Timaeus of Locri (; grc, Τίμαιος ὁ Λοκρός, Tímaios ho Lokrós; la, Timaeus Locrus) is a character in two of
Plato
Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
's
dialogues, ''
Timaeus Timaeus (or Timaios) is a Greek name. It may refer to:
* ''Timaeus'' (dialogue), a Socratic dialogue by Plato
*Timaeus of Locri, 5th-century BC Pythagorean philosopher, appearing in Plato's dialogue
*Timaeus (historian) (c. 345 BC-c. 250 BC), Greek ...
'' and ''
Critias
Critias (; grc-gre, Κριτίας, ''Kritias''; c. 460 – 403 BC) was an ancient Athenian political figure and author. Born in Athens, Critias was the son of Callaeschrus and a first cousin of Plato's mother Perictione. He became a leading ...
''. In both, he appears as a
philosopher of the
Pythagorean school. If there ever existed a historical Timaeus of Locri, he would have lived in the fifth century
BC, but his historicity is dubious since he only appears as a literary figure in Plato's works; all other ancient sources are either based on Plato or are fictional accounts.
Historicity
In Plato's works, Timaeus appears as a wealthy aristocrat from the
Greek colony
Greek colonization was an organised colonial expansion by the Archaic Greeks into the Mediterranean Sea and Black Sea in the period of the 8th–6th centuries BC.
This colonization differed from the migrations of the Greek Dark Ages in that i ...
of Lokroi Epizephyrioi (present-day
Locri
Locri is a town and ''comune'' (municipality) in the province of Reggio Calabria, Calabria, southern Italy. Its name derives from that of the ancient Greek region of Locris. Today it is an important administrative and cultural centre on the Ion ...
in
Calabria), who had served in high offices in his native town before coming to Athens, where the dialogue of ''Timaeus'' is set. Plato does not explicitly label Timaeus a Pythagorean, but leaves enough hints for the reader to infer this. He appears competent in all areas of ancient philosophy, especially
natural philosophy
Natural philosophy or philosophy of nature (from Latin ''philosophia naturalis'') is the philosophical study of physics, that is, nature and the physical universe. It was dominant before the development of modern science.
From the ancient wo ...
and
astronomy
Astronomy () is a natural science that studies celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and evolution. Objects of interest include planets, moons, stars, nebulae, g ...
.
In antiquity, Timaeus's historical existence was beyond dispute.
Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the esta ...
reports that Plato traveled to Italy to study with Timaeus and other Pythagoreans. The report of this meeting led
Macrobius, a writer of
late antiquity
Late antiquity is the time of transition from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages, generally spanning the 3rd–7th century in Europe and adjacent areas bordering the Mediterranean Basin. The popularization of this periodization in English ha ...
, to conclude that Timaeus could not have been in a face-to-face dialogue with
Socrates
Socrates (; ; –399 BC) was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and among the first moral philosophers of the ethical tradition of thought. An enigmatic figure, Socrates authored no te ...
, who, by Timaeus's time, was long dead.
Iamblichus lists Timaeus among the notable members of the Pythagorean school.
Diogenes Laërtius in his ''
Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers'', suggests that the character of Timaeus was based on the
Pythagorean
Pythagorean, meaning of or pertaining to the ancient Ionian mathematician, philosopher, and music theorist Pythagoras, may refer to:
Philosophy
* Pythagoreanism, the esoteric and metaphysical beliefs purported to have been held by Pythagoras
* Ne ...
Philolaus
Philolaus (; grc, Φιλόλαος, ''Philólaos''; ) was a Greek Pythagorean and pre-Socratic philosopher. He was born in a Greek colony in Italy and migrated to Greece. Philolaus has been called one of three most prominent figures in the Pyt ...
. Further references to Timaeus are found in
Proclus, ''Commentary on Plato's Timaeus'' (II, 38, I); in commentaries on
Aristotle
Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of ph ...
by
Simplicius; and in
Porphyry, where Timaeus mentions the house of Pythagoras in
Croton.
Modern scholarship tends to dismiss Timaeus's historicity, treating him as a literary figure constructed by Plato from features of the Pythagoreans known to him, such as
Archytas. The main reason for assigning the status of a literary fiction to Timaeus is the lack of any information that does not stem ultimately from Plato's dialogues.
As a counterargument, it has been pointed out that most characters appearing in Plato's dialogues are in fact historical persons.
