campaign involved Alcibiades and the Athenian assembly's attempt to recall him. Immediately before the expedition's departure, the assembly suspected Alcibiades of religious sacrilege. Afraid of Alcibiades' power in the army, the Athenian assembly decided to wait until they departed to pursue the issue. The Athenian assembly indicted Alcibiades for sacrilege after he sailed for Sicily and ordered him to return to face charges. On the return journey in a separate ship, Alcibiades escaped at Thurii
of them happened to be Alcibiades who demanded to see Agathon. He continues to praise Agathon as the smartest and best looking man in town, asking if he could join the party in which they all agreed. Alcibiades was asked to sit next to Agathon, which he planted his seat right in between him and Socrates. Socrates ends up getting accused by Alcibiades because he asked him how he happened to trap Agathon and sit next to him, which senses a lot of jealousy coming from Alcibiades. He asked Agathon for
Alcibiades was a modern hero for the Athenian people. He was wealthy, beautiful, and eloquent in his speaking. As a man of the people, his soul became filled with flattery and pleasures. Alcibiades was not virtuous, however, he was also not vicious. His charm, wealth and good fortune pushed him into the public sphere, which ultimately aided in his demise. Plutarch uses the Life of Alcibiades as a moral and ethical lesson for his readers, demonstrating both the good and bad in his life. With his outer
The Sicilian Expedition is the decisive event in the Peloponnesian war. In fact that is what motivated Thucydide's to record it in his historical records. Thucydides prophesized that it would be `the greatest in all Greek history' and "it was a major turning point for Athens',moreover, it was the `most glorious victory for the winners, and the worst calamity for the loosers.' The outcome was that Athens lost the war which lead to the eventual collapse of her empire and dignity. The Athenians lost
Philosophy and the Human Condition Socrates and Alcibiades In Plato’s Symposium, he describes the party which Agathon had several famous people of his time over for dinner. Those in attendance include Phaedrus, Pausanias, Eryximachus, Aristophanes, and Socrates. The party begins by the members of the party eating dinner and then beginning to talk to about love. Each person gives a eulogy of love. After everyone has spoken, including Socrates, Alcibiades enters and gives a eulogy of Socrates. The two
Alcibiades and Critias were both largely responsible for their own anti-democratic movements in Athens. Their history as former students of Socrates put a bad reputation on the philosopher, and attributed to his being called to trial in 399 B.C.E. The conditions surrounding Socrates’ trial raises a lot of questions, like why put Socrates to death when he was an old man, and why try to silence him when free speech is so vital to democracy? At the very least, evidence appears to point to the notion
common element: loving. Socrates asserts that he himself is in love with Alcibiades, the son of Cleinias and with philosophy and that Callicles is in love with the Athenian people and the son of Pyrilampes. As Socrates develops his argument, he illustrates that love triumphs all other forces and that his love for philosophy and Alcibiades are fundamentally distinct. Ironically, in the Symposium, an exasperated Alcibiades implies that Socrates neglects him due to his love for philosophy—an attribute
The Tragedy of Alcibiades in Plato's Symposium In Symposium, a selection from The Dialogues of Plato, Plato uses historical allusions to demonstrate Alcibiades’ frustration with both social expectations for the phallus and his inability to meet these expectations. Alcibiades’ inability to have a productive sexual relationship effectively castrates him and demonstrates the impotence caused by an overemphasis on eroticism. The tragedy of Alcibiades is that he realizes he is unable to gain virtue
On the surface, Sappho’s fragments seem like they are simply about a naïve and lovesick girl. In the Symposium, Alcibiades appears similarly to Sappho, being extremely devoted to Socrates. Both Sappho and Alcibiades want to experience love because they think it will make them happier, but each for different reasons. Sappho wants the experience of loving and being loved. Alcibiades wants the knowledge he believes he will gain from love, but neither are approaching love the correct way, as Diotima
In this paper, I intend to show the way Socrates depicts himself in the Apology with the way Socrates is depicted by Alcibiades in the Symposium. My argument is based on the assumption that these depictions are of the same character, or is the figure of Socrates different in these two representations? In order to prove that I’m simply derivative of Plato, I will show how each point is already existent in the literary works of Plato. Socrates is believed to be a mysterious, incomprehensible person
