Abstract

In Late Antiquity Platonism turns towards a spiritualist doctrine, universally labelled ‘Neoplatonism’. The ontology of corporeality (viz. the body as a ‘synolon’ of matter and form), as defined by Aristotle, progressively fades, especially in the Plotinus’ Enneads. Proclus recovers a matter which can be traced back to mathematical principles, with particular interest in the three-dimensionality or stereometry of bodies. The Jewish-Christian tradition can be accused by a Platonist like Celsus, duly contested by Origen, of materialism, while medical science at its highest level, affirms along with Galen the rationality and harmony of the living body.