Dio Chrysostom (; el,
Δίων Χρυσόστομος ''Dion Chrysostomos''), Dion of Prusa or Cocceianus Dio (c. 40 – c. 115 AD), was a
Greek orator, writer, philosopher and historian of the
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Roman Republic, Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings aro ...
in the 1st century AD. Eighty of his ''Discourses'' (or ''Orations''; ) are extant, as well as a few Letters and a mock essay "In Praise of Hair", as well as a few other fragments. His
sobriquet ''Chrysostom'' comes from the
Greek (), which literally means "golden-mouthed".
Life
He was born at Prusa (now
Bursa
( grc-gre, Προῦσα, Proûsa, Latin: Prusa, ota, بورسه, Arabic:بورصة) is a city in northwestern Turkey and the administrative center of Bursa Province. The fourth-most populous city in Turkey and second-most populous in the ...
), in the Roman province of
Bithynia
Bithynia (; Koine Greek: , ''Bithynía'') was an ancient region, kingdom and Roman province in the northwest of Asia Minor (present-day Turkey), adjoining the Sea of Marmara, the Bosporus, and the Black Sea. It bordered Mysia to the southwest, ...
(now part of northwestern
Turkey). His father, Pasicrates, seems to have bestowed great care on his son Dio's education. At first he lived in Prusa, where he held important offices, composed speeches and other
rhetorical and
sophistical essays, and studied
philosophy. The
Stoic
Stoic may refer to:
* An adherent of Stoicism
Stoicism is a school of Hellenistic philosophy founded by Zeno of Citium in Athens in the early 3rd century BCE. It is a philosophy of personal virtue ethics informed by its system of logic and ...
and
Platonist philosophies, however, appear to have had the greatest charms for him, particularly the stoicism of
Musonius Rufus
Gaius Musonius Rufus (; grc-gre, Μουσώνιος Ῥοῦφος) was a Roman Stoic philosopher of the 1st century AD. He taught philosophy in Rome during the reign of Nero and so was sent into exile in 65 AD, returning to Rome only under Galb ...
.
He went to
Rome during
Vespasian's reign (69–79 AD), by which time he seems to have got married and had a child. He became a critic of the Emperor
Domitian
Domitian (; la, Domitianus; 24 October 51 – 18 September 96) was a Roman emperor who reigned from 81 to 96. The son of Vespasian and the younger brother of Titus, his two predecessors on the throne, he was the last member of the Flav ...
, who banished him from Rome,
Italy, and Bithynia in 82 for advising one of the Emperor's conspiring relatives. He claims that, on the advice of the
Delphic oracle, he put on the clothes of a
beggar
Begging (also panhandling) is the practice of imploring others to grant a favor, often a gift of money, with little or no expectation of reciprocation. A person doing such is called a beggar or panhandler. Beggars may operate in public plac ...
, and with nothing in his pocket but a copy of
Plato's ''
Phaedo'' and
Demosthenes's ''
On the False Embassy "On the False Embassy" ( grc, Περὶ τῆς παραπρεσβείας) is the name of two famous judicial orations, both delivered in 343 BC by the prominent Athenian statesmen and fierce opponents, Demosthenes and Aeschines.
Historical backg ...
'', he lived the life of a
Cynic philosopher, undertaking a journey to the countries in the north and east of the
Roman empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Roman Republic, Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings aro ...
. He thus visited
Thrace,
Mysia,
Scythia, and the country of the
Getae, giving orations.
He was a friend of
Nerva, and when Domitian was murdered in 96 AD, Dio used his influence with the
army
An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...
stationed on the frontier in favour of Nerva. Under Emperor Nerva's reign, his exile was ended, and he was able to return home to Prusa. He adopted the surname Cocceianus,
[Pliny, ''Epistles,']
10.81
/ref> reflecting Nerva's '' nomen'', Cocceius. Dio addressed his four ''Orations on Kingship'' to Nerva's successor, Trajan, and appears to have known the Emperor personally, claiming "I am perhaps as well acquainted with your character as anyone." He knew Apollonius of Tyana
Apollonius of Tyana ( grc, Ἀπολλώνιος ὁ Τυανεύς; c. 3 BC – c. 97 AD) was a Greek Neopythagorean philosopher from the town of Tyana in the Roman province of Cappadocia in Anatolia. He is the subject of ...
and Euphrates of Tyre. In his later life Dio had considerable status in Prusa, and Pliny the Younger reports that he was involved in a lawsuit about a civic building project around 111. He probably died a few years later.
Writings
Dio Chrysostom was part of the Second Sophistic
The Second Sophistic is a literary-historical term referring to the Greek writers who flourished from the reign of Nero until c. 230 AD and who were catalogued and celebrated by Philostratus in his ''Lives of the Sophists''. However, some recent r ...
school of Greek philosophers which reached its peak in the early 2nd century. He was considered one of the most eminent of the Greek rhetoricians and sophists
A sophist ( el, σοφιστής, sophistes) was a teacher in ancient Greece in the fifth and fourth centuries BC. Sophists specialized in one or more subject areas, such as philosophy, rhetoric, music, athletics, and mathematics. They taught ...
by the ancients who wrote about him, such as Philostratus
Philostratus or Lucius Flavius Philostratus (; grc-gre, Φιλόστρατος ; c. 170 – 247/250 AD), called "the Athenian", was a Greek sophist of the Roman imperial period. His father was a minor sophist of the same name. He was born prob ...
,[Philostratus, ''Vitae sophistorum'' i.7] Synesius, and Photius
Photios I ( el, Φώτιος, ''Phōtios''; c. 810/820 – 6 February 893), also spelled PhotiusFr. Justin Taylor, essay "Canon Law in the Age of the Fathers" (published in Jordan Hite, T.O.R., & Daniel J. Ward, O.S.B., "Readings, Cases, Materia ...
