–167b, somewhat in the mood of Plato, he ridicules
descriptions of torments in the afterlife. This is surprising in view of his relish
for the horrendous scenes of eschatological torment in his myths, especially
that in De sera, where daimon torturers hurl the souls from one pool of molten
metal to another. Yet in De lat. viv. 1130c–e and Non posse 1104a–1107c, a late
essay, as H. Adam has observed, he finds torments of this sort inconsistent
with the spirituality of the soul.14 He ridicules such torments in De virtute 450a
and De aud. poet. 17c. In De E (394a), De lat. viv. (1130c–e), and De sera (564f),
sometimes humorously against the Epicureans, he toys with the idea that eter-
nal punishment consists of oblivion. But even Plutarch’s great eschatological
myths are done with a touch of humor and wit lightening the otherwise hor-
rendous scenes.
An iconoclast strain is evident in De superstitione 167e–f, as H. Moellering
has noted.15 This appears in a more respectful form in Perikles 39 and Ad princ.
iner. 780e, where human beings are more representative of God than inanimate
objects, in De Iside 382ab, where animals are better than inanimate objects,
and in Numa 8, where he praises the absence of statues in Roman religion
of the early days as a refined religious idea probably due to the influence of
Pythagoras. In Camillus 6, Coriolanus 37–38, and De Pythiae oraculis 398c he
reveals great uneasiness in the face of statue portents. In the Lives he passes
over a number in his sources, though actually finding them most useful at other
times.
14 For the dating of the essay, see C.P. Jones, Chronology, 72, and H. Adam, Plutarchs Schrift
Non posse suaviter vivi secundum Epicurum (Amsterdam, 1974) 3–4 and 67–70; she cites
W. Beck, Mythopoiie des Plutarch (Heidelberg, 1953) 57–85. See also O. Seel, “Zu Plutarchs
Schrift De Latenter Vivendo,” in R. Hanslik, A. Lesky and H. Schwabl (eds.), Antidosis
(Vienna, 1972) 357–380.
15 Moellering, Plutarch on Superstition, 165–173. Older treatment can be found in C. Clerc,
Les théories relatives au culte des images (Paris, 1915), also printed as idem, “Plutarque
et le culte des images,” Rev. Hist. Rel. 70 (1914) 8–124. On the matter of early Roman
statues, and problems of Neopythagorean interpretation which plague this section of
Numa, see K. Latte, Römische Religionsgeschichte (Munich, 1960; 21967) 150, n. 1, and the
reply of H. Wagenvoort, “Wesenszüge altrömischer Religion,” anrw i.2 (1972) 348–376,
to G. Dumézil, La religion romaine archaïque (Paris, 1966) (English Translation: Archaic
Roman Religion [Chicago, 1970]). For the miraculous in Plutarch, see Mackay, “Plutarch
and the Miraculous,” 93–113, and G.T. Smith, The Importance of Miracle in the Religious
Truth of Plutarch of Chaeronea (Diss. New York, 1972).
He attacks the superstitious belief in eclipses as portents at De superstitione

169a, though he uses them this way in the Lives, while at the same time treat-
ing them as scientific phenomena.16 He seems to have felt, as for example in
Nikias 23 (the eclipse before Syracuse), that God works through natural causes.
He relates here—rather strange to modern ears—that eclipses were a normal
event, but that Nikias could have been saved by a good soothsayer.17 In Coniu-
galia praecepta 145cd he advocates coeducation on the grounds that women
enlightened by astronomy would not be duped by witches like the famous
Aglaonike of Thessaly. There is some contempt for “foreign cults” in De super-
stitione in contrast to the respect and tolerance shown them in De Iside, but the
points of contact here are not all that exact.
16 The question of eclipses was intensively studied by Plutarch. See R. Flacelière, “Plutarque
et les éclipses de la lune,”reg 53 (1951) 203–221; Ziegler, Plutarchos, 73–74; Cherniss’ intro-
duction to De facie in the Loeb edition (Mor., xii, 1957); H. Görgemanns, Untersuchungen
zu Plutarchs Dialog De facie in orbe lunae (Heidelberg, 1970), and the review by F.H. Sand-
bach, cr 23 (1973) 32–34, and H. Martin, “Plutarch’s De facie: The Recapitulation and
the Lost Beginning,” grbs 15 (1974) 73–88. Sandbach admires the close interrelationship
between physical and spiritual cosmology. He notes that Plutarch’s heterodoxy in treating
the moon’s substance as earth was a lucky guess, influenced perhaps by non-scientific
contexts such as the mythoi of the Pythagoreans and “space fiction,” that the doctrine
had not been in vogue in philosophical schools for centuries before, and that it did not
appear in scientific studies after Plutarch. See also R. Flacelière, “La lune selon Plutarque,”
in P. Ducrey (ed.), Mélanges d’ histoire ancienne et d’archéologie (Paris, 1976) 193–195.
17 A.W. Gomme (with A. Andrewes and K.J. Dover), A Historical Commentary on Thucy-
dides iv (Oxford, 1970) 428, note how both modern and ancient authors have exagger-
ated Nikias’ superstition. They take the lsj definition of θειασμός as “superstition” to be
erroneous, and define it “as a human utterance about the divine in an inspired state,” not-
ing Thucydides 7.50.4: ἦ γάρ τι καὶ ἄγαν θειασμῷ τε καὶ τῷ τοιούτῳ προσκείμενος. See also
Flacelière, Plutarque, Vies, vii (Paris, 1972) 132–139; Wardman, Plutarch’s Lives, 154–157; and
P.A. Stadter, “Thucydidean Orators in Plutarch,” in P.A. Stadter (ed.), The Speeches in Thucy-
dides (Chapel Hill, 1973) 109–123; and idem, “Plutarch’s Comparison of Pericles and Fabius
Maximus,” grbs 16 (1975) 77–85, where he shows how Plutarch manipulates Thucydidean
material. One can also consult, L. Gil, “La semblanza de Nicias en Plutarco,”E. Clas. 6 (1962)
404–450; F. Frost, Plutarch’s Themistocles. A Historical Commentary (Princeton, 1980) 3–39,
on Plutarch’s use of Thucydides; and Citti, “Plutarco, Nic. 1.5,” 99–110.
chapter 3
Plutarch’s Idea of God in the Light of Alexandrian

Middle Platonism
Plato left many problems behind him in the realm of theology and in partic-
ular the concept of the divine. The Ideas or Forms in the Timaios, which also
appear in Plutarch as paradeigmata, do not seem to receive as much promi-
nence as they did in Plato’s middle period, considering that we take the Timaios
as late. While retaining a certain place in the Timaios for the Ideas, Plato seems
more interested in the intelligibility (logos or nous) of the kosmos itself and its
relationship to disorder and non-teleological activity. This at least is the tradi-
tional approach to Plato’s theology in the Timaios and Laws and forms the basis
for F. Solmsen’s approach toward Plato’s theology in his book which appeared
30 years ago.1 “God” becomes more and more identified with the intelligible
principles of the universe and its creative power of self-organization. Though
Solmsen does not say so, one might think of the approach of modern scientists
like Einstein, who would see within matter rational principles and the power
of self-organization.2
In the framework of Solmsen’s thought, the kosmos in Plato is divine, even
called theos (Timaios 39de; 41bc; 68e; 92c). The older anthropomorphic con-
cepts of Greek mythology are given by Plato affirmation on a higher level and
on new ground through the orientation of the kosmos toward the Good and
the realm of perfect Forms, and the realization of the operation of nous in it.
Solmsen is still rather cautious, and one could take this line of thought a step
further, as was done in the early Hellenistic period. All the noeton, nous, and
the divine can be seen somehow as the rational, creative, intelligible principle
within the material kosmos itself. Thus the extreme transcendence of Plato’s
middle-period, as represented in the separation between unchangeable being
and being in flux, the world of Forms and the phenomenal world, is united in an
immanentist world sufficient in itself. How much of this was due to the growing
importance and success of Greek science is hard to say. Solmsen believed that
the Timaios was inspired through Plato’s indirect contact with Egyptian and
1 Plato’s Theology (Ithaca, New York, 1942) esp. 84–97, 114–121, and 123–141.
2 On this see F.W. Walbank, The Hellenistic World (Cambridge, Mass. 1981) 184–185, and
G.E.R. Lloyd, Greek Science after Aristotle (London, 1973) 1–7, 154–178, esp. 166–170.

Babylonian astronomy, and the heady scientific advances being made in this
area. However, Plato retained at least literally, Ideas, nous, and the Demiour-
gos, and seems to have resisted a theism which would have united all these
elements, making one supreme God the embodiment of nous, the creator, and
telos of man.
The tendency toward ever greater identification of God or the divine with
the intelligibility of the visible universe, which characterized philosophy and
science after Plato, is reflected in Aristotle’s criticism of Plato. He believed that
Plato wrongly held to a creation in time in the Timaios. One view is that Aris-
totle deliberately misinterpreted Plato, who did not teach a literal ‘creation’, a
position taken in antiquity and advocated by some modern scholars. Recently
T.M. Robinson and J. Whittaker suggest that Plato did teach a “literal” “creation”
of the world and that embarrassed by Aristotle’s critique, and one might add by
the cosmic view of the early Hellenistic period, early Platonists reinterpreted
Plato and even changed the text of the Timaios to make Plato a respectable con-
formist in Hellenistic intellectual circles.3 Robinson, who dates the Timaios to
Plato’s middle period, insists on the temporal language used by Plato, and the
separation between the product of nous and the product of ananke, which are
correlative in the generation of the kosmos (Timaios 47e4). Whittaker argues
that the phrase τί τὸ γιγνόμενον μὲν ἀεί (27d5) was manipulated by later Platon-
ists to substantiate the non-temporal origin of the kosmos as propounded by
Xenokrates, against the accepted reading in antiquity which did not include ἀεί.
These scholars would maintain that Plutarch returned in fact, perhaps unwit-
tingly on his part, to the true Platonic interpretation of the master. Plutarch
himself felt that the majority of Platonists opposed temporal creation “contrary
to Plato’s true meaning.” As H. Cherniss notes, however, such is traditional lan-
guage to clothe Plutarch’s real purpose, a commentary on Plato’s Timaios in
the light of his own theology, and not a rigorous philological and philosophical
attempt to deduce Plato’s fourth century meaning.4
A more complex expression of this general principle of Aristotle’s distor-
tion of Plato’s thought, such as was claimed by the early Platonists, appears
3 T.M. Robinson, Plato’s Psychology (Toronto, 1970) esp. 59–92; J. Whittaker, “Timaeus 77d 5ff.,”
Phoenix 23 (1969) 181–185; and idem, “Textual Comments on Timaeus 27c–d,”Phoenix 27 (1973)
387–391. R. Mohr, “The World-Soul in Platonic Cosmology,” ics 7 (1982) 41–49, suggests that
Plato intended a soul which maintained the “homoeostatic” rather than kinetic condition
of matter, which is not to plan, produce, or keep an eye on the paradeigmata (intelligible
models), and has neither reason nor the possibility of “discarnate” existence.
4 H. Cherniss, Plutarch’s Moralia xiii, Part 1 (London and Cambridge, Mass., 1976), Introduc-
tion, 136–149; on atheists, 136.
plutarch’s idea of god in the light of alexandrian platonism 27
in M. Baltes’ recent book on the genesis of the universe in the Timaios.5 Baltes
notes that Plutarch, studiously avoiding the aid of Aristotle in the justification
of his own position, wanted to proceed with a methodology which was philo-
logically acceptable. Plutarch, for example, does not say the kosmos came to be
χρόνῳ or ἐν χρόνῳ—something explained by Quaest. Plat. 6 (1007c) where dis-
ordered movement does not count as time, but time and the kosmos come to
exist simultaneously. Nonetheless, in Baltes’ interpretation, “earlier” and “later”
have real meaning in Plutarch.6 As Cherniss notes, Plutarch’s interpretation was
meant to refute the “atheists” of Laws 10 who denied that soul was senior to
body. Plutarch instead would hold that God brought the world into existence
from precosmic principles which always existed, an interpretation which “no
known Platonist before Plutarch held.”
In any case Plutarch’s Timaios is a far more fundamentalist and anthropo-
morphic one than Plato’s and undoubtedly more so than that of Eudoros—
though he conceptualized the One as both personal and impersonal, and far
different from a totally impersonal Hellenistic conception. In this sense Plato’s
frequent use of the Demiourgos and theos to describe the agent of his order-
ing are faithfully reflected in Plutarch. But since elsewhere in Plato’s writings
such a theistic concept is absent, the Timaios passages were easily interpreted
as symbolic. In other treatises of Plutarch the end of human aspiration is the
Good or Beautiful, clearly identified with Plato’s Forms, but these also seem
to be closely linked or identical with the divine, or God (to theion or o theos).
More so than Plato, Plutarch in his commentary on the Timaios constantly
puts the “creating” God before our eyes, and downplays the Ideas. Nor is God
or the Demiourgos, as suggested in De Iside 374ef, closely associated with the
Ideas or identical with them. His relationship to them is “as imitator to pat-
tern” (De animae procreatione 1023cd). But this also seems to imply that the
Ideas are paradeigmata, that is, intelligible principles, some of which at least
have a close relationship to the mathematicals, judging by his statements (for
instance, “… Plato regards the substance of soul not as number either, but as
being ordered by number …”), and by the constant mathematical speculation
in the treatise, for example, in 1013cd. Numbers seem to be closely related to
the intellectual structure of visible reality, not just the Good, Beautiful, Just, and
so forth, so prominent in Plato’s middle dialogues. Similarly at 1026ef when
5 Baltes, Die Weltentstehung, 38–45, 93–95 on Plutarch; 32–38, 86–93 on Philo; 83–86 on Kran-
tor and Eudoros. See also P. Moraux, Der aristotelismus bei den Griechen. Von Andronikos
bis Alexander von Aphrodisias i: Die Renaissance des Aristotelismus im i. Jh. v. Chr. (Berlin,
1973).
6 Die Weltentstehung, 43.
the cosmic soul begins to turn the world backwards, it must look back to its
paradeigma to recover its health. Plutarch, using a passage from the Politikos
as his source, gratuitously introduces God rolling it in the right direction. It is
difficult to see how turning back in the right direction could be accomplished
just by reflection on the Good, or even a vision of it. The suggestion is that
somehow the world soul regains an intellectual comprehension of the intel-
ligible principles, equatable perhaps with mathematical terms and ratios used
in geophysics and astronomy, behind the correct order and arrangement of
the celestial bodies and the other components of the kosmos. Moreover, an
anthropomorphic literalism is introduced without Platonic warranty from the
Timaios.7
Plutarch thus broke with Alexandrian Platonism which seemed before his
time to reaffirm the “traditional” Platonic interpretation of the non-temporal
creation of the universe, the position of Eudoros as cited by Plutarch in De
animae procreatione (1013b), following Xenokrates and Krantor. Baltes makes
a very good observation on the contradictory role of Eudoros. He affirmed
the “traditional” interpretation of the Timaios, which maintained symbolic
creation, but at the same time by following in the footsteps “of his teacher,”
Antiochos of Askalon, broke the Aristotelian stranglehold on the interpretation
of that work. Thus he offered an opportunity to read Plato with a fresh eye,
including the passages on the creation of the universe.8
7 [en: On Plato’s myth as a theodicy, see now G. Casadio, “The Politicus Myth (268d–274e)
and the History of Religion,” Kernos 8 (1995) 85–95. On Plutarch’s reception and develop-
ment of the motif, see Dillon, The Middle Platonists, 204–205; W. Deuse, Untersuchungen zur
mittelplatonischen und neuplatonischen Seelenlehre (Mainz: Akademie der Wissenschaften
und der Literatur, 1983) 84; F. Ferrari, Dio, idee e materia: la struttura del cosmo in Plutarco di
Cheronea (Naples: M. D’Auria, 1995); J.M. Dillon, “Plutarch and God: Theodicy and Cosmogony
in the Thought of Plutarch,” in A. Laks and D. Frede (eds.), Traditions of Theology: Studies in
Hellenistic Theology, its Background and Aftermath (Leiden: Brill, 2002) 223–237; J. Opsomer,
“Plutarch’s De animae procreatione in Timaeo: Manipulation or Search for Consistency?,”bics
47 (2004) 137–162; L. Roig Lanzillotta, “Plutarch and the Image of the Sleeping and Waking
Soul,” in S. Amendola, G. Pace & P. Volpe Cacciatore (eds.), Immagini letterarie e iconografia
nelle opere di Plutarco (Madrid: Ediciones Clásicas, 2017) 209–222; on rationalized myths in
general, see G. Hawes, Rationalizing Myth in Antiquity (Oxford—New York: Oxford Univer-
sity Press, 2014).]
8 Die Weltentstehung, 85. [en: see now also Ferrari, Dio, idee e materia; idem, “Dio: padre e
artefice. La theologia di Plutarco in Plat. Quaest. 2,” in I. Gallo (ed.), Plutarco e la religione,
395–409; idem, “Πρόνοια platonica e νόησις νοήσεως aristotelica: Plutarco e l’impossibilita
di una sintisi,” in A. Pérez Jiménez, J. García López & R. Aguilar (eds.), Plutarco, Platon y
Aristoteles, 63–77; idem, “Plutarch. Platonismus und Tradition,” in M. Erler & A. Graeser
Something of Plutarch’s struggle with different strains of contemporary

Platonism appears in the contrast between Quaest. conv. 7.2 (720bc) and De
Iside 374de. In the first Ammonios is given a speech in which God “creates, and
oversees the kosmos” διὰ παντός, apparently through all time. The statement
suggests again the eternal future of the world and something close if not
identical to the creatio aeterna of God. In the De Iside passage, Plutarch begins
by saying that the world is not eternal (ἀΐδιος) but twists the statement to
mean that the kosmos is ever born (ἀειγενής): it had a beginning and is really
ἀειγενής, that is, lasting forever after a real act of creation.9 The term ἀεί applies,
then, only for the limitless time which came into being after the genesis of the
world. Moreover, the similarity of this passage to that in De animae procreatione
suggests that the two belong together, if not chronologically, at least in the
mode of Plutarch’s thought.10
One can also compare Plutarch’s great leap forward in his treatment of the
temporal creation of the kosmos, with the traditionalism of Philo of Alexandria,
even though it would have fitted Philo’s purpose better to interpret the Timaios
as supporting temporal creation, a topic hotly debated at the time. In Baltes’
view, relying on Peripatetic sources and perhaps Aristotle’s De Philosophia,
Philo believed Aristotle’s testimony to Plato’s thought had to be taken seriously.
On the other hand, he was well aware of Platonic interpreters who insisted on
a symbolic or allegorical creation. Baltes thinks that a Peripatetic position is
behind Philo’s interpretation which appears here for the first time: the γιγνόμε-
νον ἀεί of Timaios 37d–38a would refer to the visible kosmos but the τὸ ὂν ἀεί to
the kosmos noetos (De aeternitate mundi 14).11
Philo argues that since it is uncreated—“something agreed upon by all,”—
then the kosmos, which gives the orderly movements upon which time is based,
must also be eternal. But in De providentia 4–5 he proposes another argument.
A beginning to the kosmos would imply a time when God was inactive, another
argument coming from a Peripatetic milieu, even if the concept of a creatio
aeterna is not Aristotelian. Philo also speaks (28–29) of the Ideas or Forms
(eds.), Philosophen des Altertums (Darmstadt: Primus Verlag, 2000) 109–127; J. Boulogne,
“Trois Eros?: Comment Plutarque Réécrit Platon,” in A. Pérez Jiménez, J. García López, &
R. Aguilar Fernández (eds.), Plutarco, Platón y Aristóteles, 215–226.]
9 Die Weltentstehung, 94.
10 [en: On God in Plutarch, see S.T. Teodorsson, “La concepción plutarquea del Dios
Supremo,” in Pérez Jiménez & Casadesús Bordoy (eds.), Misticismo y religiones mistéricas
en la obra de Plutarco, 275–281.]
11 Die Weltentstehung, 86–87.
(εἴδη), the intelligible types of different forms of life, as “being from the begin-
ning with God.” Thus later Platonists used Aristotle against himself. Taking the
argument of the eternal activity of God from Aristotle’s De Philosophia, they
turned it against his literal interpretation of the Timaios to support a creatio
aeterna, seeing in Plato’s God a Hellenistic euergetes (benefactor) who would
have no recipients for his benefactions, and thus sorely demoted in status,
should the world not always have existed. The true εὐεργέτης needed the εὐερ-
γετούμενον.12
The movement from earlier immanentist philosophy to the beginnings of
transcendantalism begins to appear by the time of Cicero. Dörrie notes that
the Platonists cited by Cicero have a religious tinge foreign to the religious
indifference of the Academy previous to his time.13 It is interesting, moreover,
that both Cicero and Philo state that according to the Platonists the kosmos
began in time (whereas Plutarch states the opposite). Cicero seems to treat
all Platonists as holding this, in opposition to Aristotle who held the contrary
position. Philo speaks of a minority which loved to pervert the sense of Plato,
pretending that the universe was eternal both as to the past and the future
(Cicero, Tusc. Disp. 1. 70; Philo, De aetern. mundi 13).14 Dörrie speaks of the
surprising lack of a sense of tradition among the new school at Alexandria
where Platonism was rising like a Phoenix out of the ashes, and notes that in
Cicero’s translation of the Timaios at times he is inclined to take Plato literally,
at other times in a symbolic way.15
Further illumination on the individual characteristics of Plutarch’s Platoniz-
ing theology and correspondingly the theology of the early Imperial period has
come through the criticisms of C.J. de Vogel on Dörrie’s Plutarchan and Mid-
dle Platonic writings, and from the last major article Dörrie wrote on Plutarch’s
12 Die Weltentstehung, 91–93. [en: For this and other themes in Philo of Alexandria,
see now David T. Runia, & International Philo Bibliography Project, Philo of Alexan-
dria: An Annotated Bibliography 1997–2006 with Addenda for 1987–1996 (Leiden: Brill,
2012)].
13 “Le platonisme de Plutarque,” 524, 527–529.
14 “Le renouveau du Platonisme,” 20.
15 “Le renouveau du Platonisme,” 19. T. Tobin, The Creation of Man. Philo and the History
of Interpretation (Washington, 1983) notes that since Panaitios and Poseidonios show
interest in the Timaios, Dörrie’s date of 70–60bc for Plutarch’s renewed interest is too late;
he suggests the latter part of the 2nd Cent. bc (note 45). He notes too (44) that Cicero,
who probably translated the Timaios into Latin in 45 bc, is unaware of the philosophical
developments either in Eudoros or Timaios Lokros, and that Cicero’s Pythagoreanism
reflects, instead, that of Publius Nigidius Figulus (98–45bc).
religious philosophy.16 Dörrie’s approach was in fact not very consistent. On the
one hand he saw Plutarch sizing up Plato with a fresh eye, an inheritor of the
ruins of the Academy after Sulla’s attack on Athens, which destroyed the last
vestiges of the school tradition, if it were alive until then, and permitted new
descendants of Plato to rise, a fresh generation unshackled by dogmatism and
carrying the Timaios under their arm like a Bible. Gone too was the religious
indifference of the New Academy.17 But while noting that Plutarch pushed Pla-
tonism in the direction of transcendence and a personal God, Dörrie also con-
tinued to characterize him as an immanentist who rejected the Platonic Ideas
and preferred the innate logos of the universe. Dörrie, who always fought for
the Alexandrian influence on Platonism of this time and especially of Eudoros,
noted that Pythagoreans of the Hellenistic period neither seemed acquainted
with the Timaios or were interested in analogous questions. In his view it was
Eudoros who originated the telos formula (God as the destiny of man) with its
emphasis on likeness to God (ὁμοίωσις).18 Then Dörrie came to treat Middle and
Later Platonism under a suspiciously categorical division, nous-transcendence
vs. logos-immanence.19 His assertion that the literal understanding of Plutarch
had to be tempered with attention to ambivalence of expression which sug-
gested transcendence, did not entirely set matters right. Plutarch as a Diesseit-
igkeit theologian revealed apparent disdain for the Ideas and an “old fashioned”
approach toward philosophy, anchored in the phraseology and thought of the
Hellenistic interpreters of Plato.20
16 “Der sogennante Mittelplatonismus,” 277–302. Among Dörrie’s articles bearing on her

study are the following: “Der Platoniker Eudoros,” 25–39; “Zum Ursprung der neuplatonis-
chen Hypostasenlehre,” Hermes 82 (1954) 331–342 (= idem, Platonica Minora, 286–296);
“Die Frage nach dem Transzendenten im Mittelplatonismus,” in Fondation Hardt (ed.), Les
sources de Plotin (Vandœuvres-Geneva, 1960) 191–223 [= idem, Platonica Minora, 211–228];
“Die Erneuerung des Platonismus;” “Die Stellung Plutarchs;” “Logos-Religion? Oder Nous-
Theologie? Die hauptsächlichen Aspekte des kaiserzeitlichen Platonismus,” in J. Mans-
feld & L.M. De Rijk (eds.), Kephalaion. Studies in Greek Philosophy and its Continuation
(Assen, 1975) 115–136; Von Platon zum Platonismus. Ein Bruch in der Überlieferung und seine
Überwindung (Opladen, 1976); “Der Platonismus in der Kultur- und Geistesgeschichte der
frühen Kaiserzeit,” in idem, Platonica Minora, 166–210.
17 “Der Platoniker Eudoros,” 299.
18 “Der Platoniker Eudoros,” 305–307. See also L.J. Simms, Plutarch’s Knowledge of Rome (Diss.
Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill 1974); and R. Flacelière, “Rome et ses empereurs vus
par Plutarque,” ac 32 (1963) 28–47.
19 “Logos-Religion? Oder Nous-Theologie?,” 130.
20 “Die Stellung Plutarchs,” 52, 54. Dillon, The Middle Platonists, 155, believes that the stirrings
of negative theology in Alexandrian Platonism influenced Philo, not vice-versa. Dillon
The matter did not sit well with C.J. de Vogel, who took issue with Dörrie
in his own Festschrift. First she attempted to clarify Plato’s own position. For
her Plato always remained a philosopher of transcendence himself. Though
offering a self-critique in the Parmenides he never abandoned his beloved
theory of Ideas. In her view more than the Timaios was behind the Platonic
revival of the end of the first century bc, as indicated by Cicero’s translations
of the whole Plato not just the Timaios, the strong interest in the Phaidon, and
Philo’s great interest in Plato’s famous middle dialogues. Being in Rome and
having studied philosophy at a younger age, under masters now much older,
Cicero probably had Platonic interests which no longer coincided with those
in Alexandria. Thus his attention would not have been so exclusively focused
on the Timaios as that of contemporary Platonists elsewhere. In any case, these
things would only be fermenting during Cicero’s life and in full swing after his
death.
De Vogel considers Philo the first to introduce a transcendental God. One
might ask, too, though she does not raise the question, whether the strong
tradition of a transcendental God in the Jewish community at Alexandria
did not contribute somewhat to the new conceptions generating in that city.
But she finds Philo disturbingly traditional in his language: God is the mind
of the universe (ὁ τῶν ὅλων νοῦς, De opificio mundi 2), and in her view the
intelligible paradeigma of the kosmos noetos exists in θεοῦ λόγος, the divine
logos, to be distinguished from a creative, still transcendent logos (De opificio
mundi 7.25).21
It is the modern interpreters like W. Theiler, an unhealthy influence on
Dörrie, who perverted the sense of the Timaios.22 In her view the Demiourgos
is the personification of the creative power, on the level of transcendent being,
and not equatable with the world-soul, even if the theistic concept of God from
later Platonism is lacking in Plato. This interpretation puts the whole question
of the Demiourgos in the Timaios on a new footing and is most convincing. One
must admit, though, that the dividing line between a transcendental nous and
treats the matter in idem, “The Nature of God in the Quod Deus,” in D. Winston &
J.M. Dillon (eds.), Two Treatises of Philo of Alexandria (Chico, California, 1983) 217–228.
Citing Abr. 202–204 and Spec. 2.54–55, he notes that Philo attributed to God eupatheia (in
ordinary Greek, “good feeling,” “enjoyment,” but for the Stoics, a good state of the passions).
He adds that this was something the Stoics apparently never did, since for them “God” was
an impersonal force (224–226).
21 “Der sogennante Mittelplatonismus,” 278–280.
22 “Plotin zwischen Platon und Stoa,” in Fondation Hardt (ed.), Les sources de Plotin, 63–86;
65 cited here.
a nous which is the higher part of the world soul, and like all intelligible reality
by nature detachable from matter, is rather thin. It is also difficult to come to
terms with Philo’s logos, and one suspects that modern commentators give it
an independent existence beyond what Philo intended.23
As she understands Dörrie, Plutarch dispenses with transcendental para-
deigmata and rather puts the Ideas in the world-soul, thus moving the tran-
scendent into the immanent.24 But she sees this as a misinterpretation. Rather,
Plutarch’s understanding of the Timaios was correct. The Demiourgos-Creator
is the transcendent Nous, something carried even farther in Quaest. Plat. 2
where the paradeigma of Timaios 37c8 becomes God, the γεννήσας πατήρ (the
father who has begotten) in Plutarch, going far beyond the Timaios. Thus,
though never putting the Ideas in the mind of God, he virtually equated
Demiourgos, paradeigmata, Ideas, Nous. It was wrong not to credit him with
the movement toward transcendence.25
The weakness in her argument, as in fact in that of Dörrie, and to some
extent Whittaker in his article on the Platonic Question, though he is careful
to balance an immanentist text with a transcendental, is the reliance on one
or two particular texts which may have a life outside Plutarch, without being
that typical of his own position or general outlook. In favor of her position she
relies heavily on Ammonios’ speech at the end of De E, which she regards as a
Parmenidean interpretation of Plato carried à l’outrance, apparently oblivious
of Whittaker’s penetrating study of the speech.26 She finds Plutarch, in contrast
to Plato, saying that man equals soul, that man is nothing, that the phenom-
23 [en: On Plutarch’s Demiurge and his Middle Platonic context see now J. Mansfeld, “Com-
patible Alternatives: Middle Platonist Theology and the Xenophanes Reception,” in R.
van den Broek, T. Baarda & J. Mansfeld (eds.), Knowledge of God in the Graeco Roman
World (Leiden, 1988) 92–117, esp. 96; M. Bonazzi, “Eudoro di Alessandria e il Timeo di
Platone (a proposito di Simpl. In Phys. p. 181,7–30 Diels),” in F. Calabi (ed.), Arrhetos
Theos. L’ineffabilità del primo principio nel medio platonismo (Pisa, 2002) 11–34; F. Ferrari,
“Pronoia platonica e noesi noeseos aristotelica: Plutarco e l’impossibilita di una sintesi,”
in A. Pérez Jiménez, J. García López y R. Aguilar (eds.), Plutarco, Platón y Aristóteles, 63–
77; and J. Opsomer, “Demiurges in Early Imperial Platonism,” in R. Hirsch-Luipold (ed.),
Gott und die Götter bei Plutarch, 51–99; L. Roig Lanzillotta, “Dios como Padre y artífice
en Moralia de Plutarco,” in P. de Navascués, M. Crespo, A. Sáez (eds.), Filiación. Cul-
tura pagana, religión de Israel, orígenes del cristianismo, v (Madrid: Trotta, 2013) 139–156,
esp. 148–149.]
24 “Der sog. Mittelplatonismus,” 283; citing Dörrie, “Die Stellung Plutarchs,” 51–53.
25 “Der sog. Mittelplatonismus,” 284.
26 “Der sog. Mittelplatonismus,” 285; Whittaker, “Ammonius,” 185–192.
enal world has no part in being, even if the speech does not totally exclude par-
ticipation (μέθεξις). Whittaker notes the transitions from neuter to masculine
grammatical forms when Ammonios is speaking about Being.27 He means that
Ammonios moves from Being as a non-personal entity to Being equated with
a personal God. He notes the same procedure in Philo as well. His conclusion
is that the speech seems to be a genuine representation of Alexandrian Mid-
dle Platonism as it existed shortly before Plutarch, that it was influenced by
Eudoros and similar speculation, and that it was “the most sublime that con-
temporary Alexandria could offer.”
Whittaker speculated that the Septuagint version of the Bible, which trans-
lated the name given by Jahweh to Moses as “He-Who-Is,” was an important
link between Jewish speculation and Platonic philosophy.28 But one should
note that outside of the De E, including the De animae procreatione, Plutarch
does not set God up against the phenomenal world or man in the extreme form
which we see in the De E. Nor does Plutarch use “the supreme God” (ὁ ἀνωτάτω
θεός), a slightly different formation than that of Eudoros (ὁ ὑπεράνω θεός) in his
commentary on the Timaios. Rather, this phrase is reserved for Quaest. Plat. 2.
Its addition to the Platonic text suggests Alexandrian Platonism. It is difficult to
date Plutarch’s philosophical writings, but the Quaest. Plat. look more like aca-
demic exercises than the De animae procreatione, an undertaking regarded by
Plutarch himself as personal and individualistic, thus suggesting some matu-
rity.29
More representative of Plutarch’s general view would seem to be the end
of the myth in De facie or the myth of Timarchos in the De genio, where God
seems to be identified with the noeton, the Forms, and nous, and this is located
symbolically if not physically in the highest regions. This suggests a strong tran-
scendental God, though a not too personal one. There is no reason to deny that
27 [en: Besides the studies by F. Ferrari referred to above page 28, footnote 8 and page 33,
note 33, see now idem, “Le Système Des Causes Dans Le Platonisme Moyen,” Aitia 2 (2014)
185–205.]
28 “Plutarch, Platonism and Christianity,” 51. See also in the same volume Walsh, “Apuleius
and Plutarch,” 20–32, noting Apuleius’ esteem for Plutarch, and the latter’s influence
upon him. [en: On Plutarch’s acquaintance with Jewish religious practices and ideas, see
J. Geiger, “Plutarch, Dionysus, and the God of the Jews Revisited,” in L. van der Stockt et al.
(eds.), Gods, Daimones, Rituals, Myths, 211–219.]
29 Ziegler, Plutarchos, 75, would put the actual dating of the De E in the 90’s ad, but the
dramatic date is much earlier, the time of Nero’s visit, 66/67. Thus, if Plutarch is reflecting
the real character of Ammonios’ speech, he might be giving a philosophical situation of
30 years before, while modifying it somewhat to fit his present speculation.
Plutarch, as typical in his dialogues, has preserved the intellectual character of

his speaker while modifying it to meet the exigencies of an Apollinine solution
in De E.
The peculiar theological characteristics of this speech can be summarized
here. The supreme One (A-pollon) is contrasted with the many, complex,
impure, destructive, changing, abounding, unseen, dark, soundless, bringer
of oblivion, temporal, equivalent to A-idoneus (Hades). A large fragment of
Eudoros (Diels 181.7–30) is printed in J.M. Dillon’s work on Middle Platonism
and in T. Tobin’s recent study of Philo.30 In it a One, the first principle tran-
scending the principles of existent things, called the supreme God (ὁ ὑπεράνω
θεός) establishes the second One and its opposite, and from the second one the
elements (στοιχεῖα) derive. The second One is the ordered, limited, knowable,
male, odd, right, and light; that opposed is the disordered, unlimited, unknow-
able, female, even, left, and darkness. This second One is the Monad opposed
to the Dyad.
Ammonios seems to be describing God-One in terms of both Eudoros’
supreme and second One. Plutarch may have simplified for popular purposes.
Further links with Alexandria are the expression that we have no part in Being,
a statement which appears in Philo (De Iosepho 125). Whittaker has noted
the contemporary Pythagorean parallels. Baltes even suggests that the Neopy-
thagorean Timaios Lokros, On the Nature of the Soul and the Universe, was actu-
ally written in late first century bc Alexandria.31 In it a supreme transcendent
Nous is followed by an Idea, the model or archetype of the visible world stand-
ing between Nous and the kosmos.
Ammonios’ speech, however, does not treat God as Nous, and at first sight
seems to exclude patterning after the divine (Ἡμῖν μὲν γὰρ ὄντως τοῦ εἶναι μέτε-
στιν οὐδέν …, 392a). But the sun is His visible image, offering reflections and
appearances (ἐμφάσεις τινὰς καὶ εἴδωλα) of the divine benevolence and blessed-
ness (393e). This warm anthropomorphism may be a Plutarchan touch going
30 Dillon, The Middle Platonists, 126–127; Tobin, The Creation of Man, 14. See also Winston &
Dillon, Two Treatises of Philo of Alexandria, esp. J.M. Dillon, “The Nature of God in the Quod
Deus,” 217–228, and commentary, 273–358. H. Diels, Simplicii in Aristotelis Physicorum
Libros Quattuor Priores Commentarii (Berlin, 1883) 181, 10ff. (ad Arist., Physica 188 a 19):
κατὰ τὸν ἀνωτάτω λόγον φατέον τοὺς Πυθαγορικοὺς τὸ ἓν ἀρχὴν τῶν πάντων λέγειν, κατὰ δὲ
τὸν δεύτερον λόγον δύο ἀρχὰς τῶν ἀποτελουμένων εἶναι, τό τε ἓν καὶ τὴν ἐναντίαν τούτῳ φύσιν.
ὑποτάσσεσθαι δὲ πάντων τῶν κατὰ ἐναντίωσιν ἐπινοουμένων τὸ μὲν ἀστεῖον τῷ ἑνί, τὸ δε φαῦλον
τῇ πρὸς τοῦτο ἐναντιουμένῃ φύσει.
31 M. Baltes, Timaios Lokros. Über die Natur des Kosmos und der Seele (Leiden, 1972) 23. See
Tobin, The Creation of Man, note 53.
beyond the cold, principle-oriented terminology of Alexandrian Eudoros, as is

the more theistic, Apollinine description of the One-God at the close of the
speech. Elsewhere the harsh impersonalism of τὸ θεῖον, ἕν, ὄν (the divine, one,
being) is broken by θεός (God) only once and by a few masculine pronouns in
393a–c.
De Vogel was not entirely fair in the way she presented an immanentist
Plutarch in Dörrie’s writings, partly because he tended to describe positions
schematically, thus leaving out some nuances which might obfuscate the over-
all scheme. In his talk for the Budé Congress, he expressed his caution in tak-
ing Plutarch literally, depicting him as old-fashioned, that is, Hellenistic in not
restricting his concept of the kosmos through the antithesis between corporeal
and transcendental world, but advanced in looking for a destiny of the soul out-
side this world (soteria), in rejecting the Hellenistic view that philosophy was
the art of living well, and in the personalization of the Nous which makes the
creator stand apart from creation.32
Dörrie’s final major article on Plutarch’s religious thought in Mélanges Quis-
pel is far more comprehensive than one might deduce from the title, “Gnostic
Traces in Plutarch,” obviously reflecting years of thought on Plutarch’s religious
philosophy.33 He even gives a comprehensive sweep of developments from the
death of Plato through Plutarch. Dörrie surprisingly returns to Poseidonios as
the foundation for both Plutarch’s eschatology and Gnostic systems.34 In his
description of the early Hellenistic period, there is no literary trace extant of
Plato’s concern about the contamination of the good through evil. The earlier
Stoics, in fact, saw no problem, maintaining the fundamental axiom that what
was in accordance with nature was also in accordance with reason, and could
not be threatened by the irrational. But as the complacent assertions of Zeno
and Chrysippos dissolved in the later Hellenistic period, Poseidonios was will-
ing to stake out the necessary conclusions. Eschatology, uninteresting to the
optimistic this-worldliness of the early Hellenistic period, which saw philos-
ophy as a guide to life, suddenly became a concern.35 While using traditional
Stoic language, Poseidonios broke with that world. The soul was now not a unity
but a duality, a combination of pathos and logos which could be separated from
the body and continue at least for a time in an independent existence after
death.36
32 Le platonisme de Plutarque, 524, 527–529.

33 “Gnostische Spuren,” 92–117.
34 “Gnostische Spuren,” 95. For Plutarch’s debt to the Stoics, see the masterly study of Babut,
Plutarque et le stoïcisme.
35 “Gnostische Spuren,” 97.
This impulse, not the dialogues of Plato, was the primary influence on
Plutarch, and brought him into relationship with the Gnostics.37 Like Poseido-
nios, Plutarch believed in the creeping degeneration of the kosmos, including
humanity, which was becoming incapable of understanding the manifesta-
tions of logos in cult, rites, and customs. Only by gaining knowledge (gnosis)
could one participate in the knowledge of God, even if Plutarch did not explic-
itly link salvation (soteria) with gnosis.38 The statement on Plutarch’s belief in
the creeping degeneration of humanity will strike most readers of Plutarch as
exaggerated, and can hardly find much support in his work. Dörrie goes on
to find similarities between Plutarch and Philo, thus suggesting that he was
regarding Plutarch now as more of a “transcendental” theologian. Plutarch’s
εὐλάβεια (respect, caution, reserve), however, in dealing with the divine led
to understatement, allusion, symbolism, and disjointedness in place of simple
rational clarity, an irresistible bait to commentators inclined to overinterpreta-
tion.39 Even his eschatological systems become a form of understatement, but
thereby compatible with both Stoic-Poseidonian cosmology and contemporary
Platonic speculation.40
Dörrie’s description of the daimones and the ascent of the soul deserves
special attention. Even if oversimplified in its exclusion of special cases, it is
most accurate for the general picture it draws, in an area often drowned in
fog. The daimones are nothing else than purified souls who act as helpers and
guardians in the destiny of men, a principal theme for Plutarch, but marginal
in comparison to his overriding themes, one of which is the purification and
the ascent of the soul. Thus, daimonology is founded on his eschatology. The
main theme is the purification and ascent of the soul, not through repentance
or conversion, nor bestowed through an act of grace, nor earned through some
great accomplishment, nor dominated by fear, but based on fixed conditions
attached to the purity of the soul, which according to its nature accelerates the
soul toward the region of the sun faster or slower, a process which applies to all
souls sooner or later.41
Dörrie once more approached the problem of transcendence and imma-
nence. He still leaned toward immanence, feeling that Plutarch, like Plato
would deny that the Good could be contaminated or corrupted by matter, and
was reluctant to admit an evil principle or soul, which could only exist not as a

dumb idiot but as the most ingenious deviser of an evil creation.42 The famous
Quaest. Plat. 2 (1001bc) was given a fresh look. While speaking about the soul
as a part of God, Dörrie also interpreted it “as the substance of the father is in
the child.” Whittaker has in fact devoted considerable attention to this passage,
and like Dörrie is concerned with the problems of immanence and transcen-
dence. For Whittaker it represents the search for a compromise between Stoic
immanentism and excessive transcendentalism, represented by the unknowa-
bility of God. The last idea he dates to the time of Cicero, seeing it reflected
in Cicero’s tendentious translation (or mistranslation) of Timaios 28c 3–5: “it
would be impossible to declare him (the creator) to all mankind” as “the con-
cept of the creator cannot be expressed in words” (in Timaeo patrem huius
mundi nominari neget posse).43 Whittaker would then take Plutarch’s imma-
nentist assertion as a commonplace of this time, balanced by the transcenden-
talism of Middle Platonism.44 This, in Plutarch’s time still optimistic, taught the
doctrine of assimilation to God (ὁμοίωσις θεῷ).45 The allegorical interpretation
of the Timaios would be an attempt to syncretize Plato and Aristotle, who in
the outlook of the time were considered as teaching fundamentally the same
doctrine.
Dörrie’s interpretation is validated by comparison with a passage in De sera
559c, where speaking of the crimes of parents being punished through their
children, Plutarch asserts that the son is a part (μέρος) of the father, created
out of him (ἐξ αὐτοῦ), not by him (ἀπ’ αὐτοῦ). We would say that the child
carries the genes of the father. As Plutarch puts it, the child carries around in
himself a part of the father (ἔχει τι καὶ φέρεται). In any case this is different than
saying that the human mind is nothing more than a piece of the divine nous.
This terminology has some bearing on the De animae procreatione where the
nous of the world soul seems to come from the divine nous. Repeating parts
of Timaios 36e–37a, Plutarch does not assert that the nous of the world soul
is a part of God or of the divine nous, but in a more vague way, that out of
the disorderly soul (precosmic soul) and the “most excellent being yonder”
(which Cherniss would take as the “indivisible being” of Timaios 35a 1–2),
the Demiourgos produced a rational and orderly soul, and from himself (ἀπ’

43 “Plutarch, Platonism and Christianity,” 51.
44 [en: On the issue see now M. Vorwerk, “Maker or Father?: the Demiurge from Plutarch
to Plotinus,” in R.D. Mohr and B.M. Sattler (ed.), One Book, The Whole Universe: Plato’s
Timaeus Today (Las Vegas/Zurich/Athens: Parmenides Publishing, 2010) 79–100.]
45 “Plutarch, Platonism and Christianity,” 56.
αὐτοῦ) provided intellectuality (τὸ νοερόν) as a form (εἶδος) for the sense and
motive powers of the world soul.46 Plutarch omits the ἐξ αὐτοῦ which appears
in Quaest. Plat. 2.47
The second text for Dörrie’s immanentist Plutarch had been De Iside 373ac,
where Plutarch implies that logos does not lose its value when it comes into
matter, but matter gains something.48 Dörrie links this statement with the cre-
ation of the world in time and Plato’s conviction of the incorruptibility of the
Good.49 However, just as the Platonica Quaestio raises difficulties if treated as
Plutarch’s original thought, so does the De Iside passage. Griffiths and Hani
trace most of the sources to the early and middle Hellenistic periods of ram-
pant immanentism.50 Platonizing interpretations seem to have had a long
history in Alexandria. Hani, who interprets this passage as Platonic in inspi-
ration, is reluctant to deny it a real foundation in Egyptian religion and the-
ologizing. The seemingly fevered, pure Greek speculation (373bc) suggests in
46 Plutarch’s Moralia xiii, Part 1, 143 and 201, on De animae procr. 1016c: Plutarch makes the
demiourgos (craftsman) identical with the “indivisible being.” In Cherniss’ interpretation
of Plutarch, God is the νοῦς (intellect) par excellence. Cf. Quaest. Plat. 1002b (ὁ γὰρ θεὸς ἐν
τοῖς νοητοῖς).
47 [en: On Quaest. Plat. 2 see Ferrari, “Le Système Des Causes”; Roig Lanzillotta, “Dios como
Padre y artífice”; and Vorwerk, “Maker or Father?”].
48 Plutarch really says that the intelligible, good, being (τὸ γὰρ ὂν καὶ νοητὸν καὶ ἀγαθόν)
is superior to change and destruction (373a). The analogy is that the soul of Osiris is
everlasting, but his body Typhon often breaks apart and disperses. [en: G. Casadio, “La
nozione di religione nel De Iside Et Osiride di Plutarco e lo studio scientifico della Reli-
gione,” in U. Bianchi (ed.), The Notion of Religion in Comparative Research. Selected Pro-
ceedings of the xvith Congress of the International Association for the History of Reli-
gions, Rome 3rd–8th September, 1990 (Rome: L’Erma di Bretschneider, 1994) 349–354; idem,
“Strategia delle citazioni nel De Iside et Osiride: un platonico greco di fronte a una cul-
tura religiosa altra,” in G. D’Ippolito & I. Gallo (eds.), Strutture formali dei Moralia di
Plutarco. Atti del iii Convegno plutarcheo. Palermo 3–5 maggio 1989 (Naples: D’Auria, 1991)
257–271; N. Brout, “Au carrefour entre la philosophie grecque et les religions barbares:
Typhon dans le De Iside de Plutarque,” Revue de Philosophie Ancienne 22 (2004) 71–94;
G. Sfameni Gasparro, “Tra δεισιδαιμονία e ἀθεότης: I percorsi della religione filosofica di
Plutarco,” in A. Pérez Jiménez et al. (eds.), Valori letterari delle opere di Plutarco, 163–
183.]
49 “Gnostische Spuren,” 113. Plutarch’s application of this formula to the monarch has been
studied by G.F. Chesnut, “The Ruler and the Logos,” in anrw ii.16.2 (1978) 1310–1332; 1321–
1324 on Plutarch.
50 Griffiths, De Iside et Osiride, introduction; Hani, La religion égyptienne, 20–21, 248–250, 252;
see also E. Chassinat, Le mystère d’ Osiris au mois de Khoiak i–ii (Cairo, 1966–1968).
his view an essentially correct reading of Egyptian theology, the preexistence

of a primordial god (Haroueris) in the chaos.51 The reading even leads one to
suspect that the germ of Plutarch’s precosmic soul in De animae procreatione
may be a Platonic interpretation of the Isis myth. But Hani, who does not sug-
gest this himself, notes a difference as well: Plutarch speaks of an “evil soul,” in
the De animae procreatione, not the dual, primeval animation of matter such
as appears in the De Iside passage.52 Faced with deciding between original-
ity in Plutarch’s Platonic interpretation for the De Iside, or traditional Platonic
interpretations developed in Alexandria, Hani leans toward previous allegori-
cal speculation in a Platonic vein by Egyptian priests or Alexandrian scholars.53
Thus, two principal texts dissolve somewhat, the Platonica Quaestio, which may
be a kind of school exercise, and the De Iside passage, which may be to some
extent a reporting of Alexandrian Hellenistic Platonizing.
The Academic, philosophical treatises of the Moralia are often considered
early in the chronology of Plutarch’s writings. References to historical persons
in the De Iside would put this essay toward the end of Plutarch’s career. There
may be, then, a long span between Quaest. Plat. 2 and the essay on Isis religion.
K. Ziegler notes that Plutarch was young when he went to Egypt and there is no
evidence he ever returned.54 In contrast, he had close associations with Athens,
and perhaps access to different works than those at Alexandria, even works
or copies from the old Academy library. Only indirectly, then, would he have
kept himself informed of religious and philosophical developments in Alexan-
dria. Among the mature religious writings the most avant-garde passage is the
eschatological scene of De genio (591ac). Four principles (archai) exist in the
celestial region: life, motion, birth, decay (ζωή, κίνησις, γένησις, φθορά). The first
is linked to the second by Monas at the invisible (ἀόρατον), the second to the
third by Nous at the sun, the third to the fourth by Physis at the moon, while
the Moirai, daughters of Ananke, hold the keys and preside over each link. In
Dörrie’s analysis of this conception, we find an anticipation of the gradation of
being found later in Plotinos. He would note that the three female κλειδοῦχοι
(holders of the keys), who are gate keepers, have a close relationship to Gnos-
tic conceptions, something not remarked upon before.55 Even so, Plutarch’s
51 La religion égyptienne, 248–249.

52 La religion égyptienne, 250.
53 La religion égyptienne, 252.
54 Plutarchos von Chaironeia, 18: trip to Alexandria.
55 [en: On the issue see now L. Roig Lanzillotta, “Plutarch of Chaeronea and the Gnostic
Worldview: Middle Platonism and the Nag Hammadi Library,” in J.M. Candau Morón,
fantasy comes from Stoic-Poseidonian cosmology and contemporary Platonic

speculation, playing with imagery from Plato (Politeia 617c). But Plutarch in
Dörrie’s view does not create a transcendental realm outside the kosmos, thus
remaining long removed himself from Neoplatonic ontology. No transcenden-
tal Being, much less a kosmos noetos, is settled in those distant realms.56
It is difficult to go all the way with Dörrie here. The Timarchos myth of the
De genio does not treat the final destiny of the souls, though the best daimon-
souls are identified with the stars. It is inconceivable that Plutarch would not
in symbolic terms have put the noeton outside the visible universe, such as
is suggested at the end of the myth in De facie (944e). Perhaps Plutarch’s
silence after the mention of the separation of nous from psyche is due to an
unwillingness to repeat Plato’s vision of the Forms, combined with a feeling
that the Ideas really were in a supreme Nous, perhaps as his thoughts, the
paradeigmata from which he worked, the kosmos noetos, and that the central
Ideas, Good, Beautiful, and the concept of One, were identifiable with this
Nous-God. If Plutarch’s epheton (the desirable), and so forth, is also the One, as
in De E, then, presumably the human nous contemplates it at the non-visible,
that is, above the sun. However, only “better” daimones qualify for the latter, and
the sun is never said to be the “Heimat” of the nous or daimon.57 It is rather the
visible image of the Epheton-Kalon-Theion-Makarion (the Desirable, Beautiful,
Divine, Blessed), which releases nous from psyche.58 In De genio 591b Monas has
F.J. González Ponce & A.L. Chávez Reino (eds.), Plutarco como Transmisor. Actas del
Simposio internacional de la sociedad española de Plutarquistas. Sevilla, 12–14 de noviembre
de 2009 (Seville: Secr. de Publicaciones de la Universidad de Sevilla, 2011) 401–417, esp. 409;
idem, “Plutarch’s Anthropology and its Influence on His Cosmological Framework,” in
M. Meeussen & L. Van der Stock (eds.), Aspects of Plutarch’s Natural Philosophy (Leuven,
2015) 179–195, es 189–191.]
57 Dörrie may have been misled by a false reading of the text De facie 944e. In “Gnostische
Spuren,” 110, he states: “Es besteht die beruhigende Gewißheit, daß eine jede Seele zur
rechten Zeit den Mond, und daß ein jeder Geist zur rechten Zeit seine Heimat, die Sonne,
erreichen wird; …”
58 H. Cherniss and W.C. Helmbold, Plutarch’s Moralia xii (London and Cambridge, Mass.,
1968), 213. Cherniss notes that the main inspiration is Politeia 507–509, but the thought
is echoed in De Iside 372e; De E 393e; Ad princip. inerud. 780f, 781f; Quaest. Plat. 1006f–
1007a. The last part of the sentence, with the notion of striving after the good, and the
term ἐφετόν are derived from Aristotle, Phys. 1.9 and Metaph. 11.7. One might think of
syncretized Platonism before Plutarch. The passage is reflected in De Iside 372ef and
Amator. 770b. At Amator. 766a Plutarch suggests a vision of the form of the Beautiful after
death (ἐκεῖ γὰρ ἀνακλᾶται πρὸς τὸ θεῖον καὶ νοητὸν καλόν· ὁρατοῦ δὲ σώματος ἐντυχὼν κάλλει
a symbolic position above Nous, but Nous, though joining kinesis and genesis
at the sun, is not explicitly said to reside there.59
καὶ χρώμενος οἷον ὀργάνῳ τινὶ τῆς μνήμης ἀσπάζεται καὶ ἀγαπᾷ, …) but as in Philo, there is
never a clear assertion. Moreover, the vision theme is heavily influenced by Plutarch’s
model, the Symposion, while θεῖον and νοητόν are redolent of Middle Platonism. After
death, at 766b, the lover associates with ta kala, but then returns to another earthly
existence, as though there were no real vision of a single kalon, nor any escape from the
cycle.
59 [en: On Plutarch’s interpretation of Plato’s cosmology, see Sven-Tage Teodorsson, “Plu-
tarch’s Interpretation of Plato’s Cosmology: Plausible Exegesis or Misrepresentation?,”
in Luc van der Stockt et al. (eds.), Gods, Daimones, Rituals, Myths, 419–435; also Roig
Lanzillotta, “Plutarch’s Anthropology and its Influence,” 179–195.]
chapter 4
Plutarch’s Daimonology
A controversial point for interpretation is Plutarch’s demonology (in his case

it is almost better to speak of “daimonology”). Normally scholars treating it
as part of the general philosophical movement of his day tend to credit him
with belief in daimonological theories and the intrusion of evil daimones into
human life to a higher degree than those whose principal object is to study
Plutarch himself. Thus, one finds less reluctance to stress his belief in daimones
among people like Merlan, and Dillon, than among Ziegler, Griffiths, Flacelière,
and Russell. Babut, who carefully analyzes the evidence, seems swayed by his
own general belief in Plutarch’s growing tolerance for Stoic views, and accepts
the rather old opinion of increasing credulity regarding evil daimones.1
1 On this see my articles: Brenk, “ ‘A Most Strange Doctrine,’” 1–11; and idem, “Le songe de Bru-
tus,” 588–594. Authors on the subject are split between attributing to Plutarch views of speak-
ers (and thus misrepresenting him at times), looking for a solution in relative chronology, or
cautiously treating the matter as rather hypothetical and tentative in Plutarch, i.e., more a
view of others than himself. The development theory appears in Volkmann, Erbse, Moeller-
ing, and Babut, but poses many problems. An early protest against overstressing Plutarch’s use
of daimonology, and in particular attributing to him a belief in evil daimones as a powerful
force of evil in the world, is that of Eisele, “Zur Dämonologie Plutarchs,” 28–51, but his concept
of daimon in Plutarch is too restricted. His opinion that the real demonic power was the pre-
cosmic soul comes close to Dillon’s analysis. An exaggerated position can be found in Hirzel,
Der Dialog, 157, following upon Zeller’s systematization of the speech of Kleombrotos, and a
work repeating Zeller by Pohl, Die Dämonologie des Plutarch (Breslau, 1859), and can be found
in R. Volkmann, Leben, Schriften und Philosophie des Plutarch (Berlin, 1869) ii, 247–323. Trench
and Fabricius, Zur religiösen Anschauungsweise did not give it much attention. Hirzel called it
“der eigentliche Mittelpunkt von Plutarchs religiösen Ansichten.” Influenced by this view are
M. Pohlenz, Vom Zorne Gottes (Göttingen, 1909) 136–137; R.M. Jones, The Platonism of Plutarch,
39; Latzarus, Les idées religieuses; E. Seillière, “La religion de Plutarque,” Séances et Travaux de
l’ Académie des Sciences Morales 181 (1921) 422–434. The culmination of this line of thought is
G. Soury, La démonologie de Plutarque (Paris, 1942) which contains much exaggeration and
serious defects in methodology, though very interesting. Much is given to Oriental influence.
Ziegler, Plutarchos, 304, was very cautious, as were M.P. Nilsson, Geschichte der griechischen
Religion ii (Munich, 1951) 403; R. Flacelière (in a running battle with Soury in the pages of
reg) “Plutarque, prêtre de Delphes,” reg 55 (1942) 50–69; idem, “Plutarque et la Pythie,” reg
56 (1943) 72–111; and V. Goldschmidt, “Les thèmes du De defectu oraculorum de Plutarque,”reg
61 (1948) 298–302. The account by Merlan, “The Later Academy and Platonism,” 53–64, is very
misleading and contains some patently false statements about the use of demons to solve

In reality, if allowances are made for individual speakers, reporting of opin-

ions, eschatological coloring, and tolerance of the views of others, there is not
much with which to label Plutarch a demonologist, in the sense of one who uses
evil daimones to solve most problems. One can find as much hostility toward
the belief in the power of evil daimones, as tolerance; and in general Plutarch is
more interested in the age-old belief in daimones as disincarnate human souls,
a belief which can easily be related to the association of nous with daimon, as
found in Plato, and probably common since his time.2
problems (63). Babut, and Griffiths, De Iside et Osiride, though balanced, do not challenge
some of Soury’s assumptions. A more satisfactory account in this regard is Russell, Plutarch,
78. Dillon, The Middle Platonists, 216–221, notes that he is treating views of speakers, but one
still feels that systematization and the influence of Neoplatonism upon his treatment give a
somewhat misleading impression of the importance of evil daimones in Plutarch’s general
religious philosophy. However, balance is achieved by excellent treatment on the problem of
evil in Plutarch. The introduction by A. Corlu to Le démon de Socrate is primarily concerned
with the guardian daimones. For daimones in general one can consult Andres, re Suppl. iii
(1918) 267–322, and Waser, re iv (1901) 2010–2012, and the articles in Reallexikon für Antike und
Christentum: J. Ter Vrugt-Lentz, “Geister (Dämonen) ii. Vorhellenistisches Griechenland,” ix
(1974) 598–615, and C. Zintzen, iiic. “Hellenistische und kaiserzeitliche Philosophie,” ix (1974)
640–668. Ter Vrugt-Lentz traces a movement from dynamism through a personal guardian or
evil spirit to identifying daimon with tyche. Zintzen is impressed by the role of Xenokrates
in the development after Plato to Neoplatonism. Worthwhile are the appropriate sections in
Nilsson. The daimonology can be found in Vernière, Symboles et mythes, 38–40, and 249–262.
She is influenced by Soury and repeats Flacelière’s hypothesis of growing disaffection for dai-
mones in Plutarch.
2 [en: See more recently: Y. Vernière, “Nature et Fonction des Démons chez Plutarque,” in
J. Ries (ed.), Anges et Démons (Louvain-la-Neuve: Centre d’histoire des religions, 1989) 241–
252; M.I. Méndez Lloret, “El Démon: La inteligencia en el Mundo,” Faventia 15 (1993) 23–38; D.
O’Brien, “Empedocles: the Wandering Daimon and the Two Poems,” Aevum Antiquum 11 (2001)
79–179; C. Martínez Maza, “La Cristianización de los démones Mistéricos,” in Pérez Jiménez &
Casadesús (eds.), Misticismo y religiones mistéricas en la obra de Plutarco, 165–177; R. Turcan,
“Les démons et la crise du paganisme Gréco-Romain,”Revue de Philosophie Ancienne 21 (2003)
33–54; E. Almagor, “The king’s daimon (Plut. Art. 15.7) reconsidered,” in L. van der Stockt et al.
(eds.), Gods, Daimones, Rituals, Myths, 31–40; J.A. Fernández Delgado, “Héroes, enigmas y edad
de los démones, de Hesíodo a Plutarco: la intertextualidad fragmentada,” in L. van der Stockt
et al. (eds.), Gods, Daimones, Rituals, Myths, 163–175; G.M.A. Margagliotta, Il demone di Socrate
nelle interpretazioni di Plutarco e Apuleio (Bautz, 2012); D.S. Kalleres, “‘Oh, Lord, Give This
One a Daimon so That He May No Longer Sin’: The Holy Man and His Daimones in Hagiogra-
phy,” Archiv für Religionsgeschichte 14 (2012) 205–235; J.F. Finamore, “Plutarch and Apuleius
on Socrates’ daimonion,” in D.A. Layne & H.A.S. Tarrant (eds.), The Neoplatonic Socrates.
Papers Exploring the Portrait of Socrates Developed by the Platonists in the First Six Cents.
a.d. (Philadelphia (Pa.): University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014) 36–50; C. Addey, Crystal,
plutarch’s daimonology 45
The hostility toward this belief in the power of evil daimones can possibly
be observed in De superstitione 168c where the superstitious believe in the
ambiguously stated “attacks of god or daimon.” At 171c speaking about the
sacrifice of children at Carthage, he seems acquainted with the belief that
human sacrifice is offered to appease evil daimones, and that apotropaic rites
are associated with beings of this nature. The passage here is repeated almost
verbatim in the Life of Pelopidas 21, where a dream commands the hero, before
the battle of Leuktra, to sacrifice a virgin to the shades of the daughters of
Skedasos. The world is ruled by a good God, the father of us all, not by Titans
and Typhons, and it would be the height of folly to believe in the power of
such creatures. In De stoic. repugn. 1051c, a passage not cited by G. Soury, who
finds daimones everywhere in Plutarch, Plutarch associates the theory of evil
daimones particularly with Chrysippos, whose theories on providence he could
not share. Here a belief in evil daimonia, the term Chrysippos seems to use, is
rejected as contradictory to the notion of divine providence.3
An exposition of daimonological theory, in which Xenokrates seems to play
a large role, is given in De defectu and De Iside, and it colors the eschatology of
De genio and De facie. More serious perhaps is its appearance in the speech
of Ammonios at the end of De E, though a different conception emerges
than that of the other dialogues. The interpretation here depends to some
extent on Flacelière’s understanding of De defectu as one in which Plutarch
plays with certain hypothetical views, a dialogue followed by De E and De
Pythiae oraculis.4 The question of this first dialogue is why the oracle has
ceased to function. A solution is offered by a Spartan named Kleombrotos who
applies daimonology and comes to the conclusion that the daimones who were
“The daimonion of Socrates: daimones and Divination in Neoplatonism,” Layne & Tarrant
(eds.), The Neoplatonic Socrates, 51–72.]
3 Plutarch quotes from the third book of Chrysippos’ Peri Ousias: oversights in divine provi-
dence are like a few grains of wheat overlooked in a well-run household, or evil daimonia have
been set over some good men, and much ananke has been mixed in; Plutarch counters that
all three solutions (using the term daimones rather than daimonia) contradict providence
(svf ii, 1178). Babut notes (Plutarque et le stoïcisme, 17) that Plutarch is typical of his period
in seeming to treat the history of Stoicism as stopping with Chrysippos. For Chrysippos in
general, see J.B. Gould, The Philosophy of Chrysippus (Leiden, 1970). The passage is treated
by Babut, 290–293; F.H. Sandbach, The Stoics (London, 1975) 101–108, discusses Chrysippos’
problems on fate, and suggests what he might have said in reply.
4 Plutarque et la Pythie, 72, and more recently in Plutarque. Œuvres morales vi, Dialogues
pythiques (Paris, 1974) 40, he puts the date as late as 125 ad, and repeats his earlier views on
the tentative nature of De defectu, 85–86. C.P. Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 136, would place the
essay, and Plutarch’s death, slightly earlier.
responsible for the prophecy have departed for another world. After a very
long discussion on the possibility of other worlds, Lamprias, Plutarch’s brother,
suggests that a pneuma (exhalation) is responsible for the inspiration, and that
when this gives out, as all material things must, the inspiration ceases.
Problems exist as to why Plutarch should have developed the daimonologi-
cal at such length, and why he should present the doctrine, supposedly largely
dependent upon Xenokrates, the pupil of Plato, as something strikingly new.
But there is no reason to take the daimonological theory here as representative
of his own views. Kleombrotos is dramatically ridiculed for his gullibility and
ignorance, his views are not accepted by the rest of the company, and the major
portion is given to the respectable Lamprias, as Flacelière and others have justly
noted.5 Though Lamprias is portrayed by Plutarch as inclined to the Peripatet-
ics, it is in fact striking how much Aristotelianism can be found in Plutarch, as
Soury himself, Dörrie, R.M. Jones, Dillon, Russell, and others have noted.6 Babut
5 See Eisele, Zur Dämonologie, 40–42; Flacelière, Plutarque et la Pythie, 72; and idem, Sur la
disparition des oracles (Paris, 1947) 22, 52–53, and 62–63; Goldschmidt, “Les thèmes du De
defectu oraculorum,” 298–302; Ziegler, Plutarchos, 327; Flacelière, Plutarque. Œuvres morales
vi, 88.
6 G. Soury, “Les questions de table et la philosophie religieuse de Plutarque,” reg 62 (1949) 320–
327; H. Dörrie, “Emanation,” in K. Flasch (ed.), Parusia. Studien zur Philosophie Platons und
zur Problemgeschichte des Platonismus (Frankfurt, 1965) 119–141 [= idem, Platonica Minora,
70–85]; R.M. Jones, The Platonism of Plutarch, 20; G. Verbeke, “Plutarch and the Development
of Aristotle,” in I. Düring and G.E.L. Owen (eds.), Aristotle and Plato in the Mid-Fourth Cen-
tury (Göteborg, 1960); Babut, Plutarque. De la vertu ethique, 66; S.G. Etheridge, Plutarch’s De
virtute morali. A Study in Extra-Peripatetic Aristotelianism (Diss. Harvard, 1961); M. Pinnoy,
Aristotelisme en Antistoicisme in Plutarchus ‘De virtute morali’ (Diss. unpublished Louvain,
1956); idem, De peripatetische Thema in Plutarchus De virtute morali (Louvain, 1968); Dillon,
The Middle Platonists, 195; Russell, Plutarch, 93–94; F. Becchi, “Contributo allo studio del De
virtute di Plutarco,” Stud. It. 46 (1974) 129–147; and H.G. Ingekamp, Plutarchs Schriften über
die Heilung der Seele (Göttingen, 1971). Recently more has been written on Plutarch’s Aris-
totelianism. P.L. Donini, Tre studi sull’Aristotelismo nel ii secolo d. C. (Turin, 1974) 63–125, has
stressed Plutarch’s use of Aristotelianism as not a direct reading of Aristotle, but as due to
the fact that Aristotelian themes and terminology had entered Middle Platonism before his
time. He suggests that the major intermediary was Aspasios, citing esp. De virt. mor. 443c and
Aspasios 44.13. Evidently in agreement over Plutarch’s knowledge of Aristotle through Middle
Platonism, rather than directly, is F.H. Sandbach, “Plutarch and Aristotle,” ics 7 (1982) 207–
232. After a thorough investigation of Plutarch’s citations, Sandbach concludes: “Plutarch or
his sources knew of Topica, Metaphysics, Nicomachean Ethics, Historia Animalium, Rhetoric
iii, and probably of De Caelo and De Anima. Direct acquaintance of the contents is cer-
tain only for Historia Animalium and Rhetorica iii.” (230). See also F.H. Sandbach, Aristotle
and the Stoics (Cambridge, 1985) 2, 10, 12, 14, 33, 40, 60. (Donini has been attacked by F. Bec-
suggests that Klembrotos is using Stoic ideas, but his speech is undoubtedly
a composite, and intriguing Egyptian references (the place Kleombrotos has
just returned from) suggest an Alexandrian source. Possibly someone in a cir-
cle with strong geographical interests like Eudoros is involved; for Kleombrotos
has gained his information from a holy man who lived among the Troglodytes
by the Red Sea. Eudoros was also interested in the views of Xenokrates, and it
is Xenokrates who is given center stage.7 The general tenets of the speech are
the following:
1. The origin of daimonology is uncertain: it may be either Persian in origin

(Zoroaster), Thracian (Orpheus), Egyptian, or Phrygian.
2. Among Greek literary accounts we find that Homer uses the words dai-
mon and theos indiscriminately, but Hesiod distinguishes four classes of
rational being: gods, daimones, heroes, and men, the golden race being
transformed into daimones and the demigods (ἡμίθεοι) into heroes.8
3. Others claim that the daimones are really human souls which undergo a
transformation similar to that which we see taking place in the generation
of water from earth, air from water, and fire from air; in the course of
time virtuous souls, who may have had to undergo a purgatory, come
to share completely in divinity; others which yield to temptation must
be reincarnated and lead once more a shadowy and murky mortal life,
like and exhalation (ἀλαμπῆ καὶ ἀμυδρὰν ζωὴν ὥσπερ ἀναθυμίασιν ἴσχειν
[415ac]).
chi, “Platonismo medio ed etica plutarchea,” Prometheus 7 (1981) 125–145, 263–284, holding
that Plutarch’s Aristotelian elements in De virt. mor. do not come from a Middle Platonic
source.) See also F. Becchi, “Contributi allo studio del De virtute morali di Plutarco;” and idem,
“Aristotelismo ed antistoicismo nel De virtute morali di Plutarco,” Prometheus 1 (1975) 160–
180.
7 On Xenokrates, see Krämer, Der Ursprung der Geistmetaphysik, 21–173, who sees Xenokrates
as extremely important as a thinker not just a systematizer; and H. Dörrie, “Xenokrates,” re
ix a. 2 (1967) 1512–1528. Dörrie is impressed by Xenokrates’ interest in triplets, of which the
independent race of daimones make a part. He is puzzled by Xenokrates’ fragments which
identify soul and daimon (Arist., Top. 2.6, 112a, 32; 7.1, 152a, 5, alluded to in Alex. Aphrod., 176.13,
and Apul., De deo Socr. 15, and more explicitly in the Suda, 443.32). See also M. Détienne, De la
pensée religieuse à la pensée philosophique. La notion de daïmôn dans le pythagorisme ancien
(Paris, 1963) 65, n. 4; and Dillon, The Middle Platonists, xv; 22–39.
8 Plutarch, or Xenokrates, was not all that observant in regard to the Odyssey, where the use
of daimon seems often to be an evil force, while theos represents a good one: compare 4.275,
5.396, 9.142, 10.65, 11.60, 12.169.
Though there may still be some justification in speaking of “Xenocratic”

daimones, the texts where Plutarch cites Plato’s disciple offer little certainty.
In De defectu 416d, Plutarch simply informs us that Xenokrates compared the
divine to an equilateral triangle, the mortal to a scalene, and the daimonic to
an isosceles. In De Iside 360e, Plato, Pythagoras, Xenokrates, and Chrysippos,
acting within Greek tradition, presumably Empedokles, early Pythagoreanism,
and folk-belief, taught that daimones existed which were “stronger” than men,
but not sharing fully in the divine, having a share in the nature of the soul and
the sense faculties of the body. This introduces his daimonological explanation
of mythology, which is undoubtedly a distortion of the philosopher’s thought.
Possibly all Xenokrates did was in a theoretical way with a fondness for geo-
metrical symbolism use the daimones as an illustration. As a matter of fact, he
only speaks of the “daimonic,” not daimones, in the triangle comparison.
It is possible only a small part of Kleombrotos’ speech applies to Xenokrates,
that giving their composition and comparing god, daimon, and man to equilat-
eral, isosceles, and scalene triangles (equal on every side, partly equal, partly
unequal, all sides unequal). Xenokrates probably used a traditional Greek con-
cept, as Plato did, stemming partly from cult, where at least some daimones
seemed to be neither god nor former man. We cannot really attribute any-
thing else in the speech to Xenokrates, though perhaps it is still fair to speak
of Xenocratic daimones, that is, daimones which never were, will be, or could
be human souls, even though it is uncertain whether he ever held such a doc-
trine. Xenokrates, who interpreted the Demiourgos of the Timaios symbolically
and had seen Plato turn the great daimon Eros into the great human instinct
to possess to kalon, seems an unlikely candidate for systematizing monsters
into early Hellenistic Platonism. His reductionist approach seems more likely
to have favored the daimones as disembodied human souls. With geometric-
philosophical reasoning, comparable to his work on the moon, as reported in
De facie (943f), he probably in a side-remark simply applied his technique to
a traditional element of Greek culture. Moreover, human souls without bodies
might just as well be scalene triangles as a non-human-soul intermediate being,
and the analogy might apply to them. Moreover, Plutarch in the Dion-Brutus
sees no difficulty in treating Brutus’ daimon in the introduction as a renegade
soul-daimon and in the Life itself as a folk monster.
It is the Red Sea mystic who tells Kleombrotos that Apollo, after slaying the
Delphic Python, was exiled to another world for “eight cycles of the great year,”
then returned, a daimon turned into a god.9 A digression had preceded this
9 Dörrie, Der “Weise vom Roten Meer,” 95–110. See also P. Borgeaud, “La mort du grand Pan,”
in which one friend, Demetrios, just returned from Britain, tells of the death
of daimones on an island off the coast of Britain where Kronos lies bound in
sleep. Philippos relates a story of the death of the Great Pan as an Egyptian
pilot named Thamous sailed by “the island Paxoi,” an event important enough
to catch the ear of the Emperor Tiberius, who sent his research scholars off to
investigate it.10
Much the same exposition of daimonology, though briefer, appears in De
Iside 361ef, where Isis and Sarapis are identified with Persephone and Pluto,
chthonic daimones in Kleombrotos’ speech, and where the infamous deeds of
the gods in the myths are said to be those of daimones. However, Plutarch is
offering different types of explanation leading up to his symbolic interpretation
of the Isis myth along Platonic lines. More disturbing is the end of De E where
God, symbolized by Apollo (A-pollon), or rather the good Apollo, is contrasted
with another deity or daimon, principle of birth and destruction, who should
really be called, among other names or descriptions, Plouton (Pluto; De E 394b).
However, the thought here seems to be confined to this one passage, and is
probably meant to be highly poetic and symbolic. The closest parallel might
be Plutarch’s description of Zoroastrianism in De Iside 369e–370c. The passage
contains interesting allegory along etymological lines both in the Platonic vein
of the One and the Many and the more Oriental vein of light and darkness.11
Rev. Hist. Rel. 200 (1983). 3–39. Both articles are treated in F.E. Brenk, “In the Light of
the Moon: Demonology in the Early Imperial Period,” anrw ii.16.3 (1986) 2068–2145.
Flacelière actually, though cautious, continued to maintain that Kleombrotos should be
taken seriously. See for example, “La théologie selon Plutarque,” in P. Gros and J.-P. Morel
(eds.), Mélanges de philosophie, de littérature et d’ histoire ancienne (Rome, 1974) 273–280.
10 See J. Hani, “La mort du Grand Pan,” in Association Guillaume Budé (ed.), Actes du viiie
Congrès, 511–519. For a summary of ingenious solutions to the nature of the source of the
story see Flacelière, Plutarque. Œuvres morales vi, 92–95. Most recently, Borgeaud, La mort
du grand Pan, who gives a complete summary of earlier opinion, treats the story as anti-
Roman propaganda.
11 On allegorical interpretation in Plutarch see F. Wehrli, Zur Geschichte der allegorischen
Deutung Homers (Leipzig, 1928) 26–40; F. Buffière, Les mythes d’homère et la pensée grecque
(Paris, 1956) 67–70; J. Pépin, Mythe et allégorie (Paris, 1958) 167; and the interpretation of
the Circe transformation (not alluded to by Pépin and Wehrli) Od. 10.239–240, fr. 200–
201 (Sandbach), Plutarch’s Moralia xv (London and Cambridge, Mass, 1969) 367–375.
Griffiths, De Iside et Osiride, 100–101, and Babut, Plutarque et le stoïcisme, 367–388, who give
rather lengthy discussions on it, note that Plutarch quite surprisingly indulges even in the
Stoic type of allegorizing. Flacelière, “La théologie selon Plutarque,” 372–380, interprets
Plutarch’s use of theologia as the derivation of religious truth out of legends, through the
use of rational criteria.
Perhaps we can get an insight here into the subtle penetration of his Platonic
inspiration by foreign elements. Yet it seems impossible from this passage
to deduce that Plutarch believed literally in a great daimon responsible for
atmospheric disturbances, and there is little hint of super- and sublunary
worlds elsewhere, as divided between these forces.12
Soury’s attempt to find evil daimones at work in the Lives yielded results
almost as elusive as the daimones themselves. The most serious case would be
Dion-Brutus where Plutarch in the introduction seems to be airing the doctrine
of Chrysippos over the intrusion of evil daimones in the lives of good men.
The idea is that evil daimonia (the terminology of Chrysippos in De stoic.
repugn.and Quaest. Rom. [277a]) frighten good men from the path of virtue
lest they receive a better portion in the next life than the daimones themselves.
An objection is raised: only those mentally disturbed or sick believe in such
things, and those who do, have the daimon of deisidaimonia in them. Following
this we have a counter argument: but Brutus and Dion were philosophically
trained and told their friends of their experience. The matter here has some
relationship to De facie 944d, where daimones sent to perform functions like
retribution act out of envy (as here) and must be punished with re-incarnation
(incarnation?). One would expect Plutarch to follow out this manifesto; but
in Dion 54 and 56 he seems to go out of his way to describe Dion’s feelings of
guilt over the murder of his rival Herakleides, and the vision is fittingly that
of a huge Erinys.13 The vision of a daimon to Brutus in chapter 36 of that life
is one of the highlights of the nocturnal bizarre in the biographies. But for
this event, which takes place at Abydos just before Brutus crosses into Greece,
Plutarch introduced disturbing elements as well to the serious demonological
interpretation. Brutus is portrayed as stretched to the limit by anxiety and the
tent is dimly lit. The vision, fittingly Xenocratic in its monstrous size, like that
of Dion, when challenged identifies itself as “your evil daimon,” but the omen
is not recorded by the philosopher Publius Volumnius, who is supposed to
12 [en: See on the issue L. Roig Lanzillotta, “Plutarch of Chaeronea and the Gnostic World-
view,” 401–417.]
13 On this, see my articles: Brenk, “Le songe de Brutus,” 588–594; idem, “‘A Most Strange
Doctrine’,” 4–5; Russell, Plutarch, 77–78. The vision is reported in Appianus, Bell. civ.
4.134. E. Gabba, Appiano e la storia delle Guerre Civili (Florence, 1956) 135 and index, 254,
following Christ-Schmid and Kornemann, finds little likelihood that Plutarch or Appianus
read one another. The incident is mentioned by Nilsson, Geschichte ii, 213. He points out
that the daimon speaks Greek in Valerius Maximus’ version of the story (1.7.7), but the
vision comes to Cassius of Parma after the battle of Actium, not to the other Cassius before
Philippi, much less to Brutus.
have recorded all of the omens, and the supposedly Epicurean explanation
of Cassius sounds remarkably like our own Plutarch on other problems.14
Moreover, Plutarch’s Roman readers should have been familiar with the story
in Valerius Maximus, an author well-known to Plutarch, who told it of Cassius
of Parma after the battle of Actium. (Incidentally, the phantom spoke Greek in
Valerius.) In the retribution passage, Caesar 69, the appearance of the daimon
is a sure sign that the murder of the imperator was not pleasing to the gods.
Here when Brutus sees it again, “he understood his fate and plunged headlong
into danger.” In short, Plutarch retained his epoche (philosophical caution in
speaking about the divine), and perhaps it is not entirely unchivalrous to
accuse him of exploiting questionable material in the interest of melodramatic
biography.
More fruitful an idea and more at home in Plutarch’s religious philosophy is
the identification of daimon with nous, a facet of the conception of daimon as
the disincarnate human soul. One can find good discussions of this in Babut,
Dillon, Corlu, and Russell.15 This idea was very ancient in Greek philosophy, and
makes itself felt in the Timaios (90a). The theory of the “others” in De defectu,
was that the human soul after death becomes successively heros, daimon, and
theos.16 At the end of the Romulus Plutarch indicates that one does not become
a god by decree but only through virtue and purification, passing through these
stages. His myths are probably meant to be taken as much symbolically as
literally, but his conception of the human composite aids their structure. In De
virtute, De animae procreatione and elsewhere, the human composite is made
up of body, soul, and mind (soma, psyche, nous or logos). Interesting in De
virtute and elsewhere is the frequency with which body is said to be tied to
soul or soul to nous with a cable of some sort.17 The physical nature of the
14 On this, comparison must be made with Plutarch’s numerous explanations of statue

portents and other miraculous occurrences in the Lives. The terminology is decidedly non-
Epicurean. For Cassius as an Epicurean see A. Momigliano, “Epicureans in Revolt,” jrs 31
(1941) 151–157; and E. Paratore, “La problematica sull’epicureismo a Roma,” anrw i.4 (1973)
116–204.
15 Babut, Plutarque et le stoïcisme, 430–440; Corlu, Le démon de Socrate, 47–64; Dillon, The
Middle Platonists, 219–223; Russell, Plutarch, 74.
16 See Babut, Plutarque et le stoïcisme, 470–473, who notes that this makes Plutarch radically
different from the Stoics, who would overlook such a qualitative difference between divine
and human realms. Plutarch in Romulus 28 treats the apotheosis of Romulus as similar
to the Greek fables about Aristeas of Prokonnesos and Kleomedes of Astypaleia. For
these two Greeks see R. Flacelière, E. Cambry, M. Juneaux, Plutarque. Vies, i (Paris, 1957)
234.
17 In De virtute 445c; 446ac, Anim. an corp. 501d, De amor. prol. 493e, and De tranq. an. 465b,
soul thus permits an ascent into an atmosphere of its own nature, while the
shuffling off of soul by nous leaves what one might call a nous-daimon. Thus his
eschatological myths are more closely related to the celestial geography than
are Plato’s. The concept of nous-daimon is most clearly set forth in De genio, but
as A. Corlu remarks, it does not by its nature exclude the concept of protective
and helping daimones, those who like athletes past their prime run along the
track urging the competitors to the finish, or like swimmers who have made it
to the shore passing a hand to those yet in the sea, a concept put expressly into
the mouths of Pythagorean speakers.18
The most distinctive features of Plutarch’s eschatological myths are his pre-
occupation with the moon, the second death of the souls, his use of Dionysiac
imagery, his avoidance of a vision of the Forms, and in De facie the apparent,
though disguised, release of the soul through love of God, described in terms
of the Platonic Form of the Good (De facie 943–945). De sera, whose theme
is the ultimate punishment of evildoers either in this life, perhaps through
their children, or at least in the next, remains close to Plato and is not all
that ingenious. Its severity is tempered by the suggestion that punishment
after death is a thought more to be promoted among the masses than taken
seriously by intellectuals, and by the humorous reincarnation of Nero into “a
vocal creature, frequenter of marshes and lakes and swamps” for his benefac-
tions to “that race whom the gods most loved,” an amelioration of the sen-
tence to turn his soul, already pierced with incandescent rivets, into a viper
which eats its way out of its mother’s womb.19 As in all his myths the celes-
the soul is conceived of as a ship kept only by its cable from being swept over the sea or
dashed down a river.
18 Le démon de Socrate, 59. For the purpose of harmony, he believes Plutarch downplayed
differences in daimonology. See also Détienne, De la pensée religieuse. Unfortunately he
is a bit too ready to snuff out demons. The work is valuable for the fragments collected.
He believes in a pre-Pythagorean lunar daimonology which influenced all subsequent
ones, but unfortunately the evidence is slim (Aet. Plac. 2.30.1, svf 404.10). Also valuable
is H. Thesleff, An Introduction to the Pythagorean Writings of the Hellenistic Period (Åbo,
1961), and S. Skovgaard Jensen, Dualism and Demonology. The Function of Demonology in
Pythagorean and Platonic Thought (Munksgaard, 1966) esp. 60–107. Recently, J. Hani, “Le
mythe de Timarque chez Plutarque et la structure de l’extase,”reg 88 (1975) 105–120, shows
the close relationship of the myth to the experience of the sleep in the cave of Trophonios.
In the same issue, 206–219, Babut gives a review of recent literature on Plutarch, along
with his own ideas on many subjects, including Corlu’s book on De genio, in “Ἱστορία οἷον
ὕλη φιλοσοφίας:’ Histoire et réflexion morale dans l’ œuvre de Plutarque,” reg 88 (1975) 206–
219.
19 See J. Dumortier, “Le châtiment de Néron dans le mythe de Thespésios,” in Association
tial voyage is important, and here the course of the souls resembles that of
spindles. Out of Delphic loyalty he seems to include an oracle of Apollo, too
high for his visionary Thespesios to reach because of the shortness of his
cable.
The moon is very important to the other myths.20 Xenokrates had associated
it with the daimones. As Détienne points out, theories about the moon had
entered Pythagorean speculation, and they seem to have interested Stoics
before Plutarch. In Amatorius 766b reincarnation takes place on the moon.
In a fragment of Plutarch’s De anima (201 Sandbach), the Elysian plain is
located on the surface of the moon lit by the sun, and the souls wander in the
celestial region before rebirth.21 In De facie, where it is difficult to tell whether
the scientific part, with Plutarch’s lucky guess that the moon was earth, or
the eschatological part primarily encouraged Plutarch to publish, we find a
surprising harmony of celestial and religious geography.22 Hades (942f, 943c)
lies between earth and moon, while the Elysian plain is described not as we
Guillaume Budé (ed.), Actes du viiie Congrès, 552–559, and R. Frazer, “Nero the Singing
Animal,” Arethusa 4 (1971) 215–218. For the period in general, see E. Cizek, L’époque de
Néron et ses controverses idéologiques (Leiden, 1972).
20 It is difficult to track down the source of this lunar daimonology. See P. Boyancé, “Les
Endymions de Varron,” rea 41 (1939) 319–324 [= in idem, Études sur la religion romaine
(Paris, 1972) 283–289]. He looks for Stoic and Pythagorean precedents, and believes Varro
wrote a book with the title Endymiones, in his Menippean satires, in which beings of this
name lived below the moon (Tert., De an. 54.2, and 55.4: sublimantur animae sapientes
… apud Stoicos sub lunam; in aethere dormitio nostra … aut circa lunam cum Endymion-
ibus Stoicorum). He incorrectly states (284) that the souls of the spoudaioi (sages) alone
become daimones citing Diog. Laert. 7.151; the text reads: Φασὶ δ’ εἶναι καί τινας δαίμονας
ἀνθρώπων συμπάθειαν ἔχοντας, ἐπόπτας τῶν ἀνθρωπείων πραγμάτων· καὶ ἥρωας τὰς ὑπολε-
λειμμένας τῶν σπουδαίων ψυχάς. The implication is that they are separated daimones, who
are spirits that watch over men, and heroes, which are the souls of the just.
21 A pun on Ἠλύσιον Πεδίον (Elysian Plain), as though derived from Ἥλιος (the Sun). The
geography of Plutarch’s myths is modeled on passages like Phaidros 248a–e. Plato here
does not speak directly of a vision of the Ideas, but Plutarch seems to be surprisingly
reticent about it. For Plato see W.K.C. Guthrie, A History of Greek Philosophy iv (Cam-
bridge, 1975) 421–427. For Plutarch’s language in the myths, see Russell, Plutarch, 71–72,
and A. Corlu, Le démon de Socrate, 92–109. On De anima, see M. Tassier, “Plutarchus over
het leven na de dood (De anima),” Kleio 2 (1972) 107–115.
22 On this see H. Görgemanns, Untersuchungen zu Plutarchs Dialog De facie in orbe lunae
(Heidelberg, 1970), and F.H. Sandbach, “Plutarch’s De Facie,” (review of Görgemanns), cr
23 (1973) 32–34. For the composition of the dialogue, see H. Martin, “Plutarch’s De facie:
The Recapitulations and the Lost Beginning,” grbs 15 (1974) 73–88.
might expect, as that part lit by the sun, but as the part which faces the heavens
(only fully in the sun’s rays at new moon). The place of purgation is located in
the “gentlest part of the air,” called “the meadows of Hades,” while the souls,
which resemble rays of light, cling to the moon, from which at times they are
swept away. The interlocutor of this had gained his information from a servant
of Kronos living off the coast of Britain (shades of Kleombrotos in De defectu)
so it is not surprising to learn that the souls, of the same substance as the
moon, suffer in gorges there called Hekate’s recesses, similar to those in the
depths of the Red Sea.23 If they slip off they must be charmed back; “of such
are Tityos, Typhon and the Delphic Python” (945b), psychai without nous (a
somewhat topsy-turvy conception of the disincarnate souls, modeled on the
evil precosmic soul of De animae procreatione).24 The three Moirai (Fates) are
located on sun, moon, and earth, while in a famous passage, as noted before, a
second death takes place on the moon.
The attendants of Kronos here (οἱ περὶ Κρόνον) explain to the clairvoyant nar-
rator a doctrine which looks very much like an attempt by Plutarch to tidy up
his previous thought on the subject. In De defectu the decline of the oracles
was due to the departure of the daimones to another world. Now the daimones
appear to be soul-daimones, who are given a promotion and leave for a bet-
ter position. As they receive the ultimate transformation (ἀρίστη ἐξαλλαγή), the
powers go to another place. This, say the attendants of Kronos, who list them-
selves among the “better ones” (βελτίονες), happened to the Idaian Daktyloi,
the Korybantes in Phrygia, as well as the Boiotian Trophoniads in Oudora, “and
thousands of others in many parts of the world” who keep their rites, honors,
and titles, “but whose powers have gone elsewhere.”25 Of the “better ones” some
receive the transformation sooner, some later, when nous is separated from psy-
che through love (ἔρως) for the image (εἰκών) in the sun, by which “shines forth
the desirable, beautiful, divine, and blessed (τὸ ἐφετόν, καλόν, θεῖον, καὶ μακά-
ριον) for which all nature, in one way or another strives” (De facie 944e). In the
structure of the essay we find a description of soul-daimones arriving at the
23 Something few scholars seem to have noticed. At 944b–c Troglodytes are mentioned (such
as those who lived near the Red Sea mystic in De defectu).
24 On the precosmic soul see Dillon, The Middle Platonists, 202–203. [en: An updated bibli-
ography in L. Roig Lanzillotta, “Plutarch and the Image of the Sleeping and Waking Soul,”
passim, but especially 221–222.]
25 See H. Cherniss, Plutarch’s Moralia xii, 205–213. The word Οὐδώρα is a mystery, appearing
nowhere else (Aldine: οὐδώσᾳ, Basiliensis: Λεβαδίᾳ) but since the shrine at Lebadaia was
in good condition at the time, Cherniss restores Οὐδώρᾳ, the mss. reading.
moon, with some of them being swept off, that is clinging to the moon, and
then falling off, while others turn upside down and sink into it as though “drop-
ping into the deep.” Others gain a firm footing, and “crown themselves with
feathers” (943d). Then the subject is dropped for a disquisition on Xenokrates’
great leap (θεῖός τις λογισμός) in understanding the nature of the moon and its
relationship to the stars (943f–944c). Now begins a new daimonological sec-
tion, suggesting the daimonology of Xenokrates as propounded in De defectu,
but introduced in such a way that the daimones here seem to be the souls of
the type previously left clinging to the moon. Not the departure of interme-
diate being daimones for other worlds in a multiple universe, but the trans-
formation of the soul-daimones into pure nous is responsible for the decline
of the shrines. Presumably they now move into the noeton (the intelligible
realm).
At 944e there is a statement which has been interpreted as applying to all
human beings, but which as a matter of fact only applies to the “better” soul-
daimones: once their soul (psyche) has been separated from their mind (nous),
they will achieve the “ultimate alteration” (so Cherniss for ἀρίστη ἐξαλλαγή).
The nous is separated from the psyche by love (ἔρως) for the image (εἰκών) in
the sun through which shines forth the manifest. Plutarch does not explicitly
say “God” here, but in the light of his general theism, a reader well acquainted
with all his writing would probably think of God. At 945d he seems to introduce
the creator God somewhat gratuitously, though suggested by the Timaios, and
only a few lines before the close of the treatise. Finally, though to kalon seems
most apt in traditional Platonic language about the Forms as the destiny of the
soul, to epheton, to theion, and to makarion suggest a theistic God rather than
an Idea.
Dörrie presumes that all souls eventually achieve the “best transformation,”
that into pure nous, an assertion not necessary from the De facie.26 Those
referred to are the “better ones,” daimones who have a cult or operate as atten-
dants at a cult site. Presumably they have gone through an initial purification,
and are different from the soul-daimones who in section 943d either fall off
the moon or sink back into it, following the daimonological theme of nature
finding its own place, or the daimones of 944d, who seem to be Xenocratic dai-
mones, but who are later described as being reincarnated, “cast out upon earth
confined to human bodies” for exceeding their license to punish malefactors.
Thus these daimones are clearly treated as soul-daimones.27 It is possible that

27 Dörrie, “Die Stellung Plutarchs,” 50, perhaps mistakenly speaks of a voyage through plan-
such souls or daimones could never escape the cycle. In the similar passage
of De defectu 415bc, the better (βελτίονες) souls reach the transformation from
souls into daimones, but only some souls pass “from the daimones” through
purification to share completely in divinity (θειότης).
In De genio metempsychosis naturally takes place on the moon, the moon’s
affinity to daimones is stressed, the road to Hades is the side of the moon
opposite the sun, the moon passes over the “Styx” from which the better
souls are rescued, and the unclean slip off in terror and consternation. But
his major preoccupation is with the concepts of nous, daimon, and psyche.
The souls in their celestial voyage are carried from above by their own nous
or daimon floating over the soul like a cork, a symbol of its activity in life,
especially in the life of Sokrates (De genio 592af). The souls ascend through
a magnificent celestial sea, a passage as much worth reading for its literary
flamboyance as for its religious exuberance.28 Meteorological bodies pass by
Timarchos in psychedelic colors to the accompaniment of the harmony of the
spheres; then celestial elements in exotic gyrations open up on rivers of fire
transforming blue to white and causing the “sea” to boil; then to a great abyss
“in what seemed to be a sphere cut away,” in which roars and groans of animals,
wailing of babies, and mingled lamentations of men and women startle the
hero out of his life. When a celestial guide appears from nowhere to ask if
he would like anything explained, Timarchos responds, “Everything, for what
etary spheres. Rather, Plutarch conceives of a celestial sea with shoals and shallows—
possibly representing the Milky Way—planets floating by like islands, and the abyss
(χάσμα)—probably the earth (= Hades). The Styx is the path to Hades, and souls fall
off the moon at periods of 6 months, presumed to be those of lunar eclipses. Professor
Sandbach suspects that the Styx is the cone of air which is in the shadow cast by the
earth.
28 There have been several recent attempts to reconcile the political and philosophical parts
of the De genio: M. Riley, “The Purpose and Unity of Plutarch’s De genio Socratis,” grbs 18
(1977) 257–273; A. Aloni, “Ricerche sulla forma letteraria del De genio Socratis di Plutarco,”
Acme 33 (1980) 45–112; and D. Babut, “Le dialogue de Plutarque Sur le démon de Socrate.
Essai d’ interprétation,” Bull. Budé 1 (1984) 51–76. Riley sees Sokrates as resolving the ten-
sion between philosopher and citizen (269). Aloni notes a more all-embracing providence,
based on metempsychosis in Theanor’s speech as opposed to that of Simmias (77). Babut
sees Plutarch dividing humanity into three groups according to their relationship with
the divine: those with complete mastery of self in direct communication with the divine
world, those who are slaves to their passion, and an intermediate group represented by
the conspirators, whose courage and moral qualities do not completely shelter them from
passion, and who are often troubled and surprised by events and deceived by the predic-
tions of their divination (69).
here is not marvelous?” (590c–591a).29 Through the work of P.H. De Lacy and
B. Einarson, though we may still find the vision marvelous, we need not be quite
so confused as Timarchos. Now J. Hani, while substantially in agreement with
their interpretation, has added further clarification, and even offered a celestial
map for the aid of future voyagers intending to duplicate that trip.
Plutarch’s allegorizing and humanizing of religious myth can be observed
here. As Timarchos looks down into a great abyss (χάσμα), he hears the cries
of roaring animals, wailing infants, and the mingled lamentations of men and
women. This abyss, also apparently called Hades, is loosely identified with the
earth, the place of punishment for souls. Hani would take the cries of the babies
to be not those of the untimely dead, the ἄωροι of Vergil, Aeneid 6.426–429,
but rather souls departing for rebirth as beasts or babies. But this does not
explain the mingled lamentation of men and women. More likely these are
souls returning from life on earth, like those in De facie 944b, described as the
souls of the chastised coming up from the earth to the moon, and out of its
shadow, with lamentation and wailing. In any case, Hades is a purgatorio, not
an inferno. The stumbling block in this myth is the sudden appearance of what
seems to be hypostases, something strikingly Neoplatonic in tone which has
intrigued Krämer, Dörrie, and Dillon.30 The suggestion of Dionysiac themes
29 P.H. De Lacy and B. Einarson, Plutarch’s Moralia vii (Cambridge, Mass. 1959) 461–467;
J. Hani, Plutarque. Œuvres morales viii (Paris, 1980) 39–67, esp. 55–58, and 226–232. He
sees the principal theme as the unifying of the πρακτικός (practical) and θεωρητικὸς βίος
(theoretical, i. e. philosophical life) (61). Hani agrees on virtually all details with De Lacy
and Einarson, except on the “surge:” “As they crested the surge, the islands ‘came back’.”
The word used for “surge” (ῥόθια) is actually plural. Hani argues rather convincingly that
Plutarch has in mind a planetary map. De Lacy and Einarson took the surge to be the
belt bounded by the tropics, or the tropics themselves, as the shores of the planetary sea
(464). Hani, Plutarque, 227 note 8, prefers the crests of the ecliptic on a zodiacal map,
with the farthest point away being the height of the surge. See also D.A. Stoike, “De genio
Socratis (Moralia 575a–598f),” in Betz (ed.), Plutarch’s Theological Writings, 236–285. For
Plutarch’s interest in color in these myths see Russell, Plutarch, 71–72. For another possible
parallel between Vergil’s Aeneid 6.739–742 (aliae panduntur inanes / suspensae ad ventos)
with De genio 590b, see F. Solmsen, “The World of the Dead in Book 6 of the Aeneid,” cp 67
(1972) 37, and my article: F.E. Brenk, “Most Beautiful Horror: Baroque Touches in Vergil’s
Underworld,” cw 73 (1979) 1–7. [en: See now J.N. Bremmer, “The Golden Bough: Orphic,
Eleusinian, and Hellenistic-Jewish Sources of Virgil’s Underworld in Aeneid vi,” Kernos 22
(2009) 183–208].
30 Krämer, Der Ursprung der Geistmetaphysik, 98, n. 250. See also Dörrie, “Zum Ursprung,”
331–343. The matter from Dillon can be found in his The Middle Platonists, 188–230,
esp. 214–215.
along with the afterlife is also most intriguing, as R. Turcan has noticed.31 In De
Iside 362b Dionysos is identified with Osiris-Sarapis and associated with death
and rebirth. In De sera 565e–566a Lethe receives a quite original description in
which Dionysiac imagery seems to express elements ambivalently good or evil.
In this rather light interlude in Plutarch’s otherwise horrendous, though
sometimes witty, Nekyia Thespesios is carried up by beams of light until he
reaches a great chasm. Other souls draw themselves together like birds, alight,
and walk around the rim of the chasm. But this part is no inferno. Instead, a
Bacchic grotto with pleasant foliage and flowers wafts soft, perfumed breezes to
induce a quasi-alcoholic inebriation as of wine, making the souls expansive and
friendly. This place, called the place of Lethe (Forgetfulness) by the heavenly
guide, is already beginning to capture the fancy of Thespesios as an ideal place
to stay, when the guide pulls his Pinocchio away by force, explaining that his
faculty of reasoning (τὸ φρονοῦν) is quickly “dissolved away and liquefied by
pleasure,” while the non-rational part (τὸ ἄλογον) feeds upon it and stimulates
the recollection of the body, thus drawing the soul towards birth (γένεσις)
through “earthward inclination” (ἐπὶ γῆν νεῦσις). This lack of conscious choice,
which has been supplanted in the myth by pure emotional inclination and
an almost natural drift downward, is untypical of Plato’s Politeia but fits in
somewhat with his Laws and parts of the Phaidros. In Plutarch the process
of purification, or the movement up, is not so clear, and ascent seems more
a product of natural disposition than a conscious effort to escape from this
world. One might in particular cite De sera 565e where one soul is borne
down toward birth (γένεσις, that is, rebirth) through a weakness of logos and
31 Les sarcophages romains à représentations dionysiaques (Paris, 1966) 3. See also M.P. Nils-
son, The Dionysiac Mysteries in the Hellenistic and Roman Age (Lund, 1967) 123; Y. Vernière,
“Le Léthé de Plutarque,” rea 66 (1964) 22–32; R. Turcan, “Les sarcophages romains et
le problème du symbolisme funéraire,” anrw ii.16.2 (1978) 1700–1735; and G. Koch and
H. Sichertmann, Römische Sarkophage (Munich, 1982). The negativity of the Dionysiac
imagery in De sera Numinis Vindicta is strange, considering the associations of Dionysos
with liberation and purity of soul in the gold tablets from South Italy; see B. Feyerrabend,
“Zur Wegmetaphorik beim Goldblättchen aus Hipponion und dem Proömium des Par-
menides,” Rh. M. 127 (1984) 1–24. The Lethe passage has also been studied by S.G. Cole,
“New Evidence for the Mysteries of Dionysos,” grbs 21 (1980) 223–238, notes: “Souls
who drink from this water will tread a sacred road in the underworld which other mys-
toi and bakchoi tread.” She argues that it means a follower of Dionysos, and refers to
Plutarch’s Consolatio ad uxorem 611de, where consoling his wife over the death of a child
he argues that bacchic initiation has removed the fear of death (224, 237). See also W. Burk-
ert, Griechische Religion der archaischen und klassischen Epoche (Stuttgart, 1977) 436–
440.
neglect of contemplation (τὸ θεωρεῖν) through τὸ πρακτικόν—which De Lacy

and Einarson translate as “a practical proclivity.” Others are drawn toward
rebirth through the desire to gratify ἐπιθυμίαι (translated by these authors
as “licentiousness”) through the body, since in the afterlife there is only “an
imperfect shadow (σκιά) and dream (ὄναρ) of pleasure without consummation
(πλήρωσις).” Besides the natural tendency down, an added element appears,
found also in Philo and possibly a contemporary strain of Platonism: souls, or
daimones, which end up in rebirth—Philo would call them evil daimones—
have an inordinate appetite for sensual, and in particular sexual, pleasure (De
gigantibus 17–18).32
As T.J. Saunders points out, in the Timaios (esp. 40a, 42bc, 91d) and in
Laws (903e 5–904a 1) Plato seems to blur the distinction between phenomenal
and Idea worlds and attribute a kind of mechanical or physical ascent and
descent to souls, what Saunders calls a new scientific eschatology.33 The state
of the soul automatically determines where it will go. With so much emphasis
on the Timaios both in Alexandrian Middle Platonism, and in Plutarch’s own
Platonic studies, it is not surprising that this nuance should have entered his
32 See De Lacy & Einarson, Plutarch’s Moralia vii, 285–289, for text, translation, and com-
mentary. The comparison of the souls to birds appears in Vergil, Aeneid 6.309–312, where
he uses Homeric similes to heighten his effect, but the idea of the souls receiving wings
is from the Phaidros. See also, A. Aloni and C. Guidorizzi, Il Demone di Socrate. I ritardi
della punizione divina; R. Klaerr & Y. Vernière, Plutarque. Œuvres morales vii (Paris, 1974)
167, however, take to praktikon as “par besoin d’ agir.” This seems to be supported by Arist.,
en 1139a 27, where praktike is opposed to theoretike; i.e. the souls have no taste for intel-
lectual life or contemplation and are drawn toward immersing themselves in the world
again. For a commentary on the myth itself, see 215–225, esp. 220–222, with rather full
notes and bibliography. For Philo’s doctrine of “evil angels,” i.e. souls which fall into bod-
ies, see J.M. Dillon, “Philo’s Doctrine of Angels,” in Winston & Dillon, Two Treatises of Philo
of Alexandria, 197–206. Fr. 200 Sandbach has some similarities with Philo in the natu-
ral tendency of the soul toward rebirth and the role of pleasure. Particularly striking is:
ποθοῦσαι δὲ καθ’ ἡδονὰς τὴν συνήθη καὶ σύντροφον ἐν σαρκὶ καὶ μετὰ σαρκὸς δίαιταν ἐμπίπτου-
σιν αὖθις εἰς τὸν κυκεῶνα … (34–36) F.H. Sandbach, Plutarchi Moralia vii (Leipzig, 1967)
126.
33 T.J. Saunders, “Penology and Eschatology in Plato’s Timaeus and Laws,” cq 23 (1973) 232–
244. [en: On Plutarch’s eschatology, see H.G. Ingenkamp, “Juridical and Non-Juridical
Eschatologies—and Mysteries,” in Pérez Jiménes & Bordoy Casadesús (eds.), Misticismo y
religiones mistéricas en la obra de Plutarco, 131–141; A. Pérez Jiménez, “En las Praderas de
Hades: imágenes, metáforas y experiencias escatológicas de las almas buenas en Plu., De
Facie 943c–e,” in L. van der Stockt et al. (eds.), Gods, Daimones, Rituals, Myths, 333–343;
A. Setaioli, “Plutarch and Pindar’s Eschatology,” ibidem, 397–405.]
eschatology. Here a divine guide helps out, and in De genio, soul-daimones who
have completed the course of life assist others, but elsewhere in De facie, the
rise of the soul depends upon its purity, the achievement of which is not well
explained. In the myth of Timarchos in De genio, souls which have a docile
inferior part guided by a strong nous seem to rise without difficulty whereas
others only rise with difficulty or not at all. In the myth of De genio some souls
simply fall off the moon and float down as a “Styx” approaches and are carried
away by “Hades,” which here seems to be rebirth; and other souls coming up
from incarnation, which are foul and unclean (ἀκάθαρτοι) and rejected by the
moon, fall away and are borne downward, all without a conscious choice (591c).
In another symbolic approach, Timarchos is told by the guide that the soul
overcome by passion is like a submerged body barely held up by a buoy (nous-
daimon) and souls returning from incarnation are like things rising from the
mud. In one more approach, the soul-nous-daimones are stars: stars which are
extinguished are souls sunk in the body; those lighted up and reappearing from
below are souls coming back from incarnation; stars moving about on high are
the “daimones of men said to possess nous” (591f).
In Consolatio ad uxorem 611d–f, he asks his wife to draw support from
the teaching of the Dionysiac mysteries into which they have been initiated,
that a child’s soul, having little contact with matter, has a better chance of
escaping rebirth than that of an adult. In De anima fr. 178, death (teleute) is
etymologically allegorized as mystery (telete), and in De facie 943c, the entry of
the blessed into heaven is described as the return of exiles, with a joy most like
that of initiates. He need not be speaking of Dionysiac mysteries or symbolism
here, but the thought is near. In the Amatorius, the “mysteries of Eros” resemble
those of a Dionysiac thiasos (procession). The true lover (erotikos) when he has
reached the place beyond and has associated with the beautiful (τὰ καλά) as is
his right (θέμις) grows wings and celebrates the mysteries of the god, escorting
him in the dance above until it is time for him to go to the meadows of Selene
and Aphrodite; then drugged by sleep (καταδαρθών), he begins another birth
(γένεσις) (766b).34
Recently D. Babut has turned his attention to the De genio with an eye
toward integrating the apparently inconsistent daimonological parts, or per-
haps better, integrating a dialogue where no inconsistency might have been
observed save for the acuteness of the Quellenforscher.35 In De genio a num-
34 R. Flacelière and M. Cuvigny, Plutarque. Œuvres morales, x (Paris, 1980) 150.

