TRANSLATION AND INTERPRETATION OF GREEK AND LATIN TEXTS

According to the Dublin descriptors, students, at the end of the course, will demonstrate:

1) knowledge and understanding skills such as to reinforce those achieved in the first cycle; ability to elaborate and / or apply original ideas, in a research context.

2) ability to apply knowledge and understanding and ability to solve problems to new or unfamiliar issues, inserted in broader (or interdisciplinary) contexts connected to one's field of study;

3) ability to integrate knowledge and to formulate judgments on the basis of information that is not necessarily complete;

4) ability to communicate one's knowledge clearly and unambiguously to specialist and non-specialist interlocutors.

5) ability to carry out research autonomously.

In particulare, the aim of the course is to make the typical student (who already has skills in reading ancient Greek and Latin texts) confront the texts that are not studied in other disciplines and that have their own specificity. The aim is to highlight the technical aspects of philosophical language, comparing the common or literary meanings of terms with those they take on in the field of philosophy; to show the linguistic evolution of the philosophical lexicon and to teach the method by which this last must be translated. These translation and reading skills are indispensable for the correct hermeneutics of texts, which is the final aim of this course.

Lectures

Knowledge of the historical and critical profile of the ancient Philosophy from the origins to the 6th century A.D.

Optional

Translation, linguistic and content analysis of a selection of texts chosen from different authors and centuries but linked for the philosophical problem they deal with. 

Aristotle and the definition of 'nature'

 

A) Reading texts in the original language (5 ECTS)

1. Aristotelis Physica, recognovit brevique adnotatione critica instruxis W.D. Ross, Oxonii 1950: B 1, 192b5-193b21.

2. Simplicii, In Aristotelis Physicorum libros quattuor priores Commentaria, edidit H. Diels, Berolini 1882, 258,1-282-29.

3. Ioannis Philoponi, In Aristotelis Physicorum libros tres priores Commentaria, edidit H. Vitelli, Berolini 1887, 194,1-218,18.

4. S. Thomae Aquinatis, De Physico Auditu sive Physicorum Aristotelis Commentaria, cura ac studio P.Fr. Angeli, M. Pirotta, Neapoli 1953, Liber II Lectio I.

 

The texts of Simplicius and Philoponus can be taken from the TLG, but are also available at the link

https://de.wikisource.org/wiki/Commentaria_in_Aristotelem_Graeca

 

Translations will be made in class. Some of them will be provided in advance on Studium. For further guidance the student may use the following texts :

a) Simplicius, On Aristotle Physics 2, tr. B. Fleet, London 1997

b) Philoponus, On Aristotle Physics 2, tr. A. R. Lacey, London 1993

 

B) Critical Readings (1 ECTS)

1) F. Romano, Il Neoplatonismo, Roma 1998, Carocci, pp. 13-100.

2) F. Romano, Studi e ricerche sul Neoplatonismo, Napoli 1983, Guida, ch. 1 (pp. 9-25), 4 (pp. 49-66).

 

Please remember that in compliance with art 171 L22.04.1941, n. 633 and its amendments, it is illegal to copy entire books or journals, only 15% of their content can be copied.

For further information on sanctions and regulations concerning photocopying please refer to the regulations on copyright (Linee Guida sulla Gestione dei Diritti d’Autore) provided by AIDRO - Associazione Italiana per i Diritti di Riproduzione delle opere dell’ingegno (the Italian Association on Copyright).

All the books listed in the programs can be consulted in the Library.

Oral examen