can understand the Ancient Greek traditions of loved ones and lovers, Alcibiades’s struggles with being Socrates’s “lover” is confusing. Since Alcibiades is younger than Socrates, Socrates should be the lover rather than the “loved one.” Alcibiades laments that Socrates rejects his love and advances. However, Socrates, in his own way, is loving Alcibiades. Socrates spoke earlier in the text about a woman, Diotima’s, ladder of love. He speaks of what she taught him of different levels of love. According
Agathon, where Socrates and Alcibiades are in attendance. The men at the party take turns eulogizing the god Eros. In Agathon’s eulogy, he describes Eros as a soft and tender being. When Socrates speaks, however, he makes a correction of his host’s account, by saying the soft and tender thing is the beloved, and not the lover, as Agathon would have it. When Alcibiades enters the party toward the end of the dialogue, he complains that Socrates is deceiving Agathon. Alcibiades was once the lover of Socrates
of which Socrates’ and Alcibiades’ relationship can be ascribed to. To achieve this endeavor, one will need to understand Aristotle’s notion of perfect friendship based on reciprocal goodwill and virtue, and imperfect friendship based on utility and pleasure. By applying these evaluative aspects according to Socrates’ and Alcibiades’ characteristics and disposition in pursuing a friendship, the categories of their friendships are well elucidated. The friendship that Alcibiades seeks to obtain is that
Before Aristophanes begins his speech he is interrupted by a bout of hiccups, allegorically suggestive regarding the nature of love as unpredictable and out of our control, something to which our reason is subverted. After the hiccups have ceased, Aristophanes recounts the alleged story of human origin, how humans were once whole beings who were separated into halves by the Greek god Zeus as punishment. These halves are now on a quest for unification with their corresponding half in order to achieve
famously claims that the war started “because the Spartans were afraid of further growth of Athenian power, seeing as they did have the greater part of Hellas was under the control of Athens”. The two main protagonists from opposing sides Lysander and Alcibiades had the most influential impact on the end of the war. Lysander was appointed Spartan navarch for the Aegean Sea in 407 and undertook the major project of creating a strong Spartan fleet which could take on the Athenians and their allies. Lysander
During this, Alcibiades, one of Timon’s associates, is in with the senate trying to help the fate of one of his friends who is being sentenced to death. The senate finds Alcibiades so annoying they banish him from Athens. He then plans to raise an army to destroy Athens. Timon scavenges the woods for food but then discovers a hidden cache of gold. Timon, struck by irony, reburied the gold while keeping some. Flavius, with all the money he can gather, goes out in search of Timon. Alcibiades stumbles
Probably the greatest achievement in philosophy is for an individual to acknowledge the universal nature of the thing he desires to understand. The true form of an object is the universal nature of that object. The true form of an object, such as love, should remain constant throughout infinite perceptions of that object, such that two people will acknowledge the same form of that object at any point in time. Sure, people may experiences many types of love, as depicted in the phrase "love is in the
through his focus on personalities. As an example, Thucydides provides the case of the Athenians' ally Corcyra, when civil war broke out during the Peloponnesian War. This precedent acts as a model of foreshadowing for the Athenians between Nicias and Alcibiades, as they attempt to sway the crowd using negative and positive examples about whether they should go to war with Sicily. During the civil wars in Corcyra, Thucydides emphasizes how the relationship between the democratic and oligarchic party escalates
against Athens. Alcibiades was a diplomat and military general who aided the achievement of the Peloponnesian War by influencing Argo, Mantineia and Elis to create an anti-Spartan alliance. The association was altogether defeated, however, Alcibiades managed to escape out of it and avoid any punishment. He then convinced the Athenian navy to use their resources for an invasion on Syracuse in Sicily. The Athenian navy agreed, however, the night before they were supposed to sail, Alcibiades was accused
these concepts, Alcibiades steps in. He is confused because he himself is in love with philosophy, but he is also lost in bodily desire. According to the ideology of Socrates as expressed in Plato's work "Symposium" the musician girl from Mehta's "A River Sutra" is at the bottom of Diotima's ladder because she is so entirely infatuated and obsessed with the love of physical beauty, and not Socrates ideal, which is love of wisdom. In the same way, one might say that also Alcibiades is lost in bodily