35 “La doctrine démonologique,” 201–205. One cannot do justice here to Vernière, Symboles
et mythes. Besides an introduction to philosophical myth and a summary of Plutarch’s
ber of positions are elucidated, apparently in conflict, or at least representing

different approaches. First, Galaxidoros claims that the daimonion (extremely
vague in Greek and perhaps best translated “the divine thing,” or “the super-
natural power”) was nothing other than the knowledge of ordinary divination
by sneezes and so forth. This initial speech, which meets resistance among
other members of the company, is followed by that of Simmias on a higher
theological level in which daimones are the “superior ones” (κρείττονες) who
communicate with “daimonic” men, not faintly and in dreams as with the rest of
men, but directly, reaching their nous through intelligible discourse (or thought
or word, logos) without sound (588e).
In the myth of Timarchos we find a vision in which nous, said to be a
daimon (a reference to Timaios 90a), carries the lower part of the spiritual
entity (psyche) through a celestial sea to the higher reaches. This nous-daimon
is described as external and like a buoy holding up the soul below. Finally, in the
concluding speech, Theanor presents a vivid scene of daimones aiding souls on
their way to salvation. Having terminated their earthly existence, now like ex-
athletes they stand or run along the sidelines encouraging the competitors to
the goal, or like swimmers having reached the shore, hold out a hand to those
approaching.
Babut successfully demonstrates how the individual discourses are the
building blocks of a complex architectural structure in which each piece, with
the exception of the provocative introduction by Galaxidoros, harmonizes
beautifully with the other elements, of which that by Theanor is the clé de voute.
Finally he notes that the moral rather than theological context of De genio dis-
tinguishes its daimonological aspect from that of the other treatises. Putting
this into a broader context we should recall Dörrie’s conviction that the prin-
cipal daimonological strain in Plutarch was not the existence of superhuman
beings with an ontological existence separate from human souls, positioned
between men and gods, nor the Hesiodic conception of guardian daimones,
nor the daimonological interpretation of religious myth, but the transforma-
tion of a human soul into a daimon, and through total release from the soul to
possession of divine status (θειότης), a successive purification in an ascent con-
ceived at least symbolically as upwards.36 Combined with this central tenet is
the necessity of seeing Kleombrotos’ discourse in De defectu, which through
major myths, she discusses his use of allegorical interpretation, daimonology, doctrinal
content, nature of the eschatology, nature of the gods, celestial geography, myth as a
literary genre, its importance in Plutarch, and his relationship to later Platonists who wrote
myths.
36 “Gnostische Spuren,” 92–116, here 109.
G. Soury, La démonologie de Plutarque has led scholars astray for too long, as at
least partially a parody by Plutarch of pseudo-scientific literature. This aspect,
developed at length in Dörrie’s last article, “‘Der Weise am Roten Meer’,” seri-
ously undercuts Kleombrotos’ speech and puts the last stake through the exag-
gerated demonological approach to Plutarch.37
Babut’s sensible approach to De genio, harmonizing and emphasizing Plu-
tarch’s consistent attitude toward daimon and daimones, should lead to a better
understanding not only of his religious philosophy but also of the composi-
tional technique of the Plutarchan dialogue. Though not entirely modeled on
Plato’s and at times structured differently, for example, the Amatorius com-
pared to the Symposion of Plato, the basic conception is the same. An initial
speaker with unacceptable positions raises the central issues to be discussed.
Thrasymachos’ assertions in the Politeia are not Plato’s highest thoughts, but
track the discussion of the Politeia into one of justice and injustice. Moreover,
the individual viewpoints, kaleidoscopic in their diversity, stimulate the mind
toward appreciating the nuances in the final or superior conception, as for
example in the Symposion where “wrong” ideas about Eros and beauty become
sublimated into a comprehension of the instinctive drive of the psyche toward
the intellectual possession of the Form of the Beautiful. The false starts aid in
correcting wrong impressions.
By applying a proper understanding of compositional technique to Plu-
tarch’s daimonological treatises one can put logos into their apparently dis-
ordered souls. For example in De genio, Galaxidoros’ false start frames the
question of to daimonion, really daimones and daimon, as one of supernatural
clairvoyance and communication. Soon we see the close relationship between
daimonic, daimones, and nous, and the nature of the daimonic man’s soul as
opposed to that of the multitude who only faintly achieve spiritual perception.
The myth of Timarchos illustrates the internal perspective, the tractability of
the daimonic man’s psyche to his nous, while opening a new vista, the impor-
tance of hearing the daimones, that is, the supernatural logos, not for this life,
but for its relationship to the destiny of the soul in the next. We also learn
that daimones are former human souls who out of compassion and sympathy,
having completed a similar course, help those in bodies reach the goal. The
myth of Timarchos removes a curtain to reveal the eschatological dimension
of human life, but since its major purpose is to illustrate the necessity of the
37 “Der ‘Weise vom Roten Meer’,” 95–110. M. Détienne, “Xénocrate et la démonologie pytha-
goricienne,” rea 60 (1958) 271–279, put all but the finishing touches to the supposed
reconstruction of Xenokrates’ daimonology by R. Heinze, followed by J. Daniélou.
docility of psyche to nous, never introduces a vision of the final destiny of the
nous released from the soul.38
Not only De genio contains parts leading to an architectural whole, to use
Babut’s conception, but also the complex of Plutarch’s dialogues arrives at a
more comprehensive view of this new daimonology. On a logical basis, De
defectu would appear to be the first major consideration of daimonology by
Plutarch. The apparent ineptitude of Kleombrotos not only raises the daimono-
logical issues causing so much controversy within the dialogue but also states
the themes which haunted Plutarch throughout his life, and which he even-
tually sublimated into forms peculiarly his own. Among the various elements
raised by Kleombrotos are the guardianship of the daimones, the nature of evil
daimones, the relationship of daimones to human souls, their role in cult and
shrines, their nature as “superior” beings, and their death and final destiny—
conceived here as the departure for another world.
The De defectu, rather tentative and hesitant, seems willing to entertain folk
superstition. From there on, in this theoretical framework at least, Plutarch
moved in an allegorizing direction, though the basic assumption that daimones
are human souls goes back to Hesiod. As Ammonios says, “Are they anything
else than souls that make their rounds “in mist appareled,” as Hesiod says?”
(431c). Particularly Kleombrotos’ talk of the death of daimones, an idea directed
toward Greek nature deities (Kleombrotos speaks of Naiads, while Hesiod
speaks of “Nymphs with goodly locks, daughters of Zeus bearing the aegis,”
fr. 304 Merkelbach and West),39 is later elevated to the concept of the death
of the psyche on the moon, liberating the nous (apparently for the noeton and
the vision of God, synthesized with Plato’s Forms and One).
Plato himself in the Symposion not only composed in Diotima’s speech
the passage which became the foundation for Middle Platonic daimonology,
the intermediate status of the daimones and their role as mediators between
the divine and men, but also allegorized away his “great daimon” Eros into
the instinctive drive for possession of the Form of the Beautiful. Thus Plato
followed the general tendency of Greek intellectuals toward folk religion and
superstition. The process is similar to that of Euripides in the Bakchai who
turned the daimon Dionysos into the primitive life forces and communion with
38 [en: On Plutarch’s notion of the tripartite soul in the context of Platonic tradition, see
Raúl Caballero Sánchez, “La Estructura Tripartita del Alma de los dioses en la tradición
platónica: Los Testimonios de Alcínoo, Plutarco y Plotino,” Luc van der Stockt et al. (eds.),
Gods, Daimones, Rituals, Myths, 85–109.]
39 R. Merkelbach & M.L. West, Fragmenta Hesiodea (Oxford, 1967) fr. 304 (Rzach 1913, fr. 171)
158. See also R. Flacelière, Plutarque. Œuvres morales, vi (Paris, 1974) 186.
nature associated with the mythology and religion of that god, or who in the
Hippolytos equated Aphrodite with the psychic instinct for love and sexual
pleasure, while Artemis becomes identified with the instinct for sexual purity,
freedom, athleticism, and a pure communion with nature.
The leap in Plutarch’s thought here can be seen by comparing two dialogues,
De defectu and De sera, the former of which appears to be earlier. De defectu
explains the cessation of oracular activity as the departure of the daimones for
another kosmos in an Epicurean universe which has an infinite or at least a
very large number of kosmoi. The theory runs into intense opposition and is
denounced as a plagiarism, itself philosophically dubious. However, apparently
later and after more reflection, the same idea is reconstituted in a new form.
The daimones which appear in Kleombrotos’ speech as intermediate beings
which have nothing to do with human souls now have their descriptions, activ-
ity in cults, mysteries, shrines and so forth, transferred to daimones which are
former human souls. While waiting for the “best of transformations” they are
employed on earth. With good behavior they are promoted, achieve the separa-
tion of nous from psyche, and depart for their new assignment, thus causing the
cessation of the oracle. Plutarch as usual treats such daimonological material
with a touch of humor, but his new conception illustrates a radical recasting
of the identical matter, incorporated now into his basically serious theme of
the identification of daimones with souls in a state of purification toward their
final destiny. De defectu did not need an eschatology, but Plutarch at that time
might have been incapable of the newer conception which encouraged such
visions.
The De sera looks like a magnificent place to introduce the final vision, but
instead, mingling horror with wit, Plutarch ended with Nero’s soul saved from
the daimon torturers, incandescent rivets, and life as a future Indian, Pindaric,
or Nicandrian viper (according to the readings of various textual critics) to
become reincarnated:
into a species more gentle, some sort of singer of odes, an animal living by
swamps and ponds; for where he has gone wrong he has paid his debts,
and he deserves something worthy from the gods, since of his subjects,
the race best and dearest to God he liberated.40
40 Plutarch, De sera 567f. On the passage, and some textual difficulties, see Klaerr & Vernière,
Plutarque. Œuvres morales, vii, 224, note 4.
Thus there is no advancement in his conception here more than there is

in the daimonological explanation of mythology in De Iside. Nor are there no
anomalies in his architecture. The evil daimon at the end of De E is hard to
explain away otherwise than as Alexandrian Platonism either taught by Ammo-
nios or put under his name. Otherwise the pieces fit together architectonically,
a beautiful structure retaining Platonic humor and inspiration. But there is also
a disturbing side. Each great vision, with the exception of that in De genio, ends
not with eternal destiny, but with reincarnation. In De genio, too, the finale is
not that optimistic. Timarchos’ last vision is that of the souls having become
stars on high, but the divine guide ends by relating the murder of the daimonic
shaman, Hermodoros of Klazomenai, whose enemies burned his body while
his nous roamed freely through the world. Thus, even being a daimonic man has
its occupational hazards, though Plutarch here, as elsewhere, may have decided
to close with humor rather than horror.
The De facie is most striking. The first nine-tenths consists of astronomical
cosmology out of the spirit of the early Hellenistic period, based on sources
from Xenokrates on. Suddenly we drift upwards in a sea of Middle Platonic
transcendentalism, as spiritual voyeurs of a universe of lunar souls and of nous
stripped of psyche. Even Plato of the Timaios would be embarrassed. But having
reached the top of the visible world and learned of the separation of the soul
through love of the “Desirable, Beautiful, Divine, and Blessed,” for us the myth,
like the world in the Politikos, suddenly rolls backwards to a vision, not of the
few entering into glory but to the pessimistic spectacle of the cycle of rebirth
beginning again for the multitude.
chapter 5
De Iside et Osiride: Allegorical Interpretation and

Syncretism
In the portrayal of his youthful views in De E, Plutarch already shows a tendency

toward allegorical interpretation. Much of this has to do with speculation on
the pempad (five) along Pythagorean lines, including its designation as “mar-
riage” and “nature.” Apollo is then split in two. In his deathless, eternal, pure,
and solitary state he is Phoibos and Apollon. In his turning into winds and
water, earth and stars, generation of plants and animals, fire and the like he
is Dionysos, Zagreus, Nyktelios, and Isodaetes. For this god they sing emotional
dithyrambic strains; for Apollo they sing the paian music, regulated and chaste.
Apollo is ageless and young, Dionysos in many guises; Apollo orderly and seri-
ous, Dionysos playful, wanton, and frenzied. Equally related to the number five
is the harmony of music, composition of the world’s elements, senses, parts
of the world, animate beings (gods, daimones, heroes, men, the irrational and
beastly), the supreme first principles of the Sophist (Being, Identity, Diver-
gence, Motion, and Rest), and finally the categories under which the Good
displays itself (moderation, due proportion, mind, science and arts and true
opinions, pleasure, 387f–391e). In Ammonios’ speech at the end of this dia-
logue, we find similar interpretation: Apollo the supreme being, unity; Hades
or Pluto, symbols of diversity and the forces of destruction and change.
Finally, Plutarch’s inclination toward simpler, more direct solutions to reli-
gious problems, letting certain elements serve perhaps as symbols, can be seen
in De Pythiae oraculis 397c, where in spite of the long discussions on dai-
mones and pneuma in De defectu, Theon, the speaker who is given the principal
place in the dialogue, opts for a very simple, uncomplicated, and reasonably
acceptable solution to the problem of Delphic prophecy: in inspiration the god
puts into the mind of the prophetess a vision and creates a light in her soul
regarding the future, “for this is inspiration (enthousiasmos)”; neither the voice,
utterance, or diction (γῆρυς, φθόγγος, λέξις) is that of the god. This in general
seems to be Plutarch’s method of arriving at a solution, to propose a number
of solutions, some of which are chosen for their bizarreness, then to gradu-
ally arrive at a rather elevated intellectual and spiritual answer. This method
leaves the impression of disorganization and incoherence, and one must admit
that his addressee, Klea, must have been very confused at times by his expla-
nations.

de iside et osiride: allegorical interpretation and syncretism 67
J.G. Griffiths has given an excellent commentary and introduction to De

Iside.1 Plutarch’s work is too long and diverse to treat it in much detail here,
but some of the major attitudes and tendencies can be noted. First of all Grif-
fiths points out that Plutarch’s sources were very old. The principal ones were
Manethon and Hekataios of Abdera, both under the first Ptolemy. Griffiths
would see his sources as primarily Eudoxos of Knidos, Hekataios of Abdera,
Hellanikos of Lesbos, Manethon, and Timotheos from the fifth and fourth cen-
turies, Antikleides, Archemachos of Euboia, and Phylarchos from the third.
After this he finds few sources and only two from the Roman era. The gen-
eral picture of the cult fits the early Hellenistic period, with only some features
of cult practice drawn from the Imperial period. Griffiths gives the sources
for various parts of the work. Important for our purposes would be the myth
(Manethon, Hekataios, and Eudoxos), euhemerism (an unknown third cen-
tury or later source) and daimonology (Xenokrates and Chrysippos), dual-
ism (Theopompos and possibly Eudoxos), and interpretations (Pythagorean,
Platonic, Stoic, Gnostic, with mostly pre-Hellenistic references to myth and
cult). The inconsistencies in the final conclusions lead Griffiths to suspect that
Plutarch was using some handbook, a missing link, but in Griffiths’ view it was
most likely “a Stoic author of Neo-Platonic sympathies”—a rather strange use
of terminology in itself.2
In the introduction to De Iside, Plutarch tells the addressee, Klea, a devo-
tee of Isis, though it is not clear that she was a priestess in the cult, that the
key to appreciating Egyptian religion, and the Isis myth in particular, is alle-
gorical, or symbolic interpretation. Though the lines are not always imme-
diately evident, there is an ascending scale of interpretation in which one
goes beyond the literal meaning. Thus we find first the euhemerist solution,
the daimonological—leading into Zoroastrianism and Greek dualism—and,
finally, after warning against Stoic physical allegory, a symbolic interpretation
of the Isis myth along Platonic lines. However, as Griffiths notes, in spite of
certain attitudes taken in the treatise, Plutarch, like Cornutus, used every con-
ceivable type of allegorical interpretation: etymological, physical and moral
allegory.3 And Flacelière remarks, in his introduction to Theseus and Romulus,
1 Griffiths, Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride.

2 De Iside et Osiride, 75–100, on the sources. Griffiths does not want to rule out Poseidonios,
though preferring “a Stoic author of Neo-Platonic sympathies,” (100). Hani, La religion égypti-
enne, 12–22, esp. 13–14, however, citing recent source work on Plutarch, believes he personally
read a considerable number of the authors he cites.
3 Griffiths, De Iside et Osiride, 100–101. On this see also Wehrli, Zur Geschichte, 26–40; Pápin,
that he liked the euhemerist approach.4 Plutarch gives some description of the
theories of Euhemeros of Messene, though in the eyes of some modern scholars
he misunderstood the novelistic or fictional quality of Euhemeros’ writing.
Plutarch thinks the theory leads to atheism (360a) but actually, perhaps drifting
from his source, speaks more favorably of it later on. The daimonological
interpretation (360e–361d) is very close to that in De defectu, but more stress
is put upon its being at home in Greek thought (Homer, Hesiod, Empedokles)
and it is trimmed down a bit to fit the Isis legend more specifically. Typhon
would be an evil daimon and Isis and Osiris daimones turned into gods. Physical
allegory forms a bridge to the dualist section. As for the Greeks Kronos is
time (chronos), Hera air (aera), so Osiris is the Nile, Isis the earth, Typhon
the sea; or Typhon is heat, hostile to moisture (363d), or the solar world, vs.
Osiris the lunar world, while Isis is the moon made pregnant by the sun and
so forth. In this passage the dismemberment of Osiris is compared to that of
Dionysos.
There follows a strongly dualistic passage, which Griffiths thinks is repre-
sentative more of the spirit of the essay and a spirit of compromise than a deep
seated view of Plutarch, but Babut may be right in seeing his hostility toward
the Stoics as inclining him in this direction. Herakleitos is praised and the Sto-
ics are condemned, the first for seeing the world as caught between opposing
forces of good and evil, the later for making God responsible for all, including
evil (369b). Theopompos is his source for the Zoroastrian section. Its essentials
are the creation of gods between Oromazdes (Griffiths prefers Horomazdes)
and Areimanios (a daimon), the removal of Oromazdes beyond the sun, the
alternate periods of success for each side in battles lasting three thousand years,
the eventual victory of Oromazdes, and the apocalyptic paradise: “the earth
shall be flat and level and one way of life and one government shall arise of all
Mythe et allégorie, 167, and A.J. Festugière, “L’exégèse allégorique dans le De Iside de Plutar-
que,” Ann. ephe, 5ème sect. (1960–1961) 104–105.
4 R. Flacelière, É. Chambry & M. Juneaux, Plutarque. Vies, i. Thésée-Romulus, Lycurgue-Numa
(Paris, 1957); See H.J. Rose, “Euhemerus,” ocd (1970) 414–415, treated at greater length by
H.F. Van der Meer, Euhemerus of Messene (Amsterdam, 1949); and H. Dörrie, Der Königskult
des Antiochos von Kommagene im Lichte neuer Inschriftenfunde (Göttingen, 1964) 218ff. Grif-
fiths, De Iside et Osiride, 378–379, thinks Euhemeros’ influence was considerable and that his
work was known and admired at Rome. G. Vallauri, Evemero di Messene. Testimonianze e fram-
menti (Turin, 1956) 48, noted that Kallimachos accused Euhemeros of falsity and bad faith,
and that the inexactness in Plutarch leads to the conclusion that he had never himself seen
the Hiera Anagraphe. See also K. Thraede, “Euhemerismus,”rac vi (1965) 877–890; here, 881–
882.
men, who shall be happy and speak the same language,” the crushing of “Hades”
and the happiness of men needing no sustenance and casting no shadow. Hani,
Nilsson, and Del Re felt Plutarch was quite traditional here.5 Zaehner, Molé, and
Benveniste describe Plutarch’s religion as a form of Zervanism, though as Grif-
fiths notes, there are many problems with the development of Persian religion.6
E.D. Phillips felt that Plutarch had missed the spirit of the great apocalyptic
struggle, the Frashkart.7 At any rate, outside of his investigations into Roman
and Greek religion, which are by no means thorough, Plutarch does not show
much inclination to investigate other religions. He never mentions Christian-
ity in his works, has little to say about Judaism (and that is not well-informed),
and seems to avoid investigation of foreign religious practice in the Lives. From
the standpoint of method, one might say that he tended to follow his sources,
as here, without making independent investigation or bringing matters up to
5 Soury, La démonologie, 63, called Plutarch’s experiment with Zoroastrianism “a dangerous

digression.” He was criticized by M. Pohlenz in his review of the book, Gnomon 21 (1949)
350, for attributing a dualistic system to Xenokrates. Others who seem to overemphasize
the Zoroastrian element in Plutarch are W.H. Porter, The Life of Dion (Dublin, 1952) 47–
48; Latzarus, Les idées religieuses de Plutarque, 66 and 98; and J. Beaujeu, “La religion de
Plutarque,” L’ Inform. Lit. 11 (1959) 207–213. J. Hani, “Plutarque en face du dualisme Iranien,”
reg 77 (1964) 489–525, and R. del Re, “Il pensiero metafisico di Plutarco: Dio, la natura, il
male,” Stud. It. 24 (1950) 33–64, take an opposite stand, seeing his position as basically Greek.
Griffiths, De Iside et Osiride, 24, thinks one should not soft-pedal the dualism here, challenging
Oakes, The Religion of Plutarch, but does not see much of it elsewhere in Plutarch’s writings,
and therefore concludes he is influenced by the topic and his sympathetic manner of treating
foreign ideas.
6 R.C. Zaehner, The Dawn and Twilight of Zoroastrianism (London, 1961) 123–124, sees Plutarch’s
exposition as a “halfway house between catholic Zoroastrianism and the Mithraism of the
Roman Empire,” and notes that Plutarch is silent about the most important rite, the great bull
sacrifice. M. Molé, Cultes, mythe et cosmologie dans l’ Iran Ancien (Paris, 1963) 10–15, who oth-
erwise seems to contradict Zaehner on every point, has little to say on Plutarch’s text, agreeing
with M. Benveniste, The Persian Religion According to the Greek Texts (Paris, 1929), and idem,
“Un mythe zervanite chez Plutarque,” ja 215 (1929) 287–296, that Plutarch is describing a form
of Zervanism (based on the sacrifice offered to Ahriman as well as Oromazdes). Griffiths,
De Iside et Osiride, 478, believes the egg in the cosmology here may be an Orphic intrusion,
with eventual roots in Egypt. Cf. S. Morenz, “Ägypten und die altorphische Kosmogonie,” in
Aus Antike und Orient (Leipzig, 1950) 64–111 (= idem, in E. Blumethaland and S. Herrmann
(eds.), Religion und Geschichte des alten Ägypten [Cologne and Vienna, 1975] 452–495). Tur-
can, “Le témoignage de Plutarque,” in idem, Mithras platonicus. Recherches sur l’hellénization
philosophique de Mithra (Leiden, 1975) 14–22, shows how the Platonic idea of the mediator
enters Plutarch’s description of Mithras in the De Iside passage.
7 Plutarque, interprête de Zoroastre, 505–511.
date. For example, in Turcan’s view, he followed Poseidonios for the tantalizing
passage on the Mithraic rites of the pirates in the Life of Pompey (24), without
going beyond that author.8
Next comes a description of Chaldaean dualism, regarding two beneficent
and two maleficent planets, and a discussion of dualism in Herakleitos, Empe-
dokles, Pythagoras, Anaxagoras, Aristotle, and Plato. As Griffiths notes, Plutarch
opposes the Dyad, rather than the older Pythagorean Plurality, to the One
(370e). This had been done by him, with Lamprias speaking, in De defectu 428f,
where the One is more in the realm of numbers than principles, strictly speak-
ing (a passage discussed by Dillon).9 Interestingly, in Ammonios’ speech at the
end of De E, the One is opposed to Plurality. In regard to Plato, Plutarch in De
Iside 370f speaks rather seriously of Plato changing his view in old age, and in
the Laws (896d) openly speaking of what he had hinted at in the Timaios (35a),
that the cosmos was moved by two souls, one good, one evil.10
Then comes an allegorical interpretation which is based on ideas appearing
in Plutarch’s De animae procreatione. Here the world is like Plutarch’s concep-
tion of the human composite (soma, psyche, nous). Matter always existed, but
only when logos associated with psyche (here manifested by movement and
opinion [doxa]), did the world (kosmos, with a play on kosmos as order) come
into being. Then incorporating ideas from numerous Platonic dialogues, he sug-
gests that the reversal of the world’s motion is due to its forgetting the vision
of the paradeigma it once had, at which time it must be recalled to its former
state:11
There will be a time and often has been in the past, during which time
its reflective power (to phronimon) becomes dull and is lulled to sleep,
filled with forgetfulness of its proper role, and that element which from
the beginning has been in communion and sympathy with body, drags
it down and makes it heavy and unwinds the progress of the universe
toward the right; it cannot, however, altogether disrupt it, but the better
8 See Mithras platonicus, 14–22, for an analysis of Plutarch’s approach (“Le témoignage de
Plutarque”); and for reliance on Poseidonios for the pirate incident, Mithras platonicus,
5.
9 Griffiths, De Iside et Osiride, 484; Dillon, The Middle Platonists, 199.
10 Plutarch liked to give priority to Plato’s “older” views. Cf. Griffiths, De Iside et Osiride, 485,
who cites Num. 11, and Quaest. Plat. 1006c, though actually the Timaios belongs to the
“older Plato.”
11 Plutarch, De animae procr. 1026ef [en: For more recent bibliography on the issue see Roig
Lanzillotta, “Plutarch and the Image of the Sleeping and Waking Soul.”]
element rouses itself again and looks toward the model (paradeigma)
with God aiding it to turn again and straighten itself out.
One can find reflections of these ideas throughout Plutarch’s writings. Here
Isis is the female principle, nurse, receptacle, with a longing for the highest
things (Osiris as the Good).12 The identification of the Good with a god (God)
shows a characteristic inclination in Plutarch’s thought (as for example the
passage in De facie which introduces the idea of a second death) as is the
longing for the Good (God). Horos is the world, a blend of matter and the
Forms, but the picture gets more complicated: there is an elder Horos (iden-
tified with Apollo, born while Isis and Osiris were in the womb of Rhea), but
this was only a picture and vision of the world (373c). The soul of Osiris is
everlasting, but his body can be dismembered by Typhon. Hermes is logos,
which causes Horos to win out over the destructive element. Whatever the
sources of these ideas, one can find parallels with De animae procreatione
and De sera, parts of the eschatological myths, the moral treatises, and the
like.13
In De Iside the allegorizing is along the lines of the Platonic conception of the
universe, though the idea of logos playing an important part becomes charac-
teristic in later Platonism. However, Dillon’s interpretation of the passage on
Osiris at 373ab may be misleading. He speaks of Osiris as the Logos, which has
two aspects, the immanent and transcendent, distinguished as the soul and
body of Osiris, the body being the Logos or Ideas immanent in matter. In reality
Plutarch speaks of “the image of being in matter” (372f: εἰκὼν γάρ ἐστιν οὐσίας
ἐν ὕλῃ γένεσις καὶ μίμημα τοῦ ὄντος τὸ γιγνόμενον [“for in matter generation is
an image of being and becoming is an imitation of the existent”]). The soul of
Osiris is not explicitly said to be the Ideas but more specifically “that which
really is and is intelligible and good,” suggesting something like God in the
speech of Ammonios in De E, rather than a plurality of Ideas. The body of Osiris
is “the images from this with which the sensible and corporeal is impressed,
and the relationships, forms, and likenesses which this takes upon itself, like
impressions of seals in wax” (not necessarily immanent ideas).14 (Immediately
12 De Iside 372ef, ἔχει δὲ σύμφυτον ἔρωτα τοῦ πρώτου καὶ κυριωτάτου πάντων, ὃ τἀγαθῷ ταὐτόν
ἐστι κἀκεῖνο ποθεῖ καὶ διώκει.
13 [en: Abundant bibliography in H.-G. Nesselrath (ed.), Plutarch On the Daimon of Socrates.
Human Liberation, Divine Guidance and Philosophy (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010).]
14 Dillon, The Middle Platonists. He sees the wax image as common in Middle Platonism
(Arius Didymus, Compendium of Platonic Doctrine, in Eusebius, Pr. Ev. 211.23, 3–6, and
in Philo, Ebr. 133, Migr. 102, Mut. 134). To be more precise: Horos is not pure and uncon-
after speaking of Osiris as the unmixed and dispassionate logos, he speaks of

Hermes as logos, a kind of defense lawyer in a trial of legitimacy for Horos, 373b)
This type of allegorizing is different from that we find in a fragment which
might come from his De anima. The different kinds of allegory may represent
different stages in his life. In the fragment (200) we find an interpretation of
Odyssey 10.239–240 in which the transformation of Odysseus’ men into swine
by Kirke has the deeper meaning of palingenesis:
οἱ δὲ συῶν μὲν ἔχον κεφαλὰς φωνήν τε τρίχας τε

καὶ δέμας· αὐτὰρ νοῦς ἦν ἔμπεδος ὡς τὸ πάρος περ·
They had the heads of swine, the voice, the hair,

the shape; yet still unchanged their former mind.15
The interpretation is “as taught by Plato and Pythagoras:” the change of a soul
into a shape according to its inclinations; how logos (Hermes) guards one
against falling into bestial shape and leads the soul to the good (Good); and
how fate and nature, like Empedokles’ daimon, wrap the soul in “unfamiliar
shirt of flesh” (fr. b126, also quoted in De esu carnium 998c). Kirke, child of the
sun, “joins birth to death and death to birth in unending succession.” Aiaia is
the region of space where the souls enter on arrival. Kirke’s brew (the kykeon) is
birth, mingling (kykosas) the mortal and the immortal. The crossroad (trioklos)
refers to the parts of the soul: those guided by the appetitive are reincarnated
as asses or swine, those guided by the irascible into wolves or lions (after Plato,
Phaidon 108a, Gorgias 524a). In the next fragment (201), on Odyssey 4.563, the
Elysian plain is the surface of the moon illuminated by the sun, where the
good live. As J. Pépin notes, these ideas appear in slightly different form, though
taminated logos like his father; physis by undergoing changes of form in regard to noeton
brings about the kosmos; Horos is the visible image (εἰκών) of the kosmos noetos (intelli-
gible world) (373b). Thus the language is more redolent of logos than Ideas. Though the
passage speaks of εἰκόνες, λόγοι, εἴδη, ὁμοιότητες, Ideas are not explicitly mentioned, unless
one takes εἴδη and ὁμοιότητες as the Platonic Ideas. In something of a dualistic scheme,
the Good (τὸ γὰρ ὂν καὶ νοητὸν καὶ ἀγαθόν) is opposed to the Evil. Through the force of
logos—apparently the same as “the Good,” “the first and most dominant”—overcome by
love, Isis-physis allows this Osiris, Good, First, most Lordly, Better, Logos to impregnate her
with “emanations and likenesses” (ἀπορροαὶ καὶ ὁμοιότητες, 372f). The passage is a curious
mixture of the middle and later Plato with the Egyptian Isis theology.
15 See the text, translation, and commentary of F.H. Sandbach, Plutarch’s Moralia xv (Lon-
don and Cambridge, Mass. 1969) 368–369.
similar, in Pseudo-Plutarch, De vita et poesi Homeri 126, which was most likely
written in the early Empire, and in Pseudo-Herakleitos, Quaest. Homericae
72–73 (Pépin does not seem to have noticed the Plutarch fragments).16 In all,
Hermes is identified with logos; like Plutarch, both stay close to the wording of
Phaidros 256b and Politeia 614. Pseudo-Plutarch has the transformation of the
men as palingenesis, but Aiaia as the place of wailing.
The De Iside contains a wealth of material on Egyptian religion and Greek
interpretation of it. For an evaluation one should consult Griffiths, but his prin-
cipal conclusions can be noted here. It is striking that Osiris receives so much
attention, and Sarapis almost none. As mentioned, little relates to Plutarch’s
own Sitz im Leben, for example, shrines in Greece. The whole study is based
on literary works relating to Egypt, while the interpretations are intensely
Greek (Neoplatonic and Stoic, as Griffiths calls them). There are affinities with
Philo, the Johannine gospel, and a touch of Gnostic-sounding matter. Unlike
Apuleius, who stresses pantheism and pansyncretism, Plutarch identifies Isis
with Demeter, and she is a goddess of wisdom, leading to gnosis of the highest
being. The myth stresses the phallic element, offers a new episode in Byblos,
and Dionysos is reflected in Osiris as pioneer of civilization. There is a surpris-
ing multiplicity of interpretation; that is, Osiris is Hades, Plouton, Dionysos,
Okeanos, as well as the unmixed and dispassionate logos and the vertical side
of the most beautiful of triangles. Isis, for example, is less Egyptian, the arbiter
of sexual love. Typhon as the dry element seems to be a Greek elaboration. Her-
mes (Thoth) is given much prominence.
The religious ideas Plutarch promotes are eternal life and immortality, based
upon knowledge and insight, terms associated with God or Zeus, and later with
Osiris, while the theme of overcoming death finds little attention. He looks for
examples of moral purity: Osiris, the logos, “pure, uncontaminated, unmixed,
and without passion,” is the guide for the souls when the souls are “set free and
migrate into the realm of the invisible and unseen, the undefiled and unspot-
ted, and the unmixed and dispassionate,” presumably the intelligible sphere.
Only in philosophy, before this, can they obtain “a dim vision of his presence”
(373b and 382d–383a, with 352a, 371a, and 375e). He avoids associating Isis with
sexual life, women, the bearing of children, and love of parents for children,
and there is no inkling of the Hellenistic and Roman conception of Isis-Tyche.17
16 Pépin, Mythe et allégorie, 112–121, gives a very ample bibliography and texts. See also Wehrli,
Zur Geschichte; and F. Buffière, Les mythes d’Homère et la pensée grecque (Paris, 1956). For
the Plutarch text and notes, see Sandbach, Plutarch’s Moralia xv, 367–375.
17 Griffiths, De Iside et Osiride, 33–75, esp. 46. For an interesting and important textual
In general one may call it a nostalgic, anachronistic blend of antiquarianism

brought into being by the interests of his own day, much like his biographies.
In a very interesting study, J. Hani has treated the De Iside in a somewhat
different way from that of Griffiths.18 Though studying individual points at
great detail, he has at the same time tried to organize the material along gen-
eral themes and groups as broached by Plutarch. Some of his more general
observations about De Iside can be given here. He feels that Plutarch was a
good religious historian, whose transcription of Egyptian was excellent, and
whose description of the religion adequately depicts it. He attacks the position
of Scott-Moncrieff and Hopfner that Plutarch is describing the religion of an
esoteric priestly group. Hani thinks the Louvre Hymn, where Osiris is on a civ-
ilizing expedition, and Egyptian wisdom texts which reveal happiness in the
world beyond show parallels with the contents of De Iside. He quotes P. Der-
chain to the effect that Festugière had not recognized the Egyptian character
of the Corpus Hermeticum since he could not distinguish the intellectual basis
from the mode of expression.19
For Hani the De Iside is incomplete, too preoccupied with spiritual advance-
ment and disdain for popular Isism, while at the same time representing Plu-
tarch’s most advanced views on the problem of evil, myth, demonology, and
allegorical interpretation. Like Dörrie and others he sees Plutarch making sig-
nificant progress on the road to Neoplatonism and later religious philosophy.
In this respect he possibly overstates his case, taking Plutarch as a product of
degenerate polytheism, “le polythéisme grec à son déclin, vidé de sa substance.”
Plutarch’s attempt then would be to revitalize the philosophical spirit through
emendation to De Iside, see M. Marcovich, “Hades as Benefactor, Plutarch, De Iside 362d,”

cp 69 (1974) 287–288, and more general, idem, “Textual Criticism of Plutarch,” Emerita 40
(1972) 157–165. See also C. Froidefond, “Notes critiques sur quelques passages du De Iside et
Osiride de Plutarque,”reg 85 (1972) 63–71. Hani, La religion égyptienne, has tried to analyze
the work on several levels, Egyptian, Greco-Egyptian (Alexandrian), Greek (6th cent.),
Imperial, and Plutarchan. He notes Plutarch’s hostility toward the cult of Attis (8), toward
Herodotos, who is never mentioned (15), gives some weight to Plutarch’s interrogation
of Egyptian priests and philosophers in Egypt (vs. Griffiths) (10–11), and thinks he had
read the 1st cent. ad Apion’s Aigyptiaka (vs. a sceptical Griffiths) (21). Hani also notes that
he downplays the popular cult to Anubis (61), omits the parallelism between Osiris and
Adonis—in Hani’s view dating to the Hyksos period (1730–1580bc) period—and that he
never even mentions Adonis (84). Hani also believes that the demonological exegesis of
the Osiris myth was present in the mysteries before Plutarch (338).
18 La religion égyptienne, conclusions, 465–471.
19 “L’ authenticité de l’ inspiration égyptienne dans le Corpus Hermeticum,” Rev. Hist. Rel. 161
(1962) 175–198, on Festugière, 176.
the fecundation of Egyptian religion, such as occurred later at Alexandria when

the Platonic spirit took hold of Christianity. The grace of mystic revelation in
the temple of Isis, vision, direct contact with the supernatural, a leap into the
beyond, and the gift and reception of the divine favor, all, for him, prefigure the
Plotinian ecstasy.
It is difficult to go this far with Hani. Surely Isism did not mean that much
to Plutarch, if we can accept Flacelière’s late date for the De Pythiae oraculis.
It was like so many of his works, written on a particular theme, which, as so
often, is treated sympathetically and a bit overstressed. He hardly meant it as a
“tentative désespéré” to save the religion of ancient Greece. Even to state it in
such a way might have been a puzzle to a Greek of that time. On the other hand,
Hani is right in seeing Plutarch as a product of his time, and to some extent
shaping it at least by popularizing religious and philosophical syncretism.
Plutarch’s use of very early sources in his De Iside, with naught a word for
contemporary Isism has always been mysterious. Something of a mystery, too,
is why, in his Metamorphoses or Asinus Aureus, Apuleius gratuitously made
the hero, Lucius, a descendant of Plutarch.20 Both Plutarch’s silence about
contemporary practice and the unusual treatment given the cult are perhaps
understandable in terms of his Roman adventure.
Plutarch’s most impressionable days in Rome apparently were under Domi-
tian. Under his reign he was very likely expelled, or at the least thought it advis-
able to remain out of sight.21 Moreover, at this time several of his friends were
executed or punished. His silence about contemporary Isism may, therefore,
have been intentional, since Domitian was its greatest promoter. There were,
undoubtedly, great differences between the practice at his native Chaironeia,
at Delphi, or at Athens, compared with that at the huge Isaeum Campense
in Rome.22 Domitian in fact may have rebuilt the temple of Isis to stress the
Egyptian heritage, through imitation of the temple at Memphis, rather than
the Hellenized transmission of the cult.23 Thus the Roman form of the reli-
20 See Walsh, “Apuleius and Plutarch,” 20–32; 22 and 31 note 10. The reference is to Ovid, Met.
1.2.1 and 2.3.2.
21 See C.P. Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 24–25. Plutarch probably had even stronger feelings
about the matter than Jones believed. See F.E. Brenk, “Plutarch’s Treatment of Nero,” in
A. Ceresa-Gastaldo (ed.), Atti delle xiv Giornate Filologiche Genovesi. Il protagonismo nella
storiografia classica (Genoa, 1987).
22 See F. Dunand, Le culte d’Isis dans le bassin oriental de la Méditerranée (Leiden, 1973) 4–17,
29–39, 132–153, 167–178.
23 See M. Malaise, Les conditions de pénétration et de diffusion des cultes égyptiens en Italie
(Leiden, 1972) 414–417; Cf. idem, “La diffusion des cultes égyptiens dans les provinces
gion, with its exotic aspects, its roots in the class of liberti and foreigners, and
Domitian’s favoritism might have created in Plutarch a certain aversion if not
contempt.24
Plutarch’s own interpretation of the religion is in fact a perversion of true
Isism, the reduction of the myth and cult to a Middle Platonic allegory. Cer-
tainly he was not uninfluenced by some attractive aspects of the religion. In
fact at a critical point in the De Iside, the myth, perhaps unconsciously, influ-
ences his Middle Platonism construct.25 His own essay on love, the Amatorius,
with its idealized conception of heterosexual love may be inspired among other
things by the idealization of the love of Isis for Osiris, a love going beyond the
grave to win the beloved’s resurrection. However, for Plutarch the culmination
of the religion is in the figure of Osiris, who represents the Platonic Logos, Form,
and telos.26
We know little of the inner spirit of Isis religion at Rome at the time of
Apuleius. Still, Lucius’ final initiation into the mysteries of Osiris, as the height
of his religious conversion, sounds suspect.27 One would not get the impression
from the aretalogies, the cult objects, and most of the inscriptions that Osiris,
not Isis, is the culmination of the religion. In fact even the “Isis book” of
européennes de l’ Empire romain,” anrw ii.17.3 (1984) 1616–1684, esp. 1645. See also A. Rou-
let, The Egyptian and Egyptianizing Monuments of Imperial Rome (Leiden, 1972) 23–34;
F. Coarelli, “I monumenti dei culti orientali in Roma: Questioni topografiche e crono-
logiche,” in U. Bianchi and M.J. Vermaseren (eds.), La soteriologia dei culti orientali nell’Im-
pero Romano (Leiden, 1982) 33–67; 63–64.
24 For the ethnic and social components see Malaise, Les conditions, 67–100.
25 See S.M. Chiodi, “Tematica ierogamica nel De Iside,” in Brenk and Gallo (eds.), Miscellanea
plutarchea, 121–126. She observes that the figure of Isis (receptacle-chora) in Plutarch
becomes very much conflated with both Eros and Penia of the Symposion, and at times
takes on very positive aspects (124–126).
26 This would seem to be the import of De Iside 371a–c, and 382f–383a, since Plutarch
appears to conflate Osiris—as nous, logos, and as leader and king toward the Form of the
beautiful—with the Form itself.
27 See J.G. Griffiths, Apuleius of Madauros. The Isis-Book (Metamorphoses, Book xi) (Leiden,
1975) 53–54. He rightly argues against R. Thibau, “Les métamorphoses d’Apulée et la
théorie platonicienne de l’ erôs,” Studia Philosophica Gandensia 3 (1965) 89–144, on this
score (that in Apuleius the culmination is in Osiris, not Isis). He notes that there were
distinctive rites for Osiris at this time (330, 335), but the evidence he cites proves nothing
about the Roman shrine. Griffiths would think of the rites of Osiris being connected with
the Serapeum. However, R.A. Wild, “The Known Isis-Sarapis Sanctuaries of the Roman
Period,” anrw ii.17.4 (1984) 1739–1851, believes that the Serapeum of the Isis Campense
may not have been constructed until the time of Alexander Severus, since 1st and 2nd
cent. writers only speak of Isis in the Campus Martius (1813).
Apuleius, an appropriate name for the book, does not leave that impression
from its imagery and description of the festival.28 Apuleius, then, with his stress
on Lucius’ lineage deriving from Plutarch, may be saying as recent authors
suggest, that the key to interpreting his Metamorphoses, and in particular the
last, “Isis book,” is Plutarch’s Middle Platonic allegorizing of the religion, and
that it is Middle Platonism, not Isism, which constitutes the true approach
to the divine. The Isiac religion would be, then, only the final part of the
general Platonic allegory running through the Metamorphoses. In the light of
this interpretation, the initiation into the mysteries of Osiris is not historical
for the Roman center, at least in the importance given it, but is essential to the
Platonic allegory. Apuleius’ romance ends, then, with the novelistic expression
of Plutarch’s Middle Platonic essay, very correctly entitled, not On Isis but On
Isis and Osiris.29
28 There is some counter evidence. A number of inscriptions are made both to Isis and
to Osiris, or to Osiris alone. See L. Vidman, Sylloge Inscriptionum Religionis Isiacae et
Sarapiacae (Berlin, 1969) 189–221. However, one should note that he records only 4 Greek
and 2 Latin inscriptions at Rome with the name of Osiris, though there are numerous ones
to Sarapis (indices, 342, 344). Presumably Osiris would receive some importance through
the Heuresis or Inventio Osiridis (The Finding of Osiris), which seems to have formed a part
of the Roman religious calendar in the Julio-Claudian period (see Malaise, Les conditions,
221–228). However, this festival can be understood as representing the triumph of Isis, and
in fact Apuleius symbolically puts the climax of his work at the Navigium Isidis, not the
Inventio Osiridis.
29 I am grateful to Prof. M.R. Salsman of Boston University for looking at this section and
making some useful suggestions. She is inclined, however, to believe that there were real
mysteries of Osiris at Rome.
chapter 6
Plutarch and the Stoics
In his very thorough study of the relationship of Plutarch’s thought to that of

the Stoics, Babut came to the conclusion that in spite of similarities of termi-
nology and personal friendship with contemporary Stoics, of admiration for
certain Stoic heroes, and a softening of attitudes on some points, the Stoic
system was at heart repugnant to him and was used very much as a foil (“révéla-
teur”) against which his own ideas were expressed.1 More of Babut’s views on
the subject can be summarized here. Surprisingly, Plutarch hardly alludes to
the Stoics of his own day such as Seneca, Mousonios, Epiktetos, and again and
again cites Chrysippos for views of the school. Babut claims that he did not
appreciate the originality of Poseidonios, though often seemingly influenced
by Panaitios and Poseidonios in his criticism of the Stoics. Much that was said
by the Stoics was of course common ground in his time; hence it is possible to
find what appears to be a preponderance of Stoic influence in An vitiositas, De
amore prolis (though not in De sollertia and An bruta animalia), in De fortuna,
De Alexandri Magni fortuna, and Ad principem ineruditum. In De exilio we find
a cosmopolitan view of the world in which there is one patris, one God, and so
forth. However, in De communibus notitiis 1076f he attacks the Stoic view of the
kosmos as a city, alive in all its parts and ruled by the divine logos. He rejects
the Stoic ekpyrosis (the conflagration which ends the world) in De E 388e–389c
on the grounds that it would destroy Apollo (that is, the eternal God). At the
opening of De Pythiae oraculis the Stoics are attacked for “mixing up god with
1 Plutarque et le stoïcisme: on allusion to Stoics of his own day, 16; dualism, 288; on admiration
of certain Stoic tenets, 470–527; on basic separation from Stoics, 533; on evil daimones and
Chrysippos’ idea of providence, 288–293. Cf. Russell, Plutarch, 67–71, who follows Babut.
Dillon, The Middle Platonists, 189, notes that Plutarch’s rhetorical compositions on ethical
subjects, following a long established tradition, affected the austere “Stoic” attitude. He
believes “a series of variation on topoi” have led commentators astray. Rather, he argues,
Plutarch took a more broadminded stance in ethics, like that of Antiochos, against the Stoic-
Pythagorean asceticism seen in Eudoros and Philo, and used Aristotelian rather than Stoic
terminology, 193. He also argues that, like other Middle Platonists, he developed no opposition
to the principate like that of the Stoics, 198. For Dillon, Theon’s speech in De E reflects not
Stoicism so much as the Platonism which had been infiltrated by Stoic logical concepts, 228.
See also M. Zanatta, Gli opuscoli contro gli Stoici i. Delle Contraddizioni degli Stoici (Bari,
1976); and H. Cherniss, Plutarch’s Moralia xiii, Part 1 (De stoicorum repugnantiis) (London
/ Cambridge, Mass., 1976) esp. 369–406.

plutarch and the stoics 79
all things,” and at the end of De defectu Lamprias attacks the unitary view of
the kosmos (the orderly world) and the materialistic conception of it.
In religious matters we find epoche (philosophical caution) and dualism.
Babut feels he never solved the problem of evil, but was troubled by Stoic
attempts, which as he saw made God responsible for evil. This is exemplified
in the attack on Chrysippos over providence (1050e), and over the attempt to
evade the dilemma by alleging certain oversights or through the use of evil
daimones. At the same time Babut finds him sympathetic to Stoic pessimism,
in the view that evil is everywhere and good is difficult to find (An virtus
doceri possit 439b, De audiendis poetis 25b); and throughout the Lives one finds
that there is no such thing as pure and unmixed virtue in this life. He has
a tolerance for views on nemesis (probably from his sources) in Pompey 42,
Aemilius 27, Camillus 37; and in Caesar 63 and Aratos 43 speaks of destiny as
irrevocable. In morals he rejected apatheia (suppression of all the passions),
and in questions of determinism rejected the Stoic position. Thus in Quaest.
convivales 740d, Lamprias outlines a theory of three causes (fate, free will, and
tyche). Determinism would destroy the idea of providence. He criticized the
Stoic telos as putting means before ends. He criticized the Stoic allegorical
interpretation (which as Pépin notes, he used himself). But he appreciated
their belief in monotheism and repugnance to anthropomorphism, their belief
in the divine power and its willingness to communicate with men. Babut takes
the progression to divinity through the states of hero, daimon, god at the end of
Romulus to be Stoic, a view Plutarch was willing to accept, even though against
divine filiation.
Babut believes that the doctrine of evil daimones was important to the Stoics,
that the terminology used for it reflects that of Chrysippos (De defectu 419a,
Quaest. Rom. 276f–277a, not in svf), and that the idea of a guardian daimon
was Stoic. Where it is difficult to go along with Babut is in his judgment that
Plutarch came more and more to accept the theory of evil daimones.2 However,
it is quite possible that the introduction to Dion-Brutus either reflects a Stoic
source, or that Plutarch wanted to introduce a Stoic theory into it. But as we
have seen, the theory rather withers away within the Lives of these men.
In Babut’s judgment there were a number of substantial matters where he
was in sympathy with the Stoa: the fatherhood of God, divine intervention
in the world, the incorruptibility and power of virtue, purity of intention in
prayer, true piety, the use of superstition as a means of government, belief
in portents—though wishing to see them as working according to natural
laws—in seeing limits to rationalism, and looking for a middle ground between
2 Babut, Plutarque et le stoïcisme, 292, note 7; 389, notes 4, 5; 435–436.

atheism and superstition. But his general conclusion points in an opposite

direction in spite of these similarities.3
3 Plutarque et le stoïcisme, 533, “Tandis que chez Plutarque, alors même que les mots sont les
mêmes que dans les textes stoïciens, le fond, le soubassement d’idées et de croyances qu’ils
traduisent, se révêle inconciliable avec la vision stoïcienne du monde.” [en: On Plutarch
and Stoicism, see: P. Donini, “Science and Metaphysics: Platonism, Aristotelianism, and Sto-
icism in Plutarch’s On the face in the moon,” in A.A. Long & J.M. Dillon (eds.), The Question of
Eclectism. Studies in Later Greek Philosophy (Berkeley: Univ. of California Press, 1988) 126–144;
T.L. Tieleman, “Diogenes of Babylon and Stoic Embryology: Ps. Plutarch, Plac. v 15. 4 Reconsid-
ered,” Mnemosyne 44 (1991) 106–125; A.A. Long, “Stoic Readings of Homer,” in R. Lamberton &
J.J. Keaney (eds.), Homer’s Ancient Readers: the Hermeneutics of Greek Epic’s Earliest Exegetes
(Princeton, n.j.: Princeton Univ. Press, 1992) 41–66; Ch. Gill, “Peace of Mind and Being Your-
self: Panaetius to Plutarch,” anrw ii.36.7 (1994) 4599–4640; Ph.T. Mitsis, “Natural Law and
Natural Right in Post-Aristotelian Philosophy: the Stoics and their Critics,”anrw ii.36.7 (1994)
4812–4850; M. Mignucci, “The Liar Paradox and the Stoics,” in K. Ierodiakonou (ed.), Topics
in Stoic Philosophy (Oxford / New York: Oxford University Press, 1999) 54–70; S.Th. Newmyer,
“Speaking of Beasts: The Stoics and Plutarch on Animal Reason and the Modern Case Against
Animals,” Quaderni Urbinati di Cultura Classica 63 (1999) 99–110; M.D. Boeri, “The Stoics on
Bodies and Incorporeals,” The Review of Metaphysics: a Philosophical Quarterly 54 (2001) 723–
752; J. Mansfeld, “Plato, Pythagoras, Aristotle, the Peripatetics, the Stoics, and Thales and His
Followers On Causes: (Ps.-Plutarchus Placita i 11 and Stobaeus Anthologium i 13),” in A. Bran-
cacci (ed.), Antichi e moderni nella filosofia di età imperiale. Atti del ii Colloquio Internazionale
Roma 21–23 settembre 2000 (Naples: Bibliopolis, 2001) 17–68; R. Brouwer, “The Early Stoic Doc-
trine of the Change to Wisdom,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 33 (2007) 285–315;
G. Roskam, On the Path to Virtue: The Stoic Doctrine of Moral Progress and its Reception in
(Middle-)Platonism (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2005); Ch. Gill, “Competing Readings
of Stoic Emotions,” in R. Salles (ed.), Metaphysics, Soul, and Ethics in Ancient Thought: Themes
from the Work of Richard Sorabji (Oxford / New York: Oxford University Press, 2005) 445–470;
R. Caballero Sánchez, “Entre la necesidad del destino y la libertad del átomo: el clinamen
epicúreo y la libertad de indiferencia (Plut., Stoic. Rep. 23, 1045 b–f),” A. Pérez Jiménez &
I. Calero Secall (eds.), Δῶρον Μνημοσύνης: miscelánea de estudios ofrecidos a mª Ángeles Durán
López (Sevilla: Libros Pórtico, 2011) 69–82; idem, “The Adventitious Motion of the Soul (Plu.,
De stoic. repugn. 23, 1045b–f) and the Controversy between Aristo of Chios and the Middle
Academy,” in Roig Lanzillotta & Muñoz Gallarte (eds.), Plutarch in the Religious and Philosoph-
ical Discourse, 55–72; F. Aronadio, “Tracce di Una Polemica fra Accademici e Stoici: [Platone]
Demodoc. 382e–384be Plut., De Stoic. Rep. 1034e,” in W. Lapini et al. (eds.), Gli antichi e noi:
scritti in onore di Antonio Mario Battegazzore (Genoa: Brigati, 2009) 225–237; R. Bett, “Did
the Stoics Invent Human Rights?,” in R. Kamtekar (ed.), Virtue and Happiness: Essays in Hon-
our of Julia Annas (Oxford / New York: Oxford University Press, 2012) 149–169; J. Mansfeld,
“Ps.Plutarch / Aëtius Plac. 4.11: Some Comments on Sensation and Concept Formation in Stoic
Thought,”Mnemosyne 67 (2014) 613–630. See also R. Hirsch-Luipold, “Aesthetics and Religious
Hermeneutics in Plutarch,” in Pérez Jiménez et al. (eds.), Valori letterari delle opere di Plutarco,
207–213.]
chapter 7
Religion in the Lives: Daimon and Tyche
In contrast to the Moralia, where daimon is used for the divinity, a spirit, or
even the mind itself, in the Lives daimon is frequently associated with fortune
or luck (tyche), if not even a synonym for it. One might recall that one of the
chapters in M.P. Nilsson’s monumental study of Greek religion, as he came to
the Hellenistic period, was entitled “Tyche and Daimon.”1 Another contrast is
that, in the Moralia, tyche is often conceived as a godless linking of chance
occurrences, a denial of reason or providence. Such is the line implicit at times
in De fortuna Romanorum and De Alexandri Magni fortuna to some extent,
more expressly in De fortuna, De sera, De tranquilitate, and in De defectu in
Lamprias’ speech on the infinity of worlds. In the Lives, we find a drift toward
what G. Herzog-Hauaser has noticed, Tyche as a divine power, or as a symbol of
the guiding hand of providence.2
1 Geschichte der griechischen Religion ii, 200–218. Cf. U. von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, Der
Glaube Der Hellenen (Darmstadt: Wischaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1976) i, 362–368, and ii,
297–311. He notes, ii, p. 303, n. 1, a line from Eur. Iph. Aul. 1136 where tyche, moira, and
daimon seem to be equated. [en: See now also J. Sfameni Gasparro, “Daimôn and tuchê in
the Hellenistic Religious Experience” in P. Bilde (ed.), Conventional values of the Hellenistic
Greeks (1997) 67–109; Y. Ustinova, “Either a Daimon, or a Hero, or Perhaps a God: Mythical
Residents of Subterranean Chambers,” Kernos 15 (2002) 267–288; A. Timotei, La démonologie
platonicienne: histoire de la notion de daimōn de Platon aux derniers néoplatoniciens (Leiden:
Brill, 2012).]
2 “Tyche,” re vii a, 2 (1948) 1643–1689. The only monograph on tyche in Plutarch is E. Lassell,
De fortunae in Plutarchi operibus notione (Marburg, 1896), a collection of passages and some
attempt at source criticism. He felt Plutarch was more tyche conscious when following
Phylarchos (Pyrrhos, Aratos, Agis and Kleomenes) than Douris (Demosthenes), that in general
he was less enthusiastic about tyche than his sources, but used it as a deus ex machina
for historical and philosophical difficulties. A more general study is A. Buricks, Peri Tyches
(Leiden, 1955). See also A. Pérez Jiménez, “Actitudes del hombre frente a la Tyche en las
Vidas Paralelas de Plutarco,” Bol. del Inst. Helen. 7 (1973) 101–110. See also L. Edmunds, Chance
and Intelligence in Thucydides (Cambridge, Mass., 1975). [en: See now the following studies:
Torraca, “I Presupposti teoretici e i diversi volti della Tyche Plutarchea,” in Gallo (ed.), Plutarco
e la Religione, 105–155; F. Mestre Roca & P. Gómez Cardó, “Tyche e individuo: Ambigüedad
de usos en las Vidas Paralelas de Plutarco,” in A. Pérez Jiménez et al. (eds.), Valori letterari
di Plutarco, 295–305; W.J. Tantum, “Another Look at Tyche in Plutarch’s Aemilius Paullus—
Timoleon,” Historia: Zeitschrift für alte Geschichte = Revue d’Histoire Ancienne 59 (2010) 448–
461; the volume edited by F. Frazier & D. Leão, Tychè et Pronoia: la marche du monde selon

As with so much of Plutarch’s religious thought, we observe not striking

innovations as the use of familiar modes of thought in a newer and stronger
personal, theistic conception. His attitude toward tyche is rooted as much in the
Hellenistic past as in his contemporary world. Working with sources derived
from Hellenistic writers, especially for the Greek Lives, as well as those close to
his time for the Roman Lives, and with some Roman Lives using Polybios for
a base, there is an unusual blending. No real study has ever been made of the
peculiar nature of parallel lives and the influence of the ideology of one upon
the other. However, in the peculiar mode of composition which Plutarch was
working with, often a major source like Livy, with Augustan ideas of fatum and
manifest destiny, runs parallel to a Greek Life written in the heyday of Hellenis-
tic tyche fever. Plutarch obviously wrote quickly, frequently reflects the aura of
Plutarque (Coimbra / Paris: Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2010) includes numerous

intersting studies: e.g. F. Frazier, “Introduction La marche du monde et les incertitudes de la
tychè,” in Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia, viii–xxiii; F. Frazier, “Le De sera, dialogue
pythique: Hasard et Providence, Philosophie et Religion dans la pensée de Plutarque,” in
Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia, 69–92; G. Roskam, “Socrates’ δαιμόνιον in Maximus
of Tyre, Apuleius, and Plutarch,” in Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia, 93–108; A. Pérez
Jiménez, “La Providencia como salvaguarda de los Proyectos Históricos Humanos en las
Vidas Paralelas,” in Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia, 169–182; D. Leão, “Tyche, Kairos
et Kronos dans le Phocion de Plutarque,” in Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia, 183–194;
R. Scannapieco, “I doni di Zeus, il dono di Prometeo. Strutture retoriche ed istanze etico-
politiche nella riflessione plutarchea sulla τύχη,” in Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia,
207–238; A. Casanova, “Fortuna e carattere da Menandro a Plutarco—con una nota testuale
su alcune citazioni di Menandro in Plutarco,” in Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia,
239–250; F. Becchi, “La nozione di τύχη in Plutarco: una variabile secondo il genere?,” in
I. Gallo & C. Moreschini (a cura di), I generi letterari in Plutarco, Atti del viii Convegno
plutarcheo (Pisa, 2–4 giugno 1999) (Naples, 2000) 299–317; J.P. Martin, “Plutarque: un aspect
de sa pensée et de son temps,” in Jean-Marie Pailler (ed.), Mélanges offerts à Monsieur Michel
Labrousse (Toulouse: Service des publications de l’ université de Toulouse-Le Mirail, 1986) 59–
78; S. Swain, “Plutarch: Chance, Providence and History,” AJPh 110 (1989) 272–302; J. Opsomer,
“Quelques réflexions sur la notion de Providence chez Plutarque,” in C. Schrader, V. Ramón
& J. Vela (eds.), Plutarco y la historia (Zaragoza, 1997) 343–356; J. Opsomer & C. Steel, “Evil
without a Cause. Proclus’ Doctrine on the Origin of Evil, and its Antecedents in Hellenistic
Philosophy,” in T. Fuhrer & M. Erler (eds.), Zur Rezeption der hellenistischen Philosophie in der
Spätantike (Stuttgart, 1999) 229–260; see also F. Becchi, “L’écrit de Plutarque Sur la Fortune:
histoire d’ une interprétation”, in Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia, 47–56; P. Volpe
Cacciatore, “Fato e fortuna negli opuscoli contro gli Stoici di Plutarco: un problema ancora
aperto,” in Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia, 39–46; H.M. Martin, “Plutarchan Morality:
arete, tyche, and Non-consequentialism,” in G. Roskam & L. Van der Stockt (eds.), Virtues for
the People: Aspects of Plutarchan Ethics (Leuven, 2011).]
religion in the lives: daimon and tyche 83
his sources, and seldom removes all contradictions. Thus while his own per-
ception of the divine in the world should have excluded any grand role for an
autocratic and independent tyche, we sometimes find passages which seem to
support the opposite view. Within the pages of Plutarch’s Lives one can find a
tyche which operates as pure capricious chance and one which is closely iden-
tified with providence. Or one might say, the sure sign of divine intervention
toward a predetermined event in history is the striking presence of tyche.
One of Plutarch’s major sources was Polybios, who lived a good two centuries
before Plutarch. All of Plutarch’s meanings for tyche were already present in
him, though its identification with the rise of the Roman Empire was obviously
not so clear as in Plutarch. F.W. Walbank some twenty-five years ago devoted
considerable attention to this problem in Polybios, and more recently he has
added a few additional strokes.3 In general Walbank finds Polybios using tyche
to describe acts outside the area of rational analysis, but in practice limiting
it to sensational, apparently capricious events, such as the sudden reversal of
a man’s fortunes, something that was almost a rule for Polybios. In contrast to
Plutarch, he did not believe that the divine was swayed by moderate behavior
(μετριότης) nor that arrogance in itself brought down divine vengeance. In con-
trast to such theistic preoccupations, he is more a child of the earlier Hellenis-
tic period in that the instability of tyche is without reference to a theological
framework. However, tyche begins to appear increasingly as something pre-
determined and teleological in the punishment of the wicked—in Walbank’s
3 F.W. Walbank, A Historical Commentary on Polybius i (Oxford, 1957) 17–25; idem, Polybius
(Berkeley, 1972) 61–65; idem, The Hellenistic World, 219–220. K. Sacks, Polybius on the Writing
of History (Berkeley, 1981) (reviewed by K.-E. Petzold, in Gnomon 58 (1986) 139–145), separates
two kinds of historical writing in Polybios, narration of events and praise and blame situa-
tions. In the latter, tyche and metabolai play a large role, since Polybios felt free to write “tragic
history.” In the historical narrative, tyche was only to be used as a last recourse (36.17), 136–140.
See also A. Roveri, “Tyche bei Polybios,” in K. Stiewe & N. Holzberg (eds.), Polybios (Darmstadt,
1982) 297–326. Plutarch seems to have invented much of the material on tyche in Aemilius.
Polybios: 29.21, introduced the tyche theme, drawing heavily on Demetrios of Phaleron’s Peri
Tyches. This suggests an all-powerful tyche. Livy 45.8.5, simply says: sine errore humano seu
casu seu necessitate indiderunt (Perseus’ revolt from Rome), and goes on to speak of multorum
regum populorumque casibus, speaking to the Romans on his staff in Greek; then speaking to
the others in Latin, he drops a phrase about the mutability of fortuna. At 45.9, speaking about
the fall of Macedon, he omits fortuna altogether. For Polybios’ biography of Philopoimen,
see H. Achleitner, “Polybios’ Philopoimen-Biographie als Quelle für Livius,” Hermes 110 (1982)
499–502. Plutarch’s language (Philop. 17) is ambiguous, but suggests the imposition of a divine
plan on a previous random tyche or all-powerful tyche theme. [en: M.R. Guelfucci, “Polybe, la
Τύχη et la marche de l’ Histoire,” in Frazier & Leão (eds.), Tychè et Pronoia, 141–168.]
view very close in conception to fate or providence. This type of tyche was then
moved one step further to become linked with the rise of Rome, which forms
the major subject of Polybios’ history, and became strongly teleological with
words like σκοπός and οἰκονομία (1.4.1; 1.4.3) to describe it. Tyche then witnesses
a fantastic transformation from pure chance into Stoic pronoia.
Walbank also found a curious tension in Polybios, which perhaps we could
extend farther and apply to Hellenistic historiography in general. According to
the Hellenistic mode of thought, one should be able to find rational principles
governing causes and events. In Polybios’ case the whole purpose of his history
was to illustrate the intelligible principles that determined the rise of Rome.
But this is absurd if the major events of history are dictated by pure chance.
Polybios, of course, could still seek intelligible principles for success or failure
without the need for a theological framework, and in a sense, perhaps, that
is what Stoic pronoia is, a kind of predestination through the intelligible links
between cause and effect.
Walbank put to the test a suggested possibility, that Polybios had moved
from an earlier Hellenistic concept of tyche such as that of Demetrios of Pha-
leron, and then through his own meditation on events gave it a new rationalistic
orientation. But he found no support for this theory in relative chronology,
since both rational and irrational tyche appeared in closely linked passages. He
then concluded that Polybios was strongly influenced by current Hellenistic
usage, which treated tyche as an objective reality, even as a goddess: it became
a convenient label for one like himself, fundamentally a religious sceptic, to
characterize fortuitous events or “acts of God,” without giving them a theolog-
ical interpretation.
A somewhat surprising result if one moves back from Plutarch to Polybios
is that tyche, theos tis, to daimonion and to automaton seem to be synonymous.
This is not so surprising if one moves in the opposite direction, from Homer to
Polybios. But in Plutarch to daimonion seems clearly linked with a divine plan.
The Latin title of Plutarch’s essay on why to theion (= to daimonion) is slow to
punish used numen, and the English translations prefer “God” or “the Divinity.”
Certainly fortuna or “luck” would be mistranslations. In contrast places in the
Lives where to daimonion punishes, especially if they are drawn from Hellenis-
tic authors, might still retain a vestige of the tyche conception. In Polybios to
daimonion seems especially associated with retribution, particularly when the
characteristic vice brings its own damnation. Thus in 4.81.4 to daimonion, by
directing the mercenaries’ vices of impiety and lawlessness (ἀσέβεια and παρα-
νομία) against themselves, encompasses their destruction.
In his more recent Sather lecture and in his new book on Hellenistic civ-
ilization Walbank, while not modifying his original statements, adds a fur-
ther dimension of the dilemma, presented by rationalistic history which had

a strong moral purpose. A reader of this history should be able to unravel the
intelligible principles upon which human events evolve, but at the same time
the moral lesson of learning to cope with vicissitudes seemed meaningless in a
world without a capricious and irrational tyche. Walbank also adds how in Hel-
lenistic culture in general tyche was both haphazard chance and benevolent,
providential action, or even perhaps the work of a malevolent power. However,
he finds it impossible to determine just how the citizen of a town with a pro-
tective Tyche actually conceptionalized this figure—represented in art with a
cornucopia and mural crown—as a theological figure in his or her own life.
One might add also that the very principle of rationalism would seem to
exclude a kind of theistic providence necessary to explain the course of events.
For this reason, to abandon the kind of tyche so popular in the Hellenis-
tic period, is also to abandon rationalism. Walbank at times mentions the
inconsistency often found in Polybios where an event is described both as the
planned outcome of diligent preparation and as the logical consequence of cer-
tain human actions, and at the same time is described in terms of tyche. But
here along the lines of double causality and motivation so well developed by
A. Lesky in his books and articles on Homer there is a tendency in Greek lit-
erature to describe both human and divine causality. That an event should be
attributed to tyche, treated either as irrational chance or as a great supernatu-
ral force determining events, or as an aspect of a theistic God or providence, is
not inconsistent with a human causality and motivation which may appear as
logical or necessary to a modern reader.
This basic conception of tyche as actually a sure indication of providence
and the direction of the universe appears frequently in the Lives, but there are a
number of other changes in Plutarch’s Lives from the tyche essays.4 For example
in Caesar, Caesar’s tyche is played down, and though in the essay De fortuna
Romanorum (319d) we learned that tyche saved him from any retribution for the
death of Pompey, in Caesar 66 every effort is made to convince the reader that
Caesar, who falls at the base of Pompey’s statue and covers it with his blood, was
led there “by some daimon” to make retribution to his enemy, Pompey. Unlike
the essay, the Life of Antony makes Antony’s inordinate passion, not his tyche,
the cause of his downfall. Similarly the early history of Rome is more a product
of providence than tyche, and Aemilius Paullus is hardly an example of glorious
4 C.P. Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 67–71, is impressed by Plutarch’s knowledge of Rome at the
time the De fortuna Romanorum was written. He sees Plutarch inspired by Polybios, but with
the peculiar viewpoint that Rome “was a stable element in the chaos of history, an anchor in
storm and change,” 70, something reflected in his mature work.
tyche so much as an example that the world is a mixture of good and evil; for in
the moment of triumph he suffered the loss of his sons, something he attributes
to the gods, nemesis, or tyche (following Livy, or very likely, Polybios).
One might say that really two pictures of tyche emerge. One is based on
Plutarch’s dualism and recognition of the world as balanced between good and
evil, an idea enunciated in De tranquilitate (474b) where he comments on a
verse of Menander:
By every man a daimon stands, the moment

he is born, the mystagogue of life,
a good one …
The rest of Menander’s fragment helps to contrast different approaches to a

popular attitude, both good Hellenistic conceptions. Plutarch has truncated
the saying to mold it into his procrustean bed of the vicissitudes of life to be
accepted with euthymia (good spirit). The full fragment runs:
ἅπαντι δαίμων ἀνδρὶ συμπαρίσταται

εὐθὺς γενομένωι μυσταγωγὸς τοῦ βίου
ἀγαθός· κακὸν γὰρ δαίμον’ οὐ νομιστέον
εἶναι βίον βλάπτοντα χρηστόν, οὐδ’ ἔχειν
κακίαν, ἅπαντα δ’ ἀγαθὸν εἶναι τὸν θεόν.
ἀλλ’ οἱ γενόμενοι τοῖς τρόποις αὐτοὶ κακοὶ
πολλὴν δ’ ἐπιπλοκὴν τοῦ βίου πεποημένοι
† εἰπάντα τὴν ἑαυτῶν ἀβουλίαν ἐκτρίψαντες †
ἀποφαίνουσι δαίμον’ αἴτιον
καὶ κακὸν ἐκεῖνόν φασιν αὐτοὶ γεγονότες.
By every man a daimon stands, the moment

he is born, the mystagogue of life,
a good one. For an evil daimon is not to be
believed, harming a noble life or to bear
spite; for good is every god.
But those whose ways are already evil,
much complication made into their lives,
accuse a daimon
and him call such, themselves evil become.5
5 F.H. Sandbach, Menandri Reliquiae Selectae (Oxford, 1972) 714 (550–551 Körte) 321; A.W.
The characteristic tendency of educated Greeks to allegorize away evil dai-

mones can be seen in Menander’s virtual equation of the evil daimon with the
character of the victim himself, in a highly moralistic way, and Plutarch’s reduc-
tion of it into a tyche-daimon depriving it of moral overtones.
The theme of the mutability of tyche runs through many Lives, and is usually
disconnected from the idea of providence working through tyche. As Dillon
suggests, Plutarch may have been influenced by Plato’s Laws 709b: “God con-
trols all that is, and fortune (tyche) and opportunity (kairos) cooperate with
God in the control of all human affairs.”6 Generally the mutability of tyche is
part of the human condition, though at other times hints are given that this
is working under a higher cause. Plutarch puts a statement into the mouth of
Lamprias in Quaest. conv. 740d, “virtue obeys no master, but tyche predeter-
mines many things in our life by reason of the various forms of education and
society which different groups enjoy,” a statement which is much more opti-
mistic than what we often find in the Lives. Particularly touching is the Life
of Pompey, where toward the middle (46) Plutarch comments that if Pompey
had died then, he would have had the reputation of Alexander, at whose age
he now was, but after this time his eutychiai (strokes of good luck) only made
others envious and his dystychiai (strokes of bad luck) were irreversible. In 74,
75, and 76 we have an extremely sympathetic treatment of Pompey in discus-
sions with his young wife Cornelia. She believes that her “heavy daimon” has
destroyed Pompey as it did Publius, the son of Crassus, who was her first hus-
band and perished on the Parthian campaign. He reassures her with advice on
the mutability of tyche, and the hope that being so bad it can only get better.
But when he complains about providence to Kratippos the philosopher at Myti-
lene, Plutarch suggests that Kratippos should have asked him if he would have
used his tyche better than Caesar had he been the victor. Plutarch adds that
Kratippos might have pointed out that the condition of the Republic demanded
monarchia (one man rule), something we have seen in the Brutus.7
Gomme & F.H. Sandbach, Menander. A Commentary (Oxford, 1973) 378. Sandbach notes Her-
akleitos, b119 d-k; ἦθος ἀνθρώπῳ δαίμων, and [Epicharmos] fr. 258 Kaibel: ὁ τρόπος ἀνθρώποισι
δαίμων ἀγαθός, οἷς δὲ καὶ κακός. Sandbach notes that μυσταγωγός was by Cicero’s time used for
guides at temples (Cicero, Vert. 4.132) and Strabo even uses it for a man who took him around
Arsinoe.
6 The explanation of Lamprias in Quaest. conv. 9 (740c) is somewhat complicated: “[according
to Plato] heimarmene [fate] interweaves with tyche, while that ἐφ’ ὑμῖν [that within our control
(Loeb: our free will)] combines with one or the other of them, or with both simultaneously.”
Dillon, The Middle Platonists, 209.
7 Kratippos was a Peripatetic philosopher of Pergamon whose distinction seems to have out-
This tendency to subordinate tyche to providence is evident in other Lives

such as the Brutus. Throughout the account of the battle of Philippi (37–51)
we are reminded of the role of tyche. Particularly significant is tyche keeping
back knowledge of Brutus’ naval victory, which would surely have caused him
to delay battle, and in Plutarch’s eyes, win the war. In 47 he writes that tyche
kept back the knowledge, but monarchia was necessary, and Brutus the only
obstacle. In 55 (the syncrisis or comparison made at the end of most sets
of Lives) he asserts that Caesar was a good and gentle physician sent by the
daimon to cure the ills of the state. Here we are on ground similar to the
Pompey.
In Lives such as Marius, Antony, and Crassus, we find a similar reflection
on tyche, but the tyche theme has been subordinated to the ultimate ruin
brought upon one by vice. This is particularly true in Marius and Antony. In
the first, after revealing the upswing of his tyche, fall, and rise again, we find a
rather long digression on the mutability of tyche, which Flacelière and Babut
would like to attribute to one of his sources, Poseidonios, though it reflects
the sentiments of Plutarch’s own De tranquilitate. Here Marius is contrasted
with Plato and the Stoic Antipater of Tarsos, who praised their daimon and
tyche to the end; for Marius was constantly dissatisfied, in spite of his many
successes and consulships, and while lamenting what was incurable, throwing
away the present good.8 Antony’s tyche in 17, 20, 30, and 31 only serves to make
him unbearable and feed the fires of his depraved passions. At 33, reworking
paced his originality. Cicero gave him Roman citizenship and put his son under his charge,
apparently not with the best of results (De off. 1.1, 3.2; Brut. 250). C. Schneider, Kulturgeschichte
des Hellenismus i (Munich, 1967) 964, sees him as an important link between Hellenistic cul-
ture and Roman education. See also K. Büchner, Cicero. Bestand und Wandel seiner geistigen
Welt (Heidelberg, 1964) 432. Plutarch also mentions him in Cic. 24 and Brut. 24.
8 Antipater of Tarsos is mentioned by Plutarch in De tranq. an. 469de. The passage may have
been influenced by Poseidonios of Apameia, cited here for the disease and death of Marius.
He was in Rome at the time of Marius’ death, and his history, continuing that of Polybios, was
used by Plutarch. For his influence on Plutarch see Babut, Plutarque et le stoïcisme, 20 and
216–218, and on the passage, Flacelière, Plutarque. Vies, vi, 154. For his influence at Rome, see
G. Verbeke, “Le stoïcisme: une philosophie sans frontiers,” anrw i.4 (1975) 3–42. For attitudes
toward Marius, see T.F. Carney, “The Changing Picture of Marius in Ancient Literature,” paca
10 (1967) 5–22. B. Scardigli, “Echi di atteggiamenti pro e contro Mario in Plutarco,” cs 14 (1977)
185–253, argues that Plutarch had at his disposal a large number of contemporary sources on
Marius, but preferred critical ones, organizing these tightly in a schematic way. E. Valgiglio,
“L’autobiografia di Silla nelle biografie di Plutarco,” Stud. Urb. 49 (1975) 245–281, examining
parallel passages in the Marius, felt that Plutarch drew much of the Sulla from the hero’s
Memoirs.
an incident which appears in De fortuna Romanorum, Plutarch has a seer tell

him to avoid Octavius; for his daimon and tyche cowers before that of his rival
(proved by games of chance). In 70 he resigns himself to the life of the “heavy-
daimoned” (βαρυδαίμων) Timon the misanthrope, at Pharos. In death he begs
Kleopatra not to lament the last reversals of his tyche, but to remember that
he was once the most illustrious of men. However, this picture is balanced by
the numerous censures on his vice, and the erotic captivation of his soul by
Kleopatra.
On the night of the battle of Carrhae, Plutarch comments on Crassus,
crouching on the ground with his robe pulled over his head, that some might
think he was victim of an unjust tyche, but in reality he was a victim of his
own foolish ambition. But elsewhere in the Life he comments on the invinci-
bility of Roman tyche, and in the syncrisis expresses his amazement that even
Crassus could destroy the Roman eutychia. Timoleon, a companion to Aemil-
ius, is something of a puzzle. The principal source for Timoleon was most likely
the historian, Timaios of Tauromenion, and naturally the mysterious Poseido-
nios has been suggested for Aemilius.9 In Nilsson’s treatment of Timoleon, in
his chapter “Tyche and Daimon,” these forces play a considerable role in Tim-
oleon’s life. A number of rather trivial fortuitous events are related in the Life,
but on the occasion of a chance escape from assassination in 16, a rather long
disquisition is put into the mouths of the “bystanders.” Supposedly the dai-
mon protected Timoleon from assassination (the assassin was struck down by
a personal enemy just at the moment of the attempt). This daimon is identified
with the tyche “which directs all things, using the most apparently disparate
elements to achieve its designs and bringing them together in a way incom-
prehensible to the observer until it has been accomplished.” This seems to
represent a genuine Hellenistic approach toward tyche, which Plutarch has not
tampered with. Tyche, a rather teleological force, described in terms applicable
to providence, directs events mysteriously to a given end. This is really different
from the view reflected elsewhere in Plutarch in which tyche is subordinated to
providence or God, where a plethora of fortuitous events reveals not that the
world is ruled by chance but rather that we have here a sure sign of the divine
hand.
9 The use of Timaios as a source for the Life and the religious beliefs of Timaios himself are
hotly debated by modern scholars. M.J. Fontana, “Fortuna di Timoleonte. Rassegna delle fonti
letterare,”Kokalos 4 (1958) 3–23, felt Timaios was responsible for Plutarch’s picture of the hero.
Flacelière, Plutarque. Vies vi, 3–15, believes in strong influence from Timaios but with tyche
synonymous with providence.
Some attempt was made to parallel the ideological treatment of Timoleon

in Aemilius. Here Plutarch concentrates on the mutability of tyche, and the
instability of human affairs, in which good is always intermingled with evil.
The major passage on the mutability of tyche, conceived here apparently as a
blind force, is in the fall of Perseus (Aemilius 27). Here the passage seems to
be following Polybios closely,10 which had alluded to Demetrios of Phaleron’s
book on tyche. Demetrios, lauding the power of tyche had shown amazement at
the speedy collapse of the Persian Empire and suggested that the Macedonian
might also fall, something Polybios took as a divinely inspired prophecy, in his
account at this point. In De fortuna Romanorum (318b) Plutarch had spoken of
the tearless victory of Aemilius over Perseus, but in the Life—where his words
closely parallel those of Livy—Aemilius’ sons are struck down in the moment
of his triumph, and Aemilius himself reflects on the mutability of tyche and
of nemesis which demanded some share in the triumph. J. Geiger convincingly
argues that Plutarch had no special interest in Timoleon and, contrary to one’s
initial impression, he did not commence with Timoleon, look for a specious
connection, and then fictitiously add fortuna devotion to Aemilius Paullus, the
parallel.11 Rather finding Aemilius noted for devotion to fortuna, in Roman
authors, he actually made this the basis of the comparison, and included
Timoleon-Aemilius Paullus in the series at a relatively late date. However, in this
connection one should also note the importance of Hellenistic historiography
on both Lives.
The Life of Sulla is also filled with tyche, but once again Plutarch is heavily
swayed by his sources. He continually comments on Sulla’s tyche, but much of
this undoubtedly came from Sulla’s memoirs (Commentarii), even if Plutarch
does not specifically mention his source. Sulla calls himself a child of tyche,
names his children Felix and Fausta, and believes his greatest successes were
those where he acted on the spur of the moment. His tyche follows him to
the end, even in assuring that his funeral pyre disappears in a blaze of glory.
Plutarch probably misunderstood Sulla’s conception of his fortuna. It was a
puzzle to the ancients, as much as to modern scholars. The Greek title he gave
himself, corresponding to Felix, was Epaphroditos (close to Aphrodite), and it
seems that he identified Venus with Tyche as a symbol of the favor of the gods.
For Sulla, then, tyche would be a symbol of the grace of the gods, which had
singled him out and offered him constant protection. In a rather long passage
on his tyche (6) Plutarch contrasts him with Timotheos of Athens who no
10 Polybios 29.21 = Diodoros 31.10 [fgh 228.39].

