ABSTRACT
RAVENoffersusinthisbookastudyoftheinteractionbetween thePythagoreansandtheEleaticswhichenablesus,hethinks,to reconstructtheevolutionofPythagoreanthoughtthroughout thefifthcenturyandintotheearlyfourth.Hismainsourcesare AristotleandthefragmentsoftheEleatics.Healsomakessome useoflatersources,especiallyAlexanderPolyhistorap.Diogenes Laertius8,24ff.Thislast,heholds(pp.I6Iff.),following Wellmann(Hermes54,19I9,225ff.),preservesinthemainasource contemporarywithPlato;heseemsunawareofFestugiere's study(REG58,I945,Iff.)whicharguesconvincinglythatthis sourceisdefinitelypost-Platonic.InthecaseofAristotleRaven's starting-pointisMet.A.5,985b23-986a8,apassagewhich,he holds,'explicitlyrecognizesadistinctionbetweenoneschoolor generationofPythagoreansandanother'(p.II).Hebasesthis viewonthefactthatAristotle'sfirstaccountofPythagorean doctrineinltrf.et.A.5(985b23-986a2r)isintroducedwiththe words,'contemporaneouslywiththesephilosophers(theatomists) andbeforethem,theso-calledPythagoreans...',whilethe TableofOppositesinthesecondaccount(986a22ff.)isascribed to'othersofthesesamepeople',i.e.otherPythagoreans,whoare saidtohaveeitherderivedthisdoctrinefromAlcmaeonorelse werethesourceofAlcmaeon'salternativedoctrineofopposites. Ifthisinferencecouldbesustained,itwouldgiveusahistorical basisofcapitalimportanceforourreconstructionoftheevolution offifth-centuryPythagoreanism.Unfortunately,itcannot.For Aristotle'sfirstaccountisbynomeansrestrictedtoPythagorean viewscontemporarywithatomism,sincetheintroductorystate-
ment reads, €v 8E1 TovTot<;, Ka;, Trpo TovTwv. Moreover, the immediately following phrase speaks of these 'so-called Pythagoreans' as those 'who were the first to take up mathematics'; this shows that Aristotle is talking about a group which includes the very first generation of Pythagoreanism. To be sure, neither can we infer from this that all the views of the first account are projected to the first generation of Pythagoreanism. All we can gather from the all too vague chronological tags of this first account is that Aristotle is thinking of fifth-century Pythagoreanism m bloc, describing the general doctrine which he thinks characteristic of the school so considered, even though he feels free to illustrate one of the peculiarities of this world-view by an example (that of the counter-earth at 986 a u) which is doubtless drawn from a later generation.
