Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

education in the roman empire 865
in Alexandria before coming to Athens, concerned himself exclusively with
Aristotle. In Alexandria Olympiodorus still composed commentaries on
Plato of little philosophical significance, but John Philoponus, David and
Elias seem to have confined their teaching to Aristotle.
The succession of the heads of the schools of Athens and Alexandria
in the fifth and sixth century can be plausibly reconstructed. In Athens
Plutarch, a member of a family connected with the Academy for several
generations, became head c. 410. He was succeeded c. 431 by Syrianus, who
at an unknown date was succeeded by his pupil Proclus. On Proclus’ death
in 485 the headship passed successively to Marinus, Isidorus and
Damascius, who was dismissed or resigned when the school was closed in
529. In Alexandria Ammonius, son of Hermeias (so called to distinguish
him from an earlier homonym) and a pupil of Proclus, died c. 520 after
heading the school for many years. He was succeeded, perhaps after a short
interregnum, by Olympiodorus, who remained head until 565 or later. He
in turn was followed by Elias, the first Christian holder of the chair. 29 He
was succeeded by David, who in turn was succeeded by Stephanus. The
transference of Stephanus to Constantinople some time between 610 and
618, no doubt on account of the Persian occupation of Egypt, probably
implied the transference of the whole school. 30 But it is likely that some
teachers returned to Alexandria after the end of the occupation, and that
some philosophical education went on until the Arab conquest or later.
John Philoponus, a pupil of Ammonius and a Monophysite Christian,
whose ideas have interested modern philosophers and historians of science,
never became head of the school and may indeed have left it before his
death soon after 565. He is sometimes referred to as a grammarian, and may,
at least at first, have taught grammar rather than philosophy. In his De aeternitate
mundi contra Proclum he rejects the traditional view that the superlunary
is different in its nature and superior to the sublunar world, and in his De
opificio mundi, dedicated to Sergius, patriarch of Antioch 546–9, he attempts
to reconcile Aristotle’s Physics with Christian doctrine. The commentaries in
his name on several works of Aristotle are actually the notes which he made
at Ammonius’ lectures with his own additions and comments. 31 Writings of
most of these teachers, and sometimes very extensive bodies of writings,
survive. We therefore have more detailed information on philosophical
teaching than on any other branch of late antique education.
Many students of philosophy, who will already have studied rhetoric,
went on to study law in Berytus in the fifth century and probably also in the
sixth. An example is Severus, the future Monophysite patriarch of Antioch.
Born in Pisidia c. 465, he studied rhetoric and philosophy in Alexandria,
29 PLRE iii.438. Elias has sometimes been supposed to have been praetorian prefect of Illyricum
on the basis of Justinian’s Novels 130 and 135. But his title apo eparchōn is almost certainly honorary.
30 Wolska-Conus (1989). 31 Sorabji (1987); Wildberg (1988); Verrycken (1990).
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