Oxford Bibliographies in Classics - Greek and Roman Science-Libre

General Overviews
The study of the history of science is constantly challenged to explain the known evolution of concepts, while
avoiding the twin extremes of relativism and teleological progressivism. Much of the study of early Greek
science has been characterized by teleological progressivism, as already seen in Aristotles approach of
interpreting all the pre-Socratics plus Plato as somehow leading up to his theory. Since more nuanced and
insightful accounts of those early Greek workers are now available, and since early Greek science is
remarkable, this article provides a section devoted to those scholarly efforts, Origins and Early
Development. Correlatively, some accounts of the history of science, ancient or later, too much dismiss or
neglect the results of science and explain all scientific activity as being primarily the seeking of power or as
rhetorical display, an approach pioneered by Nietzsche. Therefore, a section of this article, Surveys, is
devoted to surveys and syntheses of Greek science that give due credit to accomplishments, without falling
into Aristotles error of teleological progressivism. The aims and methods of ancient Greek science represent
an early stage in a long and still ongoing evolution, but they are recognizably consonant with what we would
demarcate as science. Any evolutionary track of sufficient length will display a greater and greater variety of
species occupying a greater and greater number of niches, and so it is with science that we see a greater
and greater range of coverage, of understanding, and of results.
ORIGINS AND EARLY DEVELOPMENT
An unusual confluence of cultural factors promoted the evolution of scientific activity in ancient Greece by
the early 7th century BCE. Already ancient Greeks themselves extensively debated those factors, as seen
in Zhmud 2006. Modern scholars invoke the Presocratic philosophers as influential individuals, either
generally (Furley 1989, Long 1999, and Gregory 2007) or especially Pythagoras (Zhmud 1997). But the
phenomenon is likely largely social, as argued in Lloyd 1979 and Lloyd 1987.Keyser 2013 builds on these
works, arguing that it is reasonable to suppose that science will be more actively pursued in more
prosperous societies since the prerequisite resources for the practice of science will be more available in
such societies. Many Greek cities, and several of the empires that emerged from the wars waged by
Alexander, were very prosperous indeed, and a strong correlation can be shown between prosperity and
scientific achievement in Greek antiquity. The unusual degree of Greek prosperity depended largely on
commercial activities: especially trade within the Greek cultural zone, but also outside it. That observation
points to the second factor, the relative openness of commercial societies to innovation and change.
Science proceeds by proposing new theories, acquiring new data, and making new discoveries, so it is
reasonable to suppose that science will be more actively pursued in societies that are more open to
innovation and, thus indeed, commercial societies. Societies whose economy is primarily extractivei.e.,
producing goods from the land via agriculture, herding, fishing, or miningwill value stability in order to
maintain the productivity of their extractive activities. Ancient Greek commercial societies, whether city-state
or empire, were marked by contentious public debate about many topics, so that one can fairly speak of a
trade in ideas. Those debates were remarkably open, admitting concepts and participants to an unusual
degree. That third factor is relevant because science is more broadly pursued in any society where more of
the members participate in public discourse on a wider range of concepts. A greater diversity of hypotheses
and innovations will emerge from such a discourse, and, moreover, the greater variety of skills and
knowledge deployed by the greater diversity of participants will tend to produce more innovations in science
as in other areas. Lloyd 1996 studies parallels with, and divergences from, early Chinese science.
Furley, David J. 1989. Cosmic problems. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
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Furley reprints sixteen of his essays, adding two new contributions, on everything from infinity to the void
(half concern atomism), especially the dynamics of the centrifocal theory, Anaxagorass system, motion in
the void, the anti-teleological rainfall example in Aristotle, Physics 2.8, and the decisive difference between
atomists and Aristotelians about cosmology. Available online for purchase.
Gregory, Andrew. 2007. Ancient Greek cosmogony. London: Duckworth.

Greek theories of the generation of the cosmos were greatly diverse and opened debates that persisted. In
fourteen chapters, Gregory concisely surveys those theories, as found in myths, early philosophers and
those of the 5th century BCE (e.g., Empedocles, Anaxagoras, the atomists), Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, and
the Christians and Neoplatonists of Late Antiquity.
Keyser, Paul T. 2013. The name and nature of science: Authorship in social and evolutionary
context. In Writing science: Medical and mathematical authorship in ancient Greece. Edited by
Marcus Asper, 1761. Science, Technology, and Medicine in Ancient Cultures 1. Berlin: De Gruyter.
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Keyser argues that prosperity in commercially oriented Greek cities, and their practice of open debate,
promoted the more rapid evolution of science. The Greek cultural space provided an unusually rich
marketplace of ideas and practice, with a continuing flow of new data and ideas, in which science flourished.
Available online for purchase.
Lloyd, G. E. R. 1979. Magic, reason and experience: Studies in the origin and development of Greek
science. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Lloyd studies the relation between traditional and scientific thought in Greek society, starting with the
criticism of magic found in some texts, and how dialectic and politically motivated rhetoric promoted the
development of scientific debate and then of empirical research. He makes heavy use of the Hippocratic
corpus, Plato, and Aristotle.
Lloyd, G. E. R. 1987. The revolutions of wisdom: Studies in the claims and practice of ancient Greek
science. Berkeley: Univ. of California Press.
Lloyds Sather Lectures at Berkeley are here published as six chapters, in which he deepens Lloyd
1979 and studies how the Greek inquiry about nature diverged from, and adhered to, its antecedents. Lloyd
focuses on the aims and ambitions of the ancient investigators, and their deployment or avoidance of
dogmatism, metaphors, measurement, idealization, and simplification. Available online for purchase.
Lloyd, G. E. R. 1996. Adversaries and authorities: Investigations into ancient Greek and Chinese
science. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Lloyd here compares and contrasts the Greek and Chinese developments of science, gathering and
updating published or delivered papers on topics such as causes and correlations, (in)finitude, heavenly
harmonies, the politics of the body, and the title essay on adversaries and authorities. The sciences
addressed are mathematics, astronomy, and medicine. Available online for purchase.
Long, A. A., ed. 1999. Cambridge companion to early Greek philosophy. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
Univ. Press.
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The essays cover the Presocratic philosophers and major topics they raise: Long, warning against
anachronism, opens by exploring the scope of their work, to give an account of the cosmos; other notable
contributions include Algra on the beginnings of cosmology, Huffman on the Pythagoreans, Taylor on the
atomists, and Vegetti on the important role of Herodotos and the Hippocratic corpus.
Zhmud, Leonid J. 1997. Wissenschaft, Philosophie und Religion im frhen Pythagoreismus. Berlin:
Akademie Verlag.
See pp. 129257. Zhmud provides an optimistic yet well-informed reading of the fragmentary sources,
covering in the cited pages mathematics, harmonics, acoustics, astronomy, botany, and medicine. He
credits Pythagoras with about as much as can reasonably be granted; other scholars would be more
skeptical.
Zhmud, Leonid J. 2006. The origin of the history of science in classical antiquity. Berlin: De Gruyter.

