LOBECK, CHRISTIAN AUGUST. - Classical philologist, b. at Naumburg on June 5, 1781; he taught at the University of Königsberg, where he d. on Aug. 26, 1860.
He occupied himself above all with Greek philology: Paralipomena grammatica graecae (2 vols., Leipzig 1837); Pathologiae sermonis graeci prolegomena (ibid. 1843); Pathologiae graeci sermonis elementa (Königsberg 1846); but his fame is due to the battle that, together with J. H. Voss, he waged against the symbolist interpretation of Greek mythology upheld by F. Creuzer (v.). L.'s work bears as its title the name of the supposed Orphic teacher of Pythagoras, Aglaophamus "the brilliant speaker," mentioned by the Neoplatonist Iamblichus, Vita Pythag., 96: Aglaophamus, sive de theologiae mysticae Graecorum causis (2 vols., Königsberg 1829). The work is divided into three sections dedicated respectively to the Eleusinian, Orphic and Samothracian mysteries; after the critical part L. collects in each section the fragments of the ancient authors relating to each of them. Excellent for its value as negative criticism, the work, given the author's rationalistic tendency, which is that proper to the Enlightenment of the time, is deficient from the positive point of view, in that L. takes no account of the relations that exist between myth and cult, on which the magical-symbolic value of myth and its sacral interpretation are in fact based. L.'s work has the great merit of having opened the way to the positive and historical interpretation of myths, along which K. O. Müller and L. Preller then set out with profit.
Bibliography
Nicola Turchi