Alkibiades, Pyrrhos und Alexander: Eine Untersuchung zu Emotionen und Gewalt in den Viten Plutarchs unter Verwendung digitaler Methoden

Abstract

Researchers have largely ignored the importance of emotions in Plutarch's biographies, although emotions have a crucial role in the emergence of violence. By using ERIS, a Hamburg Information System on the Representation of Greek and Roman Violence, the paper explores depictions of violence in the biographies of Alcibiades, Pyrrhos, and Alexander, that are linked to the emotional motive. A visualization of the findings helps to recognize and perceive patterns in the dataset and better understand the relations between the objects and features. The findings show the extent to which digital tools may contribute to finding new relations between victim, perpetrator, weapon, application, and motive in Plutarch's biographies. Moreover, the findings demonstrated how emotional violence and uncontrollability could have been influenced by the increased power and a lack of paideia. This paper aims to show the importance and added value of connecting digital and hermeneutic analysis.