In this work centered on Eudemoss fragmentary books on the history of geometry, arithmetic, and
astronomy, Zhmud attempts to reconstruct their origin and contents and to situate the Peripatetic
historiographical project in its context, showing that Eudemos adhered to teleological progressivism. Zhmud
narrows the history of science to investigations that would still pass muster as science. Translated and
updated from the Russian original. Available online for purchase.
SURVEYS
Much of the study of ancient Greek science has centered on one or more of: the works of various early
natural philosophers (the Presocratics), Plato, Aristotle, or especially the four chief schools of Hellenistic
philosophy. These four schools set the terms of the debate, and they dominated the intellectual world,
from c. 300 BCE to c. 200 CE: the Academy (i.e., Platonists), the Peripatos (i.e., Aristotelians), the Stoa
(Stoics, i.e., followers of Zeno of Citium), and the Garden (Epicureans, i.e., followers of Epicurus). For the
early thinkers, such questions as what is everything made of? or what is the large-scale structure of the
cosmos? seemed primary. Later, as consensus evolved toward certain models in each field, the questions
came to focus on issues within, or at the edges of, those consensus models. Only in Late Antiquity did a
single unifying model emerge, which had the effect of reducing the range of questions available for
debate. OMeara 1989 and Sorabji 1990survey the Late Antique period; and the transition to this period can
be seen in the life and work of Galen: see Gill, et al. 2009. For surveys of the earlier periods, i.e., origins to
2nd century CE, seeBowen 1991 and Rihll 1999. A different kind of survey is one that covers one or another
of the four main schools, such as Dillon 2003 on the Academy, Leunissen 2010 on the Peripatos, Hahm
1977on the Stoa, and Asmis 1984 on Epicurus.
Asmis, Elizabeth. 1984. Epicurus scientific method. Cornell Studies in Classical Philology 42. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell Univ. Press.
Asmis argues that Epicurus proposed a coherent scientific method, starting from self-evident perceptible
data and proceeding to observations based directly thereon, which are, in turn, signs of what is unobserved.
Asmis then surveys the Epicurean results obtained by that method: atoms and the void, the boundless
universe, the nature of motion, etc.
Bowen, Alan C., ed. 1991. Science and philosophy in classical Greece. Essays from a conference,
The interaction of science and philosophy in fifth and fourth century Greece, held by the Institute
for Research in Classical Philosophy and Science in 1986. Sources and Studies in the History and
Philosophy of Classical Science 2. New York: Garland.
Bowen edits twelve essays presented at a conference on Plato and Aristotle (Mourelatos, Owens, Turnbull),
mathematics (Fowler, Knorr, Mueller), harmonics (Barker, Bowen), astronomy (Berggren), and medicine
(Lennox, Lloyd). Kahn opened with Some Remarks on the Origins of Greek Science and Philosophy,
defending the old thesis that the Milesian philosophers created it.
Dillon, John M. 2003. The heirs of Plato: A study of the old Academy, 347274 B.C. Oxford: Oxford
Univ. Press.
Primarily on the early scholarchs, i.e., Speusippos (chapter 2: interested in classification, number, and
physical theory), Xenokrates (chapter 3: systematizer of Platonism), and Polemon (chapter 4), as well as
Philippos of Opous (astronomy and mathematics), Hermodoros of Syracuse, Herakleides of Pontus
(astronomy), and Crantor of Soloi (all in chapter 5).
Gill, Christopher, Tim Whitmarsh, and John Wilkins, eds. 2009. Galen and the world of knowledge.
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
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A bakers dozen articles from a conference held at the University of Exeter in 2005 broadly surveying the
intellectual role and world of Galen; includes contributions by Nutton on Galens library, by Manetti on
Galens use of Hippocrates, by Chiaradonna on Galens relation to Middle Platonism, by van der Eijk on
Galens relation to Aristotles school, by Tielemann on Galens relation to the Stoics, etc.
Hahm, David E. 1977. The origins of Stoic cosmology. Columbus: Ohio State Univ. Press.
The cyclic cosmology of Zeno was widely accepted from c. 300 BCE to c. 200 CE, and Hahm attempts to
deduce its parentage; he traces the Stoic conception of nature as craftsman to Aristotles pervasive crafts
analogy, the cyclic return to Pythagoreans, and the role of pneuma to medical theories.
Leunissen, Mariska. 2010. Explanation and teleology in Aristotles science of nature. Cambridge, UK:
Cambridge Univ. Press.
Beginning with Aristotles Physics, Leunissen explores that and five more of his works, On the Soul, Parts of
Animals, On the Heaven, Generation and Corruption, and Meteorologica, investigating how his teleology
informs and produces his accounts of the physical world. Available online for purchase.
OMeara, Dominic J. 1989. Pythagoras revived: Mathematics and philosophy in late antiquity. Oxford:
Clarendon.
OMeara studies how the Pythagorean belief in the mathematical foundation of reality led Iamblichus to
reinterpret Platos works via a version of Pythagoreanism; see especially chapters on Varieties of
Pythagoreanism in the Second and Third Centuries AD and on the results as seen in Mathematics and
Physics in Proclus.
Rihll, Tracey E. 1999. Greek science. Greece & Rome: New Surveys in the Classics 29. Oxford:
Oxford Univ. Press.
This fine brief survey introduces readers to the range of Greek sciences, with chapters on physics (matter
and its transformations), mathematics, astronomy, geography, and biology and medicine. Rihll opens with
an insightful essay on the nature of Greek science, covers her material magisterially, and chooses her
examples eclectically.
Sorabji, Richard, ed. 1990. Aristotle transformed: The ancient commentators and their influence.
London: Duckworth.
Sorabji edits twenty studies (six new, five revised) on the commentators from Alexander of Aphrodisias
(c. 200 CE) through Plotinos (c. 260 CE) and Porphyry (c. 280 CE) to Philoponus (c. 540 CE) and Simplicius
(c. 535 CE). Two studies are by Sorabji; see also Sharples on Alexander, P. Hadot on Porphyry, and I. Hadot
on Simplicius.
Editions of Texts
Making the texts of the works available is the first challenge, and the necessary foundation for any reliable
results, of the study of ancient Greek science. Moreover, to make a given work as widely available as
possible, a good translation, with suitable explanatory commentary, is needed. The process of creating an
edition of an ancient text must take into account a wide variety of accidents, of transmission and
preservation, and of alterations (corruptions) that occur when manuscripts are copied, and it is thus a
complex, difficult, and tedious endeavor. We cannot know what the ancient writers meant until we can read
what they wrotebut it can be very difficult to determine what they wrote if we do not understand what they
meant. For works that came to be regarded as canonical, such as Platos Timaeus or Euclids Elements,
good texts have long been available, but for many works the only edition is very old or not reliable. Likewise,
reliable English translations are available only for a minority of the texts. The works listed here are recent
exemplary efforts toward producing reliable texts, translations, and commentaries. Two series of editions
(with translations) include scientific works, the Loeb from Harvard (as in Johnston and Horsley 2011) and the
Bud from Paris (as in Rashed 2005). The Theophrastus project, ably led by Fortenbaugh, has produced
not only numerous conferences on Peripatetics, but also a magisterial edition of the fragments of
Theophrastus (Fortenbaugh, et al. 19921993). The series Studies in Ancient Medicine, ably edited by
Scarborough, van der Eijk, and Hanson, and recently also by Ziegler, publishes not only monographs and
collections of essays, but also editions (as in Craik 2009). Huffman 2005 has produced a careful edition of a
key but neglected figure, Archytas, to whom Winter 2007 (cited underMechanics Including Pneumatics)
assigns the extant pseudo-Aristotelian Mechanics; Staden 1989 is a magisterial edition of an influential
Hellenistic medical writer. Two collections of texts round out the list: Long and Sedley 19871989 includes
Hellenistic philosophers and Thesleff 1965 gathers neglected Pythagorean texts. Because the corpus of
ancient medicine is so very large, a separate section, Medicine: Editions of Texts, is included.
Craik, Elizabeth M. 2009. The Hippocratic treatise On Glands. Studies in Ancient Medicine 36. Leiden,
The Netherlands: Brill.
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Craik provides a text, facing-page English translation, and commentary on this mostly neglected work
(c. 400380 BCE), arguing that its author also wrote the treatises in Lonie 1981 and Potter 2012(cited
under Medicine: Gynecology). The author locates glands in the kidneys, the tonsils, the armpits, the groin,
and the brain, and knows of the lymphatic system. Available online here and herefor purchase, with a link to
online content for subscribers.
Fortenbaugh, William W., Pamela Huby, Robert W. Sharples, and Dimitri Gutas, eds. 1992
1993. Theophrastus of Eresus: Sources for his life, writings, thought and influence. Leiden, The
Netherlands: Brill.
Fortenbaugh and his team provide a thorough edition with facing-page English translation of the numerous
fragments of Theophrastus on a wide variety of scientific topics; subsequent volumes (appearing 1994
2010) provide ample commentary. Theophrastus wrote more works of science than Aristotle, but most are
lost. See also Coutant 1971 (cited under Alchemy) and Coutant and Eichenlaub 1975 (cited
under Meteorologika). Available online for purchase.
Huffman, Carl A. 2005. Archytas of Tarentum: Pythagorean, philosopher and mathematician king.
In this first book-length study of Archytas, Huffman offers a careful and critical reading of the sources, with
edition, translation, and commentary on the extant fragments, that treat geometry, harmonics, optics, and
medicine. Archytas, c. 380 BCE, influenced Plato and others, but his works did not survive past Late
Antiquity, although Winter 2007 (cited under Mechanics Including Pneumatics) argues that one did.
Johnston, Ian, and G. H. R. Horsley. 2011. Galen: Method of medicine. 3 vols. Loeb Classical Library
516518. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press
The Loeb Library offers pocket-sized editions with facing-page English translation of Greek and Latin texts of
Greek and Roman antiquity; besides Galen, eleven other volumes of Greek science, including Hippocrates
and Theophrastos are available. This work by Galen is an account of his principles of therapy, including
case studies. Available for purchase in the Loeb Classical Libraryonline: Volume 1, Volume 2, and Volume
3.
Long, A. A., and David N. Sedley. 19871989. The Hellenistic philosophers. 2 vols. Cambridge, UK:
The most comprehensive collection in English of these key texts, primarily Epicurean (physics, 415) and
Stoic (physics, 4355), with editions and some explanatory notes; translation and edition are fresh.
Epicureans and Stoics strongly influenced ancient science, but their texts are almost wholly lost, so these
fragments provide key evidence. See Volume 1, Translations of the Principal Sources, with Philosophical
Commentary, available online, and Volume 2, Greek and Latin Texts with Notes and Bibliography,
available online, both for purchase.
Rashed, Marwan. 2005. Aristote: De la gnration et de la corruption. Rev. ed. Collection des
Universits de France: Srie grecque 444. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
This series (often called the Bud) offers editions with facing-page French translation of Greek and Latin
texts of Greek and Roman antiquity; besides works of Aristotle, the series includes some works of
Archimedes, Nicander, and Theophrastos, and of astronomy, geography, optics, alchemy, and medicine.
This work by Aristotle concerns the four elements and their transformations. Available for purchase in the
Belles Lettres series online: online.
Staden, Heinrich von. 1989. Herophilus: The art of medicine in early Alexandria. Cambridge, UK:
Comprehensive collection of the fragments, with translations, arranged by work and topic, and provided with
commentary. Herophilos (c. 270 BCE) was an influential innovative physician in Alexandria who pioneered
dissection, demonstrated the function of the nerves, and advanced pulse theory. Part II (pp. 445578) lists
and discusses the fragments of members of his school. Availableonline for purchase.
Thesleff, Holger. 1965. The Pythagorean texts of the Hellenistic period. Acta Academiae Aboensis,
Series A, Humaniora 30.1. bo, Finland: bo Akademi.
Many texts composed in the Hellenistic era were purported to be by early Pythagoreans (especially Timaios
of Lokri), and they played a role in the development of science. This is the only complete edition of the
surviving texts of that kind. The scientific aspects are primarily mathematical and astronomical.
Scholarly Aids
The few scholarly aids for this field are gathered together here rather than separated by type (textbooks or
anthologies or bibliographies). Classicists or philosophers have produced all of them, although Keyser, e.g.,
also has training in science. Because of that origin, most of them emphasize ancient texts. Moreover,
consensus about results in the field is insufficient for scholars to produce textbooks, and anthologies of
ancient texts directed at students are rare. On the whole, more scholarly aids are greatly needed, especially
items that provide a genuinely synoptic survey, although some topical books were intended as, or have been
used as, textbooks: e.g., Evans 1998(cited under Astronomy), Grmek 1989 (cited under Medicine:
Hippocrates), or Jackson 1988 (cited under Roman Science: Medicine, Imperial). One anthology of ancient
texts directed at students isIrby-Massie and Keyser 2002; another sourcebook is Newmyer 2010 (cited
under Biology (Plants and Animals). Kirk, et al. 1983 (KRS), an anthology that has been several times
updated, is very valuable for the Presocratics, but it offers more philosophy than science. The primary
ongoing bibliography of classics is the Lanne philologique (Association Guillaume Bud and Socit
international de bibliographique classique 1924), which despite its name includes archaeology, history,
philosophy, and even science. The topical essays in the ANRW (Aufstieg und Niedergang der rmischen
Welt) often include extensive bibliography (see Temporini 19871996), as do the entries on philosophers in
the DPA (Dictionnaire des philosophes antiques; see Goulet 1989). TheANRW was intended to provide a
comprehensive and even encyclopedic survey of the Roman world, and most of its essays provide a
valuable snapshot of their topic, but the selection of topics, at least for science, is somewhat ad hoc. Like
KRS and the DPA, the focus of the Routledge History of Philosophy (see Taylor 1997 and Furley 1999) and
of the ongoing online Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is philosophy; butalso like KRS and the DPA
they both include significant ancient science. The sole encyclopedia wholly devoted to ancient science
is Keyser and Irby-Massie 2008.
Association Guillaume Bud and Socit international de bibliographie classique. 1924.Lanne

philologique: Bibliographie critique et analytique de lantiquit grco-latine. Paris: Socit ddition
Les Belles Lettres.

