This is a most welcome book, the revised version of H.’s doctoral thesis at Cambridge. It focuses on the reception of Plato's Timaeus by Roman writers, such as Cicero, Apuleius, Calcidius and Augustine. The role of Calcidius in particular was pivotal, since the medieval world came to know the Timaeus mostly through his commentary.

The book is divided into five chapters followed by a conclusion, a bibliography and four indexes (of Greek words, of Latin words, of cited passages and of subjects). In the introduction H. outlines the most important research advances made in recent years and summarises the subsequent chapters. The first chapter is a succinct presentation of the Timaeus and its main interpretative challenges. Particularly valuable is the section on the dialogue's methodology (pp. 18–21), which discusses what kind of account the cosmology of the Timaeus is, μῦθος or λόγος, and how we should understand εἰκὼς λόγος and εἰκὼς μῦθος. The presentation at this point may look like a survey, but the reader will soon realise how differently the εἰκὼς λόγος has been understood by the Latin interpreters and the important interpretative implications that it had.

With the second chapter that centres on Cicero we enter the core of the book. Cicero was the first to translate the Timaeus into Latin, yet he translated only part of it, from 27d6 to 47b2. Cicero omitted the dialogue's introductory discussion in which Critias outlines the historical background of Athens' ancestors and the inhabitants of Atlantis, which means that he isolated the cosmological account of the Timaeus from the political account that connects the dialogue with the Republic. Interestingly, Cicero replaced the interlocutors introduced in the first part of the Timaeus with his own Roman interlocutors, Nigidius Figulus, the well-known natural philosopher, and the Peripatetic Cratippus, the teacher of Cicero's son. H. scrutinises Cicero's translation, and this yields some remarkable results. Cicero, for instance, translates πολλὰ περὶ θεῶν καὶ τῆς τοῦ παντὸς γενέσεως (Tim. 29c4–5) as quodcirca si forte de deorum natura ortuque mundi disserentes (Cic. Tim. 3.8.3–4 Ax/Plasberg). The Timaeus, however, is not about the nature of Gods; the phrase deorum natura is Cicero's addition, indicating that in his view the dialogue is also about theology, not only about cosmology. Hence Cicero connects his translation of the Timaeus with the project of the De natura deorum, which was carried out at the same time, July to December 45 bce. Cicero's translation of εἰκὼς λόγος and εἰκὼς μῦθος with similitudo veri or probabile (which is how Cicero translates εἰκὼς and πιθανόν in his rhetorical treatises) suggests that he takes the cosmogonical account as a probable one, that is, as an account that can be found convincing but can also be doubted or criticised. The fact that the Peripatetic Cratippus is an interlocutor corroborates that. Cicero takes the cosmogony of the Timaeus as actual and temporal; he refers to the coming into being of the world as a past event (ortus est, which translates γέγονεν). Yet Cicero assumes a sceptic position about creationism in Acad. 2.119, using criticism that he attributes to Aristotle. This squares with Cicero's overall scepticism, which makes him sensitive to declaring the account as simply certain or true. Cicero understands the Timaeus not as a dogmatic dialogue but as a dialogue supporting his sceptical epistemology.

The next chapter discusses the reception of the Timaeus by Apuleius. After a short outline of second-century ad Platonism and Apuleius' position in it, which shows how central the role of the Timaeus in contemporary Platonism was, H. undertakes a close study of the parts of Apuleius' works in which he presents his interpretation of crucial aspects of the Timaeus, mainly in De Platone et eius dogmate and De deo Socratis. Apuleius clearly sides with the metaphorical interpretation of the Timaeus, favoured in the second century ad, namely the view according to which the world has not been actually created and has no beginning, but rather always existed (semper fuerit). Apuleius emphasises the world's eternity and perseverance (perseverantia) due to the care and benevolence of the demiurge. Like many contemporary Platonists, Apuleius takes this position to fend off the criticism of Aristotle in De caelo against the created character of the world in the Timaeus. What is less usual, however, is that Apuleius seeks to reconcile the Aristotelian position with Plato's cosmology in the Timaeus. Apuleius made an adaptation of the ps.-Aristotelian Peri kosmou, which he considered authentic Aristotelian. In his De mundo Apuleius presents God as the founder of the things (auctor originis), where the Greek text says only that ‘all things are from and by the divine’ (Peri kosmou 391b14–15; De mundo 24.342). Apuleius describes the Platonic demiurge similarly (rerum dominator atque auctor, De deo Socratis 3.124–5; cf. Tim. 28c3–4). Striking in this regard is the application of the Aristotelian analogy of God as an army commander to the Platonic demiurge (De mundo 30.357–8). This is important for the position that Apuleius takes on divine providence: he defends a providential higher God who takes care of the world through the secondary gods and the demons, in a way reminiscent of the providence suggested in the ps.-Aristotelian Peri kosmou ch. 6.

The next chapter focuses on Calcidius, a fourth-century ad author, about whom almost nothing is known. Calcidius composed a partial translation of, and a commentary on, the Timaeus, being especially interested in the world's coming into being (he translated until 53c). Calcidius' translation of εἰκὼς λόγος as mediocris explanatio is striking. H. argues that this rendering reflects Calcidius' concept of physics as subordinate to theology and contrasts it with the inquisitio epoptica that concerns theological matters. This is remarkable, since the εἰκὼς λόγος is also of theological significance, both because it concerns the work of the divine craftsman and because it concerns the nature and contribution of lower gods. Calcidius defends a non-temporal interpretation of the Timaeus cosmogony, which means that he takes ἀρχὴ in a causative sense, yet he justifies its temporal character as pedagogically motivated. Calcidius shows particular interest in the theology of the Timaeus, especially in divine providence. In this part of his commentary Calcidius speaks of three divine hypostaseis in a manner reminiscent of the Neoplatonists. Yet Calcidius also seeks to close the gap between the first and the second god, while he keeps distinct the third hypostasis, the world-soul, since for Calcidius it is the world-soul that executes providence over the world, not the demons, as Plutarch and Apuleius suggested.

The final chapter concerns Augustine, who had access to the Timaeus through Cicero's translation. Augustine takes the Timaeus to be a dogmatic dialogue, and he maintains that Plato's doctrine in it supports Christian creationism – against Plato's Neoplatonic interpreters. To the anti-creationist argument according to which it is impossible for the immutable God to change from non-creating to creating, Augustine replies that this is not the case since God has created the world-soul not temporally but causally, and in this sense it has always existed. Augustine seeks to align the cosmogony of the Timaeus with the biblical one and like other Christians distinguishes stages of creation, such as the creation of the intelligible and the material world (termed conditio and administratio respectively). This brings him to present Christ in Platonic terms, as a mediator between being and becoming, between eternal and temporal (Tim. 31b4). To Augustine, this mediating role of Christ was the only thing that Plato failed to understand, and he criticises Platonists such as Apuleius for ascribing such a role to demons. The book ends with a short conclusion, which points to the connection of all episodes of the Latin reception of the Timaeus and to the variety of interpretations maintained in it.

This is a rich book, meticulously researched. Particularly valuable is the careful philological method used throughout, which shows how the Latin authors worked with the Timaeus and how their interpretations motivated their translations. The book not only fills an important gap in the history of the impact of the Timaeus but also teaches us much about the interpretative options concerning Plato's famous dialogue.