Mankind’s Past: Evolution or Progress?
Abstract
The author argues that there were two views of social development in classical antiquity. One of these, associated principally with the Stoic tradition, acknowledged great advances in the arts and sciences, in philosophy and in social life, but supposed that human nature remained essentially the same. The other tradition, deriving mainly from Epicureanism, saw rather an evolutionary transformation of human nature from an early asocial state, in which people were hardy enough to survive on their own, to a new condition of mutual dependency, during which sentiments of affection and pity emerged. The views of Epicurus, Lucretius, Posidonius, Manilius, Seneca, Polybius, Plato, Juvenal and Lactantius are discussed.
Abstract
The author argues that there were two views of social development in classical antiquity. One of these, associated principally with the Stoic tradition, acknowledged great advances in the arts and sciences, in philosophy and in social life, but supposed that human nature remained essentially the same. The other tradition, deriving mainly from Epicureanism, saw rather an evolutionary transformation of human nature from an early asocial state, in which people were hardy enough to survive on their own, to a new condition of mutual dependency, during which sentiments of affection and pity emerged. The views of Epicurus, Lucretius, Posidonius, Manilius, Seneca, Polybius, Plato, Juvenal and Lactantius are discussed.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Preface V
- Contents VII
- List of Abbreviations IX
- Introduction 1
-
I. Thinking the past: categories and structures of the antique
- Mankind’s Past: Evolution or Progress? 17
- Semantica senecana del primitivo 27
- Quando i romani ‘scoprirono’ gli armeni: il re Tigran e la tigre (Varrone, ling. 5.100) 39
- The past in Pausanias: its narration, structure and relationship with the present 49
- Tarda antichità anacronica. Tra storiografia e panegirico 65
-
II. Functionalizations of the past
- Livy’s antiquities: rethinking the distant past in the Ab urbe condita 87
- Princeps et res publica: Des multiples façons de se référer au passé 111
- Apud antiquos. La ricostruzione dell’antichità nell’insegnamento di Poliziano 131
- I nuovi antichi. Classicismo e petrarchismo fra Bembo e Tasso 155
-
III. Veteres: the relation to past authorities
- The Burden of Antiquity in Horace and in the Dialogus de oratoribus 175
- Fronto’s and Gellius′ veteres 199
- Vetustas e antiquitas, veteres e antiqui nei grammatici latini 213
- Quando i giuristi diventarono ‘veteres’. Augusto e Sabino, i tempi del potere e i tempi della giurisprudenza 249
- Convertire l’enciclopedia: Agostino e Varrone 303
- Index Nominum et Rerum Potiorum 319
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Preface V
- Contents VII
- List of Abbreviations IX
- Introduction 1
-
I. Thinking the past: categories and structures of the antique
- Mankind’s Past: Evolution or Progress? 17
- Semantica senecana del primitivo 27
- Quando i romani ‘scoprirono’ gli armeni: il re Tigran e la tigre (Varrone, ling. 5.100) 39
- The past in Pausanias: its narration, structure and relationship with the present 49
- Tarda antichità anacronica. Tra storiografia e panegirico 65
-
II. Functionalizations of the past
- Livy’s antiquities: rethinking the distant past in the Ab urbe condita 87
- Princeps et res publica: Des multiples façons de se référer au passé 111
- Apud antiquos. La ricostruzione dell’antichità nell’insegnamento di Poliziano 131
- I nuovi antichi. Classicismo e petrarchismo fra Bembo e Tasso 155
-
III. Veteres: the relation to past authorities
- The Burden of Antiquity in Horace and in the Dialogus de oratoribus 175
- Fronto’s and Gellius′ veteres 199
- Vetustas e antiquitas, veteres e antiqui nei grammatici latini 213
- Quando i giuristi diventarono ‘veteres’. Augusto e Sabino, i tempi del potere e i tempi della giurisprudenza 249
- Convertire l’enciclopedia: Agostino e Varrone 303
- Index Nominum et Rerum Potiorum 319