11 J. Geiger, “Plutarch’s Parallel Lives,” here 99–104.
longer had any successes after he denied that his victories were due to tyche.
Since Plutarch uses the Timotheos incident elsewhere, though in a somewhat
different way, the suspicion is that Plutarch rather than Sulla was responsible
for the comparison.12
Caesar’s murder, which should belong to the to daimonion type of retribu-
tion as it appears in Hellenistic historians, the result of a series of chance events
which reveals a supernatural force demanding vengeance, becomes in Plutarch
(Caesar 66) an anti-tyche happening. First the unheeded warnings of Calpurnia
(Caesar’s wife), a soothsayer, and the philosopher Artemidoros are classified,
through what seems total illogicality, possible acts of to automaton. But Caesar’s
position under the statue of Pompey in his “theater,” the most likely candidate
for to automaton, is not even listed as the work of to daimonion, or even the
daimon (that is, the divinity), but of some daimon directing events so the mur-
der would happen there. Invoking the principle of over-determination Plutarch
has the Epicurean Cassius stoop so low as to invoke the statue, presumably the
12 Latte, Römische Religionsgeschichte, 187–188 and 279–280, saw Sulla’s tyche as a divine
force emanating from within him and expressing the guidance of the divine powers:
Venus, the symbol of divine favor would be related to tyche ( fortuna) in war. He sees
the Hellenistic goddess Tyche as important to this development. Besides the Venus of
Pompeii, represented in the guise of the Tyche of Antioch type, Sulla erected a statue of
the Artemis type (the Aphrodite of Aphrodisias) (cf. Herzog-Hauser, re vii a, 2 [1948]
1686). With only one exception Tyche does not appear in Attic vases, but in the exception,
she is in the company of Aphrodite (thus Epaphroditos?) (see G. Körte, “Eichelförmige
Lekythos mit Goldschmuck aus Attika,” Archäologische Zeitung 37 [1879] 93–96, here 95),
and Apelles had painted a picture of Tyche accompanying Aphrodite (Herzog-Hauser,
1688). Perhaps even his “Bellona, Ma, Selene” goddess brought back from the Orient could
be associated with tyche through the Artemis connection. Plutarch comments elsewhere
on Timotheos: Reg. et imper. 187e, De Herod. malign. 856b (suspiciously different!). W.-
H. Friederich, “Caesar und sein Glück,” in O. Hiltbrunner, H. Kornhardt, & F. Tietze
(eds.), Thesaurismata (Munich, 1954) 1–24 (repr. in: idem, Dauer im Wechsel. Aufsätze
von W.-H. Friederich [Göttingen, 1977] 376–388), saw Caesar’s belief in his fortuna or star
(De fort. Rom. 319b–d) as a literary invention based on the influence of comparisons
with Alexander and the partiality of authors writing about Pompey. H. Ericsson, “Sulla
Felix. Eine Wortstudie,” Eranos 41 (1943) 77–89, shows how Plutarch misunderstood and
distorted the Roman concept of fortuna, represented by Venus. See also Iiro Kajanto,
“Fortuna,” anrw ii.17.1 (1981) 502–558, and J. Champeaux, Fortuna. Recherches sur le culte
de la Fortune à Rome et dans le monde romain des origines à la mort de César. i Fortuna dans
la religion archaïque (Rome, 1982). [en: L. Torraca, “I Presupposti teoretici e i diversi volti
della Tyche Plutarchea,” in Gallo (ed.), Plutarco e la Religione, 105–155; Tatum, “Another
Look at Tyche in Plutarch’s Aemilius Paullus—Timoleon."]
shade of Pompey, before the Attentat. Finally, as the blood of Caesar drenches
the pedestal of Pompey’s statue, we are informed that Pompey seemed to be
presiding over his vengeance.
In Caesar 69, however, where in Hellenistic historiography one is condi-
tioned to expect another to daimonion event, to daimonion does not punish
Brutus and Cassius, though the supernatural is evidenced again by a series of
chance events and by the characteristic vice of the guilty. Rather Caesar’s “great
daimon,” apparently a reference to Caesar’s tyche, becomes an avenger and is
responsible for succeeding events. The proof is an obvious tyche event: Cassius
slays himself with the same dagger he had used on Caesar. But suddenly our
ideological perspective changes to evil meteorological phenomena, classified
as among the divine events (τὰ θεῖα). This is followed by more daimonologi-
cal and demonological confusion: the introduction of the evil daimon which
appeared to Brutus at Abydos on his crossing from Asia to Philippi. Plutarch
then notes the second visit of the daimon before the battle of Philippi, and
positions it immediately before Brutus’ suicide so that it flows as a natural con-
sequence of the appearance of the monster. This daimon seems different from
Caesar’s great daimon, though by now the totally confused reader might think
so, and it is not impossible. But there is no confusing this daimon with the tyche
kind. Both the Caesar and Alexander are remarkably free of tyche, an approach,
at least for Alexander, reflected in an apparently earlier essay on the tyche of
Alexander.
The evil daimon which appears to Brutus at Abydos, unlike the great dai-
mon of Caesar, if the two are different, is operating with higher hierarchical
approval:
More than anything else, the apparition which appeared to Brutus

showed that the murder was not pleasing to the gods.
Caesar 69
But in the introduction to Dion-Brutus, Plutarch seems to have rethought the

matter, partly influenced by his desire to present the hero in the best possible
light and as a follower of Platonic doctrine. The daimon, then, does not serve as
an agent of divine disapproval for a murder committed against the will of the
gods, but as a diabolic intrusion into Brutus’ life to prevent him from obtaining
eternal salvation; or, put in Plutarch’s terms, this daimon is a soul-daimon sent
by the gods to oversee the affairs of men, but driven on by envy (φθόνος) and
about to see Brutus saved (“receive a higher portion,” presumably the separa-
tion of nous [intelligence] from psyche [soul], the “best of transformations”),
and acting illegally, had decided to frighten Brutus from the “path of moral
excellence (ἀρετή).” Thus Brutus’ evil daimon really is an evil daimon in a new
sense, and will be punished with reincarnation.
The introduction to Dion-Brutus presupposes, it would seem, the daimono-
logical background of Plutarch’s dialogues touching on the subject, in particu-
lar the De facie. It seems very likely that this passage, or the Lives themselves
of Dion and Brutus, were written after the Caesar, and with more reflection
on the theological consequences. In any case the two parallel passages reveal
the totally different biographical and theological perspectives which Plutarch
could use in moving from one personage to the other, in each case concerned
about presenting him in a favorable light where possible. Moreover, as Pelling
notes, the Caesar seems to be conceived more in terms of historical perspec-
tive, stasis (revolution), demos (the people) and tyrannos (demagogic dictator),
while the Dion-Brutus has a very moralistic perspective.13 One might add that
the involvement of Dion with the school of Plato in the first Life may have
influenced the introduction of corresponding philosophical discussion within
a Platonic framework into the second.14 If the daimonological passages here
were written after those in the Caesar, which seems very likely considering
the attention given them, then we find the traditional attitude in Plutarch and
other educated Greeks to do away with monstrous beings of folk superstition,
substituting for them soul-daimones. A more benevolent divine world, less out
of control, and the subjugation of superstition to rational theology can be seen.
But at the same time the Hellenistic world of tyche, even a tyche corresponding
to pronoia (providence) is undermined.
The great innovation which Plutarch introduced into the Brutus has scarcely
been noticed by scholars, along with the remarkable way that the concept of
parallel lives affected the Brutus. Far from being pragmatike historia of Poly-
bios, even in its moral dimension, this Life takes on an eschatological orien-
tation, not only looking back to philosophical autobiography such as that in
Empedokles’ Katharmoi, but forward to Christian hagiography. The introduc-
tion, more philosophical than historical, appears to refer to a daimonological
treatise Plutarch was working on at the time. This suggests even more that he
conceived of Brutus, albeit in a very timid way, as one of the soul runners or
swimmers of De genio, and as a nous of De facie looking for eventual libera-
tion from the psyche. Through Dion’s attachment to the school of Plato, whose
13 “Plutarch’s Method of Work,” 78.

14 The subject is treated in R. Flacelière & É. Chambry, Plutarque. Vies, xiv (Paris, 1978) 2–17.
Flacelière sees the Life as a glorification of the Platonic Academy: Dion though θεῖά τις τύχη
(some divine tyche) meets Plato who brings about his conversion from a life of luxury and
pleasure, inflaming him with desire for the pursuit of arete and the good (τὰ καλά) (p. 2).
name appears constantly in the opening chapters, philosophical biography has

infected Dion and from there spread to Brutus. The effect is most startling and
possibly was incredibly more so to an ancient reader in possession of the hos-
tile sources in which these vile phantoms probably first appeared as avenging
demons. Such is hinted at by the use of to daimonion to introduce the visions,
the nature of the daimon as an Erinys in Dion, and the theme of demonic
vengeance at the end of the Caesar. In a sense Plutarch, in addition to his
formidable talents as a parallel biographer, may be the inventor of historical-
eschatological biography. In his new vision not only did these two heroes have
to survive the normal assaults on the virtuous man’s arete, but also diabolic
intrusion from the other world, intending to deprive their souls of eternal sal-
vation.
Plutarch avoids conceiving of tyche as the Hellenistic goddess personifying
the favoring circumstances, the eutychia, of an individual or city. Rather, he is
more concerned with contrasts between arete and tyche, and prefers to see
a man’s success as a combination of these factors. He is surprisingly undis-
criminating in certain parts of the Life, and seems to have been taken in by
Sulla’s fortuna propaganda, perhaps because he saw in Sulla a kindred soul,
who believed in the power of dreams as the best form of divination, and among
the Roman heroes most seemed to have a sense of destiny under the direction
of the gods. But the admission of material in this way—not in style among mod-
ern historians or biographers—also helps to characterize Sulla and penetrate
his psychology, leaving it up to the reader to be more critical.
In Philopoimen, Phokion, Cicero and Demosthenes a rather pessimistic and
fatalistic view of the Greek tyche emerges. On the occasion of the battle of the
Thermodon in Demosthenes 19, Plutarch mentions that some daimonios tyche
was about to extinguish the flame of Greek liberty. Citing Euripides, he feels
that the Athenians lost when the gods and tyche turned against them at Syra-
cuse (Nikias 17). The tychai of Greece render Phokion’s arete obscure (Phokion
1). Apollonios, the rhetoric teacher of Cicero, laments the tyche of Greece which
permitted her eloquence to pass to Rome (Cicero 4), and Philopoimen laments
the tyche which was bringing to pass the fated end of Greece (Philopoimen 17).
We may contrast such statements about the tyche of Greece with those in De
fortuna Romanorum where Plutarch marvels at the Roman tyche which, unlike
that of the other great powers which arose in the course of history, was like a
strong sea breeze, continuous and unflagging, resisting every challenge to its
authority. There is no doubt that he found something divine and mysterious in
the rise of the Romans to supremacy over the Mediterranean world, and that
his conception of tyche in the operation of great states, and particularly in their
fall, contributed to his sentiment. He accepted the Roman Empire as something
divinely ordained for the good of mankind, a product of providence, whose

power was revealed as much in the chance occurrences which determined the
success of the Romans, as in the benevolent favor which determined the power
of the Roman army, and the arete (virtue) of its generals.15
15 However, in Flamininus 11, after the defeat of Philip at Kynoskephalai, he has the friends of
the hero, in a little disquisition which is obviously Plutarch’s own thoughts, lay the blame
not on the vagaries of a callous tyche but on the eternal contentiousness of the Greeks. For
Plutarch’s ideas on war and peace consult A. García Bravo, “El pensamiento de Plutarco
acerca de la paz y de la guerra,” cfc 5 (1973) 141–191.
chapter 8
Omens and Portents
Plutarch accepted on religious grounds the belief in portents, though as Babut

and others have noted, he wished to see no infringement upon natural laws,
exercised epoche (philosophical caution), and felt that only after all scientific
explanations failed should one accept the miraculous. Thus, where portents
are related he often tries to offer a scientific explanation. At the same time
he found portents and omens most useful for his pathetic, tragic, baroque,
melodramatic type of biography.1 Often like dreams they help to convey a sense
of psychological disturbance. Another author might have tried to convey this by
speeches put in the mouth of his characters, but Plutarch is chary of doing this.
As a rule he disliked piling up portents in annalistic fashion, especially
where they might be trivial. One can compare his account of the approach
of Hannibal into Italy in Fabius 2 with Livy 22.1. The underlined parts are the
portents used by Plutarch:
8. Augebant metum prodigia ex pluribus simul locis nuntiata; in Sicilia

militibus aliquot spicula, in Sardinia autem in muro circumeunti uigilias
equiti scipionem quem manu tenuerit arsisse et litora crebris ignibus
fulsisse et scuta duo sanguine sudasse, 9. et milites quosdam ictos ful-
minibus et solis orbem minui uisum, et Praeneste ardentes lapides caelo
cecidisse, et Arpis parmas in caelo uisas pugnantemque cum luna solem,
et Capenae duas interdiu lunas ortas, 10. et aquas Caeretes sanguine
mixtas fluxisse fontemque ipsum Herculis cruentis manasse respersum
1 [en: On portents: see J. Isager & R.S. Lorsch, Divination and Portents in the Roman World
(Odense: University Press of Southern Denmark, 2000); J.C. Meyer, “Omens, Prophecies and
Oracles in Ancient Decision-making,” in J.E. Skydsgaard & K. Ascani (eds.), Ancient History
Matters: Studies Presented to J.E. Skydsgaard (Rome: L’Erma di Bretschneider, 2002) 173–183;
S.W. Rasmussen, Public Portents in Republican Rome (Rome, 2003); P. McKechnie, “Omens of
the Death of Alexander the Great,” in Pat V. Wheatley & Hannah, Robert (eds.), Alexander
& his Successors: Essays from the Antipodes. Essays Resulting from the Third International
Conference on Alexander held at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand, in 2006
(Claremont [Calif.]: Regina Books, 2009) 206–226; C. Barat, “Miracles et apparitions: les statues
voyageuses de Sinope et leur signification Politique,” in G. Hoffmann & A. Gailliot (eds.), Rituels
et transgressions de l’ Antiquité à nos jours: actes du colloque (Amiens, 23–25 janvier 2008)
(Amiens: Encrage, 2009) 211–222.]

omens and portents 97
maculis, et in Antiati metentibus cruentas in corbem spicas cecidisse,

11. et Faleriis caelum findi uelut magno hiatu uisum quaque patuerit
ingens lumen effulsisse; sortes sua sponte attenuatas unamque excidisse
ita scriptam: “Mauors telum suum concutit,” 12. et per idem tempus
Romae signum Martis Appia uia ac simulacra luporum sudasse, et Capuae
speciem caeli ardentis fuisse lunaeque inter imbrem cadentis. 13. Inde
minoribus etiam dictu prodigiis fides habita: capras lanatas quibusdam
factas, et gallinam in marem, gallum in ferminam sese uertisse.2
In spite of his regard for eclipses as scientific phenomena, he uses them with
surprising frequency. This curious mentality can be seen in Perikles 6, where
Anaxagoras, by dissecting the brain, explains the cause of a horn growing out of
the head of a goat, but Plutarch also accepts the seer Lampon’s interpretation
that it signified the one man rule of Perikles. In Nikias 23 (the eclipse before
Syracuse which caused Nikias’ fatal delay) Plutarch relates how Plato was the
first to subordinate scientific causes to the theological. Thus, he accepts the fact
that the eclipse was a scientific phenomenon which should not have altered
Nikias’ plans, but also claims that a good soothsayer would have seen that the
eclipse was a good omen for their escape.
In Sulla (7) some Neopythagorean speculation may have entered. According
to Etruscan scholars (logioi), in the intervals between the Great Years clear
signs are given out by to daimonion; during the rest of time divination falls
into disfavor because of weak signs. This comes after he has enumerated, in
annalistic fashion, a number of astounding portents, even if they would not
startle Livy, and Plutarch’s clarification does not explain his ordinary practice
in the Lives. This explanation is followed by a rather trivial Roman portent. A
sparrow carrying a cicada or grasshopper (tettix) in its beak flies into the temple
of Bellona where the Senate is being held. It leaves half the insect behind and
flies off. Plutarch’s explanation may be offered as an excuse for the large number
of portents in the Sulla, or he may have intended to reveal the mentality of the
time, as well as underscoring the momentous change from Republic to Empire.
On the whole the portents are used to accompany and portray the rise and
fall psychologically and often morally of the hero, and in this regard are often
used with striking effect. Mounting portents often signify the moral and phys-
ical end of the hero as he is devastated in soul and mind. In Marcellus 28
2 Livy, Ab urb. cond. 22.1.8–13. The passage is discussed by Rose, The Roman Questions, 16–17.
Professor Sandbach believes Rose made an unnecessary fuss over σαλεύω. The use of the word
to “toss” or “shake” something seems to have been popular in Plutarch’s day.
Plutarch strikingly compresses the portents of Livy 22 in order to throw the

impetuosity of Marcellus’ character into relief. There is an interesting flow of
one portent into another: lightning strikes a temple, a temple is entered by an
animal, an animal utters human speech, and a human is born with characteris-
tics of an animal. Naturally, as is frequent, the hero is “greatly disturbed by the
portents.” In Brutus we have such things as the daimon at Abydos and before the
second battle at Philippi, bees swarming and an Ethiopian hacked to pieces.3 In
Tiberius Gracchus and Caesar, numerous ill-boding portents and dreams before
the murder disturb the hero who hesitates, but goes to his doom.
This technique sometimes involves the use of particularly disturbing or dis-
gusting portents. Alexander is a brilliant case. Sometimes a moment of relief is
given by a propitious portent,4 but the pessimistic flow is hardly interrupted. In
57, as he degenerates psychologically, particularly ugly and disturbing prodigies
and portents undermine him: a lamb with a tiara and testicles growing out of
its head, a favorite lion kicked to death by an ass, a mysterious stranger sitting
on the royal throne, supposedly sent by the god Sarapis. A ray of hope is the dis-
covery of “naphtha,” a grossly underappreciated portent by modern standards,
but the ultimate effect of the series of portents is to turn him to drink. Ulti-
mately he becomes the deisidaimon of De superstitione, filling the house with
incensers, sacrificers, and diviners (75). As Plutarch comments, “just as disbe-
lief in the divine is to be condemned so is deisidaimonia which like water, is
always running off to a lower level” (here the text breaks off). This is quite dif-
ferent from what we find in Arrian (7.24, 7.30) and shows the artistic care and
liberties Plutarch took to achieve a desired effect.5
3 On a visit to the site of Philippi, still untouched by modern development, the author saw bees
swarming from a stone mask lying on the ground among the ruins.
4 In Alexander 2, 3, 14, 17, 26, 27, and 31, favorable portents accompany the hero on his tri-
umphant march to fame.
5 Aristoboulos is given by Arrian (7.23) as his source for a ribbon portent, not recorded by
Plutarch. This portent is similar but somewhat different in Diodoros 17.116. Aristoboulos is
also the source for the man on the throne. Only Plutarch mentions his name (Dionysios).
This raises interesting possibilities. Flacelière, Plutarque. Vies, ix (Paris, 1975) 7–8, believes
Alexander posed as Neos Dionysos to avoid retribution for Thebes. In reality, Plutarch only
hints at this theme. A.D. Nock, Essays on Religion and the Ancient World i (Oxford, 1972) 134–
157, sees no contemporary evidence for Alexander equating himself with Neos Dionysos, and
even finds counter-evidence. There also seems to be a link between Dionysos and Sarapis here
(interpretatio Graeca). On this see J. Stambaugh, Sarapis under the Early Ptolemies (Leiden,
1972) 9–11, and W. Hornbostel, Sarapis (Leiden, 1973) 44–45. Nock, Essays, 140, places the
equation Neos Dionysos = Sarapis in the 3rd cent. In Alex. 14, Plutarch attributes the death of
Kleitos to Dionysos, though in 50 he attributes it to Kleitos’ evil daimon. [en: E. Suárez de la
He likes to use symbolism in which a portent is closely related to the hero

because of some previous event. This is very well done in Antonius. In 24 he
rides magnificently into Ephesos like Dionysos, drawn by lions and surrounded
by bacchantes and satyrs—a flamboyant description matching Kleopatra’s
arrival on the Knidos. Before the battle of Actium (60) the Herakleion at Patrai
is destroyed by lightning and the statue of Dionysos in the Gigantomachia at
Athens, the dedication of Attalos of Pergamon is swept away by the wind. (Her-
akles was another god he had associated himself with, as Plutarch remarks.)
Finally in 75, before the battle of Alexandria, instead of the comfort of a few
hours’ sleep which he desires, he hears the sounds of a mystic procession.
Antony tells his slaves to fill his cup generously that night, since it was uncertain
whether he would be alive the next. As his friends begin to weep, he expresses
his pessimism about the future. Then late that night a Bacchic thiasos is heard
with instruments, chanting, and the shouts of maenads and satyrs moving from
the middle of the city to the outer gate, where it reaches its climax and dies
away. Plutarch suggests that the god “whom Antony had most modeled his life
on” Dionysos, was now abandoning him.
This is one of the really brilliant touches in the Lives, prepared for by
Antony’s magnificent entrance into Ephesos earlier where he met Kleopatra
as Aphrodite. It would be very unusual if Plutarch, who wrote on Egyptian
religion in the De Iside, should not be aware of the Egyptian significance of
Antony’s imitation of Dionysos, and the naming of Antony and Kleopatra’s chil-
dren. At 364e he suggests very strongly that Osiris is really Dionysos, though
at 361e he relates Persephone to Isis. Recently the subject of Antony-Dionysos-
Osiris, and Kleopatra-Aphrodite-Isis has received attention in an article by F. Le
Corsu.6
Torre, “Dioniso y el Dionisismo en Plutarco,” in A. Pérez Jiménez, J. García López, & R. Aguilar
Fernández (eds.), Plutarco, Platón y Aristóteles, 29–55.]
6 See F. Le Corsu, “Cléopatre-Isis,”bsfé 82 (1978) 22–23, and idem, Isis. Son mythe et ses mystères
(Paris, 1977) 86–91. She believes that Kleopatra’s and Antony’s assimilation to Isis and Osiris
(along with Aphrodite and Dionysos) led to the romantic image taken advantage of by
Octavian’s propaganda. See also idem, Plutarque et les femmes dans les Vies Parallèles (Paris,
1981); on Kleopatra, see 220–223. The best treatment of Antony’s and Kleopatra’s relationship
to Dionysos and Aphrodite, and to a lesser extent Osiris and Isis, can be found in P.M. Fraser,
Ptolemaic Alexandria (Oxford, 1972). Where he does not treat certain points explicitly, the
reader can deduce for himself what Antony’s and Kleopatra’s relationship to the ideology
and ritual of these gods must have been, e.g.: Dionysos-Osiris, 192, 202, 206, 211, 497; the
pompe at Alexandria, 231–232; Ptolemaic descent from Dionysos, 44–45, 202–203; Antony as
Dionysos, 205; on the possible temple built for him by Kleopatra, 24; royal support for the
cult of Aphrodite, 238–240; association of Aphrodite with Isis, 671–672; and Kleopatra as
Portents are used with reserve and with significance for the hero. In Marius
8 good sacrifices encourage the hero to strive for the consulship. In 36, while
fleeing from Sulla’s cavalry, he is buoyed up by the recollection of a portent
during his youth, the discovery of a nest with seven eagles, interpreted to mean
he would have seven consulships. In 39 an ass seeking water indicates flight by
sea. Finally, in 45 evil portents and nightmares undermine him psychologically
as Sulla advances. The suspicion is that Plutarch took the portent of the eagles
from Marius’ youth and transferred it to this important psychological moment.
(Then he goes on to disprove the possibility of an eagle laying seven eggs.)
Sometimes he seems to relate a portent out of ars gratia artis. Such might be
in the description of the landscape near Apollonia (Sulla 27), an idyllic passage
into which the ominous fire of volcanic eruption hints at evil. This is followed
by the capture of a satyr bleating unintelligibly, an incident which disturbs
Sulla, who feels it signifies the disbandment of his troops when he reaches Italy.
His spirits are raised by an apparition of two armies (or goats, depending on
one’s textual preference) fighting in the sky over Campania. The portent seems
a little unnecessary, but it does indicate Sulla’s problem, his apprehension over
it, and the reason for his confidence when once approaching Rome.7
A very skillful and touching use of portents comes at the end of the Cicero
(48) where the externals are closely related to the inner psychological world
of Cicero with his native culture and humanity grotesquely overwhelmed by
barbarity and horror in a world turned upside down on itself. Near Caieta the
place where Cicero is to embark, there is a temple of Apollo above the sea.
Crows rise up from the temple and land on Cicero’s ship as it is being rowed
to land, an event regarded as a bad omen by the spectators. Cicero, however,
“New Isis,” 244–245. Plutarch was aware of the titles Neos Dionysos and Nea Isis for Antony
and Kleopatra (61). He also suggests in this chapter that Antony identified himself with the
kingdom of Pergamon. (His name was on the statues at Athens of Attalos and Eumenes, which
were blown down.) Perhaps Kleopatra’s trip by barge on the Knidos was modeled on an Isis
ritual by boat. On this see R. Merkelbach, Isisfeste in griechisch-römischer Zeit. Daten und Riten
(Meisenheim, 1963), 39–41 and 45–47. Fraser, however, notes that no surviving document links
Kleopatra with Isis; see i, 245, and ii, 397, note 441.
7 Actually there was nothing all that portentous about the volcanic stream; see Flacelière,
Plutarque. Vies vi, 340. It was described by Ael., v.h. 13.16 and Plin., nh 2.106. Professor
N.G.L. Hammond has told me that such streams are still to be found in the area. The vision
at 27.8 of two goats (mss.) was corrected by Ziegler and Flacelière to “armies,” on the basis of
Iul., Obs. 57 and Aug., De civ. Dei. 2.25. One wonders whether there might have been confusion
in the Latin mss., between aries and acies, just as there would be between στρατοί and τράγοι.
Plutarch, influenced by the satyr portent, might himself have seen a connection between a
satyr and a goat portent.
goes to his villa, which is infested by crows which caw hideously and try to drag
the garments from his face. The slaves then reproach themselves for standing
by for their master to be murdered while wild, dumb creatures try to save him.
They then put him in a litter and carry him back to the sea.
This is another of Plutarch’s literary masterpieces in the manneristic style.
Crows were long associated with Apollo and therefore appropriate. Not only
was Apollo a great benevolent god in Augustan ideology, which may have
helped to popularize the story, but Plutarch, who at the age of fifty held the
highest priesthood at Delphi and was a great Delphic propagandist, would be
interested in any cult of Apollo and in presenting him in the most benevolent
way. Here the god tries to save the great Roman orator, himself the most
prominent Phil-Hellene of his age, from the murderous hands of assassins
hired by power-mad and cruel politicians and soldiers. Thus again Plutarch
can intertwine the Greek and Roman worlds both within the complex of two
separate lives and in the individual pages of each. The contrast between Apollo,
the symbol of idealized and refined humanity and culture, and the hideous
crows, who are at the same time his attribute, in the milieu of approaching
murder and barbarism is a touch which causes no regret for Plutarch not
restricting himself to pragmatike historia. Perhaps Augustan history with its
Apollinine ideology preserved the incident of the temple. In the very short
versions of Appian and Valerius Maximus this touch is not to be found.8
The temple of Apollo is mentioned by Livy (40.21.1) while reviewing por-
tents at the time of a dispute between Perseus of Macedon and his brother,
Demetrios. Plutarch may personally have seen the temple at Caieta on an Ital-
ian trip, or reviewed the topography of Cicero’s death with Roman friends,
either in Italy or Greece, and might have been reminded of the temple while
preparing material for his life of Aemilius Paullus. It is not impossible that his
fancy made the connection between the crows and the temple of Apollo at Cai-
eta.
The inhumanity of man to man is underscored by the betrayal of Cicero by
a young man he had educated, the pathetic description of the old orator trying
to accept death stoically “in the pose he was most famous for, with his chin
resting on his left hand, but his hair long and covered with dust and face filled
with anxiety,” and the description of the hands and head cut off and nailed
to the rostra “where the viewers saw not Cicero’s members but the soul of
8 Appian, Bell. Civ. 4.19, Valerius Maximus, 1.4.5. In Valerius, a crow takes the hand of a sun dial
in its beak. See D. Magnino, Vita Ciceronis (Florence, 1963) 168–169; Flacelière & É. Chambry,
Plutarque. Vies, xii 162–163.
Antony.” In many respects the passage contains personal touches of the author.
It is in sympathy with his own “Pythagorean” animal treatises that the passage
here emphasizes the humanity of animals and animality of human beings. He
was intrigued by divination through birds, and by korakes (crows or ravens)
in particular, referring to them in the Gryllos (989a), using them in Tiberius
Gracchus before the death of the hero, and in Alexander for the march to Siwah,
in contrast to the snakes used by Arrian. It is possible that he turned things
around so that we have a touching expression of the sympathy of nature for an
afflicted man rather than a mere ominous portent such as he may have found
in his source.9
On occasion, but really very seldom, a hero ignores a portent with impunity,
though some, naturally, are misunderstood. He was highly selective and, as can
be seen, took rather surprising liberties with his sources. At times one gets the
feeling that through them, as through dreams in Plutarch (and in Homer), the
gods initiate the course of history in the strange manner of the interaction
of the human and divine, which A. Lesky describes as double causality and
motivation.10
9 On this see H. Homeyer, Die antiken Berichte über den Tod Ciceros und ihre Quellen (Baden-
Baden, 1964), and idem, “Ciceros Tod im Urteil der Nachwelt,” Altertum 17 (1971) 165–174.
However, at a meeting of American Ancient Historians at the University of Michigan,
1971, E. Badian criticized her study as excessive Quellenkritik. Dio, 47.8, omits portents
for Cicero’s death. In Appianus, Bell. civ. 4.74 the korakes try to warn the slaves that their
conduct is not pleasing to the gods. In De sollertia 976c birds are praised for their ability
in divination, and korakes are used as portents in Cic. 4, Alex. 27, and 73, T. Grach. 17
and Nic. 13, and appear in Pomp. 25 and Flam. 10, where he explains that the supposed
omen was due to natural causes. The whole death scene has a decidedly Plutarchan touch.
For an evaluation of the work on the sources for Alexander, see J.R. Hamilton, Plutarch.
Alexander. A Commentary (Oxford, 1969) xlix–l.
10 A History of Greek Literature, 249. A great many portents appear before battles and death.
Here the pattern is typical for both Greek and Roman Lives. The absence of portents in
Philopoimen-Flamininus, one vanquished and the other victorius, taken from the pages of
Polybios, may reflect the influence of that source.
chapter 9
Dreams
Toward the end of De defectu (431e–433a), Lamprias, Plutarch’s spokesman,

lays the basis for the power of divination in dreams along lines of religious
Platonism, but with a strong touch of Aristotelian materialism. All souls have
prophetic power, which is innate, but dim and rarely manifesting itself (Plu-
tarch speaks of “blooming” and “lighting up”) except in dreams and at the
hour of death. At these times the body becomes pure (καθαρόν) and attains
a temperament (κρᾶσις) through which the reasoning and reflective faculty
(τὸ λογιστικὸν καὶ φρονιστικόν) becomes relaxed and released from the present
environment for souls turning toward the non-rational and imaginative (τὸ ἄλο-
γον καὶ φανταστικόν). An intelligent person with nous can be a good guesser,
following probabilities, but the prophetic faculty (τὸ μαντικόν) is like a blank
tablet, non-rational and non-determined in itself, but through certain sensa-
tions (πάθη), becomes receptive of impressions and presentiments without log-
ical steps, grasping the future when most removed from that near it (432cd).1
We do not have to believe that Plutarch himself believed every detail of this
theory, any more than he would have subscribed to everything in Ammonios’
speech at the end of the De E, but it would have fitted his general concep-
tions.
Dreams in the Lives are given high value and occur, as one might expect, at
momentous occasions and before death.2 Though Dodds divided dreams into
1 [en: See the volume edited A. Annus (ed.), Divination and Interpretation of Signs in the Ancient
World (Chicago: The Oriental Institute, 2010) and the following articles included in it: J. Jacobs,
“Traces of the Omen Series Šumma Izbu in Cicero, De Divinatione,” Annus (ed.), Divination
and Interpretation, 317–339; J. Allen, “Greek Philosophy and Signs,” in Annus (ed.), Divination
and Interpretation of Signs, 29–42; M. Nissinen, “Prophecy and Omen Divination: Two Sides
of the Same Coin,” in Annus (ed.), Divination and Interpretation of Signs, 341–351; see also
V. Rosenberger, Divination in the Ancient World: Religious Options and the Individual (Stuttgart:
Franz Steiner Verlag, 2013).]
2 On this see the extensive bibliography given in F.E. Brenk, “The Dreams of Plutarch’s Lives,”
Latomus 34 (1975) 336–349. Since then, R.J. White, The Interpretation of Dreams. The Oneir-
ocritica of Artemidorus (Park Ridge, 1975), and N. Lewis, The Interpretation of Dreams and
Portents (Toronto, 1975), are available. One can also consult C.A. Meier, “The Dream in Ancient
Greece and its Use in Temple Cures,” in G.E. Von Grunebaum (ed.), The Dream in Ancient Soci-
ety (Los Angeles, 1966) 303–319, and G. Devereux, Dreams in Greek Tragedy. An Ethno-Psycho-
Analytical Study (Berkeley, 1976). He notes, 30–31, that dreams involving auditory sensations

the symbolic, the vision or horama dream, and the oracular (chrematismos),
with particular stress put upon the oracular, these divisions are not all that
useful in treating the Lives, where the lines often merge and where the dreams
are frequently of the anxiety type. Notably absent is the healing dream.3 About
53 dreams occur.4 In general they need little interpretation, though no dream
is a straightforward vision of the future. The oracular dream is very common,
though it looks more Greek than Roman, since it is restricted to Greek Lives or
to Romans when on Oriental soil, with only a few exceptions and where the
source may be a Greek author.
As with portents, dreams are closely related to the aims of what one might
call ancient psychological biography and are particularly apt for relating anxi-
ety. But the heroes do get encouragement also, particularly through the oracu-
lar dream. Pure mysterious voices are a little ominous: to Agesilaus to sacrifice
his daughter at Aulis (Agesilaus 6), to a Spartan that one chair should replace
the four of the ephors (Kleomenes 7), and to Marius to beware the arrival of
Sulla (in dactylic hexameter [Marius 45]). But a number of distinguished per-
are extremely rare, and that in clinical practice dreams which involve articulate speech are
practically non-existent. He believes that dreams in Greek drama became more psycholog-
ically plausible, though less so in the latest plays of Euripides. [en: On dreams see now, in
general: J. Bilbija, The Dream in Antiquity: Aspects and Analyses (Amsterdam: Vrije Univer-
siteit, 2012); J. Harrison, Dreams and Dreaming in the Roman Empire: Cultural Memory and
Imagination (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2013); B. Ten Berge, “Dreams in Cicero’s De div-
inatione: philosophical tradition and education,” arg 15 (2013) 53–66. Dreams in Plutarch:
C.B.R. Pelling, “Tragical Dreamer: Some Dreams in the Roman Historians,” Greece and Rome
44 (1997) 197–213; G. Roskam, “A Παιδεία for the Ruler: Plutarch’s Dream of Collaboration
between Philosopher and Ruler,” in Stadter & van der Stockt (eds.), Sage and Emperor, 175–
189; A. Giardina, “Μῆτιω in Rome: A Greek Dream of Sulla,” in T. Corey Brennan & Harriet
I. Flower (eds.), East & West. Papers Presented to Glen W. Bowersock, Papers in Ancient History
Presented to Glen W. Bowersock (Harvard: University Department of the Classics, 2009) 61–
111; C.J. King, “Plutarch, Alexander, and dream divination” ics 38 (2013) 81–111; Pelling, “‘With
thousand such enchanting dreams’ ”.]
3 Most helpful is E.R. Dodds, The Greeks and the Irrational (Berkeley, 1951) 102–134; and idem,
Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety (Cambridge, 1964) 40–46, though like much else
in the two books, one must be careful in accepting generalizations. The weakness is his
underestimation of the importance of the anxiety dreams.
4 Greek Lives: Ages. 6; Alk. 39 (with an alternate); Alex. 2 (2 dreams); 3; 18; 24; 26; 50; Arist. 11; 19;
Demet. 4;19; 29; Dem. 29; Eum. 6; Kim. 18; Kleom. 7; Lys. 20; Pel. 21; Per. 3; 13; Pyr. 11; 29; Them.
27; 30; Timol. 8. In the Roman Lives: Ant. 16; 22; Brut. 20 (= Caes. 68); Caes. 32; 42 (= Pomp. 68);
63 (with an alternative); 68; Cic. 2 (possibly not a dream); 44; Cor. 24; G. Grach. 1; Luc. 10; 12;
23; Mar. 45; Pomp. 32; 68 (= Caes. 42); 73; Rom. 2; Sul. 9; 28; 37.
dreams 105
sons appear: Hestia in Romulus 2; Athena in Lucullus 10 and in Pericles 13 (the

only healing dream); Persephone and Aphrodite in Lucullus 12; Autolykos the
founder of Sinope in Lucullus 23; Zeus Soter in Aristeides 11; Kybele in Themis-
tokles 30; Alexander in Pyrrhos 11, Demetrios 19, and Eumenes 6; Persephone and
Demeter in Timoleon 8; Zeus Ammon in Lysander 20 (though not accepted as
true by Plutarch); Jupiter in Coriolanus 24; and an Eastern goddess described
as Selene, Athena, and Enyo in Sulla 9. However, only two humans, if we can
except Alexander, appear: the young Sulla, recently dead, to his father (Sulla
37) and Pompey to a Roman pilot (Pompey 73). Two dreams, those in Aristeides
19 and Lucullus 12, take place in sacred precincts.
Plutarch was very much interested in depicting anxiety. Something of this
could be seen in Sulla’s reaction to the satyr captured at Apollonia before his
crossing to Italy. There a portent was at stake, and in general it may be said that
portents and dreams serve similar functions in the Lives. However, Plutarch
seems to have preferred dreams, and they do offer greater scope for laying bare a
troubled mind. In Demetrios 19 we have an almost humorous running dream in
which the eighty-year-old Demetrios collapses at the finish line, thus signifying
the fruitlessness of his coming attempt on Cyprus. Another brilliant dream
is in Pompey 32, before his attack on Mithridates. A number of surrealistic
touches, common to anxiety dreams, appear but molded very appropriately to
fit the character of the king: the Euphrates as the dream setting; the midnight
hour at which Pompey is to prevent the wily king from escaping once more;
the relaxed dream scene of himself sailing gaily down the Black Sea, chatting
with his fellow-passengers, the Bosporos in sight and thinking himself safe
and sound, suddenly alone clinging to a piece of wreckage. At this moment,
“still dreaming and feeling the effects of his dream,” his friends wake him to
announce Pompey’s attack. Choice left behind him, he leads out his troops
to defend his camp. The brevity with which the dream is related and the
compactness of detail add to the disjointed effect intended.
Several of these anxiety dreams take place before death. In Caesar 68 Plu-
tarch relates the dream of the poet, Helvetius Cinna—apparently without
grasping his significance in Roman literature—who dreams that Caesar invited
him to dinner and when he refused, led him unwillingly by the hand. In Brutus
20 the version is a little more elaborate: he is led into a “limitless dark place,
where he follows unwillingly and stunned” (εἰς ἀχανῆ τόπον καὶ σκοτεινόν, αὐτὸν
δ’ἄκοντα καὶ τεθαμβημένον ἕπεσθαι) an expression recalling the eschatology of
Parmenides.5 The next day, while attempting to pay his respects to the dead
Caesar, he is mistaken for Cinna the conspirator and hacked to death.
5 Plutarch’s language here seems to reflect Parmenides b1.18, where the philosopher is led on his
Alkibiades dreams he is dressed in the clothes of his mistress Timandra,

daughter of the famous Lais of Corinth, who holds his head in her arms,
“whitening and painting his face as though it were a women’s.” In another
version offered he sees the Persians cutting off his head and his body burning
(Alkibiades 39). His death roughly corresponds to the dreams; for he rushes
out of a burning house and is killed by his enemies, while Timandra covers
his body with her robe. It is difficult to determine what to make of the sexual
reversal, though it certainly indicates helplessness and disturbance. The details
are genuinely convincing as far as real dreaming is concerned. Calpurnia holds
the dead Caesar in her arms and the pediment of his house falls to the ground
in Caesar 63 before his death. Demosthenes dreams that his delivery will assure
him victory in a tragic contest, but his enemy Archias, who will soon cause
his execution, wins the prize with his stage arrangements (Demosthenes 29).
Alexander dreams of Kleitos and his sons, dead and in black, before he murders
Kleitos (Alexander 50), a dream similar to that of Calpurnia in Caesar and that
of Alkibiades.
At times the dreams offer psychological motivation. For example, Brutus
and Cassius leave Rome after Cinna’s dream and murder, and Antony leaves
Octavius after a dream of lightning striking his hand (Antonius 16). At other
times, such as in Timoleon 8 or Sulla 9, an encouraging dream motivates the
hero. One of Plutarch’s most splendid passages in the Lives is that of Caesar at
the Rubicon (Caesar 32). It differs remarkably from that of Suetonius (Caesar
32). Plutarch seems to have been guided by Asinius Pollio as his ultimate
source, but where Pollio probably emphasized Caesar’s decisiveness, Plutarch
emphasizes his ruthlessness. The greatness of the moment, Caesar’s indecision,
reflection, and consultation with friends is all heightened by the language used.
He is compared to a ruthless or reckless gambler, who abandoning all caution
utters “Let the die be cast” (ἀνερρίφθω κύβος). Then we are told that the night
mystic voyage to the world beyond. The dream may have come from L. Crassicus of Tarentum,
surnamed Pasicles, a freedman who was active in the theatre and wrote a commentary on
Cinna’s Zmyrna. Plutarch seems unaware of Cinna’s place in Roman literature. On this see
J. Granarolo, “L’ époque néotérique ou la poésie romaine d’avant-garde au dernier siècle de la
République,” anrw i.3 (1973) 278–360 (299–302). C.B.R. Pelling, “Notes on Plutarch’s Caesar,”
Rh. M. 127 (1984) 33–45, defends the text in Caesar 42, with Ziegler and Garzetti, against
Flacelière and others who see a lacuna here (which would have contained the material on
Caesar’s descent from Venus, as in the parallel passage in Pompey 68). Pelling’s argument rests
on the severe abbreviation in the chapter and Plutarch’s lack of interest in divine geneology
in the Life (44–45). On Pompey’s dream about decorating the statue of Venus in his theatre,
see Brenk, In Mist Apparelled, 225.
dreams 107
before crossing he dreamt the unlawful dream, that he was sleeping with his
own mother.6 He thus suggests Caesar’s willingness, if that were necessary, to
rape his own mother to achieve his ends. Suetonius (7) had put the dream in
Spain during Caesar’s quaestorship where it indicated future mastery over his
country. Plutarch may have found the dream, in his sources, occurring at the
Rubicon, but judging by other accounts this seems doubtful. The dream came
to Hippias before Marathon in Herodotos 6.107 where the tyrant, taking the
dream to indicate his restoration at Athens, is frustrated in his hopes and dies
shortly after. There is then a hint of murder and the ultimate fruitlessness of
Caesar’s ambition.
The dream at the Rubicon deserves attention as part of compositional tech-
nique. At first one might suspect that Alexander’s crossing of the Granikos in
the parallel Life has influenced the Caesar, giving the Rubicon a significance it
did not have before Plutarch. However, both in tone and in ideology, the com-
parable passages have little in common.7 At best Alexander needs a little tolme
(daring) to conquer the physical aspects of the river. Caesar’s role is primarily
the psychological conquest of his own restraints and fears, set in the gloomy
framework of irrationality overcoming cautious prudence and respect for law.
In Suetonius (Caesar 32–33) the crossing of the Rubicon is like that in a fresco,
6 The dream of sleeping with one’s mother was more than amply discussed by Artemidoros,
Oniroc. 1. 79, where innumerable variations on it are given. Under four different conditions,
it could indicate death for the dreamer. See White, The Interpretation of Dreams, 61 and 64.
Soph. o.t. 981–982, and Paus. 4.26.3, also refer to it. See Dodds, Greeks, 47 and 61–62. Devereux,
Dreams in Greek Tragedy, xxii, doubts whether Greeks and Romans ever had flagrant incest
dreams involving a parent, something which he has never come across in his practice.
7 The most important recent studies on Plutarchan sources and his manner of composition
are those by Pelling, “Plutarch’s Method,” 74–96; idem, “Plutarch’s Adaptation of His Source
Material,” jhs 100 (1980) 127–140. He discusses the problem of the relationship of the Brutus
to the Caesar, in general seeming to support the composition of the two Lives at relatively
the same time, and collecting material for them simultaneously. On the difficult problems of
the assassination in the two Lives see “Plutarch’s Method,” 78–79. Pelling reviewed B. Scardigli,
Die Römerbiographien Plutarchs (1979), in jrs 72 (1982) 216–217. This is an indispensable work
of enormous labor in not only collecting the sources but in citing references to all critical
comment on them. However, Pelling criticizes her for “too Quellenforschung an approach,”
ignoring more recent theory on Plutarch’s use of sources. On this see the section on Plutarch’s
use of sources and mode of remembering in Frost, Plutarch’s Themistocles, 40–59. On the
incident at the Rubicon, see A. Garretti, Plutarchi Vita Caesaris (Florence, 1954) 106–107;
E. Hohl, “Cäsar am Rubico,”Hermes 80 (1952) 246–249; E. Häussler, “Keine griechische Version
der Historien Pollios,” Rh. M. 109 (1966) 339–355; H. Glaesener, “Un mot historique de César,”
ac 22 (1953) 103–105.
the glorious crossing of the army led by a breathtakingly handsome male figure,
a supernatural vision (ostentum) who seizes a trumpet to begin the passage.
A closer parallel to the Life is Lucan’s description (Pharsalia 1.183–203) where
out of the darkness a huge Vergilian vision of Roma distraught, with unkempt
white hair, bare arms, a sad face, and groans, appears, to challenge the legiti-
macy of his act. At first sight the influence of Lucan upon Plutarch may seem
improbable, judging by his abysmal ignorance of Latin poetry.8 However, a line
from De genio (590f) describes “the cries of thousands upon thousands of liv-
ing beings, the wailing of babes, and the mingled sighs of men and women” (καὶ
στεναγμοὺς ζῴων μυρίων δὲ κλαυθμὸν βρεφῶν καὶ μεμιγμένους ἀνδρῶν καὶ γυναικῶν
ὀδυρμούς …). A Roman could hardly help escape a feeling of déjà vu, especially
at the phrase μυρίων δὲ κλαυθμὸν βρεφῶν, recalling some lines of Vergil, Continuo
auditae uoces uagitus et ingens /infantumque animae flentes, in limine primo …
(Aeneid 6.426–427). (“At once are heard voices and great wailing, the souls of
infants weeping on the very threshold …”), unless this was a Hellenistic com-
monplace, for which there is no evidence. Roman friends of Plutarch may have
informed him of similar passages in Roman authors as he was working on his
own compositions.
Plutarch’s Aeschylean Caesar is faced with an ambiguous dream, but one
interpreted by Plutarch as suggesting daring in the face of illegality. As so often
in Plutarch, the dream contributes to the collapse of rational behavior through
psychological disturbance, in this case leading to the daring of a gambler. Each
step toward the Rubicon is one if not of illegality, at least of extreme daring. He
halts in his tracks, checked by the magnitude of his own tolme (daring), contem-
plating the suffering he would inflict on the human race and the fame (logos)
they would leave behind. At this point, “like men embarking on tychai (actions
requiring luck) without exit and acts of daring (tolmai)” he utters the expres-
sion which has rung through history, “Let the die be cast” (ἀνερρίφθω κύβος).9
Whatever the expression meant in other authors, as Gelzer suggests through
his translation “Hoch fliege der Würfel!” (“Let’s give it a fling!”), Plutarch seems
8 For Plutarch’s knowledge of Latin literature see Pelling, “Plutarch’s Method,” 88–89. For the
effect of parallelization on the Lives, one can consult the excellent study of Geiger, “Plutarch’s
Parallel Lives,” 85–104, but this is primarily from an historical rather than literary perspective.
9 The saying, not in Caesar’s own writings, is different in Appianus, Bell. civ. 2.35 (140), Zonaras,
Histories 10.7, and Ps. Plutarch, Reg. et Imper. Apophth. 206c. The exact expression (judging
by Suetonius’ “decretum est. iacta alea est,” changed by Erasmus to “iacta alea sit,”) appears in
Menander, fr. 59 (Körte and Sandbach; Sandbach, Menandri Reliquiae, 303), and is discussed
in Gomme and Sandbach, Menander, 690–691, with bibliography. The Menandrean passage
refers to the risk of marriage, “which is worse than going out to sea!”.
dreams 109
to be referring to the future not the immediate past act of the decision.10 The
expression ἀναρρίψαι alone or with κύβος in Plutarch invariably refers to a battle
in the future (Caesar 40; Pompey 84; Brutus 40; Aratos 5; Dion 54; Demosthenes
20; Fabius Maximus 14), where the enterprise results in disaster or becomes
extremely dangerous. The expression does not signify Caesar’s ability to make
a difficult decision and to stand with it, so much as risk, daring, and abandon-
ment of all else in an enterprise of chance.11 Even the ἀνερρίφθω κύβος may owe
much to Plutarch. It is much at home in his Lives, where similar expressions
occur, and he had even written an essay on life as a game of dice, Περὶ βίων,
ἐν ἄλλῳ δὲ Περὶ τοῦ τὸν βίον ἐοικέναι κυβείᾳ (On Lives or How Life Is Like a Game
of Dice).12 We must conclude that the passage is a highly artistic creation of
ancient biography, where Plutarch’s personality has deeply impressed itself.13
10 Sandbach interprets the saying as referring to the past decision. However, according to
L.A. Post, “Dramatic Uses of the Greek Imperative,” ajp 59 (1938) 30–59, the present and
perfect imperative indicate solemnity, majesty, and destiny and are not necessarily linked
to aspect. M. Gelzer, Caesar. Politician and Statesman (Oxford, 1968), 193, note 3 (original:
Caesar. Der Politiker und Staatsmann [Wiesbaden, 6th ed., 1960] 176, note 399).
11 For the improvement in quality effected by Plutarch’s change to Asinius Pollio as a major
source for the Roman Lives, see Pelling, “Plutarch’s Method,” 74–96, esp. 84–85. In Plutarch,
the hero turns to Pollio before making his decision. The text at 46.2 relates that “Caesar
uttered the phrase in Latin, but Pollio has written it in Greek.” This sentence has been
changed by most scholars into “uttered in Greek, but written in Latin.” But possibly the
text is right. If so, Pollio added the Greek original to his Latin text, slightly mistranslating
it. Thus, Plutarch can certify that he is closely following his source.
12 Lamprias catalogue, 105.
13 On this see Hohl, “Cäsar am Rubico,” 246–249. Scholars do not seem to be quite agreed
on the exact meaning of the expression which appears here, and probably goes back
to Pollio (see above note 11). The saying is first found in Menander, Arrephoros, fr. 59
(see above page 108, note 9); cf. Gomme and Sandbach, Menander, 690–691, who see it
as something emphasizing the decision, and Gelzer, Caesar, 193, note 3, who takes it to
emphasize the risk. See also J. Taillardat, “Comica,” reg 64 (1951) 4–9. Plutarch seems to
want the expression to parallel the tone of the dream. This tone of daring appears in
ἀναρρίψαι used with μάχην (battle) in Caes. 40, with κύβος (dice) in Brut. 40 and Pomp.
74; Nik. 11; Demos. 20; Brut. 54; and in Arat. 4 with κίνδυνος (danger). All but the Nikias
passage involve famous battles, and all but the Nikias use the aorist. The likelihood is that
the perfect is meant to emphasize the action; see Post, “Dramatic Uses,” 30–59. Sandbach
explains the use of the perfect here as ordering the acceptance of what has been done, and
refers to its documentation in M.M. Kokolakis volume on the morphology of the dicing
simile, Μορφολογία τῆς Κυβευτικῆς Μεταφορᾶς (Athens, 1965), 5–41. I am grateful to Professor
E.N. O’Neil for helping to locate the passages in Plutarch. Neither Taillardat nor Sandbach
think Caesar was consciously quoting Menander.
chapter 10
Divine Retribution
Plutarch’s De sera is devoted to the proposition that crime does not pay. The
culprit has little escape.1 If not punished in this life in a proper manner, he
will at least suffer from a guilty conscience; if not, he will find his children
punished for him, or be justly compensated by infernal torments. At 567e the
children of the evildoer fly at his soul, which tries to hide. The souls are descen-
dants of Homer’s shades, who gibber like bats, but in the necessary course of
evolution have developed new psychological motivation. They gibber shrilly
in memory of what they have suffered through the fault of the ancestor, and
unlike Homer’s shades they cling and swarm like bees or bats in an attempt
to punish the guilty one. Here Plutarch, like Vergil, seems to merge Home-
ric and Hellenistic Nekyia (Underworld) images, retaining the passivity and
pathetic helplessness of the Homeric shades. He motivates them, too, with the
grotesque and pathetic desire to obtain their revenge in the energetic manner
of fearsome creatures appropriate to the horror of the inferno. Such manner-
istic touches deserve comparison with Vergil, who in general is quite removed
from Plutarch’s eschatology. Plutarch seems never to mention the great Latin
poets, or understand their work, but it would be incredible if his Roman friends
in Achaia never discussed with him at least in a rough way the masterpiece of
Vergil, as Plutarch poured over touches to complement his own eschatological
scenes.
“The mills of the gods grind slow but fine” (ὀψὲ θεῶν ἀλέουσι μύλοι, ἀλέουσι δὲ
λεπτά). He was really not all that sure about punishment after death. In De sera
554a–555c, An vitiositas 498d, 500a, and Non posse 1102e, he argues that vice is
its own punishment and divine intervention need only be taken symbolically.
In Non posse, his spokesman, Theon, argues against the Epicureans that to
theion (the divine) is not prey to feelings of anger and favor, rather its nature
is to bestow favor and lend aid, not to be angry and do harm; real punishment
is separation “from the delight and pleasure of the relationship to the divine”
(1102f–1103e). But he thinks the masses should not be illuminated, since the
fear of God may keep them from evil.2
1 The introduction to De Lacy & Einarson, Plutarch’s Moralia vii, 170–179, gives an interesting
summary of the effect of the essay on European intellectual history.
2 Non Posse is probably datable to ca. 99 ad through the dedication to L. Herennius Saturni-

divine retribution 111
Plutarch introduced the retribution theme everywhere. One can find it in

De exilio (601ab), in the story of Timokleia in Mulierum virtutes (260bc), in the
closing of Amatorius where Gamma of Galatia lures her husband’s murderer
to his death (768b–d). For putting the pregnant Empona to death poor Ves-
pasian shortly after saw all his family extinguished (though he died peacefully
and it took Domitian twenty years after this to die, 770d–771d). There are innu-
merable examples in the Lives, and some of them reappear in De sera, with
a more single-minded devotion to retribution. Thus the punishment of Tim-
oleon’s mercenaries, who sacked Delphi (Timoleon 30, De sera 552f) and the
punishment of Kallippos, the murderer of Dion (Dion 58, De sera 553bc) find
slightly different expression. In the Lives both incidents are associated with
tyche.3 In the essay, where tyche is opposed to the idea of divine punishment,
no word is heard of it. The death of Pausanias (for mistakenly killing a girl in
the dark of his tent after he “persuaded” her father to offer her services) appears
much more clearly as retribution in De sera 555c than in Kimon 6. One might
be surprised to learn from De sera 553bc of the hereditary guilt of Perikles and
Pompey.
We have seen how the death of Caesar before the pedestal of the statue of
Pompey in the portico of his own theatre was underscored by every possible
means as retribution from to daimonion (the supernatural) for the murder
of Pompey.4 Plutarch seems gratuitously to insert into the final chapter of
Alkibiades an alternate version in which the hero is slain by the brothers of a girl
he had raped (Alkibiades 39). The Silver Shields who betrayed Eumenes receive
their grim reward (Eumenes 19), as does Alexander, the murderer of Pelopidas.
nus, proconsul of Achaia in 98–99 ad (1107d, pir 2.h.126). See Ziegler, Plutarchos, 126, and
C.P. Jones, Chronology, 72. Jones is, however, not convinced it was written during Saturni-
nus’ consulship. [en: Extra bibliography in L. Roig Lanzillotta, “Plutarch’s Idea of God in the
Religious and Philosophical Context of Late Antiquity,” in Roig Lanzillotta & Muñoz Gallarte
(eds.), Plutarch in the Religious and Philosophical Discourse, 137–150.]
3 [en: T.J. Saunders, “Plutarch’s De sera numinis vindicta in the tradition of Greek penology” in
O. Diliberto (ed), Il problema della pena criminale fra filosofia greca e diritto romano (Actes
du deuxième colloque de philosophie penale, Cagliari, 20–22 Aprile 1989) (Naples, 1991–1992)
63–94; J. Krašovec, “Plato’s and Plutarch’s theories of punishment,” ZAnt 43 (1993) 5–30;
J. Krašovec, “Plato’s and Plutarch’s Theories of Punishment,” in idem, Krašovec, Jože. Reward,
Punishment, and Forgiveness: The Thinking and Beliefs of Ancient Israel in the Light of Greek
and Modern Views (Leiden: Brill, 1999) 715–738.]
4 Plutarch is alone of extant classical authors in seeing divine retribution in this incident.
Cicero, De div. 2.23, mentions that Caesar fell at the base of Pompey’s statue, but only draws
the conclusion that we are better off not knowing the future. Valerius Maximus 1.1; Suetonius,
Caes. 81; and Appianus, Bell. civ. 21.149, do not refer to the coincidence.
Plutarch apologizes for the delay, but feels that the retribution was sufficient
since he was murdered by his wife and outraged after death (Pelopidas 35).5 It
is even better if the punishment fits the crime, such as in the case of Cassius
and Kallippos who are killed with the swords used on their victims (Caesar
69, Dion 58). Sourena, who tricked Crassus, is betrayed and slain by Hyrodes;
Hyrodes treacherously killed by his own son. Brutus, like Cassius, commits
suicide with his own sword (Caesar 69).6 Philologus, who betrays Cicero is
forced to cut off his own flesh and eat it, “the only good thing Antony did in
this affair.”
One might be suspicious of the horror of Nasica’s punishment for the murder
of Tiberius Gracchus, being sent by the senate to Pergamon, where he ends
his life “ignominiously,” and perhaps of Sertorius’ assassin who ends his life in
a poor village “hated by all men” (Tiberius Gracchus 21; Sertorius 27). But it is
better if the end is more gruesome. Plutarch is not without a bit of sadism.
The punishment of the ironically named Philologus is told with some relish
in Cicero (48) Pompey’s murderers are discovered and executed to the last one
“with every possible torture” (Pompey 80). Marius drinks himself to death in
a state of hallucination, and his evil son kills himself shortly after (Marius
45).7 Plutarch had to apologize for Timoleon’s blindness, “not retribution, but
5 In De Herod. malign. 856b, historians who give base motives to Thebe, Alexander’s wife, are
attacked. In Pel. 35 she acts out of fear of divorce because of her sterility, or for Alexander
executing one of her favorites, though Plutarch admits uncertainty about the motive. In De
Herod. malign. she acts out of a noble spirit and hatred of evil (dread of faithlessness and
hatred of cruelty). In Amat. 768b the death is for the sexual abuse of the boy Pytholaus
(Thebe’s brother in Pel. 35), who for this reason kills Alexander. For modern doubts on the
authenticity of De Herod. malign., see A. Podlecki, The Life of Themistocles (Montreal, 1975)
69. Modern scholars take it to be by Plutarch, but in the Lives he certainly does not follow
all the criticisms in the essay, and the author is inclined to believe Plutarch did not write it.
Frost, Plutarch’s Themistocles, 55, takes it as genuine. See also J.W. Boake, Plutarch’s Historical
Judgment with Special Reference to the De Herodoti malignitate (Diss. Univ. of Toronto 1975).
P.A. Hansen (ed.), De Herodoti malignitate (Amsterdam, 1979), and H. Homeyer, “Zu Plutarchs
De malignitate Herodoti,”Klio 49 (1967) 181–187, defend it on the basis of the diatribe genre and
reaction to excessive admiration.
6 Some unconscious parallelism may have crept into the Lives here, since in Brut. 43 Cassius
is simply found decapitated, with some suggestion of foul play. G.A. Lehmann, “Dion and
Herakleides,” Historia 19 (1970) 401–406, notes how Plutarch followed a source hostile to
Herakleides.
7 According to Livy, Per. 88, the younger Marius died in a suicide duel with the youngest son of
Pontius Telesinus, the Samnite general. J. Bayet treats the matter as a revival of archaic military
ideals at the time: “Le suicide mutuel dans la mentalité des Romains,”L’Année Sociologique 38
divine retribution 113
heredity” (Timoleon 37) and passed lightly over Sulla’s last illness, treating it
medically rather than morally, as one might expect, thus revealing how easy it
is to play this game as one wishes.8
To complete this list, there are the lesser luminaries: Aristion of Athens’
punishment is revealed by to daimonion as approved by the gods (Sulla 14),
Marius’ bloody bodyguards are shot down by Sertorius (Sertorius 5), Philip dies
of grief after unjustly putting his son to death (Aemilius 8), Antony executes
the man who stole the cloak he put over Brutus’ body (Brutus 53), and the
murderers of Otho fill the last pages of one piece with a clutter of dead bodies
(Galba 27). Victims of injustice must be recompensed. There is the elaborate
description of the funeral honors of Philopoimen taken from the pages of
Polybios (Philopoimen 21), and similar descriptions are found in Cato Minor
71 and Cicero 49. The latter ends with a tribute from Augustus to Cicero’s
patriotism (told to his grandson who was furtively reading the orator’s works);
and in Antonius 87 we find the family of Cicero removing the honors and
statues of Antony, and hereditary vice from Antony’s line (“none of whom
henceforth were allowed to bear the name Marcus”) eventually accumulating
in Nero “who came near to destroying the whole Empire.”
(1951) 35–89, reprinted in idem, Croyance et Rites dans la Rome Antique (Paris, 1971) 130–176;
on the young Marius, 131.
8 Though Plutarch describes the debauchery of Sulla’s last days, he surprisingly leaves out ret-
ribution here, and he treats his end as the last manifestation of his glorious tyche. Appianus,
Bell. civ. 1.192, does something similar. Pliny, nh 7.138, presents a hostile tradition, apparently
suppressed by Plutarch, in contrast to the hostile tradition in Marius toward Marius.
chapter 11
Delphi
A prejudice for Delphi fills the Lives, as one might expect from a high func-
tionary there, with close connections to important Romans, including Trajan,
and Hadrian, who rewarded him handsomely. Hadrian would do much him-
self to revitalize the shrine. Besides underlining its role in the great accom-
plishments of Greece, Plutarch wished to show the long-standing relationship
between Delphi and the triumphs of Roman history, and the cultivation of the
shrine by noble Romans of the past.1 Only five Greek Lives fail to mention the
oracle (Kimon, Dion, Eumenes, Alkibiades, and Pyrrhos). Much of the informa-
tion was the stock and trade of Greek historiography, but Plutarch enlarges
upon it, adds a certain emphasis, and at times radically rewrites it. An inter-
esting problem was caused by Agesilaus and Theseus. According to the ora-
cle, one of these heroes should not have been king, and the other should not
even have been born. Plutarch is puzzled in both cases, a puzzlement largely
left to the syncrisis, and some sharpness is required to notice that the ora-
cles came from Delphi. In Lysandros 18 and 25–26, with Douris as his source,
1 For the bibliography on the Delphic Oracle, see J. Fontenrose, The Delphic Oracle. Its Responses
and Operations with a Catalogue of Responses (Berkeley, 1978). His major reference is to
H.W. Parke and D.E.W. Wormell, The Delphic Oracle (Oxford, 1956). See also S. Levin, “The
Old Greek Oracles in Decline,” anrw ii.18.2 (1989) 1599–1649. [en: See also S.C.R. Swain,
“Plutarch, Hadrian, and Delphi,”Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte = Revue d’Histoire Anci-
enne 40 (1991) 318–330; M. Maass, Das antike Delphi (Munich, 2007); M. Baltes, “Der Nieder-
gang des Delphischen Orakels: Delphis Oracula Cessant,” in J. Gebauer, E. Grabow, F. Jünger,
& D. Metzler (eds.), Bildergeschichte: Festschrift Klaus Stähler (Bildergeschichte, Bibliopolis
(Möhnesee), 2004) 1–15; S. Hotz, “Delphi: eine störrische Ziege und Priester unter Druck,” in
G. Schwedler, S. Hotz, S. Weinfurter, & C. Ambos (eds.), Die Welt der Rituale: von der Antike bis
heute (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft 2005) 102–105. On Plutarch and Delphi
see: Ph.A. Stadter, “Plutarch: Diplomat for Delphi?,” in Lukas de Blois (ed.), The Statesman in
Plutarch’s Works: The Statesman in Plutarch’s Greek & Roman Lives 1 (Leiden: Brill, 2004) 19–31;
J. McInerney, “ ‘Do You See What I See?’: Plutarch and Pausanias at Delphi,” in De Blois (ed.),
The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works 1, 43–55; A. Casanova, “Plutarch as Apollo’s priest at Del-
phi,” in L. Roig Lanzillotta & I. Muñoz Gallarte (eds.), Plutarch in Religious and Philosophical
Discourse, 151–157; A. Müller, “Dialogic Structures and Forms of Knowledge in Plutarch’s The
E at Delphi,” shps 43(2) (2012) 245–249; M. Scott, Delphi: a History of the Center of the Ancient
World (Oxford, 2014).]

delphi 115
we find interesting details about Lysandros’ attempt to corrupt the oracle,

which are not in other authors.2
He had to rewrite the relationship of Delphi to events in the Persian Wars
since Herodotos’ account was not the most kindly. The oracle is the savior of
Greece in Themistokles 10, though with application of the pia fraus by the hero;
derogatory material such as we find in Herodotos, demoralization, duplicity,
the “miraculous” escape from plundering (Herodotos 7.140, 7.18, 8.35) do not
appear. Herodotos had given no credit to Delphi for the battle of Plataiai,
reserving clerical glory for the Elean diviner and athlete, Tisamenos (9.34). In
Plutarch the Delphic oracle informs the Greeks as to the location for battle,
even if Zeus Soter must appear in a dream to clarify some of the ambiguous
details (Aristeides 11), and the fires extinguished by the Persians are relit from
the Delphic flame.3 We do not hear of the oracle predicting victory for the
Persians if Delphi were left untouched (9.44) nor that a tenth of the booty
should go to Delphi (9.81).
In the Lykourgos Delphi is the main source of inspiration for the hero, in
contrast to other accounts which had him draw his knowledge from Crete. Nat-
urally Theseus is dominated by help from Delphi. In contrast, those who are
hostile to Delphi or try to take advantage of it, like Lysandros (Lysandros 18),
Demetrios (Demetrios 10–13), Demosthenes (Demosthenes 19), or Timoleon’s
mercenaries (Timoleon 30), receive harsh words from Plutarch and often ret-
ribution from to daimonion. Since Delphi occupies a large part of Theseus, it
is not unusual that Plutarch in the Romulus (9), even through inadvertence,
should have spoken of the building of the asylum at Rome as something in obe-
dience to what may be mistranslated as “an oracle from Delphi,” and toward the
end of the life Delphi is introduced in connection with a story parallel to the
mysterious disappearance of Romulus (28).4 But an introduction of Delphi into
2 Nock, Essays i, 248, is rather sceptical about Plutarch’s account of both Lysandros and
Demetrios. In the latter case, the Dionysia was not eliminated from the festivals, but the
Demetreia added to it. Nilsson, Geschichte ii, 139, is also very sceptical.
3 Plutarch gives the oracle in the original Dorian, apparently to underscore its authenticity. See
Fontenrose, The Delphic Oracle, 319–320.
4 Parke & Wormell, The Delphic Oracle, do not include this passage. The word πυθόχρηστος
(“worthy of the Pythia?”) might be a reflection of Aischylos, Choephoroi 900–901, and 940,
where it may have received the meaning “reliable” by Plutarch’s time. Flacelière, Plutarque.
Vies, i, 69, takes it as from Delphi, believing it to be based on a Hellenistic decree (Sylloge, 3rd
ed., 550). Plutarch alone gives “of the god Asylum,” but the change of the case here from -ου to
-ον would give “the asylum of the god” (i e., Jupiter Capitolinus). In Arist. 11.5 and 6, an oracle
of Delphi is at stake but the meaning would be intelligible as “oracle.”
the institution of the asylum, and the story of Kleomedes of Astypalaia, who
disappeared like Romulus, may have been conscious or unconscious attempts
at parallelism with the Theseus. More clear signs of linking Rome with Delphi
are in the sending of a Roman embassy to Delphi before the capture of Veii
in Camillus 4. Plutarch’s account offers striking differences from that of Livy,
though both must have looked at the account of Fabius Pictor, an ambassador
to Delphi in the Punic Wars. Plutarch curiously is alone in naming the ambas-
sadors sent, but omits the names of the deputation who gave the golden bowl
in thanksgiving. Also (did he think it out of character?) his Camillus prays to
Zeus and the other gods before Veii, while Livy’s (5.21) (Pictor’s?) prays to the
Pythian Apollo.5 He is our only source for the golden bowl offered Delphi after
Marcellus’ victory over the Gauls (Marcellus 8).6 At the time of Hannibal’s inva-
sion into Italy, the deputation in Livy is part of the superstitious panic ensuing
upon the Roman catastrophe (22.55). Plutarch does away with this atmosphere
in Fabius 18, treating the consultation as very normal, is silent about the stupid
response recorded by Livy, and omits the request by the priests there for a part
of the booty.
Trips of Roman supermen there are treated with the greatest care. Chapter
twelve of Flamininus is taken up mainly with descriptions of the dedications
and honors performed at the time. Aemilius Paullus (Aemilius 28) arrives in
Delphi for the erection of his statue, related in some detail, then returns after
the victory over Perseus to offer thanks.7 Sulla caused much trouble, both to the
shrine and to Plutarch’s Life. Plutarch plays it both ways. The desecration of the
shrine and the attempt of a “friend of Phokis” to spare it are related in a pathetic
manner (12). The Amphiktyons themselves, in Putarch’s description, are forced
5 The oracle was quite blunt in Livy (22.55–57): Si ita faxitis Romani, uestrae res meliores
facilioresque erunt magisque ex sententia res publica uestra uobis procedet uictoriaque duelli
populi Romani erit. Pythio Apollini re publica uestra bene gesta seruataque lucris meritis donum
mittitote, deque praeda manubiis spoliisque honorem habetote lasciuiam a uobis prohibetote.
On Fabius Pictor, a delegate to Delphi, and undoubtedly behind much of this, see E. Badian,
“The Early Historians,” in T.A. Dorey (ed.), Latin Historians (London, 1966) 1–38; and D. Timpe,
“Fabius Pictor und die Anfänge der römischen Historiographie,” anrw i.2 (1972) 928–969.
6 Commented upon by K. Ziegler, “Plutarchstudien xxii. Drei Gedichte bei Plutarch,”Rh. M. 110
(1967) 53–64.
7 The inscription on the Aemilius monument is still intact: L-Aimilius-L-f-inperator-de-rege-
Perse / Macedonibusque-cepet. See Flacelière, Plutarque. Vies, iv, 104, and L. Budde, “Das
römische Historienrelief i,” anrw i.4 (1973) 800–804. Plutarch relates Delphi three times to
the career of Alexander (3; 14; 37), and in 40 he mentions the hunting scene dedicated by
Krateros and executed by Lysippos and Leochares. See Flacelière, Plutarque. Vies, ix, 83, 122,
239.
delphi 117
to cut up a large silver jar so as to transport it on donkeys. He only vaguely tries

to excuse Sulla on the grounds of expediency and the promise of compensation
(interesting if this is a rewording of Sulla’s Memoirs). Finally, Sulla, in contrast
to those great commanders of the past who left the shrine intact, is one of the
later commanders, avaricious demagogues who first sold out themselves, then
their country (Sulla 12). Yet he records Sulla’s devotion to the Pythian Apollo,
attested by a golden statuette he carried with him before Praeneste (29).
To this general treatment of the Delphic oracle in the Lives one can now
add, due to the comprehensive work on the responses and their sources by
J. Fontenrose, a sharper idea of Plutarch’s manipulation of sources in favor of
the importance of the oracle in Greek and Roman history. His study gives a full
index to citations from both the Moralia and the Lives, offering comparison
with other sources, general discussions, and the particular treatment of each
oracle.8
One can start first with the Greek Lives for Plutarch’s partiality and differ-
ence from other authors. In Theseus 15 (l = legendary, 45 in Fontenrose) the
Athenians receive an oracle from “the god” to send the boys and girls to Minos.
Plutarch’s readers would undoubtedly understand this as Delphi. Diodoros also
has “the god” (4.61.2), so this element could not have originated with Plutarch,
but no oracle is found in Ovid, Metamorphoses 7.456–460, 8.169176, treating the
same material, nor in Pausanias 1.27.10, nor Hyginus, Fabulae 41. In Theseus 18
(l 47) the hero is told by Delphi to “take Aphrodite as his guide” and (l 102)
is given an oracle to found Pythopolis. Plutarch is the only source for these,
though he gives a certain Menekrates as his own source for the latter and a ref-
erence appears to it in the Byzantine John Tzetzes (Iliad p. 95 Hermann).
That in Aristeides 11 (q 154 [q = “quasi-historical”]) also found in Quaest. conv.
628f, gives directions before the battle of Plataiai. This appears elsewhere only
in Clement of Alexandria (Protreptikos 35), an author who would have read
Plutarch. Fontenrose, who hardly is the epitome of gullibility, considers this one
of only two oracles in Plutarch which are probably genuine. The oracle on the
recovery of Theseus’ bones from Skyros (q 164) (Theseus 36, Kimon 8) appears
only in Plutarch as an oracle from Apollo. A scholion to Euripides, Hippolytos
11 simply mentions an oracle. Diodoros, 4.62.4, mentions no oracle and puts
the event in prehistoric times. That (q 163) on the lame kingship for Agesilaus
(Agesilaus 3 and Lysandros 22, De Pythiae oraculis 399bc) appears in Pausanias
8 Fontenrose, The Delphic Oracle, with the catalogue of “quasi-historical” oracles (268–354).
See also the review of Fontenrose by F.E. Brenk, Gnomon 52 (1980) 700–706, and Fontenrose’s
review of M. Delcourt, L’ oracle de Delphes (reprint of 1955 ed., Paris 1981), Gnomon 55 (1983)
264–265.
3.89 as well as in Plutarch, but in Xenophon, Hellenika 3.3.3. is simply “from

Apollo” and in Diodoros 11.50.4 is only “from the god.” Another oracle (q 199)
for Lysandros to beware “sounding hoplite and a snake” in Lysandros 29 and
De Pythiae oraculis 408a is also only in Plutarch. That (q 193) in Nikias 13 (De
aud. 43b) about the proposed war against Syracuse, appears only in Plutarch,
and is suspiciously similar to oracles from Dodona (Pausanias 8.11.12, Dion
Chrysostomos 17.17). The oracle on the finding of a golden tripod (q 76) in Solon
4, extant in other authors, seems originally to have been associated with Apollo
at Didyma. Diogenes Laertios (1.1.29) says the tripod was dedicated to Apollo
Didymeus or Apollo Delphinios at Miletos. The oracle “Blessed is the city that
listens to a single herald” (q 68) (Solon 9), one of those which Fontenrose thinks
could be genuine, is, however, not well-supported. He suggests that Plutarch’s
source, Hermippos or Androtion, turned a real prose response into verse (in
Fontenrose’s theory the oracles never have responses in verse until very late).9
Another, q 67, “Sit in the middle of the ship steering straight, you have many
helpers in Athens” (Solon 14), he thinks probably were two hexameters not
meant as an oracle, which Androtion or Hermippos, Plutarch’s source, found in
a poem, probably not written by Solon. That in Alexander 37 on a wolf as guide
to Alexander (q 217) is not mentioned in other authors, while Diodoros, Arrian
and Curtius Rufus, depending on Kleitarchos, simply mention an anonymous
oracle. q 216 in Alexander 14, on Alexander’s invincibility, is spread out in
other authors between the Delphic oracle and the shrine at Ammon. Diodoros’
source indicates both, but it is clear from 17.51 that Ammon speaks in the
original story.
While archeology seems to discover more links between Greece and the Ital-
ian world, even in the Mycenaean period, with a long period of Greek influence
on the city of Rome, Fontenrose’s study gives no support for any actual recorded
contact with the oracle. However, Plutarch is not alone responsible for its intro-
duction even if in a few cases he seems to be the only witness.
The oracle in Camillus 4 (q 202) on the taking of Veii appears in Dionysios
of Halikarnassos, Antiquitates Romanae 12.13, Livy 5.16.9, Valerius Maximus
1.6.3, and Zonaras, Histories 7.20. Livy actually gives it the fullest expression.
However, in Cicero it is the Veientine fata (De divinatione 1.44.100), and Roman
legend seems to have assigned it to a Veientine soothsayer or a noble Veientine
9 M. Manfredini & L. Piccirilli, Plutarco, La vita di Solone (Roma, 1977), point out, 133–134, that
the third verse of the oracle given in Solon 9 recalls the argumentation of Solon before the
Spartan arbitrators concerning the orientation of the corpses. This supports the Athenian
mode of orientation, thus, perhaps, added at a later date. Parke and Wormell surprisingly
rejected this oracle.
delphi 119
deserter. The earliest source, Cicero, has only the noble Veientine. Dionysios,
Livy, and Plutarch add the Delphic oracle to the soothsayer (or fata), both
saying the same thing. Fontenrose notes that it is unclear whether Delphi also
gave an actual ritual prescription to reinstate the Latin festival, in the supposed
account. He rejects the oracle on the grounds of Roman contact with Delphi
being improbable at this early date, an argument which seems to be becoming
weaker. Parke, too, listed it among legendary oracles. In Cicero 5 (q 248) the
oracle tells Cicero that he is to make his own nature, not the opinion of the
multitude, his guide in life. This rather unspectacular oracle, which sounds
more like Zeno than Apollo, is quickly discredited by Fontenrose on the basis of
its absence in Cicero’s writings. Perhaps Plutarch absorbed it from his Roman
friends, but it sounds suspiciously like the imaginary stories invented by tourist
guides to enhance their sites for particular nationalities.
In Pliny, Naturalis Historia 34.12.26 (q 228), during the time of the Samnite
war—for Parke and Wormell, the second war—the Romans receive an ora-
cle from Delphi that “they are to erect images of the bravest and the wisest
Greek.” Accordingly they set up statues of Alkibiades and Pythagoras in the
Forum. Pliny says they were removed in Sulla’s time. The oracle was anony-
mous at first or attributed to the Sibylline Books, on the basis of q 229, an oracle
about Roman consultation for a plague. This was attributed to Delphi by Ovid
(Metamorphoses 15.637–640) but to the Sibylline books by Livy (10.45.7) and
Valerius Maximus (1.8.2). But Plutarch on the statues (Numa 8) only mentions
an unidentified oracle and does not date it. Fontenrose even suggests that the
statues may never have existed in the first place and that the introduction of
Delphi is simply Pliny’s assumption. In any case, one would suspect that had
Plutarch read Pliny he would have labeled the oracle as Delphic. Otherwise
we have an incredible lapse on his part. That Ovid and Pliny introduce Delphi,
apparently gratuitously, suggests that Plutarch often finding Delphi mentioned
where its activity is not substantiated in other extant authors, did not neces-
sarily have to invent its presence. Ovid’s purpose was something like that of
Plutarch’s, to link the Greek and Roman world, and for different purposes both
liked oracles. Thus it is not unusual that we should find them as interesting
bedfellows, even if in this case in different beds.
Recently V. Citti has noted the sacral dimension given to Plutarch’s Lives by
the use of oracles and dreams which guide the devout man with arete, who
is attentive to the will of the divine through the course of history.10 As an
10 Citti, “Plutarco, Nik. 1.5,” 99–110. He notes that the latter part of the oracle given to Cicero
(Cicero 5) seems to be a citation from Plato, Kritias 44c: ἀλλὰ τί ἡμῖν, ὦ μακάριε Κρίτων, οὕτω
example he cites the discussions in Nikias 13 and 14 on the oracles and signs
before the battle of Syracuse, where the Athenians had been clearly warned by
heaven not to attack Syracuse, but led on by greed and glory, abetted by the evil
influence of Alkibiades, ignored or perverted oracles and portents. They were,
moreover, particularly misled by an oracle from Ammon that they would “take”
the Syracusans. Citti also cites Aristeides 11 and Pelopidas 20 where before the
battles of Plataiai and Leuktra the hero is advised by oracles and dreams.
Certainly Plutarch’s use of the sacred distinguishes his Lives from pragmatike
historia, but few of the aggressive politicians and soldiers of the Lives were the
daimonic men of the Moralia. Even Pelopidas is only a marginal figure among
the military philosophers who form the participants in De genio. Ammon
actually bungles its role of clairvoyant, at least in so far as any reasonable man
would interpret its response, though Plutarch would not stoop so low as to
underline its inferiority to Delphi. Moreover, Nikias’ prime fault is superstition,
a trait exaggerated in Plutarch over Thucydides. The actual makers of history
in Plutarch’s Lives frequently suffered disaster by ignoring the benevolence of
the divine, through blindness and insensitivity, while only a minority of whom
saw their eusebeia (piety) rewarded with success. But the daimonic readers of
Plutarch have been left to listen to many silent words by which they can learn
of the divine guidance of human affairs.
τῆς τῶν πολλῶν δόξης μέλει. Citti traces this theme in Plutarch of “not following the opinion
of the multitude,” and its philosophical precedents. R. Flacelière, “à Delphes,” in Études
Delphiques à la Memoire de P. de La Coste-Messeliere (Bull. Corr. Hell., Suppl. 4) (Paris, 1977)
159–160, discredits the authenticity of the oracle to Cicero.
chapter 12
The Mythological Lives and Roman Religion
Plutarch’s Life of Herakles is lost. However, the Lives of Theseus, Romulus, and
Numa are mythical to a great extent, as he himself confessed. Since Theseus was
balanced against the more historical Romulus, Plutarch was more or less forced
to follow the line of allégorisme réaliste and réalisme historico-géographique—
in Pépin’s terminology—a direction followed by Strabo and Diodoros.1 Plutarch
tells us as much in the introduction. Flacelière notes that he never cites the
Cyclic poets, rejects the Homeric line referring to Theseus, omits Bacchylides
17 on Theseus’ reception by Poseidon at the bottom of the sea, discounts a
sixth century Theseid, and criticizes the national prejudices of the drama-
tists. He cites numerous prose writers, Aristotle, logographers, Atthidographers,
Diodoros Periegetes, and Andron of Halikarnassos, whose taste in myth and rit-
ual undoubtedly suited Plutarch’s own. Euhemerism, which he disdains in De
Iside, appears in the interpretation of the Minotaur as a general of Minos, the
labyrinth as a prison (with Philochoros as source), and the descent to the under-
world as a journey to the Molossian king (Theseus 16; 19; 35).2 Rademacher
treats the life as primarily the glorification of Theseus as founder of the Attic
state, but this impression is misleading.3 Though political reasons are often
given for mythical actions, only one tenth of the Life concerns Theseus’ politi-
cal activity, and that falls mostly in 24 and 25. Plutarch rejects, as is natural, his
divine birth (2), but relates rather seriously encounters with monsters and rob-
bers (the Krommyonian sow being a female robber). He includes interesting
alternate versions, even when a bit fantastic, and is not averse to treating four
rapes and two illicit unions, pressing his historical acumen to decide whether
1 Jean Pépin, Mythe et Allégorie. Les origines grecques et les contestations Judéo-Chrétiennes
(Paris, 1958) 146;151.
2 Flacelière, Plutarque. Vies, i, 3–11, esp. 5. Flacelière, 10, n. 2, believes Plutarch may have been
influenced by Plato’s advice: “Let us not believe or permit ourselves to say that Theseus,
the son of Poseidon and Peirithoos, the son of Zeus, attempted any of these abductions so
criminal” (Politeia 391c).
3 Mythos und Sage bei den Griechen (Darmstadt, 1968 [1943]), esp. ch. 1, “Die vier Tendenzen
der Theseusbiographie,” 241–261. He finds four themes (260): Theseus as patron of the Attic
deme, as the hero of the small states around Attica, Theseus absolved from guilt, and Theseus
parallel to Herakles (but that the ktistes [founder] theme prevails). He thinks that Plutarch’s
break with rationalism belongs to the religious revival of Augustus and after (248).

Theseus participated in the Argonaut rape of Helen. Quite a bit is given to the
interpretation of ritual, possibly to balance the life with that of Romulus.4 This
falls mostly in 4, 5, 12, 21, 33, and 35—rather neatly spread out in the Life. The
two Lives reflect the comparative method, used not only in biography, but in
the Greek and Roman Questions, most of which are concerned with religion. In
general, Plutarch is a little puritanical. He attempts to avoid the impression of
savagery in the portrayal of Theseus, whose aim is quixotically “to do no wrong
but to punish those who offer violence” (7). Thus he downplays the Skiron and
Prokrustes incidents. Nor does he say anything about Pasiphae’s love for the
bull, though he seriously discusses the color of Theseus’ sails, and gives much
space to the repulse of the Amazons.5 The latter probably was interesting as
background to much Greek and Greek inspired art of his period. It is then a
little misleading to think of him struggling with might and main to turn these
Lives into history.
He was much harder on Romulus. He discards his divine birth, though
giving an interesting story about a daimonios phallos (“supernatural phallus”).
This rises from the hearth to perform its duty, which is the impregnation of
the kingly line (2). The story is puzzling in its note of antiquity, but is from
an historian, Promathion, who may have lived not much before Plutarch’s
time.6 In contrast to Theseus, we are well informed that Romulus’ reign began
4 A very exhaustive study of the sources of Theseus can be found in H. Herter, “Theseus,” re
Supplbd. xiii (1973) 1045–1238. He believes Plutarch’s account was mainly based on Istros.
Another recent account is R. Higgins, The Quest for Theseus (London, 1970). Flacelière refers to
his article, “Sur quelques passages des Vies de Plutarque,”reg 59 (1948) 67–105. For some more
recent work on Theseus, see L. Gianfrancesco, “Un frammento sofistico nella Vita di Teseo di
Plutarco,” in M. Sordi (ed.), Storiografia e propaganda (Milan, 1975) 7–20. The same volume
contains P. Ferrarese, “Caratteri della tradizione antipericlea nella Vita di Pericle di Plutarco,”
21–30, and S. Fuscagni, “Callistene di Olinto e la Vita di Pelopida di Plutarco,” 31–55. Herter
has also written an article on Theseus: “Θησεύς,” Platon 25 (1973) 3–13. F. Brommer, Theseus.
Die Taten des griechischen Helden in der antiken Kunst und Literatur (Darmstadt, 1982), offers
a perspective of the Theseus legend in art and literature, a comprehensive bibliography, and
notes, esp. to the artistic representations. Strangely he omits Plutarch from his chronological
list of ancient authors. For the difficulties in identifying the crane dance at Delos (Plutarch,
Theseus 21) on Attic vases, mostly from the archaic period, see 83–85.
5 Plutarch, Theseus 15, explains the human sacrifice incident of the Minotaur legend as in
the style of tragedy (τραγικώτατος μῦθος), and offers Euripides’ description of the Minotaur
(fr. 996, 997 Nauck). The Life is filled with alternate accounts.
6 A king with an Etruscan sounding name (Tarchetius), sees the phallus rising from the hearth
and is told by an oracle of Tethys in Etruria that he must have his daughter impregnated by
it. She is saved by Hestia, a maid performs the duty, and the twins are born (2). T.J. Cornell,
the mythological lives and roman religion 123
and ended in blood. At the end of the Life Plutarch discards any abnormal
type of divinization for Romulus, preferring to regard his divinization as the
normal progressive purification from human to hero, daimon, and god, which
is the theory of the “others” in De defectu.7 The disappearance of Romulus is
considered a fable, like that related of Kleomedes of Astypalaia, and of Aristeas
of Prokonnesos—which, according to Plutarch, took place at Kroton—and
the disappearance of the body of Alkmena.8 Finally, he modifies the words of
“Aeneas and the Twins: The Development of the Roman Foundation Legend,” pcps 21 (1975)
1–33, gives a 1st cent. bc date to Promathion. E. Gabba, “Considerazioni sulla tradizione letter-
aria sulle origini della Repubblica,” in Les origines de la République Romaine (Vandœuvres—
Geneva, 1967) 133–174, speculated that Plutarch was affected by late Republican “Etruscoma-
nia” (148).
7 R. Palmer, Roman Religion and Roman Empire. Five Essays (Philadelphia, 1974), has com-
mented on Plutarch’s inconsistency in treating the disappearance of Romulus (8), his use of
Varro for the horoscope of Romulus (Rom. 12), and his references to human sacrifice, which
he abhorred, performed in Rome in his own day (154, 157). For accounts of the disappearance
of Romulus and some newer original ideas see F. Coarelli, “Il Pantheon, l’apoteosi di Augusto
e l’apoteosi di Romolo,” in Kjeld de Fine Licht (ed.), Città e architettura nella Roma Imperiale
(Rome, 1983) 41–46. [en: C. Pelling, “Making myth look like history: Plato in Plutarch’s Theseus-
Romulus,” in A. Pérez Jiménez et al. (eds.), Plutarco, Platón y Aristóteles, 431–443; P. Marchetti,
“Autour de Romulus et des Lupercalia: une exploration préliminaire,” lec 70(1–2) (2002) 77–
92; F.E. Brenk, “Religion under Trajan: Plutarch’s resurrection of Osiris,” in Stadter and Van der
Stockt (eds.), Sage and Emperor. Plutarch, Greek Intellectuals, and Roman Power in the Time of
Trajan (98–117 a.d.) (Leuven, 2002) 72–92.]
8 Flacelière, Plutarque. Vies, i, 234, notes that Herodotos (4.13–15) put Aristeas at Kyzikos, but
feels that Plutarch, who often deviates from Herodotos, and may have been influenced by
Pythagorean sources, probably wrote what the mss. have, κρότωνος rather than κυζίκου. See
his article “Plutarque et les oracles béotiens,” Bull. Corr. Hell. 70 (1946) 199–207 (205–207).
Aristeas has been treated by J.D.P. Bolton, Aristeas of Proconnesus (Oxford, 1962) (on this
passage, 16, 128, 129, 201), who explains how Aristeas came to be associated with Croton. The
matter has been treated by Flacelière, “Sur quelques passages des Vies de Plutarque,” and
previously by K. Scott, “Plutarch and the Ruler Cult,” tapa 60 (1929) 117–135. Flacelière saw
Plutarch downgrading Romulus by giving him the status of daimon rather than theos, and
making arete, not a state decree, the qualification for divinization (94–98). Plutarch however,
in contrast to Livy who offers a rationalistic explanation for belief in the apotheosis, gives
more credence to the apotheosis, but locates it in the general context of divinization for all
‘good’ men, who advance “by nature and divine justice” from the state of heroes, to daimones,
to gods. Unlike De defectu 415b, divinization is not restricted to a ‘few’ of the good souls, nor to
the ‘better’ daimones as in De facie 944d. Moreover, here Plutarch only uses two of the terms
for the telos used at 944e, omitting ἐφετόν and θεῖον and expressing more explicitly the telos
and the idea of transformation into gods (εἰς θεοὺς ἀναφέρεσθαι, τὸ κάλλιστον καὶ μακαριώτατον
τέλος ἀπολαβούσας, 28). See also G.W. Bowersock, “Greek Intellectuals and the Imperial Cult
Romulus after death to Julius Proculus on the Appian Way, making them less
militaristic and nationalistic. Livy’s Romulus says: “So farewell and declare to
the Romans that my Rome shall be the capital of the world; so let them cherish
the art of war and let them now teach their children that no human strength
can resist Roman arms.” (1.16). Plutarch’s Romulus is more schooled in the art of
international diplomacy: “So farewell and tell the Romans that if they practice
self-restraint and add to it valor, they will reach the utmost heights of power.”
(28).
The Numa is more concerned with religious questions and rites than with
the shadowy Numa. The disappearance of Aristeas suggests Neopythagorean
sources for the Romulus, but these sources are more evident in Numa.9 In con-
trast to Cicero, who regarded the association of Numa with Pythagoras as a
ridiculous fraud of Pythagorean scholarship (inveteratus error, De Rep. 2.15.29),
and Livy (1.18–21), who like Cicero makes Numa a born and bred Sabine unaf-
fected by Greek influence, Plutarch plays upon possible Pythagorean influence,
and relates the discovery of the Books of Numa without underlining the possi-
bility of forgery. His Numa receives many possible ideas from Pythagoras, or
at least that possibility is left open, including the prohibition against images
of the gods (a special interest of Plutarch’s in De Iside, and in his discussion
of Jewish religion, as well as in De superstitione). The Numa is also more witty,
and Plutarch seems to delight in telling the story of how the hero, with the help
of Picus and Faunus, cajoled and outwitted Jupiter when he asked for human
sacrifice (15), and the story of the keeper of the temple of Hercules, who, while
shooting dice with the god, offered the prostitute Laurentia as a dubious prize
(5).
in the Second Century ad,” in W. Den Boer (ed.), Le culte des souverains dans l’Empire Romain
(Vandœuvres-Geneva, 1973) 179–206 (189); and S.F. Price, “Gods and Emperors: The Greek
Language of the Roman Imperial Cult,” jhs 104 (1984) 79–95; and idem, Rituals and Power. The
Roman Imperial Cult in Asia Minor (Cambridge, 1984), esp. 115–116. See also F.E. Brenk, “From
Rex to Rana: Plutarch’s Treatment of Nero,” in A. Ceresa-Gastaldo (ed.), Il Protagonismo nella
Storiografia Classica (Genoa, 1987) 121–142.
9 On this see Flacelière’s introduction to the Numa (Vies i, 166–178). He doubts G. Dumézil’s
theories about historicized myth in Numa on the basis that the Numa legend does not seem
strong in 2nd cent. bc literature (Ennius). Dumézil’s theories can be found in Mitra-Varuna
(Paris, 1948), and idem, Archaic Roman Religion (trs. Chicago, 1970). Flacelière notes the
theory of E. Pais, Storia critica di Roma durante i primi cinque secoli i (Rome, 1913) 447–456,
that Pythagoreans of South Italy in the 4th cent., finding an ancient river god Numicius near
the stream of Egeria, grecized the myth, changing Numicius into Numa. On Numa, see now
M. Manfredini and L. Piccirilli, Le Vite di Licurgo e di Numa (Milan, 1980) 290–338.
Plutarch relied heavily upon Livy, Fabius Pictor, Diokles of Peparethos, Varro,
and Dionysios of Halikarnassos, and probably received help from his Roman
friends, such as Sextius Sulla of Carthage. Such sources were used for the
Quaest. Rom., where he incorporated a number of other sources: among the
Greek, Juba, Aristotle, Kastor, Sokrates of Argos, Favorinus, Plato, Chrysippos,
Alexander Polyhistor, Pyrrho of Lipara, and Herodoros; among the Latin, Cato,
Cicero, Livy, Nigidius Figulus, Fenestella, Antistius Labeo, Ateius Capito, and
Cluvius Rufus. Ziegler felt that the number of mistranslations suggests that he
consulted authors like Varro directly, then later used his notes on them, being a
little unconcerned to question his friends on minutiae. Thus the October Equus
appears as the December Equus (apparently counting December as the “tenth”
month).10
H.J. Rose in a thorough study of the sources of the Quaest. Rom. felt that
Plutarch’s principal source was the Homoiotetes (Similarities) of King Juba of
Mauretania, whose interests would be similar to those of Plutarch, and who
drew heavily on Dionysios and Varro. Juba had married a daughter of Antony,
and presumably his knowledge of Latin would have been excellent. In Rose’s
view 53 out of 113 questions might have been taken directly from Varro, but
were more likely found in Juba, and may even have been in other authors.
In his opinion whatever the original or intermediate sources, Plutarch was
surprisingly independent. Rose thinks that he found Livy in Juba (though he
also used him directly), as well as Nigidius Figulus and Ateius Capito. Since he
used Fenestella for Sulla and Crassus, this was a direct source. Rose reduced
to twenty-five the number of passages resembling the work of Verrius Flaccus,
very recent in Plutarch’s day; but he went on to show that many of these
parallels were not all that convincing and suggested that Verrius might have
been used by Juba. His eventual feeling was that Verrius, like Varro, was found in
Juba, and Plutarch went on to consult these authors directly, but at a later time.
Rose concluded that Plutarch drew on good sources and not unintelligently,
that the mistakes were a small percentage of the whole, and thus the work was
on the whole quite reliable.11
10 For Plutarch’s sources see Flacelière, Vies i, 55; Ziegler, Plutarchos, 223–224; Pelling, “Plu-
tarch’s Method,” 74–96; and idem, “Plutarch’s Adaptation,” 127–140. For the Quaest. Rom.
there is a full, but rather confusing treatment of the sources in Rose, The Roman Questions,
11–45; 27 on use of Juba; 30 on questions from Varro. On Plutarch’s use of Varro see
E. Valgiglio, “Varrone in Plutarco,” Atti del Congresso Internazionale di Studi Varroniani ii
(Rieti, 1976) 571–595. Plutarch seems to have ignored the De Lingua Latina.
11 An example (in regard to covering the head when praying) from Kastor, “when he is trying
Plutarch employs a number of different approaches: comparison with Greek

rites, Pythagorean speculation or symbolism, etymological explanation, num-
ber mysticism, alleged historical cause or confusion. He seems most on target
when offering comparative Greek material of a primitive type, but he seems
oblivious to the possibility of consulting other comparative material. Thus his
rate of success is around fifty percent at best, and where he is successful often
we suspect a lucky guess. Though at times his instinct for comparative Greek
material, which he undoubtedly knew as well as any Greek of his day, leads him
to a good conclusion, a modern scholar would be surprised at the infrequency
with which he uses this approach.
Among the questions which interested him in the Romulus are those con-
cerning the Parilia, Jupiter Feretrius, Moneta, the Matronalia, Carmentalia,
Lupercalia, Vestals, the lituus (the crooked staff used by the augurs), the disap-
pearance of Romulus, Quirinus, and the Regia. In Numa he treats the Pontifices
and Vestals in greater detail, along with the Fetiales, Terminus, Fides, Vesta, Ege-
ria, Libitina, the Salii, Picus and Faunus, Fides and Terminus. Many of these are
pseudo-historical explanations. In the Romulus, though he starts right on the
Lupercalia, he eventually loses his way. Similarly, in explaining the round shape
of the temple of Vesta he is hopelessly lost in Pythagorean speculation. Though
something of an inspector Clouzot in his approach, he offers Greek models
for Numa’s love (Pan-Pindar, Muses-Archilochos, Hesiod, Asklepios-Sophokles,
then Zaleucos, Minos, Zoroaster).
One can compare these subjects with those of the Quaest. Rom.: the Vicus
Patricius shrine of Diana, the stags’ horns in Diana’s temple, the covering of
heads when worshipping, Saturn, the beating of a slave woman in the shrine
of Matuta, the rites of the Bona Dea, reverence for the woodpecker, Janus,
Libitina-Venus, the consecration of walls but not gates, the carrying of the
bride over the threshold, the Argeii, the libations to the dead in February, the
Larentia, the restrictions on the Flamen Dialis (one of the priests) (not to anoint
himself in open air, not to take an oath, not to touch meal or yeast, to resign
office if wife dies, not to touch ivy or travel along road under it, to avoid dogs and
goats, not to hold or seek office), the Veneralia, the temple of Vulcanus outside
the city, the dog beside the Lares, the sacrifice of a bitch to Geneta Mana, the
vultures used in augury, the shrine of Aesculapius outside the city, the burial of
Vestals alive, the October Equus, the augurs’ right to the priesthood, the bullae
to bring Roman customs into relation with Pythagorean doctrines: the daimon within us
entreats and supplicates the gods without, and thus he symbolizes by the covering of the
head the covering and concealing of the soul by the body” (266e).
(amulets worn like a locket), and the Lupercalia.12 Often he rightly suspects a
taboo or apotropaic sacrifice, as that of a dog to the wolf on the Lupercalia. But
at times one suspects that his intention is to justify rather than to explain, for
example, that raw flesh is repulsive, like an open wound.
Hardly convincing is Plutarch’s attempt to relate the October Equus to the
Trojan horse, and the Argeii to Herakles, or the Consualia to a feast of Poseidon,
thereby explaining the putting of garlands on horses and asses. That the Lares
are clad in dog skins because they are like the Erinyes is an interesting guess. His
relationship of the Lupercalia to the purification rites in Boiotia is valuable, as is
his frequent reference to dogs or dog sacrifice. Still, we must tolerate his opinion
that the Flamen Dialis did not anoint himself in the open air through an
aversion to Greek pederasty, and his being careful not to step under ivy because
of what happened to the women of Bakchos. As so often with Plutarch, we can
remain less grateful for his opinions than thankful for the information, though
such views reflect the thought patterns of his day in the field of comparative
religion. Finally, according to Plutarch (sounding like an incipient structuralist)
the Flamen Dialis does not touch raw meat because it “… neither is a living
creature nor has it yet become a cooked food. Now boiling or roasting, being a
sort of alteration and mutilation, eliminates the previous form; but raw fresh
meat does not have a clean and unsullied appearance, but one that is repulsive,
like a fresh wound.”
After so many details in the complex and not always consistent or unitary
religious philosophy of Plutarch, it may be well to conclude with a passage
from De tranquilitate which gives a broad sweep and optimistic attitude toward
the world, religion, and our destiny.13 He begins with an introduction from
the Cynic Diogenes, who when seeing someone preparing for a holiday said
“Is not every day a holiday?” This rather non-cynical remark suggests a Stoic
framework for his coming declaration, but in effect it is deeply Platonic. The
kosmos is a temple, most holy and worthy of God. Man is introduced into
it as a spectator of sensible imitations (μιμήματα) of the intelligibles (νοητά)
revealed, according to Plato by the divine nous (intelligence) (Timaios 92c,
Epinomis 984a). These imitations have within them the principle (ἀρχή) of life
and motion, both in the celestial bodies and on the earth we live in. Life itself
is an initiation (μύησις) and most perfect mystery rite (τελετὴ τελειοτάτη). It
should be full of cheerful tranquillity (εὐθυμία) and joy. True we are happy when
12 Cf. Latte, Römische Religionsgeschichte, 97.

