-A, O K ⇒ K
Aristotheros (ca 250 BCE?)
According to S, In de cael. 2.1.2 (CAG 7 [1894] 504.16–505.19), Aristotheros had a
dispute with A, which Simplicius cites as proof that Autolukos failed in his
attempts to explain the apparent variation in the distance of the planets from the Earth by
means of hypotheses (here, models: sc. homocentric spheres). Simplicius does not say what
the dispute was about, and we cannot confirm his account in any of its details; indeed, given
that Simplicius here reconstructs the past by retrojecting later astronomical theory, it is
probably a thorough misrepresentation. Still, from this text one might infer that Aristotheros
was at least a contemporary of Autolukos. But, even were Simplicius right in this limited
respect, Autolukos’ dates are uncertain, so this would hardly help to identify Aristotheros.
There is also a report in the anonymous Vita Arati IV that Aristotheros was an astronomer
and the teacher of A, but this is contradicted in the same text which also says that
Aratos was the student of Persaios of Athens as well as by reports elsewhere that he was the
pupil of Dionusios of He ̄rakleia (Vita Arati I) or of M E (Souda A-
3745). Given the current state of our sources, there is no sensible way to adjudicate this
disagreement.
SDS 1.806–839, Alan C. Bowen; Idem, “Simplicius and the Early History of Greek Planetary Theory,”
Perspectives on Science 10 (2002) 155–167; Idem, “Simplicius’ Commentary on Aristotle, De caelo
2.10–12: An Annotated Translation (Part 2)” SCIAMVS 9 (2008: forthcoming).
Alan C. Bowen
Aristoxenos (ca 25 – 50 CE)
He ̄rophilean physician, A P’ student (G, Puls. Diff. 4.10
[8.746 K.]), wrote a polemical On the School of He ̄rophilos, attacking even prominent members
of his own school for their illogical or defective understanding of medicine and their impre-
cise, redundant and superfluous definitions, especially of sphygmology, e.g., B,
Z, K, A “M,” and H E (Gale ̄n,
Puls. Diff. 4.7, 4.8, 4.10 [8.734–735, 738–740, 744–747 K.], Puls. Dign. 4.3 [955 K.]). Gale ̄n,
who may have relied on the text for substantial portions of his Puls. Diff. (von Staden 1999:
170 – 171), praises Aristoxenos’ theory of the pulse, which distinguished between distention
and contraction, and identified the pulse as a function of the arteries and heart (8.734–5,
955 K.). He prescribed purgatives to patients to maintain humoral balance (C
A, Acute 3.134 [CML 6.1.1, p. 372]).
von Staden (1989) 559–563; Idem (1999) 170–176; BNP 1 (2002) 1155 (#2), V. Nutton.
GLIM
Aristoxenos of Taras (350 – 310 BCE)
Traditionally regarded as the major musical authority of the ancient world (hence simply
called “the musician”), he was born in Taras to Spintharos, or Mne ̄sias, a nickname that
some scholars think derived from the verb mimne ̄sko ̄ (“to remember”), according to the habit
widespread among Pythagoreans of using epithets related to the sphere of memory. From
his father he received his first training in music which, according to the sources, continued
with Lampro ̄s of Eruthrai (perhaps during his stay in Mantinea, whence he moved to
Corinth and then to Athens), the Pythagorean X and, from about 330 BCE,
ARISTOXENOS OF TARAS