The omnipresence of philosophy in Plutarch’s Quaestiones Convivales

Abstract

In the following paper I attempt to clarify in which way philosophy is present in the Quaestiones Convivales. I leave aside the role that this work plays as an anthology of Ancient Philosophy and focus on two other aspects that seem to be decisive for an understanding of its architecture: philosophy as a discussion subject, and, more important, as a structural force in this collection of talks. Taking into account the traditional division of Ancient Philosophy in three branches – logic, ethics and physics –, I try to show that there are very clear connections between them and those two vectors of analysis: philosophy as a subject of discussing is strictly related with physics, and philosophy as a structural force depends on ethics and logic.