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Plutarch's Lives

The Text on LacusCurtius

The translation is that of the Loeb Classical Library edition, by Bernadotte Perrin. Dating in its entirety back to before 1923, it is in the public domain. (Details here.)

As usual, I retyped the text rather than scanning it: not only to minimize errors prior to proofing, but as an opportunity for me to become intimately familiar with the work, an exercise which I heartily recommend. (Well-meaning attempts to get me to scan text, if successful, would merely turn me into some kind of machine: gambit declined.)

In the table of contents below, all the Lives are shown on blue backgrounds, indicating that they've been minutely proofread; the header bar at the top of each webpage will remind you with the same color scheme. That said, errors are inevitable: should you spot one, please do report it, of course.

Further details on the technical aspects of the site layout follow the Table of Contents.

Background

For a summary of Plutarch's life and of the manuscripts, editions and translations of the Lives, see the Loeb edition's introductory material, by Bernadotte Perrin.

For another summary of his life, and a brief but careful assessment of him as a philosopher and historian, see the Plutarch section of Livius.Org; and for a good look at Plutarch and why he has long been so widely read, and still deserves to be, see Plutarch & the issue of character by Roger Kimball.

Chapter and Section Numbering, Local Links

Both chapters (represented by large numbers embedded in the text) and sections (small numbers) mark local links, according to a consistent scheme; you can therefore link to any passage directly. In addition, the traditional numbering scheme, the page numbers in the 1624 Paris edition — Stephanus' textus receptus — are indicated in the left margin, and the Loeb edition's page numbers in the right; they too are links. Stephanus' page numbers are also provided in the table below, for look‑up purposes.

Annotation

The Loeb translation includes a few notes; I put them online, and sometimes added further information. In the print edition, some notes are referred to a note to a previous Life; I found it simpler to do the same, although often enough that previous note is not thoroughly satisfactory: still, the diligent reader will probably not begrudge me the shortcut — and the superficial reader will never notice.

Other Texts of the Lives Online

A seeming myriad of other versions of the Parallel Lives are online; since, however, — at least as of writing, May 2007 — every one of them is incomplete, sometimes wretchedly so, I'm not recommending any; you're on your own.

I know of only one original Greek text online, however; with only about half the Lives, it too is incomplete. Where appropriate, I've linked to it in the header.

Images with borders lead to more information. The thicker the border, the more information. (Details here.)
My warm thanks to John McVeagh for sharing in the labor of proofing the Web transcription.
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A page or image on this site is in the public domain only if its URL has a total of one *asterisk. If the URL has two **asterisks, the item is copyright someone else, and used by permission or fair use. If the URL has none the item is © Bill Thayer. See my copyright page for details and contact information.