Introduction: The Old Academy to Cicero

The first and fourth chapters in this section represent a period before the rise of the Hellenistic philosophies, when Plato’s heritage was still alive and well, and a time when Plato was once again becoming a central figure in philosophic thinking. In between we have essays on the reception of Plato by the Stoics and by the Academic Sceptics, who may still have been preserving glimmers of the school’s Platonic heritage, but whose arguments and influence are intimately bound up with their need to counter their Hellenistic, and principally Stoic, opponents.