SOURCE: Swain, Simon. “The Reliability of Philostratus's The Lives of the Sophists.” Classical Antiquity 1, no. 2 (1991): 148-63.

In the following essay, Swain provides a summary of the sources Philostratus used in compiling his Lives of the Sophists, and how he interpreted and presented the information available to him.

For those interested in investigating the Greek society and culture of the first three centuries a.d. Philostratus's record of sophistic activity in the Lives of the Sophists (VS) is unavoidable. There have been a number of important treatments of the Lives, including most recently a useful commentary on those of the sophists who held an official chair of rhetoric at Athens or Rome.¹ The question of the reliability of Philostratus's testimony is still open. In particular, his relationship with his sources, which are so far as we can tell oral, has not been properly explored. In what follows here I...