Plutarch is commonly viewed as a major exponent of a shared Greco-Roman culture among the imperial elite to which he belonged. However, while dealing with the Greek and Roman worlds on fairly equal terms, he essentially expects the protagonists of his Lives, both Greek and Roman, to display virtues grounded in Greek culture and conforming to Greek role models. Thus, Philopoemen–Flamininus analyzes the Roman conquest of Greece with a strong focus on Greek historical experience; Marius shows the adverse consequences of anti-Hellenism and lack of paideia in a Roman statesman; and Lucullus presents a Roman career shaped by philhellenic benefactions on the one hand and barbarian luxury on the other. Beyond the Lives, the Roman Questions frequently invoke Greek concepts and traditions to explain Roman customs and institutions, whereas Advice on Statesmanship is predominantly concerned with the autonomy of the Greek cities and the power of the local aristocracy, thus epitomizing the Hellenocentric perspective that characterizes Plutarch’s oeuvre as a whole.

This chapter explores the depictions of the barbarians, and indeed the very concept barbaros, in Plutarch’s works. It reviews Plutarch’s rhetoric dealing with non-Greeks, which was circumscribed on the one hand by the Roman imperial political reality and on the other by memories of the old Hellenic valor, which was filtered only through texts and oratory. The chapter examines Plutarch’s play with the established stereotypes in a way that shows ethnic labeling to be elusive. It studies Plutarch’s ethnic taxonomic schemes (i.e. a twofold arrangement of barbarians vs. Greeks/Romans and a threefold scheme of Greeks vs. Romans vs. barbarians), and the subtle moral and political implications thereof. It also looks into the literary significance of the use of barbarians in the narrative and of the mismatch between Greek and barbarian practices as presented mostly in the Lives.

Chapter 6 investigates the debate surrounding Julian’s final – and fundamental, in the eyes of late Roman intellectuals – objection to Christianity: his critique of its universalising rhetoric. Third- and fourth-century bishops legitimised their increasing political prominence through competitive arguments pointing to Christianity as the only philosophy that was accessible to everyone, including the ill-educated. Julian set in opposition to this the Platonist belief that any self-confessed system of knowledge appealing to the many disqualifies its intellectual authority by revealing crowd-pleasing (hence, deceptive) ambitions. The reaction of upper-class Christians, divided between the popular consensus and allegiance to Julian’s elitist sensibilities, demonstrates the criticality of this argument. Yet – as I show in the second section – the Neoplatonic objection to the Christian rhetoric of universalism ultimately displaced non-Christian philosophers from the political scene (Eunapius’ Lives of the Philosophers and Sophists). Moreover, the rising popularity of ascetic leaders encouraged even highly authoritative ecclesiastical voices (e.g., John Chrysostom) to question the validity of Greco-Roman education. This, ironically, resulted in a power-driven challenge to the validity of the cultural system whose adaptation had been key to stabilising Christian power.

Plutarch’s parallel structure of the Lives, pitting a Greek protagonist against a Roman hero, offers a fascinating array of interpretative possibilities where cultural and political resistance to Rome and Roman imperialism are two of its more interesting manifestations. This chapter suggests that Plutarch’s text, encoded with devices of figured speech (e.g. allegory, irony and innuendo), was meant to be read and understood by two distinct audiences simultaneously: a Greek readership and a Roman one. Thus, on one hand, to his Roman readers Plutarch can implicitly present the flaws of historical Greeks, which may come out through the overarching comparison, and which his typical Hellenocentric addressees might miss. On the other hand, the reading and circulation of Plutarch’s text would also constitute a sophisticated form of resistance to the contemporary imperial environment. The text therefore contains non-conformist elements which Roman readers completely overlooked. Two such subversive elements directed against Rome are discussed: (a) cultural resistance, with the employment of cross-cultural irony to propose the mismatch of Greek paideia in (barbaric) Rome; (b) political resistance through a subtle reading of the past, in particular the grafting of the Greco-Persian Wars onto the imperial reality and through a sophisticated comment on one instance of Greek active opposition to Rome.