13 For a commentary on this work, consult J. Dumortier and J. Defradas, Plutarque. Œuvres
morales, viii (Paris, 1975) 89–129.
there is a holiday or watching an athletic event (the Pythia). But by spending

so much time depressed, complaining, and worried about the cares that beset
them, men shame the festivals in which God is our choregos (leader of the
chorus) and mystagogos (guide in the mysteries). Men delight in music and the
sight of animals at play, but when their own life is troubled do nothing to ease
their pain. If only they would accept the present without complaint, remember
the past with gratitude, and meet the future without fear or lack of trust, their
hope cheerful and bright (477c–f)!14
The splendid balance between the appreciation and love of the “phenome-
nal” world while acknowledging the superiority of the transcendental is com-
bined with sympathy and understanding for the human condition. This opti-
mism both for this world and the next has undoubtedly contributed to giv-
ing Plutarch a lasting place in literature and in the hearts of readers of every
generation, culture, and help but be impressed by his religious spirit which
was based on a noble philanthropia—respect, love, and tolerance for one’s
fellow men. It was a blend of common sense and piety, a belief in religious
phenomena combined with a healthy appreciation of science and learning,
confidence in the superiority of the Greco-Roman way of life, though with
appreciation for the religious values and traditions of others. It was basically
monotheistic, yet indulgent toward the polytheism which lay at the roots of
this culture. At heart he was a pacifist, yet approved harsh solutions and bit-
ter medicine for the good of society, was strikingly otherworldly in his inter-
est in the beyond and the destiny of the soul, yet surprisingly interested in
the rough and tumble of his savagely ambitious heroes, and finally, he was
both ready to condemn their vices on short notice and forgive them when-
14 For a broader picture of this essay, see D. Tsekourakis’ volume on the popular works of
Plutarch, Οἱ λαϊκοφιλοσοφικές πραγμάτειες του Πλουτάρχου. Η σχέση τους με τη διατριβή και
με άλλα παραπλησία γραμματειακά είδη (Thessalonika, 1983) 77–177. J.M. Dillon, “Plutarch
and Second Century Platonism,” in A.H. Armstrong (ed.), Classical Mediterranean Spir-
ituality. Egyptian, Greek, Roman (New York, 1986) 214–229, gives a summary of Plutarch’s
spirituality. He identifies its guiding principles as devotion to Apollo and Delphic worship,
cosmic dualism, and in ethics, moderation; and Plutarch separates static and dynamic
concepts of daimones. Dillon finds it difficult to place Plutarch in a precise relationship to
other thinkers of his period because of the insufficiency of the extant writings. However,
he finds Plutarch’s spirituality to be “basically optimistic and world-affirming,” recognizing
the tension between good and evil without falling into Manichean or Jansenistic gloom.
He, thus, sees Plutarch as more like Plotinos than many of his contemporaries, who were
living, according to Dodds, in an “age of anxiety.” I am grateful to Professor Dillon for hav-
ing let me see his manuscript before publication.
ever human nature failed to conform in the most excellent way to that toward
which he saw all nature striving, the paradeigmata, perfect Beauty and Good-
ness.15
15 I would like to thank Professor F.H. Sandbach of Trinity College, Cambridge, for looking
over an earlier draft of this article, and Professor Harold W. Attridge of Southern Methodist
University for looking over some of the newer sections, in particular that on Middle Pla-
tonism. Professor Pier Luigi Donini of the University of Turin has kindly made some
corrections and offered some helpful suggestions on Plutarch’s Aristotelianism. Professor
John Dillon of Trinity College, Dublin, and Professor John Whittaker of Memorial Univer-
sity, St. John’s, Newfoundland, also were willing to read the manuscript and offer some
suggestions. Patricia di Martino graciously helped correct the proofs. Professor Werner
Mayer of the Pontifical Biblical Institute detected some remaining infelicities.
part 2
The Life of Mark Antony:
A Literary and Cultural Study
∵
For F.H. Sandbach in memoriam
∵
chapter 1
The Neronian Background to the Life
1 The Nerogonia of the Antonios
At the termination of the Antonios, the reader suddenly discovers that the
real villain is Nero.1 In the longest genealogical ending of the Lives, Plutarch
dedicates special interest to the fate of Antony’s children:
Ἀντωνίου δὲ γενεὰν ἀπολιπόντος ἐκ τριῶν γυναικῶν ἑπτὰ παῖδας, ὁ πρεσβύτα-

τος Ἄντυλλος ὑπὸ Καίσαρος ἀνῃρέθη μόνος· τοὺς δὲ λοιποὺς Ὀκταουία παρα-
λαβοῦσα μετὰ τῶν ἐξ ἑαυτῆς ἔθρεψε. καὶ Κλεοπάτραν μὲν τὴν ἐκ Κλεοπάτρας
Ἰόβᾳ τῷ χαριεστάτῳ βασιλέων συνῴκισεν, Ἀντώνιον δὲ τὸν ἐκ Φουλβίας οὕτω
μέγαν ἐποίησεν, ὥστε τὴν πρώτην παρὰ Καίσαρι τιμὴν Ἀγρίππου, τὴν δὲ δευτέ-
ραν τῶν Λιβίας παίδων ἐχόντων, τρίτον εἶναι καὶ δοκεῖν Ἀντώνιον. ἐκ δὲ Μαρ-
κέλλου δυεῖν αὐτῇ θυγατέρων οὐσῶν, ἑνὸς δ’ υἱοῦ Μαρκέλλου, τοῦτον μὲν ἅμα
παῖδα καὶ γαμβρὸν ἐποιήσατο Καῖσαρ, τῶν δὲ θυγατέρων Ἀγρίππᾳ τὴν ἑτέραν
ἔδωκεν. ἐπεὶ δὲ Μάρκελλος ἐτελεύτησε κομιδῇ νεόγαμος, καὶ Καίσαρι γαμβρὸν
ἔχοντα πίστιν οὐκ εὔπορον ἦν ἐκ τῶν ἄλλων φίλων ἑλέσθαι, λόγον ἡ Ὀκταο-
υία προσήνεγκεν ὡς χρὴ τὴν Καίσαρος θυγατέρα λαβεῖν Ἀγρίππαν, ἀφέντα τὴν
ἑαυτῆς. πεισθέντος δὲ Καίσαρος πρῶτον, εἶτ’ Ἀγρίππου, τὴν μὲν αὑτῆς ἀπολα-
βοῦσα συνῴκισεν Ἀντωνίῳ, τὴν δὲ Καίσαρος Ἀγρίππας ἔγημεν. ἀπολειπομένων
δὲ τῶν Ἀντωνίου καὶ Ὀκταουίας δυεῖν θυγατέρων τὴν μὲν Δομίτιος Ἀηνόβαρβος
ἔλαβε, τὴν δὲ σωφροσύνῃ καὶ κάλλει περιβόητον Ἀντωνίαν Δροῦσος, ὁ Λιβίας
1 This article is greatly indebted to C.B.R. Pelling, Plutarch. Life of Antony (Cambridge, 1988), and
to R. Scuderi, Commento a Plutarco, Vita di Antonio (Florence, 1984); Cf. O. Andrei & R. Scuderi
(introduction B. Scardigli and M. Manfredini), Plutarco. Demetrio. Antonio (Milan, 1989). See
also B. Scardigli, Die Römerbiographien Plutarchs. Ein Forschungsbericht (Munich, 1979) 144–
151; and idem, “Scritti recenti sulle Vite di Plutarco (1974–1986),” in F.E. Brenk & I. Gallo
(eds.), Miscellanea Plutarchea, Atti del i Convegno di Studi su Plutarco (Roma, 23 novembre 1985)
(Ferrara, 1986) 7–21—besides K. Ziegler, Plutarchos von Chaironeia (Stuttgart, 1964) (= rev. ed.
of Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft xxi [Stuttgart, 1951] 636–962), 259–
266. In the notes “Professor” (in a general sense and irrespective of holding a chair) is used
before a scholar’s name when the information has been communicated either in a letter or
in conversation. Where a name is primarily geographical, often the Greek spelling has been
used, e.g., “Aktion,” even when the normal English spelling has been used in another context,
e.g., “The Battle of Actium.”

υἱός, πρόγονος δὲ Καίσαρος. ἐκ τούτων ἐγένετο Γερμανικὸς καὶ Κλαύδιος· ὧν

Κλαύδιος μὲν ὕστερον ἦρξε· τῶν δὲ Γερμανικοῦ παίδων Γάιος μὲν ἄρξας ἐπιφα-
νῶς οὐ πολὺν χρόνον ἀνῃρέθη μετὰ τέκνου καὶ γυναικός, Ἀγριππίνα δ’ υἱὸν ἐξ
Ἀηνοβάρβου Λεύκιον Δομίτιον ἔχουσα, Κλαυδίῳ Καίσαρι συνῴκησε· καὶ θέμε-
νος τὸν υἱὸν αὐτῆς Κλαύδιος Νέρωνα Γερμανικὸν προσωνόμασεν. οὗτος ἄρξας
ἐφ’ ἡμῶν ἀπέκτεινε τὴν μητέρα καὶ μικρὸν ἐδέησεν ὑπ’ ἐμπληξίας καὶ παραφρο-
σύνης ἀνατρέψαι τὴν Ῥωμαίων ἡγεμονίαν, πέμπτος ἀπ’ Ἀντωνίου κατ’ ἀριθμὸν
διαδοχῆς γενόμενος.2
Antony left seven children by his three wives, of whom Antyllus, the
eldest, was the only one executed by Caesar. The rest were taken over
by Octavia, who brought them up with her own children. Kleopatra, the
daughter of Kleopatra, Octavia gave in marriage to Juba, a very edu-
cated and distinguished king. Antonius, the son of Fulvia, she managed
to advance to an extraordinary degree. While Agrippa held the high-
est honors under Augustus, and Livia’s sons the second highest, Anto-
nius was considered, and really was, the third in line. Through Marcel-
lus, Octavia had two daughters and one son, also named Marcellus. The
Emperor made Marcellus both his son and son-in-law, and married off
one of Octavia’s daughters to Agrippa. But Marcellus died shortly after
his marriage, and Caesar, from among his other friends, could not find
a son-in-law he could trust. Octavia, therefore, proposed that Agrippa
should marry Augustus’ own daughter, dissolving the marriage with her
own. Augustus was first persuaded by her, then Agrippa. Whereupon
taking back her own daughter she married her to the young Antonius,
while Agrippa married Augustus’ daughter. Antonius left two daughters
by Octavia, one of whom married Domitius Ahenobarbus. The other
Antonia, who was renowned for her beauty and virtue, was married to
Drusus, Livia’s son and the stepson of Augustus. From this marriage, Ger-
manicus and Claudius were born. Of the two, Claudius became emperor,
and of the children of Germanicus, Gaius reigned madly, but only for
a short while, and then was murdered along with his wife and child.3
2 Antonios 87; C.B.R. Pelling, Plutarch, Life of Antony (Oxford, 1988) 114–115. [en: See now
H. Halfmann, Marcus Antonius (Darmstadt, 2011); S. Moorhead, & D. Stuttart, 31 v. Chr.:
Antonius, Kleopatra und der Fall Ägyptens (Stuttgart, 2012); J.L. Zecher, “Antony’s Vision of
Death?: Athanasius of Alexandria, Palladius of Helenopolis, and Egyptian Mortuary Religion,”
jla 7 (2014) 159–176.]
3 See Pelling, Life of Antony, 326, who for the ms. ἐπιφανῶς (87.8) accepts ἐπιμανῶς (following
Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 80, note 50). K. Ziegler, Plutarchi Vitae Parallelae ιιι.1 (Leipzig, 1971)
the neronian background to the life 135
Agrippina, who had a son by Ahenobarbus, Lucius Domitius, became the

consort of the emperor Claudius. Claudius then adopted Agrippina’s son,
giving him the name Nero Germanicus. This Nero, who became emperor
in my time, killed his mother and by his folly and madness nearly brought
down the Roman Empire. He was the fifth in descent from Antonius.
The passage with its formal genealogical ending returns to the very origins of
Greek literature. Surprisingly, in perhaps the last of his Lives, Plutarch seems
inspired by the genealogies of oral poetry. One might recall in particular Hes-
iod’s Theogony, but in a sense too, the Works and Days with the successive
deterioration of the human race. The Homeric epics also come immediately
to mind, though in reality the genealogies there are extremely restrained. The
genealogies of the Homeric epics look both forward and backward, stretching
the glorious lineage of a hero into the distant or mythical past, and even back
to an original insemination by the divine. Hesiod’s Theogony is a progression
in its general lines downward in time but upward in virtue, as the gods become
symbols of refinement and power exercised with caution and reason. The Cat-
alogue of Women at the end of the Theogony offers an instance of a genealogy
terminating a literary work.4 The general result of the genealogy is positive,
with the progeny a lesser god or hero. The weakness of the human condition
may be hinted at in the genealogy of Ino, Semele, Agave. But these three would
be exceptions that prove the rule.5 Moreover, the poet of this section of the
retains the ms. reading as do R. Flacelière & É. Chambry, Plutarque. Vies xiii (Paris, 1977)
185, who translate “de façon voyante.” But see W.R. Paton & E.L. Hicks, The Inscriptions of Cos
(Oxford, 1891): Ἐ]νιαυτοῦ πρώτου τᾶς Γαΐ]ου … ἐπιφανείας (Inscr. Cos 391); and Amatorius 753e,
where Semiramis (φαύλη) rules “gloriously” (ἐβασίλευσε ἐπιφανῶς πολὺν χρόνον) over Asia.
4 On the Theogony, see M.L. West, The Hesiodic Catalogue of Women. Its Nature, Structure
and Origins (Oxford, 1985). A very long treatment of genealogy, primarily in archaic and
classical Greece, can be found in R. Thomas, Oral Tradition and Written Record in Classical
Athens (Cambridge, 1989) 153–195, with a very extensive bibliography. The Iliadic genealogies
are somewhat limited in scope: Aeneas, 8 generations (20.200–241), Glaukos, 6 (6.145–211),
Achilleus’ only goes back two generations to a god (21.188–191). (As a descendant of Aeneas,
perhaps Nero inherited a long genealogy!) Thomas notes the aristocratic and telescoping
aspect of most genealogies, which skip back to an illustrious or divine ancestor (157). She also
mentions Plato’s contempt (Theaet. 174e–175b) for persons (like Antony), who traced their
ancestry back to Herakles, an ancestry which has no bearing on their own character (174).
5 Semele in Euripides’ Bacchai, as one struck by lightning (diobletos), has received a shrine and
cult (6–8). See A.B. Cook, Zeus. A Study in Ancient Religion i: Zeus, a God of the Bright Sky (Cam-
bridge, 1914) 22–29; M.P. Nilsson, Geschichte der griechischen Religion i, 71–73; W. Burkert,
“Elysion,” Glotta 39 (1960–1961) 208–213; idem, Greek Religion. Archaic and Classical (Oxford,
Theogony was possibly unaware of the tragic stories of these women as known
to us from the Bacchai of the strikingly original Euripides. Finally, these Hes-
iodic genealogies are not especially consistent or well organized.
Genealogical tables bespeak a serious interest in the transmission of virtue,
arete (excellence) or vice, through the blood line, expressing perfectly the con-
cept of dynasty. Still, in the Parallel Lives Plutarch treated a number of Hel-
lenistic monarchs whose dynastic posterity was important, without delineating
this lineage. In general, he contents himself with the brief genealogies lead-
ing to the hero’s birth. The Demetrios, the Life paired with the Antonios, has
a typically brief genealogy. Even the Antonios is more interested in childhood
influences on the hero than in the bloodline itself. The ending of the Antonios
is, then, an exception. The mention of numerous women in the genealogy of
Nero emphasizes even more the biological transmission of human qualities.
Plutarch is non-committal on Claudius, but Gaius (Caligula) certainly seems
symptomatic of a deteriorating biological species, almost Stoic in its concep-
tion.6
Though a genealogical ending might appear normal or even necessary in
Biography, a comparative study reveals the rarity of its appearance in Plutarch’s
Lives. At the termination of the Phokion, the hero’s son is described as worthless,
so ruled by sexual passion for a slave girl he loved as to ransom her from a
brothel (38).7 In Aratos (54) the end of the Macedonian line is Perseus, who
succeeded Philip and was displayed in Aemilius’ triumph. However, Perseus
is considered by Plutarch the supposititious son of a seamstress, not a direct
descendant of Philip. Aratos’ descendants are then described as living in Sikyon
1985) 126 (= idem, Griechische Religion der archaischen und klassischen Epoche [Stuttgart, 1977]
201).
6 [en: See Ph.A. Stadter, “Φιλόσοφος και φίλανδρος: Plutarch’s View of Women in the Moralia
and the Lives,” in S.B. Pomeroy (ed.), Plutarch’s Advice to the Bride and Groom and A Con-
solation to His Wife: English Translations, Commentary, Interpretive Essays, and Bibliography
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999) 173–182; B.B. Buszard, “The Speech of Greek and
Roman Women in Plutarch’s Lives,” cp 105 (2010) 83–115; R.M. Aguilar Fernández, “La valía
de las mujeres en Plutarco,” in Ribeiro Ferreira, Van der Stockt, & Fialho (eds.), Philosophy in
Society, 9–17; M. Durán Mañas, “Valores y virtudes de las mujeres en la Vida de Demetrio,” in
Ribeiro Ferreira, Van der Stockt, & Fialho (eds.), Philosophy in Society, 75–98; E. Melandri, “La
virtù al femminile,” in Ribeiro Ferreira, Van der Stockt, & Zambujo Fialho (eds.), Philosophy
in Society, 173–193.]
7 Cf. L.A. Tritle, “Plutarch’s Life of Phocion: An Analysis and Critical Report,” anrw ii.33.6 (1992)
4293. [en: See also C. Mossé, “Le procès de Phocion,” Dike 1 (1998) 79–85; M. d. C. Fialho “The
Interplay of Textual References in Plutarch’s Life of Phocion,” Ploutarchos 8 (2010–2011) 91–
102.]
and Pellene in the time of Plutarch. As so often in the endings of the Lives,
he creates a context of retribution for the villain and reward for the hero or
his children. In Themistokles 32 the hero’s descendants are entitled to certain
honors even in the author’s own time. A Themistokles of Athens, presumably a
direct descendant, enjoyed these revenues and was Plutarch’s companion and
friend in the “school of Ammonios the philosopher.”8
The only other genealogy, or more accurately, reference to descendants, out-
side the pair Demetrios-Antonios, also belongs to the Julio-Claudian dynasty—
excluding the evil end of Marius Junior (Marios 46), and the revenge of Cicero’s
sons who engaged in the damnatio memoriae of Antony. (His sons removed
the statues and honors of Antony and forbade use of the name Marcus to his
descendants [Cicero 49]). The line of Marcellus, according to the author, contin-
ued its splendor down to the time of Marcellus, the nephew of Augustus, whose
library and theater “bear his name” (Marcellos 30.11).9 Thus, the genealogy at the
end of Demetrios seems written to parallel the long genealogy designed for the
Antonios (53.8–9):
Ἀπέλιπε δὲ γενεὰν ὁ Δημήτριος Ἀντίγονον μὲν ἐκ Φίλας καὶ Στρατονίκην, δύο δὲ

Δημητρίους, τὸν μὲν Λεπτὸν ἐξ Ἰλλυρίδος γυναικός, τὸν δ’ ἄρξαντα Κυρήνης ἐκ
Πτολεμαΐδος, ἐκ δὲ Δηιδαμείας Ἀλέξανδρον, ὃς ἐν Αἰγύπτῳ κατεβίωσε. λέγεται
δὲ καὶ Κόρραγον υἱὸν ἐξ Εὐρυδίκης αὐτῷ γενέσθαι. κατέβη δὲ ταῖς διαδοχαῖς
τὸ γένος αὐτοῦ βασιλεῦον εἰς Περσέα τελευταῖον, ἐφ’ οὗ Ῥωμαῖοι Μακεδονίαν
ὑπηγάγοντο.
Demetrios left the following offspring: Antigonos and Stratonike by Philia;

two children named Demetrios, one called Leptos (the Thin), by an Illyr-
ian woman; and another, who became ruler of Kyrene, by Ptolemais; and
by Deïdameia, Alexandros, who lived and died in Egypt. He is also sup-
8 F. Manfredini, Plutarch’s Themistocles. A Historical Commentary (Princeton, 1980) 235–236;

C. Carena, M. Manfredini, & L. Piccirilli, Plutarco. Vite parallele. Le vite di Temistocle e di
Camillo (Milan, 1983) 286; P.L. Donini, “Plutarco, Ammonio e l’Academia,” in Brenk & I. Gallo
(eds.), Miscellanea Plutarchea, 97–110 and J. Dillon, “Plutarch and Platonist Orthodoxy,” in
M. Marcovich, F.E. Brenk, J.P. Hershbell, & P.A. Stadter, Plutarch. Robert Flacelière in Memo-
riam (Urbana, 1988) 357–364, take issue with J. Glucker, Antiochus and the Late Academy
(Göttingen, 1978) esp. 124–127, 133, 257–280, who describes the Academy at that time as a
gymnasion, a school for ephebes (359).
9 [en: J.E. Bernard, “Historia magistra mortis: Tite-Live, Plutarque et la fin de Marcellus,” in
P. Defosse (ed.), Hommages à Carl Deroux. 2: Prose et linguistique, médecine (Collection
Latomus 267; Bruxelles: Latomus 2002) 30–39.]
posed to have had a son by Eurydike, named Korrhagos. His line came
down in successions of kings to the last of them, Perseus, in whose reign
the Romans conquered Macedonia.10
Both terminate with an ultimate tragedy for the family line.

There are striking verbal parallels as well in the Antonios and Demetrios
genealogies:
Ἀπέλιπε δὲ γενεὰν ὁ Δημήτριος Ἀντωνίου δὲ γενεὰν ἀπολιπόντος

ἐκ Φίλας, ἐξ Ἰλλυρίδος γυναικός, ἐκ ἐκ Κλεοπάτρας, ἐκ Φουλβίας;
Πτολεμαΐδος, ἐκ δὲ Δηιδαμείας, ἐξ Εὐρυδίκης
κατέβη δὲ ταῖς διαδοχαῖς κατ’ ἀριθμὸν διαδοχῆς γενόμενος
Ῥωμαῖοι Μακεδονίαν ὑπηγάνοντο ἀνατρέψαι τὴν Ῥωμαίων ἡγεμονίαν
Plutarch omits mentioning that Nero ended the Julio-Claudians, something

which would correspond with the word τελευταῖον (last) of the Demetrios pas-
sage. The fact was obvious, but he perhaps desired variation. The τελευταῖα of
the first passage corresponds to πέμπτος (fifth) of the Antonios. Comparing the
two passages, one can easily observe, in spite of variation in Demetrios, that
the formulae are somewhat monotonous. In the longer passage of the Anto-
nios, Plutarch carefully varied the phraseology. Thus, variation occurs in state-
ments on the birth and fate of the child. Secondary personages of great interest
to the reader, such as Juba, Agrippa, and Domitius Ahenobarbus are intro-
duced. A background of dynastic machinations and intrigue is suggested. The
beauty and virtue of Antonia Minor, despite the inheritance from her father,
contrasts with the mad (?) career of Gaius and his murder. And, finally, there
are intimations of Agrippina’s relentless scheming to establish Nero on the
throne.11
10 Ziegler, Plutarchi Vitae Parallelae iii.1. There are some variations in the mss. over the
spelling of the children’s names. There is no suggestion here, as in Aratos 54, that Perseus
might not be a direct descendant.
11 On the section see Pelling, Life of Antony, 323–327; Scuderi, Vita di Antonio, 119–123. Tech-
nically speaking, Antony did not suffer damnatio memoriae, but his treatment was a fore-
runner of the Imperial form of it; Cf. Pelling, Life of Antony, 323. The endings of the Lives of
Cato Maior and Cato Minor depict the prevalence of good blood, which produces heroic
offspring, while Aristeides ends with an anecdote concerning an apparently degenerate
offspring. [en: M.B. Trapp, “Socrates, the Phaedo, and the Lives of Phocion and Cato the
Younger,” in A. Pérez Jiménez, J. García López, & R. Aguilar Fernández (eds.), Plutarco,
Undoubtedly, the genealogical tradition was extremely strong among noble

Roman families, as observable from the Scipionic epigrams, and must have
been extremely important for family biography.12 However, as a rule Plutarch
very briefly relates the genealogical traditions at the beginning of a Life. A large
number of Republican heroes are treated in the Parallel Lives, but almost never
does the ending speak of the line’s continuation. On the other hand, in the early
Empire the genealogical connections of the Julio-Claudian family achieved
enormous importance, and seemingly affected Plutarch just as they affect
modern Neronian scholars and novelists who reproduce an extraordinarily
complicated family tree.13
The genealogy of Glaukos in the Iliad is paradigmatic for Greek literature. It
follows immediately upon the simile of the leaves (6.146–149):
οἵη περ φύλλων γενεή, τοίη δὲ καὶ ἀνδρῶν.

φύλλα τὰ μέν τ’ ἄνεμος χαμάδις χέει, ἄλλα δέ θ’ ὕλη
τηλεθόωσα φύει, ἔαρος δ’ ἐπιγίγνεται ὥρη·
ὣς ἀνδρῶν γενεὴ ἣ μὲν φύει ἣ δ’ ἀπολήγει.
Platón y Aristóteles, 487–499; D.P. Orsi, “Le pere di Catone l’Uticense: (Plutarco, Cato
Minor 46,4),” aflb 54–55 (2011–2012) 75–76; L.M. Günther, “Catos Feigen aus Karthago:
zur Interpretation einer Anekdote (Plutarch, Cato maior, 27, 1),” in J. González et al. (eds.),
L’ Africa Romana. Le ricchezze dell’Africa. Risorse, produzioni, scambi Atti del xvii convegno
di studio Sevilla, 14–17 dicembre 2006 (Roma: Carocci editore, 2008) 151–156; Ch. Carsana,
“Il Catone di Plutarco: da modello ad antimodello,” in A. González & M.T. Schettino
(eds.), L’ idéalisation de l’ autre. Faire un modèle d’un anti-modèle (Besançon, 2014) 243–
266; T. Means, “Plutarch and the Family of Cato Minor,” cj 69 (1974) 210–215.]
12 See for example, F.E. Brenk, “Auorum Spes et Purpurei Flores: The Eulogy for Marcellus
in Aeneid vi,” AJPh 107 (1986) 218–228; F. Coarelli, “Il Sepolcro degli Scipioni,” Dialoghi
di Archeologia 6 (1972) 36–106; J. van Sickle, “Stile ellenistico-romano e nascita dell’epi-
gramma a Roma,” in G. Flores (ed.), Dall’epigramma ellenistico all’elegia romana. Atti del
Congresso della s.i.s.a.c. (Naples, 1984) 9–26; idem, “The Elogia of the Cornelii Scipiones
and the Origin of Epigram at Rome,” AJPh 108 (1987) 41–55, esp. 44–48.
13 D. Sansone, “Atticus, Suetonius and Nero’s Ancestors,” in C. Deroux (ed.), Studies in Latin
Literature and Roman History, iv (Brussels, 1986) 269–277, believes that T. Pomponius Atti-
cus, the friend of Cicero, probably wrote the genealogy of Nero’s family used by Suetonius,
and that others, like M. Terentius Varro, C. Iulius Hyginus, and M. Valerius Messalla Rufus,
turned out genealogies in this period. The dynastic concept is strong in Augustan iconog-
raphy, e.g., the Gemma Augustea and related art; Cf. P. Zanker, The Power of Images in the
Age of Augustus (Ann Arbor, 1988) 230–238, pls. 182 (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna,
ixa.79); 183b (British Museum, London, gr 1866.8–6.1.) (= idem, Augustus und die Macht
der Bilder [Munich, 1987] 229–235, Abb. 182, 183b).
Even as is the generations of leaves, such is that of men.

As for the leaves, some the wind heaps upon the ground, others the
forest
Brings forth blooming, when there arrives the season of spring.
So is the generation of men, one springeth up and the other passeth
away.
The simile has been considered a generic statement of the human condi-
tion, followed by a specific one of genealogy, in which man is separated from
the leaves and the rest of the non-human world by a distinct lineage, by the
remembrance of named individuals.14 The Lives constantly play between these
poles, the generic and the specific. Thus, the genealogy at the end of Anto-
nios carefully delineates the specific vice of the protagonist as an individual
and its transmission in one family line, as though it were “tagging” a dis-
ease.15
There is a hint of degeneration in the paradigmatic Glaukos genealogy as
well, though Glaukos recites it as a means of suggesting his own valor. He is not
the indomitable warrior that Bellerophon was, and inferior to Sarpedon, who
also was a descendant of Bellerophon. Even Bellerophon at life’s end wanders
around hated by gods and men, while Isandros, his son, is slain by the Solymoi, a
race unable to defeat his father. Perhaps by their very nature genealogies which
descend from a hero must express deterioration. At the same time, Glaukos
too is a hero, and in a deconstructionist sense, Plutarch, though ambiguous
about Antony and condemnatory of Nero, by projecting them into an epic-
like genealogy of the legendary past endows them with heroic, semi-divine
status.
But there is another aspect to the genealogy as related by Glaukos, the estab-
lishment of a link with the present. The actions of a distant ancestor create a
salvific rapport with the contemporary condition. In the case of Glaukos, the
14 J.M. Redfield, Nature and Culture in the Iliad. The Tragedy of Hector (Chicago, 1975) 102,
notes how the genealogy stresses the individual and kinship, while the nature similes
emphasize the continuation of the species.
15 The concept is extremely important for Plutarch’s De sera. As the principal speaker, he
presents an argument (against Bion), based on the prevention of evil. Having seen his
own children punished for his sins, in the next incarnation the malefactor should avoid
making the same mistake; the children, aware of their inherited vice, will take measures
against it (561b–f). See P. De Lacy & B. Einarson, Plutarch’s Moralia vii (Cambridge, Mass.,
1969) 177. In Broutos 1 and the first chapters of the Cato Lives, family genes are responsible
for transmitting even extremely specific traits (such as exterminating tyrants).
recollection of his grandfather Bellerophon shakes the memory of Diomedes.

Recalling that his grandfather Oineus had once hosted “the peerless Bellero-
phon” in his halls for twenty days, and that they had exchanged expensive gifts,
Diomedes forgets his own murderous intentions. Diomedes and Glaukos, fol-
lowing the paradigm, then exchange gifts themselves. Glaukos thus escapes
death, even if a sleepy Homer, who rebukes him for exchanging expensive gifts
for cheap, seems to have underestimated his peril.
At the end of other Lives, genealogies leading downward from the hero
to a future ancestor also suggest degeneration or establish a link with the
present. For example, the sons of Phokion and Marius16 are worse than their
fathers, while the surreptitious son of Philip, Perseus, not only is inferior to
his father, but terminates the Macedonian line. Even Marcellus, the nephew of
Augustus, can only be considered a pale shadow of his namesake, the illustrious
general. As for a link with the present, the Aratos genealogy names persons who
possibly were acquaintances of Plutarch. In Themistokles, a descendant was
a friend in “the school of Ammonios,” a period of life recalled with fondness
elsewhere in his works.
Looking at the genealogy as a genre within the Lives, one could predict that
a downward genealogy in Antonios would express deterioration, the closing
off of a line, and establish a link with the present. No surprise, then, that
the genes of Antony transmitted to numerous persons would produce a Nero,
terminating the Julio-Claudian dynasty and striking out, even in death, at the
biographer himself. But Plutarch, in Homeric fashion, anticipates the ending
with a bit of foreshadowing.17 Two family reminiscences previous to the ending
link his own family with Antony, first in a painless, then in a bitter way. In
chapter 28, his grandfather Lamprias is the indirect oral source of an anecdote
on Antony’s extravagance at table. The direct oral source is a much older friend
of his grandfather, Philotas of Amphissa, who when the incident occurred was
studying medicine at Alexandria and became a personal physician to Antony’s
son.18 The second reminiscence, concerning the great-grandfather Nikarchos,
16 [en: B.B. Buszard, “The Decline of Roman Statesmanship in Plutarch’s Pyrrhus-Marius,” cq

55 (2005) 481–497; idem, “Caesar’s Ambition: a Combined Reading of Plutarch’s Alexander-
Caesar and Pyrrhus-Marius,” tapa 138 (2008) 185–215; G. Schepens, “Plutarch’s View of
Ancient Rome: Some Remarks on the Life of Pyrrhus,” in L. Mooren (ed.), Politics, Admin-
istration and Society in the Hellenistic and Roman World (Leuven: Peeters, 2000) 349–364.]
17 [en: M. Nerdahl, Homeric Models in Plutarch’s Lives (Diss., University of Wisconsin Madi-
son, 2007, 2007).]
18 Pelling, Life of Antony, 195, gives the inscription at Delphi mentioning Philotas (Supple-
is a bitter one. Before the battle of Actium, “all the citizens” of Chaironeia
“under the whip” carried grain to the sea for transport to Antony’s army. The
“salvation” of the city was assured when news arrived of his defeat at Actium
(68).19
At the end of the Nerogonia, Plutarch is extremely reticent about the danger
the Emperor brought to the author. He tends to review his character with
cool detachment, respectful of the distance of time and space. The ending of
Antonios then, does not convey the great personal suffering he experienced
indirectly through the punishment or execution of elder members of a circle on
whose fringe he later figured, and perhaps, under Domitian—who revived the
persecution against this group, the necessity to save his own life by a hasty flight
from Rome: “This Nero, who became emperor in my time, killed his mother and
by his folly and madness nearly brought down the Roman Empire. He was the
fifth in descent from Antonius” (87.4).
The comment underscores two points, matricide, and mental instability
(ἐμπληξίας καὶ παραφροσύνης) which nearly caused political catastrophe.
Plutarch’s nature, which seeks redeeming good in everyone, contrasts with
that of Tacitus, who slashes at persons he despises. Unearthing hidden sadism,
Tacitus depicts, in an inimitably appropriate style, human depravity erupting
from the darkest recesses of the soul. But Plutarch treats Antony amazingly well
for a case study in moral deficiency. Given his nature, one would be surprised
to find him exceptionally hard on Nero. Still, his attitude toward Nero deserves
mentum Epigraphicum Graecum 1 [Leiden, 1923] 181), citing Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 10.
Lamprias, Plutarch’s grandfather, would have been fifty years younger than Philotas.
19 Pelling, Life of Antony, 288. He or Nikarchos was presumably Lamprias’ father and eighty
years old at Plutarch’s birth, something of a Methuselah; but he might have had enough
wits about him to relate the tale to our budding author. [en: On the use of anecdotes
in the Lives, see M.A. Beck, Plutarch’s Use of Anecdotes in the Lives (Diss. Univ. of North.
Carolina, 1998); and idem, “Plato, Plutarch, and the Use and Manipulation of Anecdotes
in the Lives of Lycurgus and Agesilaus: History of the Laconic Apophthegm,” in A. Pérez
Jiménez, J. García López, & R. Aguilar Fernández (eds.), Plutarco, Platón y Aristóteles, 173–
187; Ph.A. Stadter, “Plutarch’s Compositional Technique: The Anecdote Collections and
the Parallel Lives,” grbs 54 (2014) 665–686; L.H. Feldman, “Parallel Lives of Two Lawgivers:
Josephus’ Moses and Plutarch’s Lycurgus,” in J.C. Edmondson, S. Mason & J. Boykin Rives
(eds.), Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome. Contributions présentées à un colloque qui s’est
tenu à Toronto en mai 2001 (Oxford / New York: Oxford University Press, 2005) 209–242;
S. Nevin, “Negative Comparison: Agamemnon and Alexander in Plutarch’s Agesilaus—
Pompey,” grbs 54 (2014) 45–68; D. Sansone, “Agesilaus and the Case of the Lame Dancer,”
ics 37 (2012) 75–96; K.M. Trego, “Competition in Context philonikia in Agesilaus-Pompey,”
Ploutarchos 10 (2012–2013) 63–74.]
more than a superficial glance, since he strangely appears to have observed

Antony through the same spectacles used for Nero, a Nero who belonged to
the impressionable years of his youth.
2 Plutarch and the Rex Turned Rana
What was Plutarch’s attitude toward Nero?20 Classical historians have noted
Plutarch’s extreme frankness and courage in writing his biographies.21 He did
not allow biography to degenerate into an instrument of Imperial propaganda.
Nor did he allow the benefactions of the Flavian emperors to Delphi to influ-
ence his notably hostile attitude toward these rulers.22 Passages in Plutarch’s
Othon and Galbas sometimes cited for the view that Nero had some spark of
virtue, in fact, are not convincing.23 Elsewhere, outside of purely technical ref-
erences, allusions to Nero are universally negative: the massive extermination
of his political enemies (Galbas 8), his excessive prodigality (16), actions deserv-
ing the fate he received (17), outrages committed by his “sacrilegious” procu-
rators in Spain (4), embarassment caused by his theatrical performances, the
murder of his mother and “slaughter of his wife” (14), his debauchery, the seduc-
tion of Poppaea, the wife of Crispinus—with a hint she found the emperor sex-
ually disgusting—and, again, the killing of his mother and “wife-sister” (19).24
20 See F.E. Brenk, “From Rex to Rana: Plutarch’s Treatment of Nero,” in A. Ceresa-Gastaldo
(ed.), Il protagonismo nella storiografia classica (Genoa, 1987) 121–142, for Plutarch’s hatred
of Nero. A milder judgment is offered by Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 16–19, 120, and Russel,
Plutarch, 2–3.
21 A. Momigliano, The Development of Greek Biography. Four Lectures (Cambridge, Mass.,
1971) 99–100.
22 Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 25; see also idem, “Towards a Chronology of Plutarch’s Works,”
jrs 55 (1966) 61–74 (63–66). [en: J.M. Mossman, “Travel Writing, History, and Biography,” in
B. McGing & J. Mossman (eds.), The Limits of Ancient Biography (Swansea: Classical Press
of Wales, 2006) 281–303.]
23 [en: A. Anagnostou-Laoutides & M.B. Charles, “Galba in the Bedroom: Sexual Allusions
in Suetonius’ Galba,” Latomus 71 (2012) 1077–1087; L. De Blois, “Soldiers and Leaders
in Plutarch’s Galba and Otho,” in A. Kriekhaus & H.M. Schellenberg (eds.), A Roman
Miscellany: Essays in Honour of A.R. Birley (Gdansk: Foundation for the Development of
Gdansk University, 2008) 5–13.]
24 Brenk, “From Rex to Rana,” 126–127. For Plutarch’s Lives of the emperors, see A. Georgiadou,
“The Lives of the Caesars and Plutarch’s Other Lives,” in Marcovich et al. (ed.), Plutarch,
349–356. She notes a great amount of synkrisis already in these Lives.
A passage from the life of Flamininus (12) on the hero’s liberation of Greece,
with reference to the later liberation by Nero, is often cited by scholars as
expressing admiration for Nero. However, it only relates that both liberations
took place at the Isthmian Games. Plutarch may, in fact, be implicitly con-
demning Nero, contrasting the more modest honors Flamininus received with
the extravagant and sacrilegious ones of Nero.25 Besides, the abolition of taxes
involved in the liberation may have meant a larger burden on Plutarch and his
wealthy friends. Among other negative aspects of Nero’s philhellenism were his
failure in Greece to visit either Athens or Eleusis, places dear to Plutarch, and
his seizure of treasure from the sanctuaries at Athens, Delphi, Olympia, Thes-
piai, and Pergamon after the great fire of 64 ad26 Such depredations to pay for
his extravagance may have occurred earlier as well. Plutarch himself was not
only a priest of the shrine at Delphi, but also its leading propagandist in his
day. According to Pausanias (10.7.1), Nero stole five hundred bronze statues of
gods and men.27
Passages from the Moralia are more damning: through flattery Nero was
degraded to the status of a stage actor, a profligate egged on by Petronius
(Quomodo adulator 56e, 60b); an irascible person who smarted at the loss
of expensive and irreplaceable objects (De cohibenda ira 462a); a tyrant who
deserved to be murdered (De garrulitate 505c). Possibly the most damning
statement is in Praecepta gerendae 810a, where Nero is described as hating and
fearing Thrasea, yet acknowledging his merits as a judge. Hinting that Nero
belonged to those “by nature evil and criminally inclined,” Plutarch records the
Emperor’s acknowledgement of Thrasea’s virtue.28
25 On this section see C.B.R. Pelling, “Synkrisis in Plutarch’s Lives,” in Brenk & I. Gallo (eds.),
Miscellanea Plutarchea, 83–96 (84–89); S. Swain, “Plutarch’s Philopoemen and Flamininus,”
in Marcovich et al. (ed.), Plutarch, 335–347. Swain notes Plutarch’s realism about Roman
liberation (343). [en: J. Raeymaekers, “The Origins of the Rivalry between Philopoemen
and Flamininus,” AncSoc 27 (1996) 259–276.]
26 For Plutarch’s interest in Athens see A.J. Podlecki, “Plutarch and Athens,” in Marcovich et
al. (ed.), Plutarch, 231–243.
27 Brenk, “From Rex to Rana,” 128–130.
28 A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius. The Scholar and his Caesars (London, 1983; New Haven
1984) 142, following B. Mouchavá, notes that Suetonius’ Nero goes from initial liberality,
clemency, and geniality (10), to luxury and lust (26–31), then avarice (32) and finally cruelty
(33–38). On his extravagance see 167–174, 179. Professor Pelling notes that in Moralia, e.g.,
Quomodo adulator, 56e, 61a–b, De fortuna Romanorum, 319e–f, Plutarch is notably more
negative in similar “one-liners” about Antony than in the more considered verdicts in the
Lives.
The shadow, or shade, of Thrasea Paetus, thus, indirectly falls over the Anto-
nios. Presumably Plutarch was first influenced by the contradictory combina-
tion of artistic philhellenism and sadistic cruelty in Nero, and only later became
interested in Antony as a rather remote biographical subject. Plutarch person-
ally knew Nero’s victim and the group keeping his memory alive under Domi-
tianus. His own troubles began as the noose drew around those faithful to the
memory of the Stoic saint. On the request of Arulenus Rusticus, a follower of
Thrasea, the younger Pliny possibly defended Plutarch’s brother, Timon, who
had been summoned to Rome.29 Later, seven persons in a group adhering to
the memory of Thrasea were executed or sent into exile. Among them was Aru-
lenus, executed in 93ad. Plutarch himself possibly fled Rome at this time to
escape the terror.30
Since he tells us little about these events, we must turn to Tacitus. Plutarch
never cites Tacitus in his works and presumably had not read him. However,
having links with the circle of Rusticus and Thrasea, he should have had access
to similar information, and presumably a similar viewpoint. In Annales 16.21–
25, the Roman historian relates the execution of the Stoic hero:
Trucidatis tot insignibus uiris, ad postremum Nero uirtutem ipsam exscin-

dere concupiuit interfecto Thrasea Paeto et Barea Sorano, ohm utriusque
infensus, et accedentibus causis in Thraseam, quod senatu egressus est, cum
de Agrippina referretur, ut memoraui …
After the slaughter of so many distinguished men, Nero finally decided to

extirpate virtue herself through the killing of Thrasea Paetus and Barea
Soranus—hostile to both from of old; and in the case of Thrasea there
were additional reasons, since he had walked out of the senate when
Agrippina’s case came up, as I have mentioned …31
16.21.1
Tacitus then explains Thrasea’s constant and fearless provocation of Nero.

Among the list of provocations are: his disinterest in the festival of the Iuvena-
lia, his singing in tragic costume at his native place, Patavium (!), his obtaining
29 C.P. Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 24–25.

30 On the Thrasea Paetus affair and Plutarch’s role among his followers, see E. Çizek, L’époque
de Néron et ses controverses idéologiques (Leiden, 1972) 64–67, 129, 181–183, 199; M.T. Griffin,
Nero. The End of a Dynasty (London, 1984) 165–166; Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 24–25.
31 Text of K. Wellesley, Cornelii Taciti Libri qui supersunt, i.2: Ab Excessu Diui Augusti Libri xi–
xvi (Leipzig, 1986).
a milder penalty for a praetor who had written lampoons on Nero, his delib-
erately absenting himself from the voting of divine honors to Poppaea, Nero’s
deceased wife, and not assisting at her funeral.32 In the charge drawn up by
Capito, Thrasea is also accused of evading the customary oath, of never offer-
ing sacrifice for the welfare of the Emperor or his “celestial voice,” of being a
continual opponent and source of faction within the Senate, of condemning
religion, and of parading himself as a champion of liberty (16.22).
The Annales continue with Thrasea subjected to humiliations or personal
suffering before his execution. He is ordered to avoid the reception for Tiridates,
who has arrived at Rome to be invested with the kingdom of Armenia. Nero’s
convening of the Senate offers an occasion for Tacitus to present two speeches
with opposing viewpoints on Thrasea’s next move. Some advise an honorable
death rather than perishing in silence like a coward; others stress the ignominy
of a Senate provoked to physical violence against him, the folly of attacking
Nero for his crimes, the cruelty Nero might exercise on Thrasea’s wife and
daughters, and hint at suicide as the best solution (16.25–26).
After a touching scene between father and daughter at the trial of a fellow
victim, Soranus (16.30–33), there follows the decree of the Senate “according
free choice of death” and the arrival of the quaestor at Thrasea’s house. Thrasea
is “nearer to joy than sorrow,” since Helvidius, his son-in-law, is only to be exiled.
Then, retiring to his bedroom with two friends, he opens his arteries (16.35.1–2):
… porrectisque utriusque brachii uenis, postquam cruorem effudit, hu-mum

super spargens, pro pius uocato quaestore, “Libamus” inquit “Ioui liberatori.
Specta, iuuenis; et omen quidem dii prohibeant, ceterum in ea tempora
natus es, quibus firmare animum expediat constantibus exemplis.” post
lenitudine exitus graues cruciatus adferente, obuersis in Demetrium …
… offered the arteries of both arms, and when the blood had begun to flow,
sprinkling it upon the ground, called the quaestor nearer: ‘We are making
a libation.’ he declared, to Jupiter the Liberator. Take a look, young man—
and may the gods indeed avert the omen—but you are living in times
when you must steel your mind with examples of firmness. Afterwards, as
the slowness of his departure from life brought excruciating pain, turning
his gaze to Demetrius …33
32 That Thrasea should have competed in singing is a surprise, and a surprising piece of
propaganda.
33 For the historical problems in these passages, see E. Koestermann, Cornelius Taci-
At this dramatic point the Mediceus cruelly breaks off leaving posterity
without thirty chapters of this book and without the whole of xvii and xviii,
including undoubtedly, the death of the villain.
The horrible brutality in the Tacitean death scenes of members of the ideo-
logical and political resistance to Nero seems light-years away from Plutarch’s
restrained comments. But his own closeness to these “subversives” in the for-
mative years of his life undoubtedly left a tremendous impression upon him,
engendering for the monster behind these executions, a reaction of contempt-
ible detestation. The impression that Plutarch has a “soft spot” in his heart
for Nero because of his benefactions to Greece derives from a passage in
De sera (567e–f). Although Plutarch appears to forgive Nero, he may have
injected a hidden double meaning. If the text is considered solely in the light
of Plato’s Republic, Nero gets off reasonably well. Nonetheless, in the Middle
Platonic period Plato’s Timaios was very popular and enjoyed immense pres-
tige. Besides, Plutarch himself wrote an important and original commentary on
this work. At the end of the Timaios (91d) Plato describes the origin of differ-
ent species through reincarnation. The utterly worthless are transformed into
marine creatures. The Timaios here apparently expresses a new eschatology,
where the individual psychic state automatically determines a place in a world
ultimately constituted by four elements.34 The nearest thing to personal inter-
vention in this impersonal scheme is at 92b where “the remoulders” construct
water creatures from the most depraved human beings. The transformation of
humans into water creatures, moreover, is the result of their utter πλημμέλεια.
Originally meaning “out of tune” in a musical sense, the word came to signify
mental instability and moral depravity.35 The phrase ὑπ’ ἐμπληξίας καὶ παραφρο-
tus. Annalen, iv: Buch 14–16 (Heidelberg, 1968) 376–388, 408–409. He sees a decrescendo:
with the exitus of Thrasea and Barea Soranus begin the processes for laesa maiestas
against lesser luminaries (377); and (16.35.1–2) sees a poetic touch in humum super spar-
gens (Horatius, Epodi, 5.25; Ovidius, Metamorphoses 1.67) (409). See also R.H. Martin,
“Structure and Interpretation in the Annals of Tacitus,” anrw ii.33.2 (1990) 1501–1581
(1569–1575), and M. Morford, “Tacitus’ Historical Methods in the Neronian Books of the
Annals,” ibidem, 1582–1627 (1598–1601).
34 So T.J. Saunders, “Penology and Eschatology in Plato’s Timaeus and Laws,” cq 23 (1973)
232–244; esp. 234–235, 238, 243–244. [en: F.E. Brenk, “O Sweet Mystery of the Lives!: The
Eschatalogical Dimension of Plutarch’s Biographies,” De Blois (ed.), The Statesman in
Plutarch’s Works, 61–73.]
35 Plutarch elsewhere uses the term in a musical sense, but Aristotle for impiety toward the
gods (De virtutibus et vitiis 1251a31). Plato (Leges 691a) employs the term to describe kings
who “by living ostentatiously in luxury ruin all.”
σύνης (“by his stupidity [or capriciousness] and madness”) used for Nero at the
end of Plutarch’s Antonios suggests a similar concept.
The mysterious voice of De sera which adjudicates a milder fate for Nero may
also belong to a satirical context:
Ἔσχατα δὲ ὁρῶντος αὐτοῦ τὰς ἐπὶ δευτέραν γένεσιν τρεπομένας ψυχὰς εἴς
τε ζῷα παντοδαπὰ καμπτομένας βίᾳ καὶ μετασχηματιζομένας ὑπὸ τῶν ταῦτα
δημιουργούντων, ὀργάνοις τισὶ καὶ πληγαῖς τὰ μὲν κολλώντων μέρη καὶ συνε-
λαυνόντων, τὰ δὲ ἀποστρεφόντων, ἔνια δ’ ἐκλεαινόντων καὶ ἀφανιζόντων παν-
τάπασιν ὅπως ἐφαρμόσειεν ἑτέροις ἤθεσι καὶ βίοις, ἐν ταύταις φανῆναι τὴν
Νέρωνος, τά τε ἄλλα κακῶς ἔχουσαν ἤδη καὶ διαπεπαρμένην ἥλοις διαπύροις.
προκεχειρισμένων δὲ καὶ ταύτῃ τῶν δημιουργῶν Νικανδρικῆς ἐχίδνης εἶδος, ἐν
ᾧ κυηθεῖσαν καὶ διαφαγοῦσαν τὴν μητέρα βιώσεσθαι, φῶς ἔφασκεν ἐξαίφνης
διαλάμψαι μέγα καὶ φωνὴν ἐκ τοῦ φωτὸς γενέσθαι προστάττουσαν εἰς ἄλλο
γένος ἡμερώτερον μεταβαλεῖν, ᾠδικόν τι μηχανησαμένους περὶ ἕλη καὶ λίμνας
ζῷον· ὧν μὲν γὰρ ἠδίκησεν δεδωκέναι δίκας, ὀφείλεσθαι δέ τι καὶ χρηστὸν αὐτῷ
παρὰ θεῶν ὅτι τῶν ὑπηκόων τὸ βέλτιστον καὶ θεοφιλέστατον γένος ἠλευθέρωσε
[τὴν Ἑλλάδα].36
Viewing the final part of his vision of the souls directed toward a sec-
ond birth—bent by force into all sorts of living creatures, and turned into
different shapes by these crafters, with blows from various tools, draw-
ing and gluing together different members, rejecting some, or rubbing
down others almost to the point of disappearance, that they might adapt
them to lives of different ethos—he saw among them the soul of Nero,
already otherwise in a sorry plight, pierced through with glowing rivets.
The craftsmen had manufactured a form for this one, that of Nikandros’
viper, in which once conceived and having eaten through its mother, it
was to live. Suddenly a great light flashed, and from the light, a voice com-
manding them to transfer the soul into a more gentle species, devising
instead a singing type, a creature of swamps and ponds. Having paid the
penalty for his injustices, he deserved something worthy from the gods,
since—among his subjects—to the race best and dearest to the gods, he
had given freedom.
36 De sera 567ef Loeb text of De Lacy & Einarson, Plutarch’s Moralia vii, 296–298, with
Morel’s conjecture, vs. W.R. Paton, M. Pohlenz, W. Sieving, & I. Wegehaupt (eds.), Plutarchi
Moralia iii (Leipzig, 1929, rpt. 1972) 443, which retains Πινδαρικῆς—all the mss. (Pindar,
ft. 276)—and the Budé edition of R. Klaerr & Y. Vernière, Plutarque. Œeuvres Morales vii.2
The mysterious divine voice recalls a famous decree from Akraiphiai in Boi-
otia, granting divine honors to Nero. Since Akraiphiai was near to Plutarch’s
native Chaironeia, he perhaps was acquainted with the document. In the
decree, probably typical of many conferred, Nero, shining upon (ἐπιλάμψας)
the Greeks as a new Helios and a Zeus Eleutherios, is extolled for his grant
of freedom (ἐλευθερία) to the Greeks.37 In Plutarch’s dialogue, a great light—
presumably identifiable with Apollon Helios—shines forth (διαλάμψαι), and in
return for the liberty granted the Greeks, the god bestows upon the ex-Neos
Helios, ex-Zeus Eleutherios, the form of a frog.
(Paris, 1974) 172, which accepts Ziegler’s conjecture Ἰνδικῆς, based on Herodotos, 3.109. This
cannot be right, since Herodotus is referring to Arabia in the passage, not India, and the
type of viper is found in several countries.
37 H. Dessau, Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae ii.2 (Berlin, 1906) 8794 (= H. Dittenberger, Syl-
loge Inscriptionum Graecarum [3rd ed., Leipzig, 1915–1924] 814): ὁ ἀρχιερεὺς τῶν Σεβαστῶν
διὰ βίου καὶ Νέρωνος Κλαυδίου Καίσαρος Σεβαστοῦ Ἐπαμεινώνδας Ἐπαμεινώνδου εἶπεν· προ-
βεβουλευμένον ἑαυτῷ εἶναι πρός τε τὴν βουλὴν καὶ τὸν δῆμον, ἐπιδὴ ὁ τοῦ παντὸς κόσμου κύριος
Νέρων, αὐτοκράτωρ μέγιστος, δημαρχικῆς ἐξουσίας τὸ τρισκαιδέκατον ἀποδεδειγμένος, πατὴρ
πατρίδος, νέος Ἥλιος ἐπιλάμψας τοῖς Ἕλλησιν, προειρημένος εὐεργετεῖν τὴν Ἑλλάδα, ἀμειβόμε-
νος δὲ καὶ εὐσεβῶν τοὺς θεοὺς ἡμῶν παριστανομένους αὐτῷ πάντοτε ἐπὶ προνοίᾳ καὶ σωτηρίᾳ τὴν
ἀπὸ παντὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος αὐθιγενῆ καὶ αὐτόχθονα ἐλευθερίαν πρότερον ἀφαιρεθεῖσαν τῶν Ἑλλήνων
εἷς καὶ μόνος τῶν ἀπ’ αἰῶνος αὐτοκράτωρ μέγιστος φιλέλλην γενόμενος [Νέρων] Ζεὺς Ἐλευ-
θέριος ἔδωκεν, ἐχαρίσατο, ἀποκατέστησεν εἰς τὴν ἀρχαιότητα τῆς αὐτονομίας καὶ ἐλευθερίας,
προσθεὶς τῇ μεγάλῃ καὶ ἀπροσδοκήτῳ δωρεᾷ καὶ ἀνεισφορίαν, ἣν οὐδεὶς τῶν πρότερον Σεβα-
στῶν ὁλοτελῆ ἔδωκεν. δι’ ἃ δὴ πάντα δεδογμένον εἶναι τοῖς τε ἄρχουσι καὶ συνέδροις καὶ τῷ δήμῳ
καθιερῶσαι μὲν κατὰ τὸ παρὸν τὸν πρὸς τῷ Διὶ τῷ Σωτῆρι βωμόν, ἐπιγράφοντας, Διὶ Ἐλευθερίῳ
[Νέρων]ι εἰς αἰῶνα, καὶ ἀγάλματα ἐν τῷ ναῷ τοῦ Ἀπόλλωνος τοῦ Πτωΐου συνκαθειδρύοντας τοῖς
[ἡμῶν] πατρίοις θεοῖς [Νέρωνος] Διὸς Ἐλευθερίου καὶ Θεᾶς Σεβαστῆς [Μεσσαλίνης], ἵνα τούτων
οὕτως τελεσθέντων καὶ ἡ ἡμετέρα πόλις φαίνηται πᾶσαν τειμὴν καὶ εὐσέβειαν ἐκπεπληρωκυῖα
εἰς τὸν τοῦ κυρίου Σεβαστοῦ [Νέρωνος οἶκον]. εἶναι δὲ ἐν ἀναγραφῇ τὸ ψήφισμα παρά τε τῷ Διὶ
τῷ Σωτῆρι ἐν τῇ ἀγορᾷ ἐν στήλῃ καὶ ἐν τῷ ἱερῷ τοῦ Ἀπόλλωνος τοῦ Πτωΐου. Translations in
D.C. Braund, Augustus to Nero: A Sourcebook on Roman History 31 bc–ad 68 (London, 1985)
102–103, and E.M. Smallwood, Documents Illustrating the Principates of Gaius, Claudius
and Nero (Cambridge, 1967) 64. Discussed by S.R.F. Price, “Gods and Emperors: The Greek
Language of the Roman Imperial Cult,” jhs 104 (1984) 79–95 (82–83 and note 37), who
also gives a translation. S.R.F. Price, Rituals and Power. The Roman Imperial Cult in Asia
Minor (Cambridge, 1984) 115–116—modifying somewhat G.W. Bowersock, “Greek Intel-
lectuals and the Imperial Cult in the Second Century ad,” in W. den Boer (ed.), Le culte
des souverains dans l’ Empire Romain. Entretiens sur l’ Antiquité Classique 19 (Vandœuvres-
Geneva, 1973) 179–206. Price argues that Plutarch was antagonistic toward the imperial
cult (116); so also, F. Millar, “Discussion,” in Den Boer, Le culte des souverains (207). D. Fish-
wick, “Votive Offerings to the Emperor?,” zpe 80 (1990) 121–130, notes, vs. Price, that the
evidence for votive offerings to a living emperor is dubious.
Some of the humor of Plutarch’s dialogue may depend upon Nero’s assimi-
lation to Apollo.38 In Nero’s triumph, that is, a musical one on returning from
Greece, he entered the Circus Maximus in a chariot used for Augustus’ tri-
umphs. Wearing a purple robe and a Greek chlamys adorned with stars of gold,
he bore on his head the Olympic crown, while holding in his right hand the
Pythian one. After passing through the place where the arch of the Circus Max-
imus had been demolished to provide room, he proceeded to the Temple of
Apollo on the Palatine. There, he placed sacred crowns on the couches of his
bedchamber and on statues representing him in the guise of a lyre player (Sue-
tonius, Nero 25). The assimilation to Apollon Citharoedus, Apollo the lyre player,
seems unmistakable. The crown of stars, on the other hand, suggests an assim-
ilation to a celestial Apollon Helios, Apollo the Sun God.39
There could be a sinister double meaning as well in Nero’s non-transforma-
tion into a viper. The viper reincarnation is rightly understood as an allusion to
Nero’s assassination of his mother, Agrippina. Overtly, the viper transformation
38 The satirical context has affinities with the Senecan Apocolocyntosis, the title of which
plays on “apotheosis.” Besides Claudius’ pretensions to divinity, his venality and cruelty are
attacked; Cf. M.T. Griffin, Seneca. A Philosopher in Politics (Oxford, 1976) 130; J.P. Sullivan,
Literature and Politics in the Age of Nero (Ithaca, 1985) 48–55. In the work (4.1) Apollo,
speaking of Nero, proclaims: … uincat mortalis tempora uitae / ille mihi similis uultu,
similisque decore / nec cantu nec uoce minor / … flagrat nitidus fulgure remisso / uultus …
Sullivan dismisses attempts to deny the work’s authenticity (48, note 62); on which also
see K. Abel, “Seneca: Leben und Leistung,” in anrw ii.32.2 (1985) 653–775 (726–728) and
K. Bringmann, “Seneca’s Apocolocyntosis: Ein Forschungsbericht 1959–1982,” ibid. 885–914.
39 On Nero as Apollo Citharoedus, see Griffin, Nero, 120–121, 149, 163, and A. Bélis, “Néron
musician,” crai (1989) 747–763. Following J. Irigoin, Bélis believes the famous qualis artifex
pereo was said in Greek, οἷος τεχνίτης … (i.e. Dionysos) (the first part of an iambic trimeter)
(764). She is enthusiastic about Cassius Dio’s observation (63.28.4–5) that Nero began
to live the monstrosities of matricide, infanticide, and the like, which previously had
only been theatrical fantasies; and she observes that his own death was a mise en scène
presented for his friends (763). B.E. Levy, “Nero’s ‘Apollonia’ Series: the Achaean Context,”
nc 149 (1989) 59–68, notes that on coins issued after the liberation of Greece representing
him as the patron of the whole of Hellas, Nero is called Neron Apollon Ktistes (59, coin
no. 85, plate 18). The games were held to honor him as a benefactor, while the coins
represent him as interested in the federal institutions of Achaia (66–68). At Aphrodisias,
he is linked with Helios (Griffin, Nero 216; J. Reynolds, “New Evidence for the Imperial
Cult in Julio-Claudian Aphrodisias,” zpe 43 [1981] 317–327 [324, no. 9, plate xii d]). In
the inscription (1st ad) he is not exactly identified with Helios, but his name, column a
(νερων κλαυδιοσ δρουσοσ καισαρ σεβαστοσ), accompanies the god’s name, column
b (ηλιοσ), with which, presumably, a relief was associated. After Nero’s fall in 68 ad the
still legible νερων was erased.
would enact a fitting punishment for Nero, since the mother viper is supposedly
destroyed by her offspring, who eat their way out of her pregnant womb.40
But Plutarch may have Plato’s Laws in mind. There (870d–e), “according to the
mysteries” vengeance is enacted in Hades, but in reincarnation also “the natural
penalty” must be paid. The matricide must return to earth as a female to be
slain by “his” own children, since “for the pollution of common blood there is
no other purification” (872c–873a).41
In the light of the Laws passage, Nero, entering the underworld, faces Dante’s
“Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate” (“Abandon all hope, you who enter
here.”) (Inferno iii.9). For all eternity he will be denied the possibility of oblit-
erating the pollution—the miasma, the “damned spot” of matricide clinging to
his soul.
3 Nero and Antonius Omestes
Antony’s entry into Ephesos (24) may be influenced by the more immediate
events of the reign of Nero, though with a difference. Antony’s arrival at the
capital of Asia is set in a Bacchic thiasos of pageantry, music, and feasting,
similar to the accounts of Nero’s own entertainments in Rome and travels
abroad, especially in Greece. The double nature of Nero as both generous
and predatory is suggested in the description of Antony as not only Dionysos
Meilichios and Charidotes (Beneficent and Giver of Joy) but also Omestes and
Agrionios (Carnivorous and Savage). Then Plutarch digresses on the dangers of
flattery, which left the hero a victim of opportunists: he could not believe that
those insulting him in jest, were actually corrupting him in earnest, removing
from flattery its insipid nature by injecting frankness, like a touch of tartar
sauce. The words recall Quomodo adulator 56e (and 60b), where Antony and
Nero are treated similarly:
… [flattery] subverted and destroyed the character of the Romans then,

extenuating Antonius’ displays of luxury, lust, and ostentation, as ‘good-
40 Nikandros 132–135; just before, the female tears the male’s head off after mating; A.S.F. Gow
& A.F. Schofield, Nicander. The Poems and Poetical Fragments (Cambridge, 1953) 36–37.
41 Pointed out by P. Cosenza, “Reati contro parenti e sangue familiare nelle Leggi di Platone,”
in F. Vattoni (ed.), Sangue e Antropologia nella liturgia. Atti della iv Settimana di Studi
(Rome, 1984) 1–17 (9–10). Professor Pelling suggests that Plutarch may have intended the
“gentler punishment” of Nero’s frog transformation to satisfy the more rigorous demands
for expiation found in the Laws passage.
hearted and philanthropic actions due to his generous treatment at the

hands of power and fortune’ … What else placed Nero on a tragic stage
and provided him with mask and high shoes? Was it not flatterers’ praise?
In the second passage (60b) frank speech and criticism are more damnable.
Its practitioners are the most unscrupulous of flatterers. Surrendering to such
flattery is considered Heraklean and Dionysian, since Herakles enjoyed the
company of the Kerkopes, and Dionysos the Silenoi. Even more serious is
flattery that encourages a person’s vicious tendencies; so Petronius egged on
Nero’s profligacy by accusing him of being niggardly and cheap.
Nothing in the life of Antonios suggests that the hero was guilty of Nero’s
excesses in receiving divine honors. In fact, though, Nero, compared with other
emperors, was not excessive in this regard.42 Still the attack on divine honors
in Demetrios may reflect some vague association in Plutarch’s mind between
Demetrios, Antony, and Nero.43 Indeed, many of Plutarch’s harshest attacks on
ruler cult appear in Demetrios. Ultimately they are based on hostile sources.44
Still, their inclusion may reflect personal antagonism toward excesses of the
Neronian period. One of the Julio-Claudians most notorious in this respect was
42 According to Griffin, Nero, 215–220, Nero introduced no important innovations, in the

beginning refused gold and silver statues of himself in Rome, and rejected excessive
honors in Egypt (Tacitus, Annales, 13.10), and as late as 65 ad refused a temple to Divus Nero
in Rome (Tacitus, Annales 13.10; Suetonius, Augustus, 52; Cassius Dio 51.20.8). The famous
gilded statue, near the later Colosseum, apparently was a portrait statue, not of Nero-Sol-
Helios (Suetonius, Nero, 31; Pliny, nh 34.45; Suetonius, Vespasianus, 8; Cassius Dio 66.15.1).
On some late coins Nero appears with a radiate crown, and he was called Neos Helios
in some Greek inscriptions: F. Leroux, Inscriptiones Graecae ad Res Romanas pertinentes
(Paris, 1906–1927) iii.345 (= Smallwood, no. 146), Sagalassos in Pamphylia; A.G. Woodhead
et al., seg xviii (1962) 566: Prostanna; H. Dessau, ils 8794: Boiotia (Griffin, Nero, 216,
218). The radiate crown was worn by Gaius as part of his Apollo costume. But until Nero
the crown had been associated with Sol and had only adorned one deified Princeps
(Augustus). Only two gold and silver coin types—minted at Rome—however, show him
with the radiate crown, both dated to 65 ad. See C.H.V. Sutherland & R.A.G. Carson (eds.),
The Roman Imperial Coinage i (2nd ed., London, 1984) nos. 44, 46 (Griffin, Nero, 217–218).
See also S. Weinstock, Divus Julius (Oxford, 1971) 381–384.
43 A. Dihle, Die Entstehung der historischen Biographie (Heidelberg, 1987) 56, notes that
Hellenistic rulers in their epoch had entered a sacral, superhuman sphere, which later
readers would naturally reinterpret in the light of the Imperial cult.
44 On the windfall brought Plutarch because of the tendentious nature of his sources, see
T.W. Hillard, “Plutarch’s Late-Republican Lives: Between the Lines,” Antichthon 21 (1987)
19–48 (47).
Gaius, who even if the conjecture “madly” (ruling) is not correct, seems roundly
condemned at the termination of the Antonios.
Demetrios 10 contains Plutarch’s condemnation of the extravagant honors
awarded Demetrios and Antigonos.45 These awards supposedly are deliber-
ately exaggerated by the Athenians to make the rulers more odious. Antigonos
and his son are called Savior Gods (Soteres), and a priesthood is established
for them, with the year dated by their rule. Their figures are woven into the
sacred peplos of Athena for the Panathenaic festival, an altar is erected where
Demetrios first alighted from his chariot, and two demes (phylai) are named in
their honor.46 In 12, Demetrios is condemned for changing the month Mouny-
chion to Demetrion, and the Dionysia to the Demetria. Apparently as a sign of
divine condemnation—derived from a hostile source—the peplos with their
figures embroidered into it was rent by a hurricane, the soil teemed with hem-
lock around the altars of the Soteres, and it was frosty at the Dionysia. Worst
of all—according to the parallel biographer—the Athenians were to obtain
an oracle from Demetrios to determine the dedication of the sacred shields
at Delphi. Not unpredictably, the man who proposed these honors later went
mad.47
45 The whole matter is treated in great detail by K. Scott, “The Deification of Demetrios
Poliorcetes,” AJPh 49 (1928) 137–166, 217–239; and by I. Kertész, “Bemerkungen zum Kult
des Demetrius Poliorketes,” Oikumene 2 (1978) 163–175. Kertész notes that Athena Proma-
chos appeared on Demetrios’ coins, that Athena Alkis was a protective divinity of the
Macedonian royal house, and that many of Demetrios’ soldiers were Athenians (166–
167). The hostile propaganda obscures the positive effects of Demetrios’ overtures toward
Athens.
46 See Andrei & Scuderi, Demetrio, 142–155, on these matters. They note (145, note 70) that
the epigraphic documentation—vs. Plutarch—mentions Antigonos and Demetrios not
as Θεοὶ Σωτῆρες but rather only as Σωτῆρες, citing L. Moretti, Iscrizioni storiche ellenis-
tiche (Florence, 1967–1975) i.5, lines 16–21. [en: A.V. Zadorojnyi, “Sappho and Plato in
Plutarch, Demetrius 38,” in A. Pérez Jiménez (ed.), Plutarco, Platón y Aristóteles (Madrid,
1999) 515–532; M. Monaco, “Folly and dark humor in the Life of Demetrius,” Ploutarchos 9
(2011–2012) 49–59; idem, “The bema and the Stage: Stratocles and Philippides in Plutarch’s
Demetrius,” ics 38 (2013) 113–126; G.W.M. Harrison, “Plutarch the Dramaturg [Sic]: State-
craft as Stagecraft in the Lives,” De Blois et al. (ed.), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works,
53–59.]
47 See Andrei & Scuderi, Demetrio, 149–153, for slight errors in Plutarch’s account here. De
fortuna Alexandros 338a also mentions the incident of the sacred embassy (theoria) to
Demetrios. E. Capellano, Il fattore politico negli onori divini a Demetrio Poliorcete (Turin,
1954) 33–35, notes that Demetrios’ coinage flourishes at this time. She suspects a link
between Bacchos, Iacchos, and Eleusis, as important for Demetrios, but notes that ref-
In chapter 30 Plutarch again attacks Demetrios for receiving divine honors.

After the defeat at Ipsos (301 bc), he flees to Ephesos, where Plutarch seems
surprised that Demetrios not only refrained from plundering the temple trea-
sury, but hastening on prevented the troops from doing so. Then, as Demetrios
sails near the Kyklades, an Athenian embassy arrives beseeching him not to
approach the city. At this point Plutarch attacks the hypocrisy involved in
bestowing divine honors, claiming that if granted through fear, they have no
real value. Rather, in his view, men should first judge their own achievements
and then decide on the value of receiving divine honors (ἀποθεώσεις, 7)—
whether they are genuinely offered, or only granted through compulsion, since
frequently a city despises the very ones upon whom it lavishes honors.
In 25 Demetrios’ journeys to the Peloponnesos, where he presides over the
games at Argos, changes the name of Sikyon to Demetrias, and at the Isthmus of
Corinth calls a general assembly at which he is proclaimed “Leader” (Ἡγεμών,
4) of the Greeks. Plutarch condemns him even for taking the title, king, and
refusing it to others, while Alexander refused the title “King of Kings,” and called
others “king.”
In chapter 8, Demetrios proclaims the liberation of the Greeks, foreshad-
owing Flaminius, and, naturally, Nero.48 Here Plutarch, naively ignorant of the
politics of Hellenistic monarchs, could have been slavishly following a pro-
Demetrian source, or possibly he simply wished to offer a dubious but good
model for contemporary and future Roman emperors. However, elsewhere he
comments on the ambiguous nature of philotimia, which can produce results
either splendid or catastrophic. The passion for glory (philotimia) won by the
liberation of Halikarnassos supposedly inspires Antigonos and Demetrios with
a “wonderful eagerness” to liberate Greece, reduced to subjection by Kassan-
dros and Ptolemaios:
erences to Hellenistic monarchs venerated as Dionysos at Athens are late and in Roman
authors. In contrast, Demetrios clearly assimilated himself to Poseidon and Helios (33–
37). On the “ingratitude” of the Athenians, see C. Habicht, Gottmenschentum und griechis-
che Städte (Munich, 1956) 187–189, who notes that Kataibates (alighting) suggests an
assimilation to Zeus (50).
48 Flamininus 10–12, De sera 567ef; see Flacelière & Chambry, Plutarque. Vies xiii, 3; cf.
Pelling, “Synkrisis,” 84–88. Professor Pelling sees the possibility of inner contradiction:
excessive honors (timai) corrupt the “love of honor” (philotimia). [en: R. Feig Vishnia, “A
Case of ‘Bad Press’?: Gaius Flaminius in Ancient Historiography,” zpe 181 (2012) 27–45.]
… τούτου πόλεμον οὐδεὶς ἐπολέμησε τῶν βασιλέων καλλίω καὶ δικαιότερον· ἃς

γὰρ ἅμα τοὺς βαρβάρους ταπεινοῦντες εὐπορίας συνήγαγον, εἰς τοὺς Ἕλληνας
ὑπὲρ εὐδοξίας καὶ τιμῆς ἀνήλισκον.
No Hellenistic king ever waged a more just war. The treasures amassed
by subduing barbarians were now lavishly spent upon the Greeks to win
repute and honor.
8.2–3
But like Flamininus and Nero, Demetrios allows his good intentions to be
spoiled by the divine honors he expropriates to himself. Here Plutarch hides
behind the satirical verses of Philippides, in which the bestowing of divine
honors upon men, such as the impious ones for Demetrios and Antigonos, is
responsible for the frost and the fierce wind which rent the Panathenaic robe
(12.7).49
Another link with Nero’s career is Demetrios’ desire to be initiated into the
mysteries. Nero, however, apparently did not visit Eleusis. The hostile tradi-
tion reported in Suetonius (Nero 34) attributes his absence to the murder of
Agrippina, which rendered him unworthy.50 According to Plutarch (26), as
Demetrios was getting ready to return to Athens, he wrote letters in advance
indicating his desire to be initiated into all the grades at Eleusis. This was not
lawful; and, besides, according to Plutarch, the lesser rites were performed in
the month Anthesterion, the great rites in Boëdromion, and the final rites,
the Epoptika celebrated a year after the Greater Mysteries. On the motion of
Stratokles, then, the current month Mounychion is changed into Anthesterion,
and the lesser rites at Agra are performed for Demetrios, after which Mouny-
chion became Boëdromion instead of Anthesterion. Demetrios thus receives
the remaining rites and is admitted to the highest grade, epoptos.51
49 See Andrei & Scuderi, Demetrio, 152–153, for the epigraphic documentation.
50 Cf. K. Clinton, “The Eleusinian Mysteries: Roman Initiates and Benefactors, Second Cen-
tury bc to ad 267,” anrw ii.18.2 (1989) 1499–1539 (1514). K.R. Bradley, Suetonius’ Life of Nero
(Brussels, 1978) 206, notes that supposedly for the same reason, Nero did not visit Athens or
Sparta (Cassius Dio 63.14.3), though the sites have produced representations of him there,
citing C.C. Vermeule, Roman Imperial Art in Greece and Asia Minor (Cambridge, Mass.,
1968) 209–211.
51 See Andrei & Scuderi, Demetrio, 186–188. Philochoros (F. Jacoby, Die Fragmente der grie-
chischen Historiker i [Berlin / Leiden, 1923] 328, f 69–70), criticized the procedure as
sacrilege; but Diodoros (20.110.1) defended it because of Demetrios’ benefactions.
In chapter 45 Plutarch continues his mockery of Demetrios’ pretensions.

Demetrios, having fallen from power, flees to Kassandreia. His wife, Phila,
unable to bear his disgrace, drinks poison and dies.52 He then visits Athens
in private dress, where a wit applies to him the verses of Euripides—hinting
perhaps at Dionysian pretensions:
μορφὴν ἀμείψας ἐκ θεοῦ βροτησίαν

πάρεστι Δίρκης νάματ’ Ἰσμηνοῦ θ’ ὕδωρ·
The form exchanging from god to mortal,

Visits Dirke’s streams and Ismenos’ water.
Bacchai 4–5, with adaptation by plutarch53
Nero’s own interference in religious ritual, though, was of a milder type. Besides
introducing the Neronia at Rome, in Greece he tampered with the traditional
competitions at the religious festivals. All, even those widely separated in time,
were condensed into a single year, so he could compete in each; and, contrary
to custom, he introduced a musical contest at Olympia. He also removed the
statues and busts of former victors (Suetonius, Nero 23–24).54
Apparently Nero’s benefactions to Greece, real or promised, never overrode
Plutarch’s detestation for the emperor. For Plutarch he remains, as a paradigm
of the worst excesses of the human spirit, a tyrant who deserved to be assas-
52 For the historical reality, see the very thorough discussion of G. Marasco, “Introduzione
alla biografia plutarchea di Demetrio,” Sileno 7 (1981) 35–70 and Sileno 9 (1983) 35–54, who
regards Plutarch in general as credible, but influenced by distorted sources ([1981] 46–49;
[1983] 48, 50–52). At stake are the decree of Stratokles, the liberation of Greece, the priest
of the Soteres replacing the eponymous archon, the change of the months, the Demetria,
soap for Lamia, and the initiation at Eleusis.
53 μορφὴν δ’ ἀμείψας ἐκ θεοῦ βροτησίαν / πάρειμι Δίρκης νάματ’ Ἰσμηνοῦ θ’ ὕδωρ. E.C. Kopff,
Euripides. Bacchae (Leipzig, 1982) 3, seems to misunderstand Plutarch’s change. Ziegler
unnecessarily makes Plutarch’s text deviate (νάμαθ’ Ἱσμηνοῦ) from that of Euripides. P. Car-
rara, “Plutarco ed Euripide: Alcune considerazioni sulle citazioni euripidee in Plutarco
(De aud. poet.),” in Marcovich et al. (ed.), Plutarch, 447–455, attributes such citations to
Plutarch’s schoolboy memorization (450). Conveniently, he cites from the beginning of
the play.
54 See Griffin, Nero, 210–211; Brenk, “From Rex to Rana,” 129–130. Nero made a grant of 400,000
sesterces to Delphi, but after the fire in Rome (64ad) confiscated temple treasure there
and elsewhere, expropriated temple lands, and despoiled the shrine of 500 bronze statues
(Pausanias 10.7.1; cf. 10.19.2). As a priest at Delphoi, Plutarch should have been sensitive
about these depredations.
sinated.55 Plutarch’s expansive style and customary generosity toward his sub-
jects, however, conceals his repulsion. He seems to paint, in the luminous colors
of a fresco, atrocities whose horror deserves the chiaroscuric tones of Tacitus’
Annales.
4 Vice Inherited: The Rotten Tree
The Nerogonia, which terminates the Antonios, hints at the theory of inherited
vice, but strictly speaking does not directly attribute the vice of the ultimate
descendant to the ancestor and hero of the Life. Still, what use are genealo-
gies unless they presume the transmission of genes of greatness—heroism,
grandeur, and at least the possibility of great achievement—or depravity? Pin-
dar underscores such aspects again and again. Among the Roman Scipiones,
the untimely death of a young scion is doubly tragic, since ancestry would have
guaranteed great accomplishments.
Inherited virtue or vice is fundamental to some of Plutarch’s moral theology,
at least in the sense of inherited propensities.56 By introducing different speak-
ers and opinions, he sometimes distances himself from a particular solution. In
De sera, though, as a priest of the Delphic Apollon, he is the principal speaker.
The logic and justice of inherited punishment is based on the solidarity of city
or family.57 Members of a “bad or wicked line” should be punished (ἐκ κακῶν
γεγονότες ἢ πονηρῶν, 558b), since descendants, of a worthy ancestor are hon-
ored (558b). A city, like a living organism, should be treated as an entity (559a).
Even more should a family be treated so, “deriving … from a single origin which
reproduces in the members a certain force and mutual characteristic pervading
them all” … (559c). Such moral generalizations are illustrated with the example
of a forewarned physician treating a son for a malady which caused his father’s
death (561d). No one expects scorpions not to have stings nor snakes venom; so
is there nothing extraordinary in vice being inherited (562cd). Finally not all:
τὰ τῶν τεκόντων σφάλματ’ εἰς τοὺς ἐγγόνους … “the parents’ transgressions onto
the offspring [the gods turn …]” (556e). Sometimes “out of a scoundrel is born
55 De garrulitate 505c, Galbas 1; see Jones, Plutarch and Rome, 19.

