From the Early Interpreters of the Categories to Alexander of Aphrodisias

This article provides a critical overview of the reception of Aristotle’s Categories between the 1st century BCE and Alexander of Aphrodisias. It is divided into six sections. In the first section, the temporal boundaries of the overview are discussed and the main overarching features of the reception of the Categories in this period are summarised. Section 2 discusses the role of Andronicus of Rhodes with reference to his work on the corpus and its legacy. Section 3 is devoted to the work of Boethus of Sidon, while section 4 discusses the activity on the Categories by non-Peripatetic philosophers (Stoics and Platonists) with reference to their philosophical agendas. Section 5 turns to the 1st century CE and to the Peripatetic scholars of the 2nd century CE (Adrastus of Aphrodisias, Aspasius, Herminus, Sosigenes), before focusing on Galen’s work on the Categories and, more generally, on the categories; in this context, the section on the categories in Clement of Alexandria’s Stromata VIII is discussed, too. Finally, section 6 introduces Alexander’s lost commentary on the Categories and provides an overview of the sources of evidence, at least in part not yet fully explored, of Alexander’s take on the Categories and the categories.