Opuscula de rebus mirabilibus et de longaevis

Phlegon of Tralles, a learned freedman of Hadrians, was a prolific writer, but only two of his works have though not entirely survived: Peri thaumasion (On marvellous things) and Peri makrobion (On long-lived persons). The former is probably the main extant paradoxographic collection from classical antiquity, mostly famous for some memorable ghost stories (one of which inspired Goethe); the latter reviews long-lived individuals from both archival and literary sources. Both are extensively interespersed with oracles, Sibylline and others. These works were hitherto available in unsatisfactory editions. Stramaglias new edition relies on a fresh, meticulous collation of the codex unicus (Heidelberg, Palat. Gr. 398); takes complete account of scholarship from the editio princeps (1568) onwards; establishes the text according to a sounder evaluation of Phlegons language and style; and includes not only a detailed apparatus criticus, but also for the first time an apparatus auxiliarius providing loci similes vel paralleli, as well as close bibliographical references and elucidations of obscure or abstruse passages. See more