Towards a Textual History and Reconstruction of Alexander of Aphrodisias’s Treatise On the Principles of the Universe

Towards a Textual History and Reconstruction of Alexander of Aphrodisias’s Treatise On the Principles of the UniverseJournal of Semitic StudiesSyriaca.org: The Syriac Reference PortalThe National Endowment for the HumanitiesThe International Balzan Prize FoundationDavid A. Michelsoncbsc_adminRecord added to Zotero bycbsc_adminSyriaca.org: The Syriac Reference Portalhttp://syriaca.org/cbss/83NQ3HLB/tei

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2024-08-15-04:00

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CREATED: This bibl record was autogenerated from a Zotero record.SilviaFazzoMauroZontaTowards a Textual History and Reconstruction of Alexander of Aphrodisias’s Treatise On the Principles of the Universehttp://syriaca.org/cbss/83NQ3HLBhttps://www.zotero.org/groups/a_comprehensive_bibliography_on_syriac_studies/items/83NQ3HLBhttps://www.zotero.org/groups/4861694/items/83NQ3HLBJournal of Semitic Studies59:1201491-116Among Alexander of Aphrodisias's works, a key role is played by his treatise On the Principles of the Universe. It contains Alexander's exegesis of Aristotle's theory of the unmoved mover, as in Metaphysics Lambda and in Physics VIII. Its original Greek text is lost, but a sixth-century Syriac version and two tenth-century Arabic ones are still extant. All these versions have already been published, and two of them have been rendered into modern languages (English, French, Italian) in the last ninety years, but a really deep textual comparison between them, aiming at the reconstruction of the lost Greek text, has not yet been made. Usually, a key role is given to the second, later Arabic version, mostly since it is more complete than the other ones. Here, a philological re-examination of the history of the textual transmission of Alexander's work is given, and some new conclusions about it are suggested, according to which the role of the first Arabic version, and that of the Syriac one in particular, are found to be more important than hitherto suspected. Fazzo, Silvia, and Mauro Zonta. “Towards a Textual History and Reconstruction of Alexander of Aphrodisias’s Treatise On the Principles of the Universe.” Journal of Semitic Studies 59:1 (2014): 91–116. Silvia Fazzo and Mauro Zonta, Towards a Textual History and Reconstruction of Alexander of Aphrodisias’s Treatise On the Principles of the Universe,” Journal of Semitic Studies 59:1 (2014): 91–116.Alexander of AphrodisiasGreek philosophyIV-VII CEVI CEVII-XVIII CEcosmologytranslations from Greektranslations into Arabictranslations into Syriac