What is the The AHRC Ancient Letter Collections Project?

Nearly 50 letter collections survive in Greek or Latin from before A.D. 400, including letters by or attributed to some of the most famous figures from classical antiquity, including Cicero, Pliny, Seneca, Plato, Themistocles and Socrates, as well as foundational Christian letters such those in the New Testament and those of Ambrose, Augustine and Basil. The project examines the orders and arrangements of these letter collections as found in the manuscripts of the letters, in order to establish how ancient letter collections were ordered and read. A good number of the surviving collections are available only in standard modern editions which have abandoned the distinctive ordering found in the ancient manuscripts. For example, Cicero’s Letters to Friends show ordering by addressee or theme in the manuscripts; but modern editors have re-ordered these letters to privilege chronology, thus obscuring the format in which the letters were read for first 1,500 years of their history.

Project outputs

The main output will be a monograph (of some 400,000 words, under contract with Oxford University Press) gathering the data on orders and arrangements and other relevant aspects of the collections. This ‘critical review’ will contain a distinct entry for each of the collections, presenting: (i) key information on the senders and addressees of the constituent letters, the dating of the collection, the number and length of the letters, and the main arrangements in the manuscripts; (ii) surveys of the main characteristics of the collection as found in the main arrangements, the publication history of the collection and the other texts with which the collection tends to be transmitted in the manuscripts; (iii) a list of the relevant reference edition and other key items of bibliography.

The Collections in the Project

The Ancient Letter Collections Project was funded by the AHRC between 2016-24.

Grief and loss: Synesius, Letters 10 and 16

Dear Mistress – I send greetings to you and through you to your most blessed companions. Though I’ve long been bringing the charge against you that I’m not considered worthy of a letter, I now know that I’m neglected by you all not because I’ve done something wrong, but because I’m unfortunate in many ways – in all the ways a man can be unfortunate. But if I’d had your letters and learnt how you were getting on (and I’m sure you’re well and enjoying better fortune), I would have suffered only half as much, rejoicing at your good fortune. But as it is this too has added to the troubles which have overtaken me. I have lost my children, my friends, the goodwill of all, but the biggest loss is your divine soul, which I’d hoped I would always have, to be stronger than the spite of fortune and the twists of destiny. (Letter 10)

I dictate this letter bed-ridden, but receive it in good health, mother, sister, teacher, and through all of these my benefactor, and whatever is honourable in word and deed. In my case physical sickness has followed because of spiritual weakness. Gradually the memory of my departed children consumes me. […] I wish I would either stop living or thinking about the tomb of my sons! (Letter 16)

  • Synesius was a Neoplatonist philosopher thrust into the position of bishop (and effectively governor) of Ptolemais in North Africa in the late fourth and early fifth centuries AD.
  • Hypatia was his teacher and mentor. She was herself a Neoplatonist philosopher, mathematician and astronomer, based in Alexandria. She was murdered by a Christian mob in AD 415.

Pliny on the eruption of Vesuvius (6.20.14-17)

‘Let’s turn aside’, I said, ‘while we can see, in case we we’re knocked over in the road by the crowd following behind and get trampled to death in the blackness. We had just sat down when night came, not a moonless or cloudy one, but as when a light is put out in a closed-up space. You could hear the cries of women, the wailing of children, the shouts of men; with their voices, some looked for parents, some for children, some for spouses, and recognised them by their voices. Some lamented their situation, others that of their loved ones. Some from fear of death prayed for death; many raised their hands to the gods, but the majority concluded that nowhere were there any gods and that world’s  final, eternal night had come. 

[…] Gradually it became lighter, but it seemed not daylight, but the sign of approaching fire. But the fire remained at a distance and darkness returned, and ash again, large and heavy. Repeatedly we got up and shook it off, otherwise we would have been covered and even crushed by its weight. I might have boasted that no groan or fearful word escaped me though in such great dangers, except that I was convinced (sad though powerful consolation for death!) that everyone and everything was perishing along with me.

  • Pliny (‘Pliny the Younger’) was a senator and orator under the emperors Domitian and Nerva, and served as governor of Pontus-Bithynia under Trajan.
  • Mt Vesuvius in the bay of Naples erupted in AD 79, destroying the towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum.
  • Pliny’s uncle, the Elder Pliny, was killed attempting to help those caught in the eruption. His death is described in Letter 6.16. 

