Edition Practices

Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca et Byzantina

The project provides critical editions of ancient and, especially, Byzantine commentaries, paraphrases, compendia and scholia on the text of Aristotle.

Aristotle, probably the most influential philosopher of classical Antiquity, continuously attracted the attention of readers and commentators all throughout the Greek Middle Ages, far beyond the end of Antiquity itself. However, the texts documenting the Byzantine reception of Aristotle are still little known nowadays and only a small proportion of them has been made accessible through modern editions. By providing critical editions and source collections of these texts, CAGB will both enhance our understanding of Aristotle and originally contribute to the knowledge of philosophy and higher education in Byzantium.
 
The project will benefit from the co-operation with the Aristotle Archive of the Freie Universität Berlin, which hosts an extensive microfilm collection of manuscripts containing the works of Aristotle and his commentators. Along with inventories and descriptions of the commentators´ manuscripts (ca. 1,000 items), prosopographical data on on Byzantine authors and on the people who commissioned, copied, owned and annotated the manuscripts are going to be systematically collected. The practices of Mediaeval commentators will be studied in detail on the basis of individual manuscripts and with the aid of digital images. This part of the project will be implemented thanks to the co-operation with the Teuchos centre of the Hamburg Universität.
 
The edition and source collection are going to be published in the series ´Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca et Byzantina. Quellen und Studien´ (De Gruyter). The project is part of the Research Centre for Primary Sources of the Ancient World at the Berlin-Brandeburg Academy of Science and Humanities.                                
 
Editions of the CAGB:
Georgios Pachymeres, Comentary on Metaphysica (F. Pagani)
 
Leon Magentinos, Comentary on Analytica Priora II (Nikos Agiotis)
 
Simplikios, Comentary on Physica I (Lutz Koch)
 
Theodoros Metochites, Paraphrasen zu De motu animalium, De incessu animalium,
De longitudine vitae, De juventute, De vita et morte, De respiratione (C. Ludwig)
 
Editionen externer CAGB-Mitarbeiter
Georgios Pachymeres, Comentary on Ethica Nicomachea (S. Xenophontos, Glasgow)
 
Georgios Scholarios, Scholien on Ethica Nicomachea I (Ph. Schäfer, Hamburg)
 
Michael von Ephesos, Die abweichenden Versionen des Kommentars zu De partibus animalium (Eleni Pappa, Berlin)