Classics Colloquium with Lorenzo Ronchini

The thesis of Galen’s treatise The Capacities of the Soul Follow the Mixtures of the Body is stated already in its title. Galen repeats it throughout the work and, by means of extensive quotations, argues that the best physicians and philosophers – namely Plato, Aristotle, and Hippocrates – agree with it. Despite this apparent clarity, the exact meaning of the verb ἕπονται, by which Galen describes the relationship between the soul’s δυνάμεις and the bodily κράσεις, has been the subject of prolonged scholarly debate. In this talk, I will show that an understanding of Galen’s thesis can be gained by focusing on his interpretation of Plato; and that, since this interpretation lies in the selection and commentary of the passages he cites, the Platonic quotations provide a key to reading the treatise as a whole. They reveal Galen’s engagement with the Laws and his intention, through exegetical practice, to overturn the Platonic thesis of the soul’s rule over the body.