Question from an ignoramus (me): What were the sources/manuscripts from which we know of Socrates/Plato/Aristotle? Were they ever lost and 'rediscovered'? Were their commentaries on them throughout the ages continually?
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Plato we would know “about” even from Latin sources but the dialogues were all preserved in Byzantium and copied/translated after council of florence
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Aristotle had a copy of his corpus in Alexandria that was basis for many long quotes/plagiarism in other books but this was accidentally burnt by Caesar’s troops
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The modern corpus comes mainly from a copy kept by Aristotle’s kin in a basement in Anatolia for 200yrs
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It was brought back to Athens by a plutocrat just before Rome conquered, looted it, it was in Pompey’s palace iirc and his librarian embezzled it and put out the modern edition
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Boethius translates the logical parts (organon) and those were in use continuously thru middle ages; various new translations from Greek post-1200, modern edition of whole corpus printed in latin 1496
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Wow that's fascinating. Thank you!.
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