Der Vortrag verfolgt die Geschichte und rhetorischen Funktionalisierungen des Seneca-Zitats, dass es nicht darauf ankomme, wer spricht, sondern allein darauf, was gesagt werde, von der Spätantike bis ins Spätmittelalter. Das Zitat erweist sich als polyfunktional: Geistlichen dient es zur Absicherung gegenüber der Gemeinde, Akademikern hilft es in Fällen anonymer Überlieferung - sogar eine Frau, die über das Waffenhandwerk publiziert, lenkt damit von sich als Verfasserin ab.

Au sortir de quatre années d’une guerre fratricide, les États-Unis s’engageaient sur la voie de la Reconstruction, période qui généra des questions autour de la liberté. Deux catégories étaient au cœur d’une actualité faite de rebondissements multiples : les Noirs et les femmes. Les uns parce que leurs soutiens abolitionnistes souhaitaient obtenir une citoyenneté immédiate (“This is the Negro’s hour”) ; les autres parce qu’elles étaient les alliées de longue date des mêmes abolitionnistes et réclamaient dorénavant le suffrage. Ce fut le début d’alliances, de mésalliances entre les hommes noirs, les suffragists, les femmes noires et leurs soutiens et adversaires respectifs, pris qu’ils étaient dans les péripéties de luttes et de causes qui, bien que complémentaires et concomitantes, demeurèrent souvent différentes voire divergentes sur le plan des principes et des stratégies de lutte, ce qui mena parfois à une hostilité réciproque. Tous entrèrent ainsi dans un jeu continu entre universalisme et particularisme (s) jusqu’à l’avènement du vote féminin (Sud mis à part) en 1920 puis du Voting Right Act (1865). Que la réussite des un(e)s dépendît ou non de la victoire des autres, les défaites successives des un(e)s et des autres montraient quant à elles les réticences d’une société traversée par les convulsions occasionnées par ses contradictions d’origine : depuis qu’elle avait proclamé tous les hommes (hormis les Noirs, les Amérindiens et les femmes) égaux. L’inclusion électorale des Noirs et des femmes fut effective au terme de plus d’un siècle de luttes, d’alliances et de mésalliances qui se succédèrent au milieu de cycles successifs d’adhésions ou d’oppositions souvent tumultueuses d’un bout à l’autre de l’échiquier politique. / In the wake of a tragic civil war, the United States entered a period of Reconstruction that aroused many questions about the notion of liberty. Two groups were propelled into the center of the country’s public debate: Blacks and women. While the former became a central issue because their abolitionist allies wanted them to garner immediate citizenship (“This is the Negro’s hour”), the latter were trying to catch public attention because they had been longtime allies to the same abolitionists and were now claiming their own enfranchisement. That was the inception of a long period made of alliances interspersed with moments of blatant disagreement and even separation between black male militants, suffragists, black female franchise advocators, and their respective supporters or opponents. They were all caught in the twists and turns of struggles and causes that complemented one another. Though their motives were concomitant and compatible, they remained fundamentally distinct, even divergent in terms of principles and strategies, which sometimes sparked mutual hostility. They all entered a cycle of actions oscillating between a universal and a particular claim of the franchise. This situation prevailed until the advent of universal female suffrage in 1920 (except for black women in the South). Whether or not the success or failure of black males depended on the defeat of women, the successive defeats of both groups pointed out the reluctance of a society undergoing the convulsions sparked by its original contradictions stemming from the very period when it declared all men equal; all except Indians, Blacks, and women. The final enfranchisement of both women and Blacks took more than a century of alliances and dissociations in the midst of a tumult of successive support or opposition across the country’s political spectrum.

