Introduction

The introduction reconsiders the notion of “inauthentic” writings attributed to ancient philosophers, arguing that pseudepigraphy should not be dismissed as deception but understood as a literary interpretation that gives voice to a historical thinker. This perspective is applied to collections of letters ascribed to Greek philosophers of the Archaic, Classical, and early Hellenistic periods – texts often neglected and long deemed spurious since Bentley, yet still valuable and in need of proper editions and translations. Recent studies show that such letters shed light on how ancient philosophers were received and reinterpreted. The volume combines a philological approach (manuscript traditions and transmission) with a philosophical one (the relationship between the letters, their supposed authors, and ancient intellectual history). It examines issues such as the coherence of epistolary corpora, the use of fictional letters within philosophical schools, links with apologetic or propagandistic aims, connections with biography and doxography, and the appropriation and dissemination of philosophical ideas through epistolary fiction. Born from a 2023 workshop of the Pseudopythagorica project in Paris, the book expands the discussion to several lesser-known corpora, excluding the already well-studied Platonic Epistles. The editors aim to stimulate further research on these overlooked materials and their role in the transmission of ancient thought.