a native of Tyre, a Greek writer of the age of the Antonines, was rather later, therefore,
than Maximus the Rhetorician, mentioned by Plutarch (Symp. ix. probl. 4),
and rather earlier than the Maximus mentioned by Porphyry (apud Euseb. Evang.
Praep. 10.3) as having been present at the supper given by Longinus at Athens in honour
of Plato. It is disputed whether Maximus of Tyre was one of the tutors of the emperor
Aurelius. The text of the
Chronicon of Eusebius, in which he is mentioned,
being lost, we have to choose between the interpretation of his translator Jerome, according
to whom Maximus is not mentioned as tutor to the emperor, and the reading of Georgius
Syncellus [GEORGIUS, No. 46], who appears to have transcribed
Eusebius, and according to whom Maximos held that office in conjunction with Apollonius of
Chalcedon [APOLLONIUS, No. 11], and Basileides of Scythopolis [BASILEIDES, No. 2]. Even if we accept the reading of Syncellus, as
representing the genuine text of Eusebius, it is not improbable that the statement may have
arisen from the latter confounding Claudius Maximus, the Stoic, with Maximus of Tyre.
Tillemont contends earnestly (Hist. des Empereurs, vol. ii. p. 550, note 11, sur l'Emp. Tite Antonin.) for the identity of the two persons,
following in this the judgment of Jos. Scaliger, Jac. Cappellus, Dan. Heinsius, and Barthius.
According to Suidas (s. v.Μάξιμος Τύριος) Maximus resided at Rome in the time of
the emperor Commodus, and the title of the MS. of the Dissertationes Maximi, in
the King's Library at Paris, used by Heinsius, Μαξίμου Τυρίου
πλατωνικοῦ Ἐπιδημίας τῶν ἐν Ῥώμῃ διαλέξεων τῆς πρώτης ἐπιδημίας λόγοι
μά, Maximi Tyrii Platonici Philosophi Dissertationum Romae, quum
ibi primo versaretur, compositarum, &c., gives reason to believe that he resided
there at least twice. Davis, indeed, disputes this, and conjectures from intimations contained
in the work itself that only a few of the dissertations (five or perhaps seven) were written
at Rome, that others were written in Greece, in which country he thinks Maximus passed a
longer period of his life than at Rome. Certainly, while his works contain abundant allusions
to Grecian history, there is scarcely a single reference to that of Rome. In one passage (Dissert. 8.8), Maximus states that he had seen the sacred rivers Marsyas and
Maeander at Celaenae in Phrygia. He probably also had visited Paphos, in the isle of Cyprus,
Mount Olympus, in Asia Minor, and perhaps Aetna, in Sicily, with which he contrasts Olympus;
and as lie had seen also the quadrangular stone which the Arabs worshipped as an image or
emblem of their deity, it is most likely that he had been in Arabia. (Maxim. Dissert. ibid.) But he does not appear to have resided in these places, but only to
have visited them in the course of his travels, which must have been extensive. The time of
his death is not known.
Works
Διαλέξεις (Dissertationes)
The title of his only extant work is variously given as Διαλέξεις,
Dissertationes, or Λόγοι, Sermones. It consists of forty-one
dissertations on theological, ethical, and other philosophical subjects. Heinsius thinks
that the author arranged them in ten Tetralogia, or sets of four each,
according to the subjects; and in one of his notes he conjecturally gives what he regards as
their correct order. The Dissertatio Ὅτι πρὸς πᾶσαν
ὑπόθεσιν ἁρμόσεται τοῦ Φιλοσόφου λόγος, Omni subjecto
philosophiam convenire, he considers to have been the pröem or introduction to
the whole work.
Other works
The works Περὶ Ὁμήρον κὰ τίς ἡ παῤ αὐτῷ ἀρχαία
φιλοσοφία, De Homero et quae sit apud eum antiqua
Philosophia, and Εἰ καλῶς Σωκράτης οὐκ
ἀπελογήσατο, Rectene Socrates feceril, quod accusatus non
responderit, mentioned by Suidas (l.c.), appear to be two of the
Dissertationes, Nos. 16 and 39, in the editions of Heinsius and first of
Davis, and Nos. 32 and 9 in Davis's second and Reiske's editions.
Some Scholia in Cratylum Platonis, by Maximus of Tyre, were formerly
extant in the Palatine Library.
Editions
The Dissertationes were first printed in the Latin
version of Cosmus Paccius, archbishop of Florence, made from a MS. of the original which
Janus Lascaris had brought from Greece into Italy to Lorenzo de' Medici. This version was
published fol. Rome, 1517, by Petrus Paccius, the translator's brother: again,
fol. Basil. 1519, and in a smaller form at Paris, 1554.
The Greek text was first printed by Hen. Stephanus, 8vo. Paris, 1557,
accompanied, but in a separate volume, by the version of Paccius. The edition of
Heinsius, from a MS. in the King's Library at Paris (with the title quoted above),
with a new Latin version and notes by the editor, was printed 8vo. Leyden, 1607 and again
1614, and without the notes, A. D. 1630. It has been
reprinted once or twice since then. In the first edition the Latin version and the notes
formed separate volumes. Heinsius did not follow either the arrangement of his MS. or his own
suggested arrangement in Tetralogia.The first edition of Davis, fellow of Queen's College, Cambridge, with the version of
Heinsius, whose arrangement he adopted, and short notes, was published, 8vo. Cambridge,
1703; the second and more important edition, in which the text was carefully revised
and a different arrangement of the
Dissertationes was adopted, was published
after the editor's death by Dr. John Ward, the Gresham professor, with valuable notes,
by Jeremiah Markland, 4to. London, 1740. This second edition of Davis was
reprinted with some corrections and additional notes by Jo. Jac. Reiske, 2 vols. 8vo. Lips.
1774-5.
Another possible reference to Maximus
Fed. Morellus conjectured, but on insufficient grounds, that Maximus was the Tyrian sophist
mentioned by Libanius (Orat. xix. pro
Saltatoribits) as having written an Ἐντάφιος
λόγος, Oratio Funebris, for the Trojan Paris.
The merits of Maximus of Tyre have been variously estimated. Reiske, who undertook the
charge of the Leipzig edition, at the request of the bookseller, when worn down by increasing
years and long literary labours, especially in editing Plutarch, speaks of Maximus as a
tedious, affected writer, who degraded the most elevated and important subjects by his
trivial and puerile mode of treating them. But Markland, while admitting and blaming the
haste and inaccuracy of Maximus, praises his acuteness, ability, and learning. He thinks that
Maximus published two editions of his Dissertationes; in the second of which by the version of Paccius, the
Parisian MS. followed by Heinsius, and the Harleian MS., one of those employed by Davis for
his second edition) he corrected the errors in argument of the first edition, but left
uncorrected the numerous errors as to historical facts. (Fabric. Biblioth.
Graec. vol. i. p. 516, vol. iii. p. 77, vol. v. p. 515, &c.; Heinsius, Davis,
Markland, alii, Praefat. Notae &c. ad Opera Maximi Tyrii.)