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Michael J. B. Allen's
Nuptial Arithmetic:
Marsilio Ficino's Commentary on the Fatal Number in Book VIII of Plato's Republic

The latest of Michael Allen's distinguished studies of the leading Renaissance Neoplatonist, Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499), presents for the first time a difficult and fascinating text. Very late in his career Ficino wrote a commentary on the mathematical passage in Book VIII of Plato's Republic that concerns the mysterious geometric or "fatal" number. Since antiquity no one had interpreted this famous enigma; in doing so, Ficino addressed a variety of wide-ranging philosophical, psychological, numerological, astrological, and prophetic themes that are central to our understanding of his thought and of the mentalité of his age.

In the first part of Nuptial Arithmetic, Allen introduces the Florentine's commentary and explores its context, sources, and difficulties, especially its debts to Plato's Timaeus and to Theon of Smyrna. He then analyzes Ficino's Pythagorean approach to figured numbers and their progressions and Ficino's determination of the fatal and the nuptial numbers. Allen next turns to Ficino's arresting speculations on eugenics, man's habitus, man's spirit, and the daemons, and to the roles Ficino assigns to astrology and prophecy, to Jupiter and to Saturn, in the instauration of a golden age. The second part of the book provides a critical edition and translation of the commentary, with accompanying notes. Nuptial Aritbmetic is a welcome presentation of this rich and interesting text by one of the most influential luminaries of the European Renaissance.

"This long, well-written and well-documented study... is a major contribution, not only to the interpretation of Ficino but also to that of Plato, of the Pythagoreans, of Aristotle, and of the Neoplatonists." --Paul Oskar Kristeller, Columbia University

"This work continues to maintain the high standards of scholarship shown in Allen's earlier publications.... One of the main difficulties in reading Ficino is comprehending the enormous range of ancient philosophical and scientific sources which he commanded. A modern interpreter needs almost the same command, and Allen approximates this ideal." --Stephen Gersh, University of Notre Dame

Michael J. B. Allen is Professor of English at the University of California, Los Angeles. Previously, California has published his Icastes: Marsilio Ficino's Interpretation of Plato's Sophist (1989), The Platonism of Marsilio Ficino (1984), Marsilio Ficino and the Phaedran Charioteer (1981), and Marsilio Ficino: The Philebus Commentary (1975), as well as Shakespeare's Plays in Quarto: A Facsimile Edition (co-edited with Kenneth Muir, 1982).

From the reviews of Icastes: Marsilio Ficino's Interpretation of Plato's Sophist

"A worthy addition to the body of work which has made Professor Allen the leading authority on Renaissance Neoplatonism of the post-WWII generation, Icastes is a carefully organized, persuasively argued, and elegant study; ...a rich book. ...Allen's delicate and compelling reading of Ficino's Sophist commentary convinces because it remains true to a complex text and its sources." --Brian Copenhaver, Renaissance Quarterly

"Professor Allen's detailed studies are indispensable. They display an impressive familiarity with the neo-Platonists of antiquity who are not generally sufficiently well known for their influence on Ficino's Platonica to be discerned easily. The claims for the importance of the Sophist in the Renaissance via Ficino are powerful and substantiated.... Much in this book is of general cultural interest . . . [and] there is abundant material on the conception of the sophist in the Renaissance . . . in addition to consideration of Ficino's loftier notion of a sophist-demiurge.... This book does not just make this material more widely available. It also shows forcefully why it should be read." --Andrew Laird, Modern Language Review

"Allen has blazed a new trail into Renaissance Platonism, especially its aesthetics." --Carol Kaske, Sixteenth Century Journal

"This careful, detailed and thorough exposition of important aspects of Ficino's concept and interpretation of Plato's Sophist provides telling insights into the manner in which Plato was understood by the quattrocento hellenists." --Alan E. Samuel, Classical World

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