56 See, for example, F.E. Brenk, In Mist Apparelled, 26, 160, 256–275, 269; idem, “The Reli-
gious Spirit of Plutarch of Chaironeia,” this volume, above pages 5–129, esp. 64–65, 110–
113.
57 [en: M. Briones Artacho, “Vida de Aristides: aproximaciones a la idea de justicia,” in Pérez
Jiménez & Casadesús Bordoy (eds.), Misticismo y religiones mistéricas en Plutarco, 337–
344.]
a worthy man,” “adopted out of vice” supposedly, but, if not, he deserves to pay
the debts of an inherited estate (562f).58
Perhaps the discussion about inherited vice in a vague way reflects the
importance of dynastic descent in the Julio-Claudian line and the shock caused
by the extermination of the line.59 Though evidently written after 81 ad, the
dramatic date is eleven years after Nero’s fall; for the Sibyl forecasts the eruption
of Vesuvius (August 24th–26th, 79ad) (566e). A further reference to the gentle
death of a good emperor would put the dramatic date between the 24th of
June and the 24th–26th of August, 79ad60 In the period between Nero’s death
and writing the dialogue, Plutarch had ample time to mull over the dynastic
weakness in the Julio-Claudian line. The stress placed upon inherited vice in
the dialogue, and the prominence of Nero within the eschatological scene
suggests an association between the two. The strong hint of inherited vice
coursing through the Julio-Claudian veins in spite of worthy specimens links
the Antonios with the theological context of De sera.
But what vice did Antony transmit to Nero? Taking a hint from Einstein’s the-
ory of relativity, we should play the Antonios backwards from Nero to Antony,
or more exactly, from Plutarch’s experience of the Neronian period back to his
research on Antony. What passages in the Life seem influenced by his experi-
ences of the Neronian period and his reading of Neronian historians? Plutarch
was somewhat constrained by using Antony’s assimilation to Dionysos as a
58 A. Nauck, Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta (2nd ed.; Leipzig, 1889; rpt. with Supple-
mentum, B. Snell, Hildesheim, 1964) Euripides, fr. 980, identified at 556e as Euripidean.
“Adopted out of vice” (562) is a conjecture: οἷον ἐκποίητος (Victorius according to De Lacy
& Einarson, Plutarch’s Moralia vii, 266; Bachet de Méziriac according to Paton et al.,
Plutarchi Moralia iii, 431), for the mss. ἐκ ποιότητος.
59 [en: J.H. Lane, The Political Life and Virtue: A Reconsideration of Plutarch’s Parallel Lives
(Diss., Boston College, 1998); E. Alexiou, “Parallelität und die moralischen Ziele Plutarchs:
Coriolanus und Alkibiades,” Hermes 127 (1999) 61–74; D.H.J. Larmour, “Statesman and Self
in the Parallel Lives,” in De Blois et al. (eds.), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works, 43–51;
T.E. Duff, Plutarch’s Lives: Exploring Virtue and Vice (Oxford: Clarendon Pr, 1999); idem,
“Plutarch’s Readers and the Moralism of the Lives,” Ploutarchos 5 (2008) 3–18; see also the
volume edited by Ribeiro Ferreira, Van der Stockt, & Fialho (eds.), Philosophy in Society
with the following papers: F. Becchi, “Virtù e fortuna nelle Vitae e nei Moralia di Plutarco,”
39–52; P. Carrara, “I poeti tragici maestri di virtù nelle opere di Plutarco,” 65–74; M. do
C. Fialho, “From Flower to Chameleon: Values and Counter-Values in Alcibiades’Life,” 108–
116; R. Giannattasio Andria, “La philia tra Moralia e Vitae,” 137–153; L. van Hoof, “Plutarch
on (un)sociable Talk: Ethics and Etiquette?,” 209–232; P. Volpe Cacciatore, “Il concetto di
δικαιοσύνη negli Opuscoli contro gli Stoici,” 233–242.]
60 See De Lacy & Einarson, Plutarch’s Moralia vii, 173–174.
guiding thread in the Life. Nero was more the incarnation of Apollon, Helios,
or Zeus, than Dionysos. Still his famous tragic performances belong to the inti-
mate domain of Dionysos. Like Dionysos, Nero was basically non-military, artis-
tic, and, moreover, well-educated, and, arguably, refined, compared with the
rather rough-and-tough Antony, a soldier, whose Dionysian activities were to
be portrayed as more oinological than thespian. The more refined, or degen-
erate, Dionysian traits suit Nero better than Antony. Nonetheless, oscillations
between military hardship and real or imagined submission to effete luxury
allowed the Dionysos assimilation to be used for Antony. Undoubtedly, vicious
propaganda and the mythological archetype of an Ares-Mars seduced by an
Aphrodite-Venus, now realized in Antony and Kleopatra, helped fix the anal-
ogy in the popular mind.
Antony’s assimilation to Nero is suggested in the emphasis on extravagance,
drinking, and womanizing in Antonios. The triumvir’s grandfather, Antony
Creticus, the orator, is kindly, honest, and generous (1).61 Antony’s extrava-
gance and generosity, however, are sometimes tinged with cruelty. In chap-
ter 2 Plutarch notes a lack of restraint in drinking bouts, sexual pleasure, and
extravagant expenditures (εἰς πότους καὶ γύναια καὶ δαπάνας πολυτελεῖς, 2.4).
These traits are combined with demagoguery, the Asiatic style in oratory, and a
“swashbuckling and boastful life, full of empty exultation and distorted ambi-
tion.” There is method in his madness, however, since his excesses make him
popular among the troops (4). Nero’s political base depended on something
similar (for example, Suetonius, Nero, 10–13).62 Chapter 9 continues this type of
61 Pelling, Life of Antony, 117, notes that unlike Plutarch, who seems to be using a tech-
nique of linking father to son, other sources depict M. Antonius Creticus as avaricious
(Sallustius, Historiae 3.3; Cicero, Verres 2.3.213–217). As S. Swain, “Character Change in
Plutarch,” Phoenix 43 (1989) 61–68, analyzes Plutarch’s thought, heredity is extremely
important, but one cannot predict entirely from heredity how a person’s character will
develop; “environment”—change of birth, background, circumstances, luck—can either
altogether cancel the inherited trait, or make it difficult to recognize for a long time
(e. g., De sera 559bc, 562b). [en: D.R. Shipley, A Commentary on Plutarch’s Life of Age-
silaos: Response to Sources in the Presentation of Character (Oxford / New York: Oxford
University Pr, 1997); E. Almagor, “Hold your Horses: Characterization through Animals in
Plutarch’s Artaxerxes 1,” Ploutarchos 7 (2009–2010) 3–21; idem, “Hold your Horses: Char-
acterization through Animals in Plutarch’s Artaxerxes 2,” Ploutarchos 11 (2014) 3–18; on
which C. Von Binder, Plutarchs Vita des Artaxerxes: ein historischer Kommentar (Berlin,
2008); J.M. Mossman, “A Life Unparalleled: Artaxerxes,” in Humble (ed.), Plutarch’s Lives,
145–168.]
62 However, Nero was not the military man that Antony was. Griffin, Nero, 221–234, outlines
Nero’s need for military accomplishments and his designs in this respect before his death.
characterization: drinking, heavy expenditures, debauches with women, sleep-

ing by day and revelling by night, followed by the customary after-effects, even
to vomiting in his toga while conducting public business, and time wasted at
entertainments and the parties of mime actors and jesters. An actress, Cytheris,
becomes his constant companion, travelling around with him in a litter to vari-
ous cities.63 In his excursions golden beakers are borne before him, as though in
a sacred procession, while tents are erected and costly repasts served in groves
and beside rivers. Chariots drawn by lions become his means of transportation
and honest men’s houses are requisitioned for entertainments performed by
sambuca players and the dregs of society.64
In 23, though, we find a somewhat reformed hero, with some distinctively
Neronian traits. He now listens to literary discussions, becomes a spectator not
only at games but at religious rites as well, and is prudent in his judicial deci-
sions. One might recall Nero’s literary interests, his participation as a spectator
in the games, some of his religious activities, and at least in his early career,
in judicial procedures. Moreover, like Nero later, Antony is described as a phil-
hellene, more precisely, a philathenian, and he plans to rebuild the temple of
Apollon Pythios at Delphi.65
But the philhellenic excesses of this Nero rediuiuus are condemned immedi-
ately after. At his famous entry into Asia and Ephesos, the positive aspects give
way to dissolution, womanizing, and association with low characters. Despoil-
63 Stage name of the freedwoman, Volumnia, and in a late, and dubious, tradition associated
with Lycoris for whom Gallus wrote his elegies (Pelling, Life of Antony, 139). For this
interesting woman (and period), see Nisbet’s account, in R.D. Anderson, P.J. Parsons, &
R.G.M. Nisbet, “Elegiacs by Gallus from Qaṣr Ibrîm,” jrs 69 (1979) 125–155 (151–155).
64 Pelling, Life of Antony, 139, notes that in 43–42 bc, Antony’s coin types represent lions,
citing M.H. Crawford, Roman Republican Coinage (Cambridge, 1974) 489.5–6 and 533.1;
comment, ii, 740, note 1. Plutarch possibly chose the lion chariot image to enhance the
later associations with Dionysos, as in the entry to Ephesos (24). For the iconography
see C. Gasparri, “Dionysos/Bacchus,” in L. Kahil et al. (eds.), Lexicon Iconographicum
Mythologiae Classicae iii.1 and iii.2 (Zurich / Munich, 1986) iii.1, 540–566, iii.2, 428–
456; iii.1, 551, 558; iii.2 fig. 245 = 133 = 142 (Baltimore, Walters Art Gallery 23.31, Tomb of
Pisones); Cf. R. Turcan, Les sarcophages romains à représentations dionysiaques. Essai de
chronologie et d’histoire religieuse (Paris, 1966) 224–225. The Indian triumph is represented
with animals which look like female lions, or lion-like panthers (“tigri”—Gasparri), pulling
the chariot of Dionysos.
65 Griffin, Nero, 44–45. Plutarch simply writes “the temple of Apollon Pythios.” Flacelière and
Chambry, Plutarque. Vies xiii, 216, and Griffin, understand a temple at Athens, while Jones,
“Towards a Chronology,” 65, suggests Megara as a possibility; but Pelling, Life of Antony, 176,
argues convincingly that Delphoi is meant; Cf. Andrei & Scuderi Demetrio, 60–61.
ing many persons of their property, he becomes Dionysos Giver of Joy and
Beneficent (Charidotes and Meilichios) to some, but to most, Carnivorous and
Savage (Omestes and Agrionios) (24.5).66 In 27 in Kilikia, Antony tries to sur-
pass Kleopatra in the splendor and elegance of his banquets. At Alexandria he
becomes famous for extravagant dinners, squandering time in an association
called the “Inimitable Livers” (Ἀμιμητόβιοι), with “expenditures of unbelievable
profusion” (28.2–3). Nero’s dinners as depicted in Suetonius’ Life, and Trimal-
chio’s grotesque imitation in the pages of Petronius’ Satyrica come to mind.
Chapter 53 digresses on Antony’s marital problems, torn between wife and mis-
tress, a matter which occupied the biographers of Nero. Antony’s disrespect-
ful treatment of Octavia, because of his infatuation with Kleopatra, reflects
Octavia’s treatment by Nero, who preferred Poppaea, although she was already
married to Otho. Antony’s benefactions to the technitai of Dionysos at Priene,
and his enjoyment of athletics and the theater at Athens also forge a link with
Nero’s philhellenism (57).67
66 Appianus, Bell. Civ. 5.4.15, only records a sacrifice to the Ephesian Artemis; possibly Plu-
tarch was anticipating the Dionysiac identification (Andrei & Scuderi, Demetrio, 62). On
the contradictory aspects of Zeus Meilichios and of Dionysos, see R. Parker, “Festivals of
the Attic Demes,” in T. Linders & G. Nordquist (eds.), Gifts to the Gods. Uppsala Studies
in Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Civilizations 15 (Uppsala, 1987) 137–147 (140);
M. Jameson, “Notes on the Sacrificial Calendar from Erchia,” bch 89 (1965) 154–172 (159–
166); B. Einarson & P.H. De Lacy, Plutarch’s Moralia. xiv (London, 1967) 120–121; C. Segal,
Dionysiac Poetics and Euripides’ Bacchae (Princeton, 1982) 183–184; M. Detienne, Dionysos
en ses parousies: un dieu épidémique, in L’association dionysiaque dans les sociétés anci-
ennes (Paris / Rome, 1986) 53–83 (74); E. Valgiglio, Divinità e religione in Plutarco (Genoa,
1988) (26, 177); Forni, La fortuna dei Romani, 120, note 89. Plutarch generally uses μειλί-
χιος only in a positive way, but in De superstitione 166de and Theseus 12 there is a hint
of the dread aspects of Zeus Meilichios. In Quaest. conv. (613d) the Nymphs introduce
Dionysos “as kind and gentle to our bodies;” the Muses present him “as Meilichios and
Charidotes to our souls.” Besides Theseus 12 and the Antonios passage in the Lives, the
term appears in De superstitione 166de, Quaest. Rom. 281e, De fortuna Rom. 322f; De Iside
370cd; De defectu 417c; Quaest. conv. 613d; 692e; De esu carn. 994a; and Non posse 1102e—
for a number of gods, but most frequently for Dionysos. S. Swain, “Cultural Interchange
in Plutarch’s Antony,” quuc 34 (1990) 151–157, notes that elsewhere in Plutarch Dionysos
Omestes is always associated with human sacrifice (citing Themist. 13.3; Arist. 9.2; Quaest.
Graec. 299f); and that Plutarch pits neither Antony’s philhellenism nor Greek luxury,
against Roman mores, but rather contrasts Kleopatra’s Alexandrianism with the expected
mores of a Roman general (154). See also S. Swain, “Plutarch’s Lives of Cicero, Cato, and
Brutus,” Hermes 118 (1990) 192–203, and idem, “Hellenic Culture and the Roman Heroes of
Plutarch,” jhs 110 (1990) 126–145, esp. 126–131.
67 F. Chamoux, Marc Antoine dernier prince de l’ Orient grec (Paris, 1986) 27, observes that
A further link is suicide. Nero was the first and last of the Julio-Claudians
to dispose of himself, and like Antony, under some compulsion. Still, Antony’s
suicide is not as solitary as Nero’s but closely intertwined with the fate of
Kleopatra. Like Nero in Suetonius’ Life, Antony suffers military defeat and
the desertion of his friends. Like Nero, too, he witnesses his enemies, Roman
generals, tightening the noose around him. Cruelty also links the hero to Nero.
This feature appears primarily in the proscriptions, where Antony is painted
with particularly somber colors.68 In Tacitean style, Plutarch castigates this
bartering in blood relatives, as the triumvirs whet their appetite for vengeance:
οὐδὲν ὠμότερον οὐδ’ ἀγριώτερον τῆς διαμείψεως ταύτης δοκῶ γενέσθαι· φόνων
γὰρ ἀντικαταλλασσόμενοι φόνους, ὁμοίως μὲν οἷς ἐλάμβανον ἀνῄρουν οὓς ἐδί-
δοσαν, ἀδικώτεροι δὲ περὶ τοὺς φίλους ἦσαν οὓς ἀπεκτίννυσαν μηδὲ μισοῦντες.
Nothing could be more savage or beastly than this exchange, in my opin-

ion. For murders bartering murders, just as they killed those they took for
themselves, so also those they surrendered. More unjust were they toward
their friends, whom they slaughtered without even hating.
19.4
The statement is harsher than its parallel in the Life of Cicero:
οὕτως ἐξέπεσον ὑπὸ θυμοῦ καὶ λύσσης τῶν ἀνθρωπίνων λογισμῶν, μᾶλλον δ’
ἀπέδειξαν ὡς οὐδὲν ἀνθρώπου θηρίον ἐστὶν ἀγριώτερον ἐξουσίαν πάθει προσ-
λαβόντος.
Plutarch is the only source to mention Antony’s early stay in Greece. In his “Vues nou-
velles sur Marc Antoine,” Échos du Monde Classique 30 (1986) 231–243, he notes Antony’s
fascination with the East long before meeting Kleopatra at Tarsos. In 58 bc, at the age of
twenty-five, he studied in Athens, and after his defeat wanted to retire there as a private
citizen (Antonios 72). He was gymnasiarch at both Athens and Alexandria, and a patron
of the arts and theatre (237–238). Pelling, Life of Antony, 175, sees the Life contrasting his
affection for Greece earlier (Antonios 23, 33) with the sufferings he brought upon it later
(62–68). A.E. Raubitschek, “Phaidros and his Roman Pupils,” Hesperia 18 (1949) 96–103,
considers that in spite of Cicero’s condemnation, Antony’s appointment in 51 bc of Lysi-
ades, son of the Epicurean philosopher Phaidros, to the Areopagos was an excellent one
(102–103). On Antony’s life in general, besides Chamoux, Marc Antoine, see A. Roberts,
Mark Antony. His Life and Times (Upton-upon-Severn, 1988).
68 For the much treated scene see the extensive bibliography in Andrei & Scuderi, Demetrio,
56.
So far under the influence of emotion and rage did they deviate from
rational humanity. Or rather, they demonstrated that no wild animal is
more savage than a human being whose passion is backed by power.
46.6
Cicero’s execution had already been related in his Life. Nonetheless, in the
Antonios, Plutarch repeats the scene. Cicero is now described more vividly as
“butchered” (Κικέρωνος δὲ σφαγέντος, 20.3), and there follows the account of
the amputation of the head and right hand, and Antony’s reaction, again in the
Tacitean manner:
καὶ κομισθέντων ἐθεᾶτο γεγηθὼς καὶ ἀνακαγχάζων ὑπὸ χαρᾶς πολλάκις· εἶτ’
ἐμπλησθεὶς ἐκέλευσεν ὑπὲρ τοῦ βήματος ἐν ἀγορᾷ τεθῆναι, καθάπερ εἰς τὸν
νεκρὸν ὑβρίζων, οὐχ αὑτὸν ἐνυβρίζοντα τῇ τύχῃ καὶ καταισχύνοντα τὴν ἐξου-
σίαν ἐπιδεικνύμενος.
When they were delivered, he gazed upon them exultantly, laughing

loudly for joy many times over. Then, having taken his satisfaction, he
ordered them to be displayed above the rostra in the forum, as though
he were insulting the dead, and not rather making a show of insulting
behavior toward his good fortune and displaying his abuse of power.69
Here one might recall the death of Octavia in Tacitus:
Ac puella uicesimo aetatis anno inter centuriones et milites, praesagio malo

rum iam uitae exempta, nondum tamen morte adquiescebat. paucis dehinc
interiectis diebus mor iubetur, cum jam uiduam se et tantum soro rem
testaretur communes que Germanicos et postremo Agnippinae nomen
cieret, qua incolumi infelix quidem matrimonium, sed sine exitio pertulisset,
restringitur uinclis uenaeque eius per omnes artus exsoluuntur; et quia pres-
sus pauore San guis tardius labebatur, praeferuidi balnei uapore ft enecatur.
69 Pelling, Life of Antony, 167, who notes that in Cicero 48.6 both of Cicero’s hands are cut
off, suggests that the Antonios passage has Pollio as its source. D. Magnino, Plutarchi
Vita Ciceronis (Florence, 1963) 171–173. See also J.L. Moles, The Life of Cicero (Warminster,
Wiltshire, 1988) 200–201. K. Scott, “The Political Propaganda of 44–30 bc,” Memoirs of
the American Academy in Rome 11 (1933) 7–50, notes that Suetonius, Augustus 13.1–2—
undoubtedly Antonian propaganda—has Octavius sending Brutus’ head to Rome to be
thrown at the foot of Caesar’s statue (22), while the Octavian propaganda laid the horrors
of the proscriptions on Antony, only ending when he became sated (19).
additurque atrocior saeuitia, quod caput amputatum latumque in Vrbem

Poppaea uidit. dona ob haec templis decreta quem ad finem memorabimus?
And this girl, in the twentieth year of her life, surrounded by centurions
and soldiers, by foreknowledge of future ills already cut off from life, still
rested not in the peace of death … Bound fast with cords, her veins were
opened in every limb; and because the blood arrested by terror ebbed
too slowly, she was slaughtered in the vapor of a steaming bath. Added is
more hideous cruelty; the head, amputated and carried to Rome, Poppaea
viewed. For all these atrocities offerings were made in the temples. Is there
any need to mention it?70
Annales 14.64.1–3
The tragic-pathetic style of the passage, a masterpiece of its type, helps explain
the ambience of similar passages in Plutarch. In its harshness, the Antonios
passage contrasts in other respects with the Cicero, though Plutarch is usually
more benevolent when relating an incident concerning the protagonist of a
Life. The account in Cicero is more factual.71
Cicero’s extremities are brought to Rome while Antony is conducting an
election. Seeing them, he exclaims, “now let our proscriptions have an end,”
and has the members attached to the rostra. This is “a sight horrifying to the
Romans,” who believe they are viewing “not the visage of Cicero, but an image
of Antony’s soul.” But with uncustomary sadism, Plutarch praises Antony for
having done “one decent thing.” Philologus, the hero’s “betrayer,” is delivered
over to Cicero’s sister-in-law, who forces him to roast his own flesh and eat it
(49). Perhaps embarrassed by the inhumanity of the incident itself and his own
lack of sensitivity in reporting it, Plutarch omits it in the Antonios.
The Life of Cicero reveals the inner soul of Cicero, achieves an effect of
pathos and creates sympathy for the hero. Moreover, it leaves an illusion of
poetic justice, reward for Cicero, and divine punishment for Antony. After a
relatively sympathetic picture of Cicero’s attempted flight and cruel execution,
Plutarch depicts the reaction of Antony, the nailing of the extremities to the
70 Koestermann, Cornelius Tacitus, 153–154, notes that Octavia was actually twenty-two years
old, not twenty, citing R. Syme, Tacitus ii (Oxford, 1952) 746, and that she died on June 9th,
six years to the day before Nero committed suicide. See also H. Martin, “Structure and
Interpretation,” 1566; Morford, “Tacitus’ Historical Methods,” 1604–1606. Morford sees the
murders of Agrippina and Octavia as extremely important to Tacitus’ themes of the
decline of liberty and the emergence of autocracy.
71 [en: A.W. Lintott, Demosthenes and Cicero (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013).]
rostra, and the punishment of Philologus (49). The work closes with a visit
of Augustus to a grandson who was reading Cicero, the Emperor’s praise for
the orator’s life, his rewarding of Cicero’s family, and punishment of Antony’s
family—that no member should bear the name Marcus. To be more explicit,
“the daimonion devolves upon the family of Cicero, the final steps in the pun-
ishment of Antonius” (49.6). The punishment of Philologus, presented as some-
thing decent, forms part of a general context of retribution in the Life of Cicero.
The sadism of Cicero’s family in the Cicero, however, is counterproductive,
detracting from the inhumanity of his enemies.
The synkrisis comparing Antony and Demetrios also reflects Neronian traits.
Both heroes are condemned for insolence in prosperity and abandonment to
luxury. Demetrios, however, is praised for not allowing pleasure to interfere
with business, unlike Antony. Antony drives away his lawful wife and conspires
in his uncle’s murder. Finally, he deserts others fighting for his sake and com-
mits suicide “in a cowardly, pitiable, and ignoble way,” even if escaping a humil-
iating capture and death (93 = comp. 6).
The cowardliness of Antony’s death strikes a new and discordant note, more
explicable in the light of Nero’s insubstantial ghost lurking in the shadows. The
death scene in the Life, in fact, is laced with heroics. Seeing himself deserted,
Antony retires into the city, protesting his betrayal by Kleopatra. When her
messengers falsely announce her death, he reviles himself for being inferior in
courage to a woman. He immediately decides on suicide, ordering his slave,
Eros, to despatch him with his sword. When Eros kills himself instead, he
praises him for setting a good example and he falls on his sword. When the
blow proves insufficient, he begs the bystanders to finish him off (76).72
Plutarch’s strictures on Antony’s suicide better fit the Suetonian Nero. First
Nero bids his companions prepare a grave to his measurements and material
for cremation. Then, frightened of plans to execute him in the ancient Roman
way—striped naked, his head in a wooden fork, flogged to death with sticks—
he snatches two daggers and tests them. But protesting the anticipation of the
fatal hour, he puts them away. He then begs others to commit suicide first,
lamenting his cowardice, and he attempts to compose himself. Only with the
hoof-beats of the approaching cavalry in his ears, does he dispatch himself. He
too, “botching the job” like Antony, is half alive when the cavalry arrives, but
72 Andrei & Scuderi, Demetrio, 114; Pelling, Life of Antony, 76. Pelling, “Plutarch’s Method,” 74–
96 (85, 89) suggests a biographical source here; Russel, Plutarch, 140, suggested a memoir of
a friend like Aristokrates or Lucilius. Chamoux, Marc Antoine, 393, believes that Plutarch
admired not only Antony’s courageous acceptance of suffering and death but also his final
proclamation of indissoluble union with Kleopatra.
his final words are quite different (Nero 49).73 The last promise extorted from
his friends is not to be decapitated, but to be buried without mutilation. His
last words to the despatching centurion are “Sero.” and “Haec est fides?” Thus,
according to the principles of De sera and only slightly less than one hundred
years after the death of our hero the Divine (to daimonion) in a mysterious way,
acting through biology and the laws of genetics, settled the score with the victor
of Actium.
The genealogy at the end of Antonios with its almost violent condemnation
of Nero is so striking, that it suggests Plutarch found and highlighted in the Life
of Antony traits that characterized the reign of the Emperor. Plutarch’s misgiv-
ings about that period were associated in particular with the sufferings of mem-
bers of the Stoic opposition, either known to him personally or admired from
a distance, and with his own unpleasant and dangerous experiences under
Domitianus. He seems to have sincerely believed in the genetic transmission
of tendencies toward particular vices, and thus he would be tempted to see
Antonian traits in Nero and Neronian traits in Antony. Antony’s interest in the
arts, his extravagance, and his cruelty receive special prominence. But Plutarch
does not consistently underscore Neronian characteristics and often excuses
his hero’s lapses or describes penitence and a change for the better. In fact, the
bitter damnatio of Nero, the ultimate descendant of Antony, after the problem-
atic if not sympathetic treatment of the hero’s death, is a surprising cry in the
wilderness.
73 Bradley, Life of Nero, 273, praises the compression, vividness, and detail in Suetonius’
narrative of Nero’s death. There was popular exitus literature, e.g., that of Titinius Capito
and C. Fannius (Pliny, Epistolae 5.5.3; 8. 12.4) (Bradley, Life of Nero, 18). See also M.M. Sage,
“Tacitus’ Historical Works: A Survey and Appraisal,” anrw ii.33.2 (1990) 851–1030 (1016–
1017).
chapter 2
Antonius and Demetrios
1 Biographical Platonism and the Chance of Living Again
The unkindest cut is to treat Plutarch as a non-parallel biographer. Thus, there

are commentaries on Plutarch’s Antonios, Cicero, Pericles, Themistocles, but not
Demetrios and Antonios, and the like.1 Something of an innovation, however,
was Plutarch’s composition of parallel Lives of considerable length and on a
grand scale.2 More complications arise when we consider his consciousness of
writing a series, such as the earlier Lives of the Roman emperors, and later the
gigantic figures of Greek and Roman history, in the midst of them returning to
the misty Romulus and Theseus.3 As an unparalleled work to be judged on its
1 Pelling, though omitting the synkrisis from his text, actually devotes more than eight pages
of his commentary to parallelism in Demetrios-Antonios (18–26), much of the fascination of
the Lives being in the material’s resistance to easy comparison or formulation (25). See also
P.A. Stadter, “Plutarch’s Comparison of Pericles and Fabius Maximus,” grbs 16 (1975) 77–85—
primarily from an ethical standpoint; Russell, Plutarch 109–116; D.H.J. Larmour, “Plutarch’s
Compositional Methods in the Theseus and Romulus,” tapa 118 (1988) 361–375, who believes
(in Romylos-Theseus) Plutarch is constantly aiming at the synkrisis (375); cf. idem, “Making
Parallels: Synkrisis and Plutarch’s Themistocles and Camillus,” anrw ii.33.6 (1992) 4154–4200
(4157–4174). See also F. Frazier, “A propos de la composition des couples dans les Vies Parallèles
de Plutarque,” RPh 61 (1987) 65–74, for whom Demetrios-Antonios fits into the “political
conduct category” (71–72), common to lives 16–23 in Jones, “Towards a Chronology,” 68; and
P. Desideri, “La formazione delle coppie nelle Vite plutarchee,” anrw ii.33.6 (1992) 4470–
4486 (4481–4486). Frazier sees the parallelism as part of “Graecia capta.” This becomes a
comparative re-analysis of the great figures of the past and of the underlying principles and
foundations of Graeco-Roman civilization, which, while abstracting universal values, inflicts
a subtle but cruel revenge, depriving the Romans of their own cultural identity (4486). [en:
W.J. Tatum, “Antiquarianism and its Uses: Plutarch’s Roman Questions and His Lives of Early
Romans,” Athenaeum 102 (2014) 104–119.]
2 Just how much precedent there was for “genuine” biography and parallel biography is a matter
of some debate. Discussions can be found in Momigliano, The Development of Greek Biogra-
phy, 1–42, 96–99; Dihle, Die Entstehung der historischen Biographie, 7–27; J. Geiger, Cornelius
Nepos and Ancient Political Biography (Stuttgart, 1985) 9–65; and B. Gentili & G. Cerri, History
and Biography in Ancient Thought (Amsterdam, 1988) 66–67 (= idem, Storia e biografia nel
pensiero antico [Roma / Bari, 1983] 71–77). Few, however, mention the eschatological dimen-
sion.
3 [en: On Theseus, see C. Schubert, “Die Method der Atthidographen: die Kleidemos-Frag-

own merits, his Lives reflect the grandiose artistic conceptions of his time and
present some complicated problems of interpretation. First, the immediate Life
before us can be considered an artistic work in itself, in this case, Antonios.
But an individual Life is like a facing statue on a tomb. Moreover, Lives seem
issued in bundles, so to speak, with some reciprocal rapport. Most striking is the
unexpected change of perspective when the same material appears in different
Lives. The cross-references within the Lives, though, suggest that after a certain
point Plutarch realized he was constructing a grandiose and complex edifice,
not just individual or matching showpieces.4
Handling the comparison of individual points in two Lives and giving some
indication of their construction is extremely complex in itself, but fitting an
individual Life into the complete “architectonic” structure of the ensemble
does strain the imagination and ingenuity of a commentator. The task is ren-
dered more difficult by Plutarch’s growing realization of the titanic scale of
his enterprise. No attempt will be made here to incorporate the Antonios into
the entire series. Only its obvious relationship to the Demetrios will be consid-
ered. However, that the Antonios was meant to add the polishing stroke to an
epoch is suggested by the genealogy of Nero. If so, it would finish off both the
Julio-Claudians and Plutarch’s career as a parallel-biographer.5 He had already
mente in der Theseus-Vita des Plutarch,”Mnemosyne 67 (2014) 930–952; M. d. C. Fialho, “Φιλαν-

θρωπία and φιλαυτία in Plutarch’s Theseus,” Hermathena 182 (2007) 71–83; C.R. Cooper, “Mak-
ing irrational myth plausible history: Polybian Intertextuality in Plutarch’s Theseus,” Phoenix
61 (2007) 212–233; on Romulus: B.B. Buszard, “Translating Rome: Plutarch’s Skeptical Etymol-
ogy in Romulus and Numa,” in S. McElduff & E. Sciarrino (eds.), Complicating the History of
Western Translation (Manchester: St. Jerome Publishing, 2011) 146–158; J.L. Banta, “Who gives
a fig (tree a name)?: Chronotopic Conflicts in Plutarch’s Romulus,” Intertexts 11 (2007) 25–41.]
4 See J. Geiger, “Plutarch’s Parallel Lives: The Choice of Heroes,” Hermes 109 (1981) 85–104; and
idem, “Nepos and Plutarch: From Latin to Greek Political Biography,” in Marcovich et al. (ed.),
Plutarch, 245–256 (247–249). Some of Geiger’s assertions have been criticized by D. Musti,
“Protagonismo e forma politica nella cittâ greca,” in A. Ceresa-Gastaldo (ed.), Il protagonismo
nella storiografia classica (Genoa, 1987) 9–36 (esp., 19–20); J. de Romilly, “Rencontres avec
Plutarque,” in Marcovich et al. (ed.), Plutarch, 219–229, considers Plutarch “le véritable père de
la biographie” because of the variety and comprehensiveness of his work (221). [en: On cross-
reference, see A.G. Nikolaïdis, “Plutarch’s Methods: His Cross-references and the Sequence of
the Parallel Lives,” in A. Pérez Jiménez & Frances Titchener (eds.), Historical and Biographical
Values of Plutarch’s Works. Studies devoted to Professor Philip A. Stadter by the International
Plutarch Society (Málaga—Utah, 2005) 283–323.]
5 Pelling, “Plutarch’s Method,” 74–96, would argue that Pompeios, Markos Katon, Krassos,
Kaisar, Broutos, and Antonios were prepared together (83) and written after Cicero (89–90);
cf. Antonios 26–36. This theory helps explain the length of the Parthian campaign in Anto-
antonius and demetrios 169
treated this epoch in his Lives of certain emperors. Even if he wanted to redo
them, he might have appreciated the value of letting his Lives die with the end
of the Republic. Different historiographical and biographical principles would
be at stake, since no Greek hero could quite challenge a Roman Emperor, the
monarch of both Rome and Greece.
If we consider Plutarch a philosopher by nature, vocation, and divine design
(pronoia), and a biographer only through chance (tyche or to automaton), then
he deserves serious consideration as a philosophical biographer or a biograph-
ical philosopher.6 Most of us labor under the Platonically mistaken impression
that a person only lives once. For some persons that impression may not be
mistaken. However, in the Platonic theory of reincarnation, which Plutarch
endorses philosophically and depicts with horrendous images, one’s life is
not so linear. Moreover, many Stoic philosophers considered all things recur-
ring again in exactly, or almost exactly, the same manner. Though Plutarch
remained an enemy of Stoic apokatastasis (the regeneration of the entire cos-
mos), the doctrine would have reinforced the Platonic idea that in incarnation
or reincarnation, one swallow does not make a spring.7
In the scheme of Platonic metempsychosis, the importance of the particular
events of a specific period of time becomes less significant than the generic
nios, the shortness of the Philippi account—without cross reference—and suggests looking
for other interrelationships within the group (in part due to common source material and
working methods). Geiger, “Choice of Heroes,” believes the availability and quality of the
source material is often decisive: of the seven Hellenistic Lives, three, Eumenes, Demetrios
Poliorketes, and Pyrrhos, derive from Hieronymos of Kardia, who also wrote of Antigonos
Monophthalamos, Demetrios’ father, an important figure in Demetrios (91). Hieronymos
offered abundant material to pair with Antonios. Geiger maintains that the choice of Hel-
lenistic Lives was quite original and they were not included in the initial plan (92, 94). [en:
For Pyrrhos, see J. Edwards, “Plutarch and the Death of Pyrrhus: Disambiguating the Con-
flicting Accounts,” Scholia 20 (2011) 112–131; for Eumenes: E.M. Anson, “The Battle of Gabene:
Eumenes’ Inescapable Doom?,” in V.A. Troncoso & E.M. Anson (eds.), After Alexander: The
Time of the Diadochi (323–281 bc) (Oxford/Oakville: Oxbow Books, 2013) 99–109.]
6 Brenk, In Mist Apparelled, 274–275; idem, “The Religious Spirit,” 119–120; and, rather original
in conception, W. Den Boer, “Plutarch’s Philosophical Basis for Personal Involvement,” in
J.W. Eadie and J. Ober (eds.), The Craft of the Ancient Historian. Essays in Honor of Chester
G. Starr (Lanham, Maryland, 1985) 373–386, esp., 381–382.
7 A.A. Long & D.N. Sedley, The Hellenistic Philosophers (Cambridge, 1987) i. Translations of the
Principal Sources, with Philosophical Commentary ii. Greek and Latin Texts with Notes and
Bibliography i, 274–279; ii, 271–277; R. Sorabij, Time, Creation and the Continuum (London,
1983) 21–27, 98–112, 371–377; idem, Matter, Space and Motion (Ithaca, 1988) 160–185.
quality of one’s life.8 Presumably, given a different time frame and even a dif-
ferent culture, the person’s character would reveal itself in a similar way. But
the theory is not necessarily true. Having lived one good life might be insignif-
icant, since the conditions might simply have been favorable. Rather it might
take several lives to test virtue worthy of escape from the cycle.9 Plutarch’s De
defectu (415b–c) suggests that multiple incarnation is not a necessary condi-
tion, but that escape is limited to the relatively few, and only after a life of virtue
in our terrestrial world and a purgatory in the next.10 This doctrine would seem
to exclude the majority of the heroes he has taught us to love, not only the cau-
tionary Demetrios and Antony.11
In any case, just as an illustrated lecture with two projectors renders it psy-
chologically or culturally impossible ever to project fewer than two images at
any time, so the concept of Parallel Lives should have rendered it impossible
ever to write a commentary on only one Life. Unfortunately, the astuteness
8 For Plutarch’s general relationship to Platonism, see J. Whittaker, “Platonic Philosophy in

the Early Centuries of the Empire,” anrw ii.36.1 (1987) 81–123; C. Froidefond, “Plutarque
et le platonisme,” ibidem, 184–233; Brenk, “The Religious Spirit,” 25–42. [en: M. Nerdahl,
“Flattery and Platonic Philosophy: The Limits of Education in Plutarch’s Life of Dion,”
cw 104 (2011) 295–309; Ph.A., Stadter, “Plato in Plutarch’s Lives of Lycurgus and Age-
silaus,” in Pérez Jiménez, García López, & Aguilar (eds.), Plutarco, Platón y Aristóteles,
475–486; also A. Pérez Jiménez, “Exemplum: The Paradigmatic Education of the Ruler
in the Lives of Plutarch,” in Stadter & Van der Stockt (eds.), Sage and Emperor, 105–
114.]
9 Escape from the cycle is not so clear. In Phaedros 248e–249a a virtuous soul is freed
after three successive periods of a thousand years, and after having been a “guileless
philosopher” or “a ‘pederast’ with philosophia”; in Phaed. 114bc those purified through
philosophia “live without bodies and pass to still more beautiful abodes.” Repub. 621cd
seems to hold eternal reincarnation, in spite of the final words “when we receive our
reward, as the victors in the games.” J. Annas, An Introduction to Plato’s Republic (Oxford,
1981), attributes the pessimistic tone to Plato’s emphasis on the importance of one’s
choices (349–353).
10 Brenk, “The Religious Spirit,” above 43–65; idem, “In the Light of the Moon: Demonology
in the Early Imperial Period,” anrw ii.16.3 (1986) 2068–2145 (2117–2130).
11 A. Barigazzi, “Plutarco e il corso futuro della storia,” Prometheus 10 (1984) 264–286, notes
the presence of only one of the Diadochoi in the Lives, and he a representative of vice.
Barigazzi would attribute this absence, perhaps a little idealistically, to Plutarch’s low
opinion: they ruined Alexander’s vision, leaving it to Romans to fulfill (271–272). S. Swain,
“Plutarch: Chance, Providence, and History,” AJPh 110 (1989) 272–302, offers a good analysis
of the complexities of Plutarch’s thought about fortune (tyche), providence, and Roman
rule. He concludes that overall Plutarch accepted the Romans as worthy and that in his
mature works Roman rule belongs to the divine plan (284–285, 298).
of modern scholars has outwitted Plutarch. Still, for the reader of the Lives
as intended, attention to one individual is necessarily limited, while “compare
and contrast” is encouraged, in the hope that the reader will eventually arrive
at general principles by a process of abstraction. The time period, nationality,
and cultural background at times utterly vanish as the virtue of the protagonist
is put under a microscope. True, Plutarch, like the precosmic soul in his com-
mentary on the Timaios, sometimes becomes absorbed in the exciting flow of
the phainomena, the forbidden fruit of Platonism, and seems less than non-
chalant about particulars. Still, at the termination of most Lives the compar-
ison, the synkrisis, attempts to pull us up by our boot straps, underlining the
non-phenomenal aspect of the two human endeavors, and focusing our gaze
through the spectacles of centuries, if not through those of cyclical regenera-
tion or eternity.12
Nonetheless, the eschatological aspect of the Lives is not obtrusive; in fact,
it can barely be found. Plutarch uses divine intervention or hints of it quite
frequently, but apparently regarding biography as a different genre from phi-
losophy, he is virtually silent about the eschatological result. The only real
exception is Dion-Broutos, in which the stupendous diabolical part belongs
more to the Roman hero than the Greek. The daimonic intervention is sup-
posed to prevent the hero from obtaining a better place in the next life than the
malicious spirit (daimon) himself (2).13 However, this preface and the demono-
logical developments within the particular pair are quite exceptional.14 The
12 Pelling, “Synkrisis,” 83–96, who considers the synkriseis, with their simplistic moral tone,
disappointing, believes the real comparisons are embedded in the Lives’ more intractable
matter, which defies simple analysis; on Demetrios-Antonios, 89–90.
13 Brenk, “The Religious Spirit,” above 92. idem, “I veri demoni greci ‘nella nebbia amman-
tellati’? Esiodo e Plutarco,” in E. Corsini & E. Costa (eds.), L’autunno del diavolo, Diabo-
los, Dialogos, Daimon. I Mondo antico e giudaico-cristiano (Milan, 1990) 23–36 (29–30).
In the Derveni Papyrus (lines 9–10) both daimones and Eumenides seem to be souls, as
noted by A. Henrichs, “The Eumenides and Wineless Libations in the Derveni Papyrus,”
in Atti del xvii Congresso Internazionale di Papirologia ii (Naples, 1984) 254–268 (257–
258).
14 P.A. Stadter, “The Proems of Plutarch’s Lives,” in Marcovich et al. (ed.), Plutarch, 275–
295, is impressed by the great diversity in the introductions; for Dion-Broutos, where the
supernatural factor enters, see 285. [en: J. Dillon, “Dion and Brutus: Philosopher Kings
adrift in a Hostile World,” in Humble (ed.), Plutarch’s Lives, 87–102; M. Pade, “‘I give you
back Plutarch in Latin’: Guarino Veronese’s version of Plutarch’s Dion (1414) and Early
Humanist Translation,” crcl 41 (2014) 354–368; A.V. Zadorojnyi, “The Ethico-Politics of
Writing in Plutarch’s Life of Dion,” jhs 131 (2011) 147–163.]
diabolical incursions are, moreover, not very integral to the main thread and
are undercut during the course of the narration.15
Given the philosophical necessity of abstracting from individual phenom-
ena, the importance and advantage of parallel Lives becomes more evident.
Demetrios-Antonios offers one slice of history from the Hellenistic world of
around 338bc to 283bc and another from the Roman world of 86 bc to 30 bc
The two time segments are almost exactly equal. Antony at the age of fifty-
six disposed of himself with the sword, conveniently terminating his life in
a chronological span equivalent to that finished by Demetrios’ last kylix of
wine. The choice of these Parallel Lives was even more propitious; for Antony
followed in many footsteps of his predecessor, historically and biographically
speaking. Overtly, however, Plutarch avoided comparison on temporal or geo-
graphical similarities, and focused on the supposed heroic perversity of soul
found in these examples of cautionary vice. Still, sailing over the same waves
and tramping through the same sands did not hurt parallelism. There seems,
moreover, to be a large amount of contamination in the two Lives. The geneal-
ogy, for example, following Demetrios’s death is the longest in the Lives after
that of Antony. At any rate, the Demetrios-Antonios seems especially conscious
of parallelism.
2 Parallels in Vice
The Lives begin with a long preface excusing the inclusion of two scoundrels in
an otherwise noble series (1.6):
οὕτως μοι δοκοῦμεν ἡμεῖς προθυμότεροι τῶν βελτιόνων ἔσεσθαι καὶ θεαταὶ καὶ
μιμηταὶ βίων, εἰ μηδὲ τῶν φαύλων καὶ ψεγομένων ἀνιστορήτως ἔχοιμεν.
15 Brenk, “The Religious Spirit” 50–52. idem, “Demonology,” 2128–2129. P. Desideri, “Teo-
ria e prassi storiografica di Plutarco: una proposta di lettura della coppia Emilio Paolo-
Timoleonte,” Maia 41 (1989) 199–215, asks whether Plutarch’s heroes becoming daimones
after death, as alluded to in Dion-Broutos and Romulos 31, intervene in human affairs.
Regarding this as not improbable, he suggests a different twist: a regaining by contem-
poraries of the motivations, ideals, and capacity for action of great men of the past. In
this sense, the Lives, by rediscovering the reasons and the driving force behind an individ-
ual action, constitute a profound rethinking of the Polybian and Thucydidean conception
of the utility of historical reflection (214–215).
… it is my impression that we ourselves will be more eager spectators of

the better lives, and imitators, if of the base and reprehensible we are not
deprived of a history.
It immediately adds that Demetrios and Antony were “great natures” (μεγάλαι
φύσεις, 1.8), and, thereby, bear testimony to a saying of Plato (the location of
which has baffled modern scholars) that great natures bear witness to great
vices as well as great virtues.16 The similar great vices of the present heroes
are not immediately specified, but presumably they would be erotic passion,
heavy drinking, extravagance, and overbearing or lawless conduct (ὑβρισταί,
1.8). A military nature and munificence, other similarities mentioned, cannot
be considered qualities which Plutarch would universally condemn. The next
great similarity is the oscillation of their fortune (tyche). Supposedly all during
life they enjoyed tremendous success but also great reverses. Finally, both
came to a bad end, one in captivity, the other on the verge of a similar fate
(1).
Obviously, the reasoning of the preface is somewhat specious. A biogra-
pher could not overlook such prominent and dashing heroes. Demetrios was
perhaps a womanizer, but less so, Antony. Plutarch would not have neglected
Antony’s eroticism, but probably felt the need to exaggerate this compari-
son, which in the end is unconvincing, only conforming to the propagandistic
stereotype. Moreover, the supposed oscillation of tyche (fortune), or Tyche—
the darling of Hellenistic historians—though important for Demetrios, is
hardly so for Antony. His fortunes mark a rather steady rise until his failure on
the Parthian campaign, the real turning point of his political fortunes.17 There-
16 Dihle, Entstehung der historischen Biographie, 13 and 16, attributes “praise and blame”
to the influence of enkomion literature, an ancestor of biography. Stadter, “The Proems,”
notes different kinds of rhetorical enkomion and Plutarch’s flexibility in using them (277–
284). Pelling, Life of Antony, 15, remarks, though, that Demetrios-Antonios is not so much
interested in “protreptic” moralism as in “descriptive ethical truths” about human nature.
[en: A.V. Zadorojnyi, “The Rhetoric and Philosophy of Plutarch’s Mirrors,” in Humble (ed.),
Plutarch’s Lives, 169–195; T.E. Duff, “Plutarch’s Lives and the Critical Reader,” in G. Roskam,
& L. Van der Stockt (eds.), Virtues for the People: Aspects of Plutarchan Ethics. Essays
Originally Presented at an International Conference at Delphi in September 2004 (Leuven:
Leuven University Press, 2011) 59–82.]
17 S.C.R. Swain, “Plutarch’s Aemilius and Timoleon,” Historia 38 (1989) 314–334, treats tyche
in these Hellenistic Lives (esp., 314–315). [en: See now W.J. Tatum, “Another look at tyche
in Plutarch’s Aemilius Paullus—Timoleon,” Historia 59 (2010) 448–461; P. Tansey, “A Note
on the Repulsae of L. Aemilius Paullus (cos. 182, 168),” Athenaeum 99 (2011) 185–188;
upon, he suffers a series of humiliating defeats leading to his eventual isolation

and suicide, and, if not saved through the intercession of Isis-Kleopatra, to a
miserable afterlife.
Apparently Plutarch sincerely believed that Antony was captivated by his
love for Kleopatra. On the other hand, the necessity of making Antony’s eroti-
cism correspond to that of Demetrios may have encouraged Plutarch to accept
and embellish the Augustan propaganda which made Antonius the tipsy par-
amour of the Egyptian queen. Plutarch highlighted the role of Lamia, the
hetaira of Ptolemaios discovered among the spoils of Kypriote Salamis. Like
Kleopatra’s, her beauty left something to be desired and her accomplishments
outside love were more astonishing than those within. Originally only becom-
ing distinguished as a flautist, only later did she become “illustrious in love
matters” (τοῖς ἐρωτικοῖς λαμπρὰ γενομένη, 16.5):
At any rate, although she had already lost the flower of youth by this time,
and found Demetrios much younger than herself, she so overcame and
possessed him by her charm that he became for her alone the lover, of all
other women, the beloved.
In 19.6 his conduct seems to merit more a smile than the lash:
The story is related that after Lamia’s open conquest of Demetrios,

coming home from abroad he greeted his father with a kiss. At this,
Antigonos laughingly remarked, ‘Son, are you sure you are kissing me and
not Lamia?’
Plutarch seems unconcerned that the following chreia dulls the splendor of
Lamia’s conquest (19.8):
D.N. Sánchez Vendramini, “Morte de Aemilius Paullus em Cana: fazendo de herói um

general derrotado (Polybius 3.112–117),” Classica(Brasil) 27 (2014) 185–196; on Timoleon:
D. Miano, “Tychai of Timoleon and Servius Tullius: a Hypothesis on the Sources,” asnp
4 (2012) 365–378; S.P. Teodorsson, “Timoleon: the Fortunate General,” in De Blois et al.
(eds.), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works, 215–226.] In S.C.R. Swain, “Plutarch’s De fortuna
Romanorum,” cq 39 (1989) 504–516, the author sees a deepening of Plutarch’s thought: in
the essay (319f) Kleopatra belongs to the good tyche of “Caesar” (Octavius), but in the Life
her effect is analyzed in profoundly human terms (511–512). See also G. Forni, Plutarco. La
fortuna dei Romani (Naples: M. D’Auria, 1989) 13–20, 61, note 68.
And again, having learned his son was sick, Antigonos went to visit him,
and encountered a beauty at the door.18 Entering and seating himself
at his side, he grasped him by the hand. ‘The fever is gone now.’ said
Demetrios. ‘I can believe that, son,’ he replied, ‘I just passed it on the way
in’.
3 Parallels in Assimilations
Having announced his general program in the preface, Plutarch proceeds to the
particulars. Demetrios was extremely handsome as a young man, so handsome
that his beauty lacked adequate reproduction in painting and sculpture. A
bon vivant, devoted to drinking and luxurious living, he was also energetic,
persistent, and effective in action, a Dionysos (2.3):
ᾗ καὶ μάλιστα τῶν θεῶν ἐζήλου τὸν Διόνυσον, ὡς πολέμῳ τε χρῆσθαι δεινότατον,
εἰρήνην τ’ αὖθις ἐκ πολέμου τρέψαι [καὶ] πρὸς εὐφροσύνην καὶ χάριν ἐμμελέ-
στατον.
… he, therefore, of all the gods most emulated Dionysos, since more
than any other god he was most terrible in waging war but most accom-
plished, once war was over, in turning peace to joyfulness and graceful
artistry.
The Hellenistic Neos Dionysos reflected here contrasts with the crude image of
a drunken Bacchus as conjured up by the Augustan propaganda machine.19
18 The Greek (τῶν καλῶν) leaves it unclear, perhaps deliberately on Plutarch’s part, whether
a woman or a boy is at stake, though the term is usually used for boys. In 24, a boy called
Damokles ὁ καλός in an attempt to avoid Demetrios’ advances leaps into a tub of boiling
water.
19 For Dionysos and Rome see J.-M. Pailler, Bacchanalia: La répression de 186 av. J.-C. à Rome
et en Italie (Paris, 1988) 746–770; E.S. Gruen, Studies in Greek Culture and Roman Pol-
icy (Leiden, 1990) 72–78; and J.-P. Brisson, “Rome et l’âge d’or: Dionysos on Saturne?,”
mefra. Antiquité 100 (1988) 917–982—not so convincing, however, in its central argu-
ment. A bitter propaganda war was waged at the time, as delineated in K. Scott, “The
Political Propaganda of 44–30bc,” with Octavius taking great pains to refute Antony (48).
See also I. Becher, “Augustus und Dionysos—ein Feindverhältnis?,” Zeitschrift für ägyptis-
che Sprache und Altertumskunde 103 (1976) 88–101; and for the iconographical campaign
against Antony, Zanker, The Power of Images, 57–65 (65–72 in the German ed.). [M. Böhme,
But this assimilation of Demetrios to Dionysos is swiftly abandoned. One

wonders whether the brief allusion was not invented or used only for paral-
lelism. In fact, the assimilation may not be supported by numismatics. The
coins show him as very handsome. One in particular depicts him as an ide-
alized, beautiful youth.20 In the begining of his reign he imitated the coins
of Alexander. Thus, coins of this period depict Athena on the obverse, and
Demetrios either in the guise of Herakles or with the attributes of Herakles
on the reverse.21 Some supposedly portray him with the bull horn of Dionysos.
The interpretation of the bull horns as those of Dionysos has, however, been
questioned. None of the other coin types indicate a Dionysian connection.
Repeatedly he portrayed himself with ships and with Poseidon, who is hon-
ored in every possible way. In this interpretation, after the debacle at Ipsos in
301 bc, Demetrios wanted to recall his previous success at Kypriote Salamis;
he therefore emphasized his power at sea, changing the coin types to ships
and Poseidon. The horned figure, then, represents not Dionysos but Poseidon
Taureios.22 The image of a horned Poseidon recalls Euripides’Hippolytos (1201–
1217). In response to the prayer of Theseus, Hippolytos’s father, Poseidon dis-
charges a monstrous bull, which rises out of the sea to overwhelm the youth
(1201–1217):
ἔνθεν τις ἠχὼ χθόνιος, ὡς βροντὴ Διός, / βαρὺν βρόμον μεθῆκε, φρικώδη κλύ-
ειν· … ἐς δ’ ἁλιρρόθους / ἀκτὰς ἀποβλέψαντες ἱερὸν εἴδομεν / κῦμ’ οὐρανῶι
στηρίζον, … / κἄπειτ’ ἀνοιδῆσάν τε καὶ πέριξ ἀφρὸν / πολὺν καχλάζον πον-
“Plutarch und die Attische Demokratie,” in V.V. Dement’eva, & Tassilo Schmitt (eds.), unter
Mitarb. von Moritz Böhme & Claudia Horst, Beiträge zu einem von den Universitäten Bre-
men und Jaroslawl organisierten Kongress in Jaroslawl 2007 (Göttingen: Ruprecht 2010)
149–158.]
20 B.V. Head et al., A Guide to the Principal Coins of the Greeks from circ. 700bc to a.d.270
(London, 1965) Period ivb, 10 (54 and pl. 29).
21 E.g., E.T. Netwell, The Coinages of Demetrius Poliorcetes (London, 1927) 166–169 and Pls. i 1,
5, 11, 16–18.
22 Scutum 104. Netwell, The Coinages, 72–73, argues for the Poseidon identification; on the
desire to glorify Salamis after Ipsos (31). In Athenaeus, 6.62–63, Demetrios calls himself
the son of Poseidon. An enormous number of Poseidon coin types can be found in
Netwell, The Coinages, 24–27, pl. ii, 1–19, but also iii–xviii, and in other collections such
as A.B. Brett, Catalogue of Greek Coins. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (Boston, 1955) 94–
95; #705–711, p1.38. However, less convincingly, K. Scott, “The Deification of Demetrius
Poliorcetes,” AJPh 49 (1928) 137–166; 217–239, on the basis of the prevalent assimilation
of Hellenistic rulers to Dionysos, believes the horns represent Dionysos.
τίωι φυσήματι / χωρεῖ πρὸς ἀκτὰς …/ αὐτῶι δὲ σὺν κλύδωνι καὶ τρικυμίαι /
κῦμ’ ἐξέθηκε ταῦρον, ἄγριον τέρας· / οὗ πᾶσα μὲν χθὼν φθέγματος πληρου-
μένη / φρικῶδες ἀντεφθέγγετ.’ εἰσορῶσι δὲ / κρεῖσσον θέαμα δεργμάτων ἐφαί-
νετο.23
There we heard a heavy rumbling sound, like the thunder of Zeus, but
it rose out of the earth with a deep roar, horrible to hear … Gazing out
to the breaking surf, we saw a wave of unearthly size, rearing to the
sky … Then, swelling still higher, and spattering foam on every side, it
rushed seething and hissing to the shore … In the moment of bursting
and crashing, the wave threw forth a monstrous savage bull, whose bellow
filled the whole earth with an appalling echo, a sight too great for mortal
vision.
The assimilation of both Demetrios and Antony to Herakles at times falls more
or less to the wayside. The numismatic assimilation of Demetrios to Herakles
on coins was common in that epoch. But in chapter 4, Plutarch almost derails
Antony’s Dionysiac assimilation by stressing his lineage from Herakles. This
assimilation was based on physiognomy, but the Antonii were Herakleidai,
descended from Anton, son of Herakles (4.2). Supposedly Antony fostered
this assimilation by wearing his tunic girt high, bearing a large sword, and
wearing a heavy cloak.24 The mythical lineage serves to underscore Antony’s
military competence, drinking, camaraderie, womanizing, boastfulness, and
liberality, in short the qualities of “great natures” (μεγάλαι φύσεις) in which
erotic passion and heavy drinking, accompany extravagance and overbearing
conduct (ὑβρισταί).
Plutarch’s disdain or reluctance to exploit the Herakles assimilation of either
Demetrios or Antony reveals a certain dislike of rather mechanical parallels,
23 Text of J. Diggle, Euripidis Fabulae, i (Oxford, 1984) 260.

24 On Antony’s coin types see Pelling, Life of Antony, 123–124. Some of the coins are repro-
duced in E.G. Huzar, Mark Antony. A Biography (Minneapolis, 1978) 150–151. M. Grant,
Cleopatra (London, 1972) 112, notes that the Nemean lion appeared on Antony’s coins as
the astrological sign for the date of his conception (E.A. Sydenham, rev. G.C. Haines et
al., The Coinage of the Roman Republic [London, 1952] 189 nos. 1160, 1163). M. Bieber, “The
Development of Portraiture on Roman Republican Coins,” anrw i.4 (1973) 871–898 (882–
885 on Antony) notes his early interest in Sol—reflected in very unusual coins, minted
in Gaul, 42 bc—representing the god within a distyle temple (884; Tafeln, 213, fig. 19). His
coins representing Fulvia (authenticity questioned), Octavia, and Kleopatra were the first
in which real women appeared on Roman coins.
though aspects like the passion for Kleopatra could be made to correspond
with Herakles’ fatal love for Iole. Moreover, the Herakles assimilation would
obscure Antony’s degeneration in Alexandria. This aspect of the hero’s char-
acter is symbolized by Dionysos, one of the principal gods of the city, and is
necessary for the Dionysiac thiasos which abandons Alexandria before the bat-
tle there.25
The Herakles assimilation in Antonios, however, is not totally abandoned,
but remains at a lower level of importance. Later this assimilation, along with
that of Dionysos, constitutes one of the important portents before the Battle
of Actium (60). In Patrai, during Antony’s sojourn there, the Herakleion is
destroyed by lightning. At Athens, Dionysos in a statuary group of the Battle of
the Giants dedicated by Attalos of Pergamon, at the south wall of the Acropolis
is dislodged by the wind. After an allusion to Antony’s Heraklean lineage,
Plutarch relates the assimilation to Dionysos, “in the mode of life he adopted,”
and in his title, Neos Dionysos. The unusual wind portent may be intended as
a parallel to an earlier one in Demetrios. Here (12) figures of Demetrios and
Antigonos had been added to those of Zeus and Athena in the Panathenaic
robe of Athena, but as the procession was passing through the Kerameikos the
robe was rent by a furious wind. The parallel is not underlined, though, and in
Demetrios, the portent is a threat for usurping divine honors. The wind portent
in both Lives takes place at Athens, one affecting the Kerameikos, and the other
the Acropolis and the area below.26
25 J.M. Mossman, “Tragedy and Epic in Plutarch’s Alexander,” jhs 108 (1988) 83–93, with one
exception, regards all the allusions to Dionysos and Alexander in the Life of Alexander
as sinister (87). [en: See now S.R. Asirvatham, “Olympias’ Snake and Callisthenes’ Stand:
Religion and Politics in Plutarch’s Life of Alexander,” in S.R. Asirvatham, C.O. Pache, &
J. Watrous (eds.), Between Magic and Religion: Interdisciplinary Studies in Ancient Mediter-
ranean Religion and Society (Lanham (Md.): Rowman and Littlefield, 2001) 93–125;
D. Aubriot-Sévin, “Quelques observations sur la religion d’Alexandre (par rapport à la
tradition classique) à partir de Plutarque (La Vie d’Alexandre) et d’Arrien (L’Anabase
d’ Alexandre),” Métis 1 (2003) 225–249; K.D. Nawotka, “Persia, Alexander the Great and the
kingdom of Asia,” Klio 94 (2012) 348–356.]
26 In Antonios 60 the tempest striking the Akropolis overturns the Statues of Eumenes and
Attalos upon which Antony’s name had been inscribed; see Pelling, Life of Antony, 265–
266.
4 Treading the Same Ground
Besides the location of the wind portents at Athens, there are other geo-
graphical points of contact between Demetrios and Antonios. Both heroes
have encounters at Gaza, Demetrios meeting defeat and Antony early success
(Demetrios 5, Antonios 3), in Syria (Demetrios 6, Antonios 30, 51), and Sidon
(Demetrios 32, Antonios 51). Moreover, both had important interests in Cyprus
(Demetrios 15, a-54); their careers carry them to Athens (Demetrios 8, 23–24,
26–27, 33–34, Antonios 34), to Ephesos, defeat for Demetrios (30), glory fol-
lowed by defeat for Antony (24, 56), and Tarsos (Demetrios 47, a-26). Both cross
the Euphrates (Demetrios 7, Antonios 37) and conduct battles in Makedonia
(Demetrios 39, Antonios 22), not to mention the other footsteps of Demetrios
followed by Antony.
Analysis of the Ephesos adventure illuminates Plutarch’s “bi-biographical”
style and the importance of intertextuality.27 Presuming the Demetrios has
been read first, one encounters a Demetrios in flight but strangely marked by an
act of piety, respect for the Temple of Artemis (30). Intertextuality should make
one suspect a similar mishap in Antony’s future. The first Ephesos adventure of
Antony and the only one of Demetrios occupy a similar position in the Lives
(Demetrios 30, Antonios 24). Antony’s first entry into Ephesos is surprisingly a
Bacchic triumph, though tainted with rapacity—also a theme in the Demetrios
chapter—, the hero himself is mysteriously respectful of the Temple.
27 On Dionysos at Ephesos see R.E. Oster, “Ephesus as a Religious Center under the Princi-
pate i. Paganism before Constantine,” anrw ii. 18.3 (1990) 1661–1728 (1673–1676, esp. 1674,
the entry of Antony into the city; 1676, the technitai of Dionysos). Plutarch’s generos-
ity to Antony may be motivated by his respect for the Artemision (judging by Antonios
24 and 56). Like other Romans, according to Strabo 14.1.26, he apparently did not “rob”
the Artemision treasury, a “sacrilege” probably common to the Attalid monarchs. On the
other hand, though he doubled the asylum space, he dragged some of Brutus and Cas-
sius’ partisans from the peribolos of the Temple, and tore from the altars Kleopatra’s
sister and, possibly, brothers. See L. Boffo, “I re ellenistici e i centri religiosi dell’Asia
Minore,” in Pubblicazioni della Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia dell’Università di Pavia 37
(Florence, 1985) 150–163, esp. 156, 159–160, citing C. Picard, Éphèse et Claros. Recherches
sur les sanctuaires et les cultes de l’ Ionie du Nord (Paris, 1922) 150–151, G.W. Bowersock,
“Plutarch,” in P.E. Easterling & B.M.W. Knox (eds.), The Cambridge History of Classical
Literature i. Greek Literature (Cambridge 1985) 665–669, who notes the “unmistakable per-
sonal quality” of Plutarch’s writing, sees him avoiding big cities like Athens, Ephesos, or
Smyrna, and preferring Chaironeia in Boiotia, “the proverbial home of dullards” (666–
668).
Parallelism does not mean that equal space or importance is given to the
similar visits to Ephesos. Antony’s first visit (24) consumes much more narra-
tive space than Demetrios’ (30). First comes the Dionysian entry, then Antony’s
exactions against the cities of Asia. The exactions part occupies more space
(34 lines in the Teubner) than the triumphal entry (only 6 lines, but 15 previ-
ous lines on Asia); but the triumph, because of its brilliant use of imagery and
its exploitation of the popular iconography of the Indian triumph of Dionysos,
has left the exactions in the shadows. The final part of the exactions section
dilates on the simplicity of Antony’s character, his repentance when the fault
is pointed out, and restitution to the wronged. These observations form some-
thing of an introduction to the ultimate evil (τελευταῖον κακόν), his destructive
love for Kleopatra (25.1).28 The important allotment of space to the somber
side of Antony’s visit to Ephesos takes on more significance when one recalls
Demetrios’ entry into the city.29 Later, during Antony’s second visit to Ephesos
(56), his political and military position is more akin to Demetrios’. After the
defeat in Parthia, he is in the process of making stupendous preparations for
the Battle of Actium, where destiny will seal his doom. The passage most similar
to Demetrios’ retreat into Ephesos, however, is the description, a little earlier
in the Life, of Antony’s flight to Leuke Kome (51) between Berytos and Sidon
(Demetrios 30.2–5):
But Demetrios, fleeing with five thousand foot and four thousand horse,
marched hurriedly to Ephesos. Here everyone thought lack of funds
would make it impossible to resist plundering the temple treasury. But he,
fearing his soldiers might do so, departed quickly, sailing for Greece—of
his remaining hopes, putting most in Athens. For he happened to have
28 P.J. Bicknell, “Caesar, Antony, Cleopatra and Cyprus,” Latomus 37 (1977) 324–342, claims
Antony actually gave Kleopatra little at the Kydnos meeting and even took away Kypros
(334–335), that he temporarily arraigned Megabyzos (the priest of Artemis) for shielding
Arsinoe (Appianus, Bell. Civ. 5.8–9) (336), and that at Leuke Kome Kleopatra drove a hard
bargain, not releasing funds without more compensation (342). On the Ephesos scene,
see also Chamoux, Marc Antoine, 234–236, who notes Dionysiac qualities in Antony, such
as being generous after being savage. E.S. Gruen, The Hellenistic World and the Coming of
Rome i (Berkeley, 1984) 270, claims philhellenism had “no relation” to public policy, and
might be a political liability.
29 Pelling, Life of Antony, 192, suspects a conspiracy of silence here: Arsinoe, Kleopatra’s sister,
dragged from sanctuary at Ephesos and killed, along with the surrender of the disloyal
admiral Serapion at Tyros, and of a pretender to the throne (Appianus, Bell. Civ. 5.9;
Josephus, Jewish Antiquities 15.88–93).
left there ships, money, and his wife Deïdameia, and thought no securer
refuge in his plight could exist than the good will of the Athenians. As
he approached the Kyklades, however, an Athenian embassy met him,
begging him not to approach the city, since the assembly had passed a
vote refusing admittance to any of the kings, and informing him that
Deïdameia had been sent to Megara with a fitting escort. Then, in his
anger he lost control of himself, although he had borne his other mis-
fortune very easily and in so great a reversal of his situation had shown
himself neither mean-spirited nor ignoble. But that he should be utterly
deceived in his hopes by the Athenians, and that their apparent goodwill,
when tested, was to appear insubstantial and fabricated, was painful to
him.
Two passages from the Antonios recall the earlier one. The first, Antonios 51.1–
4:
But now, pushing on through much wintry weather, which was already at
hand, and incessant snowstorms, he lost eight thousand men along the
march. He himself, though, went down with a small company to the sea,
and in a village between Berytos and Sidon, called Leuke Kome, awaited
Kleopatra. As her coming dragged on, beside himself with anxiety, he
immediately started drinking and getting drunk, although he remained
not long seated, but in the midst of the company would spring to his feet,
until she arrived in port, bringing with her a large quantity of clothing
and money for his soldiers. Some, however, allege that the clothing he did,
indeed, receive from Kleopatra, but the silver, taken from his own private
funds, he distributed as though she had given.30
The second arrival of Antony at Ephesos also reflects Demetrios’ passage

through the city, but the details are quite different (Antonios 56.2–10):
But he himself, taking Kleopatra with him, arrived at Ephesos, where his
naval force was gathering from all over the world … Antonius, persuaded
by Domitius and some others, ordered Kleopatra to sail for Egypt and
there await the outcome of the war. Kleopatra, however, persuaded Cani-
30 Pelling, Life of Antony, 241–242, describes Plutarch’s language as particularly expressive in

this passage, e.g., ἀδημονῶν ἤλυε (“… wandered around distraught, was beside himself with
distress”) (51.3).
dius with large bribes to intercede for her with Antonius. He pleaded the
injustice of driving away from the war a woman whose contributions were
so large, the necessity for Antonius not to demoralize the Egyptians, who
formed a large part of his naval force, and the equality of Kleopatra in
intelligence with any of the allied rulers … Such counsel—since every-
thing eventually was to end in Caesar’s hands—prevailed. As soon as all
the forces were united, then, sailing to Samos, they spent their time in
enjoyment … So the word went round, ‘What will the victory celebrations
be like, once the war is won, if with such extravagance they celebrate the
preparations?’
5 Fighting the Same Battles
There is much similarity in the battle scenes in the two Lives, though Plutarch
has to a great extent, from an impressionistic point of view, denied Antony any
victories except his minor iuuenalia. Demetrios as a very young man engages in
battle for the first time at Gaza, while Ptolemaios is away attacking Syria. The
hero meets disaster. He not only loses 13,000 men, either slain or captive, but
also his tent, his money, and his personal belongings (5). Antony’s early and
brilliant engagement at Pelousion in the Gaza strip contrasts with Demetrios’
debacle (Antonios 3). The account of Demetrios’ defeat was coldly factual, even
omitting details of the battle. Antony’s dashing actions at Pelousion are now
vividly portrayed against a romantic backdrop (Antonios 3.6):
But more than the war, the march to Pelousion was feared, since the route
lay through deep sand without water, as far as the Ekregma and Serbonian
marshes, which the Egyptians call the blasts of Typhon, although they
appear to consist of backwater and seepage from the Red Sea at the
narrowest point of the isthmus between them and the Mediterranean …
The Egyptian color so early in the Life serves to foreshadow the later scenes at
Alexandria. The passage also elevates Antony to the heroic rank of Alexander,
by recalling Alexander’s march across to the shrine of Zeus Ammon, after the
army of Kambyses, as narrated in Herodotos, had disappeared in the sands.
Previous to the march related in the Alexandros the hero had taken Gaza
(25), then founded Alexandria, later so intimately associated with Antony (26)
before thinking of Siwah (Alexandros 26.11–12):
The march is long, filled with toils and miseries, and two perils. One is
the dearth of water, absent for several days. The other occurs when a
fierce southeaster descends upon travellers in deep and boundless sand,
as, indeed, once happened to Kambyses’ army, transforming the plain
into huge breakers and billows of sand, burying fifty thousand men and
destroying them.
Shortly after, in perhaps a subconscious field of associations, Plutarch relates

Antony’s descent from the Herakleidai (4), another link with Alexander.31 Nev-
ertheless, Antony is, strangely, never explicitly paralleled with Alexander.32
Antony’s first real engagement, however, had been at Jerusalem, a conquest of
Alexander, even if not mentioned in the Alexander histories. Antony gallantly
scales the “highest fortification,” routs the force of Aristoboulos, “many times
the size of his own,” and slays “all but a few” (3).
In the third major engagement, during the Civil War against Pompeius
Magnus, the hero does little. He is, in fact, fleeing the hostile ships, when a
southeaster wind (Notos), brings up a heavy swell. Carried toward “a precipitous
and craggy shore” with no hope of escape, he suddenly sees a change to the
south wind (Libas), which saves him and annihilates his pursuers. He then
reverses his course and surveys the shore covered with wrecks (6).33
31 In Alexandros 2.1, Alexander is descended from Herakles on his father’s side, through
Karanos.
32 Professor Eric Gruen has brought this to my attention. Perhaps, Plutarch felt one Roman
Alexander, Caesar, was enough. However, Professor Pelling points out that the Alexander
comparison is prominent in Pompeios (Cf. 2.1, 34, and 46), and that in Antonios, parallels
with Demetrios would tend to preempt those with Alexander.
33 [en: On Pompeius, see T.P. Hillman, “Pompeius in Africa and Sulla’s Order to Demobilize
(Plutarch, Pompeius 13, 1–4),” Latomus 56 (1997) 94–106; J.M. Candau Morón, “Plutarch’s
Lysander and Sulla: Integrated Characters in Roman Historical Perspective,” AJPh 121(3)
(2000) 453–478; T.P. Hillman, “Notes on the Trial of Pompeius at Plutarch, Pomp. 4. 1–
6,” RhM 141 (1998) 176–193; J. Beneker, “Thematic Correspondences in Plutarch’s Lives of
Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus,” in De Blois (ed.), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works, 315–325;
idem, “Asêmotatos or autokratôr? Obscurity and Glory in Plutarch’s Sertorius,” in Humble
(ed.), Plutarch’s Lives, 103–119; P. Payen, “Sertorius et l’Occident dans les Vies parallèles
de Plutarque: acculturation et contraintes narratives,” Pallas 60 (2002) 93–115; M. Durán
Mañas, “Influencia aristotélica en los sueños de las Vidas plutarqueas de Alejandro y
César” cfc(g) 20 (2010) 231–246; V. Nasel et al., “Nouveaux fragments d’un papyrus de
la Vie de César de Plutarque (P.Gen. inv. 477 et 504),” mh 70 (2013) 10–15; J. Lundon,
“P.Köln xiii 499 and the (In)completeness of Plutarch’s Caesar,” zpe 185 (2013) 107–110;
M. Giebel (ed.), Caesar (Stuttgart: Reclam, 2015); W.G. Schropp, “Der zweite Kaiser oder
As a victory, the battle at Pelousion corresponds to Demetrios’ early success

at Kypriote Salamis (Demetrios 16). Actually, the battle which should corre-
spond to Demetrios’ naval battle is Antony’s land battle at Philippi, but Plutarch
practically omitted it from the Life. The Pelousion engagement is charged with
emotional overtones in contrast to the coldly factual relation of the battle in
Demetrios. The Salamis victory is also subordinated somewhat to the acquisi-
tion of one part of the booty, Lamia the hetaira, who was to master the master of
the world, Demetrios. The emotional tones of the Salamis encounter, are, how-
ever, developed in three following chapters, which form a longer exposition to
the narration of the battle.
One might think Antony’s escape and unexpected victory in the naval
engagement of Dyrrachion were intended to foreshadow the hero’s strategy in
the later naval conflict at Actium. Not a hint of this in 66, the description of the
Battle of Actium. Rather, soldiers of a seemingly passive Antony, impatient at
the delay and seeing the wind beginning to rise, put their left wing in motion, to
Octavius’ delight. In the naval engagement of Dyrrachion, Plutarch seems more
interested in depicting Antony’s passivity, followed by pure luck, rather than in
implanting hopes for an anticipated change of wind at Actium. In both cases
Antony flees, not shaping destiny but carried along by events. His conduct vio-
lently contrasts with Demetrios. whose strategy is only summarily described.
But he sails to the attack, cleverly blocks the strait with a few ships, and then
cracks Ptolemaios’ formation (16).
Plutarch virtually ignores Antony’s victory at Philippi. He does receive
credit—“it was Antony who was everywhere victoriously directing the oper-
ations”—but little else (22.1). If we exclude the burial of Brutus, no more than
half a chapter is devoted to the battle. Moreover, Plutarch undercuts Antony’s
importance by relating a hostile account which asserted that he only arrived
on the scene after his men had already routed Cassius. Even in the second and
decisive battle, Plutarch follows hostile propaganda: Antony won the “greater
credit for the victory, since Caesar was sick” (22.5).
The virtual omission of the Battle of Philippi suggests a reluctance to repeat
something already magnificently narrated, another indication that the entire
set of Lives was conceived as something of a unit. An extended treatment would
also disturb the tightness and crispness of various contrasts which dominate
chapters 14–22. Philippi was narrated vividly and at great length in the Broutos
(15 Teubner pages), which formed part of a group with the Antonios. Surpris-
ein zweiter Caesar: Überlegungen zu Plu. Numa 19.6 und App. Ill. 13.39,” Mnemosyne 68
(2015) 1003–1007.]
ingly, in Antonios we have no cross reference to the Broutos, but this omission
is understandable if Antonios were “published” with the Broutos. However, the
story of Antony’s generosity to the fallen Brutus (Broutos 53) is repeated in an
embellished and slightly different version.34 There is also a gruesome touch,
the order that Hortensius, who had killed Antony’s brother Gaius in Macedo-
nia, be executed on his tomb. The generosity toward Brutus—Antony laying
his expensive purple cloak over the enemy’s body and providing for decent
funeral rites, then executing the freedman who absconds with the money—
poetically justifies the final respect for the body of Antony, and his obsequies
(77). The Parthian disaster of Antony is another event which parallels one in
Demetrios’. Nothing as dramatic occurs in the Greek Life, though the hero,
winding up the skein of war, wanders about ineffectively while campaigning
in the Seleukid kingdom. Both heroes cross the Euphrates and at times Antony
leaves the impression of pressing on the footsteps of his biographical and his-
torical predecessor. In particular, Demetrios’ condition in chapter 47.1–2 resem-
bles Antony’s 45.7–12:
Τέλος δὲ καὶ νόσου τῷ λιμῷ συνεπιτιθεμένης ὥσπερ εἴωθεν, ἐπὶ βρώσεις ἀναγ-
καίας τρεπομένων, τοὺς πάντας οὐκ ἐλάσσονας ὀκτακισχιλίων ἀποβαλών, ἀνῆ-
γεν ὀπίσω τοὺς λοιπούς· καὶ καταβὰς εἰς Ταρσόν, ἐβούλετο μὲν …
In the end sickness as well as famine overcame them, as happens when

men eat food necessary for survival; and after losing no less than eight
thousand men, and leading the rest back to Tarsos …
Demetrios 47.1–2
καὶ λιμὸς ἥπτετο τοῦ στρατοῦ … τραπόμενοι δὲ πρὸς λάχανα καὶ ῥίζας, ὀλίγοις
μὲν ἐνετύγχανον τῶν συνήθων, ἀναγκαζόμενοι δὲ πειρᾶσθαι καὶ τῶν ἀγεύστων
πρότερον, ἥψαντό τινος πόας ἐπὶ θάνατον διὰ μανίας ἀγούσης … φθειρομένων
δὲ πολλῶν καὶ τῶν Πάρθων οὐκ ἀφισταμένων, …
Famine also seized the army … turning, therefore, to greens and roots and
finding few they were used to, they were compelled to experiment with
untasted ones. Thus, they consumed a certain herb which was fatal, after
first causing insanity … Many perished this way, and the Parthians would
not desist …
Antonios 45.7–12
34 Pelling, Life of Antony, 173, notes that Antony also returned Brutus’ ashes to his mother
Servilia (Broutos 53.4).
When Antony held a review of his troops, he discovered that twenty thou-
sand infantry and four thousand cavalry had perished, not all through the
enemy, but more than half overcome by disease (50).
Antony still duels riskily with intertextuality by not dying like Crassus in the
interior of the Asian land mass. Also, the campaign in this part of the world is
really the finish for Demetrios. Afterwards his character disintegrates, and he
destroys his own health. In the Roman Life, just before reaching safety across
the river Araxes, Antony loses hope of escape and is close to suicide. But the
retreat does not terminate his career. He returns to Armenia (in 34 bc) (50)
to avenge himself, or more properly take revenge on a scapegoat, the Arme-
nian king. On the return from Parthia (51), though, Antony stays at Leuke Kome
where he drinks heavily, much like the vanquished Demetrios.
Plutarch’s biographical technique here is interesting in that the real parallel
is not with Demetrios but with Krassos. The tremendous length of the Parthian
Campaign in the Antonios indicates its importance for the author. The cam-
paign in Antonios covers 16 chapters (37–52) in a work of 87 chapters. Thus, a
sixth of the Life consists of the Parthian campaign, 16 times more space than
the Battle of Philippi, and about 6 chapters, or a third more, than the Battle at
Actium (56, 60–68)!35 The allocation of space is roughly equal to the campaign
in Krassos’ (16–33), but since the Krassos’ has only 33 chapters, the Parthian
campaign occupies half the Life. The complexity and extraordinary length of
the Antonios allow the two campaigns of Parthia and Actium together to con-
stitute only a third of the Antonios narrative space.
The narration of the campaign in Antonios, then, suggests a rather complex
concept of Parallel Lives. Besides the two immediate Lives at stake, other types
of parallelism enter, eventually embracing, at least indirectly, all the Lives in
the series.36 Strangely, though, Antony himself makes no reference to Cras-
sus. Rather he brings to mind the successful campaign of Xenophon’s Ten-
Thousand, while symbolically tracing, and striving mightily not to trace liter-
ally, the footsteps of Crassus. Antony, nonetheless, only saves his life through
the hindsight of not repeating Crassus’ mistakes, at least not every one. Crassus
is only mentioned twice. At the beginning of the campaign Antony demands
back the standards of Crassus (37). More importantly, toward the end, the
35 Pelling, Life of Antony, 220, considers the Parthian Campaign a pendant to the Battle of
Actium.
36 [en: On the issue of parallelism in Plutarch’s Lives, see now the following articles included
in the volume edited by Humble, (ed.), Plutarch’s Lives: Ph.A. Stadter, “Parallels in three
dimensions,” 197–216; W.J. Tatum, “Why Parallel Lives?,” 1–22.]
Parthian guide, Mithridates, kindly warns Alexandros, one of the officers, that
Antony will suffer the fate of Crassus if he proceeds by the plain (46). Otherwise
Plutarch’s Antony is sublimely unaware of either the life or Crassus.37
The Battle of Actium in Antonios, though, is much enhanced by knowledge
of Demetrios’ victory at Kypriote Salamis. The paired hero had been invincible
at sea; and Antony himself had been successful earlier in the naval engagement
near Dyrrachion, while fleeing the forces of Pompeius Magnus. Demetrios’
victory was stupendous, even if—except for numismatics—ephemeral. Still,
though frustrated in war, he remained undefeated at sea. Only the land brought
him humiliation and ultimate defeat. Antony’s position is the reverse. Canidius
advises him to surrender the sea to Caesar, who had been victorious in Sicily,
and rely on his army (63). The argument is summed up in a touching vignette.
A centurion begs Antony to fight on land:
O Commander, why, shaming these wounds and sword, in wretched

planks do you put your hopes? Let the Egyptians and Phoenicians fight
at sea. Give us the land, where we are used either to death or victory.
64.3
6 From Battle to Banquet and Boudoir
Both Demetrios and Antonios alternate remarkably between open and closed
space. Battles, in particular those at sea in a large open space, are preceded
or succeeded by drinking and merrymaking in an enclosed space.38 The bat-
tle scenes tend to symbolize the hero’s Heraklean virtue. The partying suggests
the debilitating erosion of logos through passion, in particular, the darker side
of Dionysos, an alcoholism born of the paralysis of moral degeneration.
This alternation can be represented schematically:
37 [en: A.V. Zadorojnyi, “Tragedy and Epic in Plutarch’s Crassus,” Hermes 125 (1997) 169–
182.]
38 For the concept of open/closed space see C. Segal, Tragedy and Civilization. An Interpreta-
tion of Sophocles (Cambridge, Mass. 1981) 105–107.
Demetrios Antonios
Drinking, etc. Battle Drinking, etc. Battle
1 (allusion)39 1 (Dem. 1)
2 5–7 2 3
14 15–16 4 7–8
23–27 9 17–18
28–29 22
31–36 24–29 37–50
41–42 43–44 51
46–50 53
52 56 56
61–66
71 74
75 76
The schema above reveals the oscillation between the overtly public life of the
hero and his more private life. A keen nose would discern the decadent scent
of the Neronian period. Luxury, extravagance, and satiety become morbidly
associated with death.40 Enhanced by a profusion of pictorial detail, the elegant
scenes reflect the ideals of the baroque manner. Huge interior vistas of halls
with banqueters parallel even vaster panoramas of land and sea, upon which
appear military arrays or naval formations.
In addition to the simple alternation between poles of exterior and inte-
rior scenes, there is the distribution of these scenes in a particular section.
For example, Antonios 24–30 begins with his Bacchic entry into Ephesos, but
39 An allusion to the Spartan custom of getting helots drunk in the presence of the young,
to exemplify the evils of drink, is used to justify the “cautionary” tales of Demetrios and
Antonios.
40 Different aspects are developed in W. Arrowsmith, “Luxury and Death in the Satyricon,”
Arion 5 (1966) 304–331; F. Zeitlin, “Petronius as Paradox: Anarchy and Artistic Integrity,”
tapa 102 (1971) 657–684—the banquet as an artificial world, finally destroyed by the real
one (662); Sullivan, Literature and Politics, 160–161; C. Saylor, “Funeral Games: the Signif-
icance of Games in the Cena Trimalchionis,” Latomus 46 (1987) 593–602; and A. Novara,
“Rude saeculum que l’ âge d’ or selon Sénèque (d’ après Ad Lucil. 90.44–46),” Bulletin Budé
(1988) 129–139 (esp. 132).
passes quickly into the τελευταῖον κακόν (“the ultimate evil”) (25.1), his love for
Kleopatra. His passion is symbolized by the feasting on board ship at Tarsos,
and the banquets, pleasures, and diversions of Alexandria. In 33–35 there is
some digression on Antony’s relationship to Octavius and Octavia.41 But then
we find the preparations for the Parthian War and an exceedingly long section
dedicated to the campaign. The preparations and initial phase of the war are
described in 33–37. The military part is then interrupted by a digression on
Antony’s love for Kleopatra (36). After this, the actual campaign is narrated in
37–50. A similar pattern appears in Demetrios 23–27, where his extravagance,
feasting, and wenching at Athens is followed by the campaigns (in their Greek
form) at Ipsos, the Chersonesos, Syria and Kilikia, the Peloponnesos, Athenai,
Sparta, Makedonia, and Thessalia (28–39). The narrative space in 23–27 is rel-
atively equal to that for Antony’s diversions.
7 Inimitable Livers and Inseparable in Death
Despite some interesting counter-movements, the heroes and the reader

advance toward the psychological disintegration of the hero rather than pure
military defeat. This phenomenon is not unique in the Lives.42 Antony, at first
more vulnerable to wine than women, surrenders to Kleopatra’s charms. But
his end is tainted by heavy drinking. At Leuke Kome, after his defeat in Parthia,
his alcoholism, the result of depression, brings no political benefits (51).43 After
Actium, the society of the Inimitable Livers at Alexandria became the Insepa-
rable in Death (71).44 Presumably this group continued the essential functions
41 Antony’s private life was not a model of simplicity. E. Huzar, “Mark Antony: Marriages
vs. Careers,” cj 81 (1986) 97–111—perhaps not the most felicitous title—lists his wives
and lovers: Fadia (1), daughter of a freedman; Antonia (2), divorced for adultery with
P. Cornelius Dolabella; Fulvia (3), the widow of Clodius; Octavia (4). Among the mistresses
were Cytheris, and Glaphyra of Kappadokia (the latter, at least according to Cicero 97).
42 See, for example, Swain, “Character Change in Plutarch,” 66–68.
43 M. Reingold, From Republic to Principate. An Historical Commentary on Cassius Dio’s
Roman History Books 49–52 (36–29bc) (Atlanta, 1988) 57–62, believes Antony’s army had
100,000 troops, the largest ever mobilized against Parthia, and that he lost over twenty-five
percent of his forces.
44 Pelling, Life of Antony, 195; P.M. Fraser, “Mark Antony in Alexandria: A Note,” jrs 47 (1957)
71–73, reinterprets W. Dittenberger, Orientis Graeci Inscriptiones Selectae (Leipzig, 1903–
1905) i, 195 in the following manner (72): Ἀντώνιον μέγαν | ἀ̣μίμητον ἀφροδισίοις | Παράσιτος
τὸν ἑαυτοῦ θεὸν{ε̣} | κ̣ αὶ εὐεργέτην, l ιδ τοῦ καὶ δ, | Χοιὰχ Κθ. He believes the club might have
been a Dionysiac thiasos; Cf. idem, Ptolemaic Alexandria (Oxford, 1972) i, 204, note 113.
of its predecessor. Not the menu but the modality would be changed. The feast-
ing is now inextricably linked with coming death. Moreover, before the battle
at Alexandria, Antony bids his servants pour out the wine more generously,
expecting to be dead on the morrow (75). Antony is Dionysos to the end. In the
moment of death—not for evil motives, but either “because thirsty or hoping
to be released more quickly”—he asks Kleopatra for a drink of wine, which he
consumes before expiring (77.6–7).
After his defeat in the Tauros range, Demetrios, a bird in Seleukos’ gilded
cage, drinks himself to death in the Syrian Chersonesos. Demetrios fares worse
than Antony. At first employing himself in hunting and other pursuits, he
gradually abandons himself only to drinking and dicing:
… either running away from his sober thoughts about his present con-
dition and smothering his reason in drunkenness, or convinced this was
the life he had always longed for and striven to attain but missed through
folly and empty ambition, thereby bringing many troubles upon himself,
many upon others, in weapons and fleets and armies seeking the good
(τὸ ἀγαθὸν ζητῶν), which now to his surprise, he had discovered in inac-
tivity and leisure and repose. What other limit than this exists to wars and
risky adventures, for worthless kings, wicked and mindless as they are, not
because they pursue luxury and pleasure instead of virtue and goodness,
but because the enjoyment of true pleasure or luxury escapes their com-
prehension?
52.3–4
The disquisition undoubtedly alludes to the hero’s earlier pleasures at Athens.45

Spending his time with hetairai, he lavished public funds upon them and
received in return invitations to their extravagant dinners, at least when not
abusing boys (24, 27). As in the Antonios, however, Plutarch treats the diver-
sions with more whimsy than damnation. About to proceed to the battle of
Ipsos, he remarks self-consciously “now we leave the comic for the tragic stage”
(28.1).46
45 A. Mastrocinque, “Demetrios tragodoumenos: Propaganda e letteratura al tempo di

Demetrio Poliorcete,” Athenaeum 57 (1979) 260–276, attributes these—much deriving
from Douris and Phylarchos—to a massive propaganda campaign depicting the hero as a
despoiler rather than liberator (264–269). See also Kertész, “Bemerkungen.”
46 Mossman, “Tragedy and Epic,” describes Plutarch as skillful but sparing in his use of a
tragic framework, employing it primarily to express tensions and internal forces within
In both Demetrios and Antonios Plutarch serves a bitter-sweet course. In the

latter, Antony’s extravagance and luxury, punctuated by drinking and surrender
to eros, occur principally at Ephesos, Tarsos, and Alexandria. He enters the
first city with a Bacchic thiasos and instantly surrenders himself to pleasure.
In Asia “the wives of kings” compete with one another to lay their virtue at his
feet (24.1). But like Demetrios, he exacts a heavy price there, laying hands on
the wealth of Asia (24). In 28 a foreboding atmosphere begins to press upon
the narrative, as the “Inimitable Livers” at Alexandria feast each other every
day, making “expenditures of incredible excess,” not to mention demands upon
the cook (28.3).47 In both Lives the earlier days of wine and roses marked by
“conspicuous consumption”—though tinged with bitterness for the victims
who had to pay for this extravagance—gradually become more morbid, even
to thoughts of self-destruction. In the Demetrios considerable space separates
the first profusions of extravagance (23–27) from the second (41–42) and the
final excesses (52). In the penultimate chapter, in fact, Plutarch seems to evoke
Demetrios’ earlier days of merrymaking in order to harmonize the section with
Antony’s final days.
The last chapters of both Lives link satiety and extravagance with death
and the melodramatically funeral. Simultaneously, the epic or tragic quality in
the final rites has an elevating or heroizing effect, like that of the magnificent
burials of Patroklos and Hektor in the Iliad and Achilleus in the Odyssey or
the final scenes of some Greek tragedies relating the death and funeral rites of
the hero, such as those in the Trachiniai.48 In fact, Plutarch calls the obsequies
for Demetrios “tragic and theatrical”—that is, filled with all the solemnity and
sensitivity toward suffering and death which one associates with tragedy, and
accompanied by appropriate music (53.1).49 His son Antigonos sails out with
his fleet to meet the remains “off the islands.” The ashes, deposited in a golden
a self-destructive character. She sees the tragic overtones of Demetrios spilling over into
Antonios (92–93).
47 However, the cook seems to have a good sense of humor about it.
48 D.P. Fowler, “First Thoughts on Closure: Problems and Prospects,” Materiali e Discussioni
per l’Analisi dei Testi Classici 22 (1989) 75–122, notes the strong ending or closure of the
Iliad (81–82). In his view, biography is close to drama, yet manifests great variety, even
if seemingly predetermined by the birth, life, and death of the subject; for example, that
“Antonius’ moment of expiry comes in a participial phrase at the opening of chapter 78,”
but the work continues for another ten chapters before concluding with Nero (116).
49 [en: E. Voutyras, “Le cadavre et le serpent ou l’ héroïsation manquée de Cléomène de
Sparte,” in V. Pirenne-Delforge & E. Suárez de la Torre (eds.), Héros et héroïnes dans les
mythes et les cultes grecs (Liège: Centre International d’Étude de la Religion Grecque
Antique, 2000) 377–394.]
urn, are conveyed by the largest flagship. Cities where they pass adorn the urn
with garlands or send men in funeral attire to escort it to its destination. At
Corinth the urn, decorated with royal purple and a diadem, is surrounded by
an honor guard on deck, while a celebrated flautist sitting beside the precious
remains, plays the most sacred music (53.5):
καὶ πρὸς τοῦτο τῆς εἰρεσίας ἀναφερομένης μετὰ ῥυθμοῦ τινος, ἀπήντα ψόφος
ὥσπερ ἐν κοπετῷ ταῖς τῶν αὐλημάτων περιόδοις.
To these sounds the stroking of the oars responds in a fixed rhythm, like
beating the breast, to the cadences of the melodies of the flute.50
Throngs along the shore are overcome by pity and sorrow, seeing the young
Antigonos humbled and overcome by tears. The banquets of Antony and
Kleopatra at Alexandria perhaps in real life were the inspiration for the Ver-
gilian banquets of Dido and Aeneas with their potential for desperation and
self-destruction.51 In the final chapters of the Plutarchan version, “The Insepa-
rable in Death,” or more exactly, “Those About to Die Together”—actually begin
planning their departure from this world to another. Antony had attempted sui-
cide at Paraitonion but was dissuaded by his friends (69). He then enters his
Timoneion at Pharos to separate himself from the evils of civilization.52 The
50 The flautist, Xenophantos of Thebes, appears in an inscription; see Andrei & Scuderi,
Demetrio, 262; Flacelière & Chambry, Plutarque. Vies xiii, 208.
51 Pelling, Life of Antony, 17–18, detects striking similarity between the accounts of Plutarch
and Vergil, though there is no evidence for him having read Vergil. However, the wail-
ing of babies in the approach to the celestial “underworld,” De genio 590f (μυρίων δὲ
κλαυθμὸν βρεφῶν), might be inspired, at least indirectly, by Vergil, Aeneid 6.426–429;
see Brenk, “The Religious Spirit,” 55–57. Plutarch’s Roman friends might have described,
recited, or translated Vergil. See A.T. Davis, “Cleopatra Rediviva,” g & r 16 (1969) 91–93,
for associated motifs of drinking, death, and destruction in the Cleopatra ode (Horatius,
1.37).
52 T.E.V. Pearce, “The Tomb by the Sea: History of a Motif,” Latomus 42 (1983) 110–115, lists
tombs by the sea, many of which were tourist attractions in Plutarch’s day, e.g. Achilleus in
the Troad (Strabo 13.1.32) and Aias at Rhoiteion (Strabo 13.1.30). Scipio Africanus Maior’s
supposedly was by the sea (Strabo 5.4.4), as was Cato Minor’s (Plutarch, Markos Katon
71), Opimius’ at Dyrrachion (Cicero, Pro Sestio 140), and in Lucanus 8.771–772; 8.816–
818, Pompeius Magnus’ on the African shore. Moreover, in Egypt Menelaos had built a
cenotaph for Agamemnon (Odyssey 4.584). Pearce sees heroic pathos, with an emphasis
on death in a strange land, exile, and isolation. See also, F.E. Brenk, “Unum pro multis caput:
Myth, History, and Symbolic Imagery in Vergil’s Palinurus Incident,” Latomus 43 (1984)
event offers an occasion for an extremely selective and rather morbid digres-
sion on Timon the Misanthrope. Two principal elements, separation from civ-
ilization and suicide, harmonize with the main plot: Timon offered his tree for
anyone wishing to hang himself; and his tomb slipping into the water became
“completely inaccessible to man.”
But as he is deserted by the dynasts, the hero either has second thoughts
about the vices of civilization or fails to grasp the opportunities and benefits of
an eremitical life of contemplation which might have offered salvation to one
who had formerly studied philosophy.53 He abandons the Timoneion. The life
of isolation now changes to an obsessive Götterdämmerung against a backdrop
of the transient pleasures of earthly phenomena.
… as if gladly laying aside his hopes, thus laying aside his anxieties, he
forsook his dwelling by the sea, which he called the Timoneion; received
back into the palace by Kleopatra, to dinners, and drinking bouts, and the
distribution of gifts, he turned the city …
71.2–3
There follows the creation of the other society “not at all inferior in daintiness
and luxury and extravagant outlay,” called “Those about to Die Together (συνα-
ποθανούμενοι)” with the enrollment of friends for this purpose. At this moment,
Kleopatra begins to experiment with poison.
776–801 (esp. 779–781), and W.S.M. Nicoli, “The Sacrifice of Palinurus,” cq n.s. 38 (1988)
459–472. The introduction of Timon, however, in Antonios produces a mock heroic or
anti-heroic tone. In its function the Timoneion is suspiciously like Kleopatra’s monument-
tomb?
53 C. Pelling, “Plutarch: Roman Heroes and Greek Culture,” in M. Griffin and J. Barnes (eds.),
Philosophia Togata (Oxford, 1989) 199–232, esp. 216–222, citing J. Moles, Cicero, introduc-
tory note, observes that Plutarch left two types of life open to Cicero, the political and the
philosophical; but Cicero, makes a number of dispiriting choices and in the end refuses
to retire to Greece and seriously pursue philosophy. Though his life is the opposite of
Antony’s (Cicero 43.2), the destructive contrast is not between philosophy and public life,
but between noble and ignoble public life (221–222). The Timoneion fits into the con-
text of, especially Cynic, ideas of self-sufficiency (autarkeia). G.W. Most, “The Stranger’s
Stratagem: Self-Disclosure and Self-Sufficiency in Greek Culture,” jhs 109 (1989) 114–133,
believes the ideal of perfect autarkeia, closely linked to the ephemerality of human life,
arises out of a profound desire among Greeks to be dependent upon no one, except the
gods (129). See also F.E. Brenk, “Old Wineskins Recycled: Autarkeia in i Timothy 6.5–10,”
Filologia Neotestamentaria 3 (1990) 39–51.
The night before the battle of Alexandria is also marked by this coincidence
of opposites of life and death, feasting and drinking, a Dionysiac thiasos, and
thoughts about the grave.54 Departing for battle against Octavius, Antony is
“conscious that there was no better death for him than that by battle.” He then
drinks and eats heavily, “since he is uncertain whether he will be alive on the
morrow, and not lying dead a mummy (or skeleton) and nothing more” (75.2).55
54 Dionysos, through the mysteries, is closely linked with death and the afterlife, as well as
with the pleasures of this world. See W. Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults (Cambridge, Mass.
1987) esp. 21–23, 33–35, 104–106. See also C. Bérard & C. Bron, “Bacchos au creur de la
cité. Le thiase dionysiaque dans l’ espace politique,” in L’association dionysiaque dans les
societés anciennes (Paris, 1986) 13–30; see also F. Dunand, “Les associations dionysiaques
au service du pouvoir lagide (iiie s. av. J.-C.),” L’ association dionysiaque, 85–104; J. Scheid,
“Le thiase du Metropolitan Museum (igur i 160),” en L’association dionysiaque dans les
societes anciennes (Rome 1986) 275–290; C. Segal, Dionysiac Poetics and Euripides’ Bacchae
(Princeton, 1982), sees in the Dionysos complex a special relationship with women, non-
integration of adult personality, arms, anger, and phallic propensities, besides the inability
to distinguish truth and illusion (159–160, 189–195, 234)—traits which Plutarch’s fertile
imagination would quickly find in Antony.
55 A. Dihle, Studien zur griechischen Biographie (Göttingen, 1965) 96, detects tragic pathos in
many of Plutarch’s sayings (apophthegmata, chreiai). The skeletos was a prominent fea-
ture of Graeco-Roman banquets, the significance of which varied considerably within
different contexts; Pelling, Life of Antony, 302–303. K.M.D. Dunbabin, “Sic Erimus Cuncti …
The Skeleton in Graeco-Roman Art,” jdai 101 (1986) 185–255, claims the motif reached its
greatest popularity in the first centuries bc and ad (194). She suggests an Egyptian origin
to the custom, since wooden mummy figures a cubit or two long were common at ban-
quets of the wealthy (Herodotos, 2.78: περιφέρει ἀνὴρ νεκρὸν ἐν σορῷ ξύλινον πεποιημένον,
μεμιμημένον ἐς τὰ μάλιστα καὶ γραφῇ καὶ ἔργῳ … δεικνὺς δὲ ἑκάστῳ τῶν συμποτέων λέγει· Ἐς
τοῦτον ὁρέων πῖνέ τε καὶ τέρπευ· ἔσεαι γὰρ ἀποθανὼν τοιοῦτος) 208, note 84, citing A.B. Lloyd,
Herodotus Book ii. Commentary 1–98 (Leiden, 1976) 335–337; cf. Lloyd, “Herodotus on
Egyptians and Libyans,” in O. Reverdin & B. Grande (eds.), Hérodote et les peuples non grecs.
Entretiens sur l’ Antiquité Classique 35 (Vandœuvres-Geneva, 1990) 215–244; esp. 229–231.
G. Wöhrle, “ ‘Eine sehr hübsche Mahn-Mumie …’ Zur Rezeption eines herodoteischen
Motivs,”Hermes 118 (1990) 292–301, believes Thales’ comment on the practice in Plutarch’s
Septem sapient 148b, is probably close to the Egyptian outlook: mutual affection should
exist at a banquet, since life, which is short, should not be marred by evil conduct (… τὸν
βίον μὴ τῷ χρόνῳ βραχὺν ὄντα πράγμασι κακοῖς μακρὸν ποιεῖν [295]). The contrast between
war, strife, and the ideals of the symposion appears in a Greek inscription from Egypt
G. Kaibel, Epigrammata Graeca ex Lapidibus Conlecta [Berlin, 1878] no. 1049—cited by
W.J. Slater, “Sympotic Ethics in the Odyssey,” in O. Murray (ed.), Sympotika. A Symposium
on the Symposion (Oxford, 1990) 213–220. Slater stresses the necessity of graciousness,
good-humor (χάρις) in jesting—citing Plutarch’s Quaest. conv. 629e (214, notes 12 and 19).
Plutarch alludes to the practice in Septem sapient. 148a and De Iside 357f (J.G. Griffiths,
He refuses, moreover, to lead his friends out to a combat, which is only a cover
for realizing his own death. At this point there follows the famous description
of the Dionysiac thiasos which in the stillness of midnight, amid revelry and
tumult, departs from the gate facing the enemy, a sign “that Antonius had been
deserted by the god who protected him” (75.6). This too is an epic and tragic
touch, much like Apollon in the Iliad abandoning Hektor before his death
(22.212–213), or Artemis in Euripides’ Hippolytos withdrawing from the hero
before he expires (1437–1439).56
The concept of parallel Lives affects the interpretation of the Antonios here.
Judging by the Demetrios, one would expect the Life to terminate with funeral
rites for Antony at the monument of Kleopatra, followed by mention of the
Plutarch. De Iside et Osiride [Swansea, 1970] 335–336). An excellent reproduction of the

Boscoreale “Epicurus” skeleton cup can be found in Soprintendenza Archeologica di Pom-
pei, L. Casalis et al. (eds.), Il tesoro di Boscoreale. Gli argenti del Louvre e il corredo domestico
della “Pisanella,” Le Mostre 5. Soprintendenza Archeologica di Pompei (Milan, 1988) 11, pl. 14.
Ostensibly the sentiment is carpe diem—enjoy life, for death is just around the corner; Cf.
Lucretius, De rerum natura 3.912–915. Dunbabin sees the association of the “Inseparable in
Death” (Antonios 71.3–5) in this context (194). But in some cases, particularly the more seri-
ous Epicurean groups, the skeletos suggests—with bravado—imperturbability (ataraxia)
in the face of death. There could be an Isis-Osiris aspect, since Osiris mummies were
popular in Egypt. The most outrageous historical example of a lugubrious banquet—à la
Grande Guignol—is the Emperor Domitianus’ (Cassius Dio 67.9; Dunbabin, 195). Hatred
of Domitianus would have whetted Plutarch’s appetite for condemning Antony’s dinners;
Cf. S. Levin, “Plutarch’s Part in the Damnatio memoriae of the Emperor Domitian,” in Paul
Roesch et al (eds.), La Béotie Antique, Lyon—Saint-Étienne, 16–20 mai 1983, Colloques Inter-
nationaux du cnrs (Paris, 1985) 283–290.
56 Iliad 22.209–213: καὶ τότε δὴ χρύσεια πατὴρ ἐτίταινε τάλαντα, / ἐν δὲ τίθει δύο κῆρε τανηλεγέος
θανάτοιο, / τὴν μὲν Ἀχιλλῆος, τὴν δ’ Ἕκτορος ἱπποδάμοιο, / ἕλκε δὲ μέσσα λαβών· ῥέπε δ’
Ἕκτορος αἴσιμον ἦμαρ, / ᾤχετο δ’ εἰς Ἀΐδαο, λίπεν δέ ἑ Φοῖβος Ἀπόλλων. Euripides, Hippol.
1436–1439: Ἱππόλυτ’· ἔχεις γὰρ μοῖραν ᾗ διεφθάρης. / καὶ χαῖρ’· ἐμοὶ γὰρ οὐ θέμις φθιτοὺς ὁρᾶν
/ οὐδ’ ὄμμα χραίνειν θανασίμοισιν ἐκπνοαῖς· / ὁρῶ δέ σ’ ἤδη τοῦδε πλησίον κακοῦ. W.S. Barrett,
Euripides. Hippolytos (Oxford, 1964) 414, cites Pausanias 2.27.1, Thoukydides 3.104.2, and
i.g. 11 (2nd ed.) 1035, for keeping the dead from sacred places; and he observes that in
Alkestis 22, Apollon leaves the dying Alkestis. However, though Thetis (Odyssey 24.35–97)
is absent from the immediate funeral preparations for Achilleus, she has an important
role in the rites, as do the Nereids; and other gods in myth perform a similar threnos over
the body of their beloved. Pelling suggests Dionysos’ departure is a form of euocatio (303),
citing among other, Tacitus, Historiae 5.13.1 on Jerusalem: apertae repente delubri fores e
audita maior humana uox, excedere deos; simul ingens motus excedentium, but Scuderi,
Antonio, 113, is sceptical and doubts its role in Augustan propaganda. See also Becher,
“Augustus und Dionysos,” 96.
joint tomb there and some other tribute to the hero. She, indeed, pouring
libations and embracing the urn which holds his ashes, asks to be hidden and
buried with him, since the greatest of her misfortunes was “this short time I
lived without you” (ὁ βραχὺς οὗτος χρόνος ὃν σοῦ χωρὶς ἔζηκα 84.7), and then
departs from this life (86).57
When compared with the Demetrios, though, the Antonios almost seems
to obscure the burial of the hero. Kleopatra rather than Antony becomes
the central personage, along with Octavius, who ultimately appears on stage.
Extremely little of the final chapters is given to the funeral of Antony, and
its position is not especially significant. After the lamentations of Kleopatra
over the dying Antony (77)—which risk becoming grotesque—there follows a
long break until 82, when in one sentence Plutarch dispenses with the burial
(82.2):
… Ἀντώνιον δὲ πολλῶν αἰτουμένων θάψαι καὶ βασιλέων καὶ στρατηγῶν, οὐκ

