The Tropes of ἐποχή are arranged in groups of ten, five and two, according to the period of the Sceptical School to which they belong; the first of these groups is historically the most important, or the Ten Tropes of ἐποχή, as these are far more closely connected with the general development of Scepticism, than the later ones. By the name τρόπος or Trope, the Sceptic understood a manner of thought, or form of argument, or standpoint of judgement. It was a term common in Greek philosophy, used in this sense, from the time of Aristotle.[1] The Stoics, however, used the word with a different meaning from that attributed to it by the Sceptics.[2] Stephanus and Fabricius translate it by the Latin word modus[3] and τρόπος also is often used interchangeably with the word λόγος by Sextus, Diogenes Laertius, and others; sometimes also as synonymous with τόπος, [4] and τρόπος is found in the oldest edition of Sextus.[5] Diogenes defines the word as the standpoint, or manner of argument, by which the Sceptics arrived at the condition of doubt, in consequence of the equality of probabilities, and he calls the Tropes, the ten Tropes of doubt.[6] All writers on Pyrrhonism after the time of Aenesidemus give the Tropes the principal place in their treatment of the subject. Sextus occupies two thirds of the first book of the Hypotyposes in stating and discussing them; and about one fourth of his presentation of Scepticism is devoted to the Tropes by Diogenes. In addition to these two authors, Aristocles the Peripatetic refers to them in his attack on Scepticism.[7] Favorinus wrote a book entitled Pyrrhonean Tropes, and Plutarch one called The Ten (τόποι) Topes of Pyrrho.[8] Both of these latter works are lost.
[1] Pappenheim Erlauterung Pyrrh. Grundzugen, p. 35.
[2] Diog I. 76; Adv. Math. VIII. 227.
[3] Fabricius, Cap. XIV. 7.
[4] Hyp. I. 36.
[5] Fabricius on Hyp. I. 36; Cap. XIV. G.
[6] Diog. IX. 11, 79-108.
[7] Aristocles Euseb. praep. ev. X. 14, 18.
[8] Fabricius on Hyp. I. 36.
All authorities unite in attributing to Aenesidemus the work of systematizing and presenting to the world the ten Tropes of ἐποχή. He was the first to conceive the project of opposing an organized philosophical system of Pyrrhonism to the dogmatism of his contemporaries.[1] Moreover, the fact that Diogenes introduces the Tropes into his life of Pyrrho, does not necessarily imply that he considered Pyrrho their author, for Diogenes invariably combines the teachings of the followers of a movement with those of the founders themselves; he gives these Tropes after speaking of Aenesidemus' work entitled Pyrrhonean Hypotyposes, and apparently quotes from this book, in giving at least a part of his presentation of Pyrrhonism, either directly or through, the works of others. Nietzsche proposes a correction of the text of Diogenes IX. 11, 79, which would make him quote the Tropes from a book by Theodosius,[2] author of a commentary on the works of Theodas. No writer of antiquity claims for the Tropes an older source than the books of Aenesidemus, to whom Aristocles also attributes them.[3] They are not mentioned in Diogenes' life of Timon, the immediate disciple of Pyrrho. Cicero has no knowledge of them, and does not refer to them in his discussion of Scepticism.