Here Dante, not yet dead, is in Paradise. His participation premortem in the knowledge and love of Heaven, and so in its community, is experienced as the “mystical,” which, earthbound, points to the reality that transcends the earth. And if Paradiso is by way of its narrative the articulation of Dante’s mystical theology it is so in a style that seems to owe much to that of St. Bonaventure, a distinctive feature of which is that he brings together all the steps on the way to a mystical union from the lowest “purgative” disciplines of the senses and through the reform of intellect, memory, and will, into the final vision of God. This theological epistemology allows Dante to conceive of Paradise as holding together the two dimensions of Heaven as at once an eternal journey of learning, an ultimate paideia, and a vision finally achieved.

This chapter examines modern and ancient conceptions of ethnicity. For Smith, six elements constitute ethnicity: a name, myth of collective descent, history, culture, territory, and a sense of solidary. However, a connection with a special territory and the myth of common descent are particularly important. David Horrell has demonstrated that these six elements are active in 1 Peter. Ethnicities are expressed in culturally specific ways. Therefore, this chapter examines conceptions of ancient Jewish and Greek ethnicity, with particular focus on putative common descent. Most Jews in the Second Temple period were Jewish by birth. However, the possibility of conversion and apostasy complicate the picture. Along with birth, Jewish identity was maintained through social praxis. In the Hellenistic period, “Greekness” came to be identified with paidaeia, or education. Those not born Greek could become Greek. Yet, “Greekness” never fully lost its connection to birth. In both Jewish and Greek culture, birth and paidaeia continued to constitute ethnic identity in a complex tension.

As Dio began writing the history of his own time, he began to incorporate his personal experiences into the narrative of the Roman History to the point that the final portion of his history serves as a largely autobiographical sphragis to the Roman History. These final books of his history are central to the construction of historian’s authorial persona and his self-fashioning the embodiment to traditional senatorial virtues. This chapter analyses Dio’s representation of himself through what he says about his dreams, his conduct and his career, before turning to looking what he says about his senatorial peers in the contemporary narrative of the Roman History. It is argued that an underlying theme of the Severan books is the commemoration of men (like Dio) who upheld a senatorial ideal, excelling domi militiaeque and in the field of paideia, in the face of perceived external and internal threats to the senatorial order.

This essay explores the views of Neoplatonic commentators (e.g. Proclus and the anonymous Prolegomena to Platonic Philosophy) on the relation between Plato’s ethical philosophy and the literary format of the Platonic dialogue. It focuses in particular on the role of visualisation in the process of moral education. The Neoplatonists praise Plato’s dialogues for their 'vividness' (enargeia). They hold that the vivid depiction of good characters (e.g. Socrates) promotes imitation of similar manners, whereas the equally vivid depiction of bad characters (e.g. the ambitious Alcibiades) invites critical self-examination. The Neoplatonists develop their view in part in response to the Stoics, who had argued that moral education should be restricted to the teaching of bare moral rules. The difference between the Stoic and Platonic view on the importance of literature in moral education can be explained from their differing views on the constitution of the human soul. Whereas (most) Stoics hold that the entire soul is rational, the Platonic tradition acknowledges the non-rational aspect of the human soul and holds that moral education should address both the rational and non-rational. Modern psychological research corroborates the Platonic position on the human soul and the need for (literary) examples in moral education.

Sextus Empiricus brings his discussion of the so-called ‘liberal arts’ (Math. 1–6) to a close by attacking the epistemic and therapeutic pretences of a would-be science of musicology. He presents two kinds of arguments that bring about and preserve a state of suspension of judgement about the claims of those who profess knowledge in this domain. First, he borrows material from Epicureans purporting to establish that expertise in matters of music holds no prospects for a happy life. Second, he argues that fundamental notions of music theory do not correspond to anything in reality, and thus that the science itself does not exist. The emerging Sextan critique of musicology provides an interesting angle on the Pyrrhonian project as well as on Sextus’ authorial methods. In this paper, I present the agenda of the treatise as being compatible with Pyrrhonism as described in Sextus’ Outlines (Section 1), discuss the arguments employed by Sextus (Sections 2–4), and argue that the treatise does not support readings according to which his treatment of music requires Sextus to abandon the suspensive stance (Section 5).