ἀφείλετο Κλεοπάτρας τὸ σῶμα Καῖσαρ, ἀλλ’ ἐθάπτετο ταῖς ἐκείνης χερσὶ πολυ-
τελῶς καὶ βασιλικῶς, πᾶσιν ὡς ἐβούλετο χρῆσθαι λαβούσης.
Antonius, demanded for burial by many kings and commanders, Caesar

refused to take from Kleopatra; but the body was buried by her hands in
magnificent and regal fashion, everything she asked for, receiving.
The final chapter and line of the penultimate chapter, instead—after four chap-
ters describing the last days of Kleopatra—are concerned not with the burial,
but with the damnatio memoriae of Antony, and with the Nerogonia. After
57 There is an epigrammatic quality to Kleopatra’s utterance, faintly reminiscent of the

Hippokrates herm at Ostia: βραχὺς ὁ βίος ‖ μακρὸν δὲ ‖ τὸν κατὰ γᾶς ‖ αἰῶνα τελε- ‖ τῶμεν
βρο- ‖ τοί [foglia d’edera] πᾶσι δὲ ‖ μοῖρα φέρεσ- ‖ θαι δαίμο- ‖ νος αἶσαν ‖ ἅ τις ἂν τύχῃ.
For the inscription, see P. Frassinetti, “Un frammento di Pindaro?,” Giornale Italiano di
Filologia 4 (1951) 1–5; H. Hommel, “Euripides in Ostia. Ein neues Chorliedfragment und
seine Umwelt,”Epigraphica 19 (1957) 109–164 (136–149) (= idem, Symbola i. Kleine Schriften
zur Literatur- und Kulturgeschichte der Antike, Ed. B. Gladigow [Hildesheim and New
York, 1976] 117–163 [141–152], with a “Nachwort,” 164); C. Gallavotti, “Monumentum Sicili,
Miscellanea di Studi in Memoria di Marino Barchiesi,” Riv. Cult. Class. Med. 19 (1977)
399–410 (405–406); G. Sacco (ed.), Iscrizioni greche d’Italia, i. Porto. Unione Accademica
Nazionale (Rome, 1984) 71–74, #52 (= f 279h, R. Kannicht and B. Snell (eds.), Tragicorum
Graecorum Fragmenta [TrGrF] ii. Fragmenta Adespota [Göttingen, 1981] 88). There is
some resemblance to Plutarch, Septem sapient. 148b: … τὸν βίον μὴ τῷ χρόνῳ βραχὺν ὄντα
πράγμασι κακοῖς μακρὸν ποιεῖν.
preparing the reader for a magnificent funeral, Plutarch defeats our expecta-
tions, only mentioning it in passing. The expression “by her hands,” contrasting
with the magnificent escort accompanying the last remains of Demetrios, even
suggests a humble, private quality to these obsequies.
Moreover, not only in the finale, but throughout the Lives Plutarch has cre-
ated the poetic justice which demands a magnificent funeral. Both heroes
show great respect for the dead. But death grazes Antony more closely and
he responds to it more continuously. Demetrios is “naturally humane” (φιλάν-
θρωπον φύσει, 4.1) in general, but the trait is best displayed, after his victory at
Salamis, toward the vanquished enemy (17.1):
So brilliant and splendid a victory coming his way adorning it still more by
his humanity and kindness of heart, Demetrios buried the fallen enemy
magnificently and liberated his prisoners. Moreover, upon the Athenians,
from the spoils, he bestowed twelve hundred panoplies.58
Antony’s whole life is touched by premature or unexpected death.59 His grand-

father Antony was executed by Marius (1). After his stepfather Lentulus was
executed by Cicero in the Catilinarian conspiracy, he bitterly accused Cicero of
attempting to deny Lentulus’ family burial.60 In 14, Antony delivers the famous
58 H. Martin, “The Concept of Philanthropia in Plutarch’s Lives,” AJPh 82 (1961) 164–175, dis-
cerns a fundamental relationship between philanthropia and civilization, but describes
the term as rather flexible in Plutarch (174). A.E. Samuel, The Shifting Sands of History.
Interpretations of Ptolemaic Egypt. Publications of the Association of Ancient Historians 2
(Lanham, Maryland and London, 1990) 78–79, remarks that there is a new type of phi-
lanthropia proclaimed in the 2nd cent. bc and evident in official documents such as
P. Tebt 5—reflecting an ideology of kingship, developed by philosophers and propagan-
dists in that century, in which the monarch becomes the personal protector of his peo-
ple.
59 C. Pelling, “Aspects of Plutarch’s Characterization,” in Marcovich (ed.), Plutarch, 257–
274, believes Plutarch missed excellent opportunities to discuss the hero’s childhood and
only produces disappointing results (258); see also idem, “Childhood and Personality in
Greek Biography,” in C. Pelling (ed.), Characterization and Individuality in Greek Literature
(Oxford, 1990) 213–244. He claims that though Plutarch had a great interest in childhood,
as a representative Greek he was unable to exploit it (225–226). See also B. Bucher-Isler,
“Norm und Individualität in den Biographien Plutarchs,” Noctes Romanae 13 (Bern, 1972)
21, 24, 49, 67–68; C. Gill, “The Question of Character-Development: Plutarch and Tacitus,”
cq 33 (1983) 469–487; A. Dihle, Studien zur griechischen Biographie, 81; and C. Pelling,
“Plutarch: Roman Heroes and Greek Culture,” 231.
60 C.B.R. Pelling, “Plutarch and Catiline,” Hermes 113 (1985) 311–329, suggests Plutarch used a
funeral oration over the mutilated body of his commander Caesar. Plutarch
describes Antony as hypocritical but is sensitive to the powerful effect it pro-
duced on the plebs. Supposedly generosity was a family trait. His father was
“kindly, honest and exceptionally generous in repaying favors” (εὐγνώμων δὲ
καὶ χρηστὸς ἄλλως τε καὶ πρὸς τὰς μεταδόσεις ἐλευθέριος, 1.1).61 After the battle at
Philippi, Antony acts nobly toward the fallen Brutus (even if Hortensius might
have thought differently about it) (22.6–8):
Standing beside the corpse of Brutus, Antony reviled him somewhat

for cutting off the life of his brother Gaius (for Brutus had executed
him in Makedonia, avenging Cicero); but saying that Hortensius more
than Brutus should be blamed for his brother’s slaughter, he ordered
Hortensius to be slaughtered on the tomb. Over Brutus, however, he cast
his own purple cloak, of enormous value, and commanded one of his
freedmen to provide for the burial. This person, after Antonius discovered
he had not burned the purple robe with the body, but had purloined much
of the allocation for the burial, he executed.
The cruelest blow, then, is the literary denial of epic funeral to Antony. The
reader puts away the Life, at least before reading the synkrisis, not with a funeral
dirge in his ears and a complacent feeling of literary recompense, but with the
disquieting note of the murders and madness of Nero. The last funeral touch, a
little before, is, in fact, reserved for the Egyptian queen rather than the Roman
imperator (86.7):
But Caesar, though irritated at this end to her life admired her nobility,
and ordered that her body be buried with that of Antonius, in splendid
and regal fashion (λαμπρῶς καὶ βασιλικῶς). Honorable also was the inter-
ment which her women received at his command.
Nor is the synkrisis much help. Both Demetrios and Antony are condemned for
their deaths: one “by wine and belly tamed like an animal … whereas Antonius
in a cowardly, pitiful, and ignoble way (δειλῶς μὲν καὶ οἰκτρῶς καὶ ἀτίμως), but
hypomnema (set of notes) of Ciceronian material for the later Lives, and then adapted this
for the subject in hand (322), but influenced more by his immediate interest than a desire
to present the version most favorable to the hero (322–324, 326).
61 Not really, according to Pelling, Life of Antony, 117, who thinks Plutarch wanted to link
father to son.
at least before his enemy could make himself master of his body, he disposed
of himself” (93 [6].4).
But in a sense their deaths outshine the splendor of any funeral trappings,
even those of Demetrios. Moreover, so utterly identified with another have
Kleopatra and Antony become that her death terminating the Life becomes a
tribute rather than a slur, like that of a widow or a person of a royal household
who prefers extinction to living without the deceased.
The parallelism of Demetrios-Antonios would be philosophically grounded
for Plutarch in the Platonic doctrine of metempsychosis and the expectation
of either a release from terrestrial life after death or the commencement of a
new cycle of rebirth. Thus, individual circumstances fade into insignificance
compared to the more stable and decisive traits of virtue or vice which the
soul either brings with it from a previous existence as a spirit or from a previ-
ously sullied existence in this world. Thus, the concept of parallel lives from two
distinct periods, by transcending time and space, highlights the importance of
moral qualities which remain stable, even through reincarnations. This pair of
Lives is so particularly rich in parallels that one seems to have influenced the
other. Some similarities are moral, such as the propensity toward passionate
excess in eros or drink. Others are more circumstantial, such as sailing over the
same seas, tramping over the same ground, visiting the same cities, assimilation
to the same gods, or a peculiar generosity toward the dead. Also characterizing
the Lives is an alternation between exterior and interior space. Finally, there is
a general pattern of initial success followed by isolation and defeat, demoral-
ization and death, heroic threnody and solemn obsequies.
It would be unworthy to terminate without ring composition. The enormous
importance given the preparations for death in both Lives, particularly in
Antonios, seems to reflect Plutarch’s interest in the future of the soul, and not
just the terrestrial career alone of his heroes. The major purpose for life and
a Life in this Platonic sense is its profitability for the coming one. In Antonios
the importance of Kleopatra and her own devotion to Isis, a goddess related to
the dead, and one of the most popular, suggests even more this other-worldly
dimension to Plutarchan Lives.
chapter 3
Narrative
1 Time
The chronological arrangement of Plutarch’s Life of Antony, the récit, in the

terminology of modern criticism, is extremely sraightforward.1 This simplicity
contrasts drastically with some of Plutarch’s dialogues in the Moralia with an
extremely complex chronological format, such as De genio, or the Amatorius.2
1 For récit and temps racontant, see G. Genette, Figures iii (Paris, 1972) 77–78 (partly trans-
lated into English as Narrative Discourse. An Essay in Method [Ithaca, 1980] 33–35); and
idem, Figures of Literary Discourse (New York, 1982) 127–146; “Frontiers of Narrative” (from
Figures ii [Paris, 1969]); also S. Chatman, Story and Discourse. Narrative Structure in Fiction
and Film (Ithaca, 1978); and G. Prince, “Narratology: The Form and Functioning of Narra-
tive,” Janua Linguarum 108 (1982) 26–34. The concept is G. Müller’s “Erzählzeit und erzählte
Zeit” from his Morphologische Poetik (Tübingen, 1968), in Italian, “tempo della narrazione,” in
English, “narration time” (vs. “narrative time”). Chatman, Story and Discourse, 62–84, prefers
the expressions “story-time” and “discourse time.” Narrative time is real time, the duration
of the events recounted in the narrative. “Narration time” is the material time necessary
to tell the story. In dialogues, narration time is very close to narrative time, but normally
it is much shorter (Genette, Figures, iii 122–144 [English 86–112]). W.C. Booth, The Rhetoric
of Fiction (Chicago, 1961, rev. 1983) 439–441, is particularly impressed by Genette’s ideas on
speed, duration, repetition, and frequency. For a survey of these modern narratological posi-
tions, see J.L. Ska, “Our Fathers Have Told Us: Introduction to the Analysis of Hebrew Nar-
ratives,” Subsidia Biblica 13 (1990). A. Deremetz, “Plutarque: histoire de l’origine et genèse
du récit,” reg 103 (1990) 54–78, interprets the Life of Romulus according to Ricœur’s “Temp
et Récit.” He sees Plutarch bringing the reader into the actual “hermeneutical” process of
the récit, as he examines contradictory versions, evidence, problems involved, and as he
attributes relative credibility to the ability of the account to solve the problems, the apor-
iai (62). The Life of Romulus is, thus, a “mise en intrigue” in which the “heterogeneous tax-
onomies,” through the archetype of heroic myth and the corresponding matrix of Diokles
as a source, become (re)composed into an intelligible cosmos which is not only coher-
ent but also necessary and purposeful (72–73). [en: H.D. Betz, “Credibility and Credulity in
Plutarch’s Life of Numa Pompilius,” in idem, Gesammelte Aufsätze. 5: Paulinische Theologie
und Religionsgeschichte (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009) 191–207; idem, “Plutarch’s Life of
Numa: Some Observations on Graeco-Roman messianism,” idem, Gesammelte Aufsätze, 166–
190.]
2 Daimonion here means something like “the supernatural phenomenon” and is misleadingly
translated into Latin as genius. The Loeb editors translate it as “divine sign,” but as P.R. Hardie

narrative 201
In De genio, for example, we find, in dizzying order, recollections of the past,

predictions of the future, admonitions from the tomb, a “daimonic” time which
neither belongs to the eternity of the Platonic Forms (or Ideas) nor to mortal
time, and which is intensely preoccupied with the critical moment (kairos) in
history.
Plutarch’s conception of time in this dialogue helps illuminate that in the
Antonios. In De genio, there are two parallel lines of development. One con-
sists of the historical events of the Theban revolution against Sparta of 379bc
Running simultaneously with this is a discussion among the conspirators over
the daimonion, the supernatural phenomenon which advised Sokrates. The two
principal threads of the essay, the discussion over the daimonion and the story
of the uprising, are not entirely independent, since the speakers are involved
in the conspiracy and the events of the conspiracy impinge upon or punctu-
ate the course of the discussion (the dialogue in the strict sense). Moreover,
within the dialogue an eschatological “myth of Timarchos,” which describes the
journey of the soul through celestial spheres to arrive at the aldilà, postulates
successive reincarnations in this life. Thus, the immediate events of the histori-
cal narration, so vividly anchored in time, receive a contrasting, quasi-temporal
or almost a-temporal framework in the cyclical phenomenon of the ascent
and descent of souls subjected to reincarnation. Moreover, warnings from
the tomb of Alkmena and the communication of the dead Lysis to Theanor
serve as voices from the past communicating with the present.3 Added to
wittily remarks in “Sign Language in On the Sign of Socrates,” in Luc Van der Stockt (ed.), A
Miscellany of Essays on Plutarch (Leuven, 1996) 123–136, above all, the one thing the daimonion
is not, is a sign, since the daimonic converses directly with men. On the dialogue see M. Riley,
“The Purpose and Unity of Plutarch’s De genio Socratis,” grbs 18 (1977) 257–273; A. Aloni,
“Ricerche sulla forma letteraria del De genio Socratis di Plutarco,” Acme 33 (1980) 41–112;
P. Desideri, “Il De genio Socratis di Plutarco: Un esempio di ‘storiografia tragica?’,” Athenaeum,
n.s. 72 (1984) 569–585; K. Döring, “Plutarch und das Daimonion des Sokrates (Plut., de genio
Socratis Kap. 20–24),” Mnemosyne 37 (1984) 376–392; A. Barigazzi, “Plutarco e il dialogo
‘drammatico’,” Prometheus 14 (1988) 141–163 (141–154); D. Babut, “La part du rationalisme
dans la religion de Plutarque: l’ exemple du De genio Socratis,” in Marcovich et al. (eds.),
Plutarch, 383–408; A. Barigazzi, “Una nuova interpretazione del De genio Socratis,” ibidem,
409–425.
3 At 579e–f Theanor, the Pythagorean stranger from Magna Graecia, spends the night at the
tomb of Lysis intending to remove the remains unless “something supernatural” (ti daimo-
nion) in his sleep should prevent him. At 583b he remarks that to daimonion of Lysis had
revealed his death to them (probably something supernatural emanating from Lysis, rather
than Lysis’ daimon, as translated in the Loeb edition by De Lacy and Einarson, Plutarch’s
Moralia vii [London / Cambridge, Mass., 1959] 421). In 585e a certain sign (semeion)
this communication between past and present are “flashbacks” into legendary
Theban myth or previous history.
Three alternating times appear in the dialogue: the succession of events in
the historical narration, the somewhat timeless or slow-moving discussion of
Sokrates’ daimonion by the participants in the dialogue proper, and the quasi-
temporality of the daimones in the philosophical myth, which involves souls
passing to or from reincarnation. Subordinate to the others is a fourth time, that
of a past narrated in analepses (flashbacks).4 The historical narration, in no way
a “cold” narrative, is constantly affected by the psychological world of surprise,
despair, and elation, of souls in bodies as it were, the miserable creatures
described in the dialogues of Plato’s middle period, and by the unforgettable
verses of Vergil’s underworld (Aeneid 6.733–734).
Each of these lines of development receives a different kind of récit time.
In modern critical terms, the récit (or “narrating” or “story”) time taken to
narrate the dialogue proper, the discussion on Sokrates’ daimonion, is roughly
equal to the time consumed by the event itself. Obviously, the “narrating” of
the historical events is very condensed, though they occurred—conveniently
for Plutarch and for Aristotelian theories about drama—in a twenty-four-hour
time span. The daimonic time of the myth, however, eludes definition. The
souls, or daimones (mind [nous] + psyche), travel very lightly and almost at the
speed of light. Their only real baggage is the weight and recalcitrance of the
appearing in the sleep of the Pythagoreans had revealed the death of Lysis. At 585f Theanor,
who summons the soul of Lysis, sees no vision but hears a voice saying “move not the immove-
able.” Lysis’ soul has already been “joined by lot to another daimon and released for reincarna-
tion” (585f), suggesting, surprisingly, that reincarnation is immediate, not after an immensely
long period, as in Plato.
4 See Genette, Figures iii, 77–121. Analepsis (flashback) is the telling of events after the moment
in which they took place chronologically; “prolepsis” is anticipation; “ellipsis” is a gap, a lack
of information contrived by temporal displacement; Cf. M. Sternberg, The Poetics of Biblical
Narrative: Ideological Literature and the Drama of Reading (Bloomington, 1985) 237. Gaps are
relevant to the narration. See also H. Weinrich, “Tempus: Besprochene und erzählte Welt,”
Sprache und Literatur 16 (Stuttgart, 1964); J. Vogt, Aspekte erzählender Prosa: Grundstudium
Literaturwissenschaft (Düsseldorf, 1972) 40–53; A. Marchese, L’officina del racconto. Semiotica
della narrativa (Milan, 1983) 132–153; C. Segre, Introduction to the Analysis of a Literary Text
(Bloomington, 1988) 223–234 (= idem, Avviamento all’analisi del testo letterario [Turin, 1985]
273–274), and idem, Structures and Time. Narration, Poetry, Models (Chicago, 1979) 18–19 (=
Le strutture e il tempo. Narrazione, poesia, modelli [Turin, 1974] 24–26). Segre (Structures and
Time, 5–57) stresses the interdependence of narrative and cultural models, holding that the
semiotic models, which unlike those of logic or mathematics are historical, have the same
convergence points as the cultural or societal ones.
narrative 203
psyche they drag behind them. Thus, the duration of the récit of their voyage
can be considered roughly equivalent to their actual supersonic ascent through
the heavens.
Behind the temporality of this dialogue are some fundamental ideas about
time in Antiquity. First, as a Platonist, Plutarch was well aware of the a-tem-
porality of the Platonic Forms. At least on one occasion he attributes to God
the eternal or instantaneous time in which Being exists. He was acquainted
with the cyclic time of the Stoic conflagration and reintegration of the world
(ekpyrosis and apokatastasis). Possibly he knew of discussion on the nature of
time during the conflagration (ekpyrosis), when there is no ordered universe
(kosmos) against which to measure motion, the foundation of our perception
of past and present. There were other debates over the nature of cyclical
time, whether events and persons repeated themselves exactly, or almost so,
with slight changes in each reconstitution of the universe. The Epicureans,
moreover, needed atoms which travelled at incredible velocity, “at a speed
like that of thought,” in a disintegrating universe which had little chance of
identical reconstitution.5
For a Platonist the human soul does, or at least might, enter the stream of life
more than once. Still, reincarnation is not mentioned in the Lives. The nearest
hint appears in the introduction to the Broutos, where daimones are clearly
beings who interfere in the lives of good men, terrorizing them so as to remove
them from the path of virtue, lest they receive “a better portion” in the next life
than the daimon himself. Still, Plutarch maintains the biographical fiction (at
least for a Platonist) that life is a ‘one shot’ affair, that there is no possibility of
reprieve by returning to one’s starting point.
Nonetheless, in its essence the concept of parallel Lives intimates that the
individual circumstances of the period in which we live are relatively indiffer-
ent compared to good or evil character asserting itself under many different
conditions. Thus, should Demetrios live again, he might not have corrected his
false opinions, during the years of his intermediate or transient purgatory, and
might affect events and be affected by them in a way not dissimilar to that
of his previous existence. The individual epoch of our transitory existence is
not tremendously important. Human situations repeat themselves and certain
human traits reappear again and again. The phenomenal world is only one part
5 See Long & Sedley, The Hellenistic Philosophers i, 304–313; #47–48, 50, 72; ii, 301–309, #43–
46, 75–78; R. Sorabji, Time, Creation and the Continuum. Theories in Antiquity and the Early
Middle Ages (London, 1983) 21–32, 80–83,98–130; idem, Matter, Space and Motion. Theories
in Antiquity and Their Sequel (Ithaca, 1988) 160–185; and J. Whittaker, God Time Being. Two
Studies in the Transcendental Tradition in Greek Philosophy. so Fasc. Supplet. 23 (Oslo, 1971).
of reality, and the minor part. As the reader moves from Life to Life, he expe-
riences transmigration in a microcosmic way, entering different phenomena
and a different time, being vicariously reincarnated. So he might himself move
from life to life, being progressively reborn in a chronological order. Individual
events are subordinate to the exercise of “virtue” (arete) in each reincarnation.
In the general composition of the Lives, one oscillates between two blocks
of time, one for the “glory that was Greece,” another for the “grandeur that
was Rome.” At times the two paths cross, as in the Lives of Flamininus and
Philopoimen, but this is the exception which proves the rule. Generally a
rather large temporal distance divides the two protagonists, such as the 4th–
3rd centuries bc, in which Demetrios operated, and the 1st century bc in which
Antony lived. In the light of regeneration, however, temporal distancing is a
necessity.
The manner of dividing a récit into two distinct but interacting units is one
of the earliest features of Greek literature, already operative in the Homeric
poems, especially in the Iliad. The discussions of the gods above alternate
with and determine human events below. The gods have little use for the a-
temporality of the Platonic Forms.6 They drink, eat, and, whether tired or not,
retire to their couches to enjoy the pleasures of Aphrodite. Thus, their existence
resembles the cyclical temporality of the heavenly bodies. At the same time,
they experience human time. They observe and enter into the general narrative
of the war. And there is progression within their own society, even if largely
mental or emotional. Certain decisions are made, certain compromises and
agreements are decided upon, and they become aware of mistakes or impasses.
They must habituate themselves to an unpleasant decision or outcome. But
because they are free of the imperative of death, they can view human events
with more detachment. They do deeply empathize with the human condition.
They can show anxiety, for example, as does Here before the threats of her
consort Zeus, the wielder of the thunderbolt. But they do not like the human
protagonists face the prospect of declining powers, fading beauty, old age, and
death.
6 According to J. Whittaker, “The ‘Eternity’ of the Platonic Forms,” Phronesis 13 (1968) 131–
144—though contested by Sorabji, Time, Creation and the Continuum, 105–107—the Forms
exist forever, but without being given non-duration by Plato. Aristotle’s god, however, clearly
has eternal duration (Sorabji, 127). On the other hand, in the new and radical solution of
Augustinus, past, present, and future are nothing more than mental states (Sorabji, 29). Some
of the Stoic positions seem to foreshadow “imaginary time;” see S.W. Hawking, A Brief History
of Time. From the Big Bang to Black Holes (New York, 1988) 136–141.
narrative 205
In De genio, the philosophical discussion remains somewhat independent

of the anxieties of the acting conspirators, but still parallels it. The progres-
sion of the dialogue is positive, leading to an appreciation of virtue and its
reward in the next life, and understanding of divine guidance awarded vir-
tuous men. Sokrates in the eyes of many came to a wretched end. But in the
eyes of Middle Platonism, his death only liberated him for the ascent into
higher regions and, presumably, final purification and the vision. Readers of
Plutarch’s other dialogues would surmise that eventually Sokrates’ soul (psy-
che) would be separated from his intellect (nous), and as pure intelligence he
would enter the divine sphere, beyond the vicissitudes and temporality of the
human and daimonic worlds. Simultaneously, the outcome of the philosophi-
cal discussion harmonizes with that of the historical events. Though related in a
gripping way, with anxious moments and unexpected complications, and with
the interventions of chance, the final pages provide a felicitous ending, “all’s
well that end’s well.” The termination of the dialogue, then, is almost the oppo-
site of the tragic or semi-tragic endings of most Plutarchan biographies. Though
debated recently, one could argue as well that the anxieties of the participants
were unwarranted, since behind the apparent “illegibility” of the human flow
of events was the guidance of the daimones.7 The daimones, souls who once
engaged in the human endeavor, like former athletes, run along the course,
encouraging the others from the sidelines, or like swimmers who have reached
the shore, stretch out a hand to those still struggling in the waves.
In the Antonios, Plutarch employs another scheme of two different temporal
modes. Antony, like all mortals, races against the clock. He must take advantage
of the moment in an historical world where “timing is everything.” Supposedly,
for narratology, travelling is the supreme expression of temporality.8 Antony,
like Demetrios, is always on the move, if not actually fleeing. For most of the
7 D. Babut, “La part du rationalisme dans la religion de Plutarque,” 385–386, argues for a great
amount of rationalism in the dialogue, and notes that mention is never made of direct
divine intervention in the course of the historical events. However, Plutarch may have been
following genres, as in the case of Moralia in contrast to Lives. Moralia allows a great amount
of supernatural interference, while the Lives tend to omit it altogether or speak in rather
general terms, such as “seeing that the daimonion did not wish,” etc. But Plutarch surely
must have intended the reader to believe that during the revolution at least Epameinondas
was guided by the supernatural. Moreover, it is difficult to believe that the discourse of the
rationalist Galaxidoros is on the same level as those of the Pythagoreans, even if Plutarch did
not necessarily endorse one particular view, or all of them. [en: See, however, the volume
edited by A.G. Nikolaïdis, (ed.), The Unity of Plutarch’s Work: Moralia Themes in the Lives.
Features of the Lives in the Moralia (Berlin; New York: de Gruyter, 2008).]
8 So M. Bettini, “ ‘In cammino’: riflessioni di antropologia letteraria,” in idem, Antropologia
final part of the biography events are beyond his control, as he becomes the
victim of a runaway destiny. Thus, the récit of human events suggests little
respite from the incessant press of events. In De genio, the rather dispassionate
inquiry of the participants into the “supernatural” of Sokrates offered a striking
paradox, with the preoccupations of conspirators devastated or elated by every
rumor. But in Antonios, the “quiet scenes” often reveal the same sense of inqui-
etude and abandonment to the phenomenal, the same entrapment, perhaps
even the same death urge, as ultimately appears in the more active scenes on
the public stage of politics and military campaigning. Antonios’ vice is the mor-
tal sin of Platonism, to be so enmeshed in the phenomena of this world and, in
particular, to be so tossed by every wind of passion as to leave no moment for
contemplation of one’s true destiny.
But before examining the contrasts between active and quiet scenes, we
should consider the simplicity of the biography’s chronological structure. What
is most striking is the straightforward manner of the telling, without many
ellipses (gaps), or analepses (flashbacks), though it is characterized by the alter-
nation of non-military “quiet” scenes with those of rapid and tempestuous
military engagements. For example, Plutarch dispenses with Antony’s origins
in one chapter. Except for his being reared by a stepfather, Cornelius Lentulus,
nothing is said of his childhood. His youth up to the campaign with Gabinius
takes another chapter. Thus, the first 25 or 28 years of the hero’s life are covered
in only two chapters.9 The campaign in Palestine and Egypt (57–54bc) is dis-
missed in one chapter. The next nine years are compressed into another four
and a half chapters of historical narration. However, two chapters of reflection
on Antony’s character create the psychological effect of elongating the narrat-
ing of the historical events of these years. The psychological or “Kallimachean”
time of the Life is evident from the narration of events preceding the murder
of Caesar and its aftermath, a very short period in real life (“narrative” or “story
time”) but occupying five chapters in the Life (“narration” or “discourse time”).
e cultura romana. Parentela, tempo, immagini dell’anima (Rome, 1986) 144–152, citing (146)
Seneca, De breuitate uitae 3.2. R. Barthes, The Semiotic Challenge (New York, 1988) 212 (=
idem, L’ aventure sémiologique [Paris, 1985] 184), without mentioning Ricœur, notes that
contemporary researchers give primacy to logic over chronology, vs. Propp, who argued for
the irreducibility of the chronological order; Cf. C. Bremond, “Logique du récit,” Collection
Poétique (Paris, 1973) 30, note 1, supporting Propp against C. Lévi-Strauss, “La structure et la
forme,” Cahiers de l’ Institut de Science Économique Appliquée 99 (1960) 3–36 (29).
9 The year of his birth is unknown. Plutarch’s sources gave either fifty-six or fifty-three years
old at his death in 30 bc (86). Pelling, Life of Antony, 322–323, gives evidence for preferring
fifty-three.
narrative 207
The narration then speeds up slightly to cover the defeat of the tyrannicides (six
chapters). Another chapter (23) brings us to 41 bc. Then eight chapters are ded-
icated primarily to the private, or semi-public, life of Antony, before the defeat
of Sextus Pompeius and the termination of the disastrous Parthian Campaign
(36 bc).
The Parthian Campaign, though quite brief in Antony’s real life, consumes
an enormous amount of narration time, though there is an interlude in 35
with Octavia’s distress and the pact at Tarentum, and in 36 with a reflection on
Antony’s passion for Kleopatra. The Parthian Campaign of 36 bc, slows down
the récit, with fifteen chapters dedicated to the military events of the cam-
paign, and one chapter to its aftermath. An interlude takes place in 53, in which
Kleopatra supposedly wards off the influence of Octavia, her rival for Antony’s
affection; in 54, with the donations of Alexandria; and in 55, which details
Octavius’ propaganda campaign against the hero. The reader would probably
be oblivious to the fact that almost five years have passed by in three chap-
ters consisting largely of infighting between Octavia, Kleopatra, and Antony.
By 56 we are preparing for the battle at Actium. Suddenly the récit slows to
a snail’s pace. Time is no longer measured as much by the orderly progres-
sion of the celestial bodies, the time of Plato and Aristotle, as by the human
psyche’s perception of events, “the temporality” of Augustinus, in part because
of the momentousness of the event, but also because of the momentousness
to the hero.10 Thus, only a year slips by, though narrated in fourteen chapters.
Another five chapters concern the fighting of a single day. “Slow motion” almost
becomes “stop motion.”
A final dragging of narration time occurs in the description of the final year
at Alexandria just before Antony’s death. A total of eighteen chapters are dedi-
cated to this tragic and even lugubrious period, followed by another chapter
devoted to the Nachleben—or the Nerogonia—the destiny of Antony’s chil-
dren and grandchildren. The narration of these events contrasts strikingly with
Actium or the Parthian Campaign, récits of equal length. In this final section
the narration “decelerates” to an even greater degree to depict Kleopatra’s final
days amid threnodic swan songs. The time span is uncertain, but the impres-
sion is one of only a few days. Kleopatra’s final weeks and demise consume nine
chapters in all, a very considerable part of a Life of eighty-seven chapters, and
excepting the one-day naval encounter of Actium, the most “extended” part
10 Discussed by P. Ricoeur, Time and Narrative iii (Chicago, 1988), “The Time of the Soul and
the Time of the World: The Dispute between Augustine and Aristotle,” 12–22 (= Temps et
récit iii [Paris, 1985], “Temps de l’ âme et temps du monde: Le débat entre Augustin et
Aristote,” 19–36).
of the récit. The phenomenon is extraordinary. Even if “a queen, and a great

queen,” she emerges from the shadows of her supporting role to terminate the
Life in a manner hardly comprehensible from the paradigms of previous Lives.
2 The Unified Plot
In this narrating of the active and private lives of Antony and of the death of
Kleopatra, we find a very unified plot with each event leading into the other
and almost all extraneous matter suppressed.11 The overall impression is much
less episodic than that resulting from Demetrios where the logical connections
between events often remain mysterious. The episodes in the Roman Life all
bear on the main narrative, though some were selected primarily to illustrate
character, such as Antony’s early gallantry in the attacks on Jerusalem and
Pelousion.12
11 See R. Scholes & R. Kellog, The Nature of Narrative (New York, 1966) 207–239, esp., 214;
Genette, Figures iii, 72; Chatman, Story and Discourse, 19–22. In the unified plot all the
episodes are relevant to the narrative and have a bearing on the outcome of the events
recounted. In an episodic plot there is a rather disconnected narration. R.S. Crane, “The
Concept of Plot and the Plot of Tom Jones,” in R.S. Crane (ed.), Critics and Criticism, Ancient
and Modern (Chicago, 1952) 616–647, distinguishes three main types of episodic plot
(action, character, thought): change in situation, change of values (in the protagonist),
and change in thought and feeling. But, as in Antonios, a single narrative usually combines
several kinds of plots. Plutarch should be primarily interested in a change of values, but he
usually speaks, instead, of revelation of character. Following Aristotle’s Poetics, Chatman
speaks of plots of resolution and revelatory plots (48). Most ancient literature contains
plots of resolution, but since Plutarch’s interest is primarily biographical and ethical, in
a certain sense his plots are those of revelation. R. Barthes, s/z (New York, 1974) 17 (=
idem, Paris, 1970, 21), uses the term “hermeneutics,” functions which articulate in various
ways a question and its response, sometimes done by chance events. Chatman, Story and
Discourse, 53–56 also speaks of “kernels” (Barthes’ “noyaux”)—narrative moments which
give rise to cruxes, the branching points upon which the structure rides, e.g., Achilleus
giving up Briseis—and “satellites,” minor non-crucial events which entail no choice but
depict the consequences of choices made in the kernels.
12 Pelling, Life of Antony, 33–36, notes how Plutarch reshaped episodes, moved stories to
different contexts, or transferred them from one person to another, how he exaggerated
and simplified, borrowed from stereotypes, fabricated details (even perhaps inventing
a major river and a range of hills), conflated events, and otherwise took great liberties,
much like a novelist. At the same time, he avoids total fabrication; for example, he did not
construct an imaginary boyhood for Antony. See also, C.B.R. Pelling, “Truth and Fiction in
Plutarch’s Lives,” in A.D. Russel (ed.), Antonine Literature (Oxford, 1990) 19–53, esp. 38.
narrative 209
Plutarch almost scrupulously avoids foreshadowing and flashback (prolepsis

and analepsis). One exception occurs in the narration of Antony’s stay at
Leuke after the Parthian defeat (51). Before narrating the arrival of Kleopatra,
he mentions Antony’s campaign of revenge against the Armenians, and the
triumph over Artavasdes celebrated in Alexandria in 34 bc, two years later.
This dislocation is caused by Plutarch’s desire to communicate how Antony
responded to his troops’ demands to punish the “Armenian,” and, perhaps, by
the technical benefit of squeezing the later invasion and triumph into minimal
narration space. The chapter ends with the self-conscious “but all this took
place at a later date.”
Short analepses occur elsewhere. In 35 we first learn of Antony’s two daugh-
ters by Octavia, though they were born sometime before. In 54 (5) an analepsis
conveys the information that Antony “was hated, too, because of the donations
made to his children in Alexandria,” and another flashback mentioning the
birth of Caesarion leads us back to Kleopatra’s pregnancy, through Caesar. How-
ever, these analepses do not constitute an extended narrative, or a flashback in
the full sense. The description of the Battle of Actium, however, is an exception
to the rule. Plutarch first describes the flight of Antony, his boarding Kleopa-
tra’s ship, and their arrival at Tainaron. He then reverses himself, narrating the
situation of the fleet at Actium, “which held out for a long time” (68.1), the sur-
render of the fleet and the army after seven days, and the flight of Canidius.
Next comes Octavius’ arrival in Athens, during which Plutarch injects another
analepsis, his grandfather’s story of how the Chaironeians were forced under
the whip to transport grain to Antony’s ships.
Similarly, after Antony’s death in chapters 76–77, Kleopatra’s attempted sui-
cide, and “Caesar’s” entry into Alexandria with the philosopher Areios (80),
several events are narrated, including the fate of Antony’s sons, the vengeance
on the slave who betrayed Antyllus (81), and the execution of Caesarion (82).
The temporal sequence for Antyllus’ death is uncertain. Caesarion clearly was
murdered after Kleopatra’s death. The reason for this foreshadowing is puz-
zling and its appearance is rather obtrusive. Some suspense, though, is created
for Kleopatra’s death, as well as an atmosphere of inexorability, since even
the innocent are slain. Finally, the time frame is broken by analepsis in 86 to
explain Kleopatra’s death by the asp, and by foreshadowing later at 87, through
the Nachleben, the genealogy of Antony’s descendants to Nero. However, these
exceptions prove the rule that analepsis or prolepsis is minimal, economically
designed to insert “background information”. The Nachleben ironically sug-
gests the ending of those Euripidean dramas which play with the audience’s
perception of a future which in fact belongs to the fantastic and legendary
past.
The fleeting character of Antony’s life is characterized by his constant move-

ments, as it was for Demetrios. The military-political narration of Antony’s
life, in particular, is marked by urgency and flight. Travelling and, above all,
flight underscores the brevity, fragility, and temporality of human life.13 At first
Antony profits from his accelerated movements. Later, losing control of events
and frittering away his opportunities, flight becomes not only a mode of tem-
porary salvation, but also an escape from reality. Plutarch skillfully laces his
account with premonitions of this phenomenon long before the ultimate catas-
trophe.
Antony arrives on the stage in a vigorous state of attack. He begins glori-
ously as a young officer on the Palestinian and Egyptian campaigns of Gabinius.
Like Patroklos in the Iliad, he mounts the highest fortifications at Jerusalem,
and, more successfully than his model, drives Aristoboulos from the walls,
initiates battle, and turns the king to flight. In Gaza he arrives with his cav-
alry, occupies a narrow pass, takes Pelousion, and assures Gabinius’ victory (3).
Plutarch devotes much to this aspect of Antony’s career and relatively little to
the campaign at Philippi, possibly to underscore the effect of initial success
followed by decline. Antony thus contrasts dramatically with Demetrios, who
starts badly (also in Egypt), but wins great success at Kypriote Salamis before
disintegration begins. Other chapters reflect this aspect of relentless move-
ment. In chapter 5 Antony is driven from the Senate by the consul Lentulus.
In 7, while fleeing the ships of Pompeius Magnus, he remarkably escapes the
galleys of the enemy, but then is carried along by forces out of his control (7.4–
5):
καὶ γενόμενος καταφανὴς τοῖς πολεμίοις καὶ διωκόμενος, τὸν μὲν ἐκ τούτων
κίνδυνον διέφυγε, λαμπροῦ νότου κῦμα μέγα … ἐκφερόμενος δὲ ταῖς ναυσὶ πρὸς
κρημνοὺς καὶ φάραγγας ἀγχιβαθεῖς …
Being discovered by the enemy and pursued, he escaped the danger from
them, since a violent Notos brought a heavy swell … but he was carried
with his ships toward cliffs and precipices running deep into the sea.
After running, though not fleeing, at the Lupercalia in 12, he gets a foretaste
of his Parthian campaign in 17. Following the Battle of Mutina, while escaping
13 Plutarch, De E, following Herakleitos, claims that it is impossible to lay hold twice of any
substance in a permanent state; it is alway “coming and going” (πρόσεισι καὶ ἄπεισιν) 392c;
cf. 392ef.
narrative 211
the forces of Hirtius and Pansa, he is reduced to the most dire straits of exhaus-
tion and hunger (17.3–6):
Φεύγοντι δ’ Ἀντωνίῳ πολλὰ συνέπιπτε τῶν ἀπόρων, ὁ δὲ λιμὸς ἀπορώτατον

… ἀπὸ τρυφῆς τοσαύτης καὶ πολυτελείας ὕδωρ τε πίνων διεφθαρμένον εὐκό-
λως καὶ καρποὺς ἀγρίους καὶ ῥίζας προσφερόμενος. ἐβρώθη δὲ καὶ φλοιὸς
ὡς λέγεται, καὶ ζῴων ἀγεύστων πρότερον ἥψαντο τὰς Ἄλπεις ὑπερβάλλον-
τες.
Upon Antonius fleeing, many difficulties fell; famine was the most ines-
capable … after such a life of extravagance and luxury, content to be
drinking foul water and eating wild fruit and roots. Bark was also eaten,
supposedly, and they laid their hands on animals never tasted before—
while traversing the Alps.
In chapter 33, he is rather implausibly driven to flight by the pronouncement of

an Egyptian seer who advises him to put the greatest possible distance between
his daimon and that of “Caesar,” and he quickly departs from Rome.
Two of the most important events of the Life, the Parthian Campaign and
the Battle of Actium, become, essentially, tales of movement and flight. The
first of these is upon the terra firma, the second over the water of the sea, a
symbol of instability and endless motion. The récit of the Parthian campaign
is especially impressive for the amount of space dedicated to the anabasis, the
retreat, in contrast to the katabasis, the invasion or inward march. Even if the
retreat was more eventful psychologically, the distance covered by Antony’s
army in the advance was the same. But in the narration beginning at chapter 38,
only two chapters are devoted to the advance, while twelve account for the
more critical and dramatic retreat. Antony himself had no illusions. The hero
remarks that the Parthians must restore the captured standards “lest he be
thought altogether satisfied with reaching safety” (40.6).
Obviously, Antony’s most memorable flight is his ignominious turning tail
at Actium, when the Queen hoists her sails for Egypt (66.8):
οὐ γὰρ ἔφθη τὴν ἐκείνης ἰδὼν ναῦν ἀποπλέουσαν, καὶ πάντων ἐκλαθόμενος, καὶ
προδοὺς καὶ ἀποδρὰς τοὺς ὑπὲρ αὐτοῦ μαχομένους καὶ θνῄσκοντας, εἰς πεντήρη
μεταβάς, Ἀλεξᾶ τοῦ Σύρου καὶ Σκελλίου μόνων αὐτῷ συνεμβάντων, ἐδίωκε τὴν
ἀπολωλεκυῖαν ἤδη καὶ προσαπολοῦσαν αὐτόν.
For he wasted no time once he saw her ship sailing away, then oblivious
of everything else, betraying and running away from those fighting and
dying on his behalf … hastened after the woman who had already ruined
him and would bring additional ruin.14
Plutarch underscores the temporal urgency: Antony “hastens” (ἐδίωκε) after

the woman who had already ruined him and would ruin him even more. He
sits down in silence, holding his head in his hands, and is carried along. Only
the attack of Eurykies attempting to avenge his father’s death at the hands
of Antony rouses the hero to defend himself. His cowardliness is contrasted
with the valor of the fleet, which continued fighting for a “long time” and
surrendered “only when damaged by the high seas, and at the tenth hour,” and
by that of the army, which “held together for seven days” (68.1, 68.4). The final
portent signaling an end of supernatural aid in the affairs of this world is a
mysterious Dionysiac thiasos which abandons Alexandria (75). In 76 Antony,
an anti-Hektor, retires into the City for the last time.
3 The Episodic Plot
The account of the hero’s “private life” is at least partially episodic.15 The
presumed intention of these vignettes is to reveal character through the small
traits which offer a great revelation of the soul.16 Nevertheless, there is a definite
14 Following Pelling’s text which rejects Ziegler’s conjecture: τὴν ⟨ἑαυτὴν⟩ ἀπολωλεκυῖαν.
15 Scholes & Kellog, The Nature of Narrative, 208–210, give as examples of the episodic plot
Gilgamesh and Beowulf.
16 In modern terminology, one finds “dynamic” and “static” characters, “flat” or “round;” but
Chatman proposes a distinction between “trait” and “habit” (119–134). A “trait” is “a great
system of interdependent habits,” and a “habit” is a tendency to repeat regularly the same
action, gesture, or words in similar circumstances. As Chatman, Story and Discourse, 122–
123, notes—and his point is very pertinent for the Lives—some habits can be inconsistent
with a trait. Plutarch’s minor characters are generally rather “flat” as is the almost invisible
Octavius in Antonios. Plutarch describes Kleopatra as very complex, and her actions
correspond to this complexity, in spite of his propagandistic sources and influences. The
Russian Formalists and French Structuralists tried to go beyond the surface of characters
and elaborated a system of “functions” (V. Propp, Morphologie du conte russe [Paris, 1966]);
or “actants” (A.-J. Greimas, Sémantique structurale. Recherche de méthode [Paris, 1966]
192–195). For comments see R. Scholes, Structuralism in Literature. An Introduction (New
Haven, 1974) 104–117; J. Culler, Structuralist Poetics. Structuralism, Linguistics and the Study
of Literature (London, 1985); R.M. Polzin, “Biblical Structuralism: Method and Subjectivity
in the Study of Ancient Texts,” Semeia Supplements 5 (Philadelphia, 1977). For a semiotic
approach see P. Hamon, “Pour un statut sémiologique du personnage,” in R. Barthes,
narrative 213
progression. In De genio the philosophical part contains an optimistic view of

the fate of the virtuous soul, an exposition which progresses in stages through
the contributions of the participants. Thus, the semi-static discussion parallels
the optimistic plot of the “phenomenal” events, the liberation of Thebes. So
in Antonios, the more static part, the semi-private life of Antony, contains
its own progression and inner dynamic, which parallels the hero’s disastrous
course in the political and military world. Though rather episodic, this plot line
has a strong temporal dimension, because the relationships change between
the major characters in a chronological framework of political alliances and
wars.
Overtly Antony is eventually overcome by passion, above all by his love for
Kleopatra, but also by drink, and in more general terms, dissolution and neglect
of duty. This development is rather complex, especially in view of the previ-
ous Life, where Demetrios simply drinks himself to death in his forced (and
enforced) retirement. The Life begins with Antony’s sociability and generosity,
laudable traits from his father. Drinking, womanizing, and extravagant expen-
ditures are still reformable in chapter 2, when he abandons his evil influence,
Curio. There is “method in his madness” also, since his carousing wins the
affection of his troops (4). In chapter 9 among more debauchery—women,
wine, song, and the like—his travelling companion, Cytheris, is introduced.
The description of his excursions with their display and extravagance fore-
shadows his entry later into Ephesos. In 9 he pitches tents while laying out
costly repasts near groves and rivers, abuses the hospitality of honest men
and women, and arrives in chariots drawn by lions. Much later, at Ephesos
(24), he arrives like Bacchos—who in some accounts and representations is
famous for his panther chariot—and is surrounded by actors and pests (24.4–
5):
εἰς γοῦν Ἔφεσον εἰσιόντος αὐτοῦ, γυναῖκες μὲν εἰς Βάκχας, ἄνδρες δὲ καὶ παῖ-
δες εἰς Σατύρους καὶ Πᾶνας ἡγοῦντο διεσκευασμένοι, κιττοῦ δὲ καὶ θύρσων καὶ
ψαλτηρίων καὶ συρίγγων καὶ αὐλῶν ἡ πόλις ἦν πλέα, Διόνυσον αὐτὸν ἀνακαλου-
μένων Χαριδότην καὶ Μειλίχιον. ἦν γὰρ ἀμέλει τοιοῦτος ἐνίοις, τοῖς δὲ πολλοῖς
Ὠμηστής …
Coming into Ephesos, at any rate, women dressed like Bacchai, and men
and boys like Satyrs and Pans proceeded him, and of ivy and thyrsos
W.C. Booth, P. Hamon, & W. Kayser, Poétique du récit (Paris, 1977) 115–180. Cf. Chatman,
Story and Discourse, 15–17.
wands and harps and pan-pipes and flutes the city was full, the people
hailing him as Dionysos, Giver of Joy and Beneficent. He was, indeed, to
some, but to the greater part, the Carnivorous and Savage …
The animalistic images in 9 contribute to the “carnivorous and savage” aspect

of Antony-Dionysos, developed in 24. In 36 Antony is again associated with the
animalistic. He is an example of Plato’s stubborn and unmanageable soul, like
a horse kicking against the traces and resisting all that was noble and saving.
Even so, for a considerable time, Antony exploits such revels for political advan-
tage, without incurring the wrath of his biographer. The image of procession
and movement in the rather episodic and “revelatory” plot that of his private
life, parallels the campaigns and flight in the military-political plot. Antony, like
his divine model, Dionysos, is always on the move. His entry as Neos Dionysos
into Ephesos eventually contrasts with the Dionysos’ thiasos leaving Alexan-
dria: “with a great commotion, marching out through the outer gate facing
the enemy, at which point, growing loudest, it dashed out (ἐκπεσεῖν)” (75.4–
6).
Much of the beauty of Plutarch’s Lives consists in the recurrence of themes
and images, much as a symphony plays upon various motifs, reflected not
only internally within one Life but also within the paired Life, within Lives
apparently published together, or even within the entire corpus of the Lives.
As one of the latest Lives, the Antonios would be particularly rich in this type
of association.
Antony’s great vice, his eros for Kleopatra, is also framed in symbols of tem-
porality. Immediately after the entry into Ephesos, he encounters the “crowning
evil” (τελευταῖον κακόν), “waking and throwing into a bacchic frenzy (ἀναβακ-
χεύσας) many of the passions that still lay hidden and quiescent in him” (25.1).17
Kleopatra has arrived at Tarsos (26). Her debarkation by water suggests the
momentariness and impermanence of life and love—evoking the Herakleitan
mode of the fluidity of all things, the impossibility of stepping twice in the same
river, of the irreversibility of time’s processes. The phrase was seized upon by
Plutarch (De E) to contrast human life with the unchanging life of God, who
alone is Being.18 Kleopatra’s arrival via the sea, like that of Aphrodite in myth,
17 [en: E. Alexiou, “On ἀπάθεια in Plutarch’s Lives,” in M. von Baumbach, H. Köhler, &
A.M. Ritter (eds.), Mousopolos Stephanos: Festschrift für Herwig Görgemanns (Heidelberg:
Winter, 1998) 380–389.]
18 392b, 393ab. The point is underscored by A. Benjamin, “Time and Interpretation in Her-
aclitus,” in A. Benjamin (ed.), Post Structuralist Classics (London-New York, 1988) 106–131
(118–122).
narrative 215
exudes the eroticism of Euripides’ Hippolytos where water and, above all, the
sea are so intimately associated with passion. Plutarch seals this touch with
double banquets over water, one on Kleopatra’s barque, the next by Antony.
Somehow meetings and banquets by water in the Life suggest abandonment
to corruption. Earlier, Antony, Lepidus, and Octavius met “on a small island
in a river” to initiate the proscriptions, the bloodbath of friends, former asso-
ciates, and relatives (19.1). Later, in 32, banqueting on ships docked at Misenum,
Octavius, Sextus Pompeius, and Antony divide the world among them—a set-
ting which offers Sextus a temptation for murdering Octavius and Antony.19
Moreover, the banquets of Antony and Kleopatra, which at Tarsos are a symbol
of destructive eroticism, later become a symbol of satiety, neglect of duty, and
death.
Hints of Antony’s struggle against the closing vice of mortality are developed
in progression. His father dies in the prime of life (1). His stepfather Lentulus
is executed (2). Caesar is assassinated at the height of his power (14). Fulvia,
Antony’s first wife and the former wife of Clodius, who was murdered in his
prime, dies prematurely at Sikyon while sailing to join Antony (30). Antony’s
love of Antyllus, his eldest son by Fulvia, is colored by the boy’s vulnerability to
extermination by the political vultures who hover over him (57 and 71). In the
latter chapter Antyllus receives the toga virilis with the purple hem, an event
celebrated by Antony with “drinking parties and feasting” (συμπόσια καὶ κῶμοι
καὶ θαλίαι), “which occupied him for many days” (71.3). Immediately after this,
the society of the “Inimitable Livers” (Amimetobioi) is dissolved to become that
of “The Inseparable in Death” (Synapothanoumenoi) (71.4). Antyllus will be the
first of Antony’s children to be executed.
Still, Plutarch does not indulge morbidly in the heavy imagery of banquet-
ing, passion, and death that Vergil so brilliantly exploits. He even treats it lightly
at times, playing on the more external aspects of Kleopatra’s eroticism, such as
the charm of her conversation, the magic of her presence, the persuasiveness
of her discourse, the music of her voice, the deftness of her multilingualism
(27). A more ominous tone appears in the formation of the “Inimitable Liv-
ers,” the Amimetobioi, but this is capable of humorous treatment in 28. Still,
the banquets, like the processions and voyages by water, underscore the transi-
tory and exceptional rather than the normal patterns of life, even if the excep-
tional, through repetition, has become the normal. The protagonists, first for
diversion, then in a seemingly impassioned attempt to stop time, grasp at the
pleasures of this life. Nonetheless, Plutarch only mildly condemns the Antony
19 Pompeius’ honor prevents him from allowing the assassination of Antony and Octavius at
this time.
of this period. He delights in narrating a practical joke played on Antony by

Kleopatra, while the two were fishing, with no sterner criticism for Antony than
“behaving foolishly and like a boy” (30).
The gradual deterioration of the hero is underscored in chapter 37, “seeming
under the influence of drugs or enchanted, so captivated was he by Kleopatra”
(37.6). But the narrative, to the author’s credit, often jars against such gener-
alizing judgments on ethos. The hero continues to demonstrate tremendous
resiliency and energy, such as in the aftermath of the Parthian campaign, when
he captures Artavasdes, during the massive preparations for the Actium cam-
paign, or even in the battle at Alexandria, where he initially takes the offensive
(74–75). Still one cannot neglect the tell-tale signs of his approaching doom.
Fearing disaster, just before reaching salvation on the Parthian campaign (48),
he prepares a freedman to kill him. In 51, devastated by the campaign and wait-
ing for Kleopatra, he turns to alcohol to distract himself. In 53, however, his fear
that Kleopatra will commit suicide keeps him from returning to Octavia. After
his troops in Libya defect (69), only the presence of his friends prevents him
from taking his life. Perhaps not gratuitously inserted is the saying of Timon the
Misanthrope, that whoever wanted to could hang himself on his fig tree (70).
Alcoholism accompanies the suicidal tendency. The strain of self-annihi-
lation is not evident before the end of the Parthian campaign, though his early
daring at Jerusalem and Pelousion and in the war against Pompeius offers a hint
of things to come. Alcoholism, however, is a different matter. Demetrios in final
captivity looked upon alcohol as a means of escape, “unless he had convinced
himself that this was the real life” (52). Alcohol as an escape is not evident in
Antony until his arrival at Leuke Kome, while waiting for Kleopatra, in 51, after
the disastrous Parthian campaign. His alcoholism is no longer related to revelry
or courting popular favor. Very revealing is the comment at the beginning of 71,
as he learns of the defection of Judaea, the last of his allies outside Egypt (71.2–
3):
οὐ μὴν διετάραξέ τι τούτων αὐτόν, ἀλλ’ ὥσπερ ἄσμενος τὸ ἐλπίζειν ἀποτεθειμέ-

νος ἵνα καὶ τὸ φροντίζειν, τὴν μὲν ἔναλον ἐκείνην δίαιταν ἣν Τιμώνειον ὠνόμαζεν
ἐξέλιπεν, ἀναληφθεὶς δ’ ὑπὸ τῆς Κλεοπάτρας εἰς τὰ βασίλεια, πρὸς δεῖπνα καὶ
πότους καὶ διανομὰς ἔτρεψε τὴν πόλιν …
None of these things, though, disturbed him, but as if he gladly laid aside
his hopes, so as also be freed of his anxieties, he forsook his habitation
by the sea, which he called the Timoneion, after he had been received
into the palace by Kleopatra, and turned the city into a series of banquets,
drinking parties, and distributions of gifts …
narrative 217
His eating and drinking is hardly just “revelation of true character,” the sec-
ond reason alleged for Demetrios’s drinking. Rather it appears to be a natural
response to events, an inability to face life.
While at supper, just before the Battle of Alexandria, Antony, thinking about
his coming death, drinks heavily and feasts generously. This time he even
speaks of himself as a future mummy (or skeleton), who would be lying dead
on the morrow (75). Death, drinking, and feasting could hardly be more closely
linked. The final portent in his life is the departure of Dionysos, the god of wine,
from the city (75). Antony is abandoned by the god he had assimilated himself
to—so the interpretation given by Plutarch. But on a symbolic level it can be
read as the departure of the life-giving, joyous Dionysos, in which wine is the
gift of cheer and respite from troubles. Ultimately, when Antony raises the final
cup to his lips, the wine serves to speed death rather than to affirm life (77.6–
7):
καταπαύσας δὲ τὸν θρῆνον αὐτῆς Ἀντώνιος ᾔτησε πιεῖν οἶνον, εἴτε διψῶν, εἴτε
συντομώτερον ἐλπίζων ἀπολυθήσεσθαι. πιὼν δὲ παρῄνεσεν αὐτῇ … μάλιστα …
Προκληΐῳ πιστεύουσαν …
But stopping her lamentations, Antonius asked for a drink of wine, either
thirsty, or hoping for a more speedy dissolution from this life. When
he had drunk he advised her … to put most confidence in Procleius
…
In the synkrisis Plutarch surprisingly condemns Antony for a suicide that was
“cowardly, pitiful, and ignoble” (6). But in the narration, immediately following
his last words in 77, he faces death rather heroically, wanting no tears and
advising Kleopatra (77.7):
… αὐτὸν δὲ μὴ θρηνεῖν ἐπὶ ταῖς ὑστάταις μεταβολαῖς, ἀλλὰ μακαρίζειν ὧν ἔτυχε

καλῶν, ἐπιφανέστατος ἀνθρώπων γενόμενος καὶ πλεῖστον ἰσχύσας, καὶ νῦν οὐκ
ἀγεννῶς Ῥωμαῖος ὑπὸ Ῥωμαίου κρατηθείς.
… not to lament him for his last reverses but to count him blessed for the
good things that fortune brought, having become the most illustrious of
men and having exercised supreme power, now not ignobly, a Roman by
a Roman conquered.
Nor is Antony exactly Kleopatra’s slave. In 51, after the arrival at Leuke Kome,
he drinks heavily and springs constantly to his feet in expectation of her arrival.
But she brings clothing and money. At Actium he chooses a naval battle to
please Kleopatra (62, 63). When she, turning traitor, hoists sail, he scurries after,
thus clearly proving (66.7):
… τὴν ψυχὴν τοῦ ἐρῶντος ἐν ἀλλοτρίῳ σώματι ζῆν—ἑλκόμενος ὑπὸ τῆς γυναι-
κὸς ὥσπερ συμπεφυκὼς καὶ συμμεταφερόμενος.
… the soul of a lover lives in another’s body, being dragged along by the
woman as if grown together and carried along.
But though “the nineteen legions of undefeated men-at-arms and twelve thou-
sand horsemen” hold out for seven days, the commanders, including Canidius,
who argued so firmly for a land battle, have already deserted. Antony’s suicide is
triggered by the false news of Kleopatra’s death. His motive is that “she was the
only remaining excuse for being attached to life.” This could be interpreted as
part of the “Inseparable in Death” motif, but in fact Plutarch’s narrative implic-
itly and the synkrisis explicitly (93) leave him little choice but death. Most
certainly he would have been executed.
The “episodic” plot, therefore, is not a flat portrait of an Antony mastered by
lust and liquor, but a complex and baffling depiction of character. At the ter-
mination of the Life the reader perhaps surrenders to the mystery of human
nature.20 But the reader also surrenders to the brilliance of a biographer who
did not suppress inconsistencies with his overt analysis of the hero’s charac-
ter.21
20 Recent critical theories devote much attention to the reader. Reader-Response Criticism
uses terms such as “implied author,” “real author,” “narrator”—“narratee,” “implied reader,”
“real reader,” and the involvement of the reader in an active reading. One of the main rep-
resentatives is W. Iser, The Act of Reading. A Theory of Aesthetic Response (Baltimore, 1978)
(= idem, Der Akt des Lesens. Theorie ästhetischer Wirkung [Munich, 1976, rev., 1984]). See in
particular chapter iii, “Phenomenology of Reading,” 107–159, and iv, “Interaction between
Text and Reader,” 163–232. A summary of positions can be found in W. Schlotthaus, “Condi-
tioning Factors of Textual Understanding,” in D. Meutsch and R. Viehoff (eds.), Comprehen-
sion of Literary Discourse. Results and Problems of Interdisciplinary Approaches, Research
in Text Theory (Berlin / New York, 1989) 74–88 (76–78). Critics speak of three reading
positions: “reader-elevating” (the reader knows more than the characters), “character ele-
vating” (the character knows more than the reader), and “evenhanded.” Plutarch’s Lives
pose a problem, since educated readers should have known the general history and its
outcome before reading the Lives, but often the reader would be in the same position as
the character.
21 Critics are also concerned with the “reader’s interest.” W.C. Booth, The Rhetoric of Fiction
narrative 219
Besides the “episodic” narrating of Antony’s life, the subplots deserve con-
sideration. One is the career of Kleopatra. The other is the rise of the young
Octavius, or Octavianus—called “Caesar” by Plutarch—the future Augustus.
In the Lives, the rival often emerges at the end, surveying the battlefield, the
hero’s downfall, and even his corpse. In the Antonios, though, even the most
private sphere is invaded by the newcomer. Alexandria, once a counterpoint to
Antony’s distant battles, now witnesses the hero’s final stand near his beloved.
Later, Octavius supplants Antony as the most important Roman in Kleopatra’s
life, entering the sphere, if not the space of her private life.
A Life, begun like history, begins to transform itself into something ap-
proaching modern biography. The contrast with Demetrios is striking. Deme-
trios has 53 chapters, Antonios has 87, more than any other of Plutarch’s Lives.
In chapter 49 of the first Life, Demetrios having fought his last battle, is pre-
vented from suicide by his friends, as is Antony later. Only three chapters cover
Demetrios’ life from surrender to death, the point reached in Antonios 76. But
in Antonios, the four previous chapters are devoted largely to the hero’s private
life. The eleven extra chapters are an enormous expansion over the Demetrios.
One suspects the influence of the Greek romance, or at least its ingredients. In
any case Plutarch seems to be composing a new genre of historical biography.
An unprecedented aspect for a Plutarchan Life is the change of protagonists.
Antony is already dead in 77. One or two chapters should wind up the skein.
Instead, Kleopatra, already a prominent actor in the previous chapters, now
suddenly occupies center stage. For almost ten chapters she serves as the
focal point.22 Her death in 86, not that of Antony—which is followed by the
(Chicago, 1961, rev. 1983) 125–136, speaks of “intellectual” or “cognitive” (eager to have the
facts, or the truth about life itself), “qualitative” (a strong desire to see a pattern, or further
development completed), and “practical” or “human” (a strong desire for the success or
failure of those we love or hate, or the hope of a change in character), corresponding to the
search for truth, beauty, and goodness. The first kind relates to Sternberg’s “historiographic
and ideological interests” and the second to his “aesthetic interest” (Chatman, Story and
Discourse, 41–42). Much of the fascination of Plutarch’s Lives probably results from the
interaction of all these factors. Barthes, s/z, 10–12, speaks of the plurality of codes with
which the reader approaches a text, but with meanings established not by the reader or
others but by the “systematic mark.”
22 Pelling, Life of Antony, 294, notes how unusual Kleopatra’s role is for a Plutarchan Life. Pos-
sibly the Life at this point is heavily influenced either by already existing Greek romances
or by the literary currents that produced them. The Isis motif, which enters strongly into
these final scenes, is frequently found in the Greek novel; cf. G. Anderson, Ancient Fic-
tion. The Novel in the Graeco-Roman World (London, 1984) 75–87, 144–145, 198–201; and
T. Hägg, The Novel in Antiquity (Berkeley, 1983) (= idem, Den Antika Romanen [Uppsala,
genealogy leading to Nero, but which also includes a daughter of Kleopatra—

terminates the Life. The extent of this narration is unparalleled in Plutarch.
If Antonios is the last Life, surely an excellent place to stop, he ends with a
flourish.
The other startling phenomenon for a Plutarchan Life is the rise of Octavius.
The villain does not arrive precisely in the final scene, and in any case, Antony,
not Octavius, is supposed to be the “villain.” In chapter 19 Octavius is present
to initiate the proscriptions. In 32, at the dinner on Sextus Pompeius’ ship at
Misenum, “Caesar” is also present. But only Antony and Pompeius speak, while
Octavius remains a shadow. “Caesar” is frightened at the rapidity of Antony’s
preparations for Actium and is malicious in opening the hero’s will, deposited
with the Vestal Virgins (58). He is still a venal, shadowy figure in 74, anxious to
lay his hands on Kleopatra’s treasure. In 75, in answer to Antony’s challenge
to a duel, Octavius finally speaks, a snide comment that Antony might find
many better ways to die. From 78 on, he replaces Antony as the counterpart
to Kleopatra, even if generally operating through intermediaries. Finally in
83, he becomes a principal actor, refuting Kleopatra’s arguments, and pleased
with her apparent desire to live. In 85 Octavius opens the tablet serving as her
suicide letter, and though irked by her death, admires her noble spirit (εὐγένεια,
86.7). The last words recorded are neither those of Antony nor Kleopatra, but
of “Caesar,” who grants her honorable burial and generously saves her statues
from destruction.
4 Point of View
From whose viewpoint does Plutarch narrate the Life? Recently the “point of
view” in narratological studies has aroused controversy. The question “Who
sees or perceives?” (the center of perception) is different from the question
1980] = idem, Eros and Tyche. Der Roman in der antiken Welt [Mainz, 1987]) 26–32, 86–87,
101–103, 182–183. [en: J. Beneker, The Theme of Erotic Love in Plutarch’s Late-Republican Lives
(The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: 2003); E.L. Bowie, “Poetry and Music in
the Life of Plutarch’s Statesman,” in De Blois (ed.), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works, 115–
123; J. Beneker, The Passionate Statesman: Eros and Politics in Plutarch’s Lives (Oxford; New
York: Oxford University Press, 2012); M. Tröster, Themes, Character, and Politics in Plutarch’s
Life of Lucullus: the Construction of a Roman Aristocrat (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 2008);
M.A. Beck, “The story of Damon and the ideology of euergetism in the Lives of Cimon and
Lucullus,” Hermathena 182 (2007) 53–69; P. Gómez Cardó, “Laconismo como virtud en la
Atenas del s. v a.C.: a propósito de la Vida de Cimón de Plutarco,” Myrtia 22 (2007) 69–81.]
narrative 221
“Who is the narrator?”23 The narrator may in fact relate events from the per-
spective of one or several characters. One basic classification is “internal” or
“external point of view.” If the narrator is the hero or heroine, the point of view
is ordinarily internal. Such a point of view is extremely rare in the Antonios. If
the point of view is that of the omniscient narrator, the point of view is ordinar-
ily external/ internal. But the omniscient narrator, the narrator par excellence
in the Lives, can also enter into his characters’ minds. In this case, the viewpoint
is internal, even though the viewpoint remains his own. In general, ancient lit-
erature prefers the external viewpoint.24
Another categorization delineates three major “perspectives” or “focaliza-
tions:” “from without” (corresponding to “external point of view” or “focaliza-
tion”), “vision with”—accompanying a person and seeing and feeling what he
perceives—and “vision from behind”—where the narrator “spies” on his char-
acters and reveals their inner thoughts or motivations. This point of view also
called “zero focalization,” “non-focalized narrative,” or “wide angle” is frequent
in classical narratives. In external focalization the narrator reveals less than the
character knows; in internal focalization, only what the character knows; and
in zero focalization, more than any character can know. Often the shift is indi-
cated by a character speaking to himself, something used rarely by Plutarch,
or by “free indirect discourse,” used quite frequently in the Lives.25 Some crit-
ics prefer to speak of a shift “in” point of view rather than a shift “of” point of
view. The point of view remains that of the omniscient narrator, but he enters
into the minds of his protagonists. Though the narrator sees through the eyes
of the character, the latter does not determine the perspective or focalization
of the entire narrative.26 Real internal point of view is very rare in the Anto-
23 Genette, Figures iii, 203–211 (English transl., 185–211); idem, “Nouveau discours du récit,”
Collection Poétique (Paris, 1983) 43; Chatman, Story and Discourse, 196–262; W. Kayser, “Qui
raconte le roman?,” in R. Barthes (ed.), Poétique du récit, 59–84; Barthes, The Semiotic
Challenge, 122–126; P. Pugliatti, “Lo sguardo nel racconto: Teorie e prassi del punto di vista,”
Critica Letteraria Contemporanea 3 (Bologna, 1985) 26–32; Booth, 149–165.
24 Genette, Figures iii, 204 (English, 186), Scholes and Kellog, The Nature of Narrative, 175–
176.
25 On the major perspectives, see Genette, Figures iii, 205–211 (with more precision in idem,
Nouveau discours, 43–52); Marchese, L’officina del racconto, 157–168. The classifications are
due to J. Pouillon, “Temps et roman,” La jeune philosophie 3 (Paris, 1946) and T. Todorov,
“Les catégories du récit littéraire,” Communications 8 (1966) 125–151. Genette uses a new
terminology for them: “focalization,” instead of “vision,” “aspect,” or “point of view.”
26 The external point of view of the omniscient narrator becomes internal when he restricts
his perspective to a protagonist’s thoughts or vision and enters the realm of the character’s
nios. Characters are astoundingly mute in the Lives. Perhaps Plutarch felt that
the free invention of speeches would undermine the credibility of a biograph-
ical account, which usually has rather shaky sources to begin with. He has no
complexes, though, when it comes to interpreting the motives or psychological
reactions of his characters.
Antony’s own words are very limited. In 4 he defends his generosity. In 23
he disparages the council house (bouleuterion) of the Megarians. In 45, strug-
gling through the middle of Asia he exclaims again and again “O the Ten
Thousand!”—“thereby expressing admiration for Xenophon’s army …” (and
somehow sharing Plutarch’s faith in parallelism).27 Fleeing Actium in 67,
Antony demands the name of Eurykles, the pursuer trying to avenge his father’s
murder. Quite surprising, then, is Antony’s lament over his own timidity when
he discovers that Kleopatra had preceded him in death, a feigned death as it
later proved to be, and after this, the similar complaint about his servant, Eros
(76). The statements in 4 and 23 resemble those of famous generals and states-
men, the apophthegmata. His remark in 67 is trivial but reveals the devastation
already done to Antony’s psyche. The exclamation in 45 strikes one as the reflec-
tion of the narrator rather than a personal statement by Antony. Thus, in 76
his inner reflection on Kleopatra’s supposed suicide attracts attention. But is it
mere theater, a set-piece, or a real revelation of character? Despite Plutarch’s
lavish praise of Kleopatra as an exciting and enchanting conversationalist, he
hesitated to risk trying her out on his readership. She briefly comments on
Antony’s angling (29.7):
“παράδος ἡμῖν” ἔφη “τὸν κάλαμον αὐτόκρατορ τοῖς Φαρίταις καὶ Κανωβίταις
βασιλεῦσιν· ἡ δὲ σὴ θήρα πόλεις εἰσὶ καὶ βασιλεῖαι καὶ ἤπειροι.”
inner world (“vision with” in the terms of Pouillon). But the character does not determine
the perspective (focalization) of the entire narrative. B.A. Uspensky, A Poetics of Compo-
sition. The Structure of the Artistic Text and Typology of a Compositional Form (Berkeley,
1973) (= idem, Poetika Komposizii Struktura Khudozhestvennogo Teksta i Tipologiia Kom-
pozitsionnoi Formy [Moscow, 1970]) 8–16, studies point of view under the aspects of ideol-
ogy, phraseology, time and space, and psychology, but has been criticized for introducing
too much complexity into the different levels. B.X. De Wet, “Contemporary Sources in
Plutarch’s Life of Antony,” Hermes 118 (1990) 80–90, notes that some details in the Antonios
which reflect the hero’s viewpoint, for example at 2.2 and 10.2, are preserved nowhere else.
He believes Plutarch personally read Antony’s Replies to the Philippics, and by referring to
him as a source, sought to add authenticity to his portrayal of the hero’s character.
27 Pelling, Life of Antony, 221, believes the frequent allusions to Xenophon (37.2, 41.3, 45.12,
49.5) are Plutarch’s embellishment.
narrative 223
“Hand over to us.” she said, “the fishing pole, Imperator, to the rulers of
Pharos and Kanopos. Your sport the hunt of cities is, and kingdoms and
continents”.
Less delightfully, she darkly threatens with torture Geminius, who had been
dispatched from Rome by Antony’s friends (59). Her conduct, therefore, is
extraordinary in 83, when she actually defends herself before Octavius, and in
84, when she laments Antony’s death. Her last speech, 17 lines in the Teubner
text, must be one of the longest in the Lives.
Each phrase reveals some characteristic of Kleopatra: the witty and play-
ful nature which captivated Antony, a nasty and murderous streak, the polit-
ical wheedling of her feminine demeanor, and finally her role as a loving and
lamenting “Isis.” But the ingredients are also rather general or expected. The
last speech, with its antitheses, chiasmus, and ring composition, recalls the “set
speeches,” which were the bane of school boys, scholars, and historians (84.4–
7):
“ὦ φίλ’ Ἀντώνιε” εἶπεν “ἔθαπτον μέν σε πρώην ἔτι χερσὶν ἐλευθέραις, σπένδω δὲ
νῦν αἰχμάλωτος οὖσα καὶ φρουρουμένη μήτε κοπετοῖς μήτε θρήνοις αἰκίσασθαι
τὸ δοῦλον τοῦτο σῶμα καὶ τηρούμενον ἐπὶ τοὺς κατὰ σοῦ θριάμβους. ἄλλας δὲ
μὴ προσδέχου τιμὰς ἢ χοάς·
ἀλλ’ αὗταί σοι τελευταῖαι Κλεοπάτρας ἀγομένης. ζῶντας μὲν γὰρ ἡμᾶς οὐθὲν
ἀλλήλων διέστησε, κινδυνεύομεν δὲ τῷ θανάτῳ διαμείψασθαι τοὺς τόπους, σὺ
μὲν ὁ Ῥωμαῖος ἐνταῦθα κείμενος, ἐγὼ δ’ ἡ δύστηνος ἐν Ἰταλίᾳ, τοσοῦτο τῆς σῆς
μεταλαβοῦσα χώρας μόνον. ἀλλ’ εἰ δή τις τῶν ἐκεῖ θεῶν ἀλκὴ καὶ δύναμις—
οἱ γὰρ ἐνταῦθα προὔδωκαν ἡμᾶς—, μὴ πρόῃ ζῶσαν τὴν σεαυτοῦ γυναῖκα,
μηδ’ ἐν ἐμοὶ περιίδῃς θριαμβευόμενον σεαυτόν, ἀλλ’ ἐνταῦθά με κρύψον μετὰ
σεαυτοῦ καὶ σύνθαψον, ὡς ἐμοὶ μυρίων κακῶν ὄντων οὐδὲν οὕτω μέγα καὶ δεινόν
ἐστιν,
ὡς ὁ βραχὺς οὗτος χρόνος ὃν σοῦ χωρὶς ἔζηκα.”
“O dear Antonius.” she said, “I was burying you a little while ago with
my hands still free but now pour libations as a captive; guarded lest with
beating my breast and with lamentations, I disfigure this poor slave body,
preserved for the triumphs over you. Other honors or libations expect
not; these are the last you will receive from Kleopatra. For living, nothing
parted us, one from the other. But now here we risk in death changing
places, you a Roman lying here, and I, miserable one, in Italy, obtaining
only this much of your land. But if the gods there have some might
and power—for the gods here have betrayed us—abandon not your wife
while alive nor, in my person, overlook that you are being triumphed over,
but here, hide me with yourself; and bury me; as of the myriad ills I suffer
none so great and dire is, as this brief time which, without you, I have
lived”.
This lament, which suggests the haunting repetitions of a psalm, is quite plau-
sible.28 Though general and artificial in tone, the circumstances gain our indul-
gence. It fits Kleopatra’s unique situation and wins sympathy. But some sort
28 Pelling, Life of Antony, 316–318, believes the lament is probably original with Plutarch.
He notes that direct discourse, very sparing in Plutarch, is used for important themes
or for private affections and tragedy. Refrains are characteristic of threnody; Cf. M. Alex-
iou, The Ritual Lament in Greek Tradition (Cambridge, 1974) 134. Somewhat uncharac-
teristically, according to Pelling, Kleopatra does not dwell on the greatness of Antony,
nor curse Octavius. Pelling also sees the “bridal” theme in this lament; cf. R.A.S. Seaford,
“The Tragic Wedding,” jhs 107 (1987) 106–130; Alexiou, The Ritual Lament, 120–122. How-
ever, though Sophokles’ Antigone 1237–1241 is close: … παρθένῳ προσπτύσσεται,/ καὶ φυσιῶν
ὀξεῖαν ἐκβάλλει ῥοὴν /λευκῇ παρειᾷ φοινίου / ταλάγματος. κεῖται δὲ νεκρὸς περὶ νεκρῷ, τὰ
νυμφικὰ /τέλη λαχὼν δείλαιος εἰν Ἅιδου δόμοις. (Seaford, “The Tragic Wedding,” 120), none
of the examples given by Seaford mentions union, vs. separation in burial, the theme
of the Synapothanoumenoi. However R. Lattimore, Themes in Greek and Latin Epitaphs
(Urbana, 1942) 247–250, cites a number of examples where togetherness in death is
the principal theme. Apt are (togetherness in the tomb): Aeschylos, Choephoroi 894–
895; Sophokles, Antigone 1240–1241, Elektra 1165–1170; Euripides, Alkestis 363–368; Prop-
ertius 4.7.93–94; Ovidius, Metamorphoses 8.709–710; eglc (Kaibel) 253.5–6; 386.1–2; ig
12.7.113 (3rd cent bc); ce 68.5 (Roman Republic). None is an exact parallel to Kleopatra’s
lament, but Metamorphoses 11.698–699 (Alcyone), not mentioned by Lattimore, comes
very close: … neque enim de uitae tempore quicquam non simul egissem, nec mors discreta
fuisset. J.R. Morgan, “A Sense of the Ending: The Conclusion of Heliodoros’ Aithiopika,”
tapa 119 (1989) 299–320, studies how the Greek romance both frustrates and fulfills the
reader’s expectation, keeping the happy ending in doubt as long as possible (318). Then,
good overcomes evil, and the providence of the gods is vindicated (320). Antonios in
this sense becomes something of a romance in reverse, keeping the tragic ending in
doubt as long as possible. But like the novel, the Antonios closes with the “consumma-
tion,” but in a non-literal sense, of the novel’s principal value, true love (Cf. Morgan,
320). On endings, see also F. Kermode, The Sense of an Ending. Studies in the Theory
of Fiction (Oxford, 1967) and M. Torgovnick, Closure in the Novel (Princeton, 1981). One
might note the epic quality to the lament: like Patroklos in the Iliad (23.81–92), who
desires common burial with Achilleus, Kleopatra wishes to be buried with the hero,
Antony. Scuderi, Antonio, 117, would attribute the essentials of the lament to Olympos,
Kleopatra’s physician and a major source for Kleopatra’s last days. For the Alexandria
of the time and the tombs of Antony and others, see M.-L. Bernhard, “Topographie
narrative 225
of “inseparable in death” genre, perhaps originating in New Comedy and per-

petuating itself in the romances, probably influenced the speech.29 Her charge
of abandonment by the gods of her country, however, is unconvincing. A
person might complain that a divinity has failed him, a theme common in
funeral epigrams. Undoubtedly the abandonment of Antony by the Egyptian
gods contributed to the political propaganda in the aftermath of the war.
The statement, however, contradicts Kleopatra’s own continuing allegiance
to Isis in death, and probably her expectation after passing from this world.
The viewpoint, then, remains suspiciously aloof, objective, and propagandis-
tic.
Minor characters punctuate the narrative with short comments, ostensibly
offering a different viewpoint from Antony, but in reality usually reflecting that
of the omniscient narrator. A citizen of Asia, named Hybreas, rebukes Antony
for his exactions there (24). The cook and physician at Alexandria in 28 com-
ment unfavorably, but not harshly, on Antony’s extravagance. An exception is
Philotas, a friend of Plutarch’s grandfather, who rather gratuitously pronounces
a sophism to silence a quack doctor. Because the comment adds little to the nar-
rative, one suspects Plutarch could not overlook a story belonging to his family
tradition. Sextus Pompeius complains that the only inheritance left him is his
flagship, and later gives reasons for not murdering his guests (32). A divination
from an Egyptian soothsayer appears in 33. In 35 Octavia comments on the dif-
ficult choice between living with her brother or with her husband. A Mardian
guide gives advice on escaping the Parthians (46). In 70 Timon the Misan-
thrope, who also speaks through an epitaph, is allowed to utter two “sayings”
(chreiai), a characteristically Cynic genre. Kleopatra’s handmaid is allowed a
line, as is Procleius, the agent of Octavius (79). In 80 a Sophist whom Plutarch
disliked cites a trimeter from an unknown poet (80). Areios, the Alexandrian
philosopher, neatly twists Iliad 2.204 into a recommendation for exterminat-
ing Caesarion (81). Finally, in 85 “someone” angrily rebukes the handmaid,
Charmion, for allowing Kleopatra’s death. The latter, however, while expiring,
has the last word (85.8):
d’ Alexandrie: Le Tombeau d’ Alexandre et le Mausolée d’Auguste,” ra 47 (1956) 129–156,

esp. 143; E.G. Huzar, “Alexandria ad Aegyptum in the Julio-Claudian Age,” anrw ii.10.1
(1988) 619–668, esp., 624–631; D. Fishwick, “The Temple of Caesar at Alexandria,” ajah
9 (1984) 131–134.
29 [en: S. Xenophontos, “Comedy in Plutarch’s Parallel Lives,” grbs 52 (2012) 603–631.]
“κάλλιστα μὲν οὖν” ἔφη “καὶ πρέποντα τῇ τοσούτων ἀπογόνῳ βασιλέων.”
“Most fine indeed,” she said, “and worthy of a descendant of so many

kings”.
The statement contrasts with the alleged opinion of the omniscient narrator
but not with his generally sympathetic treatment.
The internal viewpoint frequently appears in indirect discourse or is skill-
fully inserted into the narration itself. In 16, for example, Antony is motivated
by a dream of being struck by lightning and by the news that Octavius is plot-
ting against him. An Egyptian divination about the inferiority of his daimon
to that of the young “Caesar,” is followed by losses in games of chance, which
motivate Antony’s departure from Italy (33). The hero is “annoyed, though he
did not show it” (33.5). In 75, before the Battle of Alexandria, Antony conveys to
his slaves his uncertainty about the morrow, and his fear of being a corpse the
next day. The description of the Bacchic thiasos which exits from the city, how-
ever, belongs to the rumor-gathering of the omniscient narrator, “it was said.”
Some passages, though, do make the reader peep through Antony’s spectacles.
In 7 he is being pursued by Pompeius’ fleet. Though the ostensible viewpoint
is that of the omniscient narrator, we seem to see with the hero’s eyes (7.4–
6):
… καὶ γενόμενος καταφανὴς τοῖς πολεμίοις καὶ διωκόμενος, … νότου κῦμα

μέγα, … ἐκφερόμενος δὲ ταῖς ναυσὶ πρὸς κρημνοὺς καὶ φάραγγας ἀγχιβαθεῖς,
οὐδεμίαν ἐλπίδα σωτηρίας εἶχεν. ἄφνω δὲ τοῦ κόλπου πολὺν ἐκπνεύσαντος
λίβα, … καὶ πλέων σοβαρῶς ὁρᾷ ναυαγίων περίπλεων τὸν αἰγιαλόν.
… discovered by the enemy and pursued, … a heavy swell, … carried with

his ships toward a precipitous and craggy shore, had no hope of escape.
Suddenly a strong southwest wind from the bay, (…) sailed gallantly along
and saw the shore covered with wrecks …
7.4–6
Again, the whole Parthian campaign is almost seen through Antony’s eyes. The
source is probably Q. Dellius, a staff officer, who later defected to Octavius
and could at times be critical of Antony’s conduct. In most of the narrative
the distancing is rather slight. Presumably Antony and the officer saw and
feared relatively the same things. Nonetheless, Plutarch begins with a general
criticism of Antony’s strategy (38). Some passages are revealing. For example,
the destruction of the baggage train “distressed all the followers of Antonius”
narrative 227
(τοῦτο πάντας μὲν ὡς εἰκὸς ἠνίασε τοὺς περὶ Ἀντώνιον, 39.1). One detects the
viewpoint of the source. Antony is often presented as doing or saying what a
staff officer might have written in his memoirs. In 39 “all” are despondent when
the cavalry pursuit of the Parthians has little success. Nonetheless, excepting
scenes explicitly depicting Antony from the outside, the events of the war
coincide with his viewpoint.
The Battle of Actium is less personal and more distanced than the Parthian
campaign. Plutarch keeps shifting the viewpoint. He moves from Octavius, to
Canidius, to Kleopatra, to a slave of Octavius, to a soldier of Antony. Only in the
middle of 66 is the viewpoint primarily Antony’s. However, this internal view-
point is jarred by the assertion that the enemy beheld Kleopatra’s ships taking
advantage of the wind and making for the Peloponnesos, and by Plutarch’s
reflection on Antony’s soul living, like that of all lovers, in another’s body (66.7).
Events related from Antony’s perspective occupy less than a brief chapter, or 45
lines in the Teubner edition.
In conclusion, Plutarch rarely lets a character speak his mind. This is quite
striking, since the propaganda war offered abundant material for Antony’s
defense of himself. Rather, the hero, like a cadaver in a medical theater, is
dissected from outside, or, like a defendant in a court which permits no self-
defense, is left timidly watching the proceedings. Though seemingly a defect,
the relative muteness of Plutarch’s protagonists contributes to the tone of
apparent objectivity which pervading his biographical reporting endows it
with an aura of authority.
The Antonios, then, is an interesting subject for the critical microscope of the
narratologists. Time is represented in a very straightforward way, virtually with-
out prolepsis and analepsis, quite in contrast with some dialogues in Plutarch’s
Moralia. But in the background is a more complicated time scheme of two
segments of the historical past, the larger cycles of reincarnation, and the a-
temporal order of the noetic world, the last of which includes the Forms, the
Divine, and the blessed existence of the soul. The ephemerality of “phenome-
nal” time is particularly conveyed through the constant movement, and even
flight, of the protagonists and the futile attempt to give permanence to the tran-
sitory pleasures of wine, love, and song. In contrast to the main narrative, an
episodic plot has its own dynamic, illuminating character through the private
details, foibles, and interrelationships of personal life. Thus, interior scenes,
at times almost oppressively rich in sensual detail and redolent of passion,
alternate with the exterior and more coldly factual scenes of battle, risk, and
hardship. Plutarch’s characters, like good children, are seen rather than heard.
The viewpoint of the omniscient narrator universally prevails, except for a few
brief private outbursts. Even for the Parthian campaign a slight distance sep-
arates the reader from the hero. When the omniscient narrator is absent, the
perspective is not that of Antony himself but of a fellow officer on the cam-
paign. In spite of enormous liberties with details and even the themes of his
sources, the Life’s authoritative voice, enhanced by brevity of exposition and
comment, creates a convincing tone of imperturbable objectivity.
chapter 4
Some Aspects of Style
1 The Flight of Themistokles
Though the treatment here will necessarily be very selective and impression-
istic, an examination of a few passages from the Antonios can help illumi-
nate Plutarch’s style, especially its “baroque” aspect.1 This is a quality obvi-
ously very difficult to define, but it certainly includes aspects of grand design
and magnificent, rich, backdrops, elevation of theme, and theatrical or epic
depictions of heroized figures of more than normal emotions in idealized atti-
tudes. Moreover, the scenes are usually characterized by agitated or etherial
movement, and a richness of motifs and supplementary, graceful figures. Some
scholars prefer terms like “High Classical” for the Renaissance, and the term
“Mannerism” for the more imaginative and fantastic type of art which fol-
lowed, terms perhaps definable only in the examination of an individual artist’s
work. Hellenistic baroque has been characterized as theatrical, as emphasiz-
ing emotional intensity and dramatic crisis, exploiting striking contrasts and
open forms which deny boundaries and disrupt or conceal artistic balance.
Moreover, scale, movement or tumult, as well as cosmic grandeur also come
into play, as in the Great Altar at Pergamon. In the Neronian Age of Plutarch’s
youth the baroque ideal, especially in architecture and painting, was realized
in a brilliantly new manner.2 Clearly, Plutarch’s Lives, which were so often
1 Professor Winfried Bühler, who looked over a draft of this section, would prefer another term.
Some aspects of Neronian art and literature, for instance in Petronius, are strikingly similar
to those of European “Mannerism,” but Plutarch’s writing belongs to a more restrained and
classical form of art approximating the European Baroque.
2 For a definition of the Baroque, see S.J. Freedberg, Painting in Italy 1500–1600. Pelican History
of Art (New York, 1971, rev., 1979) 15, and for Mannerism, his comments in idem, Circa 1600.
A Revolution of Style in Italian Painting (Cambridge, Mass., 1983) esp. 60; J. Shearman, Man-
nerism. Style and Civilization (Harmondsworth, 1967), esp. 15–48, 49–81. J.J. Pollitt, Art in
the Hellenistic Age (Cambridge, 1986) 79–127, esp. 104–105, 111. For Vergil, see F.E. Brenk,
“Most Beautiful Horror: Baroque Touches in Vergil’s Underworld,” cw 73 (1979) 1–8. For char-
acteristics of the Neronian period, see Sullivan, Literature and Politics, 74–114. “Manneris-
tic” touches are particularly strong in Petronius’s Cena Trimalchionis. Describing “Baroque”
painting in the Neronian period, H. Eschebach, Pompeji. Erlebte antike Welt (Leipzig, 1978)
27–29, highlights the advent of pathos and brutality, sensuous nudity, and limitless back-
grounds.

the inspiration for Renaissance and Post-Renaissance painting, harmonized

well with the spirit of this epoch.3
As a stylist, Plutarch has been described as a “free Atticist.” belonging to a
development of the Augustan and Early Imperial Period. Not as much has been
written on his style, though, as one might expect. He has been praised for a nat-
uralness and sensitivity in adapting style to content and despising affectation,
such as that characteristic of Timaios of Tauromenion, or too severe imitation
of the earlier Attic writers.4 In opposition to Attic writers and the later “Atti-
cists.” Plutarch is accused of being unable to resist the temptation to “ampli-
fication” and “reflection employing a rich vocabulary.” He is characterized as
having a tendency toward “antithetical comparison” or synkrisis, employing a
“spun-out” periodicity with many subordinate and participial insertions and
long parentheses, but with a natural, rather than forced, balance. The velocity
of his production, moreover, is made the culprit for leading scholars into imag-
inary textual problems.5
3 See R. Guerini, “Plutarco e la biografia. Personaggi, episodi, moduli compositivi in alcuni cicli
pittorici romani 1540–1550,” in S. Settis (ed.), Dal testo all’immagine. La “pittura di storia” nel
Rinascimento, Memoria dell’antico nell’arte italiana 2. I generi e i temi ritrovati. Biblioteca di
Storia dell’Arte (Turin, 1985) 83–93. According to Guerini, the moral element in Plutarch’s
Lives (πράξεις-ἀρεταί: facta-mores) corresponded perfectly to the desires of those commis-
sioning the works (84–85). Guerini concludes that “the choice of personages and episodes
from classical history found in Plutarch, as a narrative pattern, was a counterpart to the icono-
graphic projects envisaged; thus, Plutarch performed a function of the first order in the artistic
culture of the age of Paul iii” (92–93). [en: M. Linder, “Plutarch’s use and Mention of Famous
Artists in the Parallel Lives,” Ancient society 45 (2015) 53–81.]
4 So E. Norden, Die antike Kunstprosa vom vi. Jahrhundert v. Chr. bis in die Zeit der Renaissance
(2nd ed., Berlin, 1915) 392–394.
5 K. Ziegler, Plutarchos, 293–301, who lamented the lack of a comprehensive study of Plutarch’s
style (294). Ziegler, moreover, stresses his avoidance of hiatus, and use of rhythms to end
a colon (Cf. F.H. Sandbach, “Rhythm and Authenticity in Plutarch’s Moralia,” cq 33 [1939]
194–203). For general principles and some misapprehensions about Plutarch’s style see now
S. Yaginuma, “Plutarch’s Language and Style,” anrw ii.33.6 (1992) 4726–4742. He notes in par-
ticular that a preference for sentences with hypotaxis (subordinate clauses following the main
verb—Blass’s “absteigende” period—or preceding and following) is especially “Plutarchean”
(4731–4734). [en: See also L. Torraca, “Lingua e stile nei Moralia di Plutarco,” anrw ii.34.4
(1998) 3487–3510.] On the Atticizing writers see W. Schmid, Der Atticismus in seinen Hauptver-
tretern. Von Dionysius von Halikarnass bis auf den zweiten Philostratus (Stuttgart, 1887–1897),
and the very illuminating study of F. Lasserre, “Prose grecque classicisante,” in H. Flashar
(ed.), Le classicisme à Rome, aux Iers siècles avant et après J.-C., Entretiens sur l’Antiquité Clas-
sique 25 (Vandœuvres-Geneva, 1979) 135–163. Lasserre notes the close relationship between
this literature and rhetoric, the ambiguity caused by the detestation of Asianism, while
some aspects of style 231
His style has also been characterized as typical of the classicizing revolution
of the Augustan and post-Augustan age, a positive and constructive archaism,
which sought to enrich the classical models rather than to imitate them slav-
ishly, a style meticulous in periodic structure, studied word-patterns, avoidance
of hiatus, and carefully chosen vocabulary, while at the same time noteworthy
for varied syntax and sophisticated word-order. Plutarch is considered simi-
lar in some respects to Dionysios of Halikarnassos. But he ostensibly disliked
Dionysios’ style, as has been noted, rewrote him when using him as a source,
and took more liberties in drawing from wider sources to exploit the new
enrichment of classical style.6 Other scholars describe a diction noteworthy
for poetic words, new composites, neologisms, and verbs with a non-classical
meaning. They see a lack of pretention to elegant style (καλλιγραφία) citing
De tranquilitate 464e. This style, in their view, is characterized by an over-
charged, redundant, and “ponderous” phraseology which is seldom content
to say in one word what two or three, even synonyms, could say just as well,
and for neologisms which roused the ire of the ancients.7 Other observations
are the rarity of chiasmus, sentences that ramble but are easy to follow, rela-
tively frequent asyndeton, unremarkable similes, metaphors that are rare but
effective at critical points in the narrative, extreme interest in variety, a remark-
able power of visualizing a scene, and a psychological incapability of hewing
simultaneously there is an inner creative dynamic within rhetoric toward enrichment of lan-
guage and toward excess. He observes, moreover, that there is a contrast between Attic style
and contemporary language—since both grammar and vocabulary reflect a combination of
purism, poeticism, and ordinary speech (137, 143–145). D.A. Russell, “Classicizing Rhetoric and
Criticism: Pseudo-Dionysian Exetasis and Mistakes in Declamation,” in Flashar (ed.), Le clas-
sicisme à Rome, 113–130, sees rhetorical effectiveness and moral acceptability as marks of the
2nd and 3rd centuries ad. He remarks that Longinos (35.4), who turns Kallimachos on his ear,
would rather have “the Rhine and the Danube than any little spring” [the symbol of Kallima-
chos’ poetry], “however holy” (115).
6 Russell, Plutarch, 18–41, esp. 21–22.
7 R. Flacelière & J. Irigoin, “Histoire du texte des Œeuvres Morales de Plutarque,” in R. Flacelière,
J. Irigoin, J. Sirinelli, & A. Philippon (eds.), Plutarque. Œeuvres Morales i.1 (Paris, 1987) ccx–
ccxi citing Phrynichos (W.G. Rutherford, The New Phrynichus. Revised Text of the Ecloga of
the Grammarian Phrynichus [London, 1881]). But Rutherford notes that Phrynichos, who
cites δυσωπία (clxvi) and σύγκρισις (ccxlv) as having non-classical meaning in Plutarch, is
mistaken about classical δυσωπία (which was a presentiment of evil or danger). He observes
that Aristotle, Theophrastos, and Philemon used σύγκρισις in Plutarch’s meaning (278, 344).
Moreover, in De tranquilitate 464f—even if he is only posing—Plutarch excuses the lack of
καλλιγραφία as due to haste, since he had to deliver the essay to a friend who was sailing shortly
for Rome.
to the brevity he demanded of others—thus making his finest narratives those

indulgent to his expansive style.8
However, one probably should be careful not to credit Plutarch with too
much originality in matters of diction and syntax, since he attempted to write
a literary κοινή in harmony with contemporary standards.9 Lately scholars
are attempting to rescue Plutarch from the over-rigid critics of the past, who
eliminated from our texts the usage and diction of the literary koine—including
some poetic archaisms popular in contemporary prose—and substituted the
classical style of an earlier period.10
8 J.R. Hamilton, Plutarch. Alexander. A Commentary (Oxford, 1969) lxvi–lxix, offers as an

example of ample narrative the murder of Kleitos in Alexandros 50–52. In the same life,
he analyzes 40.1–2: an exceptional 14-line sentence. This begins with a temporal clause,
followed by 4 result clauses (the last with a dependent participle). Then comes the main
verb, a participle with dependent infinitive and 2 causal clauses, each followed by a noun
clause (both with dependent participles), the second of which is subdivided by μὲν …
δέ. In spite of the complexity, the meaning is perfectly clear! P.A. Stadter, A Commentary
on Plutarch’s Pericles (Chapel Hill, 1989) lvi, notes the following schema in Perikles 12.1–
2: 9 finite verbs, 15 participles, and 5 infinitives. These unfold in a fairly predictable way:
relative clause, main clause, a participle introducing a series of clauses—each clause more
complicated than the preceding—while the entire sentence is characterized by frequent
doubling of verbs and objects, often with little effect on the sense. We also find mild
hyperbaton in a b a b order, with a triplet of nouns (λίθους … ἀγάλματα … ναούς), and
ending with a 6 syllable word (χιλιοταλάντους) in a favorite clausula (– ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ – –). He
also remarks that insistent about uariatio, Plutarch never repeats a word in the same
context (lv). [T.E. Duff, “The Prologue to the Lifes of Perikles and Fabius (Per. 1–2),” in Pérez
Jimémez & Casadesús (eds.), Misticismo y religiones mistéricas en la obra de Plutarco, 351–
363; Mosconi, G., “Pericle, la guerra, la democrazia e il buon uso del corpo del cittadino,”
MediterrAnt 17 (2014) 51–86; S. Xenophontos, “Περὶ ἀγαθοῦ στρατηγοῦ: Plutarch’s Fabius
Maximus and the Ethics of Generalship,” Hermes v. 140(2) (2012) 160–183. O. Imperio,
“Il ritratto di Pericle nella commedia attica antica: presenze e assenze dei comici nella
biografia periclea di Plutarco,” c&c 8 (2013) 145–174.]
9 As Flacelière and Irigoin seem to suggest stressing Plutarch’s desire to write the koine
(ccxiv).
10 See the important critique of G. Giangrande, “Problemi di critica testuale nei Moralia.
i,” and idem, “Problemi di critica testuale nei Moralia. ii,” in I. Gallo, A. Garzya, G. Gian-
grande, M. Manfredini (eds.), Sulla tradizione manoscritta dei Moralia di Plutarco (1988)
55–78, 79–102, esp. 60–61, 78–80. For the textual tradition, see the summary in Stadter, Peri-
cles, lvii–lviii, with the bibliography given there. He includes M. Manfredini, “La tradizione
manoscritta delle Vite,” in Andrei & Scuderi, Demetrio, 16–26, but see also M. Manfredini,
“Codici minori delle Vite,” in A. Pérez Jiménez (ed.), Estudios sobre Plutarco. Obra y tradi-
ción. Actas del i Simposio Español sobre Plutarco. Fuengirola 1988. Sociedad Española de
Before turning to Antonios, though, it will help to study a passage from

