Anonymous’ and Stephanus’ commentaries, written in the 12th century AD, are the first surviving commentaries on Aristotle’s Rhetoric. Their study, including the environment in which they were written and the philosophical ideas expressed in them, provides a better understanding of the reception of Aristotle’s Rhetoric in Byzantium, the Byzantine practice of commenting on classical texts, and what can be called “Byzantine philosophy”. For the first time, this book explores the context of production of the commentaries, discusses the identity and features of their authors, and reveals their philosophical and philological significance. In particular, I examine the main topics discussed by Aristotle in the Rhetoric as contributing to persuasion, namely valid and fallacious rhetorical arguments, ethical notions, emotional response and style, and I analyse the commentators’ interpretations of these topics. In this analysis, I focus on highlighting the value of the philosophical views expressed, and on creating a discussion between the Byzantine and the modern interpretations of the treatise. Conclusively, the two commentators need to be considered as independent thinkers, who aimed primarily at integrating the treatise within the Aristotelian philosophical system.

Peter Adamson presents an engaging and wide-ranging introduction to two great intellectual cultures: Byzantium and the Italian Renaissance. First he tells the story of philosophy in the Eastern Christian world, from the 8th century to the 15th century, then he explores the rebirth of philosophy in Italy in the era of Machiavelli and Galileo.

This volume, the first ever of its kind in English, introduces and surveys Greek literature in Byzantium (330 - 1453 CE). In twenty-five chapters composed by leading specialists, The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Literature surveys the immense body of Greek literature produced from the fourth to the fifteenth century CE and advances a nuanced understanding of what "literature" was in Byzantium. This volume is structured in four sections. The first, "Materials, Norms, Codes," presents basic structures for understanding the history of Byzantine literature like language, manuscript book culture, theories of literature, and systems of textual memory. The second, "Forms," deals with the how Byzantine literature works: oral discourse and "text"; storytelling; rhetoric; re-writing; verse; and song. The third section ("Agents") focuses on the creators of Byzantine literature, both its producers and its recipients. The final section, entitled "Translation, Transmission, Edition," surveys the three main ways by which we access Byzantine Greek literature today: translations into other Byzantine languages during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages; Byzantine and post-Byzantine manuscripts; and modern printed editions. The volume concludes with an essay that offers a view of the recent past--as well as the likely future--of Byzantine literary studies.

Gives accurate and reliable summaries of the current state of research. It includes entries on philosophers, problems, terms, historical periods, subjects and the cultural context of Renaissance Philosophy. Furthermore, it covers Latin, Arabic, Jewish, Byzantine and vernacular philosophy, and includes entries on the cross-fertilization of these philosophical traditions. A unique feature of this encyclopedia is that it does not aim to define what Renaissance philosophy is, rather simply to cover the philosophy of the period between 1300 and 1650.

Arranged alphabetically, this volume contains articles on various aspects of life in the Middle Ages, from A.D. 500 to 1500 and covering a geographic area including the Latin West, the Slavic world, Asia Minor, the lands of the caliphate in the East, and the Muslim-Christian areas of North Africa.

The purpose of history is to help people understand the present by providing a sense of continuity to their lives. The history of western civilization begins in Ancient Greece. So much of what we observe around us -- art, architecture, poetry, drama, and political systems -- is derived from the Greeks. Even religious beliefs and beliefs about the solar system emanate from the writings of Greek and Roman philosophers. Writing itself is a phenomenon of Greek civilization. Students seeking to understand the social impact of technologies such as writing, print, and television, must begin their study with figures such as Socrates, who was one of the first to be concerned with the changes in social interaction and consciousness wrought by the emergence of writing on portable material. For students of language, an awareness of the classical world is particularly important. The study of human discourse is an entirely western phenomenon. As far as one can judge from surviving evidence, the Greeks were the only people of the ancient world who endeavored to analyze the ways in which human beings communicate with each other. Greece is, therefore, the birthplace of the art of discourse, which includes not only rhetoric, but also logic and grammar. Although many other ancient civilizations produced literature, only the Greeks produced analytic, expository treatises that attempted to discover the actual bases of human communication. Written treatises and school "systems" which allowed rhetorical discoveries to be transmitted to others enabled the Greeks and later the Romans to amass a considerable body of precepts to guide speakers and writers. This body of precepts forms the basis for the study of "rhetoric" -- the art of human discourse. This book provides a clear understanding of the classical roots of rhetoric. While no single volume can account for every idea developed by the ancients on the art of rhetoric, this book seeks to present the concepts that will most effectively provide today's student with a basis for understanding human communication. The text contains essays about the period, original treatises by ancient writers with modern analyses that elaborate on their rhetorical precepts, and representative speeches given by celebrated orators of the ancient world. In addition, a bibliography of readings is presented for those who want to study this period more deeply.