Abstract

This paper investigates the relevance of a materialist ontology of Lucretian origin in Machiavelli's conception of animality. It argues that Machiavelli's view of man as another expression of the material world serves as a starting point, where man is an animal urged to overcome his animality through institutions and civic life. Machiavelli's political philosophy can be interpreted as an ontological understanding of society, with a state of war as its foundation. Man is seen as a political animal in the sense of homo homini lupus rather than Aristotle's assumption of a being driven by civic friendship. The inherent conflict in political life arises from the desire of elites to dominate the masses, and only political institutions can bring Seneca's homo sacra res homini to life. For Machiavelli, the sacred is an institutionally guaranteed status resulting from a social and political construction that prevents the powerful from devouring the common people. The paper considers whether this Machiavellian animality gives rise to a new kind of collective phronesis, which seeks to overcome this ‘animality’ as part of a teleology of human materiality.