Themistokles, where Plutarch obviously used Thoukydides 1.136–137 as his
model.11 Thoukydides is noted for the use of poetical language, repetition of
words, doubling—especially of opposites—puns, a tendency toward abstrac-
tion and the use of the neuter substantive, the apparent coining of new words
with new suffixes—in short a seemingly original language which antiquity
considered individualistic.12 Other observations underline a highly antithet-
ical style chronologically between the linear (short independent sentences)
and periodic styles, a preference for the universal over the particular, clarity,
balance and contrast, and a preference for neuter adjectives, infinitives, and
participles. In this view the style by later standards was both archaic and poetic,
making Thoukydides a kind of counterpart to Aischylos, but in fact Thouky-
dides was employing a medium fairly uniform about twenty-five years before
his acme.13 Another specialist stresses a strong feeling for unity and the removal
of all extraneous material, besides an apparent objectivity which allows the
facts to speak for themselves.14
Plutarquistas (Málaga, 1990) 9–20. Excellent studies are, though the application is primar-
ily to the Moralia, Flacelière & Irigoin, “Histoire du texte des Œeuvres Morales de Plutar-
que,” ccxxvii–cccxxiv; A. Garzya, “La tradizione manoscritta dei Moralia: Linee generali,”
in I. Gallo (ed.), Sulla tradizione manoscritta, 9–38; idem, “Planude e il testo dei Moralia,”
ibidem, 39–54; M. Manfredini, “Codici plutarchei contenenti Vitae e Moralia,” ibidem, 103–
122; and idem, “Sulla tradizione manoscritta dei Moralia 70–77,” ibidem, 123–138. For the
Lamprias catalogue, which has some bearing on authenticity and other problems, see
J. Irigoin, “Le Catalogue de Lamprias: Tradition manuscrite et éditions imprimées,” reg
99 (1986) 318–331, and his treatment of it in Flacelière (ed.), Œeuvres Morales i. 1, cciii–
ccxviii.
11 Use of this passage was suggested by a lecture of Professor Winfried Bühler, “La fuga
di Temistocle in Persia secondo Tucidide e secondo Plutarco,” University of Rome, La
Sapienza, February, 1988.
12 So P. Huart, Le vocabulaire de l’ analyse psychologiquc dans l’oeuvre de Thucydide (Paris,
1968) 1–32, esp., 21–31. He observes (23, note 2) that Dionysios of Halikarnassos wrote a
letter entitled “Concerning the Characteristics of the Language of Thucydides” (H. Usener
& L. Radermacher, Dionysii Halicarnassei Opuscula [Leipzig, 1899] 375).
13 So J.H. Finley, jr., Thucydides (Cambridge, Mass., 1942) 250–288, esp. 253–255, 264–266,
271, 275–276, 286.
14 So J. de Romilly, Histoire et raison chez Thucydide (Collection d’Études Anciennes; Paris,
1956) 40–52, 84. See also her “Plutarch and Thucydides or the Free Use of Quotations,”
Phoenix 42 (1988) 22–34, and her “Rencontres avec Plutarque,” in Marcovich et al. (ed.),
Plutarch, 219–229. In the first article she notes how Plutarch often omits evaluations
fundamental and brilliant in Thoukydides and how he injects different meaning into
the same words. She attributes these differences not just to biographical genre but to an
The passage in the classical author runs as follows:
ὁ δὲ Θεμιστοκλῆς προαισθόμενος φεύγει ἐκ Πελοποννήσου ἐς Κέρκυραν, ὢν

αὐτῶν εὐεργέτης. δεδιέναι δὲ φασκόντων Κερκυραίων ἔχειν αὐτὸν ὥστε Λακε-
δαιμονίοις καὶ Ἀθηναίοις ἀπεχθέσθαι, διακομίζεται ὑπ’ αὐτῶν ἐς τὴν ἤπειρον τὴν
καταντικρύ. καὶ διωκόμενος ὑπὸ τῶν προστεταγμένων κατὰ πύστιν ᾗ χωροίη,
ἀναγκάζεται κατά τι ἄπορον παρὰ Ἄδμητον τὸν Μολοσσῶν βασιλέα ὄντα αὐτῷ
οὐ φίλον καταλῦσαι. καὶ ὁ μὲν οὐκ ἔτυχεν ἐπιδημῶν, ὁ δὲ τῆς γυναικὸς ἱκέ-
της γενόμενος διδάσκεται ὑπ’ αὐτῆς τὸν παῖδα σφῶν λαβὼν καθέζεσθαι ἐπὶ τὴν
ἑστίαν. καὶ ἐλθόντος οὐ πολὺ ὕστερον τοῦ Ἀδμήτου δηλοῖ τε ὅς ἐστι καὶ οὐκ
ἀξιοῖ, εἴ τι ἄρα αὐτὸς ἀντεῖπεν αὐτῷ Ἀθηναίων δεομένῳ, φεύγοντα τιμωρεῖσθαι·
καὶ γὰρ ἂν ὑπ’ ἐκείνου πολλῷ ἀσθενεστέρου ἐν τῷ παρόντι κακῶς πάσχειν, γεν-
ναῖον δὲ εἶναι τοὺς ὁμοίους ἀπὸ τοῦ ἴσου τιμωρεῖσθαι. καὶ ἅμα αὐτὸς μὲν ἐκείνῳ
χρείας τινὸς καὶ οὐκ ἐς τὸ σῶμα σῴζεσθαι ἐναντιωθῆναι, ἐκεῖνον δ’ ἄν, εἰ ἐκδοίη
αὐτόν (εἰπὼν ὑφ’ ὧν καὶ ἐφ’ ᾧ διώκεται), σωτηρίας ἂν τῆς ψυχῆς ἀποστερῆ-
σαι. ὁ δὲ ἀκούσας ἀνίστησί τε αὐτὸν μετὰ τοῦ ἑαυτοῦ υἱέος, ὥσπερ καὶ ἔχων
αὐτὸν ἐκαθέζετο, καὶ μέγιστον ἦν ἱκέτευμα τοῦτο, καὶ ὕστερον οὐ πολλῷ τοῖς τε
Λακεδαιμονίοις καὶ Ἀθηναίοις ἐλθοῦσι καὶ πολλὰ εἰποῦσιν οὐκ ἐκδίδωσιν, ἀλλ’
ἀποστέλλει βουλόμενον ὡς βασιλέα πορευθῆναι ἐπὶ τὴν ἑτέραν θάλασσαν πεζῇ
ἐς Πύδναν τὴν Ἀλεξάνδρου. ἐν ᾗ ὁλκάδος τυχὼν ἀναγομένης ἐπ’ Ἰωνίας καὶ ἐπι-
βὰς καταφέρεται χειμῶνι ἐς τὸ Ἀθηναίων στρατόπεδον, ὃ ἐπολιόρκει Νάξον. καί
(ἦν γὰρ ἀγνὼς τοῖς ἐν τῇ νηί) δείσας φράζει τῷ ναυκλήρῳ ὅστις ἐστὶ καὶ δι’ ἃ
φεύγει, καὶ εἰ μὴ σώσει αὐτόν, ἔφη ἐρεῖν ὅτι χρήμασι πεισθεὶς αὐτὸν ἄγει· τὴν δὲ
ἀσφάλειαν εἶναι μηδένα ἐκβῆναι ἐκ τῆς νεὼς μέχρι πλοῦς γένηται· πειθομένῳ δ’
αὐτῷ χάριν ἀπομνήσεσθαι ἀξίαν. ὁ δὲ ναύκληρος ποιεῖ τε ταῦτα καὶ ἀποσαλεύ-
σας ἡμέραν καὶ νύκτα ὑπὲρ τοῦ στρατοπέδου ὕστερον ἀφικνεῖται ἐς Ἔφεσον.
Themistokles, forewarned, flees from the Peloponnesos to Kerkyra, being

their benefactor. Since the Kerkyrians, though, claim they are afraid to
receive him, lest they incur the enmity of the Lakedaimonians and Athe-
nians, he is conveyed across by them to the mainland opposite. Being pur-
sued by those commissioned to track him down, he is compelled, being in
an inextricable position, to take refuge with Admetos, the Molossian king,
who was not friendly. He happened to be away at the time, but Themistok-
les, as a suppliant, is instructed by his wife to take their child and sit down
ideological change between 5th cent. Athens and the Imperial period (24–28, 33). In the
second article, she underscores Plutarch’s moral interest in the hero, which goes beyond
mere psychology, and is concerned with interpersonal relationships—the result being
subtle, but profound and persuasive, modifications in the sources (221–223).
at the hearth. And when Admetos has returned a little later, he reveals
who he is and that Admetos should not consider it right, even if once he
opposed his request to the Athenians, to take revenge on him a fugitive.
For in his present condition he might come to harm at the hands of a
much weaker person, but the decent thing was to take vengeance among
equals on fair terms. Besides, he had opposed Admetos in the matter of a
petition and not over a question of life or death; but if he should surren-
der him to his pursuers (explaining who they were and the charge), it was
his life’s salvation of which he would deprive him.
136
Hearing this, Admetos raises him up, together with his own son (even as
he still sat holding him, and this was the most powerful form of suppli-
cation there). Not long after, he does not surrender him to the Lakedai-
monians and Athenians who arrived, but gives him an escort—since he
wanted to go to the King—to the other sea, overland, to Pydna the capital
of Alexander. Here, chancing on a merchant vessel setting sail for Ionia,
and going aboard, he is carried off in a storm to the base of the Athenians
besieging Naxos. Being afraid (for his identity was unknown to those in
the vessel) he tells the captain who he is and why he is fleeing, and says
that if he will not save him, he will accuse him of bribery in taking him
aboard, and that their only hope of salvation is for no one to leave the ship
before sailing, and if persuaded, he will remember the favor handsomely.
The captain does as bidden and, after riding out the gale a day and a night
just outside the Athenian base, on the next day arrives at Ephesos.15
137
15 Text of H.S. Jones, rev. J.E. Powell, Thucydidis Historiae i (Oxford, 1942). The reader is asked
to forgive the literalness of the translations, the main purpose of which is not to infuriate
Greek scholars and English readers, even Miltonians, but to highlight the peculiarities,
especially in word order, tense, and phraseology. In cases where the meaning would be
absolutely unintelligible or slight changes would make little difference, the Greek word
order and phraseology has been changed. On the arbitration and flight see R. Flacelière,
“Sur quelques points obscurs de la vie de Thémistocle,” rea 55 (1953) 4–28; R. Flacelière,
É. Chambry, & M. Juneaux (eds.), Plutarque. Vies ii (Paris, 1961) 130; L. Piccirilli, “Temistocle
εὐεργέτης dei Corciresi,” asnp 3 (1973) 317–355; idem, Gli arbitrati interstatali greci i.
Dalle origini al 338 a.C. (Pisa, 1973) 61–66; F.J. Frost, Plutarch’s Themistocles. A Historical
Commentary (Princeton, 1980) 200–208; and C. Carena, M. Manfredini & L. Piccirilli
(eds.), Le vite di Temistocle e di Camillo. Plutarco. Vite Parallele, Scrittori Greci e Latini
(Verona, 1983) 270–274. [en: J. Marr, Life of Themistocles (Warminster: Aris and Phillips,
Plutarch’s version is this:
Προαισθόμενος δ’ ἐκεῖνος εἰς Κέρκυραν διεπέρασεν, οὔσης αὐτῷ πρὸς τὴν πόλιν
εὐεργεσίας. γενόμενος γὰρ αὐτῶν κριτὴς πρὸς Κορινθίους ἐχόντων διαφοράν,
ἔλυσε τὴν ἔχθραν εἴκοσι τάλαντα κρίνας τοὺς Κορινθίους καταβαλεῖν καὶ Λευ-
κάδα κοινῇ νέμειν ἀμφοτέρων ἄποικον. ἐκεῖθεν δ’ εἰς Ἤπειρον ἔφυγε, καὶ διω-
κόμενος ὑπὸ τῶν Ἀθηναίων καὶ τῶν Λακεδαιμονίων, ἔρριψεν ἑαυτὸν εἰς ἐλπίδας
χαλεπὰς καὶ ἀπόρους, καταφυγὼν πρὸς Ἄδμητον, ὃς βασιλεὺς μὲν ἦν Μολοσ-
σῶν, δεηθεὶς δέ τι τῶν Ἀθηναίων καὶ προπηλακισθεὶς ὑπὸ τοῦ Θεμιστοκλέους,
ὅτ’ ἤκμαζεν ἐν τῇ πολιτείᾳ, δι’ ὀργῆς εἶχεν αὐτὸν αἰεί, καὶ δῆλος ἦν εἰ λάβοι
τιμωρησόμενος. ἐν δὲ τῇ τότε τύχῃ μᾶλλον ὁ Θεμιστοκλῆς φοβηθεὶς συγγενῆ
καὶ πρόσφατον φθόνον ὀργῆς παλαιᾶς καὶ βασιλικῆς, ταύτῃ φέρων ὑπέθηκεν
ἑαυτόν, ἱκέτης τοῦ Ἀδμήτου καταστὰς ἴδιόν τινα καὶ παρηλλαγμένον τρόπον.
ἔχων γὰρ αὐτοῦ τὸν υἱὸν ὄντα παῖδα πρὸς τὴν ἑστίαν προσέπεσε, ταύτην μεγί-
στην καὶ μόνην σχεδὸν ἀναντίρρητον ἡγουμένων ἱκεσίαν τῶν Μολοσσῶν. ἔνιοι
μὲν οὖν Φθίαν τὴν γυναῖκα τοῦ βασιλέως λέγουσιν ὑποθέσθαι τῷ Θεμιστοκλεῖ
τὸ ἱκέτευμα τοῦτο καὶ τὸν υἱὸν ἐπὶ τὴν ἑστίαν καθίσαι μετ’ αὐτοῦ· τινὲς δ’ αὐτὸν
τὸν Ἄδμητον, ὡς ἀφοσιώσαιτο πρὸς τοὺς διώκοντας τὴν ἀνάγκην δι’ ἣν οὐκ ἐκδί-
δωσι τὸν ἄνδρα, διαθεῖναι καὶ συντραγῳδῆσαι τὴν ἱκεσίαν.
24
Θουκυδίδης ἐκπλεῦσαί φησιν αὐτὸν ἐπὶ τὴν ἑτέραν καταβάντα θάλατταν ἀπὸ
Πύδνης, οὐδενὸς εἰδότος ὅστις εἴη τῶν πλεόντων, μέχρι οὗ πνεύματι τῆς ὁλκάδος
εἰς Θάσον καταφερομένης ὑπ’ Ἀθηναίων πολιορκουμένην τότε, φοβηθεὶς ἀνα-
δείξειεν ἑαυτὸν τῷ τε ναυκλήρῳ καὶ τῷ κυβερνήτῃ, καὶ τὰ μὲν δεόμενος, τὰ δ’
ἀπειλῶν καὶ λέγων ὅτι κατηγορήσοι καὶ καταψεύσοιτο πρὸς τοὺς Ἀθηναίους, ὡς
οὐκ ἀγνοοῦντες, ἀλλὰ χρήμασι πεισθέντες ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἀναλάβοιεν αὐτόν, οὕτως
ἀναγκάσειε παραπλεῦσαι καὶ λαβέσθαι τῆς Ἀσίας.
25
1998); T.E. Duff, “The Opening of Plutarch’s Life of Themistokles,” grbs 48 (2008) 159–
179; idem, “Plutarch’s Themistocles and Camillus,” Humble (ed.), Plutarch’s Lives, 45–86;
C.D. Graninger, “Plutarch on the Evacuation of Athens (Themistocles 10.8–9),” Hermes 138
(2010) 308–317; K. Uchibayashi, “Plutarch’s Parallel Lives and Heroic Legends: the Lives of
Themistocles and Camillus Interpreted as a Single Unit,” jcs 56 (2008) 77–88; T. Späth,
“Erzählt, erfunden: Camillus,” in M. Coudry & T. Späth (eds.), L’invention des grands
hommes de la Rome antique (Paris, 2003) 341–412.]
But being forewarned, to Kerkyra he crossed, there being under his name
a benefaction to the city … Thence he fled to Epeiros.16 And being pur-
sued by the Athenians and by the Lakedaimonians, he threw himself into
hopes difficult and inextricable, fleeing to Admetos, who was king of the
Molossians, and who having asked a favor of the Athenians, and being
insultingly refused by Themistokles when he was at the height of his
powers, was filled with rage ever after and clearly, if he might seize him,
intending to take revenge. But in the present misfortune, Themistokles
was more afraid of family and manifest hatred than of anger ancient and
monarchial. Taking himself there, he cast himself on Admetos as a sup-
pliant, making use of a most peculiar and twisted form. For taking the
king’s young son in his arms, he fell down at the hearth, since the Molos-
sians considered this the most sacred and nearly the only supplication
impossible to refuse. Some say, indeed, that it was Phthia, the king’s wife,
who suggested to Themistokles this form of supplication, and that she
seated her son on the hearth with him, but others that Admetos, to create
a pretence of religious obligation for the pursuers, so as not to surrender
the man, arranged things and collaborated in staging this. (24) … Thouky-
dides says he set sail from Pydna, going across to the opposite sea, no one
of the passengers knowing Themistokles’ identity, until, as the vessel was
carried by the wind to Thasos, at that time besieged by the Athenians,
being frightened, he revealed himself to the master and the captain, both
begging and threatening, and claiming he would accuse and falsely tes-
tify before the Athenians to their having taken him aboard, not as being
ignorant but as having been bribed from the very beginning; that thus he
compelled them to sail by and make for Asia … (25).17
16 Or “to the mainland” (ἤπειρον). Frost, Themistocles, 203, notes that in Thoukydides the
territory was not yet the land of the Molossians.
17 Text of C. Lindskog & K. Ziegler, Plutarchus. Vitae parallelae i.1 (Leipzig, 1957). The sec-
tion 24.1–5 is found in shorter form in Schol. Thuc., 1.136.1–2: C. Hude, Thucydidis Historiae
i (Leipzig, 1913) 99; Schol. bd Ael. Arist. 46.233.17: W. Lindskog (ed.), Aelius Aristides iii
(Leipzig, 1829) 680; Schol. Oxon. Ad. Arist., 46.233.17: Lindskog, iii, 680; and part in POxy.
1012 c (Fr. 9) ii, 11.23–34 (Piccirilli, Temistocle εὐεργέτης, 318, 349) but there are no striking
similarities with Plutarch’s phraseology, except for εὐεργεσία in POxy. 1012 c (Fr. 9) 26. The
matter of 24–25 is covered briefly in Nepos, Themistocles 8; Diodoros, 11.56; and Aristode-
mos, Fr. 10.1–3: F. Jacoby, Die Fragmente der griechischen Historiker 104, ii, a (Berlin, 1926)
499—commentary, FGrHist, ii, c (Berlin, 1926) 326–327. The date of Aristodemos, who
probably used Ephoros, is uncertain, despite attempts to put him in the 4th or 5th cent.
ad (Jacoby, ii, c, 319–321). Again, there are no striking parallels in phraseology between
First, compared with Thoukydides, Plutarch’s text reveals a much fuller and
more flowery, though not excessively periodic, style, with more attempt at
harmony and balance in the sentence structure.18 Thoukydides’ sentences here
are generally composed of an introductory participle or prepositional phrase
with the verb near the middle of the sentence, followed by another participle
or prepositional phrase. Infinitives are frequent and in natural word positions.
The sentences are relatively brief, paratactic, and uniform in length. Nor is there
a noticeable number of lengthy middle-passive participles.
In chapter 24 Plutarch may be trying to reproduce the flavor of Thoukydides,
where he at times seems to be imitating him.19 However, the complication of
Plutarch and Diodoros or Aristodemos. In fact, Plutarch went out of his way to rewrite his
sources. In Aristodemos (10.2), as in Thoukydides, Admetos’ wife (unclimactically!) pro-
poses the supplication, and (10.3) Themistokles (not very imaginatively!) threatens to kill
the ship captain if not obeyed; in Nepos, 8.7, he promises a great reward (multa pollicens)
if saved; Cf. Frost, Themistocles, 206–208.
Ziegler gives Νάξος in place of the mss. “Θάσος” (25.2), but Flacelière, “Sur quelques
points obscurs de la vie de Thémistocle,”rea 55 (1953) 4–28, esp. 4–8; idem, Plutarque. Vies
ii, 130; and Carena et al., Temistocle, 273–274, convincingly argue that Plutarch intended to
write Θάσος.
18 S. Yaginuma, “Thucydides 6.100,” in E.M. Craik (ed.), “Owls to Athens.” Essays on Classical
Subjects Presented to Sir Kenneth Dover (Oxford, 1990) 281–285, finds five sentences: the
first 137 words long, the second 7, the third 13, the fourth 25, and the fifth 22. He rejects
the view of J. Steup (J. Steup and J. Classen, Thukydides i [Berlin, 51919] lxxviii) that the
difference in length is due to Thoukydides being in a line of development from εἰρομένη
λέξις (linear style) to κατεστραμμένη λέξις (periodic style). He argues, rather, that in the
long sentences, hypotactical units are united into larger paratactical units to express a
single action or event in a single sentence “in its multi-faceted entirety with motives,
grounds, purposes, expectations, results and so on” (284).
19 P.A. Stadter, “Thucydidean Orators in Plutarch,” in P.A. Stadter (ed.), The Speeches in Thucy-
dides. A Collection of Original Studies with a Bibliography (Chapel Hill, 1973) 109–123, con-
vincingly demonstrates how Plutarch distanced himself from the stylistic and intellec-
tual characteristics of Thoukydides’ speeches (120–123). However, D.P. Tompkins, “Stylistic
Characteristics in Thucydides: Nicias and Alcibiades,” in A. Parry (ed.), Studies in Fifth-
Century Thought and Literature (Cambridge, Mass., 1972) 181–214, shows that the speeches
are much more individualistic and dramatic than critics have allowed (214). [en: T.E. Duff,
“The First Five Anecdotes of Plutarch’s Life of Alkibiades,” in De Blois (ed.), The Stateman
in Plutarch’s Works, 157–166; J.M. Candau Morón, “Plutarco como transmisor de Timeo:
la Vida de Nicias,” Ploutarchos 2 (2004–2005) 11–34; E. Alexiou, “Plutarchs Lysander und
Alkibiades als Syzygie: ein Beitrag zum moralischen Programm Plutarchs,” RhM 153 (2010)
323–352; I.S. Chialva, “… Como una tragedia: historía y páthos en las Vidas de Nicias y Craso
de Plutarco,” in F. Vergara Cerqueira & M.A. Silva de Oliveira (eds.), Ensaios sobre Plutarco
the third sentence (24.2) goes beyond Thoukydides: an introductory phrase,

main verb, participle with prepositional phrase and a relative clause. The rel-
ative clause includes within it two balanced aorist passive participles and a
temporal clause. The subordinate verb is followed by another subordinate verb
in a conditional clause, itself containing a future participle to indicate purpose,
and ending with the long participle τιμωρησόμενος.20
Something similar occurs in 25. Plutarch begins slowly with a 6 word sen-
tence. The next sentence contains 37 words of indirect discourse including a
genitive absolute and a noun clause after a main verb. But by the third sentence
(25.2)—that beginning the selection in 25 above—he has risen to a crescendo:
accusative with infinitive in indirect discourse after a main verb, prepositional
phrase, genitive absolute, indirect question, temporal clause with a participial
phrase split by an absolute before the subordinate verb, two parallel participles,
noun clause with two parallel subordinate verbs, another subordinate adver-
bial clause within the noun clause with two parallel participles, and a result
clause with two parallel infinitives. The total comes to 71 words. Particularly
striking is his use of long middle-passive participles, though with great vari-
ety:
(24)
1. προαισθόμενος (Thoukydides 1.136.1, but placed after “Themistokles”) …

aorist active. γενόμενος (1.136.3) … aorist active.
2. διωκόμενος (1.136.2) aorist active.
προπηλακισθείς … aorist active, imperfect active … τιμωρησόμενος (for
infinitive τιμωρεῖσθαι) (1.136.41).
(Pelotas: Universidade Federal de Pelotas, 2010) 149–178; S. Verdegem, Plutarch’s Life of

Alcibiades: Story, Text and Moralism (Leuven: University Press, 2010); S. Verdegem, “Paral-
lels and Contrasts: Plutarch’s Comparison of Coriolanus and Alcibiades,” in Humble (ed.),
Plutarch’s Lives, 23–44; A. Larivée, “Eros tyrannos: Alcibiades as the Model of the Tyrant in
Book ix of the Republic,” ijpt 6 (2012) 1–26; G. Roskam, “Socrates and Alcibiades: a noto-
rious σκάνδαλον in the later Platonist tradition,” in L. Roig Lanzillotta & Muñoz Gallarte
(eds.), Plutarch in Religious and Philosophical Discourse, 85–100; D. Leão, “The Eleusinian
Mysteries and Political Timing in the Life of Alcibiades,” ibidem, 181–192; M.A. Lucchesi,
“Love Theory and Political Practice in Plutarch: The Amatorius and the Lives of Coriolanus
and Alcibiades,” in Ch. Sanders, Ch.C. Thumiger, N.J. Lowe (eds.), Erôs in ancient Greece
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013) 209–228.]
20 The ending does not fit any of Sandbach’s rhythms, either to be preferred or avoided. The
absolute frequencies in the Lives are similar to those in Moralia (“Rhythm,” 194).
3. aorist passive participle … present participle, aorist active … aorist active

participle … παρηλλαγμένον …
4. present active participle … aorist active … ἡγουμένων …
(25)
2. (indirect discourse) … καταφερομένης … πολιορκουμένην … aorist passive

participle … aorist optative … δεόμενος (1.136.4: δεομένῳ) present participle
… present participle … present participle … πεισθέντες … (1.137.2: πεισθείς).
3. (not given above) … ὑπεκκλαπέντα … imperfect active … γενομένων καὶ
συναχθέντων … κεκτημένου.
A preference for the longer participal form, even in the present active, is
observable in 24.2, where the abundant and more charming, but also somewhat
prosaic and factual, “there being under his name a benefaction to the city”
(οὔσης αὐτῷ πρὸς τὴν πόλιν εὐεργεσίας) replaces Thoukydides’ simpler and more
prosaic phrase, “being their benefactor” (ὢν αὐτῶν εὐεργέτης).21
There is a tendency toward the longer periodic sentence, though with great
variety accompanied by “defeating of expectation.” The first 31 lines of Thouky-
dides yield 10 sentences vs. Plutarch’s 7 for the same number of lines. The
opening 11 lines of chapter 25 consist of a single sentence, which, beginning
non-periodically, keeps accumulating information and heightening suspense.
The more natural language of Thoukydides, in contrast, is more staccato and
less flowing.22 Plutarch, whose object is “biography not history,” achieves this
21 Plutarch’s source was Theophrastos, Περὶ Καιρῶν, on which, according to the Lamprias cat-
alogue, he wrote a commentary. The Theophrastos passage, which is transmitted in POxy.
1012 c (Fr. 9) col. ii, 11.23–35, contains both a εὐεργέτης and εὐεργεσία: ὅτ[ι ἦ]ν αὐ| τὴ[ν]
εὐ[εργέ]της τὴν εὐεργεσίαν | [οὐκ εἶπε ταύ]την· The original source of the fragment is the
Atthis (attributed to Kleidemos [or Kleitodemos], floruit c. 350 bc). Another version of the
Admetos incident would have been transmitted through Ephoros to Nepos and Diodoros.
Cf. Piccirilli, Gli arbitrati, 6–63; idem, Temistocle εὐεργέτης, 318, 340, 355; Manfredini, Thucy-
dides, 201–203. Gomme, A Historical Commentary on Thucydides i, 438, notes that ὢν αὐτῶν
εὐεργέτης was an official title of honor, such as often given by states to foreigners or to
other states (citing M.N. Tod, A Selection of Greek Historical Inscriptions to the End of the
Fifth Century b.c. [Oxford, 1933], no. 84, line 30; no. 86, line 28). M.N. Tod, Greek Historical
Inscriptions ii (Oxford, 21946), gives two inscriptions (no. 116 [p. 45], and no. 148 [p. 147])
where εὐεργεσία appears; however, οὔσης εὐεργεσίας does not occur. The term εὐεργέτης
almost always appears with some form of the verb εἶναι, usually in the form εὐεργέτην
εἶναι.
22 In his lecture on Thoukydides and Plutarch, Professor Bühler noted that the Thucydidean
result in part through his intensive focusing on Themistokles, whereas Thouky-

dides shifts the point of view slightly—at 136.1 (Kerkyraioi), 136.3 (Admetos),
137.1 (Admetos), 137.2 (the ship captain).
Another facet of magnificence through amplification is the use of doublets.
Plutarch repeats the doublet of the source, sometimes in a new position, or
doubles where the source is more terse. Among such instances, one might note
the following:
(24)
2. ὑπὸ τῶν Ἀθηναίων καὶ τῶν Λακεδαιμονίων

χαλεπὰς καὶ ἀπόρους
δεηθεὶς … καὶ προπηλακισθείς
3. συγγενῆ καὶ πρόσφατον
παλαιᾶς καὶ βασιλικῆς
4. ἴδιόν τινα καὶ παρηλλαγμένον
μεγίστην καὶ μόνην
5. τὸ ἱκέτευμα τοῦτο καὶ τὸν υἱόν
διαθεῖναι καὶ συντραγῳδῆσαι
(25)
2. τῷ τε ναυκλήρῳ καὶ τῷ κυβερνήτῃ

ἀπειλῶν καὶ λέγων
κατηγορήσοι καὶ καταψεύσοιτο
ἀγνοοῦντες, ἀλλὰ … πεισθέντες
παραπλεῦσαι καὶ λαβέσθαι.23
(24)
2. By the Athenians and Lakedaimonians

grievous and desperate
asking for a favor and being insulted
passage is characterized by parataxis, a larger number of facts, and the simple relation
of dangers rather than mention of their existence. He also observed that where citing
Thoukydides Plutarch has employed unusually long indirect discourse, even if natural in
the circumstances.
23 Professor Bühler notes that the parallelism of these phrases differs considerably, with
some words belonging to different categories of thought.
3. kind and recent

of long standing and royal
4. quite peculiar and extraordinary
most great and alone [not to be refused]
5. the form of supplication and the son
arranged and rehearsed
(25)
2. to the master and the captain of the ship

threatening and saying
that he would denounce and vilify
not under ignorance but under bribes
to sail by and make for the coast of Asia.
Another feature is dramatic intensification or heightening of the effect, often

by concentration on the inner psychological state of the protagonist rather
than the tactical or circumstantial aspects which usually characterize history.
For example at 24.2, he suddenly shifts from an expected concrete object to
an abstract and highly psychological one: “threw himself into difficult and
inextricable hopes.”24 The melodramatic expression replaces the bland and
pragmatic phrase of his Thucydidean model “in an impasse.”
In general, Plutarch’s imagination freely spices his text with dramatic exag-
geration. For example, Thoukydides’ more placid Admetos is only “not friendly”
(οὐ φίλον, 136.2) to Themistokles, while Plutarch’s king is thirsting for ven-
geance: Admetos “was angry with him ever after and had sworn revenge” (δι’
ὀργῆς εἶχεν αὐτὸν αἰεί, τιμωρησόμενος, 24.2). Similarly, where Thoukydides’ hero
is content simply to “sit down by the hearth” (καθέζεσθαι, 136.3), Plutarch’s more
impetuous one “fell down” (προσέπεσε, 24.4), holding Admetos’ child in his
arms. He first narrates the hair-raising event in one version, then employing
“some said” Plutarch relates the Thucydidean version—with the “sit down” fol-
lowed by another version in which Admetos engineers all. At 25.2 Plutarch
employs the less dramatic “carried off by the wind” (for the ship), and a slightly
fuller form “frightened” or “fearing” (φοβηθείς) (for Themistokles). Thoukydides
employs the stronger “carried by a storm,” and the less ample form for “fear-
24 Loeb: “threw himself upon grievous and desperate chances of escape” (B. Perrin, Plutarch’s
Lives ii [London, 1914] 65); Budé: “il se jeta dans une tentative péri1euse et désespérée”
(R. Flacelière et al., Plutarque. Vies ii, 129).
ing” (δείσας, 137.2). Plutarch emphasizes more “entreaties and threats” without
relating explicitly, as does Thoukydides, the Machiavellian scheme leaving the
pilot no choice. The condensed versions in Diodoros (11.56.1–3) and Nepos’
Themistocles (11.8.3–8), like Plutarch’s, omit the Odyssean craftiness used by
Themistocles against Admetos (Thoukydides, 136.4). But for dramatic effect, in
24 Plutarch may have desired to concentrate everything on the supplication
with the boy. Thus, he reserves for 25.2, as an example of the hero’s cunning, an
exaggerated version of Themistokles’ intimidation of the ship captain. Nor do
Diodoros and Nepos indulge in the Plutarchan doubling. Adding to the baroque
effect of the Plutarchan Life is the constant intimation of motion. Following
Thoukydides, he relates that Themistokles “crossed over”—followed by back-
ground information on his role of arbitrator at Kerkyra (Corcyra); “thence he
fled” to Epeiros (24), and “threw himself” into … hopes—followed by infor-
mation on Admetos; then “threw himself down” at the hearth—followed by
explanation of the form of supplication, and the two versions of the story. After
this he “made his way to the sea,” “set sail,” “compelled them to sail by and
make the coast of Asia.” Thoukydides, however, who shifts the viewpoint to the
Kerkyrians, depicts a Themistokles who is not “conveyed” but who “fled.” He
then “approaches” Admetos’ wife, is instructed, and presents a rather sophis-
tical argument to Admetos, who “gave him an escort” to go to Pydna. Later in
Thoukidides, Themistokles tells the captain why he is “fleeing,” and then the
ship “arrives” at Ephesos. Plutarch’s account uses 6 verbs of motion associated
with Themistokles, 4 of which are swift or violent motion. In contrast, Thouky-
dides employs only 2 verbs of active motion for the hero.
2 Escaping the Ships of Libo
A revealing passage for simplification, focusing, and recasting in terms of

motion and spatial fluidity occurs in the seventh chapter of the Antonios. The
hero, attempting to bring reinforcements to Julius Caesar in the war against
Pompeius Magnus, is intercepted by the enemy fleet. Worried about Caesar,
who is surrounded at Dyrrachion, he breaks Libo’s blockade at Brundisium, and
puts to sea with “eight hundred cavalry and twenty thousand legionaries.” The
account runs like a nightmare (7.4–6):
καὶ γενόμενος καταφανὴς τοῖς πολεμίοις καὶ διωκόμενος, τὸν μὲν ἐκ τούτων κίν-
δυνον διέφυγε, λαμπροῦ νότου κῦμα μέγα καὶ κοίλην θάλατταν ταῖς τριήρεσιν
αὐτῶν περιστήσαντος, ἐκφερόμενος δὲ ταῖς ναυσὶ πρὸς κρημνοὺς καὶ φάραγ-
γας ἀγχιβαθεῖς, οὐδεμίαν ἐλπίδα σωτηρίας εἶχεν. ἄφνω δὲ τοῦ κόλπου πολὺν
ἐκπνεύσαντος λίβα, καὶ τοῦ κλύδωνος ἀπὸ τῆς γῆς εἰς τὸ πέλαγος διαχεομέ-
νου, μεταβαλόμενος ἀπὸ τῆς γῆς καὶ πλέων σοβαρῶς ὁρᾷ ναυαγίων περίπλεων
τὸν αἰγιαλόν. ἐνταῦθα γὰρ ἐξέβαλε τὸ πνεῦμα τὰς διωκούσας αὐτὸν τριήρεις,
καὶ διεφθάρησαν οὐκ ὀλίγαι· καὶ σωμάτων πολλῶν καὶ χρημάτων ἐκράτησεν
Ἀντώνιος, καὶ Λίσσον εἷλε, καὶ μέγα Καίσαρι παρέσχε θάρσος, ἐν καιρῷ μετὰ
τηλικαύτης ἀφικόμενος δυνάμεως.
Being discovered by the enemy and pursued, he escaped the danger from
them—a violent Southeaster bringing a heavy swell and creating great
troughs in the sea—but carried with his own ships toward steep cliffs
and craggy shores running down to the deep, had no hope of escape.
Suddenly, with a strong Southwester blowing from the bay, and the surf
rolling out from land to the open sea, reversing his course away from the
land and sailing aggressively along, he saw the shore filled with wrecks.25
For here the wind had cast up the triremes pursuing him and destroyed
not a few. Antony took many bodies and much treasure, captured Lissos
and gave great confidence to Caesar, by arriving with such great force in
the opportune moment.26
The account, with its focus on the protagonist and its simplification of the
historical sequence, radically contrasts, both in the narration of details and
in emphasis, with Caesar’s Bellum Civile and Appian’s Bella Civilia.27 In Caesar
the central themes are the skill and (lack of) experience of his army, his own
generosity, the danger to his inexperienced troops, and the perversity of the
enemy. Absent from the account is the number of the soldiers transported,
something which in Plutarch’s version magnifies the risk. Plutarch omits the co-
commander of the operation, Fufius Calenus, something which would distract
from the importance of Antony. Caesar also depicts the army’s morale as
somewhat forcing the issue, and makes the pursuer, Coponius, in command of
the Rhodian fleet, a protagonist. Coponius at first pursues with a failing wind,
25 The term σοβαρῶς, translated “haughtily” here, is frequent in Plutarch. It combines the
ideas of speed and vigor (lsj i: violent or rushing motion as of the wind), with haugh-
tiness, pride, and magnificence (Pelling, Life of Antony, 133). lsj also gives “triumphant,”
“insolent,” “fearless.”
26 Ending with a mouthful, the labored phrase τηλικαύτης ἀφικόμενος δυνάμεως is Plutarch’s
third most favored rhythm – ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ x – (Cf. Sandbach, “Rhythm,” 194).
27 Plutarch’s imagination has altered the source, possibly through a misunderstanding of the
Latin at 7.5 (Pelling, Life of Antony, 133).
to take advantage of his heavier fleet. Then the same south wind (Auster) as it
rises aids the Caesarian fleet; but Coponius relentlessly continues the pursuit,
hoping somehow to take advantage even of the tempest. The Caesarian fleet
is carried past Dyrrachion by the storm, still pursued by Coponius. Finally it
turns into a harbor (Nymphaion), three miles beyond Lissos, protected from
the southeast wind (Africus) but not from the south (Auster). At this moment
the south wind (Notos), which had been blowing for two days, suddenly turned
into a southwest wind (Lips). While the Caesarian ships are protected by the
harbor, the Rhodian ones are dashed along the coast and their crews either
killed against the rocks or captured and sent home by Caesar. Later, how-
ever, two Caesarian ships with inexperienced troops, which had been pursuing
a slower course, anchor opposite Lissos, foolishly surrender, and are massa-
cred.
To highlight the centrality of Antony and narrate events from his viewpoint,
Plutarch omits many of the Caesarian details. Narrated with an almost Homeric
simplicity, the account pits Antony either against almost nameless adversaries
or the elemental forces of wind and waves.28 Dreamlike visions of flight and
pursuit are depicted against a universal seascape: violent winds, swells, precip-
itous coastlines, shores lined with shipwrecks.
Again, he transforms the Caesarian phraseology. The “south wind” becomes
a “violent south wind.” He gratuitously adds a “heavy swell” (κῦμα μέγα),
“precipices and crags dropping deep into the water” (κρημνοὺς καὶ φάραγγας
ἀγχιβαθεῖς), “without hope of escape,” “swell running from land out to sea” (τοῦ
κλύδωνος ἀπὸ τῆς γῆς εἰς τὸ πέλαγος διαχεομένου). The destruction of “sixteen
Rhodian vessels” now becomes an expressionistic “shore covered with wrecks.”
All are, presumably, the offspring of his own fertile imagination. Elsewhere in
the Lives Plutarch delights in the sudden reversal of a situation. His imagina-
tion could not resist the magnificent, though probably unfounded, addition—
Antony reversing his course and sailing aggressively along (πλέων σοβαρῶς) as
he surveys the wrecks of the enemy fleet. Plutarch eliminates the loss of the two
Caesarian ships, which would have weakened the effect of sudden reversal. His
penchant for magnification through doublets is also evident here:
γενόμενος καταφανὴς … καὶ διωκόμενος, κῦμα μέγα καὶ κοίλην θάλατταν, πρὸς
κρημνοὺς καὶ φάραγγας, μεταβαλόμενος … καὶ πλέων σοβαρῶς, ἐξέβαλε … καὶ
διεφθάρησαν (having become clearly seen … and being pursued, a heavy
28 See, for example, Brenk, “Unum pro multis caput,” 793–801; and Nicoll, “The Sacrifice of
Palinurus,” 461–462.
swell and hollow sea, toward grags and precipices, turning about, and
sailing proudly, thew out … and destroyed.)
Caesar’s more factual, pragmatic, strategic account designed as military and

political propaganda has been metamorphosized into a highly psychological
account centered on Antony’s inner feelings of first despair and then elation.29
The enemy and the power of the elements stand in confrontation with the
isolated person, “he:” “discovered,” “pursued,” “escaped,” “carried,” “having no
hope,” “able to reverse course,” “sailing haughtily along,” “seeing,” “taking pris-
oners and booty,” “capturing Lissos,” and “inspiring Caesar with confidence as
he arrives in the nick of time.”
In Caesar’s Bellum civile, however, Antony, linked with Calenus, the co-
commander, fades away before the impersonal “they,” “our men,” “those,” “our
ships,” and the passage terminates with the real protagonist, Caesar. “He,” in
fact, is not Antony but the enemy admiral, Coponius, whose viewpoint covers
the initial part of the narrative, which later shifts toward that of “our men.”
The briefer account of Appianos at first sight appears to use Antony’s per-
spective. But in reality Antony’s viewpoint only frames the viewpoint of his
troops. Otherwise the narrative, with some logical amplification on military
strategy or background follows the general lines of Caesar’s:
ὁ δ’ Ἀντώνιος τοὺς ἑτέρους ἐπὶ τὰς ναῦς ἐπιβήσας Ἀπολλωνίαν μὲν παρέπλευ-
σεν, ἱστίοις μεστοῖς ἐπιπνέοντος ἀνέμου· χαλάσαντος δὲ τοῦ πνεύματος περὶ
μεσημβρίαν εἴκοσι τοῦ Πομπηίου νῆες, ἐπ’ ἔρευναν τῆς θαλάσσης ἀναχθεῖσαι,
καθορῶσι τοὺς πολεμίους καὶ ἐδίωκον. τοῖς δὲ ὡς ἐν γαλήνῃ δέος ἦν πολύ, μὴ
σφᾶς ἀνατρήσειαν ἢ καταδύσειαν αἱ μακραὶ τοῖς ἐμβόλοις· καὶ τὰ εἰκότα παρε-
σκευάζοντο, σφενδόναι τε ἠφίεντο ἤδη καὶ βέλη. καὶ ὁ ἄνεμος ἄφνω μείζων ἢ
πρότερον ἐπέρραξεν. αἱ μὲν δὴ μεγοις ἐξ ἀέλπτου τὸ πνεῦμα ἐδέχοντο καὶ διέ-
πλεον ἀδεῶς· αἱ δ’ ἀπελείποντο, ῥοθίῳ καὶ πνεύματι καὶ θαλάσσῃ κοίλῃ κακο-
παθοῦσαι. καὶ μόλις ἐς ἀλίμενα καὶ πετρώδη διερρίφησαν, δύο τινὰς ἐς τέλμα
τῶν Καίσαρος κατενεχθείσας ἑλοῦσαι. Ἀντώνιος δὲ ταῖς λοιπαῖς ἐς τὸ καλούμε-
νον Νυμφαῖον κατήχθη.
Antony embarked the remainder of the army and sailed past Apollonia
with a strong favoring wind. About noon the wind failed, and twenty of
29 G.W. Bowersock, “Discussion,” in Flashar (ed.), Le classicisme à Rome, contested by Las-

serre, stresses the non-rhetorical character of Caesar’s Commentarii, compared to history
(167). However, see also L. Raditsa, “Julius Caesar and his Writings,” anrw i.3 (1973) 417–
456, for Caesar’s “veracity” (433–442).
Pompeius’ ships, which were searching the seas, discovered and pursued
them. For Antonius’ men being in a calm there was great fear of the enemy
ramming and sinking them, that is, the enemy warships with their rams.
They prepared themselves, therefore, for the eventuality and began to dis-
charge stones and darts. Unexpectedly, however, the wind began to blow
more strongly than before. With their large sails they received the wind
and sailed on fearlessly. The other ships were left behind, pounded by the
swell, wind, and troughs of sea. They were scattered along a harborless
and rocky coast and only with difficulty captured two of Caesar’s ships
that had run aground on a shoal. Antonius, though, with the remainder
sailed into the port of Nymphaion.30
The account is rather coldly factual except for mention of the troops’ fear, but
even their anxiety is expressed in relatively weak terminology (δέος ἦν πολύ,
ἀδεῶς). The description of cliffs, sea, wind, coastline, and wrecks are a pale
reflection of Plutarch’s.
3 The Battle of Actium
Unfortunately, for the Battle of Actium (chapter 66) we lack a good source with
which to compare Plutarch.31 Cassius Dio wrote long after Plutarch and prob-
ably is influenced by him. Still, Dion’s narrative helps reconstruct Plutarch’s
originality in the reshaping of sources and the imposition of his own literary
conception. In Plutarch, “the kings” have already begun to defect. Antony’s gen-
eral, Canidius, advises Antony to dismiss Kleopatra and decide the issue by
land, either in Thrace or Macedonia, and surrender the sea to “Caesar,” who has
already demonstrated his naval superiority in the war against Sextus. However,
Kleopatra’s preference for a naval battle prevails, “though she was already con-
templating flight” and disposing her forces for easy escape (63.8). A centurion
also begs Antony to fight on land rather than on “rotten timbers,” but the hero
can only offer a cheery look and pass on. He “has no good hopes”—according to
our author—since he compels the captains to bring their sails along. After four
days of stormy seas, during which the fleets lie idle, favorable conditions return
and battle is decided upon (64). The opposing commanders are said to have
30 Bellum Civile 2.59 Text of L. Mendelssohn, rev., P. Viereck, Appiani Historia Romana ii
(Leipzig, 1905) 195. The last line seems to be corrupt; Cf. Viereck, ad loc.
31 Pelling, Life of Antony, 278–291; see also B. Scardigli, Die Römerbiographien Plutarchs, 149.
given exhortations to their troops. “Caesar” encounters Eutychos (“Fortunate”)

and his ass, Nikon (“Victorious”), which he interprets as a good omen. At the
sixth hour, after remaining motionless for a long time, the wind begins to rise.
Antony’s men become impatient and start the attack, to the delight of “Caesar”
(65). The ships of both sides, though, for tactical reasons avoid ramming one
another, so that the conflict resembles a battle on land rather than at sea. Then
the center falls into confusion as Antony’s commander, Publicola, attempts to
prevent an encircling movement by Agrippa. Plutarch continues (66.5–7):
… ἀκρίτου δὲ καὶ κοινῆς ἔτι τῆς ναυμαχίας συνεστώσης, αἰφνίδιον αἱ Κλεοπά-

τρας ἑξήκοντα νῆες ὤφθησαν αἰρόμεναι πρὸς ἀπόπλουν τὰ ἱστία καὶ διὰ μέσου
φεύγουσαι τῶν μαχομένων· ἦσαν γὰρ ὀπίσω τεταγμέναι τῶν μεγάλων καὶ διεκ-
πίπτουσαι ταραχὴν ἐποίουν. οἱ δ’ ἐναντίοι θαυμάζοντες ἐθεῶντο, τῷ πνεύματι
χρωμένας ὁρῶντες ἐπεχούσας πρὸς τὴν Πελοπόννησον. ἔνθα δὴ φανερὸν αὑτὸν
Ἀντώνιος ἐποίησεν οὔτ’ ἄρχοντος οὔτ’ ἀνδρὸς οὔθ’ ὅλως ἰδίοις λογισμοῖς διοικού-
μενον, ἀλλ’—ὅπερ τις παίζων εἶπε τὴν ψυχὴν τοῦ ἐρῶντος ἐν ἀλλοτρίῳ σώματι
ζῆν—ἑλκόμενος ὑπὸ τῆς γυναικὸς ὥσπερ συμπεφυκὼς καὶ συμμεταφερόμενος.
οὐ γὰρ ἔφθη τὴν ἐκείνης ἰδὼν ναῦν ἀποπλέουσαν, καὶ πάντων ἐκλαθόμενος, καὶ
προδοὺς καὶ ἀποδρὰς τοὺς ὑπὲρ αὐτοῦ μαχομένους καὶ θνῄσκοντας, εἰς πεντήρη
μεταβάς, Ἀλεξᾶ τοῦ Σύρου καὶ Σκελλίου μόνων αὐτῷ συνεμβάντων, ἐδίωκε τὴν
ἀπολωλεκυῖαν ἤδη καὶ προσαπολοῦσαν αὐτόν.
… although the sea battle was still undecided and equally favorable to
both sides, suddenly the sixty ships of Kleopatra were seen hoisting their
sails for breaking away, and then fleeing through the middle of the com-
batants. For they had been stationed in the rear of the warships, and by
breaking out through the engaged vessels created confusion. The enemy
looked on with amazement as they observed them taking advantage
of the wind and heading for the Peloponnesos. Here, then, Antonius
revealed himself to be guided not by a commander’s, nor a man’s, nor even
by his own tactics, but as a wit remarked “a lover’s soul dwells in another’s
body,” so he was dragged along by the woman as if grown attached and
carried along. For he wasted no time watching her ship sail away, but
oblivious of all, betraying and running away from men fighting and dying
on his behalf, he embarked on a five-oared galley, where Alexas the Syrian
and Skellios were his only companions, and hastened after the woman,
who having destroyed him already was about to add to his destruction.32
32 Ziegler adds the less elegant ἑαυτήν before the mss.’ ἀπολωλεκυῖαν in 66.8. The normal
Dion, who is primarily concerned with the probabilities of the situation,

does not totally eliminate the motif of destruction through eros, but his version
is much longer and quite different. Kleopatra, who despairs of winning, decides
that the army should occupy the most favorable strategic positions, while she
and Antony depart for Egypt. To motivate the queen, Dion uses the swallow
and statue portents used by Plutarch, along with the low morale and disease
afflicting Antony’s troops. They decide, though, not to sail away secretly, lest
they demoralize their allies, but to feint a naval battle—advisable in any case
since they might meet resistance (50.15). Long speeches by Antony and “Caesar”
to their troops follow, that of Octavius, a mine of anti-Antonine propaganda
(50.16 30).33 “Caesar,” who intuits the strategy of the pair, intends to fall upon
the rear, planning to capture Antony and Kleopatra as they retreat. But his
commanding general, Agrippa, argues that their own ships are too slow to
pursue but have a strategic advantage over Antony’s vessels, which have already
been battered by a storm. After a long delay, then, as in Plutarch, “Caesar”
begins an encircling movement which forces Antony to respond (50.31). In the
action which ensues “Caesar’s” ships dart in and out ramming the enemy, but
are vulnerable to rocks and missiles launched from the towering ships of their
adversaries (50.32). Dion’s account now begins to move away from Plutarch’s
toward the expressionistic. The battle is still indecisive, until Kleopatra become
impatient and “tortured by the agony of such long suspense—as typical of a
woman and an Egyptian”—and by “fearful expectation” turns and runs. Antony,
because he believes the ships have been routed, not that they were following
Kleopatra’s orders, follows suit (50.33). There follows a bitter and protracted
meaning of προσαπόλλυμι, is “destroy (another) besides,” though in its unique occurrence

elsewhere in Plutarch (Quomode adulator 68A), it means simply “destroy,” or “besides the
other evils caused, destroy.” The verb has been conjectured, wrongly, in Phoc. and Cat. 2.5,
Pomp. 84.8, and Artax. 22.5 for προαπόλλυμι. Professor Bühler suggests ἀπολωλυῖαν for ἀπο-
λωλεκυῖαν. However, though “complete the destruction of” is not given for προαπόλλυμι in
lsj, it is paralleled by προσγενόμενος (added to), προσγιγνόμενος (reinforcement), προσγι-
γνώσκω (learn in addition), προσδίδωμι (pay in addition), etc. I am grateful to Professor
Édouard Des Places for his opinion here. The last three words (excepting ἤδη καὶ), ἀπολω-
λεκυῖαν ἤδη καὶ προσαπολοῦσαν αὐτόν, are extremely rhythmical, with repetition in meter
corresponding to repetition in sense. Variety gained through the accents: ⏑ ⏑ – ⏑ – ⏑ [καὶ
πρὸς] ⏑ ⏑ – ⏑ (falling under Plutarch’s most favored ending, – ⏑ – x) (Sandbach, “Rhythm,”
194–195, who notes that Plato in his later works did not treat the final syllable as anceps).
33 See H. Botermann, “Review of P. Wallmann, Triumviri Rei Publicae Constituendae. Unter-
suchungen zur politischen Propaganda im Zweiten Triumvirat (43–30 v. Chr.) (Frankfurt,
1989),” Gnomon 62 (1990) 330–334, esp. 333–334, who believes the truth is lost to history
and accuses Wallmann of being the latest victim of Augustan propaganda.
struggle between and on the opposing ships, resolved only in the most horrible
way when “Caesar” orders fire to be launched against the enemy ships. An
inferno ensues which initiates the ghastly destruction of the enemy, “overcome
by the smoke, consumed in their armor, wounded by the missiles, drowned or
struck by their opponents, or mangled by sea-monsters.” Dion contrasts the
horror of these deaths with those of others who were killed by their fellow
soldiers or found some other way to die, “for they having had no tortures to
endure, dead as on a pyre, were cremated in the ships.” A grim cautionary tale
of avarice follows: others, of “Caesar’s” own troops, who had hoped to seize
treasure, sealed their own doom as “through the flame and their robberies
they perished” (50.33–35).34 “Caesar” despatches part of his fleet to pursue
Antony; but realizing their inability to overtake him, they return (51.1). The
battle narrative ends abruptly at this point.
Compared with Plutarch’s version, Antony’s flight is relatively unclimactic,
even if Dion’s narrative does not entirely bear out his theory of a pretended
battle. In Dion, since Antony’s retreat supposedly has already been decided
upon, the battle only serves as a diversion for the flight. Obviously then his
flight cannot be motivated through eros for the femme fatale. Rather his flight
is motivated through belief that the battle had already been lost and his own
forces routed. The flow of the narrative, perhaps to create suspense, is broken by
exceedingly long speeches and by constant digressions on motives or military
strategy. The viewpoint of the battle scenes shifts back and forth between the
engaged combatants, except for the brief moment in 33.3, where Antony sees
the Egyptian queen fleeing.35 Immediately after, the viewpoint returns to the
combatants, then passes to “Caesar,” who issues the last command. The final,
manneristic depictions of nightmarish agonies inflicted on anonymous and
anti-heroic troops might be read symbolically as a statement on the magnitude
of cruelty and perversity which lies dormant within the human psyche.
Plutarch, after an introduction divided between the two commanders,
focuses our attention almost entirely on the psychological reactions of Antony.
Two exceptions are Octavius’ delight at witnessing the spontaneous advance of
Antony’s fleet and the amazement registered by “Caesar’s” men when they see
the Egyptian vessels streaking for the Peloponnesos. Even more than in Dion,
Antony is dragged along rather than shaping destiny. His ships without an order
advance to the attack; his own ships are surrounded by Caesarian ships attack-
34 The text ends very suddenly here, as though something were lost in the transmission.
35 According to Pelling, Life of Antony, 284, Kleopatra’s treachery, which was first related in
Iosepos (Josephus), Against Apion 2.59, seems unknown to the Augustan poets.
ing like wasps and are encircled by Agrippa; the center falls into confusion; and
the sixty ships of Kleopatra flee. The sole positive action of Antony is his hasty
retreat into a galley to pursue “the [woman], who already having destroyed him
was about to add to his destruction.” This focusing is reinforced by frequent
use of the hero’s name: “those of Antonius,” “about one [ship] of Antonius,”
“the [soldiers] of Antonius,” “Antonius revealed himself.” The next chapter (57)
employs his name ten times. Here his initial rapid action to prevent Kleopatra’s
ship from being rammed by Eurykles is succeeded by his sulking at the prow.
Plutarch’s account, like that for Dyrrachion, is dreamlike, but not a night-
mare. Compared with Dion’s it is a model of simplicity. The actual engagement,
a battle momentous for all future history, occupies less than a single chapter.
Skirmishes between or on board ships are subordinated to the general tactical
movements of the fleets. The protagonists thus reduce themselves, as though
on a stage, to a relatively small number: Antony, “Caesar,” Agrippa, Publicola,
Kleopatra—followed by the minor characters Alexas and Skellios, the late arriv-
ing Eurykles, and a chorus of anonymous soldiers and sailors. Where Dion
relishes the confused and detailed horror of visual phenomena, Plutarch more
abstractly and intellectually surveys events from a distance, generating quasi-
universal battles against quasi-universal seascapes, and concentrates on the
passion of the protagonists: the sea tossed for four days by the wind, the wind
rising from the sea at the sixth hour, Antony’s left wing put in motion, “Cae-
sar’s” backward motion, smaller Caesarian ships surrounding the monstrous
hulks of Antony, Agrippa’s left wing beginning the encircling movement, Pub-
licola’s center in confusion, Kleopatra’s ship sailing away, and “the soul of a
lover dwelling in another’s body.” Then Plutarch’s lens seems to “zoom in” on
more individualistic detail. As Kleopatra’s ship sails away, Antony embarks in
the ship of Alexas and Skellios, a five-oared galley (penteres). Kleopatra recog-
nizes Antony and hoists him aboard, as though offering a premonition of his
death scene later in her monument near the sea at Alexandria. There follows
the somewhat detailed confrontation with Eurykles and the intimate details
on board ship. Finally, like the divine couple of Homer the two are persuaded
to “eat and sleep together,” thus drawing the curtain on the Battle of Actium.
Plutarch has also motivated his scenes much more through interior feelings
than has Dion. Dion’s Kleopatra does turn and sail away through anxiety about
the outcome, but Plutarch’s characters are much more Euripidean in their
emotional motivation. “Caesar” is “astonished” (ἐθαύμασεν, 65.6) to see the
enemy motionless, as though riding at anchor. The soldiers “impatient of delay”
advance without orders. “Caesar” is “delighted” (ἥσθε, 65.8) at this unexpected
turn. However, Plutarch unexpectedly omits any rational or irrational motive
for Kleopatra’s flight. His silence perhaps results from his focusing upon the
singular viewpoint of his hero, but it also suggests an irrational motive for her
retreat. Plutarch reflects rather on the soul of Antony, which is dragged along
by eros as though no longer in his own body but biologically attached to that of
his love. He also omits any emotional reaction of Kleopatra in 67 as she hauls
Antony aboard. Thus, the reader’s attention can be entirely focused on Antony’s
depression, his defense against Eurykles—who is himself motivated by the
passion for vengeance—and his sulking “either through anger or ashamed to
face her” (εἴθ’ ὑπ’ ὀργῆς εἴτ’ αἰδούμενος ἐκείνην). He returns to normal existence
through conversation (λόγοι), followed by eating and sleeping with Kleopatra.
The scene foreshadows his later, self-imposed exile at the “Timoneion” on
Pharos and his return from isolation, when he abandons himself to banquets
and, one would piously suppose, the pleasures of love.
At Actium the wind and sea and in particular the shifting breeze act as a
symbolic background to the untrustworthiness of Kleopatra and the instabil-
ity of erotic passion which governs the hero’s conduct.36 The motifs of the early
seascapes of Antony’s escapade with the Pompeian fleet over against Dyrra-
chion in chapter 7 hauntingly return, charged with new meaning and defeating
expectation. Some phrases in 64–67 reflect those of the earlier adventure, even
if there is no explicit reference to the previous exploit. Near Dyrrachion there
was “a huge wave from a brisk south wind and troughs in the sea” (λαμπροῦ νότου
κῦμα μέγα καὶ κοίλην θάλατταν, 7.4), “a strong southwest wind blowing from the
gulf” (τοῦ κόλπου πολὺν ἐκπνεύσαντος λίβα, 7.5), and “a swell running from land
to the open sea” (τοῦ κλύδωνος ἀπὸ τῆς γῆς εἰς τὸ πέλαγος διαχεομένου, 7.5). The
similar yet diverse phraseology offers a revelation into the care Plutarch took
in recomposing the sources into his own linguistic medium, the fullness of lan-
guage often balancing the brevity of the account.
At Actium there is “the open sea churned to waves by a great wind” (μεγάλῳ
πνεύματι κυμανθὲν τὸ πέλαγος, 65.1), followed by a fifth day “of windless weather
and a sea without breakers” (νηνεμίας καὶ γαλήνης ἀκλύστου, 65.1), then at the
sixth hour “a wind rising on the open sea” (πνεύματος αἰρομένου πελαγίου, 65.7).
The variability in expression corresponds to the variability of the wind itself.
36 For the sources see also R.T. Ridley, History of Rome. A Documented Analysis (Rome, 1987)
342–344. Plutarch, De fortuna rom. 324b, expands at great length on the metaphor of “the
great daimon of Rome” as a steady breeze. The source may be Latin, since the pun (uentus-
spiritus) is not evident in δαίμων-ἄνεμος, while Plutarch in turn may be influenced by the
Roman or Imperial genius (δαίμων) principis. On the passage see Forni, Plutarco. La fortuna
dei Romani, 125–126; F. Frazier & C. Froidefond, Plutarque. Œeuvres Morales v. 1 (Paris,
1990) 22, 26.
Another small touch ironically recalls us to the earlier scene near Dyrrachion.
There, after the wind had changed, Antony had escaped, and the shore was
lined with the wreckage of enemy ships, the hero sailed along σοβαρῶς (“haugh-
tily,” “insolently,” 7.5) surveying the coast. After Actium, it is Eurykles the Lako-
nian, who in a Liburnian, presses on Antony’s heels σοβαρῶς (67.2), brandishing
a spear, but to be frustrated in his mission of vengeance.
The high, or baroque, style of the narrative is once again enhanced by
Plutarch’s penchant for doubling, often with solemn, grandiose, multi-syllabic
phrases. But one also finds an incredible variety which defeats expectation
rather than resulting in an artificial or ponderous attempt at balance. Still, on
occasions the revelation flashes before us all too clearly that God, or nature,
or destiny created Plutarch to see all things with double vision, to describe
all things in parallel: “the heights and the greatnesses” (τοῖς ὕψεσι καὶ μεγέθεσι,
65.7), “sluggish and slow-moving” (ἀργὰς καὶ βραδείας, 65.8), “were neither ram-
mings nor smashings” (ἐμβολαὶ μὲν οὐκ ἦσαν οὐδ’ ἀναρρήξεις, 66.1), “hard and
rugged” (στερεὰ καὶ τραχέα, 66.1), “shields and spears and pikes and firethrow-
ers” (γέρροις καὶ δόρασι καὶ κοντοῖς … καὶ πυροβόλοις, 66.3), “thrown into con-
fusion and intertwined” (θορυβουμένων … καὶ συμπλεκομένων), “undecided and
equal” (ἀκρίτου δὲ καὶ κοινῆς, 66.5), “grown attached and carried along” (συμπε-
φυκὼς καὶ συμμεταφερόμενος, 66.7), “betraying and running away” (καὶ προδοὺς
καὶ ἀποδράς, 66.8), “battling and dying” (μαχομένους καὶ θνῄσκοντας, 66.8), and,
finally, “having ruined and ready to ruin more” (ἀπολωλεκυῖαν ἤδη καὶ προσα-
πολοῦσαν, 66.8). With due respect for the most famous of biographers, even
the protagonists appear in parallel: Egyptians and Phoenicians (64.3), Mar-
cus Octavius and Marcus Insteius (65.1), “Caesar” and Agrippa (65.3), Antony’s
Canidius and “Caesar’s” Taurus (65.3), Eutychos and his donkey Nikon (65.5),
Agrippa and Publicola (66.4), Alexas and Skellios (66.8), and above all, Antony
and Kleopatra themselves are the paradigmatic pair, who, as the battle fades
from sight and the shadows of even fall, are persuaded “together-to-dine and
together-to-lie-down-to-sleep” (συνδειπνεῖν καὶ συγκαθεύδειν, 67.6).37
Besides the elevation of diction, many of the above phrases and others are
brilliant in their suggestive onomatopoeia, often employing Plutarch’s beloved
full-blown and even parallel participles. In the contrasting expressions μεγάλῳ
πνεύματι κυμανθὲν τὸ πέλαγος and νηνεμίας καὶ γαλήνης ἀκλύστου γενομένης, (“the
sea turned to surge by a great wind,” and “windlessness and a waveless calm,”
65.1) we sense the surge of the sea followed by calm. In πνεύματος αἰρομένου
37 A very somniferous phrase (– – – – – – ⏑ – – ⏑ – x), with subtle variation in the accents,

and with Plutarch’s most favored ending (– ⏑ – x).
πελαγίου δυσανασχετοῦντες … (“with the wind rising from the sea, getting impa-
tient …,” 65.7), we almost feel the waves beginning to roll and the creaking of
the rigging. Others can be noted: πρὸς χαλκώματα στερεὰ καὶ τραχέα (“against
bronze, hard and rugged,” 66.1); τετραγώνων ξύλων μεγάλων σιδήρῳ συνηρμοσμέ-
νων καὶ πρὸς ἄλληλα δεδεμένων … (“of huge square timbers—fastened together
with iron and … constrained,” 66.2), with its symbolic sense of immobility;38
θορυβουμένων δὲ τούτων καὶ συμπλεκομένων (“these cast into confusion and
being entangled with,” 66.5); συμπεφυκὼς καὶ συμμεταφερόμενος (“having grown
attached and being carried along,” 66.7); ἑλκόμενος ὑπὸ τῆς γυναικὸς … (“dragged
along by the woman …,” 66.8). The phrase οὔτ’ ἄρχοντος οὔτ ἀνδρὸς οὔθ’ ὅλως ἰδίοις
λογισμοῖς διοικούμενον (“neither of a commander, nor of a man, nor even by his
own reasoning, directed,” 66.7) simultaneously suggests Antony’s lack of reso-
lution, and the rocking of his vessel in the waves.39
Periodic structure accompanies the grandiloquent phraseology. The Dyrra-
chion adventure begins with a very long period of 12 lines, in which “Gabinius,”
“Antonius,” “Caesar,” and “Libo” succeed one another as subjects (7.3). A 6 line
period, centered on Antony, follows (7.4). Next comes the sentence beginning
“Suddenly, the bay sending forth a strong southwest wind …” Though otherwise
a rather normal period, it commences with the rather startling ἄφνω (“sud-
denly”), which fits the suddenness of the event and the excitement of the troops
(7.5). The first part of the next sentence—or the entire next sentence, depend-
ing how one divides these paratactic constructions—is short, and periodic.
Finally, Antony’s triumph is structured on the Laconic style of Julius Caesar’s
“ueni, uidi, uici”—took prisoners, captured Lissos, inspired “Caesar” (… ἐκρά-
τησεν … εἵλε … παρέσχε …, 7.6).40 But the passage terminates with the high
sounding μετὰ τηλικαύτης ἀφικόμενος δυνάμεως (“so great, arriving with a force,”
7.6). Only the very long first sentence and the next longest one reserve the verb
for the final position (… ἀνήχθη, 7.3; … οὐδεμίαν ἐλπίδα σωτηρίας εἶχεν, 7.4).
The Actium scene, though quite different in conception, is marked by a
similar brilliant coordination between sentence structure and action. At 65.7
a short three-word main clause notes the hour. Then, a 3 line periodic main
clause follows, describing the wind gradually rising, the impatience of the
troops, and their motive for believing victory possible. A non-periodic, but
38 Using the much more melodic reading of Richards, καί … δεδεμένων, adopted by Pelling.
39 Also, the meter of the clausula ending (– ⏑ – – ⏑ x) is unusual, listed by Sandbach
(“Rhythm,” 194) as no. 8 (not in De Groots’s list, but also avoided by Plutarch). It does not,
however, end the sentence.
40 Pelling, Life of Antony, 134, notes the effect of the exaggerated paratactic style in καὶ … καὶ
… καὶ … καὶ …, while the perils are conveyed in more complex structures.
high-style sentence of 5 lines then depicts “Caesar’s” elation and outlines his
ensuing tactics (65.8). Chapter 66 begins with a sentence of about 50 words,
counting connectives and the like, full, but non-periodic. The first half, with
a long introductory phrase which announces the beginning of the conflict,
precedes the main verb. Then proceeding in a rambling manner it explains
why ramming was not employed (66.1). A sixteen word non-periodic sentence,
beginning with the main verb, then describes the actual damage done to the
ships (66.2). Next, are 3 short non-periodic sentences on tactics used (66.3).
A periodic sentence of 2 lines depicts Agrippa’s encircling movement and
Publicola’s reaction (66.4).
The denouement is marked by extreme variety in sentence structure. A
very periodic introduction of three and a half lines mirrors the confusion of
battle. Immediately after, the sentence snaps in two with “suddenly” (αἰφνίδιον,
66.5)—corresponding to the “suddenly” (ἄφνω) 7.5—Kleopatra’s fleet hoists
sail, and we move out of the periodic mode (66.5). Two short non-periodic
sentences follow, one to indicate the location of Kleopatra’s ships, the other
to depict the astonishment of “Caesar’s” crews as they view the flight of the
Egyptians toward the Peloponnesos (66.6).41 The chapter—and the battle—
ends with a non-periodic, compound sentence of eleven lines. The first part
castigates the indignity of Antony’s conduct. The second—breaking into two
balanced parts separated by the conjunction “and”—expands in an abstract
way upon the degrading effect of erotic passion, relates in a more detailed
manner Antony’s departure in the boat of Alexas and Skellios, and terminates
with the famous participles describing the femme fatale. As a general rule,
throughout these passages the main verb is located in the middle of a sentence
or main clause, and frequently after a full introductory phrase. On occasion
(66.2, 3, 5, 8) the main verb comes first, but only twice (65.7, 66.4, 6) receives
the final position. Very characteristic is an introductory main clause, with tag-
on participles or subordinate clauses, often in periodic structure. The periodic
element especially occurs as an introduction to a surprising turn in the action.
Plutarch also achieves brilliant change of pace in the texture of the account.
For example, he balances Antony’s review of his troops, going around in a row-
41 Plutarch likes to capture the critical moment with a frozen visual tableau (Pelling, Life of
Antony, 280). Possibly he was influenced by “expressionist” painting. in this case an actual
depiction of Kleopatra’s flight at Actium—like the mosaic at Pompeii of the Battle of Issos;
Cf. F. Villard, “Painting,” in J. Charbonneaux, R. Martin, & F. Villard (eds.), Hellenistic art
(330–50 bc) (New York, 1973) (= “Peinture,” in J. Charbonneaux, R. Martin, & F. Villard
(eds.), Grèce hellénistique, 330–50 av. J.-C., Coll. L’Univers des Formes 18 [Paris, 1970]) 97–
197 (114–118, figs. 115–117).
boat and speaking in indirect discourse, with that on land by Octavius. The
mise en scène of each has great symbolic value. Direct discourse is used for
“Caesar” and Eutychos the donkey-driver—a surprising change of focalization
and level of discourse—with prolepsis anticipating the erection of the statue
of Eutychos and his donkey at Actium after the victory. The disposition of
the forces is related in rather staccato and paratactic language. Finally, the
interior reflections on Antony are in expansive language reminiscent of Plato’s
dialogues. Finally, Plutarch sustains the interest of the reader by his intense
personalization of the scene as he moves from character to character, even if
the guiding thread is the effect on Antony.
4 The Pageantry: Antony’s Debauchery, His Arrival at Ephesos,

Kleopatra’s Arrival at Tarsos
Though the seascapes for the battle near Dyrrachion and for the battle at
Actium can be imagined as paintings or frescoes, they present themselves more
as a series of scenes than as one great painting. In contrast, the depiction
of Antony “picnicking” in 9, his arrival at Ephesos in 24, and the arrival of
Kleopatra’s barge on the Kydnos near Tarsos in 26 create the impression of
single tableaux. The scene at Tarsos actually breaks into the arrival, banquet
aboard Kleopatra’s yacht, and the reciprocal banquet on Antony’s; but the
initial scene overpowers the others.
The picnicking in chapter 9 derives from Cicero’s Philippics, as the author
hints, but it is filled with life, movement, and even a bit of sympathy, foreign
to the original.42 Dolabella has introduced a law for the abolition of debts.
Antony decides to oppose it, but is accused of being motivated by the suspicion
that Dolabella was his wife’s lover. Egged on by the Senate, he joins battle
with Dolabella in the Forum, which the latter had occupied by force. He thus
makes himself “bitterly unpopular among the masses,” while “to respectable
and decent citizens he was unacceptable because of his life in general, as Cicero
says; in fact, they hated him … disgusted at …”
At this point Plutarch uncharacteristically reels off a number of disgust-
ing vices: drunkenness, expenditures, womanizing, sleeping by day and revel-
ing by night, and passing time with mime actors and comics. Antony, while
42 Only, that Antony’s conduct made him hated by decent citizens is attributed to Cicero.
However, Pelling, Life of Antony, 137, sees 9.5–9 as a pastiche from several passages in
Philippics ii, with Plutarchan exaggerations, for example, the ἐν γάμοις μίμων καὶ γελωτο-
ποιῶν (9.5) probably based solely on Hippias’ wedding (mentioned in 9.6; Philippics 2.63).
conducting business in the Forum, vomits into his toga. The first part of the
chapter adheres closely to Cicero and is similar to the weak imitation of it in
Dion (45.27–29). But then he impresses his own personality upon the material,
describing Antony’s trips out of town (9.7–8):
καὶ Κυθηρὶς ἀπὸ τῆς αὐτῆς παλαίστρας γύναιον ἀγαπώμενον, ὃ δὴ καὶ τὰς
πόλεις ἐπιὼν ἐν φορείῳ περιήγετο, καὶ τὸ φορεῖον οὐκ ἐλάττους ἢ τὸ τῆς μητρὸς
αὐτοῦ περιέποντες ἠκολούθουν. ἐλύπουν δὲ καὶ χρυσῶν ἐκπωμάτων ὥσπερ ἐν
πομπαῖς ταῖς ἀποδημίαις διαφερομένων ὄψεις, καὶ στάσεις ἐνόδιοι σκηνῶν καὶ
πρὸς ἄλσεσι καὶ ποταμοῖς ἀρίστων πολυτελῶν διαθέσεις, καὶ λέοντες ἅρμασιν
ὑπεζευγμένοι, καὶ σωφρόνων ἀνδρῶν καὶ γυναικῶν οἰκίαι χαμαιτύπαις καὶ σαμ-
βυκιστρίαις ἐπισταθμευόμεναι.
… and Cytheris, when visiting various towns, he brought her around with
him in a litter, which had no fewer lackeys following than his mother’s—
from the same “wrestling school”—his beloved playmate. Sorrowed were
people by the sight of golden beakers borne about during his excursions
from the city as though in sacred processions, of wayside pavilions erected
near groves or streams, of expensive repasts in the country, of lions har-
nessed to chariots, and of respectable men and women’s habitations, for
streetwalkers and sambuca girls requisitioned”.43
9.7–8
Plutarch, as frequently in the Lives, then moralizes through the mouth of

imagined bystanders. Here they condemn Antony for revelling in luxury and
insulting the sensibilities of his fellow-citizens, while “Caesar,” risking his life,
was sleeping out under the open skies.44
The section at first sight appears to be an imaginary expansion upon Cicero’s
invective, but it is not pure invention.45 Antony actually was the first at Rome
to harness lions to a chariot, according to Pliny (nh 8.55). Plutarch might have
43 Pelling, Life of Antony, 137–138, delightfully analyzes the sentence structure here (9.5–9),
with its cumulative effect and the violent and crude climax in χαμαιτύπαις καὶ σαμβυκι-
στρίαις ἐπισταθμευόμεναι. The mannered effect, which softens the blow, though, suggests a
Plutarch more artistic than moralistic.
44 F. Frazier, “À propos de la composition des couples dans les Vies Parallèles de Plutarque,”
RPh 61 (1987) 65–75, puts Demetrios-Antonios among Lives of “political conduct” and takes
the choice of the pairing as based on the heroes’ luxurious and wanton lifestyle (τρυφή)
(72).
45 See Pelling, Life of Antony, 139, for this section.
included the hero’s use of a golden chamberpot (nh 33.50). Probably pure
invention, though, are lion excursions through idyllic landscapes. Just as the
naval battle near Dyrrachion foreshadows that at Actium, so the processions of
chapter 9 prepare us for the entry into Ephesos (24.1–5):
Ἐπεὶ δὲ Λεύκιον Κηνσωρῖνον ἐπὶ τῆς Ἑλλάδος καταλιπὼν εἰς Ἀσίαν διέβη
καὶ τῶν ἐκεῖ πλούτων ἥψατο, καὶ βασιλεῖς ἐπὶ θύρας ἐφοίτων, καὶ βασιλέων
γυναῖκες ἁμιλλώμεναι δωρεαῖς πρὸς ἀλλήλας καὶ κάλλεσιν ἐφθείροντο πρὸς
αὐτόν, ἐν Ῥώμῃ δὲ Καίσαρος στάσεσι καὶ πολέμοις ἀποτρυχομένου, πολλὴν
αὐτὸς ἄγων σχολὴν καὶ εἰρήνην ἀνεκυκλεῖτο τοῖς πάθεσιν εἰς τὸν συνήθη βίον,
Ἀναξήνορες δὲ κιθαρῳδοὶ καὶ Ξοῦθοι χοραῦλαι καὶ Μητρόδωρός τις ὀρχηστὴς
καὶ τοιοῦτος ἄλλος Ἀσιανῶν ἀκροαμάτων θίασος, ὑπερβαλλομένων λαμυρίᾳ καὶ
βωμολοχίᾳ τὰς ἀπὸ τῆς Ἰταλίας κῆρας, εἰσερρύη καὶ διῴκει τὴν αὐλήν, οὐδὲν
ἦν ἀνεκτόν, εἰς ταῦτα φορουμένων ἁπάντων. ἡ γὰρ Ἀσία πᾶσα, καθάπερ ἡ
Σοφόκλειος ἐκείνη πόλις, ὁμοῦ μὲν θυμιαμάτων ἔγεμεν, ὁμοῦ δὲ παιάνων τε
καὶ στεναγμάτων· εἰς γοῦν Ἔφεσον εἰσιόντος αὐτοῦ, γυναῖκες μὲν εἰς Βάκχας,
ἄνδρες δὲ καὶ παῖδες εἰς Σατύρους καὶ Πᾶνας ἡγοῦντο διεσκευασμένοι, κιττοῦ
δὲ καὶ θύρσων καὶ ψαλτηρίων καὶ συρίγγων καὶ αὐλῶν ἡ πόλις ἦν πλέα, Διόνυσον
αὐτὸν ἀνακαλουμένων Χαριδότην καὶ Μειλίχιον. ἦν γὰρ ἀμέλει τοιοῦτος ἐνίοις,
τοῖς δὲ πολλοῖς Ὠμηστὴς καὶ Ἀγριώνιος.
After leaving Lucius Censorinus in charge of Greece, he crossed into Asia

and laid hands on the riches there. Kings stood at his portals and the wives
of kings competing against one another with their gifts and charms were
corrupted by him. While at Rome “Caesar” in civil strife and foreign wars
was exhausting himself, Antony himself with all the peace and leisure in
the world was spun back by his passions into his customary mode of life.
With Anaxenores for citharists, Xouthoses for flautists, one Metrodoros a
dancer, and of Asiatic noise-makers, a comparable thiasos surpassing in
impudence and effrontery the spooks from Italy, flooded and took over
his court. In no way was the situation bearable; everything was being
carried off for such extravagances.46 For all of Asia, like the famous Sopho-
clean city, was filled alike with burning incense, alike too with paeans and
lamentations.47 At any rate, into Ephesos when he came, women as Bac-
chai, men and boys as Satyrs and Pans arrayed led the way; and of ivy and
46 Possibly φορουμένων ἁπάντων (24.2) means “all this tribute was being collected,” but the
normal word for collecting tribute is φορολογέω. Festugière gives it a personal meaning:
“tout le monde se laissant porter de ce côté” (120).
47 Oidipous Tyrannos, 4–5.
thyrsoi and harps and pipes the city was full, Dionysos, the people calling
him, Joy-Giver and Beneficent. For he was such undoubtedly to some, but
to most, the Carnivorous and Savage.
The scene uses a similar frame of reference to the excursions out of Rome
earlier in the Life but is related in a more elevated style corresponding to the
magnitude of the event.48 First, items from the hostile tradition are checked
off: excess in food and drink, his association with the scum of the earth, the
exploitation of honest citizens. Then, in Plutarch’s generally charitable manner,
the redeeming qualities of the hero are discussed. In the earlier chapter the
catalogue of his vices was followed by the narration of his reform under the
firm auspices of Julius Caesar and of Antony’s new wife, Fulvia. This scheme is
followed in 24. The change in tone between chapters 9 and 24 is something like
that from Vergil’s Eclogues to the Aeneid, nor is it altogether impossible that the
shades of Dido and Aeneas have fallen over Plutarch’s landscapes. At any rate,
sylvan spreads by the groves and streams of the Roman Campania or Arcadian
Italy, which Antony shared with a companion obscure to history and of low
rank, give way to the cities of Greece, Asia, Italy, kings and the wives of kings.
The nameless actors and musicians of chapter 9 are replaced with famous, or
infamous, performers. The passage is graced with a citation from tragedy, taken
from the opening lines of the Oidipous Tyrannos, and, granted, these may have
been learned on school benches, they still resonate with a solemn, religious
tone.49
Moreover, at Ephesos Antony is described in terms of the explicitly Dio-
nysiac thiasos, which characterized the official iconography and ideology of
48 The reasons for complaint all depend on the initial ἐπεί, in an intricate and balanced
period, but are separated into four groups of increasing length and color; the solemn quo-
tation from Sophokles changes the tone, moving the theme to divine honors—a statement
expressed in a strong balanced period—next come the outrages in sharp, simple sen-
tences, then direct discourse (the complaint of Hybreas), and, finally, a thoughtful analysis
employing heavier structure and style (Pelling, Life of Antony, 176–177).
49 P. Carrara, “Plutarco ed Euripide,” 447–455, paints a none too rosy picture of Plutarch’s
use of citations. According to Carrara, Plutarch had a vast literary education, often reveals
direct knowledge of an original text, and is acquainted with citations not found elsewhere
in extant literature. However, most are loci communes cited in other authors and in
anthologies (447). He concludes that Plutarch often used collections or intermediate
authors, particularly where Stoic παραδιόρθωσις (the use of texts for moral purposes,
with some alteration to fit the sense) is at stake, and that one must always take into
consideration the nature of the work and the context of the citation (454–455).
Hellenistic, and in particular, Ptolemaic rulers. Though the hostile sources

possibly intended to describe the derogatory “rabble,” by the term thiasos,
we begin to see Hellenism not through Roman eyes but through the Greek
eyes of the defensive Plutarch. True, Antony is Dionysos the “Carnivorous and
Savage.” But Plutarch relates, in the charmingly deconstructive manner which
is so frequent in his writings, benevolent tales about his hero, forgives him for
his “aloof management style,” and praises his repentance for the errors made
through naiveté.50
Except for the names of the musical performers and the capital of Asia, the
scene is as unspecific as the “processions” in chapter 9. The thiasos contains
the motifs of the endlessly repeated Dionysiac entourage found in painting,
mosaics, silverwork, and ultimately the Roman sarcophagi. Though there are no
allusions to Alexander, the scene recalls the Dionysiac thiasos which was mod-
elled on the Indian triumph of Alexander, but without panthers, elephants, and
centaurs. The description of Antony’s lion-rides in chapter 9 may have been
intended through suggestive association to contribute to the effect of his arrival
at Ephesos.
From the very beginning of the passage there is an elevation of tone contrast-
ing with the earlier passage in chapter 9. The structure of the earlier scene in 9
was relatively modest. Phrases are balanced, while, as so frequent in Plutarch,
qualifying or descriptive participles abundantly tumble upon one another after
main verbs following an introductory phrase. The non-periodic structure of the
scene in 9 is striking, in particular the initial position of the main verb: λέγεται
γοῦν (9.6), ἦν δὲ καὶ Σέργιος (9.7), ἐλύπουν δέ (9.8); δεινὸν γὰρ ἐποιοῦντο (9.9). The
entry into Ephesos, instead, and contrary to Plutarch’s normal process of pil-
ing up participles, begins with an enormous introductory clause.51 Like a legal
50 On deconstruction, see T.G. Rosenmeyer, Deina ta polla. A Classicist’s Checklist of Twenty

Literary-Critical Position (Buffalo, 1988) 34–37; J. Culler, On Deconstruction (Ithaca, 1985);
P. De Man, Blindness and Insight. Essays in the Rhetoric of Contemporary Criticism (New
York, 1971); and the delightful summary in R. Alter, “Deconstruction in America,” New
Republic (April 25, 1983) 27–31. Deconstructionist elements particularly are at stake in
the appearances of Kleopatra, both within and without Plutarch, as in Horatius, Odes
1.37, where—intentionally or unintentionally—the similes put her in a sympathetic light;
cf., for example, A.T. Davis, “Cleopatra Rediviva,” g&r 16 (1969) 91–93. For interpretations
since Davis, see M. Margolies De Forest, “The Central Similes of Horace’s Cleopatra Ode,”
cw 82 (1989) 167–173; G. Mader, “Heroism and Hallucination: Cleopatra in Horace c. 1.37
and Propertius 3. 11,” Grazer Beiträge 16 (1989) 183–201, esp. 187–190, 197.
51 Something like ἔπειτα δέ would have given a more natural opening, but the grammar, logic,
and suspense of οὐδὲν ἦν ἀνεκτόν would suffer.
document or a decree, it unwinds with a subordinate clause, here introduced

by “after” (ἐπεί 24.1). Squeezed within the opening part of the clause is a par-
ticipial introduction: “after, leaving behind Lucius Censorinus …” Seven verbs
follow the “after” introduction, and three participles which seem barely to have
escaped being verbs (καταλιπών, ἁμιλλώμεναι, ἀποτρυχομένου, 24.1). Of the three
following sentences, the first, though straightforward, reserves the verb for the
end. The second neatly positions the verb in the center, and the last begins with
the verb.
Twinning is still present, as the inevitable monster of parallelism rears its
double head: Greece and Asia, kings and wives of kings, gifts and charms, “Cae-
sar” and Antony, civil strife and wars, leisure and peace, lute players and flute
players, Anaxenores and Xouthoi, paeans and lamentations, women and men,
Satyrs and Pans, ivy and thyrsoi, some and others, not to mention the dou-
ble parallelism of “Giver of Joy and Beneficent,” “Carnivorous and Savage.” The
participles, though not used en masse, are sufficiently grandiloquent to make
their presence felt: ἁμιλλώμεναι, ἀποτρυχομένου, ὑπερβαλλομένων, φορουμένων,
διεσκευασμένοι, ἀνακαλουμένων (24.1–4).
The description of Kleopatra’s arrival on the Kydnos, near Tarsos in Cilicia,
is another magnificent tableau. As Antony’s thiasos evokes the Dionysos of the
visual arts, so its pendant, Kleopatra’s arrival at Tarsos, suggests a Hellenistic
fresco of the arrival of Aphrodite (26.1–5):
Πολλὰ δὲ καὶ παρ’ αὐτοῦ καὶ παρὰ τῶν φίλων δεχομένη γράμματα καλούντων,
οὕτως κατεφρόνησε καὶ κατεγέλασε τοῦ ἀνδρός, ὥστε πλεῖν ἀνὰ τὸν Κύδνον
ποταμὸν ἐν πορθμείῳ χρυσοπρύμνῳ, τῶν μὲν ἱστίων ἁλουργῶν ἐκπεπετασμέ-
νων, τῆς δ’ εἰρεσίας ἀργυραῖς κώπαις ἀναφερομένης πρὸς αὐλὸν ἅμα σύριγξι
καὶ κιθάραις συνηρμοσμένον. αὐτὴ δὲ κατέκειτο μὲν ὑπὸ σκιάδι χρυσοπάστῳ,
κεκοσμημένη γραφικῶς ὥσπερ Ἀφροδίτη, παῖδες δὲ τοῖς γραφικοῖς Ἔρωσιν
εἰκασμένοι παρ’ ἑκάτερον ἑστῶτες ἐρρίπιζον. ὁμοίως δὲ καὶ θεραπαινίδες αἱ
καλλιστεύουσαι Νηρηίδων ἔχουσαι καὶ Χαρίτων στολάς, αἱ μὲν πρὸς οἴαξιν, αἱ
δὲ πρὸς κάλοις ἦσαν. ὀδμαὶ δὲ θαυμασταὶ τὰς ὄχθας ἀπὸ θυμιαμάτων πολλῶν
κατεῖχον. τῶν δ’ ἀνθρώπων οἱ μὲν εὐθὺς ἀπὸ τοῦ ποταμοῦ παρωμάρτουν ἑκατέ-
ρωθεν, οἱ δ’ ἀπὸ τῆς πόλεως κατέβαινον ἐπὶ τὴν θέαν. ἐκχεομένου δὲ τοῦ κατὰ
τὴν ἀγορὰν ὄχλου, τέλος αὐτὸς ὁ Ἀντώνιος ἐπὶ βήματος καθεζόμενος ἀπελεί-
φθη μόνος. καί τις λόγος ἐχώρει διὰ πάντων, ὡς ἡ Ἀφροδίτη κωμάζοι πρὸς τὸν
Διόνυσον ἐπ’ ἀγαθῷ τῆς Ἀσίας.
Having received many letters of summons, either from him personally or

through his friends, she showed so little esteem and so ridiculed the man
as to sail up the Kydnos river in a barge with a golden prow, its purple
sails billowing in the wind, while the stroking of the rowing of silver
oars kept time to a flute, in harmony with pipes and lutes. She herself
reclined beneath a gold-spangled canopy, attired as in a painting like
Aphrodite, while boys resembling painted Erotes, standing on either side,
fanned her. Likewise, her serving maids, in the flower of beauty, wearing
the robes of Nereids and the Graces, some at the steering oars, others
at the reefing ropes took their station. Wonderful fragrances from many
incense burners filled the riverbanks. Of the bystanders, some followed
on either side of the river, others issued from the city to behold the sight.
But when the crowd in the agora had poured out, in the end, seated upon
the tribunal, Antonius was left to himself. A certain rumor spread abroad,
moreover, that Aphrodite was entering the revel along with Dionysos, for
the good of Asia.52
The scene is characterized by conceptual simplicity, much like the entry into
Ephesos, the naval battle near Dyrrachion, or even the Battle of Actium. Plu-
tarch’s restraint is noteworthy, and the ability to leave the reader thirsting for
more rather than surfeited with excess may have contributed to his biographi-
cal success. Here one might compare him with a contemporary, Petronius, who
in the Satyricon overwhelms the reader with detailed minutiae. The generaliz-
ing simplicity of presentation, besides rendering the narration more compre-
hensible, casts the experience in universal and familiar terms. Though quite
a number of details appear in the Kydnos scene, they are rather general and
related briefly. For example Plutarch dispenses with Kleopatra’s banquet which
follows that of Antony, “a spread beyond words to describe,” in only 10 lines.
In contrast, 22 lines survive of Sokrates of Rhodes’ description of the banquet.
With little subtlety he enumerates the extravagant preparations of Kleopatra
followed by the resulting stupor of Antony and his men. Sokrates achieves
this effect through the uninspired and Petronian like piling on of externals:
gold, jewels, tapestries, Ethiopian boys carrying torches, horses with silver har-
nesses, roses of priceless quantity. For Plutarch, however, the banquet is only
one card in the intensely psychological atmosphere of “games people play.” The
Egyptian queen pits her ploys against the blustering Roman, more Mars than
Dionysos, with the eventual triumph of the queen, modestly endowed with
physical beauty according to the generous Plutarch, but according to the coins,
52 See Pelling, Life of Antony, 186–187, for the suggestive rhythms, languorous words, and
change of pace in this scene.
of modest looks if not slightly ugly.53 The complexity and length of Petronius’
Cena Trimalchionis, written probably a generation before the Antonios, imme-
diately comes to mind.
The Kydnos scene is a mixture of rather universal visual and audial effects.
Nothing is very explicit except the names of the river, of Kleopatra, and of
Antony, who inject themselves into an otherwise mythological scene. Twice,
in fact, Plutarch invites the reader to imagine a painting, though his exact
words refer only to the attire of Kleopatra and the boys masquerading as Erotes.
Plutarch may be teasing the reader. He really plays on all the senses: a view
of the river and the agora, the odor of perfume, the beating of the oars and
the symphony of the musical instruments. Nor is the scene static. Usually one
painting does not convey a sequence. Plutarch here actually presents two focal
points difficult to join in one painting. In one, Kleopatra-Aphrodite sails up the
river followed by a growing crowd of admirers. In the other, Antony, sitting in
the agora is abandoned by the dwindling crowd. An ingenious painter could
represent the scene in higher and lower registers or on opposite sides of a large
canvas or fresco.
Metatextually this scene was prepared for by a previous tableau, that of the
funeral cortege at the end of Demetrios. Here too Plutarch balanced visual and
audial effects. Xenophantos plays the flute, while the oars of the rowers on the
funeral vessel seem to harmonize with the melody. Much artistry is devoted
naturally to the specific sounds of the funeral dirge in Demetrios, but great
similarities still exist (53.5):
53 Most of the description concerns the spectacular illumination at the banquet. Pelling,
Life of Antony, 190, notes a similarity with Vergil’s Aeneid 1.726–727. Perhaps the Aeneid
banquet was influenced by the Alexandrian ones, and Plutarch should have known about
the Aeneid. Suetonius (Nero 31) does not mention light effects in his description of the
Domus Aurea, though they might be involved in the dining room (i.e., in the circular ceiling
which revolved like the heavens). Similarly, Petronius, Satyricon (60) has nothing about
light effects in the Cena. Pelling, Life of Antony, 189, mentions the account of Kleopatra’s
dinners at Tarsos in Sokrates of Rhodes (FGrHist 192, Fr. 1 [Jacoby, ii, b, 927, commentary
ii, c, 621]). H. Gärtner, “Sokrates. 3,” in K. Ziegler, W. Sontheimer, H. Gärtner (eds.), Der
kleine Pauly. Lexikon der Antike v (Munich, 1975) 255, would put him in the 1st cent. bc.
That Plutarch uses a psychological approach, in contrast to the phenomenological one of
Sokrates, was suggested by Professor Pelling. [en: F.B. Titchener, “Everything to do with
Dionysus: Banquets in Plutarch’s Lives,” in Montes et al. (eds.), Plutarco, Dioniso y el vino,
491–499.]
… προσηύλει τῶν μελῶν τὸ ἱερώτατον· καὶ πρὸς τοῦτο τῆς εἰρεσίας ἀναφερομέ-
νης μετὰ ῥυθμοῦ τινος, ἀπήντα ψόφος ὥσπερ ἐν κοπετῷ ταῖς τῶν αὐλημάτων
περιόδοις.
… played along with the flute, of melodies, the most sacred. And to this
music, the measured rowing of the oars responded, like the beating of the
breast, to the cadences of the flute.
… τῆς δ’ εἰρεσίας ἀργυραῖς κώπαις ἀναφερομένης πρὸς αὐλὸν ἅμα σύριγξι καὶ
κιθάραις συνηρμοσμένον.
… while the revolutions of the rowing of silver oars kept time to a flute, in
harmony with pipes and lutes.54
Antonios, 26.1
The Kydnos scene is not only one of splendor, opulence, and joy, but also,
because of its relationship to the Demetrios, is disturbingly ambiguous. Perhaps
the reader would not be expected to recall the Demetrios passage, but closing
the Life on such a grand scale, it is really quite unforgettable. Thus, the recollec-
tion of oars striking the water in response to a tune might evoke the last voyage
by water of Demetrios. Just as the assimilation of Antony to Dionysos is not all
joy and merriment, but a mixture of gaiety and savagery (Carnivorous, Savage),
the aspects we find in the Dionysos of Euripides’ Bacchai. So Kleopatra’s arrival
at Kydnos, in terms of intertextuality, is not simply that of the life-bringing
Aphrodite. But even without reference to intertextuality, the gilded prow, pur-
ple sails, canopy gold-spangled, flute, and incense, suggest the decadence later
associated with the death-haunted revelry and banquets at Alexandria. Kleopa-
tra here, who seems to rise mysteriously out of the sea like Aphrodite, becomes
in fact the destructive Aphrodite of Euripides’ Hippolytos, the τελευταῖον κακόν
announced at the beginning of chapter 25. Still, the scene follows the same pat-
tern as Antony’s arrival in Ephesos. Moral condemnation of vice is succeeded
by an indulgence and sympathy which relate the intriguing details of semi-
private life: charm compensating for beauty, the persuasion and stimulation
of her multi-lingual conversation, and the sweetness of her voice. The gentle
pen of Plutarch fashions her more into a humanly ambiguous though under-
standable Circe than an overtly monstrous and destructive Scylla.
54 There is some correspondence, either in sound or sense between κοπετῷ—κώπαις, and

μετὰ ῥυθμοῦ τινος—συνηρμοσμένον.
It should be overwhelmingly clear, then, that Plutarch’s style, though belong-

ing to his period, is a very personal one, and in its own way, brilliant. In particu-
lar one is struck by its fullness—with an ever-flowing stream of participles and
never-failing parallelism—its loose periodicity, its sense of movement, yet abil-
ity to catch the dramatic moment, its variety, and finally its intense focalization
on his characters, as he probes ever deeper into the inner haunts of their souls.
There is a rich, baroque quality to the style, much like that of the corpus of the
Lives themselves, with its loose structure (or apparent lack of it). Rather than
being a self-contained logical unit, consisting of a clear beginning, middle, and
end, the Lives seem capable of endless expansion and enrichment. So too the
style. This open-endedness and resistance to simple comprehension evokes the
mystery of life itself, which at least in Platonic terms, is not reducible to sim-
ple rational formulation, nor necessarily confined to one chronological period,
nor limited to this world alone, but enjoys almost limitless horizons. Perhaps,
especially in these days, the waters of Pseudo-Longinos’ Rhine and Danube are
not to be preferred to Kallimachos’ holy spring, but fluvial majesty is not to be
scorned, nor prose “flowing like a river, a great and powerful river.”55
The Parallel Lives can be compared to a symphony. In them two main
streams, a Roman and a Greek melody or tonality, alternate back and forth, with
special interplay in the synkriseis. On occasions the Roman tonality echoes the
Greek. Motifs and themes are picked up from one Life to the next. On occa-
sion a Greek is in the Roman sphere of influence, but more often a Roman is in
the Greek world. If the Antonios is the final Life, then more than elsewhere the
Roman merges into the background of the Greek lands traversed by Alexander
the Great and his epigonoi. Not surprisingly, then, we find a crescendo of lament
at the end for Antony, but also for the last shadow of Greek supremacy repre-
sented in Alexandria as it too finally succumbs to Roman power. There follows
the long genealogy of Antony—or the Nerogonia—ending with the birth and
career of the Emperor bringing the Lives to Plutarch’s own times. A fitting coda
to a great enterprise spanning so much of Greek and Roman culture. The sharp
division between Lives and Moralia may be a modern categorization. Possibly
in Plutarch’s own mind the Lives formed an integral part of his entire philos-
ophy. They are in a sense case studies, not of morality in a narrow sense, but
in the larger context of achieving one’s eschatological destiny, an expansion on
the choice of lives in Plato’s myth of Er. In this sense most or all of his heroes
are examples of misguided human ambition,56 swept along in the Heraclitan
55 Longinos, On the Sublime, 35.4; cf. Russel, Classicizing Rhetoric, 115.