The latest volume is 82 (2011); available to subscribers online. Indexes books and articles by ancient author
and by topic, with sections on ancient scientific writers and on some of the topics of ancient science.
Includes brief abstracts (in French, English, German, etc.) of indexed items and partial lists of reviews of
books. This is still more comprehensive than google-scholar, the Science Citation Index (SCI), or the Arts &
Humanities Citation Index (A&HCI).
Furley, David J., ed. 1999. Routledge history of philosophy. Vol. 2, From Aristotle to Augustine.
London: Routledge.
Covers Aristotles science (by Furley), his students (by Sharples), Epicurus (by Everson), Zeno the Stoic (by
Inwood), mathematics and astronomy (by Bowen), and biology (by Hankinson). Availableonline for
purchase.
Goulet, Richard, ed. 1989. Dictionnaire des philosophes antiques. Vol. 1. Paris: ditions du Centre
National de la Recherche Scientifique.
The latest volume is 5b (2012); there are also three supplement volumes. Includes articles on all known
ancient philosophers, thus many ancient scientists, with copious bibliography and ample discussion but
often neglecting scientific aspects of their work; the bibliography cited is mainly French. Available online for
purchase.
Irby-Massie, Georgia L., and Paul T. Keyser. 2002. Greek science of the Hellenistic era. London and
New York: Routledge.
The editors provide translations (a third of them being entirely new) of more than one hundred scientific
authors active from 320 BCE to 230 CE, in eleven topical chapters (mathematics, astronomy, astrology,
geography, mechanics, optics, pneumatics, alchemy, biology, medicine, and psychology) with
contextualizing introductions. This volume in large measure replaces Morris R. Cohen and I. E. Drabkin, A
Sourcebook in Greek Science (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1948), outdated and marred by
teleological progressivism. The introduction by Keyser offers an early version of Keyser 2013 (see General
Overviews: Origins and Early Development). Availableonline for purchase.
Keyser, Paul T., and Georgia L. Irby-Massie. 2008. Encyclopedia of ancient natural scientists.
London: Routledge.
Approximately 120 contributors have created a comprehensive encyclopedia of all known (more than 2,000)
ancient scientists up to 650 CE. Long entries on Aristotle and Galen adjoin brief notes on obscure figures
cited once (all scientists cited in this article appear here), each with a brief orienting bibliography. There are
extensive appendixes (gazetteer, glossary, timeline), plus indexes, enabling study. Available online for
purchase.
Kirk, Geoffrey S., John E. Raven, and Malcolm Schofield. 1983. The Presocratic philosophers: A
critical history with a selection of texts. 2d ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Philosophically oriented but with good material on ancient science, this work covers the precursors of
philosophy and science, the early thinkers such as Anaximenes, the early Greek-Italian thinkers such as
Empedocles and Philolaus, as well as Anaxagoras and the atomists. Greek texts are provided with English
translations and extensive discussions. Available online for purchase.
Taylor, Christopher C. W., ed. 1997. Routledge history of philosophy. Vol. 1, From the beginning to
Plato. London: Routledge.
Volume one covers the earliest Greek thinkers of whom we know, Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes
(the Milesians), by Schofield, then Anaxagoras (by Taylor), Empedocles (by Wright), Plato (by several
authors), and the Pythagoreans (by Hussey); there is also an essay on mathematics by Mueller,
see Mathematics. Available online: From the Beginning to Plato.
Temporini, Hildegard, ed. 19871996. Aufstieg und Niedergang der rmischen Welt: Geschichte und
Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung II: Principat. Vols. 3637. Berlin: De Gruyter.
The seven parts of volume 36, and the three parts of volume 37, of this massive work (abandoned after
1998) contain numerous lengthy articles (German, French, English, and Italian) on selected aspects of
ancient science. These volumes are available online for purchase. The table of contents is
available online and the searchable index is also available online.
Zalta, Edward N., ed. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

Offers lengthy articles on major figures of ancient philosophy, including scientific aspects, e.g.,Alcmaeon,
plus topical entries, e.g., Ancient Atomism; its coverage extends to Late Antiquity, e.g.,Olympiodorus.
Journals
Although no journal appears to be devoted solely to ancient science, articles occasionally appear in many
journals of Greek and Roman studies; moreover, journals of the history of mathematics, journals of the
history of medicine, and journals of ancient philosophy likewise sometimes treat ancient science. Better
coverage is given by the following journals, most of which have a specific topical focus. Ambix focuses on
alchemy (and chemistry), a topic appearing rarely in other journals. The focus of Apeiron has depended
upon its editorship, now at the Humboldt, but consistently treats ancient philosophy and often science,
especially if there is some relation to philosophy. The Archive for History of Exact Sciences concentrates on
hard sciences; similar but even more focused is theJournal for the History of Astronomy. Two of the
journals focus on medical topics, the Bulletin of the History of Medicine and the Journal of the History of
Medicine and Allied Sciences. Probably the most influential English-language journal of the history of
science is Isis, which occasionally includes ancient science. The new journal SCIAMVS: Sources and
Commentaries in Exact Sciences is published in Japan. It is held in few libraries but covers ancient science
broadly. The absence of a journal focused on ancient science, and the scattered and partial representation
of ancient science in journals of classics and of the history of science, derives from the marginal position of
ancient science in the academy, as noted in the Introduction.
Ambix. 1937.
Covers all areas relevant to the history of alchemy, including ancient (but most articles concern medieval,
Arabic, or Renaissance alchemy). The sole scholarly journal focused on the history of alchemy. Content
available online.
Apeiron. 1966.
Covers ancient philosophy, ancient science, and especially problems that concern both fields; the focus has
varied over the years with changes in the editorship.
Archive for History of Exact Sciences. 1960.

Explores and analyzes the history of mathematical and quantitative thought and precise theories of nature,
plus anything that can be treated as experimental science. Editorial standards are very high, and articles are
typically lengthy. Most articles concern modern sciences, and whether ancient or modern, the topics are
mathematics, mechanics, astronomy, and optics.
Bulletin of the History of Medicine. 1933.

Covers social, cultural, and scientific aspects of the history of medicine for all periods and areas; thus,
articles on ancient medicine are sparse but, when present, of high quality. Content to issue 74 (2000) is
available for purchase online; and from issue 70 (1996) online.
Isis. 1912.
Founded by George Sarton (b. 1884d. 1956) and dedicated to the history of science and its cultural
influences; probably the premier history of science journal, at least in the Anglophone world. Despite
Sartons own comprehensive view of science, articles on ancient science are rare.
Journal for the History of Astronomy. 1970.

Covers the history of astronomy from the earliest times (indeed articles on Paleolithic astronomy have
appeared) up to the present (the focus of most of the articles). Although rare, articles on ancient astronomy
here are of high quality. Complete content, but with poor user-interface, is available online; and content up to
issue 31 (2000) also available online.
Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences. 1946.

Covers all aspects of the history of medicine, based on texts (i.e., not on archaeology or palaeopathology),
both what was done (medical practice) as well as how it was received (by patients and peers). Medical
professionals are perhaps more interested in the history of their science than most other modern scientists,
yet here too articles on medicine before William Harvey (b. 1578d. 1657) are rare.
SCIAMVS: Sources and Commentaries in Exact Sciences. 2000.

Covers the history of the exact sciences before 1600 CE, including primarily mathematics and astronomy.
Many of the articles are quite lengthy and important, but the journal, published in Japan, is hard to obtain
elsewhere.
Mathematics
Greek mathematics is often declared the primary or even sole success story of ancient Greek science.
Moreover, mathematics is presented as having been universally honored (if not universally practiced) in
Greek society, as a perpetual touchstone of the highest achievement of the human mind. It must, however,
be kept in mind that Greek geometry arbitrarily restricted its methods (the straight-edge and compass rule),
rarely engaged with motion or change, and islike all ancient fields of studyknown to us through an
unfortunately small proportion of its works. Furthermore, several important schools of thought either rejected
geometry (the Epicureans) or else seem to have neglected it (the Peripatetics), and what the Platonists and
Pythagoreans made of it seems to most modern mathematicians to have been largely numerology.
Nevertheless, much of the geometry was at an impressively advanced level, and the chief surviving works
Euclid, Archimedes, and Apolloniosinspired mathematicians of the Renaissance and were used as
textbooks through the 19th century, in Europe and the Americas at least. The damaged and partial state of
our knowledge of Greek mathematics may be seen in these three observations. The Method of Archimedes,
recently more completely recovered in Netz, et al. 2011, accomplishes most of the basic practical results of
the integral calculus (allowing computation of the areas and volumes of figures defined by complex curves
through the summation of infinite series). Likewise, Archimedes and Hipparchus, as well as others, studied
combinatorics of the sort later developed by Blaise Pascal (b. 1623d. 1662) and others, i.e., computations
of the number of ways of arranging a specified set of objects under some constraints. Finally, our earliest
extant evidence of Greek algebra, the manipulation of linear and nonlinear arithmetical equations with one
or more unknowns, derives from Diophantos, of the mid-3rd century CEbut undoubtedly earlier works, now
lost, did exist. Berggren 1984 surveys the state of research in the field, and Cuomo 2001 surveys what is
currently known about the results of ancient mathematics. Mueller 1997 offers an account of the
development of Greek mathematics up to Euclid, although one must take note of the challenging alternative
reconstruction in Fowler 1999.Knorr 1989 on Euclid, Netz 2009 on Archimedes (and others), DecorpsFoulquier 2000 on Apollonios, and Jones 1986 on Pappus each carefully studies one key collection of
mathematical texts.
Berggren, J. L. 1984. History of Greek mathematics: A survey of recent research. Historia

Mathematica 11.4: 394410.
DOI: 10.1016/0315-0860(84)90024-7Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Berggren emphasizes that despite many publications, important issues in Greek mathematics are still
disputed; he surveys work done on methods, on irrationals, and on Archimedes, identifying the basic papers
and issues in eachthe works of Fowler, Knorr, and Mueller play key roles.
Cuomo, Serafina. 2001. Ancient mathematics. New York: Routledge.

