Philodemus, On Property Management

Voula Tsouna

Feb 2013 · Society of Biblical literature writings from the Greco-Roman world ; Book 33 · Society of Biblical Lit

About this ebook

Philodemus was an important Epicurean philosopher active in southern Italy in the first century B.C.E. His treatise On Property Management, whose surviving part is completely translated here into English for the first time, focuses primarily on the vices or virtues involved in the acquisition and preservation of property and wealth. The extant remains of the work contain the most extensive and thorough treatment of property management found in any Hellenistic author. Philodemus criticizes rival writings by Xenophon and Theophrastus on the subject of oikonomia, or property management, and defends his own Epicurean views on the topic. More systematic and philosophical than rival approaches, the treatise clarifies many moral issues pertaining to the possession and preservation of property and wealth and provides plausible answers to a cluster of moral questions.

Ratings and reviews

i was hoping, not unreasonably, that the author would identify points of contact between this philosopher's work and modern business practices. she did not. the introduction is wretched and superfluous, and the author is hogging up the lens when she is very obviously not a part of what is going on. just another academic middle man who is getting between readers and what they are looking for.

About the author

Voula Tsouna is Professor of Philosophy at University of California, Santa Barbara. She is the author of [Philodemus]: [On Choices and Avoidances] (Bibliopolis Press), The Epistemology of the Cyrenaic School (Cambridge University Press), and The Ethics of Philodemus (Oxford University Press) as well as many articles on Plato and the Hellenistic philosophers.