56 [en: H.P. Liebert, Between City and Empire: Political Ambition and Political Form in Plu-
tarch’s Parallel Lives (Diss. University of Chicago, 2009).]
flux of phenomena, as described in De E, rather than growing wings and soaring

upward into the intelligible sphere of their telos, the Platonic Good. Antony was
an excellent subject, not because he was so evil, but rather because, subject to
passion and struggling against forces beyond his comprehension or control, he
was so much like us.57
57 Gratitude is due in particular to Professor C.B.R. Pelling, University College, Oxford, who
looked over the entire text, and offered a great number of corrections and suggestions.
Professor Katherine A. Geffcken of Wellesley College read over the first section; Professor
Jean Davison of the University of Vermont, the second; Professor Jean-Louis Ska of the
Pontifical Biblical Institute, Professor William S. Kurz of Marquette University, Mary
Hopkins looked over the third section; and Professor Charles L. Babcock of Ohio State
University and the American Academy, Rome, the fourth. All caught many errors and
made many helpful suggestions. Professor Winfried Bühler of the University of Hamburg
looked over an early draft of the last section, making many excellent points. Professor
Ronald Mellor of the University of California at Los Angeles read the proofs of the
first and second sections, Dr. Patricia de Martino, the third section; Professor Steven
Lowenstam of the University of Oregon, the last; and Timothy Duff of the University of
Cambridge the second proofs. Hopefully they will not disagree with all the views expressed
in the article and having been called upon, on brief notice, to sacrifice their time will
continue to remain friends. Thanks are also due to the American Academy, the Deutsches
Archäologisches Institut, and the École Française, for the use of their libraries in Rome,
and to Marquette University, and to the University of Cambridge, for the use of their
libraries.
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Index of Authors and Texts Cited
Aelianus (Eusebios, Praeparatio Evangelica)

Variae Historiae 211.23, 3–6 71n14
13,16 100n7 Aristoboulos 98n5, 183, 210
Aelii Aristidis Scholia bd 46.233.17 (ed. Aristodemus
Dindorf) (see P. Oxy. 1012c [Fr.]) Frgm. 10.1–3 (ed. Jacoby, FGrHist 104, ii, a,
237n17 p. 499) 238n17, 278n17
Aëtius Aristoteles
Placita Ethica Nicomachea
2.30,1 (svf 404,10) 52n18 6.2 (1139a27) 59n32
Aeschylus (Aischylos) Metaphysica
Choephoroe 11.7 (1064a–1064b) 41n58
894–895 224n Physica
900–901 115n4 1.9 (191b35–192b) 41n58
940 115n4 Topica
Alexander of Aphrodisias 6.2 (112a32) 47n7
176.13 47n7 7.1 (152a5) 47n7
Alexander Polyhistor 125 De virtutibus et vitiis
Anaxagoras 70, 97, 258, 261 7 (1251a31) 147n35
Andron of Halikarnassos 121 Arrianus (Arrian)
Androtion 118 Anabasis
Anticlides (Antikleides) 67 7.23 98n5
Antiochus of Askalon (Antiochos) 11n3, 7.24 98
28, 78 7.30 98
Antipater of Tarsos 88 Artemidorus
Antistius Labeo 125 Oneirokriticon
Antonius (Antony) 1.79 107n6
Replies to Philippics 222n Asinius Pollio (see Pollio)
Appianus (Appian) Aspasius 46n6
Bellum Civile Ateius Capito 125
1.192 113n8 Athenaeus
2.35 108n9 6.62–63 176n22
2.59 247 Atthis 240n21
4.19 101n8 Aufidius Modestus 13
4.74 102n9 Augustinus
4.134 50n13 De civitate dei
5.4,15 161n66 2.25 100n7
5.8–9 180n28
5.9 180n29 Bacchylides
21.149 111n4 Odes
Apuleius 17 121
De deo Socratis Bion 140n15
15 47n7
Metamorphoses 75–77 Caesar
Archemachus of Euboia 67 Commentarii 246n29
Arius Didymus Callimachus (Kallimachos) 68n4, 206, 231,
Compendium of Platonic Doctrine 265
314 index of authors and texts cited
Cassius Dio Dante

45.27–29 257 Inferno
47.8 102n9 3.9 151
50.15 249 Demetrios of Phalerum 83n3
50.16–35 249 (fgh 228, 39) 90n10
51.1 250 Diocles Peparethius 125
51.20,8 152n42 Diodorus (Diodoros) Periegetes 121
63.14.3 155n50 Diodorus (Diodoros) Siculus
63.28,4–5 150n39 Bibliotheca Historica
66.15,1 152n42 4.61,2 117
67.13,2 11 4.62,4 117
67.9 195n55 11.50,4 118
Castor (Kastor) 125 11.56 237n17
Cato 11, 125 11.56,1–3 243
Chrysippus 17.51 118
Peri Ousias 17.116 98n5
svf ii, 1095 19n7 20.110,1 155n51
svf ii, 1178 45n3 31.10 90n10
Cicero Diogenes Laertius
Brutus Vitae philosophorum
250 88n7 1.1,29 118
Contra Verrem 7.151 53n20
2.3.213–217 159n61 Dion Chrysostomus
De divinatione Discourses
1.44.100 118 17,17 118
De officiis 47,8 102n9
1.1 88n7 Dionysius (Dionysios) Halicarnassensis
3.2 88n7 Antiquitates Romanae
Philippicae 12,13 118
2 256n42 Duris (Douris) 81n2, 114, 190n45
2.63 256n42
9.6 256n42 Empedocles
Pro Sestio b 126 (edd. Diels-Kranz) 72
140 192n52 Ephorus (Ephoros) 237n17
Tusculanae Disputationes Epicharmus
1.70 30 Frgm. 258 (ed. Kaibel) 87n5
Verrines Epictetus (Epiktetos) 78
4.132 87n5 Epicurus 195n55
Cinna 105–106 (n. 5) Eudorus
Clidemus (Kleidemos) 240n21 Frgm. 181, 7–30 (Dox. Gr., ed. Diels) 35
Clitarchus 118 Eudoxus of Cnidus 67
Clemens of Alexandria Euhemeros of Messene 68n4
Protrepticus Euripides
35 117 Alcestis
Cornutus 67 22 195n56
Crantor 27n5, 28 363–368 225n28
Crassicius of Tarentum 106n Bacchae
4–5 156
6–8 135n5
index of authors and texts cited 315
Iphigenia Aulidensis Homerus

1136 81n1 Ilias
Frgm. 980 (ed. Snell) 158n58 2.204 225
Frgm. 996 (ed. Nauck2) 122n5 6.145–211 135n4
Frgm. 997 122n5 6.146–149 139–140
Hippolytus 20.200–241 135n4
1201–1217 176 21.188–191 135n4
1437–1439 195 22.209–213 195n56
Hippolytus, scholion to 11 117 22.212–213 195
Eusebius 23.81–92 224n28
Praeparatio Evangelica Odyssea
211.23,3–6 72n14 4.275 47n8
Fabius Pictor 116, 125 4.584 192n52
Favorinus 13 5.396 47n8
Fenestella 125 9.142 47n8
10.65 47n8
Gallus 160n63 10.239–240 49n11
11.60 47n8
Hecataeus of Abdera (Hekataios) 67 12.169 47n8
Hellanicus of Lesbos (Hellanikos) 67 Horatius
Heraclitus Odae
Frgm. 119 (edd. Diels-Kranz) 87n5 1.37 192n51, 260n50
Ps. Heraclitus Epodes
Quaestiones Homericae 5.25 147n33
72–73 73 Hyginus
Hermippus 118 Fabulae
Herodorus 125 41 117
Herodotus (Herodotos)
Historiae Inscriptiones
2.78 194n55 Inscr. Cos
3.109 149n36 391 135n3
4.13–15 123n8 eglc (Kaibel)
6.107 107 253.5–6 224n
7.18 115 386.1–2 224n
7.140 115 1049 194n55
8.35 115 ig
9.35 115 12.7.113 224n
9.44 115 ii (2nd ed.)1035 195n56
9.81 115 ils
Hesiodus 814 149n37
Opera et dies 135 8794 152n42
Scutum 176n22 igrrp
Theogonia 135 iii, 345 152n42
Frgm. 304 (edd. Merkelbach-West) ogis i, 195 189n44
63n39 seg xviii, 566 152n42
Hieronymus of Cardia (Hieronymos of IGrIt i 52 [Sacco]; (= TrGrF ii, Adespota
Kardia) 169n5 f279h [Kannicht-Snell]) 196n
Josephus Ovidius
Antiquitates Judaicae Metamorphoses 17
15.88–93 180n29 1.2.1 75n20
Contra Apionem 1.67 147n33
2.59 250n35 7.456–460 117
Juba 125, 134, 138 8.709–710 224n28
Julius Obsequens 57 100n7 11.698–699 224n28
15.637–640 119
Livius (Livy)
Ab urbe condita Panaetius (Panaitios) 30n15, 78, 80n3
1.16 124 Papyri
1.18–21 124 Derveni papyrus 171n13
5.16,9 118 POxy. 1012c 237n17, 240n21
5.21 116 Parmenides
10.45,7 119 Frgm. b 1.18 105n5
22 98 Pausanias
22.1 96 Graeciae descriptio
22.1.8–13 97n2 1.27,10 117
22.55 116 2.27,1 195n56
22.55–57 116n5 3.8,9 117–118
40.21,1 101 4.26,3 107n6
45.8,5 83n 8.11,12 118
45.9 83n 10.7.1 144, 156n54
Per. 88 112n7 10.19.2 156n54
Longinus (Pseudo-) Petronius
De sublimitate Satyricon 161
35.4 265n55 Cena Trimalchionis 161, 229, 263, 263n53
Lucanus Phaenias 18n3
Pharsalia Philemon 231n7
1.183–203 108 Philippides 115
8.771–772 192n52 Philo
8.816–818 192n52 De Abrahamo
Lucretius 202–204 32n20
3.912–915 195n55 De aeternitate mundi
13 30
Manetho 67 14 29
Menander De ebrietate
Frgm. 59 (ed. Sandbach) 108n9 133 71n14
Frgm. 714 86n5 De gigantibus
Menecrates (Menekrates) 117 17–18 59
Musonius 78 De Josepho
125 35
Nepos De migratione Abrahami
Themistocles 102 71n14
8 237n17 De mutatione nominum
8.7 238n17 134 71n14
11.8,3–8 243 De opificio mundi
Nigidius Figulus 30n15, 125 2 32
7,25 32
De providentia Timaeus
4–5 29 27d5 26
28–29 30 28c3 38
De specialibus legibus 29e–30a 21
2.54–55 32n30 35a 70
Philochorus 35a1–2 39
FGrHist 328f 155n51 36e–37a 38
Phrynichus 37c8 33
clxvi 231n7 37d–38a 29
ccxlv 231n7 39de 25
Phylarchus 67, 81n2, 190n45 40a 59
Pindarus 41bc 25
Fr.276 148n36 42bc 59
Plato 47e4 26
Critias 68e 25
44c 119n10 90a 51, 61
Gorgias 91d 59, 147
524a 72 92b 147
Leges 92c 25, 127
691a 147n35 Pseudo-Plato
709b 87 Epinomis
716b 21 984a 127
870de 151 Plinius, the Elder (Pliny)
872c–873a 151 Naturalis Historia (nh)
10 (884a–910d) 27 2.106 100n7
896d 70 7.138 113n8
903e5–904a1 59 8.55 257
Phaedo 33.50 258
108a 72 34.12,26 119
114bc 170n9 34.45 152n42
Phaedrus Plinius, the Younger
248a 21 Epistolae
248a–e 53n21 5.5.3 166n73
248e–249a 170n9 8.12.4 166n73
256b 73 Plotinus 40, 128n14
Respublica Plutarchus
391c 121n2 Moralia (Ethika)
507–509 41n58 Ad principem ineruditum (Ad princ.
613ab 21 iner.)
614 73 780e 23
617c 41 780f 41n58
621cd 170n9 781f 41n58
Symposium 21n11, 42n58, 62, 63, Amatorius
76n25 753e 135n3
Theaetetus 764d 21n11
174e–175b 135n4 764f 22
176b 21 766a 41n58
176e 20 766b 42n58, 53, 60
768b 112n5
Amatorius (cont.) 416d 48

768b–d 111 417c 161n66
770b 41n58 419a 79
770d–771d 111 428f 70
An virtus doceri possit (An virt. doc.) 431c 63
439b 79 431e–433a 103
An vitiositas ad infelicitatem sufficiat 432c 22
(An vitiositas) 432cd 103
498d 110 De e apud Delphos (De e)
500a 110 387f 17
Animine an corporis affectiones sint 387f–391e 66
peiores (Anim. an corp.) 388e–389c 78
501d 52n17 392a 35
501ef 10 392b 214n18
Bruta animalia ratione uti (Gryllus) 392c 210n13
989a 102 392ef 210n13
Coniugalia praecepta (Con. praec.) 393ab 214n18
145cd 24 393a–c 36
Consolatio ad uxorem (Cons. ad ux.) 393e 36, 41n58
611de 58n31 394a 23
611d–f 60 394b 49
De Alexandri magni fortuna (De Al. De esu carnium (De esu)
Magn. fort.) 994a 161n66
338a 153n47 998c 72
De amore prolis (De am. prol.) De exilio
493e 52n17 601ab 111
De animae procreatione in Timaeo (De De facie quae in orbe lunae apparet
an. procr.) (De facie)
1013b 28 942f 53
1014bc 21 943–945 52
1016c 39n46 943c 53, 60
1023cd 27 943c–e 59n33
1026ef 27, 70n11, 71 943d 55
De audiendis poetis (De aud. poet.) 943f 48
17c 23 943f–944c 55
25b 79 944b 57
De auditu (De aud.) 944bc 54n23
43b 118 944d 50, 55, 123n8
De cohibenda ira 944e 20, 21, 41, 41n57, 54, 55, 123n8
462a 144 945b 54
De communibus notitiis adversus 945d 54, 55
Stoicos (De comm. not.) De fortuna Romanorum (De fort. Rom.)
1076f 78 318b 90
De curiositate (De cur.) 319b–d 91n12
522de 11 319d 85
De defectu oraculorum (De def. or.) 319ef 144n28
415a–c 47 319f 174n17
415b 123n8 322f 161n66
415bc 56, 170 324b 252n36
De garrulitate 382ab 23
505c 144, 157n55 382d–383a 73
De genio Socratis (De genio Socr.) 382f–383a 76n26
579e–f 201n3 De latenter vivendo (De lat. viv.)
583b 201n3 1130c–e 23
585e 201n3 De Pythiae oraculis (De Pyth. Or.)
585f 202n3 397c 66
588e 61 398c 23
590b 57n29 399bc 117
590c–591a 57 408a 118
590f 108, 192n51 De recta ratione audiendi (De aud.)
591a–c 40, 57 43b 118
591b 41 De sera numinis vindicta (De sera
591c 60 num.)
591f 60 550d 20
592a–f 56 552f 111
De Herodoti malignitate (De Her. mal.) 553bc 111
856b 91n12, 112n5 554a–555c 110
De Iside et Osiride (De Is. et Os.) 555c 111
352a 73 556e 157, 158, 158n58
357f 194n55 558b 157
360a 68 559a 157
360e 48 559bc 159n61
360e–361d 68 559c 157
361e 99 559c 157
361ef 49 561b–f 140n15
362b 58 561d 157
363d 68 562b 159n61
364e 99 562cd 157
369b 68 562f 158
369e–370c 49 564f 23
370cd 161n66 565e 58
370e 70 565e–566a 58
370f 70 566e 158
371a 73 567e 110
371a–c 76n26 567e–f 147, 148
372e 41n58 567f 64
372ef 41n58, 71n12 De sollertia animalium (De soll. an.)
372f 71, 72n14 976c 102n9
373a 39n46 De Stoicorum repugnantiis (De Stoic.
373ab 71 rep.)
373ac 39 1050e 79
373b 72, 73 1051c 45
373bc 40 De superstitione (De sup.)
373c 71 166d–e 161n66
374de 29 166f–167b 23
374ef 27 167ef 23
375e 73 166de 161n66
378–379 68n4 168c 45
De superstitione (De sup.) (cont.) 277a 50

171c 45 281e 161n66
171d 18 Quaestiones Graecae (Quaest.
De tranquillitate animi (De tranq. an.) Gr.)
464e 231 299f 161n66
464f 231n7 Quomodo adulator (De ad. et am.)
465b 52n17 56e 144, 144n28, 151
469de 88n8 60b 144, 151
474b 86 61ab 144n28
477c–f 128 68a 249n32
De virtute morali (De virt. mor.) Septem sapientium convivium
445c 52n17 (Sept. sap. conv.)
446a–c 52n17 148a 194n55
450a 23 148b 194n55, 196n57
Mulierum virtutes (Mul. virt.) Fragmenta
260bc 111 178 60
Non posse suaviter vivi secundum 200 49n11, 59n32, 72
Epicurum (Non posse) 201 49n11, 72
1102e 110, 161n66 Vitae Parallelae (Bioi)
1102f–1103e 110 Aemilius Paullus (Aem.)
1104a–1107c 23 8 113
Praecepta gerendae reipublicae (Praec. 27 79, 90
ger. rei.) 28 116
810a 144 Agesilaus (Ages.)
816c 10 3 117
Quaestiones convivales (Quaest. conv.) 6 104, 104n4
613d 161n66 Alexander (Alex.)
615d–619b 18 2 98n4, 104n4
628f 117 2.1 183n31
629e 194n55 3 98n4, 104n4, 116n7
635e–638a 17 14 98n4, 98n5, 116n7, 118
678c 10 17 98n4
692e 161n66 18 104n4
720bc 29 24 104n4
728b 18 25 182
728d–730d 17 26 98n4, 104n4
728d–730f 17 26.11–12 183
740d 79, 87 27 98n4, 102n9
Quaestiones Platonicae (Quaest. 31 98n4
Plat.) 37 116n7, 118
1001bc (q. Pl. 2) 20, 28, 33, 34, 38, 40 116n7
39, 39n47, 40 40.1–2 232n8
1002b 20, 39n46 50 104n4, 106
1006c 70n10 50–52 232n8
1006f–1007a 41n58 57 98
1007c 27 73 102n9
Quaestiones Romanae (Quaest. Rom.) 75 98
266e 126n Alcibiades (Alc.)
276f–277a 79 39 104n4, 106, 111
Antonius (Ant.) 24.2 239, 242

1 188, 215 24.4–5 214
1.1 198 24.5 161
2 188, 215 24–29 188
2.2 222n26 25 236, 237, 239
2.4 159 25.1 189, 214
3. 179, 182, 188 25.2 239
3.6 182 26–36 168n5
4 188, 213, 222 26 214
4.1 197 26.1 264
4.2 177 26.1–5 262
5 182 27 215
6 199, 217 28–29 189
7.3 254 28 215
7.4 260, 262 28.1 190
7.4–5 210, 252 28.3 191
7.4–6 225, 244 29.7 223
7.5 252–255, 244n27 30 215, 216
7.6 254 32 215, 225
7–8 188 33 189, 211, 225
9 188, 213 33–37 154n47
9.5–9 256n42, 257n43 33.3
9.6 256n42, 260 33.5 226
9.7 260 34 179, 180
9.7–8 257 35 189, 225
9.8 260 36 189, 214
9.9 260 37–50 188, 189
10.2 222n26 37–52 186
12 178 37 179, 216
14–22 184 37.6 216
14 191, 215 38 225
16 104n4, 106, 174 39 227
17.1 197 39.1 227
17.3–6 211 40.6 211
17–18 188 45 156, 222, 227
19 174, 175 45.7–12 185
19.1 215 46 225
20.3 163 48 216
22 179, 188 49 219
22.1 184 50 186
22.5 184 51 179, 186, 188
22.6–8 198 51.1–4 181
23 160, 222 52 216
23–27 189 53 188, 216, 219
24 99, 179, 179n27, 191, 213, 214, 243 54 207, 209
24–30 188 54.5 209
24 179, 236–242 55 207
24.1 191, 261 56 179, 179n27, 186, 188
24.1–5 237n17, 259, 261 56.2–10 182
Antonius (Ant.) (cont.) 82.2 196

57 215, 251 84.4–7 224
58 220 84.7 196
59 223 85 220, 225
60 99 85.8 225
60–68 186 86 196
61–66 188 86.7 198, 220
62 218 87 113, 135, 219
63 187, 218 87.4 142
63.8 247 93 218
64–67 252 93.4 199
64 247 Aratos (Arat.)
64.3 187 4 109n13
65 248 5 109
65.1 252–255 43 79
65.6–8 251 54 136, 138n10
65.7 252 Aristides (Arist.)
66 184, 247 6 115n4
66.1–8 253–255 9.2 161n66
66.5–7 248 11 104n4, 105, 115, 117, 120
66.7 218, 225, 227 11.5 115n4
66.8 212 19 104n4
67 252 Artaxerxes
67.2 253 22.5 249n32
68 10 Brutus (Brut.)
68.1 212 1 140n15
68.4 212 20 104n4, 105
69 192, 216 24 88n7
70 216 36 50
71 188, 189, 215, 216 37–51 88
71.2–3 193, 216 40 109, 109n13
71.3 215 43 112n6
71.3–5 195n55 47 88
71.4 215 53 113, 185
74–75 188, 215 53.4 185n34
75 99, 212, 217, 220 54 109n13
75.2 194 55 88
75.4–6 214 Caesar (Caes.)
75.6 195 32 104n4, 106, 107
76 188, 212, 219 40 109, 109n13
76–77 209 42 104n4, 106n
77 196, 217, 219 63 79, 106, 187
77.6–7 217 66 85, 91
77.7 217 68 104n4, 105
78 220 69 51, 92, 112
79 225 Camillus (Cam.)
80 209, 225 4 116, 118
81 209, 225 6 23
82 196, 209 37 79
Cato Maior (Ca. Ma.) 139n11 28.1 190

Cato Minor (Ca. Mi.) 29 104n4
71 113, 192n52 30 154, 179, 180
Cicero (Cic.) 30.2–5 181
2 104n4 31–36 188
4 94, 102n9 32–34 179
5 119, 119n10 39 179
24 88n7 41–42 188, 191
43.2 193n53 43–44 188
44 104n4 45 156
46.6 163 46–50 188
48 100, 112 47 179
48.6 163n69 47.1–2 185
49 113, 137, 165 49 219
49.6 165 51 180, 186
Coriolanus (Cor.) 52 188, 191
24 104n4, 105 52.3–4 190
37–38 23 53.1 191
Crassus 53.5 192, 264
16–33 186 53.8–9 138
Demetrius (Demetr.) 56 180
1 188 Demetrius-Antonius 137, 167n1, 172,
1.6 173 173n16, 199, 256n44
1.8 173 Demosthenes (Dem.)
2 188 19 94, 115
2.3 175 20 109, 109n13
4 104n4, 154 29 104n4, 106
4.1 197 Dion
5–6 179 45.27–29 257
5–7 188 54 50, 109
7 179 56 50
8 154, 179 58 111, 112
8.2–3 155 Dion-Brutus
10 153 Introd. 92, 93
10–13 115 Eumenes (Eum.)
12 153, 178 6 104n4, 105
12.7 155 19 111
14 188 Fabius Maximus (Fab.)
15 179, 188 2 96
16 184, 188 14 109
16.6 174 18 116
19 104n4, 105 Flamininus (Flam.)
19.6 174 10 102n9
23–24 179 10–12 154n48
23–27 188, 189, 191 11 95n15
24 175n18, 191 12 116, 144
25 154 Galba
26–27 179 1 157n55
28–29 188 4 143
Galba (cont.) 15 124

8 143 Pelopidas (Pel.)
14 143 20 120
16 143 20–22 18n3
17 143 21 45, 104n4
19 143 35 104n4, 112
27 113 Pericles (Per.)
Gracchus, Gaius (cg) 3 104n4
1 104n4 6 97
Gracchus, Tiberius (tg) 12.1–2 232n8
17 102n9 13 104n4, 105
21 112 39 23
Cimon (Cim.) Philopoemen (Phil.)
6 111 17 83n3, 94
8 117 21 113
18 104n4 Philopoemen-Flamininus 144
Cleomenes (Cleom.) Phocion (Phoc.)
7 104n4 1 94
Lucullus (Luc.) 38 136
10 104n4, 105 Phocion-Cato
12 104n4, 105 2.5 249n32
23 104n4, 105 Pompeius (Pomp.)
39 14 2.1 183n32
Lysander (Lys.) 24 70
18 114, 115 25 102n9
20 104n4, 105 32 104n4, 105
22 117 34 183n32
25–26 114 42 79
29 118 46 87
Marcellus (Marc.) 46 87, 183n32
8 116 68 104n4, 106n5
28 97 73 105
30.11 137 74 87, 109n13
Marius (Mar.) 75 87
8 100 76 87
36 100 80 112
39 100 84 109
45 100, 104, 104n4, 112 84.8 249n32
46 137 Pyrrhus (Pyrrh.)
Nicias (Nic.) 11 104n4, 105
11 109n13 29 104n4
13 118, 120 Romulus (Rom.)
14 120 2 104n4, 105, 122
17 94 9 115
23 24, 97 12 123n7
Numa (Num.) 28 51n16, 115, 124
5 124 31 172n15
8 23, 119 Sertorius (Sert.)
11 70n10 5 113
27 112 Lamprias Catalogue 109n12, 233n10,

Solon (Sol.) 240n21
4 118 Ps. Plutarch
9 118, 118n9 De vita et poesi Homeri
14 118 126 73
Sulla (Sull.) Regum et imperatorum apophthegmata
6 90 (Reg. et imp. apophth.)
7 97 187e 91n12
9 104n4, 105, 106 206c 108n9
12 117 Pollio, Asinius 12, 106, 109n11, 109n13, 163n69
14 113 Polybius (Polybios)
27 100 Historiae
28 104n4 1.4,1 84
29 117 1.4,3 84
37 104n4, 105 4.81,4 84
Themistocles (Them.) 29.21 83n3, 90n10
10 115 36.17 83n3
13 18n3 Posidonius 30n15, 36–37, 41, 67n2, 70, 78,
13.3 161n66 88–89, 88n8
24 237–243 Promathion 122, 123n6
24.2 240, 242 Propertius
24.4 242 4.7.93–94 224n28
24–25 237n17 Pyrrho of Lipara 125
25 237
25.2 238n17, 239, 243 Rufus, Cluvius 125
27 104n4 Rufus, Curtius 11n3, 118
30 104n4, 115 Rusticus 11–13, 145
32 137
Theseus (Thes.) Sallustius
2 121, 122 Historiae
4 122 3.3 159n61
5 122 Seneca
7 122 Apocolocyntosis
12 122, 161n66 4.1 150n38
15 117, 122n5 Simplicius
16 121 In Aristotelis Physicorum libros Commen-
18 117 taria
19 121 181 10ff. (ad Arist. 188a 19) 35n30
21 122 Socrates (Sokrates) of Argos 125
24 121 Socrates (Sokrates) of Rhodes
25 121 Frgm. 1 (ed. Jacoby, FGrHist 192 Fr. 1; ii, c,
33 122 621) 263n53
35 121, 122 Solon 118
36 117 Sophocles (Sophokles)
Timoleon (Tim.) Antigone
8 104n4, 105, 106 1237–1241 224n28
16 89 1240–1241 224n28
30 111, 115 Electra
37 113 1165–1170 224n28
Oedipus Tyrannus 55.4 53n20

4–5 258n47 Theophrastus
981–982 107n6 Περὶ Καιρῶν
Suda Frgm. 9 (POxy. 1012c Col. ii, 11.23–35)
443.32 47n7 240n21
Strabo Theopompus 67, 68
5.4.4 192n52 Thucydides (Thoukydides)
13.1.30 192n52 Historiae
13.1.31 192n52 1.136–137 233
14.1.26 179n27 1.136.1 239, 241
Suetonius 1.136.2 239, 242
Augustus 1.136.3 239, 241, 242
13.1–2 163n69 1.136.41 239
52 152n42 1.136.4 240, 243
Caesar 1.137.1 241
7 107 1.137.2 240, 241, 243
32 106 3.104.2 195n56
32–33 107 7.50.4 24n17
81 111n4 Scholia Thucydidis
Nero 1.136.1–2 237n17
10 144n28 Timaeus Locrus (Timaios Lokros) 30n15,
10–13 159 35
23–24 156 Timaeus (Timaios) of Tauromenion 89,
25 150 230
26–31 144n28 Timotheus 67, 90, 91, 91n12
31 152n42, 263n53 Tzetzes, Johannes
32 144n28 Ilias
33–38 144n28 p. 95 (Hermann) 117
34 155
Vespasianus Valerius Maximus
8 152n42 Factorum et dictorum memorabilium libri
ix
Tacitus 1.1 111n4
Agricola 1.4,5 101n8
2 11 1.6,3 118
Annales 1.7,7 50
13.10 152n42 1.8,2 119
14.64.1–3 163–164 Varro 53n20, 123, 125, 125n10, 139n13
16.21–25 145 Vergilius
16.21.1 145 Aeneis
16.22 146 1.726–727 263n53
16.25–26 146 6.309–312 59n32
16.30–33 146 6.426–427 108
16.35.1–2 146, 147n33 6.426–429 57, 192n51
Historiae 6.733–734 202
5.13.1 195n56 6.739–742 57n29
Tertullianus Eclogae 259
De anima Georgica 13
54.2 53n20 Verrius Flaccus 125
Xenocrates 20n7, 26, 28, 44n1, 45–48, 47n7, Zeno 36, 119
47n8, 53, 55, 62n37, 65, 67, 69n5 Zonaras
Xenophon Histories
Hellenica 7.20 118
3.3.3 118 10.7 108n9
Zoroaster 47, 126
Index of Historical Persons
Admetos 234–237, 238n17, 240n21, 241–243 Augustus, Octavius (see also Caesar) 113,
Aelius (see Hadrian) 121n3, 106, 134, 137, 141, 150, 165, 174n17,
Aemilius 167n7 219
Aemilius Paullus, Lucius 75–77, 85, 89, 116 Autoboulos (friend of Plutarch) 17
Agesilaus 104, 117 Autolykos 105
Aglaonice 24 Avidius Quietus 12–13
Agrippa 134, 138, 248–249, 251, 253, 255
Agrippina, mother of Nero 135, 138, 145, 150, Brutus, Marcus Iunius 48, 50–51, 88, 92, 93,
155, 164n70 106, 112–113, 163n69, 184–185, 198
Alexander (murderer of Pelopidas) 111,
112n5 Caesar (title) 174n17, 182, 183n32, 184, 187,
Alexander (the Great) 87, 91n12, 92, 98n5, 196, 198, 209, 211, 219–220, 226, 247–258,
105–107, 116n7, 118, 154, 170n11, 176, 261
178n25, 182, 183, 183n31, 183n33, 260, Caesar, Gaius Iulius 87–88, 91–92, 105–109,
265 111, 134, 163n69, 182, 198, 206, 209, 215,
Alexander Polyhistor 125 243–247, 254, 259
Alexandros (son of Demetrios) 137 Caesarion 209, 225
Alcibiades 106, 119–120 Calenus 244, 246
Ammonios (friend of Plutarch) 10, 11n3, 18– Caligula 136
20, 29, 33–35, 45, 63, 70, 103, 137, 141 Calpurnia 91, 106
Anaxagoras 70, 97 Canidius 187, 209, 218, 227, 247, 253
Antigonos 137, 153–155, 169n5, 174–175 Capito 125, 146, 166n73
Antigonos (son of Demetrios) 178, 191–192 Cassius, Gaius Longinus 50n13, 51, 51n14, 91,
Antiochus of Ascalon 28 92, 106, 112, 112n6, 179n27, 184
Antiochus (philosopher) 78n1 Cassius of Parma 50n13, 51
Antipater of Tarsos 88 Cato Minor (Marcus Porcius Uticensis)
Antonia 134, 163n69, 166, 189n41 192n52
Antonius, Marcos (see Plutarch, Life of Censorinus 258, 261
Antonius) Charmion 225
Antonius (son of Antonius) 134 Cicero, Marcus Tullius 30, 32, 38, 87n5, 88n7,
Antyllus 134, 209, 215 94, 100, 101, 102n9, 111n4, 112–113, 118–
Apollonios (teacher of Cicero) 94 119, 120n10, 124–125, 137, 139n13, 162n67,
Aratos 81n2, 136 163–167, 193n53, 197–198, 256–257
Araxes 186 Cinna, Lucius Cornelius (the conspirator)
Archias (tyrant) 106 105–106
Areios 209, 225 Claudius 150n38
Aristion 113 Cleopatra (daughter of Cleopatra) 134
Aristoboulos 98n5, 183, 210 Cleopatra 89, 99, 100n6, 134, 159, 161, 162, 165,
Aristokrates 165n72 174, 177n24, 178, 179n27, 180–182, 189–
Arsinoe (sister of Kleopatra) 180n28–29 196, 199, 207–209, 212–227, 247–253,
Artavasdes 209, 216 256, 260–264
Arulenus Rusticus 145 Clodius 189n41, 215
Attalids 179n27 Coponius 244–246
Attalos 100n6 Cornelia 87
Attalos of Pergamon 99, 178 Crassus 89, 112, 186–187
Atticus 139n13 Crassus, Publius 87
index of historical persons 329
Crispinus 143 Gaius (brother of Antonius) 185, 198

Curio 213 Gamma of Galatia 111
Cytheris (Volumnia) 160, 189n41, 213, Geminius 223
257 Glaphyra of Kappadokia 189n41
Gracchus, Tiberius Sempronius 112
Damokles 175n18
Dante 151 Hadrian, Publius Aelius 13–14, 114
Deïdameia 137, 181 Hannibal 96, 116
Dellius 226 Helvidius 146
Demetrios (brother of Perseus) 101 Herakleides 50, 112n6
Demetrios of Phaleron 49, 83–84, 90, 101, Herennius (see Saturninus)
105, 115n2, 137, 153, 153n45–47, 154–156, Hermodoros of Klazomenai 65
169–170, 172–191, 197, 199, 203–205, 210, Hippias 107, 256n42
213, 217, 219, 264 Hortensius 185, 198
Demetrios Poliorketes 169n5 Hybreas 225, 259n48
Demetrios Leptos 137 Hyginus 117, 139n13
Demetrius 146 Hyrodes 112
Diogenes (the Cynic) 127
Dion of Syracuse 50–51, 93, 99, 111, 247, 249– Iuba 125, 134, 138
251 Iulius Caesar 243, 253, 259
Dolabella, P. Cornelius 189n41, 256
Domitian, Titus Flavius 12, 14, 75–76, 111, 142, Kallippos 111–112
166 Kambyses 182–183
Domitianus (Domitian) 195n55 Kassandros (Cassander) 154
Domitius Ahenobarbus 134, 135, 138 Klea (friend of Plutarch) 66–67
Drusus 134 Kleitos 98n5, 106, 232n8
Kleombrotos (friend of Plutarch) 43n1, 45–
Einstein 25, 158 49, 54, 61–64
Empona 111 Kleomedes of Astypalaia 51n16, 116,
Epameinondas 205n7 123
Eros (slave of Antonius) 165, 222 Korrhagos 138
Eumenes 178n26 Krateros 116n7
Eumenes (general of Alexander) 111 Kratippos of Pergamon 87, 88n7
Eumenes of Pergamon 100n6
Eurydike 138 Lais 106
Eurykles 212, 222, 251–253 Lamia 156n52, 174–175, 184
Eutychos 248, 253 Lampon 97
Lamprias (brother of Plutarch) 11n3, 22, 46,
Fadia 189n41 70, 79, 81, 87, 103, 141, 142n18
Fannius, C. 166n73 Lentulus 197, 206, 210, 215
Fausta (daughter of Sulla) 90 Leochares 116n7
Favorinus (friend of Plutarch) 13, 125 Leptos (son of Demetrios) 137
Felix (son of Sulla) 90 Libo 243, 254
Flamininus, Titus 144, 154–155, 204 Livia 134
Fulvia 134, 177n24, 189n41, 215, 259 Longinus (see Cassius)
Fundanus, C. Minicius 13 Lucilius 165n72
Lucius Censorinus 258, 261
Gabinius 206, 210, 254 Lucius Domitius 135
Gaius (Caligula) 134, 136–138, 152n42 Lycoris 160n63
330 index of historical persons
Lykourgos 115 Philopoimen 83n3, 94, 113, 204

Lysandros 115, 115n2, 118 Philotas of Amphissa 141, 142n18, 225
Lysiades 162n67 Phokion 94, 141
Lysippos 116n7 Phthia 237
Pompeius, Gnaeus Magnus 183, 187, 192n52,
Marcellus 98, 116 210, 243, 247
Marcellus, Marcus Claudius 134, 137, 141 Pompeius, Sextus 207, 215–216, 215n19, 220,
Marcus Insteius 253 225–226
Marcus Octavius 253 Pontius Telesinus 112n7
Marius, Gaius 88, 100, 104, 112–113, 141, Poppaea 143, 146, 161, 164
197 Priscus, Terentius 13
Marius, Iunior 137 Proculeius 124
Mestrius Florus, Lucius (friend of Plutarch) Ptolemaios (Ptolemy) 154, 174, 182, 184
13 Ptolemaïs 137
Metrodorus 258 Ptolemy (i) 67
Mithridates 105, 187 Publicola 248, 253, 255
Modestus, Aufidius 13 Pyrrhos 169n5
Pythagoras 18, 23, 48, 70, 72, 119, 124
Nasica, Publius Cornelius Scipio 112 Pytholaus 112n5
Nero, Claudius Caesar 34n29, 52, 64, 113,
133–162, 164n70, 165–166, 168, 188, Quietus (see Avidius)
191n48, 198, 209, 220
Nigrinus (brother of Avidius) 13 Rufus, M. Valerius Messalla 139n13
Nikarchos 141, 142n19 Rusticus (consul 92a.d.?) 11–13
Nikias 24, 97, 109n13, 120
Saturninus, Lucius Herrenius 13
Octavia (sister of Augustus) 134, 161, 163, Scipio Africanus Maior 192n52
164n70, 189, 207, 209, 216 Scipiones 157
Octavia (wife of Nero) 161, 177n24 Secundus, Iulius 13
Octavius (see Augustus) Seleukos 190
Olympos (physician of Kleopatra) 224n28 Semiramis 135n3
Opimius 192n52 Sertorius, Quintus 112–113
Otho, Marcus Salvius 113, 161 Servilia 185n34
Severus Alexander 76n27
Paccius (friend of Plutarch) 13 Skedasos 45
Paetus Thrasea (see Thrasea Paetus) Skellios 248, 251, 253, 255
Pausanias 111 Socrates (Sokrates) 56, 56n28, 125, 201, 202,
Pelopidas 111, 120 205, 206
Perikles 97, 111 Socrates (Sokrates) of Rhodes 262, 263n
Perseus 83n3, 90, 101, 116, 136, 138n10, 141 Soranus 145–146
Phaidros (Epicurean philosopher) 162n67 Sosius Senecio, Quintus 13
Phila 156 Sourena 112
Philinos (friend of Plutarch) 18 Stratokles 155, 156n52
Philip (the Great) 10 Stratonike 137
Philip (v) 95n15, 113 Sulla (son of Sulla) 105
Philip (father of Perseus) 136, 141 Sulla, Lucius Cornelius 10, 31, 89n8, 90–91,
Philippos (friend of Plutarch) 49 91n12, 94, 100, 104, 105, 113, 113n8, 116–117,
Philologus 112, 164–165 119
Philopappos 13 Sulla, Sextius (friend of Plutarch) 13, 31, 125
index of historical persons 331
Tarchetius 122n6 Timon 192–193

Taurus 253 Timon (the Misanthrope) 89, 216, 225
Telesinus (see Pontius) Timon (brother of Plutarch) 145
Thebe (wife of Alexander, murderer of Pelo- Timotheos of Athens 90–91
pidas) 112n5 Tiridates 146
Themistokles 234, 237, 238n17, 239, 241–243 Tisamenos 115
Themistokles (friend of Plutarch) 137 Trajan, Marcus Ulpius 13–14, 114
Theon (friend of Plutarch) 66, 78n1, 110
Thoukydides 233, 237–243 Ulpius (see Trajan)
Thrasea Paetus, Publius Clodius 11–12, 144–
146, 147n33 Vespasian, Titus Flavius 13
Thrasymachos (character in Plato) 62 Volumnia 160n63
Tiberius, Iulius Caesar Augustus 49 Volumnius, Publius (friend of Brutus) 51
Timandra 106
Timokleia 111 Xenophantos of Thebes 192n50, 263
Timoleon 89, 112, 115 Xouthoses 258
Index of Subjects
abandonment by gods 225 Antikyra 10

Abydos 50, 92, 98 Anton, son of Herakles 177
Academy 10, 11n3, 17, 19–21, 30–31, 40, 137n8 Anubis 74n17
Achaia 10, 13, 110, 150n39 anxiety 22n13, 50, 101, 104, 104n3, 105, 128n14,
Achilleus 135n4, 191, 192n52, 195, 208n11, 181, 204, 247
224n28 apatheia 79
Acraephiae (Akraiphiai) 149 Aphrodisias 150n39
Acropolis 178 Aphrodite of Aphrodisias 91n12
Actium (Aktion) 50n13, 51, 99, 133n1, 142, 166, Aphrodite (Venus) 60, 64, 90, 91n12, 99,
178, 180, 184, 186–189, 207, 209, 211, 216, 99n6, 105, 106n5, 117, 159, 204, 214, 261–
218, 220, 222, 227, 247, 251–256, 258, 262 264
Adonis 72n17 Apokatastasis 169, 203
Aemilius monument 116n7 Apollo (Helios, Kitharistes/Citharoedus,
Aeneas 135n4, 192, 259 Ktistes, Pythios, Delphinios, Didyminios,
aera 68 A-pollon) 19n7, 35, 48–49, 53, 66, 71, 78,
Aesculapius 126 94, 100–101, 105, 116–119, 128n14, 149–150,
aether 53n20 152n42, 154, 157, 159–160, 195, 195n56,
Africa 192n52 246
Agave 135 apophthegmata 194n55, 222
Agora 262–263 aporiai 200n1
Ahriman 69 apotheosis 51n16, 123, 123n8, 150n38
Aiaia 72–73 apotropaic rites 45, 127
A-idoneus 35 apparent objectivity 227, 233
Alcmena 123, 201 Appian Way 124
Alcoholism (drinking) 159–160, 173, 175, 177, Arabia 149n36
181, 187–194, 211, 213–217 Araxes 186
alea 108n9 Arcadian Italy 259
Alexander comparison 91n12, 183n31–32 archai 40
Alexander Mosaic, Pompeii 260 Areimanios 68
Alexandria 10, 18–19, 29–30, 30n12, 32, 34– Ares-Mars 159
35, 39–40, 99, 117, 141, 161, 162n67, 178, arete 21, 93n14, 94–95, 119, 123n8, 136, 204
182, 189–192, 194, 207, 209, 212, 214–219, Argeii 126–127
224n28, 225–226, 251, 264–265 Argonauts 122
allegorical interpretation 2, 29, 38, 40, 49, 61, Argos 154
66, 67, 69–75, 77–78 Aristotelianism 46, 129n15
Amazons 122 Armenia 146, 186, 209
ambiguity 230n5 Artemis (Ephesian) 64, 91n12, 161n66,
Amimetobioi 215 179n27, 180n28, 195
Ammon 105, 118, 120 Asia 13, 92, 135n3, 151, 159–160, 180, 186, 191,
amplification 241, 246 222, 225, 237, 242–243, 258–262
analepsis 209, 227 Asklepios 126
ananke 26, 40, 45 assimilation to God 19, 21, 99n6, 150, 175,
angels 67n32 177–178, 199
animae 61n20 astronomy 24, 26
Anthesterion 155 ataraxia 195n55
anthropomorphism 36, 79 atheism 15, 22, 68, 80
index of subjects 333
Athena (Alkis, Promachos) 105, 153, 153n45, Caieta 100–101

176, 178 Campus Martius 76n27
Athens (and athenians) 10, 13, 17n1, 31, 40, Carmentalia 126
75, 90, 94, 99, 100n6, 107, 113, 117–118, 120, Carnivorous and Savage 151, 161, 214, 259–
137, 144, 153, 153n45, 154n47, 155–156, 261, 264
160n65, 161, 162n67, 178, 179n27, 180–181, Carthage 45
189–190, 197, 209, 234n14, 235, 237, 241 Chaironeia 10, 14, 18, 75, 142, 149, 179n27
Attica 121n3 Chaldaean dualism 70
Attic 91n12, 121, 121n3, 122n4, 230, 231n5 character 12, 34n29, 35, 87, 98, 105, 116,
Attis 74n17 135n4, 142, 159, 170, 178, 180, 186, 191n46,
Augustan and post-Augustan age 230–231, 203, 206, 208, 208n11, 210, 212, 217, 218,
249n33 219n21, 222, 222n26, 227
autarkeia 193n53 Charidotes (see Dionysos)
automaton 3, 84, 91, 169 Chersonesos 189–190
avarice 144n28, 250 chiasmus 223, 231
childhood 136, 197n59, 206
Bacchai (Bacchantes, Bacchanalia) 99, 136, chora 76n25
213 choregos 128
Bacchos (see also Dionysos) 58, 58n31, 99, chreia, chreiai 175, 194n55, 225
151, 179, 188, 191, 213–214, 226 chrematismos 104
banquets (banqueting) 161, 189, 192, 194n55, Christianity 22n13, 69, 75, 93
215, 216, 252, 264 chronology of Plutarch’s writing 14–15, 40,
baroque 3, 96, 188, 229, 229n1, 229n2, 243, 43n1, 84, 206n8
253, 265 chronos 68
battle scenes 178, 182, 187–189, 219, 227, 250– Cilicia (Kilikia) 161, 189, 261
251, 256 Circus Maximus 150
Beautiful 21, 27, 41, 54, 60, 62, 63, 76n26 citations (quotations) 46n6, 117, 156n53, 259,
Bellerophon 140–141 259n48, 259n49
Bellona 91n12, 97 clairvoyancy 54, 62, 120
benefactions 30, 52, 143, 147, 155n51, 156, 161 classicism 231
Beowulf 212n15 closure 191n48
Berytos (Beirut) 180–181 coeducation 24
Biography 11, 51, 83n3, 94, 96, 104, 109, 122, coins 150n39, 152n42, 153n45, 176–177,
136, 139, 143, 167n2, 171, 173n16, 191n48, 177n24, 262
197n59, 206, 219, 240 computer 10n1
bioi 14 conspicuous consumption 191
Black Sea 105 Consualia 127
Boedromion 155 Corcyra 243
Boiotia 127, 149, 152n42, 179n27 Corinth 10, 192
Bona Dea 126 Corpus Hermeticum 74
Books of Numa 124 cowardliness 165, 212
Bosporus 105 crane dance 122n4
bouleuterion 222 creation 26, 28–30, 36, 38, 68, 109, 193
bridal theme 224n28 Crete 115
Britain 49, 54 crows 100–102
Brundisium 243 cruelty 112n5, 144n28, 145–146, 150n38, 159,
bull 69n6, 122, 176–177 162, 164, 166, 250
bullae 126 Cyclic poets 121
burial (see funeral) Cydnus (Kydnos) 180n28, 256, 261–263
334 index of subjects
cylix 172 Dionysos (Agrionios, Charidotes, Meilichios,

Cynic philosophy 193n53, 225 Omestes, Dionysia, Neos Dionysios) 52,
Cynoscephalae (Kynoskephalai) 95n15 57, 58, 53, 66, 68, 73, 98n5, 99, 99n6,
Cyprus 18n3, 105, 174, 176, 179, 184, 187, 197, 100n6, 115n2, 150n39, 151–152, 154n47,
210 159, 160n64, 161, 161n66, 175, 175n19,
176, 176n22, 177, 178, 178n25, 179n27,
daimon, daimones 2, 23, 37, 41, 43–68, 72, 180, 187, 189n44, 190, 194, 194n54,
78n1, 79, 81, 84–89, 91–94, 97–98, 111, 195, 195n56, 212, 214, 217, 259–262,
113, 115, 120, 122–123, 126n11, 128n14, 165, 264
171, 172n15, 200n2, 201–203, 205, 211, 226, Dirke 156
252n36 Divus Nero (Temple) 152n42
daimonology 37, 43, 44n1, 45–50, 52n18, Divine 3, 7, 17, 21, 24n17, 79, 83, 83n3, 91n12,
53n20, 55, 60–65, 61n35, 62n37, 67–68, 102, 110, 111–113, 120, 227, 140, 146, 149,
74n17, 79, 92–93, 120, 171, 201–202, 205 152–155, 152n42, 155, 164, 166n73, 169–
daimonion, daimonia 45, 45n2, 50, 61–62, 172, 178, 205, 205n7, 251, 259n48
84, 91–92, 94, 97, 111, 113, 115, 165–166 Dodona 118
damnatio memoriae 137–138, 196 dogmatism 31
death 32, 36, 37, 41n58, 42, 45n4, 49, 51–52, Domus Aurea 263n53
54, 58, 58n31, 60, 63, 71–73, 85, 88n8, double causality and motivation 85, 102
89, 98, 98n5, 101–103, 102n9, 102n10, doubling 232n8, 233, 243, 253
105–106, 107n6, 110–112, 112n5, 124, 141, doxa 70
146–147, 150n39, 157–158, 159n62, 163– dramatic 3, 34n29, 96, 158, 185, 211, 229,
166, 165n72, 166n73, 172, 172n15, 187, 238n19, 242, 243, 265
188–199, 191n48, 192n51, 192n52, 194n54, dreams 2, 13, 22–23, 61, 94, 96, 98, 102–107,
195n55, 201n3, 202n3, 204–205, 206n9, 119–120
207–209, 212–225, 224n28, 235, 250–251, drinking (see alcoholism)
264 dualism 67, 69n5, 70, 78n1, 79, 86, 128n14
deconstruction 140, 260, 260n50 Dyad 35, 70
defeat Demetrios 154, 174, 182, 187, 190 dynasty 136–137, 141
Antonius 162, 180, 189–190, 199, 207, 209, Dyrrachion 184, 187, 192n52, 243, 245, 251–
218 253, 256, 258, 262
degeneration 37, 140–141, 178, 187 dystychiai 87
deisidaimonia 22, 50, 98
Delos 122n4 eclipses 24, 24n16, 56n27, 97
Delphi 2, 10, 14, 17, 66, 75, 101, 111, 114–120, ecstasy (see Plotinian ecstasy)
141n18, 143–144, 153, 156n54, 160 Egeria 124n9
Demeter 73, 105, 153–154, 156n52 Egypt (Egyptian Religion) 2, 8, 39–40, 67,
demigods 47 69n6, 73, 74n17, 75, 99, 137, 152n42, 181,
demiourgos 7, 27, 32–33, 39, 39n46, 48 192n52, 194n55, 195n55, 206, 210–211,
demos 93 216, 225–226, 249
denouement 255 ekpyrosis 78, 203
determinism 79, 221–222n26 Ekregma and Serbonian marshes 182
diabolical 171–172 Eleusis 144, 154n47, 155, 156n52
Diadochoi 170n11 Elysian plain 53, 72
Diana 126 emanation 72n14
Dido and Aeneas 192, 259 Endymiones 53n20
Diesseitigkeit 31 enkomion 173n16
diobletos 135n5 enthousiasmos 66
Diomedes 141 Enyo 105
Epaphroditos 90, 91n12 flight Antonios 143, 180, 209, 214, 227
Epeiros 237, 243 Demetrios 179
ephebeia (ephebes) 11n3, 137n8 Nero 164–165
Ephesos 99, 151, 154, 160n4, 179–181, 179n27, focalization 221, 221n25, 222n26, 256, 265
188, 191, 213–214, 235, 243, 256, 258–260, foreign cults 24
262, 264 foreshadowing 141, 154, 184, 209, 252
epheton 49, 63 Formalists 212n16
Epicureanism (and epicureans) 19n3, 31, 59, Forms (Ideas) 19, 21–22, 25, 27, 30, 34, 41, 52,
59n14, 72, 99, 118, 170n67, 203n55, 211 71, 201, 203
epigonoi 273 fortune (fortuna) 81, 83n3, 84, 87, 90, 91n12,
epoche 59, 104, 144 94, 170n11
epoptos 163 Forum (Roman) 13, 1119, 163, 256–257
eques 21 Frashkart 69
Er 265 free indirect discourse 221
Erinys, Erinyes 50, 94, 127 fresco 107, 157, 256, 261, 263
eros (erotikos) 21n11, 48, 60, 62–63, 76n25, fundamentalism 27
165, 191, 199, 214, 222, 249, 250, 252 funeral (burial) 90, 113, 126, 146, 184–185, 188,
eschatology 15, 21, 23, 36–37, 45, 59, 59n33, 191–192, 195–199, 220, 224n28, 225, 263
60, 61n35, 64, 105, 110, 147
ethos 148, 216 Galaxidoros 61–62, 205n7
euergetes 30 Gauls 116
Euhemerism 67, 68, 68n4, 121 Gaza 179, 182, 210
Eumenides 171n13 Gemma Augustea 139n13
euocatio 195n56 genealogy 135–137, 135n4, 139–141, 139n13,
eupatheia 32n20 140n14, 166, 168, 209, 220, 265
Euphrates 105, 179, 185 generosity 157, 159, 179n27, 185, 198–199, 213,
Eusebeia 120 222, 244
eutychia, euthychiai 87, 89, 94 genesis 27, 29
euthymia 86 Geneta Mana 126
Eutychos 248, 253, 256 genius 220n2, 252n36
evil 36, 38, 40–41, 43–45, 43n1, 44n1, 45n3, geophysics 28
47n8, 50–54, 58–59, 59n32, 63, 65, 68, Gigantomachia 99
70, 72n14, 74, 78n1, 79, 86–87, 90, 92– Gilgamesh 212n15
93, 98n5, 100, 110, 112, 112n5, 120, 128n14, Giver of Joy and Beneficent 151, 161, 214, 259,
137, 140n15, 144, 180, 188n39, 189–192, 261
194n55, 203, 213–214, 224n28, 231n7, 249, Glaukos 135n4, 139–141
266 gnosis 45, 81
extravagance 141, 144, 144n28, 159, 166, 173, Gnostic 36, 37, 40, 67, 73
177, 182, 188–189, 191, 211, 213, 225, 258 god, gods 2, 7, 8n2, 19–21, 20n7, 23–38,
32n20, 39n46, 42–43, 45–59, 51–52, 55,
fabrication 208n12 60–61, 61n35, 63–74, 64, 68, 71, 73, 78–
fatum, fata 82, 118–119 79, 81, 84–87, 87n6, 89–92, 91n12, 92,
Faunus 124, 126 94, 98–99, 99n6, 101–102, 102n9, 105,
felicitas temporum 12 110, 113, 115n4, 116–118, 123–124, 124n9,
Felix (title of Sulla) 90 126n11, 127–128, 135, 135n4, 140, 144, 146,
Fetiales 126 147n35, 148–150, 153, 156–157, 161n66,
Fides 126 175, 177n24, 178, 193n53, 195, 195n56, 199,
Flamen Dialis 127 203–204, 204n6, 214, 217, 223, 224n28,
flattery 144, 151–152 225, 253
Good 21, 25, 27–28, 38–39, 41, 52, 66, 71, 72, Iacchos 154n47
129, 266 iconoclast 23
Götterdammerung 193 Idaian Daktyloi 54
Granikos 107 Ideas (see Forms)
Great Pan 49 identical reconstitution 203
Great Year 48, 97 ideology (ideological) 82, 90, 92, 99n6, 101,
Great Altar at Pergamon 229 107, 197n58, 219n21, 234n14, 259
great natures 173, 177 idyllic landscapes 258
Greece 10, 14, 50, 73, 75, 94, 101, 114–115, 118, illusion 164, 194n54, 211
135n4, 144, 147, 150, 151, 154, 156, 162n67, immanentism 38–39
169, 180, 193n53, 204, 258–259, 261 imperator 10, 51, 198, 223
Greek romance (novel) 219, 219n22, 224, imperial cult 67, 74n17, 152n43
224n28 individualistic detail 251
guilt 22n13, 50, 111, 121n3 infinity of worlds 81
gymnasion 11n3, 137n8 Inimitable Livers 161, 189, 191, 215
Ino 135
Hades 35, 53–54, 56–57, 60, 66, 69, 73, 151 Inseparable in Death 189, 192, 195, 195n55,
Halikarnassos 154 215, 218, 225
harmony of spheres 56 inspiration 46, 66
Haroueris 40 intelligible central fire 20, 21
heimarmene 87n6 interpretatio graeca 98n5
Hekate’s recesses 54 intertextuality 179, 186, 264
Hektor 193, 195, 212 Inventio Osiridis 77n28
Helen 122 Iole 178
Helios 149, 152n42, 154n47, 159 Ipsos 154, 176, 176n22, 189–190
Hellenistic world 8, 12, 25–26, 39, 65, 67, 73, Isandros 140
81, 84, 88n7, 90–93, 108, 154, 172–173, 229 Isis (Isism) 40, 49, 67–68, 71–77, 72n14,
Heraclitan flux 266 76n25, 76n27, 77n28, 99, 99n6, 100n6,
Herakles (Herakleidai, Herakleion) 99, 124, 195n55, 199, 219n22, 223, 225
127, 135n4, 152, 176–178, 183, 183n31 Ismenos 156
heredity (hereditary) 111, 113 Isodaetes 66
hermeneutics 208n11 isolation 174, 192n52, 193, 199, 252
Hermes 71–73 Issos 255n41
heros 51 Iuuenalia 182
Hestia 105, 122n6
hetaira, hetairai 190 Jahweh 34
Heuresis or Inventio Osiridis 77n28 Jansenism 128n14
High Classical 229 Janus 126
Hippolytos 176 Jerusalem 183, 195n56, 208, 210, 216
Hipponion tablet 58n31 Jewish religion 34n28, 124
homoeostatic condition 26n3 Joy-giver and Beneficent 259
horama 104 Judaea 216
Horos 71–72, 72n14 Judaism 69
human sacrifice 18, 45, 122n5, 123n7, 124, Julio-Claudian 77n28, 137–139, 141, 150n39,
161n66 153, 158, 162, 168
human and daimonic worlds 205 Jupiter 105, 115n4, 124, 126, 146
hypomnema 198n60
hypostases 16, 57 kairos 87, 87n6, 201
hypotaxis 230n5 Kallimachean time 206
kalon (to) 42n58, 48, 55 Lissos 244–246, 254

Kanopos 223 literalism 28
Kassandreia 156 logioi 97
katabasis 211 logos, logoi 20n7, 21n11, 25, 31–33, 37, 39, 51,
Kataibates 154n47 58, 61–62, 70–73, 72n14, 76, 76n26, 78,
Kerameikos 178 108, 187
kernels 208n11 Louvre Hymn 74
kinesis 42 Lupercalia 126–127, 210
Kirke 72 luxury 93n14, 144n28, 147n35, 151, 159,
Knidos 67, 99, 100n6 161n66, 165, 188, 190–191, 193, 211,
koine 232, 232n9 257
korakes 102, 102n9 Lysis 201, 201n3, 202n3
Korybantes 54
kosmos 20n7, 21, 25–30, 32, 35–37, 41, 64, 70, Ma 91n12
72n14, 78, 79, 127, 203 maenads 99
Krommyonian sow 121 magistra vitae 21
Kronos 49, 54, 68 makarion 55
Kroton 123 Makedonia 179, 189, 198
ktistes 121n3 Manicheans 128n14
Kybele 105 Mannerism 229, 229n1–2
kykeon 72 Marathon 107
Kyklades 154, 181 Mars 262
kykosas 72 mathematicals 27
Kyrene 137 matricide 142, 150n39, 151
Matronalia 126
laesa maiestas 147n33 Matuta 126
Lakedaimonians 234–235, 237, 241 Megabyzos 180n28
lamentation (lament) 56–57, 88–89, 94, 165, Megara 160n65, 181
196, 217, 222–224, 224n28, 230n5, 258, melodramatic 51, 96, 191, 242
261, 265 Memphis 75
Lamprias Catalogue 109n12, 233n10 metabolai 83n3
Larentia 126 metempsychosis (see reincarnation)
Lares 126–127 miasma 151
Latin 13–14, 30n15, 77n28, 83n3, 84, 100n7, Middle Platonism 19, 20, 21n11, 25–28, 31,
108, 108n8, 109n11, 110, 119, 125, 200n2, 33n23, 34–35, 38, 42n58, 46n6, 47n6, 59,
244n27, 252n36 63, 65, 71n14, 76–77, 78n1, 147, 205
Laurentia 124 Miletos 118
Lebadaia 54n25 Milky Way 56n27
Lethe 58, 58n31 Minos 126
Leuke Kome (White Village) 180, 180n28, 181, Minotaur 121, 122n5
186, 189, 216–217 Misenum 215, 220
Leuktra 18n3, 45, 120 Mithraism 69n6
Libas 183 moira, moirai 40, 54, 81n1
liberation of Greece 144, 150n39, 154, Molossian king (and molossians) 121, 234,
156n52 237, 237n16
liberti 76 Monad 35, 40
Libitina 126 monarchia 88
lion(s) 72, 98–99, 160n64, 177n24, 213, 257– Moneta 126
258, 260 monotheism 79, 128
monsters 48, 121, 250 October equus 125–127

moon 24n16, 40, 48, 52–57, 60, 63, 68, 72 Oineus 141
moral 21, 56n28, 61, 67, 71, 73, 79, 85, 87, 92– Okeanos 73
93, 97, 142, 147, 157, 171n12, 173n16, 187, Olympia 144, 156
199, 230n3, 231n5, 234n14, 257, 259n49, omens (see portents)
264 One 7, 20n7, 21, 22n13, 27, 35–26, 41, 49, 63,
Moses 34 70
Mounychion 155 open/closed space 187, 187n38
mummy (see skeleton) oracles (oracular)17, 45, 53–54, 64, 104, 114–115,
Muses 13, 161n66 115n3–4, 116n5, 117–120, 118n9, 119n10, 122n6,
music 66, 128, 151, 191–192, 215, 264 153
Mutina 210 oriental cults 104
Mystagogue (mystagogos) 86, 128 ornamenta consularia 14
mystoi 58n31 Oromazdes 68, 69n6
mysteries 60, 64, 74n17, 76, 77, 151, 155, Orphic 17, 69n6
194n54 Osiris 39n48, 49, 68, 71–74, 76–77, 76n26–27,
myth, mythoi 23, 24n16, 28n7, 34, 40–41, 49, 77n29, 99, 99n6, 195
51–53, 57–65, 59n32, 67, 71, 73–74, 76, ostentum 108
121, 124n9, 195n56, 200n1, 201–202, 214, other-worldly dimension 199
263, 265. Oudora 54
overdetermination 91
Naiads 63
narrative (narratology) 3, 83n3, 166n73, pacifist 128
186, 189, 191, 200, 200n1, 202, 204–206, pageantry 151, 256
208–209, 208n11, 216, 218, 221, 222n26, paian 66
225–227, 230n3, 231–232, 232n8, 246– painting 106, 175, 229–230, 229n2, 255n41,
247, 250, 253 256, 260, 262–263
Navigium Isidis 77n28 Palestine 206
Naxos 235 palingenesis (see reincarnation)
Nekyia 58, 110 Pan 49, 126, 213, 258, 261
nemesis 79, 86, 90 Panathenaic 77n28, 115n2, 119, 128, 153, 155–
Neoplatonism 41, 44n1, 74 156, 178
Neopythagoreans (see Pythagoreans) pansyncretism 73
Nerogonia (neronia, neronian) 133, 139, 142, pantheism 73
153, 156–158, 160, 165–166, 188, 196, 207, paradeigma, -mata 20, 25–27, 32–33, 41, 70–
229, 229n1–2, 265 71, 129
Nikon 248, 253 Paraitonion 192
noeton 25, 34, 41, 55, 63, 72n14 parallelism 74n17, 112n6, 116, 167n1, 172, 180,
Notos 183, 210, 245 186, 186n36, 199, 222, 241n23, 261, 265
nous 20, 20n7, 25–26, 31–36, 38, 40–42, 44, Parilia 126
51–52, 54–56, 60–65, 70, 76n26, 92–93, Parmenidean interpretation 33
103, 127, 202, 205 Parthia (Parthian campaign, war) 87, 168n5,
novel (see Greek romance) 173, 180, 185–187, 186n35, 189, 207, 209–
Numa 124, 124n9, 126 211, 216, 225–227
numen 84 Pasiphae 122
Numicius 124n9 passion 32n20, 56, 60, 73, 79, 85, 88, 136, 154,
Nyktelios 66 173, 177–178, 187, 189, 206–207, 213–215,
nymphs (nymphaion) 63, 161n66, 245, 227, 251–258, 266
247 pathos 37
Patrai 99, 178 polytheism 74, 128

patris 78 pompe 99n6
Patroklos 191, 210, 224n28 Pompeian fleet 252
Paxoi 49 Pontifices 126
pederasty 127 portents 2, 23–24, 50, 51n14, 79, 96–98, 98n4,
Peirithoos 121n2 100, 102n9–10, 104–105, 120, 178–179, 248,
Peloponnesos 154, 189, 227, 234, 248, 250, 255 249
Pelousion 182, 184, 208, 210, 216 Poseidon 121, 121n2, 127, 154n47, 176, 176n22
pempad 66 pragmatike historia 93, 101, 120
Penia 76n25 praktikon (to) 59n32
penteres 251 Priene 161
Pergamon 88n7, 99, 100n6, 112, 144, 178, 229 Proculus, Julius 124
periodic (periodicity) 230, 231, 233, 238, Prokrustes 122
238n18, 240, 254, 255, 260, 265 prolepsis 202, 209, 227, 256
Persephone 49, 99, 105 pronoia 3, 84, 93, 169
Persian 47, 69, 90, 115 propaganda 14, 49n10, 94, 99n6, 143, 146n32,
perversity 172, 244, 250 153n45, 159, 163n69, 174–175, 175n19, 184,
Pharos 89, 192, 223, 252 190n45, 195n56, 207, 225, 227, 246, 249,
Phenomenon, phenomena 19, 24–25, 34, 249n33
59, 92, 97, 128, 171, 189, 193, 200n2, 201, prophecy 22, 46, 66, 90
203–204, 206, 208, 210, 213, 220, 227, 251, proscriptions 162, 163n69, 164, 215, 220
263n53, 266 protagonists 2, 140, 164, 171, 204, 208n11, 215,
philanthropia 128, 197n58 219, 221, 221n26, 227, 242, 244, 246, 251,
philathenian 160 253
philhellenism 144–145, 161, 180n28 providence 45, 45n3, 56n28, 78n1, 79, 81,
Philippi 50n13, 88, 92, 98, 98n3, 169n5, 184, 83–85, 87–89, 89n9, 93, 95, 170n11,
186, 198, 210 224n28
philosophia 170n9 psyche, psychai 20, 41, 51, 54–56, 61–65,
philotimia 154, 154n48 70, 92–93, 202–203, 205, 207, 222,
Phoibos 66 250
phronimon (to) 70 psychological 3, 94–98, 100, 103n2, 104,
Phrygian theology 47 106–108, 110, 189, 202, 206, 211, 222,
phylai 153 222n26, 231, 234n14, 242, 246, 250, 262,
physis 40, 72n14 263n53
pia fraus 115 purgatory 47, 170, 203
Picus 124, 126 Pydna 235, 237, 243
Plataiai 115, 117, 120 Pythagoreanism ([Neo]pythagoreans) 15,
Platonic-Pythagorean revival 18 17, 18n3, 23n15, 24n16, 30n15, 31, 35,
Platonism 7, 11n3, 19, 20n8, 21, 29–31, 41n58, 48, 53n20, 78n1, 97, 124, 124n9, 126n11,
48, 59, 71, 78n1, 103, 171, 206 202n3, 205n7
plebs 198 Pythian (games) 150n39, 160
plot 193, 208, 208n11, 212–214, 212n15, 218, Python 48, 54
219, 227 Pythopolis 117
Plotinian ecstasy 75
Plouton 49, 73 Quellenforscher, -ung 60, 107n7
pneuma 46, 66 Quellenkritik 102n9
poetic justice 164, 197 Quirinus 126
poison 156, 193 quotations (see citations)
pollution 18, 151
rationalism 79, 85, 121n3, 205n7 self-sufficiency 193n53

réalisme historico-géographique 121 semeion 201n3
rebirth (see reincarnation) Semele 135, 135n5
recurrence of themes 214 Semiramis 135n3
Red Sea 48, 54, 182 Septuagint 34
Regia 126 Serapeum 76n27
reincarnation (metempsychosis, rebirth) 52, shaman 65
53, 56, 56n28, 57–59, 59n32, 60, 65, 93, Sibyl (Sibylline Books) 119, 158
147, 150, 151, 169, 170n9, 199, 201–204, Sicily 187
202n3, 227 Sidon 179–181
Renaissance 229, 230 signs 97, 120
Retribution 2, 50, 51, 84, 85, 91, 98n5, 110, 111– Siwah 102, 182
112, 111n4, 113n8, 115, 137, 165 Sikyon 136, 154, 215
reversal (in luck) 83, 89, 106, 181, 245 Silenoi 152
Rhodian fleet 244, 245 Silver Shields 111
Rhoiteion 192n52 Simmias 56n28, 61
rhythm 192, 230n5, 239n20, 244n26, 262n52 skeleton 194, 194n54, 194n55, 195n55, 217
Rome 145, 146, 151, 152, 152n42, 156, 156n54, Skiron 122
163n69, 164, 169, 175, 204, 211, 223, 231n7, Skyros 117
252, 257–259, 266n57 Smyrna 10, 179n27
Romulus 51n16, 115, 116, 121–124, 123n7, 123n8, Solymoi 140
126, 167, 168n3 soma 51, 70
Rubicon 106, 107, 107n7, 108 soothsayer 24, 91, 97, 118, 119, 225
ruler cult 152 Soteres 153, 156n52
soteria 36, 37
sacrilege (sacrilegious) 143, 144, 155n51, soul 7, 17, 20, 20n7, 21–23, 23n3, 27, 28, 32, 33,
179n27 36–41, 39n48, 43n1, 44, 47–48, 47n7,
Salamis 18n3, 174, 176, 176n22, 184, 187, 197, 51–65, 52n17, 53n20, 54n24, 56n27,
210 58n31, 59n32, 63n38, 66, 70–73, 70n11,
Salii 126 80n3, 89, 92–94, 97, 101, 103, 108, 110,
salvation 37, 61, 92, 94, 142, 193, 210, 216, 123n8, 126n11, 128, 142, 148, 151, 161n66,
235 164, 170, 171, 171n13, 172, 199, 201–203,
Samnite War 119 202n3, 205, 212–214, 218, 227, 248, 251,
Samos 182 252, 265
sanctus 11 source(s) 12, 23, 28, 29, 39, 47, 47n6, 49n10,
Sarapis 49, 58, 73, 77n28, 98, 98n5 53n20, 57n29, 65, 67, 67n2, 68, 69, 71, 75,
Saturnus 126 79, 81n2, 82, 83, 88, 88n8, 89, 89n9, 90,
Satyr(s) 99, 100, 100n7, 105, 213, 258, 261 94, 98n5, 102, 102n9, 102n10, 104, 106, 107,
Schulplatonismus 20 107n7, 109n11, 112n6, 114–119, 121, 112n4,
science 25, 26, 66, 128 123n8, 124–125, 125n10, 141, 146, 152–154,
Scipionic epigrams 139 152n44, 156n52, 159n61, 162n67, 163n69,
sea 47, 48, 52, 52n17, 54, 54n23, 56, 56n27, 165n72, 169n5, 200n1, 206n9, 212n16,
57n29, 61, 65, 68, 94, 100, 101, 105, 108n9, 222, 222n26, 224, 226–228, 231, 234n14,
121, 142, 176, 181, 182, 187–188, 192n52, 238n17, 240n21, 241, 244n27, 247, 252,
193, 199, 210–212, 214–216, 235, 237, 243– 252n36, 260
248, 250–254, 264 Sparta 155n50, 189, 201
Selene 60, 91n12, 105 spoudaioi 53n20
Seleukid kingdom 185 star(s) 41, 55, 60, 62, 65, 66, 91, 150
self-destruction 191, 191n46, 192 stasis 93
statue 14, 23, 23n15, 51n14, 85, 91, 91n12, 92, theoria 153n47
99, 100n6, 106n5, 111, 111n4, 113, 116, 117, Theseus 117, 121, 121n2, 121n3, 122, 122n4, 167,
119, 137, 144, 150, 152n42, 156, 156n54, 167n3, 176
163n69, 168, 178n26, 220, 249, 256 Thespesios 53, 58
Stoicism (Stoic) 2, 11, 11n3, 12, 32, 36, 36n34, Thespiai 144
37, 38, 41, 43, 45n3, 47, 49n11, 51n16, 53, Thessalia 189
53n20, 67, 67n2, 68, 73, 78–79, 78n1, thiasos 60, 99, 151, 178, 189n44, 191, 194, 195,
80n3, 84, 127, 136, 145, 166, 169, 203, 212, 214, 226, 258, 259, 260, 261
204n6, 259n49 Thrace 247
style 14n9, 18, 94, 101, 122n5, 142, 157–164, 179, threnos (threnody) 195n56, 199, 224n28
229–238, 238n18, 253–255, 254n40, 259– thyrsos, -oi 213, 259, 261
260, 259n48, 265 timai 154n48
Styx 56, 56n27, 60 Timarchos 34, 41, 56, 57, 60, 61, 62, 65, 201
suicide 92, 112, 112n7, 146, 162, 164n70, 165, time (temporality) 3, 26, 27, 29, 30, 39, 47,
174, 186, 192, 193, 209, 216–220, 222 60, 68, 70, 116, 135, 142, 156, 160, 161, 169–
sun (Sol) 19n7, 21n11, 35, 37, 40, 41, 42, 53, 172, 190, 196, 199, 200–204, 200n1, 204n6,
53n21, 54, 55, 56, 68, 72, 101, 150, 152n42, 206–207, 209, 214, 215, 222n26, 227
177n24 Timoneion 192, 193, 193n52, 193n53, 216, 252
superstition 15, 22, 24n17, 63, 79, 80, 93, 120 Titans 45
symphony 214, 263 tolme, tolmai 107, 108
symposion 194n55 tomb 13, 160n64, 168, 185, 192, 193, 193n52,
Synapothanoumenoi 215, 224n28 196, 198, 201, 201n3, 224n28, 225n28
synkrisis, synkriseis 143, 165, 167n1, 171, topoi 78n1
171n12, 198, 217, 218, 230, 265 transcendence (transcendent, transcenden-
Syracuse 24, 94, 97, 118, 120 talism) 7, 8, 25, 30–33, 35–38, 41, 65, 71,
Syria 179, 182, 189 128
transformation 47, 49n11, 54, 55, 56, 61, 64,
Tainaron 209 72, 73, 84, 92, 123n8, 147, 150, 151n41
Tarentum 207 Trimalchio(nis) 161, 229, 263
Tarsos 88, 162n67, 179, 185, 189, 191, 214, 215, triumph 77n28, 86, 90, 114, 136, 150, 160n64,
256, 261, 263n53 179, 180, 209, 223, 254, 260, 262
taxis 18 Troad 192n52
technitai 161, 179n27 Troglodytes 47, 54n23
telete 60 Trojan horse 127
teleute 60 truth 49n11, 173n16, 194n54, 219n21, 249n33
telos 19, 20, 21, 26, 31, 76, 79, 123n8, 266 Tyche (tychai) 2, 3, 15, 44n1, 73, 79, 81–95,
temporality 202–205, 207, 210, 217 81n1, 81n2, 83n3, 87n6, 89n9, 91n12,
Terminus 126 93n14, 95n15, 108, 111, 113n8, 169, 170n11,
Tethys in Etruria 122n6 173, 173n17, 174n17
tettix 94 Typhon(s) 39n48, 45, 54, 68, 71, 73, 182
Thamous 48 tyrannos (tyrant) 93, 107, 140n15, 144, 156
Thasos 237 Tyros 180n29
Theanor 56n28, 61, 201, 201n3, 202n3
Thebes 10, 98, 213 underworld 58n31, 110, 121, 151, 192n51, 202
theion 27, 41, 55, 84, 110
theism 7, 26, 55 vegetarianism 17
theologia 49n11 Veii 116, 118
Theon 66, 78n1, 110 Veneralia 126
theoretike 59n32 ventus-spiritus 252n36
Venus 90, 91n12, 106n5, 126 ἀρετή, -αί 20n10, 21, 21n10, 93, 230n3
Vesta (and vestals) 126, 220 ἀρίστη ἐξαλλαγή 54, 55
Vesuvius 158 ἀρχή 21n10, 35n30, 127, 236
vice 84, 88, 89, 92, 110, 113, 128, 136, 140, ἀσέβεια 84
140n15, 157, 158, 158n58, 166, 170n11, 172, ἀτίμως 199
173, 193, 199, 206, 214, 215, 256, 259, 264 αὐτοῦ (ἀπ’) 38, 39
victory (see also triumph) 68, 88, 90, 106, 115, αὐτοῦ (ἐξ) 38, 39
116, 182, 184, 187, 197, 210, 254, 256 ἄωροι 57
Vicus Patricius 126
viper 52, 64, 148, 148n36, 150, 151 βαρυδαίμων 89
visions 21n11, 22, 28, 41, 41n58, 42, 50, 50n13, βασιλικῶς 196, 198
51, 52, 53n21, 57, 61, 63, 64, 65, 66, 70, βελτίονες 54, 56
73, 75, 94, 104, 108, 148, 202n3, 205, 245, βραχὺς ὁ βίος 196n57
281–282 βραχὺς χρόνος 194n55, 196, 196n57, 223
Vulcanus (temple of) 126
γένεσις 58, 60, 71
water (symbolic value) 58, 98, 100, 147, 215, γεννήσας πατήρ 33
265 γῆν νεῦσις (ἐπί) 58
White Village (see Leuke Kome)
Witch 24 δαίμων, δαίμονες 53n20, 86, 87n5, 196n57,
womanizing, womanizer 159, 160, 173, 177, 252n36
213, 256 δειλῶς 199
διαλάμψαι 148, 149
Xouthoi 261 δόξα, -αι 11, 120n10
δυσωπία 231n7
Zagreus 66
Zaleukos 126 εἶδος, εἴδη 30, 39, 72n14, 128n14, 148
Zervanism 69, 69n6 εἴδωλα 36
Zeus (Eleutherios, Ammon, Soter, Meilichios) εἰκών, εἰκόνες 54, 55, 71, 72n14
63, 73, 82n2, 105, 115, 116, 121n2, 149, εἰρομένη λέξις 238n18
154n47, 159, 161n66, 177, 178, 182, ἐκπεσεῖν 214
204 ἐλευθερία, -αι; ἐλευθέριος, -οι 149, 149n37, 198,
Zoroaster 47n1, 126 223
Zoroastrianism 49, 67, 68, 69n5, 69n6 ἐμφάσεις 36
ἐξαλλαγή (see ἀρίστη ἐξαλλαγή)
ἀδημονῶν 181n30 ἐξομοίωσις, -σεις 20n10, 21
ἀεί 26, 29 ἕπεσθαι θεῷ 21, 21n10
ἀειγενής 29 ἐπιθυμία 59
ἀΐδιος 29 ἐπιλάμψας 149, 149n37
ἀκάθαρτοι 60 ἐπιμανῶς 134n3
Ἀμιμητόβιοι 161 ἐπιφανῶς 134n3, 135n3
ἀμίμητον 189n44 εὐγένεια 220
ἀναβακχεύσας 214 εὐγνώμων 198
ἀναρρῖψαι 109, 109n13 εὐεργεσία, εὐεργέτης 30, 189n44, 234, 235n15,
ἀνερρίφθω κύβος 106, 108, 109 236, 237n17, 240, 240n21
ἀόρατον 40 εὐθυμία 127
ἀποθεώσεις 154 εὐλάβεια 37
ἀπολωλεκυῖαν 211, 212n14, 248, 248n32, 253 ἐφετόν 41n58, 54, 123
ἀπορροαί 72n14 ἔχει τι καὶ φέρεται 38
ζωή 40, 47n3 μέρος 38

μίμημα, μιμήματα 71, 127
Ἡγεμών 154 μύησις 127
ἦθος 87n5, 148 μυσταγωγός 86, 87n5
Ἥλιος 53n21, 149n37, 150n39
Ἠλύσιον Πεδίον 53n20 νοητόν, νοητά 39, 39n46, 39n48, 41n58, 42n58
ἡμίθεοι 47n2 72n14
ἤπειρος, -οι 222, 234, 236, 237n16 νοῦς 32, 39n46, 72
ἥρωας 53n20
οἰκονομία 84
θαλίαι 215 οἴκτρῶς 199
θειασμός 24n17 ὁμοιότης, ὁμοιότητες 21n10, 72n14
θεῖον, θεῖα, θειότης 21, 21n10, 36, 41n58, 42n58, ὁμοίωσις θεῷ 19, 21, 31, 38
54, 55, 56, 61, 92, 93, 123 ὄναρ 59
θέμις 60, 195n56
θεός, θεοί 19, 20n10, 21, 32, 34, 35, 36, 38, πάθος, πάθη 103, 162, 258
39n46, 86, 110, 123n8, 148, 149n37, παράδειγμα 20n10
153n46, 156, 156n53, 175, 189n44, παραδιόρθωσις 259n49
223 παρανομία 84
θεωρητικὸς βίος 57n29 Πινδαρικῆς 148n36
πλημμέλεια 147
ἰδέα, -αι 21, 21n10 πλήρωσις 59
ἱερός, -οι 11, 149n37, 177 πολυτελῶς 196
Ἰνδικῆς 149 πρακτικὸς βίος 57n29, 58
Ἱσμηνοῦ 156, 156n53 πράξεις-ἀρεταί 230n3
προσαπόλλυμι 211, 248, 249n32
καθαρόν 103 πρῶτου καὶ κυριώτατου πάντων 71n12
καλλιγραφία 231, 231n7 πυθόχρηστος 115n4
κάλλιστον καὶ μακαριώτατον 123n8
καλός; καλόν, καλά 20, 20n10, 21, 41n58, 54, ῥόθια 57
60, 93n14, 175n18, 217, 261
καταδαρθών 60 σαλεύω 97n2
κατεστραμμένη λέξις 238n18 σκιά 59, 261
κίνησις 40 σκοπός 84
κλαυθμὸς βρεφῶν 108, 192n51 σοβαρῶς 226, 244, 244n25, 245, 253
κλειδοῦχοι 40 στοιχεῖα 35
κοινή, -ης 232, 236, 248, 253 σύγκρισις 231n7
κόσμος 21n10, 149n37 συμπάθειαν 53n20
κρᾶσις 103 συμπόσια 215
κρείττονες 61 συναποθανούμενοι 193
κύβος 106, 108, 109, 109n13 Σωτῆρες 153n46
κῶμοι 215
τελετὴ τελειοτάτη 127
λαμπρῶς 198 τελευταῖον κακόν 180, 189, 214, 264
λόγος, λόγοι 32, 35n30, 72n14, 133, 252, 261 τέλος, τέλη 123n8, 185, 224, 261
τεχνίτης 150n39
μακαριώτατον τέλος 123n8 τὸ ἀγαθόν 21, 39n48, 72, 190
μεγάλαι φύσεις 173, 177 τὸ ἄλογον 58, 103
μέθεξις 21, 21n10, 34 τὸ γιγνόμενον 26, 29, 71
τὸ ἕν 35n30 φθόνος 92, 236

τὸ θεωρεῖν 58 φθορά 40
τὸ λογιστικὸν καὶ φρονιστικόν 103 φιλάνθρωπον φύσει 197
τὸ μαντικόν 103 φορουμένων 258, 258n46, 261
τὸ ὄν 29 φύσις, φύσεις 21, 21n10, 35n30, 173, 177, 197,
τὸ πρακτικόν 58 224n28
τὸ φανταστικόν 103
τὸ φρονοῦν 58 χάρις, χάρεις 163, 175, 194, 234
τραγικώτατος μῦθος 122n5 χάσμα 56n27, 57
τρόπος, τρόποι 86, 87n5, 236 χρηστός, -οι 86, 148, 198
τρυφή 211, 257 χρόνῳ (ἐν) 27
τύχη (θεία τις) 93n14
ψυχή, ψυχαί 53n20, 148, 218, 234, 248
ὑβρισταί 173, 177
ὕλη 71, 139

Frederick E. Brenk On Plutarch, Religious Thinker and Biographer

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Frederick E. Brenk On Plutarch, Religious Thinker and Biographer

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Frederick E.

Brenk on Plutarch, Religious Thinker and Biographer

Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta (University of Groningen)

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/bps

Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta

with the collaboration of

Copyright 2017 by Koninklijke Brill nv, Leiden, The Netherlands.

This book is printed on acid-free paper and produced in a sustainable manner.

Abbreviations of Journals and Series vii

Introduction to Frederick E. Brenk on Plutarch, Religious Thinker and

2 The Development of Plutarch’s Religious Ideas, and His Religious

3 Plutarch’s Idea of God in the Light of Alexandrian Middle

5 De Iside et Osiride: Allegorical Interpretation and Syncretism 66

6 Plutarch and the Stoics 78

7 Religion in the Lives: Daimon and Tyche 81

8 Omens and Portents 96

10 Divine Retribution 110

12 The Mythological Lives and Roman Religion 121

1 The Neronian Background to the Life 133

2 Antonius and Demetrios 167

4 Some Aspects of Style 229

pir² Prosopographia Imperii Romani²

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2017 | doi: 10.1163/9789004348776_002

fessor Brenk in both footnotes and general bibliography, even if exhaustive at

Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta and Delfim F. Leão

This study is one of tracing the kaleidoscopic manifestations of Plutarch’s

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2017 | doi: 10.1163/9789004348776_003

the primarily immanentist intellectual models of the Hellenistic world to the

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2017 | doi: 10.1163/9789004348776_004

5 Babut, Plutarque et le stoïcisme, 239.

Plutarch, as Jones notes, lived in a world which was truly a commingling of

i. Early’ Pythagorean type works: De sollertia,12 Gryllos, De esu carnium.

The Development of Plutarch’s Religious Ideas, and

Nineteenth century German scholars sketched for Plutarch a period of youth-

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2017 | doi: 10.1163/9789004348776_005

in animal form is proposed as a deterrent to eating flesh, even if the doctrine

more sophisticated training in philosophical speculation along the lines of

4 [en: see A. Eunyoung Ju, “Posidonius as Historian of Philosophy: An Interpretation of Plu-

virtue [arete]) in some way an assimilation (ἐξομοίωσις) to Himself (Politeia

He attacks the superstitious belief in eclipses as portents at De superstitione

Plutarch’s Idea of God in the Light of Alexandrian

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2017 | doi: 10.1163/9789004348776_006

Something of Plutarch’s struggle with different strains of contemporary

16 “Der sogennante Mittelplatonismus,” 277–302. Among Dörrie’s articles bearing on her

Plutarch, as typical in his dialogues, has preserved the intellectual character of

beyond the cold, principle-oriented terminology of Alexandrian Eudoros, as is

32 Le platonisme de Plutarque, 524, 527–529.

37 “Gnostische Spuren,” 98.

42 “Gnostische Spuren,” 111.

his view an essentially correct reading of Egyptian theology, the preexistence

51 La religion égyptienne, 248–249.

fantasy comes from Stoic-Poseidonian cosmology and contemporary Platonic

A controversial point for interpretation is Plutarch’s demonology (in his case

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2017 | doi: 10.1163/9789004348776_007

In reality, if allowances are made for individual speakers, reporting of opin-

1. The origin of daimonology is uncertain: it may be either Persian in origin

Though there may still be some justification in speaking of “Xenocratic”

14 On this, comparison must be made with Plutarch’s numerous explanations of statue

26 “Gnostische Spuren,” 110.

neglect of contemplation (τὸ θεωρεῖν) through τὸ πρακτικόν—which De Lacy

34 R. Flacelière and M. Cuvigny, Plutarque. Œuvres morales, x (Paris, 1980) 150.

ber of positions are elucidated, apparently in conflict, or at least representing

Thus there is no advancement in his conception here more than there is