Cuomo treats four eras of ancient Greek mathematics, early (up to c. 330 BCE), Hellenistic (especially
Euclid, Archimedes, and Apollonios), Greco-Roman (especially Vitruvius, Heron, Nicomachos, and
Ptolemy), and Late Antiquity (3rd to 6th centuries). For each, Cuomo first presents a selection of the
evidence, then a chapter of open-ended questions. Available online for purchase.
Decorps-Foulquier, Micheline. 2000. Recherches sur les Coniques dApollonios de Perg et leurs
commentateurs grecs: Histoire de la transmission des livres IIV. Paris: Klincksieck.
Decorps-Foulquier exploits Eutociuss commentary (c. 520 CE) on Apollonioss Conics (c. 200 BCE), plus the
evidence of Serenus of Antinoeia (c. 215 CE) and Pappus of Alexandria (c. 305 CE), to elucidate how the
work was used and altered in the seven centuries after Apollonios. Decorps-Foulquier also discusses the
reception of Eutociuss edition.
Fowler, David H. 1999. The mathematics of Platos Academy: A new reconstruction. 2d ed. Oxford
and New York: Clarendon.
First published in 1987. Fowler infers a central place for ratio theory in Platos Academy, and he argues that
early Greek mathematics used lengths not numbers, often via the Euclidean algorithm (for least common
denominators); the computation of continued fractions plays a key role. The second edition revises chapter 5
and adds chapters 1011. Available online for purchase.
Jones, Alexander. 1986. Pappus of Alexandria, book 7 of the collection. 2 vols. Sources in the
history of mathematics and physical sciences 8. New York: Springer.
DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4612-4908-5Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Pappos (c. 310 CE) wrote various mathematical (and astronomical and geographical) works, among
which Collection 7 concerns analysis of geometrical problems, from Euclid (Data and Porisms) and
Apollonios (the Conics and six lost works). Jones provides an edition with facing-page English translation
(Vol. 1), and careful mathematical commentary (Vol. 2). Available online for purchase.
Knorr, Wilbur R. 1989. Textual studies in ancient and medieval geometry. Boston: Birkhuser.
Knorr studies the redaction history of three groups of mathematical texts, both to recover what was actually
written and to understand textual distortions in ancient and medieval study of Greek mathematics. The
groups are: (1) duplications of the cube, (2) Arabic texts on angle trisection and cube duplication, (3)
Archimedes Dimension of the Circle.
Mueller, Ian. 1997. Greek arithmetic, geometry, and harmonics: Thales to Plato. In The Routledge
history of philosophy. Vol. 1, From the beginning to Plato. Edited by Christopher C. W. Taylor, 271
322. London: Routledge.
Surveys the accomplishments of Greek mathematics, organized around its earliest extant work,
Euclids Elements: Eudoxos is discussed under Books 5 and 12, Theaitetos under Books 10 and 13. Mueller
then covers harmonics, arithmetic, and geometry before Euclid, focusing on Pythagoras, Hippasos of
Metapontion, and Hippocrates and Oinopides of Chios.
Netz, Reviel. 2009. Ludic proof: Greek mathematics and the Alexandrian aesthetic. Cambridge, UK:
Netz supplements his The Shaping of Deduction in Greek Mathematics (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press, 1999), which explored the lettered-diagram-and-formulaic-language style of Greek proofs
(especially in Euclid, Archimedes, and Apollonios), with a study of the aesthetic nature of such mathematics.
He argues that Hellenistic mathematics was ludic, like contemporary poetry, in playing with mathematical
concepts and in enjoying surprise. Available online for purchase.
Netz, Reviel, William Noel, Natalie Tchernetska, and Nigel Wilson, eds. 2011. The Archimedes
palimpsest. 2 vols. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Volume 1 of this magnificent book offers a detailed codicological description; a three-part reconstruction of
the tangled history of the book from 1229; explanations of the imaging techniques exploited; and how this
palimpsest fits into Archimedes scholarship (by Netz). Volume 2 offers facing-page high-quality images and
diplomatic transcriptions of the texts: Archimedes, Hyperides, and the Aristotle commentary. Images
available online for purchase.
Harmonics
The Greek science of harmonics explored the principles governing the arrangement of pitches, in
instruments and songs, i.e., concords, harmonies, tunings, etc. The goals of this science were to identify and
explain the tonal structure of music, whereas other studies covered rhythmic and metrical aspects of music.
Modern classical music, i.e., the European post-Renaissance tradition, relies on two scales, namely
major and minor, whereas Greek music deployed seven or more modes, such as the Dorian, the
Lydian, and the Phrygian. Greek musical writers assumed that harmonics could be mathematized, but
they disputed how to do sosome depended upon the human ear to perceive concords, whereas others
measured lengths of strings or dimensions of other resounding objects as a proxy for the speed of the
sounds (higher pitches being faster). Greek music held that only the octave, the fifth, and the fourth were
concords, and most writers on music alleged ethical aspects to different modes, so much so that
Aristophanes jokes about it in theClouds. An early and highly influential theorist was Aristoxenos of Taras
(c. 330 BCE); Ptolemy the astronomer also wrote on harmonics; and a Late Antique writer, Aristides
Quintilianus (c. 300 CE), was widely read in the Byzantine period. The work of Barker has been instrumental
in making Greek music more widely understood and studied: Barker 2004 gathers all the extant texts; Barker
1996provides a valuable prcis; and Barker 2007 presents a magisterial synthesis. Mathiesen 1999 also
offers a synthesis, oriented more to the later writers and showing how Greek music influenced medieval
music. The essays in Huffman 2012, an edited volume, study the whole work of Aristoxenos, who was not
solely a harmonic theorist. Creese 2010 studies the primary instrument exploited by ancient theorists for
their musical experiments; Phlmann and West 2001 gathers all extant scores of Greek music, most of them
fragmentary, as data for an analysis of actual music.
Barker, Andrew D. 1996. Music. In The Oxford classical dictionary. 3d ed. Edited by Simon
Hornblower and Antony Spawforth, 10031012. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
In this unusually long and thorough article on ancient science in a reference work of classics, Barker surveys
all aspects of ancient Greek music, instruments, history, theory, harmonics, rhythmics, notation, and the
nature of the surviving evidence for music generally and scores in particular. Available online for purchase.
Barker, Andrew D. 2004. Greek musical writings. 2 vols. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Volume 2 of this sourcebook of texts in translation (Harmonic and Acoustic Theory) is more relevant to
ancient science, covering harmonics from Pythagoras and Archytas to Late Antiquity, with copious notes
and introductory essays on each text. The longest texts are complete: Aristoxenos, the Sectio Canonis,
Nicomachus, Ptolemy, and Aristides Quintilianus. Available online: Volume 1, The Musician and His Art, is
available online, and Volume 2 is available online, both for purchase.
Barker, Andrew D. 2007. The science of harmonics in classical Greece. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
Univ. Press.
Barker thoroughly covers Aristoxenos of Taras, the primary extant Greek musical theorist, plus also
Pythagorean harmonics (i.e., Philolaus and Archytas), Plato, and Aristotle. Barker explains how Aristoxenos
set his field on a new more empirical and scientific foundation, whereas Pythagoreans had linked music to
numbers and the cosmos. Available online for purchase.
Creese, David. 2010. The monochord in ancient Greek harmonic science. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
Univ. Press.
The monochord was a stringed instrument with adjustable bridge(s); it was used as a scientific instrument to
demonstrate the geometry of concords. Creese studies how writers on Greek harmonics from Pythagoras to
Ptolemy used the device to argue about claims, and how they dealt with the necessary inexactitude of a
physical instrument. Available online for purchase.
Huffman, Carl A., ed. 2012. Aristoxenus of Tarentum. Rutgers University Studies in Classical
Humanities 17. Piscataway, NJ: Transaction Publishers.
Eleven papers from the Project Theophrastus colloquium (2007), three of which concern harmonics:
Barker (musical history), Creese (musical ethos), and Rocconi (music therapy); the others concern
Aristoxenos as Peripatetic, especially as biographer of philosophers. The series is available online, and the
volume is available online, both for purchase.
Mathiesen, Thomas J. 1999. Apollos lyre: Greek music and music theory in antiquity and the Middle
Ages. Lincoln: Univ. of Nebraska Press.
Covers types of music (hymns, paeans, dithyrambs, etc.: pp. 29157), types of instruments (strings, winds,
and percussion: pp. 159286), and harmonic theory (pp. 287607), from Aristoxenos through 2ndcentury CE writers and into Late Antiquity, especially Aristides Quintilianus (pp. 521582), fundamental for
medieval music. Available online.
Phlmann, Egert, and Martin L. West. 2001. Documents of ancient Greek music: The extant melodies
and fragments edited and transcribed with commentary. Oxford: Clarendon.
This is an edition, translation, and commentary of all known fragments of Greek musical scores. The earliest
are for Euripides, but may be 3rd-century BCE scores, and two-thirds are from the Roman period (up to the
4th century CE). The most extensive are the eight scores of Mesomedes, 2nd century CE.
Optics
Greek optics was primarily geometrical, although various thinkers propounded theories of color and light. For
Greeks, seeing was always closely allied to believing, as they explicitly stated and as is apparent from many
metaphors in Greek. There were three chief theories of vision. Democritus and other atomists, including
Epicurus, claimed that images (eidola) streamed forth from objects, an atomically thin layer peeling off
again and again, and were intercepted by our eyes, thus explaining how we formed images (and making
light merely a special kind of image, eidolon). Aristotle argued that light was the actualization of the
potential state of being that was called transparency, and thus he had trouble explaining many aspects of
optics. Plato and others proposed that rays emanated from our eyes, which then mingled with external fire
and light to produce sight, thus making vision a sense that, like taste and touch, involved contact. All three
theories had as their result that vision was, on the whole, a reliable source of data about the world. Thus, the
mathematically confirmed results of geometrical optics provided a welcome support for claims that sight (and
implicitly other senses) are reliable; as Smith 1982 shows, that assumption blinded Ptolemy to the
consequences of his results in investigating refraction. His work has been very insightful in explaining
ancient optics, and Smith 1996 provides a thorough investigation of a key but difficult text, whereas Smith
1999 is a useful survey of the whole field. Burton 1945 and Toomer 1976 make key early texts available in
English. Brownson 1981, Knorr 1991, and Berryman 1998 explore the consequences and significance of
optical theories.
Berryman, Sylvia. 1998. Euclid and the sceptic: A paper on vision, doubt, geometry, light and
drunkenness. Phronesis 43.2: 176196.
Berryman argues that the skeptical challenge to theories of perception provoked an exploration of how
errors occur, especially what we would call optical illusions, and Euclids Optics offers a model of perception
that includes a step of mental reconstruction, along with geometrical explanations of error formation.
Brownson, Carol Don. 1981. Euclids Optics and its compatibility with linear perspective.Archive for
History of Exact Sciences 24.3: 165194.
DOI: 10.1007/BF00357417Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Brownson argues that the canonical claim that ancient optics is incompatible with linear perspective is
unfounded; Brownson further argues that neither of the geometrical structures, ancient optics or linear
perspective (allegedly first discovered in the Renaissance), is arbitrary or conventional. The article sparked
great debate within the history of ancient optics.
Burton, Harry E. 1945. Euclids Optics. Journal of the Optical Society of America 35.5: 357372.
DOI: 10.1364/JOSA.35.000357Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Still the only complete translation of Euclids Optics into English, the article includes a few notes; the
diagrams are also translated (with G for , e.g.).
Knorr, Wilbur R. 1991. On the principle of linear perspective in Euclids Optics. Centaurus34.3: 193
210.
