Friendship and its Problems in Greek and Roman Thought

Abstract

Abstract It is easy to get the impression that the ancient Greeks and Romans in general were more worried about friendship than we are. I am not sure how one would prove or disprove the truth of this idea, but it is not hard to see where it comes from. The responsibility for it lies mostly with two authors: admittedly great and influential ones, but for all that only individuals whose representative status cannot automatically be taken for granted without further investigation. They are Aristotle and Cicero. Readers of the Nicomachean Ethics are usually surprised at the amount of space devoted to discussion of ϕ ι λ íαin a work on moral philosophy—a field in which, in modern times, discussion of friendship has hardly figured to any great extent. Readers of Cicero, in the same way, may be surprised that he should have seen fit to devote a philosophical dialogue to the topic of amicitia.

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