November 2023 MBR The Philosophy Shelf

The Philosophy Shelf

Ancient Women Philosophers
Kathrine R. O'Reilly, editor
Caterina Pello, editor
Cambridge University Press
www.cambridge.org
9781316516188, $110.00, HC, 290pp

https://www.amazon.com/Ancient-Women-Philosophers-Recovered-Perspectives/dp/1316516180

Synopsis: Despite the common misconception that ancient philosophy was the sole domain of male thinkers, sources confirm that ancient women engaged in philosophical activity.

Bringing together a collection of essays on ancient women thinkers, with special focus on their ideas and contributions to the history of philosophy, "Ancient Women Philosophers: Recovered Ideas and New Perspectives " is about the earliest women philosophers, their breakthroughs, and the methods we can use to excavate them.

The essays comprising "Ancient Women Philosophers" survey the methodological strategies we can use to approach the surviving evidence, retrieve the largely unresearched thought and the original ideas of ancient women philosophers, and carve out a space for them in the canon. The broad focus includes women thinkers in ancient Indian, Chinese, and Arabic philosophy as well as in the Greek and Roman philosophical traditions.

"Ancient Women Philosophers" will be valuable for a wide range of researchers, teachers, and students of ancient philosophy.

Critique: Collaboratively compiled and co-edited by the team of Professor Katharine R. O'Reilly and Research Fellow Caterina Pello, "Ancient Women Philosophers: Recovered Ideas and New Perspectives" is a compendium of twelve informative, intrinsical and erudite essays contributed by individual scholars studying women in Greco/Roman antiquity. Along with an informative Introduction (The Value of Women Philosophers for the History of Philosophy), "Ancient Women Philosophers" also includes a listing of the contributors and their credentials, a list of abbreviations, a twenty-two page list of References, and a three page Index. Original, seminal, ground-breaking, unique, "Ancient Women Philosophers" must be considered an critically essential addition to personal, professional, community, college and university library History of Philosophy and Women's History collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists. It should be noted for students, academia, and non-specialist general readers with an interest in the subject that "Ancient Women Philosophers: Recovered Ideas and New Perspectives" is also available in a digital book format (Kindle, $104.50).

Editorial Note #1: Katharine R.O'Reilly (https://katharine-oreilly.com) is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Toronto Metropolitan University. Her research areas include moral psychology in the Ancient Greek and Roman traditions, and ancient women philosophers (particularly in the Hellenistic schools).

Editorial Note #2: Caterina Pello (https://philpeople.org/profiles/caterina-pello-3) is a Research Fellow at the University of Geneva (SNSF Ambizione). She has published Pythagorean Women (Cambridge 2022) in the series Cambridge Elements on Women in the History of Philosophy.

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