ABSTRACT
Many of the general points made above are illustrated by the subject matter of the present volume. We shall be looking at the enterprises that certain figures were engaged upon. We shall see what resulted from their work and the extent to which this was a resource for those who came later. This means that some figures whose enterprises we cannot now identify will receive less attention than is traditional. We shall see many examples of how, in making constructions from available resources, authors can look to the unwary as though they are receiving transmitted ideas or knowledge. We shall also see that, in constructing knowledge rather than passively receiving it, some authors worked hard to give it a Greek, others a Roman paternity. There are examples of authors constructing histories to legitimate their views, and examples of religious and political aspects of resources militating for or against their survival. There are abundant examples of philosophers seeking to be close to the sources of political power and often suffering as a result. We shall see that in the last analysis what counted as knowledge for our authors did not depend upon its truth-value in our terms, or on its being a dimly perceived contribution to our science, but on the identity and intentionality of their own enterprise.
