Jan A. Aertsen’s scientific contributions

In 1939 Raymond Klibansky published a programmatic essay entitledThe Continuity of the Platonic Tradition during the Middle Ages, in which he presented a new project: the Corpus Platonicum Medii Aevi, meant as a counterpart of the Aristoteles Latinus. The term “continuity” in the title of the essay had a polemical intent: the principal aim of the planned collection of texts was, as it is stated in the Preface, “to reveal a neglected link” in the history of thought. In the study of medieval philosophy there existed a strong tendency to regard this period as an era dominated by Aristotelianism; it was not until the Renaissance that Plato would have been rediscovered. Against this prejudice Klibansky’s essay pointed to the continuity of the Platonic tradition throughout the Middle Ages. Medieval Platonism originated from two sources, a direct tradition, based on translations of Plato’s own works, and an indirect one through the intermediary of authors who transmitted essential doctrines of Platonism in their own accounts. This chapter will be focusing on the Latin Plato – a clear restriction, because, as Klibansky stresses, a full understanding of the role of Platonism in the Middle Ages has to take the Arabic tradition into account.