Dream of Scipio
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The Dream of Scipio (Latin, Somnium Scipionis) is a dream-vision by the Roman philosopher Cicero in which Scipio Aemilianus Africanus meets his grandfather by adoption, Scipio Africanus Major (236 BC - 184 BC), hero of the Second Punic War against Hannibal's Carthage. The Dream of Scipio forms a digression within Cicero's De republica, (English: On the Republic), his treatise on the laws and polity of the Roman republic.
In the brief but compressed work Scipio travels through the planetary spheres. Digressions upon cosmology, dream-interpretation, prophecy, time-cycles, geography and doctrine upon the nature of the soul are included in it as well as advancing Pythagorean thought and the idea of the Music of the Spheres. Somnium Scipionis was studied by the Roman philosopher Macrobius (395 - 423); his Commentary upon Scipio's Dream was valued throughout the Middle Ages. The Dream of Scipio was known to the early Christian era philosopher Boethius. Chaucer was also acquainted with it.
The sixteen-year old composer Mozart wrote a short opera entitled Il sogno di Scipione (K126) based upon Scipio's inter-planetary journey through the cosmos.
External link
- The Somnium Scipionis (http://www.ipa.net/~magreyn/somnium.htm) (in Latin)