{
    "schema": "prokopton42-public-work-v1",
    "id": "seneca.de_vita_beata",
    "canonical_url": "https://prokopton42.com/en/works/seneca/de-vita-beata/",
    "language": "en",
    "title": "On the Happy Life",
    "author": "Seneca",
    "date": "c. 58 CE",
    "summary": "Seneca defines happiness as rational agreement with nature and rejects turning it into pursuit of pleasure. The essay also answers critics who oppose his wealth and proximity to power to the austere demands he professes.",
    "learning": "Distinguish pleasure from the highest good, analyze Stoic use of wealth, and assess Seneca’s answer to the charge of inconsistency.",
    "long_summary": "The text first asks which guide to follow because majority opinion often reproduces error. Virtue, inner freedom, and governed use of external advantages are then opposed to a life subject to sensation.\n\nSeneca admits he is not wise and defends the right to indicate a standard not yet fulfilled. The philosopher may possess wealth without being possessed by it. This distinction carries the dialogue’s tension among moral progress, personal justification, and visible consistency.",
    "historical_context": "The corpus manifests do not yet establish the precise place and circumstances of composition. The images below document the author’s world or the text’s transmission. They do not claim to show the exact scene of writing.",
    "material_world_label": "Roman world, 1st century BCE to 3rd century CE",
    "material_world": {
        "technology": "Paved roads, aqueducts, concrete, glassware, mills, and hypocaust heating equip some cities, but energy comes mainly from bodies, animals, water, and wood.",
        "science": "Astronomy, geometry, natural history, and engineering compile Greek, Egyptian, and Roman knowledge. Measurement exists without a modern laboratory.",
        "medicine": "Physicians, midwives, baths, plants, and rudimentary surgery can help; reliable anaesthesia, antisepsis, and antibiotics do not exist.",
        "transport": "On foot, horseback, cart, or ship, road and sea networks connect the Empire. Travel remains slow, costly, and risky.",
        "agriculture": "Grain, vines, olives, pulses, and livestock supply cities and armies; estates, slavery, and tenancy organize part of the labour.",
        "communication": "Imperial couriers, letters on papyrus or tablets, inscriptions, and oral proclamations spread information. Everything is copied by hand.",
        "clothing": "Tunics and cloaks are common to both sexes; the stola, toga, footwear, colours, and jewellery mark citizenship, office, wealth, and origin."
    },
    "material_world_scenes": [
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/09-54-ce/world-01.webp",
            "title": "Technology, science, and care",
            "description": "Paved roads, aqueducts, concrete, glassware, mills, and hypocaust heating equip some cities, but energy comes mainly from bodies, animals, water, and wood. Astronomy, geometry, natural history, and engineering compile Greek, Egyptian, and Roman knowledge. Measurement exists without a modern laboratory. Physicians, midwives, baths, plants, and rudimentary surgery can help; reliable anaesthesia, antisepsis, and antibiotics do not exist."
        },
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/09-54-ce/world-02.webp",
            "title": "Travel and communication",
            "description": "On foot, horseback, cart, or ship, road and sea networks connect the Empire. Travel remains slow, costly, and risky. Imperial couriers, letters on papyrus or tablets, inscriptions, and oral proclamations spread information. Everything is copied by hand."
        },
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/09-54-ce/world-03.webp",
            "title": "Farming and food",
            "description": "Grain, vines, olives, pulses, and livestock supply cities and armies; estates, slavery, and tenancy organize part of the labour."
        },
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/09-54-ce/world-04.webp",
            "title": "Clothing, women and men",
            "description": "Tunics and cloaks are common to both sexes; the stola, toga, footwear, colours, and jewellery mark citizenship, office, wealth, and origin."
        }
    ],
    "intellectual_tradition": {
        "id": "stoicism",
        "label": "Stoicism"
    },
    "period": {
        "id": "ancient",
        "label": "Antiquity"
    },
    "languages": [
        "lat",
        "en",
        "fr"
    ],
    "manifestations": [
        {
            "annotation_file": "data/corpus/normalized/seneca/de-vita-beata/annotations/lat-perseus-editorial-notes.ndjson",
            "annotation_records": 31,
            "file": "data/corpus/normalized/seneca/de-vita-beata/representations/lat-perseus-lat2.ndjson",
            "language": "lat",
            "records": 28,
            "role": "original",
            "source_id": "perseus.seneca.de_vita_beata.perseus_lat2"
        },
        {
            "file": "data/corpus/normalized/seneca/de-vita-beata/representations/en-stewart.ndjson",
            "language": "en",
            "records": 28,
            "source_id": "project-gutenberg.seneca.aubrey-stewart-minor-dialogues-1889",
            "translator": "Aubrey Stewart"
        },
        {
            "file": "data/corpus/normalized/seneca/de-vita-beata/representations/fr-baillard.ndjson",
            "language": "fr",
            "records": 28,
            "source_id": "baillard-1914-wikisource-fr",
            "translator": "Joseph Baillard"
        }
    ],
    "concepts": [
        {
            "id": "family",
            "label": "Family",
            "count": 28
        },
        {
            "id": "virtue",
            "label": "Virtue",
            "count": 28
        },
        {
            "id": "wisdom",
            "label": "Wisdom",
            "count": 28
        },
        {
            "id": "care_of_soul",
            "label": "Care of the soul",
            "count": 27
        },
        {
            "id": "anger",
            "label": "Anger",
            "count": 24
        },
        {
            "id": "sin",
            "label": "Sin",
            "count": 24
        },
        {
            "id": "law",
            "label": "Law",
            "count": 23
        },
        {
            "id": "reason",
            "label": "Reason",
            "count": 20
        },
        {
            "id": "ether_field",
            "label": "Ether and field",
            "count": 19
        },
        {
            "id": "messiah",
            "label": "Messiah",
            "count": 19
        },
        {
            "id": "time",
            "label": "Time",
            "count": 19
        },
        {
            "id": "war_and_peace",
            "label": "War and peace",
            "count": 17
        }
    ],
    "source_work_ids": [
        "seneca.de_vita_beata"
    ],
    "passages": 28,
    "word_count": 12779,
    "word_counts_by_language": {
        "en": 12779,
        "fr": 11147,
        "lat": 7265
    },
    "editorial_status": "gpt_5_6_semantic_draft_v1",
    "structure": {
        "citation_scheme": "seneca_dialogue_chapter_v1",
        "kind": "native",
        "levels": [
            {
                "key": "chapter",
                "label_fr": "Chapitre",
                "label_en": "Chapter"
            }
        ],
        "leaf_fr": "Chapitre",
        "leaf_en": "Chapter"
    },
    "content_checksum": "b98d89dc87642a193322ba229204ca605d5914e2ab785e97eea17fe67bf9be16"
}