Thesis (MA)--Stellenbosch University, 2011. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Stoic philosophy taught along with the other prominent philosophical schools of the Hellenistic Era (i.e. the Academics, the Peripatetics and the Epicureans) that the goal or final end (telos) of human existence is our well-being or happiness (eudaimonia). The Stoics provided various definitions of this telos, the most famous being “living in agreement with nature” (ηὸ ὁκνινγνπκέλσο ηῇ θύζεη δῆλ) or “living according to nature” (secundum naturam vivere) and this goal essentially comes down to living according to perfect reason and virtue. The purpose of this study is to investigate how Seneca presents the Stoic doctrines regarding this topic in his Epistulae Morales (“Letters on Morality”) and to determine whether he managed to make the theoretical framework, proposed by the Stoics for the attainment of a happy life, more easily applicable in practice without compromising orthodox Stoic teachings. The orthodoxy of Seneca‟s philosophy may be judged by comparison with the doctrines of the early Stoic teachers, which is why this study will first look at the traditional Stoic teachings concerning the definition of the telos as well as the theory behind the attainment thereof. Thereafter it will be investigated how true Seneca stayed to these traditional teachings and whether he managed to make the Stoic telos more realistically attainable by the practical advice he offers in his letters. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Stoïsynse filosofie voer aan soos die ander prominente filosofiese skole van die Hellenistiese era (d.w.s. die Akademie, die Peripatetiese skool, en die Epikureërs) dat die einddoel (telos) van die mensdom welsyn of geluk (eudaimonia) is. Die Stoïsyne het verskillende definisies van die telos verskaf; die mees bekende is “om in ooreenkoms met die natuur te leef” (ηὸ ὁκνινγνπκέλσο ηῇ θύζεη δῆλ) of “om volgens die natuur te leef” (secundum naturam vivere) en hierdie einddoel kom in wese daarop neer om volgens volmaakte rede of deug te leef. Die doel van hierdie studie is om te ondersoek hoe Seneca die Stoïsynse leerstellings oor hierdie onderwerp in sy Epistulae Morales (“Briewe oor Moraliteit”) behandel en om te bepaal of hy dit makliker gemaak het om die teoretiese raamwerk, wat deur die Stoïsyne vir die bereiking van 'n gelukkige lewe voorgestel is, in die praktyk toe te pas sonder om die ortodokse Stoïsynse leerstellings te kompromitteer. Die ortodoksie van Seneca se filosofie kan beoordeel word deur dit met die leerstellings van die vroeë Stoïsyne te vergelyk. Hierdie studie begin dus met „n ondersoek na die tradisionele Stoïsynse leerstellings aangaande die definisie van die telos, sowel as die teorie oor die bereiking daarvan. Daarna word ondersoek hoe getrou Seneca was aan die tradisionele leerstellings en of hy deur die praktiese raad in sy briewe dit makliker gemaak het om die Stoïsynse telos te bereik.

A temática do presente trabalho perpassa a discussão sobre as relações de poder estabelecidas entre os setores subalternos e seus superiores hierárquicos da sociedade romana, a partir das obras filosófica e literária de Lucius Anneus Seneca. Do ponto de vista estrutural, o trabalho dividiu-se em três partes principais: 1) A construção dos setores subalternos pela historiografia contemporânea, na qual expusemos e criticamos a construção historiográfica contemporânea de que a plebs romana seria ociosa e, sobretudo, a viabilidade de utilizar Sêneca como fonte documental; 2) A trajetória social, política e textual de Sêneca, em que analisamos o período histórico vivido por Sêneca e suas idéias; 3) A visão sóciopolítica dos setores subalternos nas obras de Sêneca, com a qual abordamos a maneira com que Sêneca construiu a imagem dos setores subalternos (e.g. ingenui, alipius, gladiator) e como desenvolviam estratégias de afirmação social com seus superiores, apresentando dessa maneira, uma realidade social muito mais conflituosa do que aquela interpretada pela historiografia. / The aim of the present study goes through the discussion on the power relationships established between subaltern sectors and his hierarchical superiors in the Roman society, based upon the Lucius Anneus Seneca\'s philosophical and literary composition. From a structural point of view, the work is divided in three mains parts: 1) The construction of the subaltern sectors by the contemporary historiography, in which we introduce and criticize the current historiography construction of the Roman plebs as being idleness, and above all, the practicability of using Seneca\'s work as documental source; 2) The social, political and textual Seneca\'s career, where we analyze the epoch when Seneca lived and its assumption; 3) The social-political view of the subaltern sectors at the Seneca\'s composition, with which we approach the way Seneca constructed the image of the subaltern sectors (e.g. ingenui, alipilus, gladiator) and how these classes used to develop strategies for a social affirmative with their superiors, and then exposing a more conflicting social reality than that presented by the historiography.

