FROM THE FIRST TEACHERS OF THE SOPHIST TO THE "SEVEN LIBERAL ARTS": EDUCATION AND THE STATE OF ENLIGHTENMENT IN THE ANCIENT MEDITERRANEAN IN THE 5TH CENTURY BC – 6TH CENTURY AD

The search for the optimal model of school and higher education has recently forced educational managers to always invent something new, but the next innovation does not bring quality knowledge to either pupils or students. In contrast to permanent reforms in the field of education, the authors of this publication propose to turn to ancient experience as a well-forgotten old man. Most of the concepts, terms, definitions that we use today in our private, everyday, professional, and public lives were born in the minds of educated intellectuals of ancient times. The purpose of the publication is an attempt to update the topic of education and the state of enlightenment that took place in ancient times in the Mediterranean, where there were schools, academies, lyceums, libraries, a University (Museion in Alexandria), there was a constant search for an answer to the question of the optimal number and content of educational subjects, which culminated in the minds of intellectuals of the 5th-6th centuries AD on the model of the "seven liberal sciences / arts", which was destined to have a long life. In the article, the authors attempt to trace the millennial evolution of the development of education and the state of enlightenment during the long period of Antiquity, starting from the 5th-4th centuries BC and ending in the 5th-6th centuries AD. The essay describes the pedagogical activities and educational views of sophists, rhetoricians, the work of Plato's Academy, Aristotle's Lyceum, the Museon, and the Ptolemaic Library, presents the opinions of the classics of oratory Cicero and Quintilian, and offers an introduction to Lucian's instructions on how to write history. Special attention in the article is focused on the description of the virtues that a "good man" should have, the characteristics of the number of "liberal sciences", the formation of a new education system based on the "seven liberal arts" thanks to the efforts of Marcus Terentius Varro and the "last Romans" Marcian Capella, Aurelius Augustine, Anicius Boethius and Flavius Cassiodorus.