Studies in Seneca, De Tranquillitate Animi (Roman Empire)

Studies in Seneca, De Tranquillitate Animi is designed to connect several strands from which the treatise is composed and to identify Seneca's contribution to the topic of tranquillitas, which remains to this day ingrained in Western thought both as a term for national security (“to preserve domestic tranquillity”) and for personal peace of mind. The enduring influence the word has enjoyed must mean that it held no little importance in the Latin language as both a philosophical goal and a national identity, as indeed the present study supports. Tranquillitas, for example, became a virtue of the Roman Empire, and the emperor Hadrian (and many after him) minted coins with personified tranquillitas to celebrate the existence of national security. Already by Seneca's time, tranquillitas held an important position in the Roman psyche. Therefore, a treatise on peace of mind, written by an intellectual and a statesman, from both a philosophical and political point of view, deserves close consideration, not only for the history of ideas, but also for our own edification.; The following studies are found within: (1) Tranquillus : Etymology and Meaning Before Seneca; (2) Tranquillitas in Seneca; (3) Composition and Purpose [of De Tranquillitate Animi]; (4) Date of Seneca, De Tranquillitate Animi ; (5) Sources and Predecessors [of De Tranquillitate Animi]. Several appendices focus on other issues related to Seneca's treatise and his vocabulary for “peace of mind.” Seneca shows himself to be a keen and original observer of psychological peace and should not be seen as parroting an unidentifiable source.