DOI: 10.1111/j.1600-0498.1991.tb00694.xSave Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Knorr argues against Brownson that there is little explicit textual support in Euclids Optics for actual linear
perspective, and that the sole textual basis, proposition 10, has probably suffered textual alteration. (He
does not address Brownsons claim that Euclids optics is compatible with linear perspective.)
Smith, A. Mark. 1982. Ptolemys search for a law of refraction: A case-study in the classical
methodology of saving the appearances and its limitations. Archive for History of Exact
Sciences 26.3: 221240.
Ptolemy performed experiments on refraction, apparently intending to elicit a law of refraction, and published
his results. Smith shows that Ptolemys mathematical and philosophical assumptions, such as that any law
would be expressible in terms solely of geometrical optics, blinded him to the regularities in his data, which
conform well to Snells law.
Smith, A. Mark. 1996. Ptolemys theory of visual perception: An English translation of the Optics
with introduction and commentary. Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 86.2.
Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.
Ptolemys Optics (in which he studied refraction) survives only in a damaged medieval Latin translation;
Smith translates this into English and provides an orienting and thorough introduction.
Smith, A. Mark. 1999. Ptolemy and the foundations of ancient mathematical optics: A source based
guided study. Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 89.3. Philadelphia: American
Philosophical Society.
Smith studies all the main topics of ancient geometrical optics: (1) theories of perception, especially eidola
versus vision rays; (2) perspectival optics; (3) catoptrics: plane and curved mirrors and the law of
reflection; (4) dioptrics: lenses and no law of refraction; and (5) the rainbow and burning mirrors.
Toomer, Gerald J. 1976. Diocles on burning mirrors. Sources in the History of Mathematics and
Physical Sciences 1. Berlin: Springer.
Besides this text, Diocles is primarily known from brief remarks in Arabic sources. Toomer provides an
edition and facing-page translation (pp. 34113, with reconstructed figures) of the Arabic translation of the
lost Greek work, photographs of the manuscript (pp. 114137), and commentary (pp. 138175); he shows
that the Greek of Eutokios paraphrases Diocles 78 and 1013. Availableonline for purchase.
Astronomy
Greek astronomy, along with Mathematics and Medicine, is often cited as one of the success stories of
ancient Greek science. Moreover, a central intellectual role is claimed for astronomy. Indeed, ancient
astronomy did determine that the moon shines by reflected sunlight, that eclipses were syzygies of sun,
moon, and earth, and that the sun was much larger and more distant from the earth than was the moon.
However, most of the rest of its agreed model, as well as the range of debate, were by modern standards
entirely misplaced, so that the success of Greek astronomy must be viewed in a qualified way. Plato and
others did advance claims for the central importance of astronomy, but those same thinkers viewed the
planets as exemplary divine beings. Not all Greeks praised astronomy: Epicureans pursued it only far
enough to eliminate anxiety about heavenly events, rejected the theory of the spherical earth, and denied
that we could be certain about eclipses, lunar light, or even the size of the sun. Greek astronomy is notable
for attempting mundane and deterministic models of the heavens. Early models were very diverse, including
both the theory of Xenophanes that the sun coalesced daily from clouds or sparks, and also Philolauss
model in which the earth, sun, and all the planets orbited an unseen central Hearth. The consensus
evolved to a geocentric model, with the moon orbiting innermost and the fixed stars outermost, but otherwise
debate persisted. In the 4th century BCE, a concentric-spheres model was popular, propounded by Eudoxos,
augmented by Callippus, and advocated by Aristotle. By about 200 BCE that model had been largely
replaced by the epicyclic model, later fully developed by Ptolemy (c. 150 CE), seeToomer 1998. Babylonian
data, based on centuries of observations, were incorporated by Hipparchus (c. 150 BCE) and perhaps
earlier. The Greeks themselves began to record careful dated observations in the early 3rd
century BCE (Goldstein and Bowen 1991), and scattered traces of careful and precise observations are
found in Aristotle. Moreover, Archimedes records that Aristarchus proposed a heliocentric model of the
heavens, a theory rejected as unsupported by the evidence and impious to the goddess Earth. Jones
1999 and Kidd 1997 provide texts that widen the range of Greek astronomy; Bowen and Wildberg
2009 provides papers that explore a key astronomical work of Aristotle. Three significant and indispensable
accounts of the history of Greek astronomy are Dicks 1970, Neugebauer 1975, and Evans 1998.
Bowen, Alan C., and Christian Wildberg, eds. 2009. New perspectives on Aristotles De Caelo.
Philosophia Antiqua 117. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.
Ten papers on various aspects of Aristotles influential work on the structure of the cosmos, covering, among
other topics, his geocentric theory (Matthen), his spherical cosmos (Pellegrin), and his views on the four
elements and their natural motions (Gill, Hankinson). Available online for purchase.
Dicks, D. R. 1970. Early Greek astronomy to Aristotle. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Univ. Press.
Dicks constructs a skeptical account of early astronomy, strictly eschewing retrojection, and shows how that
makes more sense of the evidence. Chapter 1 presents a clear summary of the basic principles of Greek
astronomy, and he then surveys Homer and Hesiod, Anaxagoras and contemporaries, Pythagoreans and
contemporaries, Plato, Eudoxus, and Aristotle and Callippus.
Evans, James. 1998. The history and practice of ancient astronomy. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
In seven chapters, Evans guides the reader through all the key concepts and procedures of ancient
astronomy, exploiting ancient texts and methods. He starts with the birth of astronomy (in Babylon and
Hesiod) and moves through the celestial sphere, sundials and astrolabes, calendars, solar theory, the fixed
stars, and planetary theory. Available online for purchase.
Goldstein, Bernard R., and Alan C. Bowen. 1991. The introduction of dated observations and precise
measurement in Greek astronomy. Archive for History of Exact Sciences 43.2: 93132.
DOI: 10.1007/BF00375347Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Bowen and Goldstein have jointly and individually published a valuable suite of papers, eschewing
retrojection and advocating a skeptical approach to Greek astronomy; here they critically examine the
means, nature, and purpose of dated astronomical observations, the earliest being those that Ptolemy
records that Timokharis made in 295 BCE.
Jones, Alexander. 1999. Astronomical papyri from Oxyrhynchus. 2 vols. Memoirs of the American
Philosophical Society 233. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.
Jones edits and translates more than 180 papyri from Oxyrhynchus that reflect the practice of technical
(rather than descriptive) astronomy, including sixteen fragments of theoretical or instructional texts, more
than one hundred tables, and almost seventy horoscopes. Those form Volume 2; the commentaries form
Volume 1, showing the non-Ptolemaic character of the tables. Available online for purchase.
Kidd, Douglas. 1997. Aratus Phaenomena: Edited with introduction, translation and commentary.
Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries 34. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Aratos of Soloi (c. 275 BCE) composed a long poem on the sky and weather signs; it was probably the most
popular work of science in Antiquity. Kidd provides an edition and facing-page English translation (pp. 72
157) and a commentary treating both literary and scientific aspects (pp. 166577). Available online for
purchase.
Neugebauer, Otto. 1975. A history of ancient mathematical astronomy. 3 vols. Studies in the History
of Mathematics and Physical Sciences 1. New York: Springer.
Magisterial survey of all mathematical aspects of ancient astronomy, departing from
PtolemysAlmagest (including Apollonios and Hipparchos), then covering Babylonian astronomy and early
Greek astronomy and astronomy of the Greco-Roman period and Late Antiquity. Neugebauer uses ancient
methods and sexagesimal numbers, but modern notation, to analyze and interpret ancient evidence.
Toomer, Gerald J. 1998. Ptolemys Almagest. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press.
Toomer translates the culminating product of ancient astronomy, with reconstructed diagrams and brief
notes. Ptolemy started from Hipparchan trigonometry (Book 1), and proceeded through spherical astronomy
(Book 2), solar theory (Book 3), lunar theory (Books 45), eclipses (Book 6), the fixed stars (Books 78), to
the longitudinal (Books 911) and the non-uniform (Books 1213) planetary motions. Available online for
purchase.
Astrology
For most of us, the alleged influence of the planetary positions upon earthly life seems unlikely or absurd. It
was otherwise in Antiquity. To people who view the earth as central, the orbiting sun and moon clearly
bestow influence upon the earth, and chronological correlations would easily seem causal. Our industrial
economy is not fundamentally seasonal, but all agricultural and prior economies were, and in Greeceas in
Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Chinacelestial omens presaging seasonal events were widely accepted. The
early Greek poet Hesiod offered a farmers almanac correlating agricultural activities with astral events,
sometimes writing as if the stars had agency, and viewing lunar phases as ominous. Moreover, the
geocentric cosmos seemed rather tightly coupled, so that both Herodotos and Aristotle could describe some
heavenly events as caused by the winds or by exhalations rising from the earth. The Hippocratic corpus
considers environment crucial to health, and that environment included celestial events marking and causing
seasonal transitions. Plato advocates viewing the planets as gods, the same gods as found associated with
the planets in Babylonian traditions, and those associations persist via the Romans in our own names for the
planets. A leading role in promoting the belief in astrology was played by the Stoic model of the cosmos as
deeply interconnected by the all-pervading pneuma. Initially, stellar omens were applied to whole regions
(there will be a drought or the like), and the casting of individual horoscopes in Greek (or Latin) appears to
have commenced in the lst century BCE. Most surveys of astrology thus privilege the Latin sources
(cf. Roman Science: Astrology and Cosmology), but see the somewhat underdigested mass of data
in Gundel and Gundel 1966. Pingree 1976 and Obbink 2006 are editions of the fragments of the works of
several early Greek astrologers who wrote in verse. Vettius Valens is one of the earliest extant Greek
astrologers, and provides much data on practice, see Riley n.d.; and one relatively well-studied text is in
Latin, by Firmicus Maternus, see Bram 2005. Much of our early evidence for astrology derives from
horoscopes preserved on papyri recovered from excavations in Egypt: see Neugebauer and van Hoesen
1959.
Bram, Jean Rhys. 2005. Ancient astrology theory and practice: Matheseos Libri VIII by Firmicus
Maternus. Park Ridge, NJ: Noyes.
First edition 1975. Bram translates the Latin text of the Teubner edition (1913) and P. Monat,Firmicus
Maternus: Mathesis, 3 vols. (Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres, 1992, 1994, 1997) should also be
consulted. Firmicuss book (c. 340 CE) is the most extensive practical treatise of astrology to survive. Bram
(and Monat) provide brief explanatory notes.
Gundel, Wilhelm, and Hans-Georg Gundel. 1966. Astrologumena: Die astrologische Literatur in der
Antike und ihre Geschichte. Wiesbaden, Germany: Franz Steiner.
The father Wilhelm having died, the son completed his annotated compendium of valuable data on Greek
(and Roman) astrologers, which is marred by an overemphasis on Egyptian origins and by the neglect both
of Babylonian origins and of Arabic and Sassanian evidence. (See Pingree in Gnomon40.3 [1968]: 276
280.)
Neugebauer, Otto, and H. B. van Hoesen. 1959. Greek horoscopes. Memoirs of the American
The editors provide edition, translation, and commentary and analysis on almost two hundred horoscopes,
followed by extensive analysis and discussion; supplemented by eighteen papyri in Donata
Baccani, Oroscopi greci (Messina, Italy: Sicania, 1992), and sixty-nine in Jones 1999 (cited
under Astronomy). Horoscopes preserve valuable data about astronomical concepts and methods of
calculating planetary positions before Ptolemy.
Obbink, Dirk. 2006. Anubio: Carmen astrologicum elegiadum. Leipzig: Teubner.

