Nietzsche’s reception in the history of classical philology has been decisively influenced by the young Wilamowitz’s condemnation of The Birth of Tragedy, a condemnation which was auto­ma­tic­ally extended to all his philological writings. But the reproach made to Nietz­sche concerning the betraying of the science is excessive and misleading. This study analyses the concept of classical philology that Nietzsche conceived during the years till the notes for the never published work We philologists. Nietzsche’s criticism toward the way in which that discipline was characterized in the 19th century (the so-called “historical method”, imperturbable analysis of the ancient sources, illusion of reaching objective results) presents a lot of interesting and convincing elements, while the construction of an alternative model of philology turns out to be weak and unrealistic.