A papyrologist spoke about the last hours of Plato’s life

The National Research Council of Italy (Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche) some time ago opened funding for the Greek Schools project. As part of it, scientists from various Italian universities studied carbonized papyri from Herculaneum, a city burned by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79.

Of particular interest to researchers were the scrolls on which the works of the ancient Greek Epicurean philosopher and poet Philodemus of Gadara were recorded. He lived approximately 110-40 BC. He studied in Athens with Zeno of Sidon, and then moved to Rome and later to Herculaneum.

Philodemus is known as the author of works on ethics, theology, music theory and poetry, as well as the history of philosophical schools. One of his papyri, found under the ashes of Herculaneum, is conventionally called the “History of the Academy.” Scientists assumed that Philodemus described Plato’s Academy in it.

Historians still argue about what the Academy was. There are few facts: it is known that Plato founded a kind of gymnasium near the city walls of Athens, where they studied mathematics, astronomy, natural science and other sciences, and also paid great attention to sports. According to Diogenes Laertius, during breaks between classes, Plato had philosophical conversations with his students, and also regularly organized symposiums – the same conversations, only with wine and olives.

At the moment, historians are completely unclear about the legal status of the Academy in Athens – the land hardly belonged to Plato, but he was in complete control of it. It is also unclear on what principle Socrates’ student recruited listeners. Therefore, researchers had high hopes for Philodemus’s work.

Scientists from the Greek Schools Project, led by papyrologist Graziano Ranocchia from the University of Pisa (Italy), using various visualization methods and further philological examination, have reconstructed a significant part of the text of the History of the Academy. They used infrared, ultraviolet, thermal scanning and digital microscopy. These non-invasive methods make it possible to examine texts that are either too fragile to process, or are multi-layered and/or have writing on their backs that made them previously unreadable.

The deciphering of the papyrus made significant adjustments to the biography of Plato known to us. It is known that the philosopher managed to be in slavery. But previously scientists believed that this happened in 387 BC in Sicily. Plato arrived there to found an ideal state with the help of Dionysius of Syracuse.

At first everything went according to plan, but then the ruler got a little tired of perfection and sold his adviser into slavery. This is what is written in textbooks now. But the deciphered “History of the Academy” by Philodemus contains other information. According to them, Plato became a slave much earlier: immediately after the death of Socrates (399 BC) or even after the conquest of Aegina by the Spartans (404 BC).

Philodemus also recounted previously unknown memories of a Chaldean guest from Mesopotamia, who was next to Plato in the last hours of his life. To ease the suffering of the dying man, the owners of the house where he was staying assigned him a Thracian woman who played the flute. But she played, apparently, very poorly: the dying philosopher repeatedly drew the guest’s attention to the lack of a sense of rhythm in the musician.

Philodemus of Gadar in his work pointed to the exact burial place of the great philosopher. Previously it was believed that it was unknown where the grave was located – somewhere on the territory of the Academy. Philodemus writes that Plato was buried next to the Museion (temple of the muses), in a place that was dedicated to him during his lifetime.

Within the framework of the “Greek Schools” project, not only new details of Plato’s biography became known. Philodemus of Gadara wrote many works on the history of philosophy. Their deciphering and comparison with the works of other ancient authors quite seriously change our knowledge of the history of that period.