Aristo of Ceos

Aristo of Ceos, ( _el. Ἀρίστων ὁ Κέως), flourished c. 225 BC, was a Peripatetic philosopher and a native of the island of Ceos, where his birthplace was the town of Iulis. He is not to be confused with Aristo of Chios, a Stoic philosopher of the mid 3rd century BC.

He was a pupil of Lyco, [Diogenes Laërtius, "The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers," v.] who had succeeded Strato as the head of the Peripatetic school from about 269 BC. After the death of Lyco, (around 225 BC), Aristo probably succeeded him as the head of the school. Aristo, who was, according to Cicero, [Cicero, "de Finibus", v. 5] a man of taste and elegance, was yet deficient in gravity and energy, which prevented his writings acquiring that popularity which they otherwise deserved, and may have been one of the causes of their neglect and loss to us. In his philosophical views, if we may judge from the scanty fragments still extant, he seems to have followed his master pretty closely. Diogenes Laërtius, [Diogenes Laërtius, "The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers," vii.] after enumerating the works of Aristo of Chios, says, that Panaetius and Sosicrates attributed all these works, except the letters, to Aristo of Ceos. How far this opinion is correct, we cannot, of course, say; at any rate, however, one of those works, "Conversations on Love", is repeatedly ascribed to Aristo of Ceos by Athenaeus. [Athenaeus, "Deipnosophists" x, xiii, and xv.] One work of Aristo not mentioned by Diogenes Laërtius, was entitled "Lycon", [Plutarch, "de Aud. poet." 1.] in gratitude to his master. There are also two epigrams in the Greek Anthology, [Greek Anthology, vi, and vii.] which are commonly attributed to Aristo of Ceos, though there is no evidence for it.

Further reading

*Fortenbaugh, W., White, S., "Aristo of Ceos: Text, Translation, and Discussion". Transaction Publishers. (2006). ISBN 0-7658-0283-X

Notes