Ambrose Theodosius Macrobius (Macrobius, Ambrosius Theodosius)

Macrobius, Ambrose Theodosius; Macrobius, Ambrosius Theodosius, IV / V cc. n. e., a Roman writer and philosopher. Was, . likely (as biographical data), . high government official, . associated with a group of Roman aristocracy, officialdom, . which led Simmahov in the Senate, defended the faith in pagan gods, and stood guard over the traditional Greco-Roman culture,
. Aviation devoted M. their stories. - To his son Eustache M. wrote a commentary to sleep Scipio (Commentarii in somnium Scipionis), an extensive commentary on the extract from the book. VI of the state of Cicero. In the commentary, often rather remotely connected with the work of Cicero, M. describes, relying primarily on the comment to Porfiry Timeyu Plato, his Neo-Platonic views on various topics. Comment M. not only told us a large fragment of Cicero's works on the state, but has become an important study of Platonic philosophy, which learned about the Middle Ages thanks to M. Most important product of M. were Saturnalia (conversations during Saturnalia) in 7 books, not all of which remained completely.

Task M. was to convey to his son a large store of information, gleaned from Greek and Roman authors, whose names are often not named, but first and foremost - of Plutarch and Gellius. This information M. take the form of a literary symposium, a picture which is presented in the Symposium, Plato. The most outstanding representatives of the then Roman intellectuals, . among them, he Aurelius Simma, . talking among themselves in the house of Senator Vettius Agora Pretekstata on the eve of and during the first three days of Saturnalia (hence the name of the work), . Traditional Roman holidays, . said in December,
. The two sides discussed, inter alia, the origin and development of the Saturnalia, the Roman calendar, the mythological and the Questions of Religious, tell funny stories. Quoted in the case of Virgil's verse warns that the subject of further considerations chosen learning Virgil.

Thus, in the book. III-VI separate sides, . in accordance with their tastes, . raise various aspects of Virgil, . in excess of illustrating the findings with quotations from ancient writers: they are interested in questions from the field of astrology and philosophy, . knowledge of the sacred law, . art of divination, . rhetorical art, . and Virgil's relationship to the Greek poets, . especially to Homer, . as well as to the Roman predecessors, . interpretation of individual verses and other minor issues,
. All this is interwoven with stories about insignificant subjects. M. not an original researcher, it only collects and combines the thoughts of others. But this way he preserved for us many excerpts from various ancient authors, whose works have been lost, for example, from Ennia. Admiration for Virgil, who had already become a classic of literature, is dominated by the interlocutors of the specific analysis of his poetry. Despite some inaccuracies, the product of M. it is important to document the history of research works of Virgil. Only in later passages, we know the product M. Differences and similarities between Latin and Greek verbs (De differentiis et societatibus Graeci Latinique verbi).