Posts by Don

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Where was the Garden of Epicurus? The Evidence from the Ancient Sources and Archaeology

While we will probably never know the exact location of Epicurus’s Garden in ancient Athens, we can take a number of educated guesses.

Don

April 19, 2023 at 11:10 PM

Quote from Matteng

Another prejudice is that Epicureans friendship means to them to isolate with only some few friends from society.

See my article somewhere on this site on the location of the Garden. It was not a convent cut off from society. Supposedly, there was even a sign welcoming passers-by. There was no isolation.

Quote from Matteng

Epicureans would deny that humans are social beings

Oh, the Stoics...

Epicurus stressed the importance of friendship (φίλιας) throughout the extant texts and the history of Epicureasnism. It seems to me that Stoics emphasized duty to the state as a virtue, whereas the Epicureans stressed interpersonal relationships as a virtue.

For example:

VS23. Every friendship is an excellence* in itself, even though it begins in mutual advantage.

* The word used is ἀρετή aretē usually translated as "virtue" in other contexts.

Quote from Kalosyni

Of course in the real world, we need to work and do household upkeep so that we can have suffiency and a certain level of comfort...so there is the necessity of procuring the necessities for the continuation of life.

This made me think of...

VS41 One must laugh and seek wisdom and tend to one's home life and use one's other goods, and always recount the pronouncements of true philosophy.

γελᾶν ἅμα δεῖ καὶ φιλοσοφεῖν καὶ οἰκονομεῖν καὶ τοῖς λοιποῖς οἰκειώμασι χρῆσθαι καὶ μηδαμῇ λήγειν τὰς ἐκ τῆς ὀρθῆς φιλοσοφίας φωνὰς ἀφιέντας.

I would offer a version of the hypothetical.

Riffing on Cassius 's "Epicureans don't live in a cave" and in light of the book I've just started listening to:

What happens to your life if there is no one to remember you? If your memories are solely your own with no one who experienced them with you? Do you need someone to remember you when you die? Do you need someone to mourn you?

I think I know my answer, but I'm going to tag team on this thread with that little question.

Hmm... I'm still struggling with the hypothetical, even in light of your revision.

The **big** difference in taking a year vacation and not remembering and dying and having no memory is that we don't get to interact with the people that do remember after the we die. There's a finality to death that gets lost in the hypothetical. I think I can appreciate what you're trying to do.

To me, that finality has more to do with being content with the idea of dying right now. Have you treated people so you don't regret anything you've done? Have you lived your life as you wished? It's not a YOLO (You Only Live Once) or FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), and we can't - or most likely can't - quit our jobs and run off to live on the beach in Tahiti (or whatever scenario one prefers)... but thinking about dying right now certainly puts things in perspective: relationship, career choices, recreation, etc. Meditare mortem "Meditate on death."

Hmmm....I would think do as little a possible. Memories work both ways: as personal experiences to rerun in one's mind, and shared experiences to be retold with others. If half of that equation is gone, what's the point?

Your scenario sounds a little like dementia. Everyone around the person remembers, but not the person "taking the vacation." How do we deal with friends or family that have dementia?

I would concur with Martin.

The word used there is εὐσυνκρίτοις and seems to possibly be word coined by Epicurus. I've seen it described as referring to men who have to help others and has the meaning of “well constituted, well composed.” (remite a los hombres que han de ayudar a otros y tiene el significado de "bien
constituido, bien compuesto"). And well-compounded, well-constituted, or discriminating, Diog.Oen.1,2.

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, ε , εὔσπολον: , εὐσύγ-κρι^τος

The word also occurs in fragment 3 in the inscription, too:

And so, having described the second reason for the inscription, I now go on to mention my mission and to explain its character and nature.

Having already reached the sunset of my life (being almost on the verge of departure from the world on account of old age), I wanted, before being overtaken by death, to compose a [fine] anthem [to celebrate the] fullness [of pleasure] and so to help now those who are well-constituted. Now, if only one person or two or three or four or five or six or any larger number you choose, sir, provided that it is not very large, were in a bad predicament, I should address them individually and do all in my power to give them the best advice. But, as I have said before, the majority of people suffer from a common disease, as in a plague, with their false notions about things, and their number is increasing

**Excellent** episode, gentlemen!!

I found the last segment talking about the need for gods' bodies to experience pleasure especially insightful. I don't know whether I've ever heard it read that before.

