The term ‘Citadelle Intérieure’ — the inner citadel — functions within the depth-psychology corpus primarily as a Stoic architectural metaphor for the inviolable sovereign core of the rational self, the hégemonikon or directing principle, which external forces cannot penetrate without the explicit consent of the will. Pierre Hadot, the dominant voice in the corpus on this term, employs it as a hermeneutic key to Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations and Epictetus’s Discourses alike, situating the citadelle as the boundary that separates what is ‘ours’ — our judgments, assents, and moral choices — from what belongs to fate, body, and the external world. The term crystallizes the Stoic doctrine that representations (phantasiai) arrive involuntarily but that assent (sunkatathesis) remains always within our power. In this reading, the citadelle is not a refuge from the world but the precondition of genuine engagement with it: one must first secure the inner fortress before assuming responsibility for the common good. The concept carries a productive tension: the citadelle defines the self by its limits against external alienation, yet the same rational principle that constitutes it is held to be universal, shared with all humanity, and oriented toward the cosmic whole. The term thus oscillates between radical interiority and cosmopolitan solidarity — a tension that gives it continuing resonance beyond Stoic scholarship proper.
La frontière que ne peuvent franchir les choses, c’est la limite de ce que nous appellerons plus loin la « citadelle intérieure », ce réduit inviolable de liberté.
Hadot introduces ‘la citadelle intérieure’ as his own coinage for the Stoic hégemonikon, the inviolable locus of rational assent that external things cannot cross.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 2002thesis
La frontière que ne peuvent franchir les choses, c’est la limite de ce que nous appellerons plus loin la « citadelle intérieure », ce réduit inviolable de liberté.
The 1995 edition presents the same foundational definition, establishing the citadelle as the structural boundary of Stoic inner freedom against external causation.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 1995thesis
Le moi comme pouvoir de juger et de choisir peut devenir, comme disait Marc Aurèle, « foi, pudeur, vérité, loi, bon daimôn » ou le contraire.
Hadot elaborates the inner citadelle as the seat of moral self-determination, capable of identifying with universal Reason or its opposite — the mystery of freedom within the fortress.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 2002supporting
Le moi comme pouvoir de juger et de choisir peut devenir, comme disait Marc Aurèle, « foi, pudeur, vérité, loi, bon daimôn » ou le contraire.
Parallel to the 2002 text, this passage specifies that the inner citadelle’s sovereignty is also its vulnerability — it can align with or betray universal Reason.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 1995supporting
Marc Aurèle a souvent tendance à confondre jugement et représentation (phantasia), c’est-à-dire à identifier la représentation avec le discours intérieur qui en énonce le contenu et la valeur.
Hadot interrogates Marcus Aurelius’s handling of phantasia and judgment, laying the cognitive groundwork for understanding exactly what the citadelle must guard against.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 2002supporting
Marc Aurèle a souvent tendance à confondre jugement et représentation (phantasia), c’est-à-dire à identifier la représentation avec le discours intérieur qui en énonce le contenu et la valeur.
The 1995 parallel passage traces the Stoic distinction between involuntary impression and voluntary assent — the conceptual dyad that defines the citadelle’s threshold.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 1995supporting
« Purifie tes jugements, pour que rien de ce qui n’est pas “ tien “ ne s’attache à toi, ne te devienne connaturel, en sorte que tu n’en éprouves de la souffrance si on te l’arrache. »
Through Epictetus, Hadot shows how the citadelle is maintained by purifying judgments so that external objects do not colonise and dissolve the inner self through attachment.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 1995supporting
Ce thème de l’aliénation dans les choses auxquelles nous nous attachons est cher à Épictète (IV, 1,112): « Purifie tes jugements, pour que rien de ce qui n’est pas “ tien “ ne s’attache à toi »
Hadot frames alienation as the principal threat to the inner citadelle — attachment to external things erodes the boundary between the self’s own faculty and what belongs to fate.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 2002supporting
Le philosophe est citoyen du monde (1,9,1; II,10,3), mais aussi citoyen de la Cité humaine (II,5,26), petite image de la Cité cosmique.
Hadot situates the inner citadelle within a cosmopolitan ethics: sovereignty over the inner self is the condition for, not a retreat from, active membership in the shared rational city.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 2002aside
Si ma raison est issue de la Raison universelle, il en est de même de celle des autres hommes : tous sont frères en communiant dans la même Raison.
The passage contextualises the inner citadelle’s rational principle as simultaneously personal and universal, complicating any purely individualist reading of Stoic inner sovereignty.
, What Is Ancient Philosophy?, 1995aside