Symposium (Plato)
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The Symposium is a Socratic dialogue by Plato, dated c. 385 – 370 BC. It depicts a friendly contest of extemporaneous speeches given by a group of notable Athenian men attending a banquet. The men include the philosopher Socrates, the general and statesman Alcibiades, and the comic playwright Aristophanes. The panegyrics are to be given in praise of Eros, the god of love and sex.
The front page of the 1513 editio princeps of the Symposium
A fresco taken from the north wall of the Tomb of the Diver (from Paestum, Italy, c. 475 BC): a symposium scene
A terracotta figurine of Aphrodite Urania, c. 3rd Century BC. Aphrodite Urania symbolized an elevated, more spiritual love, as opposed to the more earthly and lustful Aphrodite Pandemos
Aristophanes, who notoriously parodied Socrates in his comedy The Clouds, gives a possibly satirical speech on Eros at the symposium
Plato
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Plato, born Aristocles, was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the written dialogue and dialectic forms. He raised problems for what became all the major areas of both theoretical philosophy and practical philosophy, and was the founder of the Platonic Academy, a philosophical school in Athens where Plato taught the doctrines that would later become known as Platonism.
Roman copy of a portrait bust c. 370 BC
Plato was one of the devoted young followers of Socrates, whose bust is pictured above.
The mathematical and mystical teachings of the followers of Pythagoras, pictured above, exerted a strong influence on Plato.
Heraclitus (1628) by Hendrick ter Brugghen. Heraclitus saw a world in flux, with everything always in conflict, constantly changing.