Hypatia

[GambolingCaribou]

Today a woman came in to speak the the DE english class about womens rights and women suffrage throughout history and one of them women that she mentioned was Hypatia. This is not someone I've ever heard of before and I can't find much on her, but I'm very interested in learning about her. About as much as I can seem to find is that she was from Alexandria and she died after being cut with oysters and then burned. Also it says that she was very interested in maths and sciences.
If anyone knows anything or has any links I would be grateful for the information.
Thanks. :smile:

[_Banbha_]

Link Here (http://www.polyamory.org/~howard/Hypatia/) for a good resource page about Hypatia.

[Philosophia]

Hypatia is somebody I admire greatly. Here are some links:
http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Hypatia.html
http://www.agnesscott.edu/lriddle/women/hypatia.htm
http://www.cosmopolis.com/people/hypatia.html
http://www.cosmopolis.com/alexandria/hypatia-bio-suda.html
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/greece/paganism/hypatia.html
http://www.astr.ua.edu/4000WS/HYPATIA.html
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/science/ockham/or030897.htm
http://www.polyamory.org/~howard/Hypatia/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypatia

[GambolingCaribou]

Thank You Both Soooooo Much :uhhuhuh:
:hugz:
-Caribou-

[Agaliha]

I love Hypatia. She's awesome.

Though her death was horrible. I feel so bad for her.

"On a fatal day, in the holy season of Lent, Hypatia was torn from her chariot, stripped naked, dragged to the church, and inhumanly butchered by the hands of Peter the reader and a troop of savage and merciless fanatics: her flesh was scraped from her bones with sharp oyster-shells, and her quivering limbs were delivered to the flames." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypatia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypatia))

Does anyone know is that really happend for if it was some "myth" that was made up?

I also read that a lot of her work was burned in the Library of Alexandra (jsut thinking about all those scrolls burning depresses me)-- that what remains is what we know from other sources. It's a shame we don't know all of what she discovered and knew :(

[Philosophia]

Hypatia's death is speculated as best. Nobody really knows what happened to her but its well known that she was tortured to death.


Not everyone was so tolerant or had a consummate grasp of metaphysical questions, however. Cryil, who was bishop of Alexandria at the time of Hypatia's death, was proceeded in that position by his kinsman, Theophlius. Emperor Theodosius I issued an edict in June, 391, which prohibited cult practices. Theophilus saw this as an opportunity to further his program of seizing pagan temples and converting them to Christian centers. Riots broke out. In 391 or 392, Theophilus moved against the Serapeum.. Its pagan defenders included Olympius, a Neo-Platonist philosopher; two teachers of Greek language and literature; and one, possibly two, poets, but no Hypatia. An edict from the emperor demanded the pagans leave the temple, proclaimed the Christians killed in the struggle martyrs, and handed the Serapeum over to the church. This is seen as further evidence of Hypatia's distance from the common people.(17)
Citing Socrates Scholasticus, as well as John, Bishop of Nikiu, Dzielska points to Hypatia's friendship with Orestes, augustal prefect in Alexandria from possibly 412-415, the year of Hypatia's death. Orestes was a Christian, but no friend of the then bishop Cyril, whom he saw as trying to seize civic powers for the ecclesiastical.(18) In a particularly nasty incident, a group of monks who were supporters of Cyril, came across Orestes, accusing him of paganism. One monk threw a stone and hit the prefect in the head. In turn, Orestes had him arrested, tortured and executed, something Cyril did not forgive.(19)
Scholasticus mentions that the people blamed Hypatia, the distant aristocrat, for the failure of Orestes and Cyril to reconcile. John of Nikiu goes even further and accuses her of witchcraft: "...and she was devoted at all times to magic, astrolabes and instruments of music, and she beguiled many people through (her) Satanic wiles. And the governor of the city honored her exceedingly; for she had beguiled him through her magic. And he ceased attending church as had been his custom."
This is what Dzeilska sees as the trigger that set the mob upon her, that is, the accusation of witchcraft, and using it to sow discord among Christians. She states that the rumor was started by Cyril as an attempt to undermine the political power of his enemy. People saw her as distant, non-Christian. They may have remembered her father's studies of magic. It clicked.(20)
The ancient accounts differ as the exact circumstances of her murder. John of Nikiu states that the mob, incensed over the news that she had bewitched the prefect Orestes, found her in a "lofty chair" (teaching?) dragged her from it, through the streets to a church called the Caesarion, where she was stripped of her clothing then dragged through the streets to her death. Her body was buried. Scholasticus wrote that she was pulled from her chariot as she was on her way home, brought to the Caesarion, stripped and flayed with ostrakois, "oyster shells," (also used for brick roof tiles) before her corpse was burned.(21)

From http://siduri.tripod.com/Hypatia_of_Alexandria.html

Also read:
http://www.banned-books.com/truth-seeker/1996archive/123_1/41_42hypatia.html
http://www.polyamory.org/~howard/Hypatia/primary-sources.html

Hypatia is a role model to me. She was somebody who I admire deeply.
:hugz: