- Philip of Opus
Philip (or Philippus) of
Opus, Greece , was a philosopher and a member of the Academy duringPlato 's lifetime. Philip was the editor ofPlato's Laws . Philip of Opus is probably identical with the Philip ofMedma (orMende ), the astronomer, who is also described as a disciple of Plato.Plato's "Laws" and "Epinomis"
According to
Diogenes Laërtius , Philip of Opus was a disciple ofPlato , [Diogenes Laërtius, iii. 37, 46] who was responsible for transcribing Plato's "Laws" into twelve books, and writing the thirteenth book (the "Epinomis ") himself:Some say that Philip the Opuntian transcribed his [Plato's] work, "Laws", which was written in wax [wooden tablets coated with wax] . They also say that the "
In the "Epinomis " [the thirteenth book of the "Laws"] , is his. [Diogenes Laërtius, iii. 37]Suda ", Philip is listed anonymously under the heading of "philosophos" ("philosopher"), his name being lost from the beginning of the entry:Philosopher who divided the "Laws" of Plato into 12 books; for he himself is said to have added the 13th. And he was a pupil of Socrates and of Plato himself, occupied with the study of the heavens. Living in the time of Philip of Macedon, he wrote the following: "On the distance of the sun and moon"; "On gods"; "On time"; "On myths"; "On freedom"; "On anger"; "On reciprocation"; "On the Opuntian Lokrians"; "On pleasure"; "On passion"; "On friends and friendship"; "On writing"; "On Plato"; "On eclipse(s) of the moon"; "On the size of the sun and moon and earth"; "On lightning"; "On the planets"; "Arithmetic"; "On prolific numbers"; "Optics"; "Enoptics"; "Kykliaka"; "Means"; etc. [ [http://www.stoa.org/sol-bin/findentry.pl?keywords=phi+418 Suda, "Philosophos"] ]
Since the entry is located under the heading "philosophos", the defect presumably existed in the source from which the "Suda" borrowed. It was not until the 18th century when Ludolf Kuster, the editor of the "Suda", [Ludolf Kuster, "Suidae Lexicon", Cambridge, 1705] identified this anonymous entry with the Philip of Opus mentioned by Diogenes Laërtius.Philip the astronomer
Because he is indentified in the Suda as an
astronomer , it is generally assumed that Philip of Opus is the same person as Philip ofMedma , (also called Philip ofMende ) [The tradition of calling him "Philip ofMende " seems to have arisen from theLatin translation of Proclus, byFrancesco Barocius , (lib. ii. c. 4) which is presumably an error of either of the printer or translator, or perhaps of the manuscript.] who was an astronomer andmathematician and a disciple of Plato. Philip of Medma is mentioned by several ancient writers, such asVitruvius , [Vitruvius, "Architect." ix. 7, s. ut alii 4]Pliny the Elder , [Pliny, "Naturalis Historia", xviii. 31. s. 74]Plutarch , [Plutarch, "Quod non possit suaviter vivi secund. Epicur. Opera"] (who states that he demonstrated the figure of theMoon ),Proclus , [Proclus, "In I. Euclid. Element. Lib. Commentar."] andAlexander of Aphrodisias . His astronomical observations were made in thePeloponnese and inLocris (where Opus was a principal city), and were used by the astronomersHipparchus ,Geminus of Rhodes , andPtolemy . He is said byStephanus of Byzantium [Stephanus, "De Urbibus s. v. Medme"] to have written a treatise on the winds.Notes
Further reading
* Tarán, Leonardo. "Academica: Plato, Philip of Opus, and the pseudo-Platonic Epinomis". Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1975.
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