Arcesilaus IV of Cyrene or Arcesilaus IV (Greek:ο Αρκεσίλαος, flourished 5th century BC) was the eighth and last Greek Cyrenaean King and last Greek Cyrenaean King to serve as a client king under Persian rule. He was a member of the Battiad dynasty and is of Greek and Libyan origin.

Ancestry[link]

Arcesilaus was the son and only child of the seventh Greek Cyrenaean King Battus IV and his mother is unknown. His maternal grandparents are unknown, however his paternal grandparents were sixth Greek Cyrenaean King Arcesilaus III and his paternal grandmother is an unnamed Libyan woman, who was the daughter of a Libyan called Alazir, who served as the governor of Barca. Herodotus states that Arcesilaus III and Alazir were related to each other.

Racing[link]

When his father died in 465 BC Arcesilaus became the new king. Arcesilaus became a celebrity of his age. He became famous in his era because in 462 BC, Arcesilaus won a chariot race at the Pythian Games at Delphi. Arcesilaus actually breed horses which were the native horses of Libya. The Libyan Horse is one of the few natural breeds of the world, which were descendant from the original wild horses of central Asia. Among the descendants of the original wild horses of central Asia are the Spanish horse and the Arabian horse. The Libyan horses are mentioned by the Greek historians Herodotus and Xenophon in their writings. Various cultures throughout history have breed and used the Libyan horse.

His victory in 462 BC, was celebrated by Greek poet Pindar in the Fourth Ode and Fifth Ode of the Pythian Ode. Pindar advises Arcesilaus in his ode to reconcile with his opponents and stresses the rightfulness of his rule because it has been eight generations of his ancestry rule in Cyrenaica.

Harsh Rule[link]

In his reign, he became more of a tyrant than a king. Arcesilaus actually exiled many Cyrenaean nobles. He supported himself by having a mercenary army. Through his tyranny, Arcesilaus destroyed his dynasty. The Cyrenaeans having enough of the Battiads dynasty, began to rebel.

Overthrow and Death[link]

The citizens rebelled that successfully that Arcesilaus left Cyrene and fled for Euesperides (modern Benghazi) with his son and only child, the last Cyrenaean prince Battus V of Cyrene or Battus V. His wife is unknown. Arcesilaus along with his son were killed by the Cyrenaean citizens in 440 BC. After Battus was killed, the Cyrenaeans cut off his head and threw his head into the sea. It is unknown whether, if Arcesilaus was buried near paternal ancestors. Battus’ beheading was a significant moment for Cyrenaica, as it was the end of The Battiads ruling Cyrenaica. The citizens proclaimed Cyrenaica a democratic republic under Persian rule.

Famous Descendant[link]

The Greek poet and Librarian Callimachus, of the Ptolemaic dynasty, claims his paternal descent from this dynasty.

See also[link]

• List of Kings of Cyrene
• Cyrene
• Cyrenaica

Sources[link]

• Herodotus, The Histories, Book 4
• Burn, A R. The Penguin History Greece, Penguin Books, Clay Ltd, St Ives P/C, England, 1990.
• Pindar's odes to Arcesilaus
• Smith dictionary
• http://www.livius.org/ct-cz/cyrenaica/cyrenaica.html
• http://www.mediterranees.net/dictionnaires/smith/cyrene.html
• http://www.ancientworlds.net/aw/Article/762227

Arcesilaus

Arcesilaus and Carneades
Born	316/5 BC, Pitane, Aeolis
Died	241/0 BC Athens
Era	Ancient philosophy
Region	Western Philosophy
School	Platonism
Main interests	Platonism, Academic skepticism
Notable ideas	Founder of Academic Skepticism
Influenced by Pyrrho, Plato, Theophrastus, Crantor, Polemo, Crates of Athens
Influenced Lacydes, Carneades, Clitomachus, Philo of Larissa