Obbink provides an edition of this fragmentary astrological poet of the late lst century CE, preserved on
papyrus scraps and a late antique partial prose paraphrase, and heavily exploited by Firmicus Maternus (on
whom see Bram 2005). Available online for purchase.
Pingree, David E. 1976. Dorothei Sidonii Carmen Astrologicum: Interpretationem Arabicam in

Linguam Anglicam versam una cum Dorothei fragmentis et Graecis et Latinis. Leipzig: Teubner.
Pingree edits and translates the Arabic version, itself based on a 3rd-century Pahlavi version of the lost
Greek original; a few fragments of the Greek verses survive (pp. 323427). Dorotheus wrote his influential
astrological poem c. 50 CE, explaining the alleged influences of various planetary configurations upon
human life. Available online for purchase.
Pingree, David E. 1978. Yavanajtaka of Sphujidhvaja. 2 vols. Harvard Oriental Series 48. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard Univ. Press.
This one small part of Pingrees life-long project, to make Sanskrit science accessible outside India, is an
edition (Vol. 1) and translation with commentary (Vol. 2) of a versified astrological text, 269270 CE, based
on a Greek (Yavana) original. Pingree here shows how Greek works influenced Sanskrit science.
Riley, Mark. n.d. A survey of Vettius Valens. Sacramento: California State Univ. Press.
Vettius wrote a lengthy compendium of astrology (c. 165 CE), providing numerous precisely worked
examples (including his own birthdate, 8 February 120). The editors had accepted this valuable survey on
Vettius, covering his life, faith in astrology, and book (which cites many predecessors), into the Aufstieg und
Niedergang der rmischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung II:
Principat 37.5, although as noted in Scholarly Aids, the series appears abandoned.
Geography
Geography begins as an attempt to give an account of the shape and content of the land around us. Early
Greekslike early people everywhereviewed the earth as flat; another common theme is to view ones
homeland as somehow central or ideal. The figure of Odysseus (the traveler who knows many cities and
peoples) is typical and prototypical of Greek explorations and understandings of their world. Egyptians and
Babylonians created maps, more or less schematic, of the world they knew, and Anaximander (c. 580 BCE)
is said to have done the same. Herodotos laughs at the schematic circular maps he has seen, and he offers
a portrait of the flat earth as extreme at its edges (Romm 1992). From the 6th century BCE and later, various
travelers or merchants gathered their experiences into accounts known as periploi (sailings around),
and Shipley 2011 is an edition of the earliest extant example; a much later one, clearly by a merchant, is
made available in Casson 1989. The data available to Greek geography was vastly expanded by the
conquests of Alexander and the travelers and merchants who exploited and explored the affected regions.
The Peripatetic scholar Dikaiarkhos (Dicearchus) measured the heights of several Greek mountains of
fabled height (a little while before Timokharis made the earliest extant dated and precise observations,
seeAstronomy). The earliest extant work devoted solely to geography was by Eratosthenes, who also
provided the first careful measurement of the circumference of the spherical earth; Roller 2010gathers the
remains of his work. The work of Eratosthenes elicited a reply by Hipparchus, whose geographical
fragments are collected in Dicks 1960. The earliest extant work of geography is a very large work by Strabo,
written under the Pax Romana, which, like the conquests of Alexander, led to an increase in the available
geographical data: on Strabo, see Dueck, et al. 2005. The work of geography that became standard in the
ancient world, and continued to influence geography through the Arabic period and the Renaissance, was by
Ptolemy, on which see Stckelberger, et al. 20062009. Dueck 2012 provides a brief survey of ancient
geography.
Casson, Lionel. 1989. The Periplus Maris Erythraei: Text with introduction, translation, and
commentary. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press.
Cassons text and facing-page English transition is augmented with two very precise commentaries,
general and textual. The anonymous work (c. 55 CE) is a merchants guide to maritime trade down the Red
Sea and across to India, replete with information about towns, peoples, and goods; the author shows a lively
curiosity. Available online for purchase.
Dicks, D. R. 1960. Geographical fragments of Hipparchus. University of London Classical Studies 1.

London: Athlone.
Dicks offers the most recent edition, with facing-page English translation and extensive commentary, of the
sixty-three fragments of Hipparchuss sole book of geography. Hipparchus sought to provide accurate data
as a basis for the work of future scientists, and he wrote about a dozen works of astronomy (including the
extant commentary on Aratoss Phainomena).
Dueck, Daniela. 2012. Geography in classical antiquity. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Chapter 4 by Kai Brodersen concerns cartography, whereas Dueck covers descriptive geography (chapter
2: in histories and in periploi and itineraries), mathematical geography (chapter 3: the spherical earth, zones,
and latitudes), and geography in practice (chapter 5: travel by land and sea). Available online for purchase.
Dueck, Daniela, Hugh Lindsay, and Sarah Pothecary, eds. 2005. Strabos cultural geography: The
making of a kolossourgia. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Sixteen essays on various aspects of the largest extant geographical work from Greco-Roman antiquity,
Strabo (c. 20 sCE); some essays concern his cultural context, others focus more on his geographical work,
especially Pothecary on European provinces of the Roman Empire, Panichi on Cappadocia, and Braund on
the Euxine (Black) Sea. Available online for purchase.
Roller, Duane W. 2010. Eratosthenes Geography: Fragments collected and translated, with
commentary and additional material. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press.
Roller provides the first translation into English, with commentary, of the fragments of this leading
geographer (c. 220 BCE), who first carefully measured the diameter of the earth and created an early
square-root-extracting slide rule. The work of Eratosthenes gave way, in turn, to that of Hipparchus
(c. 130 BCE) and then to Ptolemy. Available online for purchase.
Romm, James. 1992. The edges of the earth in ancient thought: Geography, exploration, and fiction.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press.
Greek geography studied well-known regions and also regions remote from Greece. Romm considers how
the boundaries of the earth, the remote peoples of the earth, the lands conquered by Alexander, and the
utter north (Thule) were depicted and understood. Those explorations extend from Herodotos (c. 425 BCE) to
Roman times. Available online for purchase.
Shipley, Graham, ed. 2011. Pseudo-Skylaxs Periplous: The circumnavigation of the inhabited world:
Text, translation and commentary. Exeter, UK: Bristol Phoenix.
Shipley offers the first edition since 1878, followed by the first published English translation, and a detailed
commentary, of this anonymous geographical work (c. 335 BCE). The ancient author described the
Mediterranean and Black Sea coasts as a systematic account of the scale and parts of the known world.
Stckelberger, Alfred, Gerd Grasshoff, and Florian Mittenhuber, eds. 20062009. Klaudios
Ptolemaios Handbuch der Geographie. 3 vols. Basel, Switzerland: Schwabe.
Ptolemys Geography was a canonical text of Greek geographical knowledge. This first complete edition in
150 years includes a German translation and beautifully printed reconstructed maps (Vol. 2). Volume 3
contains essays on Ptolemys sources, methods, and results, plus an edition of one of his sources,
the Canon of Important Cities. Available online (2006) and online (2009) for purchase.
Meteorologika
Much of what the early thinkers, i.e., the Presocratics, propounded about the nature of the cosmos was
understood to be the study of elevated things, i.e., meteoro-logy, even though many of the topics were in
some way or another quite down to earth. Our words for meteor and meteorite preserve that ambiguity:
The meteorite is the meteor that has fallen to earth. Anaxagoras (c. 455 BCE) had suggested that numerous
whirling bodies surrounded the earth, the sun being one such body, a stone heated yellow hot by its motion,
and on the basis of that theory predicted the fall of a meteorite that fell at Aegospotami. Besides meteors
and meteorites, the field covered comets, lightning, winds, the sea, and earthquakes. Perhaps the unifying
concept was the study of events in the realms of Zeus and Poseidon? The earliest extant work on the topic
is a volume by Aristotle (see Louis 1982, in which it is edited and annotated), that preserves fragments of
works by earlier thinkers on comets and earthquakes. Freeland 1990 explores the ways in which that work
fits into Aristotles overall scientific program. Aristotles student Theophrastus wrote a small work in one
book, On Winds, which is available in Coutant and Eichenlaub 1975. The topic of meteorologikaremained of
interest well into Late Antiquity, and the Aristotelian commentator Philoponus wrote a partially preserved
commentary on Aristotles book, explaining how it was read in his era and offering some alternatives:
see Kupreeva 2011. Hine 2002 explores how two specific topics, earthquakes and eruptions, were studied
over time. Much of ancient meteorology treated phenomena that we would also file under that term, i.e.,
weather phenomena, lightning and thunder, unusual storms, and even ordinary rain; Taub 2003 explores
that rich body of evidence. This field of ancient science has been relatively less well studied than betterknown fields such as Astronomy or Geography.
Coutant, Victor C. B., and L. V. Eichenlaub. 1975. Theophrastus De Ventis. Notre Dame, IN: Univ. of
Notre Dame Press.
Coutant and Eichenlaub provide an edition, facing-page English translation, and brief commentary; they
argue that his observations are generally very accurate. Theophrastus builds upon
AristotlesMeteorlogica 2.46 (359b27365a13) and often argues against Aristotles conclusions; the
material is also treated at comparable length in the pseudo-Aristotelian Problems 26.
Freeland, Cynthia A. 1990. Scientific explanation and empirical data in

AristotlesMeteorology. Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 8:67102.
Freeland focuses on key steps that precede (gathering opinions) and follow (use of signs and proofs) the
definitions of the phenomena Aristotle studies; the latter step approximates to abduction, i.e., arguing from
explanatory success to the validity of the underlying analysis: i.e., Aristotle is concerned with the pragmatics
of explanation.
Hine, Harry M. 2002. Seismology and vulcanology in antiquity? In Science and mathematics in
ancient Greek culture. Edited by C. J. Tuplin and T. E. Rihll, 5675. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
Quakes were a standard part of meteorologika, and Hine investigates the scattered writings on the two
topics to determine their coherence; earthquakes received repeated attention from an early date and were
systematically recorded by some, but Hine sees less continuity in writing about volcanoes (whose eruptions
are rarer than earthquakes). Available online for purchase.
Kupreeva, Inna. 2011. Philoponus: On Aristotle, Meteorology 1.13. London: Bristol Classical.
See also Philoponus: On Aristotle, Meteorology 1.49, 12 (London: Bristol Classical, 2012). Kupreeva
translates and comments upon all extant portions of Philoponuss commentary on Aristotles Meteorologika,
which discuss the four elements and aither in the cosmos (first volume) and phenomena caused by the
dry exhalation (1.48: irregular astronomical phenomena: meteors, aurorae, comets, the galaxy) and the
wet exhalation (1.9. . .12, hail and the like).
Louis, Pierre, ed. 1982. Aristote: Mtorologiques. 2 vols. Collection des Universits de France:
Srie grecque 289290. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
Books 13 of Aristotles work concern meteorologika, particularly events in the upper atmosphere (including
winds), earthquakes, and the rainbow. Aristotles unifying theory involves two exhalations, the dry and the
wet, that arise from the earth and induce events. Louis provides an edition, facing-page French translation,
and brief notes. Available for purchase online: the series;Volume 1 and Volume 2.
Taub, Liba Chaia. 2003. Ancient meteorology. London: Routledge.

