The importance of Isocrates for the study of Greek
civilisation of the fourth century BCE is indisputable.
From 403 to 393 he wrote speeches for Athenian law
courts, and then became a teacher of composition for
would-be orators. After setting up a school of rhetoric
in Chios he returned to Athens and established there a
free school of 'philosophia' involving a practical
education of the whole mind, character, judgment, and
mastery of language. This school had famous pupils from
all over the Greek world, such as the historians Ephorus
and Theopompus and orators Isaeus, Lycurgus, and
Hypereides. Isocrates also wrote in gifted style essays
on political questions, his main idea being a united
Greece to conquer the Persian empire. Thus in his fine
Panegyricus (written for the 100th Olympiad gathering in
380) he urged that the leadership should be granted to
Athens, possibly in conjunction with Sparta. In the end
he looked to Philip of Macedon, but died just as
Philip's supremacy in Greece began. Twenty-one
discourses by Isocrates survive; these include political
essays, treatises on education and on ethics, and
speeches for legal cases. Nine letters are also extant;
they are concerned more with public than with private
matters. The Loeb Classical Library edition of Isocrates
is in three volumes. Volume I contains six discourses:
To Demonicus, To Nicocles, Nicocles or The Cyprians,
Panegyricus, To Philip, and Archidamus. Five are in
Volume II: Areopagiticus, On the Peace, Panathenaicus,
Against the Sophists, Antidosis. Volume III contains
Evagoras, Helen, Busiris, Plataicus, Concerning the Team
of Horses, Trapeziticus, Against Callimachus,
Aegineticus, Against Lochites, and Against Euthynus, as
well as the nine extant letters and a comprehensive
index.
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