Arrian
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Search complete. 71 mentions across 17 episodes found for "Arrian".
Sep 10, 2026
Eric HutchinsonGUEST
There are others whose works that we have, um, in, in only fragmentary form.
Eric HutchinsonGUEST
The other big Roman Stoic philosopher who, wh- whom we have a lot of is Epictetus, um, thanks to his student Arrian, A-R-R-I-A-N, uh, who recorded a lot of, uh, a, a lot of his teaching.
Eric HutchinsonGUEST
Um, but anyway, I don't know if that was a good answer to your question or not, but
Nadya WilliamsHOST
I think this is very helpful, and especially for first-time readers, I think this is essential to understand where Marcus Aurelius is coming from.
Nadya WilliamsHOST
And what we see is that he's very much a reader, and he's not necessarily an original thinker in this regard.
Nadya WilliamsHOST
He is, um, a student of a popular philosophy of his day.
Nadya WilliamsHOST
Now, how does this all play out in the Meditations? Would you walk us through it? What sort of book is it, and what are some key themes that he in particular is interested in?
Eric HutchinsonGUEST
Um, yeah, great question again.
Tom HollandHOST
You know, this is not a man that you offend recklessly.
Tom HollandHOST
And in 84, he had written a letter to the Senate, and Arrian, the Greek historian, describes what he said.
Tom HollandHOST
He said he would be back very soon to take his vengeance on behalf of all those who had been wronged and on behalf of Rome itself upon the guilty men.
Tom HollandHOST
So a very, very ominous threat.
54 MINS LATER
Tom HollandHOST
He has no office at all.
Dominic SandbrookHOST
Whoa.
Tom HollandHOST
And he had done this, so to quote Arrian, the historian of this period, "Fearing neither his enemies at home nor the exiles abroad, such was the extent of his daring and his good luck."
Dominic SandbrookHOST
So Sulla's in his late 50s at this point.
Brian MumfordNARRATOR
Others assumed the philosophic way of life in order to escape into the sphere of Stoic freedom.
Brian MumfordNARRATOR
Among the students was a young Roman, Flavius Arrian, who took courses at Nicopolis when Epictetus was already old.
Brian MumfordNARRATOR
Flavius, who was born in one oh eight AD, was one of the intimates of Hadrian, who made him consul in one thirty AD.
Brian MumfordNARRATOR
He probably studied with Epictetus between the years one twenty-three and one twenty-six AD.
Brian MumfordNARRATOR
The informal philosophical talks which Epictetus had with his students fascinated him.
Brian MumfordNARRATOR
Needless to say, there were also systematic courses in the fields of philosophy.
Brian MumfordNARRATOR
But it was the informal discourses which convinced Arrian that he had finally discovered a Stoic Socrates or a Stoic Diogenes, who was not merely teaching a doctrine but also living the truth.
Brian MumfordNARRATOR
Arrian recorded many of the discourses and informal conversations of Epictetus with his intimate students.
D. Scott WarrenNARRATOR
But Epictetus took the child and brought it up.
D. Scott WarrenNARRATOR
Epictetus wrote nothing, and all that we have under his name was written by an affectionate pupil, Arrian, afterwards the historian of Alexander the Great, who, as he tells us, took down in writing the philosopher's discourses.
D. Scott WarrenNARRATOR
These discourses formed eight books, but only four are extant under the title of Epictetu Diatrii.
D. Scott WarrenNARRATOR
Simplicius, in his commentary on the Enchiridion, or Manual, states that this work also was put together by Arrian, who selected from the discourses of Epictetus what he considered to be the most useful and most necessary and most adapted to move men's minds.
D. Scott WarrenNARRATOR
Simplicius also says that the contents of the Enchiridion are found nearly altogether and in the same words in various parts of the discourses.
D. Scott WarrenNARRATOR
Arrian also wrote a work on the life and death of Epictetus.
D. Scott WarrenNARRATOR
The events of the philosopher's studious life were probably not many nor remarkable, but we should have been glad if this work had been preserved, which told, as Simplicius says, what kind of man Epictetus was.
D. Scott WarrenNARRATOR
Photius mentions among Arrian's works Conversations with Epictetus, Homiliai Epicteton, in twelve books.
Dominic SandbrookHOST
As for Sulla, when envoys from Rome met him on the road and asked him why he was marching with his legions against his native city, he answered, "To deliver her from tyrants." So what an extraordinary moment.
Dominic SandbrookHOST
So that's an account by Arrian, the Greek historian, and he's writing about one of the landmark moments in all Roman history, one of the most melodramatic moments in all classical history.