. This is confirmed by the eighty orations of his which are still extant, and which were the only ones known in the time of Photius. These orations appear to be written versions of his oral teaching, and are like essays on political, moral, and philosophical subjects. They include four orations on Kingship addressed to Trajan on the virtues of a sovereign; four on the character of Diogenes of Sinope, on the troubles to which men expose themselves by deserting the path of Nature
Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are p ...
, and on the difficulties which a sovereign has to encounter; essays on slavery and freedom
Freedom is understood as either having the ability to act or change without constraint or to possess the power and resources to fulfill one's purposes unhindered. Freedom is often associated with liberty and autonomy in the sense of "giving on ...
; on the means of attaining eminence as an orator; political discourses addressed to various towns which he sometimes praises and sometimes blames, but always with moderation and wisdom; on subjects of ethics and practical philosophy, which he treats in a popular and attractive manner; and lastly, orations on mythical
Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narrati ...
subjects and show-speeches. He argued strongly against permitting prostitution. He also claimed that the epics of Homer had been translated and were sung in India; this is unlikely to be true, and there may have been confusion with the '' Mahabharata'' and the '' Ramayana'', of which there are some parallels in subject matter. Two orations of his (37 and 64) are now assigned to Favorinus
Favorinus (c. 80 – c. 160 AD) was a Roman sophist and academic skeptic philosopher who flourished during the reign of Hadrian and the Second Sophistic.
Early life
He was of Gaulish ancestry, born in Arelate (Arles). He received a refin ...
. Besides the eighty orations we have fragments of fifteen others, and there are extant also five letters under Dio's name.
He wrote many other philosophical and historical works, none of which survive. One of these works, Getica, was on the Getae, which the Suda incorrectly attributes to Dio Cassius.[Suda, ''Dion'']
Editions
* Hans von Arnim
Hans von Arnim (14 September 1859, Groß Fredenwalde – 26 May 1931, Vienna) was a German-Austrian classical philologist, who specialized in studies of Plato and Aristotle.
He studied classical philology at the University of Greifswald as ...
, ''Dionis Prusaensis quem uocant Chrysostomum quae exstant omnia'' (Berlin, 1893–1896).
* C. Bost-Pouderon, ''Dion Chrysostome. Trois discours aux villes (Orr. 33–35)'' (Salerne, 2006).
* C. Bost–Pouderon (ed.), ''Dion de Pruse dit Dion Chrysostome. Oeuvres (Or. XXXIII–XXXVI'' (Paris, CUF, 2011).
* Trans. J. W. Cohoon
''Dio Chrysostom, I, Discourses 1–11''
1932. Harvard University Press, Loeb Classical Library:
* Trans. J. W. Cohoon
''Dio Chrysostom, II, Discourses 12–30''
1939.
* Trans. J. W. Cohoon & H. Lamar Crosby
''Dio Chrysostom, III, Discourses 31–36''
1940.
* Trans. H. Lamar Crosby
''Dio Chrysostom, IV, Discourses 37–60''
1946.
* Trans. H. Lamar Crosby
''Dio Chrysostom, V, Discourses 61–80. Fragments. Letters''
1951.
* H.-G. Nesselrath (ed), ''Dio von Prusa. Der Philosoph und sein Bild'' iscourses 54–55, 70–72 introduction, critical edition, commentary, translation, and essays by E. Amato et al., Tübingen 2009.
Notes
Further reading
* Eugenio Amato, ''Xenophontis imitator fidelissimus. Studi su tradizione e fortuna erudite di Dione Crisostomo tra XVI e XIX secolo'' (Alessandria: Edizioni dell'Orso, 2011) (Hellenica, 40).
* Eugenio Amato, ''Traiani Praeceptor. Studi su biografia, cronologia e fortuna di Dione Crisostomo'' (Besansçon: PUFC, 2014).
* T. Bekker-Nielsen
''Urban Life and Local Politics in Roman Bithynia: The Small World of Dion Chrysostomos''
(Aarhus, 2008).
* Aldo Brancacci, ''Rhetorike philosophousa. Dione Crisostomo nella cultura antica e bizantina'' (Napoli: Bibliopolis, 1986) (Elenchos, 11).
* P. Desideri, ''Dione di Prusa'' (Messina-Firenze, 1978).
* A. Gangloff, ''Dion Chrysostome et les mythes. Hellénisme, communication et philosophie politique'' (Grenoble, 2006).
* B.F. Harris, "Dio of Prusa", in ''Aufstieg und Niedergang der Römischen Welt'' 2.33.5 (Berlin, 1991), 3853–3881.
* C.P. Jones, ''The Roman World of Dio Chrysostom'' (Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1978).
* Simon Swain, ''Hellenism and Empire. Language, Classicism, and Power in the Greek World, AD 50–250'' (Oxford, 1996), 187–241.
* Simon Swain. ''Dio Chrysostom: Politics, Letters, and Philosophy'' (Oxford, 2000).
*
External links
Texts of Dio
at LacusCurtius (English translation complete; some items in Greek also)
Secondary material
Dio Chrysostom
a
Livius.Org
at LacusCurtius
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chrysostom, Dio
40 births
115 deaths
1st-century Greek people
2nd-century Greek people
1st-century Romans
2nd-century Romans
1st-century philosophers
2nd-century philosophers
1st-century historians
2nd-century historians
Roman-era Greek historians
Roman-era Cynic philosophers
Roman-era Sophists
People from Bithynia
Ancient Greeks in Rome
Historians from Roman Anatolia