Porphyry, on how embryos are ensouled. A review of: Luc Brisson, Gwena"Elle Aubry, Marie-H'el`ene Congourdeau, Francoise Hudry et al. (ed.) porphyre. Sur la mani`ere don'T l''Embryon recoit l''^ame. Traduction anglaise par Michael chase. Paris: librairie philosophique J. Vrin, 2012. - 384 pp

In this small treatise the Neoplatonic philosopher Porphyry (234-305) addresses the question, problematic to every Platonic philosopher, this of agency of the preexistent human soul. Are the embryos already in possession of the self-moving descended souls and thus already living beings? In order to answer the question Porphyry first tries to show that embryos are not actually animals and thus can more properly be compared with plants. The second set of arguments is aimed to show that they are not animals even potentially. Finally Porphyry argues that, regardless the time of its entry, the self-moving soul comes from out-side, not from the parents. The final chapter of the treatise is unfortunately not preserved, but the answer given by the philosopher is clear: a particular soul enters an appropriate body immediately after its birth and harmonically attuned to it for the rest of the bodily life. The article discusses new excellent commented editions of the treatise by T. Dorandi and his colleagues (Brisson et al. 2012) and by J. Wilberding (2011) and proposes suggestions for their improvement.