Complete Works of Aristotle: Translation and Commentary (Fifth Phase)

Principal Investigator:

António Pedro Mesquita

Funding Institution: FCT
Date: 2016-2019

Description

FCT Project PTDC/MHC-FIL/0787/2014

This project is aimed at promoting translation and subsequent publication of the complete set of the Aristotelian corpus, comprising: the set of works included in the Bekker edition, authentic and pseudepigrapha, plus the Athenian Constitution; the authentic, suspicious and spurious fragmentary texts attributed to Aristotle’s lost works; and the apocryphal works in circulation under Aristotle’s name in later ages, such as The Book of Causes and the Secret of Secrets.

The complete works resulting from this project will constitute the sole edition, at an international level, to contain the referred apocryphal texts.

This edition will be produced in collaboration with the Imprensa Nacional – Casa da Moeda, and consists of 41 volumes, bringing together almost every Portuguese researcher in the areas of Ancient Philosophy, Classical Studies and Arabic and Islamic Studies, affiliated with 12 different Portuguese and foreign universities and in six different research units: a total of 42 collaborators.

The project will also rely on cooperation with foreign experts, partly for the translation of the original texts, but mostly for the scientific revision of the translations, an essential step to guarantee the quality of the produced works.

This project has already published twelve volumes: the General Introduction; Topics (a work distinguished by the Latin Union with its scientific and technical translation award in 2007); On Generation and Corruption; On the Soul; History of Animals I-VI; History of Animals VII-X; Parts of Animals; Economics; Rhetoric; Mechanical [Problems]; Fragments of the Dialogues and Exhortative Works; Aristotle’s Theology.

In addition, the following works are in print: Categories; On Interpretation; Meteorology.

The following works are in reviewing stage: Parva Naturalia; Eudemian Ethics; Fragments of the Treatises, Monographies, Collections and Private Texts.

The following translations, which began during previous stages of this project, will be submitted for publication by 2018: Prior Analytics; Posterior Analytics; Physics; On the Heavens; Motion of Animals; Progression of Animals; Generation of Animals; Nicomachean Ethics; [Physical] Problems.

In consequence of the present application and during the period of the project’s fifth stage, the following works will be prepared for publication: Sophistical Refutations; Metaphyscs I-VI; On Colors; On Things Heard; Physiognomonics; On Plants; On Marvellous Things Heard; On Indivisible Lines; The Situations and Names of Winds; On Melissus, Xenophanes and Gorgias; On Virtues and Vices; Rhetoric to Alexander.

In the terms of the protocol celebrated between the Centre of Philosophy of the University of Lisbon, the Portuguese publishing house Imprensa Nacional – Casa da Moeda, and the Brazilian publishing house Martins Fontes, the translations published in Portugal by the former will be also released in Brazil in an edition prepared by the latter. This has already been in practice since 2011, with the release of four works until now: Economics (2011); Rhetoric (2012); On the Soul (2013); History of Animals (2014).

At the same time, the project’s site (www.obrasdearistoteles.net) offers an interactive Web-based platform where those interested in the translations can find, in Portuguese and English versions, the project’s description, work plan and calendar, along with a list of the names of all the collaborators and participating institutions, a continuously updated database with an essential bibliography of and on Aristotle, as well as the complete text of all published volumes, made available together with the paper version. Understandably, the access to the online version of the works is reserved for researchers, teachers, graduate and postgraduate students, institutional exchanges and analogous situations. Therefore, all who are interested in accessing the works through the website have to fill out the available registration form.

By carrying out this project, the intention is: (1) to considerably widen the knowledge of the Portuguese public regarding essential philosophical texts in the history of philosophy and Western culture; (2) to afford access and promote direct contact of graduate students with the main works of the Aristotelian corpus; (3) to promote advanced studies on Aristotle, the Peripatetic school and the Aristotelian tradition; (4) to stimulate, reinforce and consolidate scientific and scholarly exchange between Portugal and Brazil and, in a general way, with Latin America and the space of influence of the Iberian languages; and (5) to contribute to the internationalization of national scientific research on Ancient philosophy. These objectives have been successively pursued since the beginning of the project’s first stage in 2004.

Research Team

António Pedro Mesquita; António Amaral; António Caeiro; Bernardo Mota; Fernando Puente; José Pedro Serra; Maria do Céu Fialho; Paulo Tadeu Ferreira; Reina Pereira; Ricardo Santos.

Events

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