Leontius (philosopher)

Leontius (Greek Leontios ; † before 421 ) was a philosopher and rhetoric teacher in Athens . His daughter Athenaïs (baptized name: Aelia Eudocia ) married the Eastern Roman emperor Theodosius II in 421 .

Little is known about the life of Leontius. He came from Athens and, as the historian Johannes Malalas reports, was rich. In his hometown he worked as a sophist and from 415/416 held a chair for rhetoric, which the historian Olympiodorus of Thebes had allegedly given him against his will.

Leontius professed the pagan religion; he named his daughter Athenaïs, born around 400, after the patron goddess of Athens, Pallas Athene . Only after his death did Athenaïs convert to Christianity, which was a prerequisite for her marriage to the emperor. In addition to Athenaïs and probably benefited by her rise, two sons of Leontius were also of particular influence: Gessius, Praefectus praetorio of Illyricum , and Valerius, consul 432 and Magister officiorum 435.

literature

• Pierre Maraval, Richard Goulet: Léontius . In: Richard Goulet (ed.): Dictionnaire des philosophes antiques. Volume 4, CNRS Éditions, Paris 2005, ISBN 2-271-06386-8 , p. 93
• John Robert Martindale: The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire , Vol. 2, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1980, ISBN 0-521-20159-4 , pp. 668 f.
• Elżbieta Szabat: Leontios. In: Paweł Janiszewski, Krystyna Stebnicka, Elżbieta Szabat: Prosopography of Greek Rhetors and Sophists of the Roman Empire. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2015, ISBN 978-0-19-871340-1 , p. 212 f.
• Jeanne Tsatsos (Ioanna Tsatsou): Empress Athenais-Edocia. A Fifth Century Byzantine Humanist. Holy Cross Orthodox Press, Brookline (Mass.) 1977 (translation from Greek)

Remarks

1. ↑ Olympiodoros, fragment 28; Text and English translation by Roger C. Blockley (Ed.): The fragmentary classicizing historians of the later Roman Empire. Eunapius, Olympiodorus, Priscus and Malchus , Volume 2, Liverpool 1983, pp. 192f.