chapter 13 Plutarch in ’ Chronographia

Diether Roderich Reinsch

Michael Psellos was born as Konstantinos (Michael became his religious name) in in 1018. In this period, under the Emperor Basileios II and his predecessors in the tenth century, after a rather problematic period of a century and a half, the had come to new prosperity, politically,militarily, economically and culturally. He lived on until around the year 1076, when the Empire underwent a very critical phase, threatened from outside by the Seljuks in the East and the in the West and, on the domestic front, by political instability and revolts. Only after Psellos’ death did the successful coup of Alexios Komnenos (1081–1118) open a new time of prosperity. In Psellos’ interpretation the time after the reign of Basileios II was characterised by ongoing imperial prodigalities (for instance lavish building programs and appointments) and negligent disregard for the army. Young Konstantinos was the offspring of a middle class family. He received a very good education, especially in rhetoric and philosophy, and had a stellar career in the imperial civil service as secretary, advisor, speechwriter, orator, ambassador and the prince’s educator. Between about 1040 and 1076 he was in service at court in close proximity to 11 Emperors and Empresses. The mo- nastic vows which he took in 1054 for political reasons removed him only for a short time from Constantinople and did not prevent him from coming back very soon to continue his role at the imperial court. How important his status at court really was is not easy to grasp, because our knowledge is based nearly entirely on Psellos himself. However, this was only one facet of his personality. Psellos was also a pri- vate teacher in higher education (philosophy and rhetoric) and a scholar with wide-ranging interests in philosophy, theology, grammar and rhetoric, military science, jurisprudence, medicine, astronomy and much more. Above all he was a prolific writer in all these fields, not to mention his many orations, his- toriographic works and his corpus of letters, from which more than 500 have come down to us, altogether some 1,100 titles, preserved in over 1,500 medieval manuscripts.1

1 See Moore (2005).

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2019 | doi:10.1163/9789004409446_015 Plutarch in Michael Psellos’ Chronographia 235

His best-known work is perhaps the so-called Chronographia (the title is not genuine), where he deals with the lives of all the Byzantine Emperors from Basileios II to Michael VII .2 It is not a simple biographical work follow- ing its protagonists from cradle to grave, but a very complex work of literature with many elements of autobiography and a strong apologetic interest regard- ing Psellos’ own political role and his philosophical positions.3 In this historical work the author is omnipresent, often criticising his protagonists (often with veiled irony) and providing his views on political and social developments and philosophical problems. There is no question that Psellos received Plutarch widely. He himself em- phasises particularly that, in addition to Demosthenes, Isocrates, Aristides, Thucydides and Plato, Plutarch with all his writings was one of his “Muses” (Boissonade 1838: 50.14–15). Following the rules of rhetoric Psellos generally does not quote Plutarch as a source by name, but he does so once, in his apol- ogy against an unnamed detractor (Littlewood 1985: Orat. 7.138–143): “The fa- mous Cato was generally a very just man by nature, but as to his character (ēthos) he was hard to deal with (dysxymbolos) and therefore in disharmony with society. In defending him Plutarch of Chaeronea points out that the man was not entirely awkward and fierce, but bears witness to some charms (chari- tas) [sc. that he possessed] and does not hesitate to ascribe to a philosopher sweetness in his words (en tois logois glykytēta).4 In the other places where Psellos quotes the name “Plutarch”, he is not re- ferring to Plutarch of Chaeronea, but to Plutarch of Athens, the Neoplatonic philosopher of the fourth or fifth century. It is not surprising that Plutarch the philosopher is quoted several times in Psellos’ philosophical and theological works, whereas Plutarch of Chaeronea is quoted in the rhetorical works by name only once, but according to the rules of rhetoric he is present without being referred to expressly in many places.5

2 Last edition Reinsch (2014). 3 See Pietsch (2005). 4 The reference is not, as Littlewood has it in his apparatus, to Ca. Ma. 7.1, but to Phoc. 3.1 (so rightly Pade [2007]: 56): “he (Cato) did not have a winning character which would have been kindly affected to common people (oude prosphiles ochlō to ēthos)”, in combination with Ca. Mi. 5.3 “but also charm attracting the audience was spread over the roughness of the thoughts, and he presented his character which mixed the majestic with some pleasure and smile as not inhuman”) and Phoc. 5.1, where we read “as to his character (ēthos) he was very gentle and humane, but from his face he seemed to be hard to deal with (dysxymbolos) and of angry countenance”. (My own translation) 5 In Gautier (1989): Opusc. 49.214–217 “therefore the philosopher Plutarch considers godless- ness (atheïa) as more godless than superstitious fears (deisidaimonia)”, Psellos does not refer to Plutarch, De sup. 165C, as is maintained by Gautier. In this passage atheïa is not considered