The treatise De intellectu attributed to Alexander of Aphrodisias can be divided into four sections. The first (A, 106.19–110.3) is an interpretation of the Aristotelian theory of intellect, and especially of the active intellect referred to in Aristotle, De anima 3.5, which differs from the interpretation in Alexander's own De anima, and whose relation to Alexander's De anima, attribution to Alexander, and date are all disputed. The second (B, 110.4–112.5) is an account of the intellect which is broadly similar to A though differing on certain points. The third (Cl, 112.5–113.12) is an account of someone's response to the problem of how intellect can enter the human being ‘from outside’ if it is incorporeal and hence cannot move at all; in the fourth (C2, 113.12–24) the writer who reported Cl criticizes that solution and gives his own alternative one.

I. INTRODUCTION

It has become a commonplace in contemporary historiography to note the frequency of war in ancient Greece. Yvon Garlan says that, during the century and a half from the Persian wars (490 and 480–479 B.C.) to the battle of Chaeronea (338 B.C.), Athens was at war, on average, more than two years out of every three, and never enjoyed a period of peace for as long as ten consecutive years. ‘Given these conditions’, says Garlan, ‘one would expect them (i.e. the Greeks) to consider war as a problem …. But this was far from being the case.’ The Greek acceptance of war as inevitable was contrasted by Momigliano and others with the attention given to constitutional changes and to the prevention of stasis: ‘the Greeks came to accept war like birth and death about which nothing could be done …. On the other hand constitutions were men-made and could be modified by men.’

Moralist overtones were not absent from this re-evaluation of Greek civilization. Havelock observed that the Greeks exalted, legitimized, and placed organized warfare at the heart of the European value system, and Momigliano suggested that:

The idea of controlling wars, like the idea of the emancipation of women and the idea of birth control, is a part of the intellectual revolution of the nineteenth century and meant a break with the classical tradition of historiography of wars.

At the battle of Plataia, ‘Ελλησι μέν ισαμενàς ’AντιóΧoυ ἦν ‘θυóμενσ oὗτoς γàρ δ εἴπετo τŵ στρατεúματι τoúτω μάντις τàν ༐óντα ’Hλεîoν καì γένεoς τoû ’Ιαμιδέων κλυτιάδην Λακεδαιμóνιoι ༐̌oιήσαντo λεωσøέτερoν (HerodotOS 9.33.1).