Arcesilaus (Greek: Ἀρκεσίλαος) (316/5-241/0 BC^[1]) was a Greek philosopher and founder of the Second or Middle Academy—the phase of Academic skepticism. Arcesilaus succeeded Crates as the sixth head (scholarch) of the Academy c. 264 BC.^[2] He did not preserve his thoughts in writing, so his opinions can only be gleaned second-hand from what is preserved by later writers. He was the first Academic to adopt a position of philosophical skepticism, that is, he doubted the ability of the senses to discover truth about the world, although he may have continued to believe in the existence of truth itself. This brought in the skeptical phase of the Academy. His chief opponents were the Stoics and their belief that reality could be comprehended with certainty.

Life[link]

Arcesilaus was born in Pitane in Aeolis. His early education was provided by Autolycus the mathematician, with whom he migrated to Sardis. Afterwards, he studied rhetoric in Athens; but adopted philosophy and became a disciple first of Theophrastus and afterwards of Crantor.^[3] He subsequently became intimate with Polemo and Crates, and eventually became head of the school (σχολάρχης).

Diogenes Laërtius says that, like his successor Lacydes, he died of excessive drinking, but the testimony of others (e.g. Cleanthes) and his own precepts discredit the story, and he is known to have been much respected by the Athenians.

Philosophy[link]

Arcesilaus committed nothing to writing, his opinions were imperfectly known to his contemporaries, and can now only be gathered from the confused statements of his opponents. This makes his philosophy difficult to evaluate and partly inconsistent. This led scholars to see his skepticism in several ways. Some see his philosophy as completely negative or destructive of all philosophical views. Others regard him as taking the position that nothing can be known on the basis of his philosophical arguments. Others claimed he held no positive views on any philosophical topic, including the possibility of knowledge.^[4]

On the one hand, he is said to have restored the doctrines of Plato in an incorrupted form; while, on the other hand, according to Cicero,^[5] he summed up his opinions in the formula, "that he knew nothing, not even his own ignorance." There are two ways of reconciling the difficulty: either we may suppose him to have thrown out such aphorisms as an exercise for his pupils, as Sextus Empiricus,^[6] who calls him a Sceptic, would have us believe; or he may have really doubted the esoteric meaning of Plato, and have supposed himself to have been stripping his works of the figments of the Dogmatists, while he was in fact taking from them all certain principles.^[7]

The Stoics were the chief opponents of Arcesilaus; he attacked their doctrine of a convincing conception (katalêptikê phantasia) as understood to be a mean between science and opinion - a mean which he asserted could not exist, and was merely the interpolation of a name.^[8] It involved a contradiction in terms, as the very idea of phantasia implied the possibility of false as well as true conceptions of the same object.

It is a question of some importance as to how the Academic skepticism of the Middle and New Academy was distinguished from that of Pyrrhonism. Admitting the formula of Arcesilaus, "that he knew nothing, not even his own ignorance," to be an exposition of his real sentiments, it was impossible in one sense that skepticism could proceed further: but the Academic skeptics do not seem to have doubted the existence of truth in itself, only our capacities for obtaining it. It differed also from the principles of the pure skeptic in the practical tendency of its doctrines: while the object of the one was the attainment of perfect equanimity, the other seems rather to have retired from the barren field of speculation to practical life, and to have acknowledged some vestiges of a moral law within, at best but a probable guide, the possession of which, however, formed the real distinction between the sage and the fool. Slight as the difference may appear between the speculative statements of the two schools, a comparison of the lives of their founders and their respective successors leads to the conclusion, that a practical moderation was the characteristic of the Academic skeptics.^[9]

Notes[link]

Sources[link]

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 
•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Smith, William, ed. (1867). "^{article name needed}". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. 

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Arcesilaus

• Arcesilaus entry by Charles Brittain in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Arcesilaus entry in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Diogenes Laërtius, Life of Arcesilaus, translated by Robert Drew Hicks (1925).