There are several studies devoted to the examination of a single dialogue or a small group of dialogues: R.E. Allen, Plato’s “Euthyphro” and the Earlier Theory of Forms (1970); Plato, Gorgias, trans. by Terence Irwin (1979); W. Thomas Schmid, Plato’s Charmides and the Socratic Ideal of Rationality (1998); Plato, Protagoras, trans. and rev. by C.C.W. Taylor (1976, reissued 1996); Roslyn Weiss, Socrates Dissatisfied: An Analysis of Plato’s Crito (1998, reissued 2001); Plato, Hippias Major, trans. by Paul Woodruff (1982); and A.D. Woozley, Law and Obedience: The Arguments of Plato’s Crito (1979). Plato’s Apology and Crito are discussed in R.E. Allen, Socrates and Legal Obligation (1980). Richard Kraut, Socrates and the State (1984) is a study of Crito and Socrates’ attitude toward politics. The legacy of Socrates and Athens
Good general overviews are P.J. FitzPatrick, “The Legacy of Socrates,” in Barry S. Gower and Michael C. Stokes (eds.), Socratic Questions: New Essays on the Philosophy of Socrates and its Significance (1992), pp. 153–208; and C.C.W. Taylor, “Socrates and Later Philosophy,” in C.C.W. Taylor, R.M. Hare, and Jonathan Barnes, Greek Philosophers: Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle (1999), pp. 76–100. Narrower but still valuable studies are A.A. Long, “Socrates in Hellenistic Philosophy,” Classical Quarterly 38, pp. 150–71 (1988), and “Socrates and the Sophists,” chapter 6 in The Greek Heritage in Victorian Britain (1981, reissued 1984), pp. 264–321; and Pierre Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault, ed. by Arnold I. Davidson, trans. by Michael Chase (1995), pp. 147–78, chapter 5, “The Figure of Socrates.”
A history of attitudes toward Athens and Sparta is presented in Jennifer Tolbert Roberts, Athens on Triaclass="underline" The Antidemocratic Tradition in Western Thought (1994). Melissa Lane, Plato’s Progeny: How Socrates and Plato Still Captivate the Modern Mind (2001) is a history of modern debates about the politics of Socrates and Plato. The Socratic transformation of the notion of citizenship and its successors in the modern world is discussed in Dana Villa, Socratic Citizenship (2001). Richard Kraut
Socrates
Byzantine historian
Alternative Title: Socrates Scholasticus, Sokrates
Socrates, also called Socrates Scholasticus, Greek Sokrates, (born c. 380, Constantinople—died c. 450), Byzantine church historian whose annotated chronicle, Historia ecclesiastica (“Ecclesiastical History”), is an indispensable documentary source for Christian history from 305 to 439. Through excerpts from the 6th-century Latin translation ascribed to Cassiodorus and Epiphanius, it provided the medieval Latin church with a major portion of its knowledge of early Christianity.
A legal consultant, Socrates was the first known layman to write church history. The Historia ecclesiastica, the second edition of which is still completely extant, encompasses religious and secular annals of the period in seven books. Each book corresponds to the reign of an Eastern Roman emperor, from Constantine I (ad 306–337) to Theodosius II (408–450), and continues the church history of the 4th-century historian Eusebius of Caesarea. Incorporating earlier sources verbatim and integrating conciliar proceedings with available letters of emperors and bishops, Socrates compiled a relatively impartial account of events that he sometimes embellished with expanded anecdotes from eyewitnesses.
Citation Information
Article Title: Socrates
Website Name: Encyclopaedia Britannica
Publisher: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
Date Published: 04 February 2013
URL: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Socrates-Byzantine-historian
Access Date: August 27, 2019