''On the Nature of the World and the Soul''
![Pseudo-Timaeus of Locri, On the Nature of the World and the Soul](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/da/Pseudo-Timaeus_of_Locri%2C_On_the_Nature_of_the_World_and_the_Soul.jpg)
A work in
Doric Greek entitled ''On the Nature of the World and the Soul'' ( grc, Περὶ φύσιος κόσμω καὶ ψυχᾶς, Peri phýsios kósmō kai psychās), also called the ''Timaeus Locrus'' after its purported author, starts out by declaring that: "Timaeus of Locri said the following", and proceeds to summarize the theories that Timaeus defends in Plato's ''Timaeus''. The book has been preserved fully, in more than fifty manuscripts. It is mostly consistent with Plato;
it notably omits the
Theory of Forms
The theory of Forms or theory of Ideas is a philosophical theory, fuzzy concept, or world-view, attributed to Plato, that the physical world is not as real or true as timeless, absolute, unchangeable ideas. According to this theory, ideas in th ...
.
''On the World and the Soul'' was first mentioned in sources of the second century AD (
Nicomachus
Nicomachus of Gerasa ( grc-gre, Νικόμαχος; c. 60 – c. 120 AD) was an important ancient mathematician and music theorist, best known for his works ''Introduction to Arithmetic'' and ''Manual of Harmonics'' in Greek. He was born in ...
and the commentary on ''Timaeus'' by
Calvisius Taurus
Lucius Calvenus Taurus ( grc, Λούκιος Καλβῆνος Ταῦρος, Loúkios Kalbē͂nos Taũros, also Calvisius Taurus; fl. second century AD) was a Greek philosopher of the Middle Platonist school.
Biography
Taurus was a native of Be ...
) and its authenticity was not doubted in antiquity.
The work was even believed to have been a main source for Plato's dialogue; a rumor dating back to the third century BC held that Plato's ''Timaeus'' was
plagiarized
Plagiarism is the fraudulent representation of another person's language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions as one's own original work.From the 1995 '' Random House Compact Unabridged Dictionary'': use or close imitation of the language and thought ...
from a Pythagorean book, and this became connected to the ''Timaeus Locrus''.
Modern
philology
Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defined as th ...
has shown that ''On the World and the Soul'' is a
pseudepigraphon
Pseudepigrapha (also anglicized as "pseudepigraph" or "pseudepigraphs") are falsely attributed works, texts whose claimed author is not the true author, or a work whose real author attributed it to a figure of the past.Bauckham, Richard; "Pseu ...
from somewhere between the early first century BC to the early first century AD, and is based on Plato's ''Timaeus'', rather than the other way around.
The Pseudo-Timaeus employs a simplified mode of reasoning and presentation, presenting conclusions rather than arguments and omitting any dialogue, meaning that it was perhaps intended as a summary of the notoriously difficult original for use in a classroom setting. While it may have originated in part as a set of lecture notes to the Platonic original, it tends to omit difficult sections of the ''Timaeus'' rather than provide explanations. Some of Pseudo-Timaeus's theses are very hard to understand without knowledge of Plato's work.
''On the World and the Soul'' shows traces of
middle Platonist
Middle Platonism is the modern name given to a stage in the development of Platonic philosophy, lasting from about 90 BC – when Antiochus of Ascalon rejected the scepticism of the new Academy – until the development of neoplatonism ...
ideas and terminology; in particular, it resembles works by
Eudorus of Alexandria
Eudorus of Alexandria ( el, Εὔδωρος ὁ Ἀλεξανδρεύς; 1st century BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher, and a representative of Middle Platonism. He attempted to reconstruct Plato's philosophy in terms of Pythagoreanism.
He form ...
and
Philo
Philo of Alexandria (; grc, Φίλων, Phílōn; he, יְדִידְיָה, Yəḏīḏyāh (Jedediah); ), also called Philo Judaeus, was a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher who lived in Alexandria, in the Roman province of Egypt.
Philo's de ...
, making it plausible that the author lived in
Alexandria
Alexandria ( or ; ar, ٱلْإِسْكَنْدَرِيَّةُ ; grc-gre, Αλεξάνδρεια, Alexándria) is the second largest city in Egypt, and the largest city on the Mediterranean coast. Founded in by Alexander the Great, Alexandri ...
and was familiar with Eudorus's philosophy. He modernized the natural philosophy of Plato's ''Timaeus'' by incorporating insights from
Hellenistic
In Classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Mediterranean history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the emergence of the Roman Empire, as signified by the Battle of Actium in ...
astronomy and medicine.
