Alcibiades MBTI Personality Type
Personality
What personality type is Alcibiades? Alcibiades is an ENTP personality type in MBTI, 3w4 - sx/so - 378 in Enneagram, SLUEI in Big 5, SLE in Socionics.
At first I was quite unsure about his MBTI, but rereading some writings about him, I came to the conclussion that he's a Ne dom. First of all, my source is "Parallel lives" by Plutarch, vol. III ______ Here are some quotes from Plutarch's book: "Even the lisp that he had became his speech, they say, and made his talk persuasive and full of charm" "His character, in later life, displayed many inconsistencies and marked changes, as was natural amid his vast undertakings and varied fortunes" "At school, he usually paid due heed to his teachers, but he refused to play the flute, holding it to be an ignoble and illiberal thing. The use of the plectrum and the lyre, he argued, wrought no havoc with the bearing and appearance which were becoming to a gentleman; but let a man go to blowing a flute, and even his own kinsmen could scarcely recognize his features" "However, it was rather his love of distinction and love of fame to which his corrupters appealed, and thereby plunged him all too soon into ways of presumptuous scheming, persuading him that he had only to enter public life..." "Possessing a dog of wonderful size and beauty, which had cost him seventy minas, he had its tail cut off, and a beautiful tail it was, too. His comrades chid him for this, and declared that everybody was furious about the dog and abusive of its owner. But Alcibiades burst out laughing and said: 'That's just what I want; I want Athens to talk about this, that it may say nothing worse about me.'" "Alcibiades was of all men the most capable of discovering and understanding what was required in a given case. But since he strove to find not only the proper thing to say, but also the proper words and phrases in which to say it; and since in this last regard he was not a man of large resources, he would often stumble in the midst of his speech, come to a stop, and pause a while, a particular phrase eluding him. Then he would resume, and proceed with all the caution in the world". _____ First of all, we don't have to analyze things a lot to see that he was a 3w4; his seek for fame is largely talked about whenever some work mentions his name, as well as his need for recognition and being a "trendsetter" (using a modern word lmao). His wing 4 makes him more different than the enneagram 3 stereotypes, since he focused more on wealth and his personal looks instead of wanting to help or impress absolutely everyone. The biggest example of him being a Ne dom is that last excerpt I quoted; Alcibiades, always rambling on lots of ideas and being an excellent speaker, and his core 3 enneagram helped him to be more charming whenever he had to give a speech. However, he usually had it hard to communicate all of his ideas to the public because he rambled a lot and never settled down to one specific thought, yet he still convinced everyone that he was a great speaker. I'm not gonna roam a lot into this analysis because I don't want this to be a two-part comment, and also because those quotes scream Ne-Ti-Fe-Si as well as 3w4. If you want more evidence regarding his type, I suggest reading not only what Plutarch had to say about him, but also Plato's Symposium (specifically the last part). Finally, we can see that Inf si is really explicit too. Here's a definition on how Ne doms "react" to their inferior function, which really matches Alcibiades' personality: "Ne focuses on intuiting patterns in the external world in order to discover new ideas or possibilities, with an eye towards taking advantage of any good opportunity that presents itself and making continuous progress. When Ne-doms rely too heavily upon Ne, they will identify with Ne’s activities, using their creative openness to construct the foundation of their identity. (...) Si is focused on methodically collecting and sorting personally relevant facts/details in order to feel grounded in one’s own framework of prior knowledge. But Ne tends to misinterpret Si as being boring, overcautious, repetitive, or even stagnant and pointless. Ultimately, Ne forcefully rejects the Si perspective because it fears that getting bogged down in tiny details is wasting precious time that could otherwise be used for pursuing new possibilities or continual progress..." (source: mbti-notes).
Biography
Alcibiades (c. 450–404 BC) from the deme of Scambonidae, was a prominent Athenian statesman, orator, and general. He was the last famous member of his mother's aristocratic family, the Alcmaeonidae, which fell from prominence after the Peloponnesian War. He played a major role in the second half of that conflict as a strategic advisor, military commander, and politician. Alcibiades is also a character in several of Socrates's dialogues.