Este trabalho tem como objeto o pensamento político de Sêneca em sua relação com a filosofia moral estoica. Nossa hipótese é a de que a construção da noção de poder político em Sêneca se dá por meio da vinculação entre duas figuras chave de seu pensamento, a do sábio (sapiens) e a do príncipe (princeps). Isto é, pretende-se mostra, precisamente na leitura do Tratado sobre a clemência (De Clementia), que existe uma íntima relação entre, de um lado, a formação moral do governante e, de outro, as formulações teóricas da doutrina estoica acerca do homem virtuoso, do sapiens. A arte política por excelência, por não se desvincular da Ética (para o estoicismo), é materializada na interrelação existente entre a figura do princeps e a figura do sapiens, implicando, portanto, a formação moral do governante como elemento imprescindível ao bom exercício do poder político. / This paper has as its object the political thought of Seneca in his relation with stoic moral philosophy. The hypothesis is that the construction of the notion of political power in Seneca occurs through the linking between two key figures of his thought, the wise (sapiens) and the prince (princeps). This is intended to show precisely the reading of the Treaty on clemency (De Clementia), that there is a close relationship between, on the one hand, the moral education of the ruler and on the other, the theoretical formulations of the Stoic doctrine of virtuous man sapiens. The political art par excellence, not to avoid its Ethics (for Stoicism), is based upon the interrelationship between the figure of the princeps and the figure of sapiens, implying therefore the moral education of the ruler as an essential element for the proper exercise of the political power.

A Apocolocintose do divino Cláudio é a desconstrução da apoteose atribuída pelo senado romano a Cláudio, princeps morto em 54 d.C. e penúltimo César da dinastia Júlio-Claudiana. Este texto de Sêneca estrutura-se de acordo com o gênero sátira menipéia, em que se mesclam prosa e verso, coloquialismos e formas cultas, além de intensas relações que se estabelecem com outros textos greco-romanos. Para isso, Sêneca insere fatos da vida de Cláudio e relaciona-os com situações inesperadas no céu, na terra e no inferno, em um percurso fictício que o princeps romano realiza nesta dessacralização. O texto de Sêneca é uma reação ao exílio sofrido nas mãos deste mesmo princeps, a quem o filósofo veio a servir em 49 d.C. Também é uma reação aos desmandos e crueldades perpetradas por Cláudio e uma forma de enaltecer a imagem de Nero, alçado ao governo de Roma após a morte de Cláudio. Esta dissertação de Mestrado compreende uma introdução ao gênero sátira menipéia, seguida de tradução e notas da Apocolocintose do divino Cláudio, bem como de um comentário críticoanalítico em que se examinam as intenções de Sêneca nesta invectiva contra Cláudio. / Divine Claudios Apocolocintose is the destruction of the apotheosis given by the Roman senate to Claudio, princeps who died in 54 after Christ, and the penultimate Caesar of the Julian-Claudian dynasty. The text by Seneca is, in its structure, in accordance with the genre menippean satire, in which prose and verse, colloquialism and erudite forms of composition are entwined. Besides, the text has intense links with other Greek-Roman texts. In order to do that, Seneca inserts facts of Claudios life and relates them with unexpected situations in heaven, on earth and in hell, in a fictitious path the Roman princeps carries out in this dissacralization. Senecas text is a reaction due to the exile he had to undergo through the hands of the princeps himself, who the philosopher served in 49 after Christ. Its also a reaction to the whimsy deeds and cruelties done by Claudio, and a way of highlighting Neros image, who took the government after Claudios death. This Masters degree paper comprehends and introduction to the genre menippean satire, translation and notes of Divine Claudios Apocolocintose as well as a critic-analytic comment on which Senecas intentions are examined in the invective against Claudio.

This dissertation argues that Seneca’s philosophical program and literary artistry are jointly coordinated to address and redress the pervasive experience of subverted expectations, i.e. the experience of paradoxicality, attributed to the unwise by Seneca’s Stoic philosophy. With a focus on Seneca’s Epistulae Morales, I suggest that Seneca’s oft-noted paradoxical style reveals and is meant to reflect our fundamentally inconsistent (and thus dissatisfying) experience engendered, in his view, by the incoherency of our worldviews. While, as Seneca explores, our minds’ operations hide this distressing contradiction from our attention, Seneca’s subtle but steady exposure of it and its source attempts to work against this self-deception. The intended result for the reader is the recognition of their own role in their dissatisfaction and the resulting commitment to its remedy through philosophical training.