The book also appears to incorporate material from one or more now-lost commentaries on ''Timaeus''. R. Harder hypothesized that the composition of ''On the World and the Soul'' was a two-step process, whereby Pseudo-Timaeus, the author of the preserved version of the book, would have edited an earlier, Hellenistic variant of ''Timaeus''.
[Harder's hypothesis is accepted by ] Th. Tobin, by contrast, believes the work to have been composed at once, then translated into Doric.
Reception
''On the Nature of the World and the Soul'' was known to the
Neoplatonists Iamblichus, Syrianus, Proclus, and
Simplicius. The work of Pseudo-Timaeus supported the widely held Neoplatonist conviction that Pythagoreanism and Platonism constituted a singular theory, reflecting the pseudonymous author's intention of placing Plato in the Pythagorean tradition.
Giorgio Valla
Giorgio Valla (Latin: ''Georgius Valla''; Piacenza 1447–Venice 1500) was an Italian academic, mathematician, philologist and translator.
Life
He was born in Piacenza in 1447. He was the son of Andrea Valla and Cornelia Corvini. At the age of ...
, in the fifteenth century, translated ''On the Nature of the World and the Soul'' into
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
. His translation was printed in
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. The isla ...
in 1498. The Greek text appeared as part of
Aldo Manuzio's collected works of Plato, first published in 1513 and reprinted many times. In the sixteenth century, it was considered a ''
Vorlage'' of the ''Timaeus'' (so in
Henri Estienne
Henri Estienne (; ; 1528 or 15311598), also known as Henricus Stephanus (), was a French printer and classical scholar. He was the eldest son of Robert Estienne. He was instructed in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew by his father and would eventually tak ...
's edition) and often printed along with the works of Plato.
Attributions of other works
The ''
Suda'' and various
scholia
Scholia (singular scholium or scholion, from grc, σχόλιον, "comment, interpretation") are grammatical, critical, or explanatory comments – original or copied from prior commentaries – which are inserted in the margin of t ...
on Plato's ''Timaeus'' ascribe to Timaeus of Locri a work entitled ''Mathēmatiká'', of which nothing else is known. This is possibly a false attribution, confusing Timaeus with an astronomer bearing the same name. He is also reported to have authored a biography of
Pythagoras
Pythagoras of Samos ( grc, Πυθαγόρας ὁ Σάμιος, Pythagóras ho Sámios, Pythagoras the Samian, or simply ; in Ionian Greek; ) was an ancient Ionian Greek philosopher and the eponymous founder of Pythagoreanism. His politi ...
, but this may be a confusion with the historian
Timaeus of Tauromenium
Timaeus of Tauromenium ( grc, Τιμαῖος; born 356 or 350 BC; died ) was an ancient Greek historian. He was widely regarded by ancient authors as the most influential historian between the time of Ephorus (4th century BC) and Polybius (2nd ce ...
, who devoted part of his history to Pythagoras's life and work.
See also
*
List of speakers in Plato's dialogues
following is a list of the speakers found in the dialogues traditionally ascribed to Plato, including extensively quoted, indirect and conjured speakers. Dialogues, as well as Platonic '' Epistles'' and '' Epigrams'', in which these individuals ...
References
Further reading
*Timæus Locrus, ''Fragmenta et testimonia'' (Fragments and testimonies), commentary by Matthias Baltes – ''Über die Natur des Kosmos und der Seele'' / Timaeus Locrus ; Brill, 1972, xii–252 p. Coll. « Philosophia Antiqua ».
*Oxford Classical Dictionary, 2nd edition 1996: Timaeus
''Timaeus Locrus'', Henry Cary, 1854''Timaeus Locrus'' in Greek''Timaeus Locrus''translated by George Burges
Free public domain audiobook version of ''Timaeus Locrus''translated by George Burges
* . Collection includes Timaeus Locrus.
George Burges
George Burges (; 1786 – 11 January 1864) was an English classical scholar who published translations of the works of Euripides, Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Plato.
Biography
Burges was born in Bengal, India, and was probably the son of Thomas B ...
, translator (1855).
{{Authority control
Pythagoreans of Magna Graecia
Epizephyrian Locrians
5th-century BC Greek people
5th-century BC philosophers
Year of birth unknown
Year of death unknown