Taub attempts to reconstruct a brief and confessedly incomplete history of meteorologika, primarily the
subset concerned with weather. Taub treats, in turn, weather calendars (parapegmata); the explanatory
strategies employed by Aristotle and Theophrastus in their works of meteorologika; meteorology in
Lucretius, Manilius, Seneca, and the pseudo-Aristotelian On the Cosmos; and Plinys encyclopedia.
Mechanics Including Pneumatics

By mechanics the Greeks meant the study of how things move and how machines work, levers and wheels
and more complex compound devices. By pneumatics, they referred to the study of moving air or water
within devices. The common element is the production of motion that is surprising, whether because its
causes are unseen (either hidden or opaque), because the motion exhibits some anomaly, or because the
motion is large compared to the initiating motion. That is the origin of Archimedes famous boast, give me a
place to stand and I could move the earth, i.e., because there is no mathematical limit to the mechanical
advantage of the lever or other machines. Already in the early epics, automata are mentioned as evidence
of divine skill, and Daedalus in myth was credited with an ornithopter. Marvelous machines were created to
produce dramatic effects on, or above, the stage in the Athenian theater. Other machines were used to set
bones, when the power of the surgeons hands did not suffice, as attested in the Hippocratic corpus and in
later fragments, as discussed in Drachmann 1963. To shoot arrows or sling stones farther, artillery was
invented, and many texts describing those machines survive: see Marsden 1999a, Marsden 1999b,
and Garlan 1974 (also Rihll 2007, cited under Roman Science: Mechanics and Metrology). Other kinds of
machines proved critical in the numerous wars of the era: see Whitehead 2010 and Whitehead and Blyth
2004. In the intervals when wars abated, the built environment of the city was created using machines for
lifting burdens or moving water: see Drachmann 1963. The techniques around the production of motion and
other surprising results of the motions of air and water, i.e., the elements Air and Water, were studied and
exploited: see Drachmann 1948 and Prager 1974. Archimedes was instrumental in developing the theory of
the lever and in inventing the screw or worm gear: seeDrachmann 1963. For us, to say that something is
mechanical can speak to a philosophical outlook, i.e., a Cartesian machine-like deterministic world;
however, as Berryman 2009 shows, that does not seem to have been how most Greeks viewed matters.
Berryman, Sylvia. 2009. The mechanical hypothesis in ancient natural philosophy. Cambridge, UK:
In this carefully documented book, Berryman argues that mechanics emerged slowly and unsystematically
before 300 BCE, but more vigorously at Alexandria in the 3rd century BCE, although even there the discipline
was unified only gradually and partially. Archimedes, Heron, and others extrapolated beyond
accomplishments, and motion and its causes were mathematized. Availableonline for purchase.
Drachmann, Aage G. 1948. Ktesibios, Philon and Heron: A study in ancient pneumatics. Acta
Historica Scientiarum Naturalium et Medicinalium 4. Copenhagen: Munskgaard.
Despite its age, still the best comprehensive treatment of the three chief Greek writers on pneumatics (the
motions and effects of moving fluids). Drachmann carefully analyzes the machines of Ktesibios (pump,
organ, clocks), of Philon (with discussion of the Latin and Arabic versions), and, at greater length, the
manifold devices of Heron.
Drachmann, Aage G. 1963. Mechanical technology of Greek and Roman antiquity. Copenhagen:
Munskgaard.
Drachmann provides an extended reading of Herons Mechanics, extant in Arabic and a few Greek
fragments (pp. 19140), plus briefer readings of the pseudo-Aristotelian Mechanics, Vitruvius, Oreibasios
(on medical machines), and the various writers on artillery, with a view to extracting from them an
understanding of the machines they built.
Furley, David J. 1985. Stratos theory of the void. In Aristoteles: Werk und Wirkung: Paul Moraux
Gewidmet. Vol. 1, Aristoteles und seine Schule. Edited by Jrgen Wiesner, 594609. New York: De
Gruyter.
Furley explores the reports (of doxographers and Simplicius) on Stratons theory that microscopic voids exist
in matter, which explains some of their mechanical properties (such as compressibility, flexibility, miscibility,
and transparency); Straton (c. 280 BCE) was arguing explicitly against Aristotle, who denied all void.
Reprinted in Furley 1989 (cited under Overviews: Origins and Early Development), pp. 149160.
Garlan, Yvon. 1974. Recherches de poliorctique grecque. Bibliothque des coles franaises
dAthnes et de Rome 223. Athens, Greece: cole Franaise dAthnes.
Garlan offers a history of siege-techniques and machines from Pericles to Demetrios (c. 305 BCE), to which
he appends an edition with facing-page French translation of Philons book(s) on fortifications, followed by a
lengthy commentary.
Marsden, Eric W. 1999a. Greek and Roman artillery: Historical development. Oxford: Clarendon.
First edition 1969. Based on the texts and his full-scale models, Marsden describes the origins,
development, and effects of artillery from 399 BCE to c. 400 CE. (Rihll 2007, cited under Roman Science:
Mechanics and Metrology, provides a more artifact-based account.)
Marsden, Eric W. 1999b. Greek and Roman artillery: Technical treatises. Oxford: Sandpiper.
First edition 1971. In his second volume, Marsden edits, with facing-page English translation and extensive
commentary, the texts of Philon, Biton, Vitruvius, and Heron. The commentary is detailed and helpful, and
the editions remain standard.
Prager, F. D. 1974. Philo of Byzantium: Pneumatica: The first treatise on experimental physics:
Western version and eastern version: Facsimile and transcript of the Latin manuscript, CLM 534:
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich; Translation and illustrations of the Arabic Manuscript, A. S.
3713, Aya-Sofya, Istanbul. Wiesbaden, Germany: Reichert.
Philon (c. 200 BCE) wrote a compendium of Mechanics (see Garlan 1974), which included this book
on Pneumatics, that now survives only in short Latin and long Arabic versions. Prager, a patent lawyer,
provides a transcript of the twenty-one Latin chapters, and translates the sixty-five Arabic chapters (twenty
are medieval).
Whitehead, David. 2010. Apollodorus Mechanicus: Siege-matters (). Historia

Einzelschriften 216. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner.
Whitehead edits and provides the first English translation (on facing pages) of this early-2nd-century treatise
on siege craft, especially tortoises and towers used against hill-forts. The text was repeatedly augmented in
Antiquity (and after), and Whitehead makes careful attempts to indicate the accretions. He provides an
extensive linguistic and technical commentary. Available online.
Whitehead, David, and P. H. Blyth. 2004. Athenaeus Mechanicus: On Machines. Historia

Einzelschriften 182. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner.
Whitehead and Blyth offer a detailed and technical commentary to explain the concise work of this
philosopher who wrote, for Augustuss nephew, a work remarkably similar to Vitruvius 10.1316; they
translate the old text of Schneider from 1912 (printed on the facing pages): a more recent text (with Italian
translation and commentary) is available in Maurizio Gatto, Il Peri mechanematon di Ateneo
meccanico (Rome: Aracne, 2010).
Winter, Thomas Nelson. 2007. The mechanical problems in the corpus of Aristotle. Faculty
Publications, Classics and Religious Studies Department. Lincoln: Univ. of Nebraska.
Winter briefly argues that the Mechanics in the Aristotelian corpus was written by Archytas, on the basis that
Vitruvius 10.3 summarizes Mechanics 36, 20, and 2627; that the work must predate Straton (c. 270 BCE)
and does not even mention catapults; and that Vitruvius 7.pr.14 names as his sources for machines only
twelve authors, of whom only Archytas precedes Straton and catapults. Winter provides a full translation
with analytic notes.
Biology (Plants and Animals)