This thesis tackles the pervasiveness of aberration in Senecan tragedy. Aberration infects all aspects of the drama, and it is deeply entwined with Senecan criminality. In my introduction, I define my terminology of the aberrant, and I discuss a series of ongoing scholarly debates on the tragedies, showing how understanding the aberrant in Seneca's dramas can shed new light on these questions. In Chapter 1, I examine the relationship between the language of crime in the plays, tracing the Latin words for crime back to their instances in Republican Roman tragedy and other genres and seeing how Seneca uses and develops this language of crime, creating an unstable fuel for his dramas. In Chapter 2, I consider Seneca's paradoxes. I consider not only verbal manifestations but all the different paradoxes that appear in the dramas: visual paradoxes, paradoxes of infinity, thematic paradoxes, intertextual paradoxes and more. Paradox is not merely a formal feature of Seneca's writing but integral to the structure of each play. Paradox becomes Seneca's means of transforming linguistic aberration into thematic aberration. In Chapter 3, I argue that Senecan landscapes are not just verbal artefacts. Seneca describes his anomalous spaces in ways that connect with how space and place was experienced in Roman culture. Seneca's aberrant spaces give us buildings that are bigger on the inside than the outside and bodies that explode with the emotions within them. In Chapter 4, I probe aberrant behaviour, by considering the ambiguous characters of Hercules and Thyestes. I expand our focus to incorporate Roman notions of appropriate behaviour, reading the dramas and De Beneficiis as reflecting wider socio-cultural concerns, and I question common assumptions about the thematization of theatricality in Senecan tragedy. In both Hercules Furens and Thyestes, crime skews and twists the situation, rendering apparently ethical behaviour aberrant.

Ce travail de recherche reconstruit la valeur de la notion de securitas d'un point de vue conceptuel et du point de vue de l'histoire de la philosophie dans le but de montrer la centralité du concept et la cohérence de son développement dans la réflexion philosophique de Sénèque. À cette fin les dimensions intérieure et extérieure sont examinées dans leur relation d'implication mutuelle : premièrement la securitas est étudiée par rapport à la dimension psychologique du sujet dans le contexte du progrès moral, deuxièmement, elle est étudiée par rapport à la relation à autrui dans le contexte sociale de l'Empire. La securitas est également analysée en référence au statut épistémologique des Naturales Quaestiones pour étudier la relation que l'homme entretient avec le monde des phénomènes naturels grâce à la science. En outre le concept a été examiné à l’intérieur de la relation entre oeuvre philosophique et oeuvre tragique (Oedipus). Le postulat éthique de la securitas trouve une résonance et un sens complémentaires dans la poétique de l’oeuvre tragique, ce qui détermine donc une poétique de l'incertain. La recherche montre que la présence du focus sur la dimension intérieure vise des objectifs éthiques concernant la sphère extérieure. Ce qui ressort en outre de l’étude de la notion de securitas est une relation tendue avec le monde. Ce caractère tendu de la relation au monde nous a conduit à clarifier la position de Sénèque vis-à-vis de la tradition stoïcienne à laquelle il appartient, ainsi que son attitude par rapport aux autres influences philosophiques (Lucrèce, Cicéron, Celse) et idéologiques (Velleius Paterculus) auxquelles il est perméable. / This research reconstructs the value of the concept of securitas in Seneca's thought with the aim to show its centrality and the organic nature of its development both from a conceptual point of view and from the point of view of the history of ideas. Therefore the interior and the exterior dimensions of the notion and their mutual implications are analyzed: securitas is examined in its interior psychological dimension in the context of moral progress, subsequently the importance of the concept is taken into account in connection with social relations in the imperial context. The epistemological questions of the notion in Naturales Quaestiones are also studied in order to investigate the relationship that man entertains with the world of natural phenomena through science. Securitas was also examined within the relationship between philosophical and dramatic works (Oedipus), suggesting the presence of ethical assumptions of securitas in their inverted sense on a poetic level and allowing us to describe Seneca's poetic as a poetic of uncertainty. The research shows that the ethical aspects which focus on the interior dimension become part of relating to the outside world as well. The tense relationship with the world, which emerges from the study of the concept of securitas, can also be linked to the way Seneca deals with previous philosophical tradition and have contributed to clarify his position with respect to the Stoic tradition to which he belongs, as well as with respect to other philosophical (Lucretius, Cicero, Celsus) and ideological (Velleius Paterculus) influences which are present in his works.

ABSTRACT Around 65 AD, the Ancient Roman philosopher Seneca wrote his only text concerning Natural Phenomenon: Natural Questions. Considered since medieval times as part of a trinity of great thinkers including Plato and Aristotle, Seneca’s work in rhetoric, philosophy, and legal theory still receive praise today. The praise is not replicated for Natural Questions, however. Modern historians who consider the work paint it as uninspiring. Pliny, another Roman author and philosopher, wrote a far more encompassing and detailed work called Natural History, and it is this work that is considered the premier Roman comment on Natural Philosophy. These contemporaneous works become juxtaposed and used to criticize Seneca’s work as inferior. A deeper consideration of the texts --primarily the subject material and use of poetry-- will determine that Seneca and Pliny wrote to different audiences and belong to different genres.