Dominic SandbrookHOST
We're in 88 BC, and it is the decision by a Roman commander to lead an army for the very first time against Rome itself to attack his own capital city.
Dominic SandbrookHOST
Tom, this is a monumental moment in Roman history, and you could argue a key step in the process that leads from the Roman Republic to, in a century's time, the launch of the Roman Empire under Augustus.
ShankaranandaHOST
Isn't that charming? He banned all philosophers, and Epictetus had to flee and taught elsewhere.
ShankaranandaHOST
He had a terrific disciple named Arian who wrote down word for word all his lectures.
ShankaranandaHOST
And they were published.
ShankaranandaHOST
and a text called the Enchiridion, which means the manual or the handbook.
Will ShakespeareNARRATOR
The following extract from an ancient work entitled The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea may serve to prove.
Will ShakespeareNARRATOR
The author usually supposed to be Arrian after describing a city called Thina proceeds to narrate a yearly mercantile journey to the vicinity of a certain people called Sessartae, of short stature, broad faces, and flat noses evidently natives of China adds that the articles they bring for traffic outwardly resemble vine leaves being wrapped in mats which they leave behind them on their departure to their own country in the interior.
Will ShakespeareNARRATOR
From these mats, the Thina pick out a hum called Petros from which they draw the fiber and stalks.
Will ShakespeareNARRATOR
Spreading out the leaves, they double and make them up into balls passing the fiber through them in which form they take the name of malabathrum, and under this name they are brought into India by those who so prepare them.
speaker_0VOICE_ACTOR
But Epictetus took the child and brought it up.
speaker_0VOICE_ACTOR
Epictetus wrote nothing, and all that we have under his name was written by an affectionate pupil, Arrian, afterwards the historian of Alexander the Great, who, as he tells us, took down in writing the philosopher's discourses.
speaker_0VOICE_ACTOR
These discourses formed eight books, but only four are extant under the title of Epictetu Diatriabi.
speaker_0VOICE_ACTOR
Simplicius, in his commentary on the Enchiridion, or Manual, states that this work also was put together by Arrian, who selected from the discourses of Epictetus what he considered to be the most useful and most necessary and most adapted to move men's minds.
speaker_0VOICE_ACTOR
Simplicius also says that the contents of the Enchiridion are found nearly altogether and in the same words in various parts of the discourses.
speaker_0VOICE_ACTOR
Arrian also wrote a work on the life and death of Epictetus.
speaker_0VOICE_ACTOR
The events of the philosopher's studious life were probably not many nor remarkable, but we should have been glad if this work had been preserved, which told, as Simplicius says, what kind of man Epictetus was.
speaker_0VOICE_ACTOR
Photius mentions among Arrian's works Conversations with Epictetus, Homiliae Epicteton, in twelve books.
Jeanne ReamesGUEST
They are using this stuff to tell their own narrative, and they have their own foci.
Jeanne ReamesGUEST
And so, um, the Alexander that's presented in Arrian, who's one of the more f- I guess, better known Alexander biographers, is pretty different from the Alexander presented in Curtius, who's the other long form, but he's writing in Latin.
Jeanne ReamesGUEST
He's writing, both of them are writing during the Roman Empire, but had different interests.
Jeanne ReamesGUEST
And so the Alexander we get as a mythologized figure is bent to tell the story of their own time that they're writing in.
44 MINS LATER
Jeanne ReamesGUEST
A lot of it owes to the popularity of The Song of Achilles, I think that's the name of the book, um, that became popular a few years back with Madeline Miller, and they went to do Patro Achilles, this love story between Achilles and Patroclus, and, and then, uh, uh, put that onto Alexander and Hephaestion because they sacrificed at the, uh, um, tumulus tomb of, uh, Achilles in, in, uh, Troy.
Jeanne ReamesGUEST
Reminder, there is no flipping tomb 'cause there was no flipping Achilles, [laughs] okay? He was a character, but again, they thought there was.
Jeanne ReamesGUEST
Uh, and we hear about this, um, sacrifice in Arrian.
Jeanne ReamesGUEST
It's the only place we hear about this sacrifice.
Nick BulkaNARRATOR
2.
Nick BulkaNARRATOR
But he had not, like them, a Xenophon or an Arrian to write for him.
Nick BulkaNARRATOR
I name not Plato, who only used the name of Socrates to cover the whimsies of his own brain.
Nick BulkaNARRATOR
On the contrary, all the learned of his country, entrenched in its power and riches, were opposed to him.
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