<i>Curriculum uitarum</i> : Homer and the many lives of Pythagoras and Empedocles

Abstract Pythagoras and Empedocles, the earliest pre-Socratic thinkers associated with the doctrine of metempsychosis, are both said to have accounted for their own previous incarnations. This article focuses on lists of their previous lives, here dubbed curriculum uitarum ( CVV ), and argues that they are revealing not only of the specifics of how metempsychosis is conceptualized by each thinker but also of the way in which they harness poetic authority. The article surveys all the surviving permutations of Pythagoras’ CVV across the tradition and identifies an interplay of different modes of enumeration within them: lists of named human individuals vs lists of life forms. The latter mode is what also defines Empedocles’ much-cited ‘epigram’ (B117 DK) on his past incarnations. Both CVV s are informed by strategic borrowings from Homer: while Empedocles’ list draws on the characterisation of the Iliad ’s Nestor and the Odyssey ’s Proteus, Pythagoras’ CVV is defined by the constant presence of the Trojan warrior Euphorbus. As is argued, this originates in the nexus of philosophical speculation and poetical exegesis which accrued around Euphorbus’ short-lived but memorable appearance in the Iliad . In-depth engagement with Homer and Homeric exegesis is thus shown to generate philosophical innovation and to form a strong link between the Pythagorean and Empedoclean teachings on metempsychosis.