INTRODUCTION Background

Theophrastus was born at Eresus on the southwestern coast of Lesbosin 372/1 or 371/0 B.C.,i.e., some fifteenyears after the foundation of Plato's Academy. He is said to have studied first in his native city under Alcippus and then in Athens under Plato. If this report is correct, Theo­ phrastus will have enjoyed an exceptionaleducational experience. As a young man, say, eighteen years of age, he will have interacted not only with Plato but also with other members of the Academy including Speusippus, Xenocratesand above all Aristotle. But whatever the truth concerning his study in Plato's Academy,Theophrastus seems to have formed an early association with Aristotle. After Plato's death (348/7 B.C.),the two were probably together at Assos in the Troad,and we may suppose that Theophrastusinfluenced Aristotle's move to Mytileneon the island of Lesbos(345/4 B.C.). When Aristotlewas called to be tutor of Al­ exander, Theophrastus will have accompaniedhim to the court of Philip, king of Macedonia (343/2 B.C.). Eight years later, the two returned to Athens, where Aristotle founded the Peripatos (335B.C.) and for the next thirteen years directed the activities of this school. Upon the death of Alexander (323 B.C.), anti-Macedonianfeeling forced Aristotle to leave Athens for Chalcis,where he died within a year. Theophrastusremained behind, took over leadershipof the Peripatosand brought it to a high point of activity and success. He acquired property for the school and is said to have had two thousand students-a round number,but one which testifies to Theophrastus'appeal as teacher-scholar.For some thirty-sixyears Theo­ phrastus remained head of the PeripateticSchool, and when he died (288/ 7 or 287/6 B.C.),the Atheniansare said to have shown their respect by ac­ companyinghis bier on foot. Theophrastus' academic interests were as varied as those of Aris­ totle. He is today best known for his Charactersand his ground-breaking work in botany. However, his studies in logic, metaphysics,ethics and politics, rhetoric and poetics were significantand, in many cases, repre- 2 INTRODUCTION

sented advances far beyond their Aristotelian antecedents. His contribu­ tions to modal logic have begun to attract scholarly attention and to gener­ ate a respectable body of secondary literature. The same is true of his thoughts on animal psychology-thoughts so modem that one is tempted to compare Theophrastus with Konrad Lorenz. Also worthy of special mention is Theophrastus' study of human personality and in particular the difference between superficial traits and deeper-lying motives, for this work had (and still has) consequences not only for psychology and ethics but also for the comic stage. Put boldly, one cannot properly understand New Comedy (the plays of Menander) and the subsequent development of this genre without an appreciation of Theophrastus' work. Diogenes Laertius attributes some 225 works of varying length to Theophrastus. (The longest is a work on comparative law in 24 books.) Diogenes' list contains some duplication, but it is a fairly accurate indica­ tion of Theophrastus' extraordinary productivity and therefore a measure of how much has been lost. We do have two large treatises on botany, smaller pieces on natural science, sense perception and metaphysics as well as the widely-known Characters.But, for the most part, Theophrastus survives only in quotations and reports scattered throughout writers of later Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Some of these texts are short and of slight value, others are of great interest and considerable length. This material has now been brought together in two volumes-our edition. This is a sizeable corpus and one which should be of interest not only to students of the Peripatos but also to those working on Stoic and Epicurean philosophy. For it was during Theophrastus' headship of the Peripatos that Zeno founded the Stoa and Epicurus the Garden. Theophrastean in­ fluence has long been recognized, but perhaps now the extent and details of this influence can be better understood. During the nineteenth century, two collections of Theophrastean texts were produced in Germany: Schneider's edition of 1818-211 and Wimmer's of 1854-62,2 republished four years later with a Latin transla­ tion.3 Wimmer's edition is still the best general collection available to scholars and a photographic reproduction published in 1964 has made it quite accessible.' Nevertheless, the edition is sadly incomplete. Excluding texts that have their own manuscript tradition (i.e., texts whose survival

1 J.C. Schneider, TheophrastiEresii quae supersuntopera et exc:erptaUbrorum. Leipzig: Vogel vols.i-iv 1818, vol.v 1821. 2 F. Wimmer,Theophrasti Eresii opera quae supersunt omnia, Leipzig:Teubner vol. 1-21854, vol. 31862. 3 Paris:Didot 1866. 'Frankfurt a.M.: Minerva 1964.