Stobaeus, Volume II

Name: Stobaeus, Volume II
Author: John Stobaeus

Greek and English with an introduction and explanatory footnotes.

Explore the Lexicon

Stobaeus, Volume IIBook II Chapter 31 · II.31.31–II.31.33

Swipe or use the arrow keys.

English Page · Branch 392 of 516

Book II Chapter 31 · II.31.31–II.31.33

Book Mode

Ancient Greek

p. 780

Θεοφράστου

II.31.31

Ἀναγκαιοτάτη δ’ ἐπὶ γυναικῶν ἡ τῶν γραμμάτων δοκεῖ παίδευσις εἶναι καὶ αὐτὴ μέχρι χρησίμου πρὸς οἰκονομίαν· τὸ δ’ ἐξακριβούμενον ἐπὶ πλέον ἀργοτέρας τε ποιεῖ πρὸς τἆλλα καὶ λάλους καὶ περιέργους.

Ἰαμβλίχου ἐκ τοῦ Περὶ ψυχῆς

II.31.32

Ἡ γὰρ συνακολουθοῦσα παντὶ τῷ βουλήματι τοῦ διδάσκοντος τῶν μανθανόντων, αὕτη πασῶν ἐστι μουσικωτάτη τε καὶ ἀρίστη ἀκρόασις.

Ἀντισθένης

II.31.33

Ἀντισθένης ὁ Σωκρατικὸς φιλόσοφος ἐρωτηθεὶς ὑπό τινος, ποῖος στέφανος κάλλιστός ἐστιν, εἶπεν, «ὁ ἀπὸ παιδείας».

Stobaeus, Volume II: Book II Chapter 31

p. 781

Theophrastus

II.31.31

For women, instruction in letters seems most necessary—and even that only as far as is useful for managing a household.¹¹³¹ But further refinement makes them more idle in other matters, talkative, and meddlesome.¹¹³²

Iamblichus, from On the Soul

II.31.32

For the learners’ listening that follows the teacher’s every intention is the most harmonious and the best of all.¹¹³³

Antisthenes

II.31.33

When someone asked Antisthenes, the Socratic philosopher, what sort of crown was finest, he said, “The one that comes from education.”¹¹³⁴

1131.Wachsmuth prints γραμμάτων, letters or written learning, Meineke’s correction of the transmitted πραγμάτων, affairs. Οἰκονομία is management of the household; the excerpt gives no list of the reading or writing skills it allows. Αὐτή refers to the instruction itself: even that is restricted to the stated usefulness.

1132.This fragment voices a restrictive view of women’s education, tying it to household usefulness and disparaging study carried further. The qualification seems (δοκεῖ) and the limiting phrase only as far as are retained. Stobaeus supplies no larger argumentative setting for these claims or title of the work excerpted.

1133.The heading names On the Soul; the selection contains only this sentence, whose introductory for points to an argument outside the excerpt. Μουσικωτάτη can suggest cultivated responsiveness as well as harmonious agreement. The word is not limited here to hearing performed music. The emphasis is on the learner’s attention following the teacher’s entire intention, not simply hearing the sound of the words.

1134.Στέφανος is a wreath or crown of honor. The answer treats education as the source of the finest distinction, without naming a particular contest or material wreath. Antisthenes is the subject of the anecdote, rather than an author named by a separate source heading. Παιδεία includes the cultivation and formation gained through education.

About This Reading Edition

The complete surviving text of Stobaeus’s second book, through II.46.22, in Ancient Greek and English, with an introduction and 1,541 explanatory notes. All forty-six chapter headings remain, including the notices for chapters whose texts are missing.

Historical Text and Translation

Greek: Curt Wachsmuth, Ioannis Stobaei Anthologii libri duo priores, volumen II (Berlin: Weidmann, 1884), printed p. 1 and pp. 3–264. The supplied edition preserves consequential editorial signs, reconstructed joins, qualified attributions, and missing-text notices. English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes: Diotimos Editions, 2026.

About Diotimos Editions

This historical edition credits Diotimos Editions as its English translator.

Rights

Stobaeus’s ancient Greek work and Wachsmuth’s 1884 edition are in the public domain. The supplied English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes are published with the site owner’s authorization.