The Aristotelian Corpus

Among translations from Arabic and Greek, those of the texts of Aristotle are especially important, he being one of the most influential figures of philosophic auctoritas in the Middle Ages thanks to the fact that some of his logical works were already known, he so-called Logica vetus. The first works to be translated into Latin were the rest of his works from the Organon. The translations from Greek were completed by James of Venice (the Posterior Analytics; a part of the Elenchi sophistici; the Physics, the De anima; a part of the Metaphysics and the Parva naturalia), by Henricus Aristippus and by a group of anonymous translators from Italy (Prior Analytics; Topics; De generatione et corruptione; Ethica vetus; and almost the entire Metaphysics). Instead, it was Gerard of Cremona who translated from Arabic the Posterior Analytics, the Physics, the De caelo, the De generatione et corruptione, the Meterologica and the most important of the writings attributed to Aristotle which circulated in the Middle Ages, the Liber de causis, a compilation of the Elementatio theologica of Proclus completed in the philosophical circle of al-Kindi. The interest in completing the translation of the Organon was bound to the development of logic in the schools, which in turn aroused new interest in the fields of epistemology and the techniques of argumentation. The books of the Physics were at the center of the debate on the idea of nature, renewing its methods and contents. As a whole the Aristotelian corpus gave impetus to the transformation of philosophy, changing it from a generic notion to a systematic discipline subdivided into three branches, physics, metaphysics, and ethics: this concept of philosophy constituted the basis for teaching in the Faculty of Arts within the new universities. In the second half of the 13th c., the Aristotelian translations underwent a detailed process of revision and in some cases were completely redone by the Dominican friar, William of Moerbeke, a collaborator of Thomas Aquinas. These translations became the standard for reading Aristotle until new translations from the Greek were produced by the humanists. Alongside the authentic Aristotelian texts, several texts of Arabic origin were also attributed to him: the Liber de causis and the Theologia Aristotelis, completed in the circle of al-Kindi; the Secretum secretorum, a treatise in which the Greek philosopher appears as a teacher of Alexander the Great: this text not only constituted an important example of political treatises (specula principis), but also contributed to the diffusion of astrology and alchemy.