Thanks for the shout-out. We'll get that episode scheduled. I continue to hold an idealist position (not strongly, but that's the way I lean), but I'll look forward to exploring the topic.

You are DEDICATED, Cassius !! Editing on battery power!

These defaced statues bring to mind the countless individual humans and their communities - including but not limited at all to Epicureans - who were persecuted, killed, marginalized, beaten into submission, by the "triumph" of Christianity. Bart Ehrman had reminded us that a "triumph" is not a metaphor in ancient Rome. It is a celebration of the subjugation of your enemy, a parade of their enslaved men, women, and children through the streets of the city. Displaying your power that has hammered an enemy into submission.

The Triumph of Christianity - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Roman triumph - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

How are you doing? Are you directly impacted by the path?

Anyone else want to check in?

Speaking of "inscriptions"...

A Hellenic or Roman Marble Statue Face (2nd-1st Century BC), of a goddess defaced with a Christian cross during the Late Antique Period. The cross was carved by a Christian, who damaged the face representation of the goddess. Crosses were also sometimes carved on ancient statues to Christianize them for reuse as images of saints. The artifact is now located in the Archeological Museum of Samos in Greece.

"From the 6th Century BC, through the 4th Century AD, sculpture had been created and destroyed, stolen and repositioned, but always prominently displayed and used in the context of Corinthian religion, economic activity, and urban life. Yet from about the 5th Century, creation of new work dropped off rapidly, preceded by a decline in technical ability and availability of raw materials, and closely followed by the defacement and then destruction of most of what existed in public and private contexts.

Between the 5th-10th Centuries, the only new sculpture created at Corinth was in the form of architectural members or Christian reliefs for church decoration, while ancient sculpture of “pagan” or “secular” significance alike was steadily marked with crosses, defaced, cut up, reused, or melted down. This new attitude to sculpture was a fundamental change of Late Antiquity, as individually and collectively people both ceased to create new sculpture, and undertook the actual physical destruction of most of what existed.

This late antique change in attitude to sculpture happened all across the Roman Empire, and led both individuals and groups to behave toward the sculpted environment in new and hostile ways."

Amelia R. Brown, “Crosses, noses, walls and wells: Christianity and the fate of sculpture in late antique Corinth” (copied from Twitter/X @archeohistories)

Welcome aboard!

In the end, we're all silly apes just trying to enjoy our time in the world

Quote from Julia

I'll try and see if I can get a nice NFFNSNC ring or pendant somehow.

For any readers coming across this at random:

Non Fui, Fui, Non Sum, Non Curo

I was not; I was; I am not; I care not.

I also found an alternate version online:

Non Fui, Fui, Memini, Non Sum, Non Curo

I was not; I was; I remember; I am not; I care not.

That strikes me as almost even more Epicurean than the other version. "The inscription is “To the gods, underworld spirits: I did not exist. I existed. I remember. I do not exist. I don’t care. I, Donnia Italia, twenty years old, rest here. Sminthius and Donnia Calliste to their very loyal freedwoman {D(is) I(nferis) M(anibus), non fui fui memini non sum non curo Donnia Italia, annnorum XX, hic qui esco Sm[in]t(h)ius et Donnia Calliste, l(ibertae) piissimae}.” 1st-2nd century CE, now housed at the Eugène-Camoreyt Museum in France."

I myself carry around on my keychain a ring of beads spelling SFOTSE "Sic fac omnia tamquam spectet Epicurus." Do all things as if Epicurus were watching (quote from Seneca's letter)

Honestly, I'm a little embarrassed for my profession. sigh. A classic example of patron-driven collection development ... gone awry, in my opinion.

(Rant complete....Steps down off soapbox)

FYI here's the ancient Greek calendar along with festivals from the Hellenion group of pagans:

Calendar – Hellenion

Looks like today is right in the middle of the Greater Eleusinian Mysteries

Eleusinian Mysteries / Eleusinia ta megala – Hellenion

Philodemus mentions Epicurus taking part in the Mysteries at Athens.

Coming from a position of ignorance:

Does this all have to do with Planck units?

Planck units - Wikipedia

I'm sorry. I cast an extremely skeptical eye on anything that tries to equate ancient Epicurean physics and modern quantum theory.

Epicurus was good, but he wasn't *that* good.

Granted, I say the same things about any Buddhist trying to pull the same trick btw (ex, The Tao of Physics)