This chapter provides an examination of an ideal shared across languages and cultures in the second century: the ideal of the ‘deliberate speaker’, who aims to reflect time, thought, and study in his speech, and who draws attention to his words quawords. Articulate and educated speech becomes a vital tool for creating and defending in-groups in this period. By contrast, orators and authors in both Latin and Greek condemn their opponents as producing mere noise. The ideal of the deliberate speaker is explored through the works of two very different contemporaries: the African-born Roman orator Fronto and the Syrian Christian apologist Tatian. Despite moving in very different circles, Fronto and Tatian both express their identity and authority through an expertise in words, in strikingly similar ways. The chapter ends with a call for scholars of the Roman Empire to create categories of analysis that move across different cultural and linguistic groups. If we do not, we risk merely replicating the parochialism and insularity of our sources.

This chapter describes how, over the course of the fourth century, Christians took over the role that was traditionally ascribed to the pagan court philosopher, who was defined (at least in the public imagination) by his freedom of speech, disregard for wealth and social conventions, equanimity, and an uncompromising attitude towards political authority. It discusses biographies and histories from the fourth and fifth centuries AD, which recount the lives and deeds of pagan philosophers and Christian holy men. It also analyses one ceremonial speech delivered by the court philosopher Themistius to Emperor Constantius II, showing that a speech of praise could also be a vehicle for advice and criticism. The chapter focuses on the cultural construction, performance and narrative representation of two varieties of political parrhesia, to wit, ‘bold speech’ and ‘privileged access’, that were relevant to the pagan philosopher and later to the free-speaking bishop who followed in his footsteps.

This chapter investigates narrative representations of free speech in early Christian martyr acts written between c. 150 and the end of persecution in 313. It discusses both pagan and Christian models that inspired authors of early Christian martyr acts to represent the speech and behaviour of martyrs in a certain manner. One of the issues the authors addressed was how a Christian should behave when he or she stood trial before secular authorities, and what measure of frank speech was appropriate in this situation. Early Christian martyrs are often presented as respectful, polite and reticent towards authorities during interrogation. We also see a clear preference for plain speech over studied rhetoric. The chapter addresses the question of whether new interpretations of parrhesia that we find in these martyrdom narratives should be seen as indicative of a growing reluctance among Christians to criticise those in power, or as part of a process of acculturation.

Excavations at Amheida between 2004 and 2006 revealed a large, late antique domicile, dubbed the “House of Serenos,” filled with an astonishing array of decorated plaster – a rare find in terms of quantity as well as the subject matter of the paintings in the house’s main reception room. Showcasing lively figural scenes drawn from Greco-Roman mythology in an era when one might expect instead Christian iconography, the visual program of this house reveals much about the sophisticated visual and literary culture at play in a city that could otherwise be considered a backwater given its distance from the major metropolitan centers of the Nile. This chapter surveys therefore the extraordinary corpus of late antique wall painting from Amheida’s House of Serenos alongside other examples of decorated plaster from the Great Oasis in order to interrogate the role played by artistic practice and visual culture in general in articulating the social, political, and religious dynamics of late antique Egypt.

The history of temple buildings in the Great Oasis shows periods of intense activity alternating with periods of relative quiet. When seen in combination with the varying amounts of archaeological remains over time, this data allows us to chart the development of contacts between the oases and the Nile Valley. In particular, this has consequences for the times of the Libyan conflicts of the 19th Dynasty. This chapter argues that the oases were in Libyan hands during this time, after which the Egyptian army re-established control. Two dated finds from the temple at Amheida, Dakhla, are of particular interest for this discussion. A stela of Seti II marks building works at Amheida shortly after the wars of Merenptah, and a fragment of relief dated to Ramesses IX sheds light on the incursions of Libyans into the Nile Valley at that time.