Cicero's Letters to Friends (Ad Familares)

  • Main correspondent: Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC).
  • 435 letters in total.
  • 356 letters sent by Cicero himself, ten of which are sent jointly with other family members.
  • One letter co-signed by Cicero’s wife (Terentia) and daughter (Tullia): the only letter to feature women as senders in the extant Ciceronian corpus
  • Around 90 individuals receive letters, mostly Cicero’s fellow senators.
  • Only two addressees are women: his wife Terentia receives twenty-four letters (i.e. Book 14), two of them with their daughter Tullia (14.14, 14.18) and five with Tullia and son Marcus (14.1-4, 6).

The Letters of Synesius

  • Synesius of Cyrene (c. A.D. 370–413), Neoplatonist philosopher and pupil of Hypatia of Alexandria.
  • Synesius was made bishop of Ptolemais in Cyrenaica in Libya (despite his considerable reservations) towards the end of his life.
  • 155 letters, all of which are written by Synesius.
  • 39 distinct addressees.
  • Most of the letters are sent to family or friends, including 40 letters to his brother Euoptius.
  • Seven letters are sent to the philosopher Hypatia.

Pliny’s Letters

  • Main correspondent: C. Plinius Caecilius Secundus, i.e. ‘Pliny the Younger’ (c. AD 61-113)
  • Pliny sends 320 letters and the emperor Trajan 51 letters (all in Book 10 of the collection).
  • Over 100 addressees in Books 1 to 9.
  • Just under half are to senators.
  • Just under 140 letters are addressed to an inner circle of 28 correspondents who receive three or more letters each.
  • Seven women – all but one related in some way to Pliny – receive ten letters between them.

Letter Collections included in the project (Greek/Latin)

Orators, statesmen, sophists:

  • Aeschines (G)
  • Cicero Ad Att. (L), Cicero Ad Fam. (L), Cicero Ad Brut. (L), Cicero Ad Q.F. (L)
  • Demosthenes (G)
  • Dio (G)
  • Fronto (L)
  • Isocrates (G)
  • Libanius (G)
  • Pliny (L)
  • Symmachus (L)
  • Themistocles (G)

Poets, dramatists:

  • Ausonius (L)
  • Euripides (G)
  • Horace (L)
  • Ovid Ex Ponto (L)

Christian letters:

  • Ambrose (L)
  • Augustine (L)
  • Basil (G)
  • Cyprian (L)
  • Gregory Naz. (G)
  • Gregory Nyssa (G)
  • Ignatius (G/L)
  • Jerome (L)
  • NT Catholic (G)
  • NT Paul (G)
  • Paulinus (L)
  • Synesius (G)

Fictional letters:

  • Aelian (G)
  • Alciphron (G)
  • Chion (G)
  • Philostratus (G)
  • Ovid Heroides (L)

Philosophers, wise men:

  • Anarchasis (G)
  • Apollonius of Tyana (G)
  • Aristotle (G)
  • Crates (G)
  • Diogenes (G)
  • Heraclitus (G)
  • Hippocrates (G)
  • Plato (G)
  • Pythagoreans (G)
  • Seneca (L)
  • Seneca & Paul (L)
  • Socrates & the Socratics (G)

Kings, Tyrants, Rulers:

  • Brutus (G)
  • Julian (G)
  • Phalaris (G)

Example Modules from the Ancient Letter Collections Project Workshops

  • ‘Epistolary Networks in Antiquity’
  • ‘Rethinking Ancient Slavery through Letters’
  • ‘Female Voices in Ancient Letters’
  • ‘Understanding Grief through Letters’
  • ‘How did Ancient Letters Survive?’
  • ‘What did People Care About in Ancient Greece/Rome?’
  • ‘Reimagining Famous Lives through Letters’
  • ‘Letters of a Roman Emperor’
  • ‘Talking to Kings, Tyrants, Emperors’
  • ‘Letters and the Birth of Christianity’
  • ‘Fabricating Letters in Antiquity’
  • ‘Sex & Relationships in Antiquity through Letters’

Greek and Latin Letters: where to find translations

List of translations here, ideally with links