Every culture somehow classifies the plants and animals with, and upon, which they live. Moreover, most
cultures either attribute some human characteristics to animals or view some humans as being somehow
like animals. The Greeks did both and that fact influenced the development of their science of plants and
animals, for which they never developed a common name. In the early epics, warriors are often compared to
one or another dangerous animal, and in those epics and in fables, humans become animals or animals act
human. Some plants and small animals seemed to spring up spontaneously in certain environments, which
led to theories about invisible and pervasive seeds that were not refuted until the 19th century. Empedocles
and Pythagoras proposed that the human soul is separable and can return in animal formdid the apparent
relation between animals and humans inspire this? The Hippocratic corpus On the Nature of the
Child (see Medicine: Gynecology) contains an extended analogy between plant growth and the growth of the
fetus. Elsewhere in the same body of texts, i.e., the Hippocratic Regimen, we find the earliest extant
systematic classification of animals in Greek, made in terms of domicile (land, air, sea), relation to humans
(tame or wild), and properties as food. Further classificatory work was done by Plato (who in
theTimaeus explained animals as degenerated humans) and then by two of his students, Speusippos (his
successor at the Academy) and Aristotle (for whom animals were imperfect humans). More of Aristotles
extant writings concern animals than any other single topic. Pellegrin 1986 explains his classificatory
system; Lloyd 1983 studies Aristotles role in the development of biology; Gotthelf and Lennox 1987 offers
essays on the philosophy of Aristotles biology; and Vinci and Robert 2005advises against seeing his work
as any kind of anticipation of modern biology. Aristotles data about animals are collected in the large
work History of Animals, Balme 2002 provides a more recent edition of the text; as Aristotle himself said, in
his Parts of Animals: We ought to study their nature as joyfully and zealously as we do mathematics and
astronomy, since Natures purposive operation is here most clearly visible and beautiful. Aristotles student
Theophrastus turned his attention to plants, producing two large works that remained standard until Carl
Linnaeus (b. 1707d. 1778): seeEinarson and Link 19761990. The later forms of the debate about the
relation between animals and humans, especially whether they are rational, can be studied in Terian
1981 and Sorabji 1993.Newmyer 2010 provides a wide-ranging compact sourcebook on animals.
Balme, D. M., ed. 2002. Aristotle: Historia animalium. Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries
38. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Prepared for publication by Allan Gotthelf. Balme restored the manuscript order (8, 9, 7) of those books of
the work and argued that Book 10 was not part of the work, but was Aristotelian; recently, Lesley DeanJones, Clinical Gynecology and Aristotles Biology: The Composition of HA X, Apeiron45 (2012): 180199,
has argued that Book 10 is an anonymous work annotated by Aristotle. The text here is translated
in Aristotle: History of Animals, vol. 3 (Loeb [1991], see), with brief notes. Availableonline for purchase.
Einarson, Benedict, and George K. Link. 19761990. Theophrastus: De Causis Plantarum. 3 vols.
Loeb Classical Library 471, 474475. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.
Einarson and Link provide an edition, with facing-page English translation, and numerous brief botanical
notes. Also in the Loeb is Hort, Theophrastus: Enquiry into Plants (1916), with extensive botanical
appendixes needing some updating. The Enquiry presents the data based on which Theophrastus
constructs the explanations offered in this work. The series is available for purchaseonline; Volume
1, Volume 2, and Volume 3 also available.
Gotthelf, Allan, and James G. Lennox, eds. 1987. Philosophical issues in Aristotles biology.
Sixteen essays, two each by the editors, four by Balme, and one each by eight others, including Freeman
(on bodies, matter, and potentiality), Lloyd (on empirical research), and Furth (Aristotles biological
universe), scrutinize many aspects of Aristotles extensive work on biology; four essays study Aristotles use
of differentiae, three his views on teleology. Available online for purchase.
Lloyd, G. E. R. 1983. Science, folklore and ideology: Studies in the life sciences in ancient Greece.
Lloyd studies two issues in the development of Greek biology (from the 6th century BCE to the 2nd
century CE): the assimilation and criticism of traditional beliefs and the challenge to prevailing ideologies that
science raised. Lloyds topics are taxonomy of animals, gynecology (see Medicine: Gynecology), and
innovations in terminology and knowledge vis--vis traditional knowledge.
Newmyer, Stephen. 2010. Animals in Greek and Roman thought: A sourcebook. London: Routledge.
Newmyer translates passages from Greek and a few Latin texts, with analytic introductions and suggestions
for further reading, on the intellect of animals (pp. 326), human-animal kinship (pp. 2736), animal
behaviors (pp. 3769), and in Part 2, the ethical aspect of human-animal relations (pp. 73115).
Pellegrin, Pierre. 1986. Aristotles classification of animals. Translated by Anthony Preus. Berkeley:
Univ. of California Press.
Originally published in French in 1982. Pellegrin argues that Aristotles empirical classification scheme,
based on parts and functions, works well as a foundation for his teleological biology but did not originate as
a taxonomic project. Available online for purchase.
Sorabji, Richard. 1993. Animal minds and human morals: The origins of the western debate. Cornell
Studies in Classical Philology 54. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Univ. Press.
Sorabji studies the relations between human and animal perception and cognition in Part 1, and in Part 2 the
ethical issues arising therefrom. Empedocles and Plato allowed for deep similarities between animals and
humans, whereas Aristotle is ambiguous, and the animal-as-machine concept originates with the Stoics and
prevailed after Iamblichos. Available online for purchase.
Terian, Abraham. 1981. Philonis Alexandrini de Animalibus. Chico, CA: Scholars Press.
Philon of Alexandria (c. 30 CE), who wrote in Greek primarily on the Torah and also on philosophy,
composed a zoological book discussing animal rationality, which survives only in an Armenian translation
and that is reprinted here from its first edition by Aucher (1822), with the first English translation, and
extensive commentary. Philon attempts to refute his nephew Alexanders arguments favoring rationality.
Vinci, Tom, and Jason Scott Robert. 2005. Aristotle and modern genetics. Journal of the History of
Ideas 66.2: 201221.
DOI: 10.1353/jhi.2005.0041Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Vinci and Robert argue that Aristotles model of conception should not be taken to anticipate modern
genetics and, furthermore, that the modern model of development should not be described in terms of DNA
instructions but rather as an epigenetic affair involving a wide variety of factors. To explain how Aristotle
could imagine that the form of the offspring is in the male seed, a substance that clearly lacks the
expressed form of an adult male, they introduce a hierarchy of formal causes. Available online by purchase.
Medicine
The theories and practices of ancient Greek medicine persisted until the middle of the 19th century, at least
in Europe and the Americas, and they are pervasively implicit in the classics of European literature from
Shakespeare to Cervantes to Molire to Goethe. That may explain why some historians of ancient science
privilege ancient medicine as being somehow more similar to modern medical science or even more
scientific than other ancient sciences (usually such privileging grants a similar status
to Mathematics and Astronomy). Nevertheless, if items such as the role of diet and regimen in health, the
craniocentric model of cognition, and the ability to treat some injuries and illnesses were genuine
accomplishments, much of the practice and theory was misplaced and even damaging. People of all
cultures experience illness and seek remedies, which are often special foodstuffs, known or believed to
alleviate pain, nausea, or fever. Many cultures practice what might be called simple gross restorative
surgeries: replacing displaced bones, removing foreign objects, and retaining leaking blood. Early Greek
theories of disease often emphasized balance, seeing fever and chills, wasting and bloating, hardness and
softness, as extremes between which health was the mean. Theories that emphasized elemental fluids
developed early, and they settled on the famous four: blood, bile, phlegm, and black bile. Some early
doctors are named, but for those we have only the merest traces of writings; others are anonymous, and
paradoxically for those we have some five or six dozen extensive treatises gathered into a collection
attributed by librarians at Alexandria to Hippocrates, a historical figure of c. 440370 BCE; a few works were
later added to the collection. Those treatises exerted a powerful influence in ancient medicine and, indeed,
through the middle of the 19th century; thus, they warrant a section, Hippocrates. In the 4th century BCE and
especially in the Hellenistic era, there was rapid ramification of medical practice and theory, warranting a
section Hellenistic, Galen, Byzantine. Greek medicine tended to favor certain approaches, and many of its
practitioners explicitly stated that diet and regimen are the primary mode of maintaining and restoring health,
the second class of interventions being drugs, and the third and final being surgery (the Hippocratic Oath
even prohibits surgery). Thus, sections onDietetics and Regimen, Pharmacy, and Surgery are included.
Finally, there were several special practices within ancient medicine that warrant a separate look, and works
dealing with these fields appear under Gynecology, Physiognomy, and Veterinary.
EDITIONS OF TEXTS
For other texts of ancient science, as in the main section Editions of Texts, making the texts of the medical
works available is the first challenge, and the necessary foundation for any reliable results, of the study of
ancient Greek medicine. Moreover, to make a given work as widely available as possible, a good translation,
with suitable explanatory commentary, is needed. The process of creating an edition of an ancient medical
text must take into account a wide variety of accidents, of transmission and preservation and of alterations
(corruptions) that occur when manuscripts are copied, and thus it is a complex, difficult, and tedious
endeavor. We cannot know what the ancient doctors meant until we can read what they wrotebut it can be
very difficult to determine what they wrote if we do not understand what they meant. The situation is, in one
respect, better and, in another respect, worse than for other ancient sciences. Because medicine until the
middle of the 19th century, at least in Europe and the Americas, largely followed the practices and theories
of ancient medicine, the texts of the medically canonical authors, Hippocrates and Galen, were continuously
available in adequate form. At the very end of ancient medicine, each was edited by a medical scholar for
use as teaching texts in medical schools: see Khn 18211833, an edition of Galen, and Littr 18391861,
an edition of the Hippocratic corpus. (In 1861 Semmelweis published his book on puerperal fever, and in
1862 Pasteur pioneered and later published his technique.) However, because the development of the germ
theory of disease, and of the modern atomic theory of matter, rendered much of ancient medicine moot, the
texts were thereafter largely neglected, and many have not been edited since then. Some texts have been
edited ad hoc when scholars take an interest in the issues they raise, e.g., Furley and Wilkie 1984. The
French Bud series now includes both Hippocrates and Galen in its Greek section: see Boudon-Millot
2007. The German Corpus Medicorum Graecorum aims to publish editions of all of ancient Greek
medicine and is slowly approaching its goal, e.g., Nickel 2001. The series Studies in Ancient Medicine, ably
edited by Scarborough, van der Eijk, and Hanson, and recently also by Ziegler, includes a number of
editions of the Hippocratic corpus, such as Laskaris 2002, or of other medical writers, such as Diocles (van
der Eijk 20002001), and for the fragments of the Methodist school (on which see Medicine: Hellenistic,
Galen, Byzantine), see Tecusan 2003.
Boudon-Millot, Vronique. 2007. Galien. Vol. 1: Introduction gnrale: Sur lordre de ses propres
livres: Sur ses propres livres: Que lexcellent mdecin est aussi philosophe. Collection des
Universits de France: Srie grecque 453. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
Boudon-Millot provides an edition with facing-page French translation of three texts, written late in his
career, that offer a good introduction to Galens medical ideas. Galen always portrayed himself as a
philosopher-doctor and was at pains to promote his own works and to prevent or suppress forgeries.
Available online for purchase: the series and the volume.
Furley, David J., and James S. Wilkie, eds. 1984. Galen On Respiration and the Arteries. Princeton,
NJ: Princeton Univ. Press.
Furley and Wilkie edit, translate, and provide careful notes on several works by Galen on the use and the
cause of breathing, on the pulse, and on whether there is blood in the arteries. Much ancient medicine
claimed that the arteries contained only pneuma, which Galen disproved by animal vivisection.
Khn, Carl G. 18211833. Claudii Galeni Opera Omnia. 20 vols. in 22 parts. Leipzig: Knoblauch.
Khns edition, often reprinted, especially by Olms (in Hildesheim) was created for the use of practicing
physicians, when humoral medicine was still the dominant theory; despite its age it is the most recent edition
for many of Galens works, which are cited by volume.page. Khn provides a Latin translation at the foot of
the page.
Laskaris, Julie. 2002. The art is long: On the sacred disease and the scientific tradition. Studies in
Ancient Medicine 25. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.
Laskaris provides an edition, English translation, and commentary on this work, which argued that the
sacred disease (usually, epilepsy) was no more divine than any other disease, and that its causes could
be sought among ordinary material sources. The treatise accepts the brain as the location of thought and
will. Available for purchase online: the series and the volume.
Littr, mile. 18391861. Oeuvres compltes dHippocrate. 10 vols. Paris: Baillire.

Littrs edition, often reprinted, was created for the use of practicing physicians, and he provides a facingpage French translation and copious notes. Although many of the texts have been edited since then, works
of the Hippocratic corpus are still cited by volume.page of Littr.
Nickel, Diethard. 2001. Galen: ber die Ausformung der Keimlinge. Corpus Medicorum Graecorum
5.3.3. Berlin: Akademie Verlag.
The Berlin academy has been slowly editing Greek and Latin medical texts since 1908; many of the more
recent editions include a translation and even commentary. Nickel provides an exemplary edition and facingpage German translation, along with extensive commentary. Galens concern is to demonstrate his theory of
formation, namely liver then heart then brain. Available online: the seriesand the volume.
Tecusan, Manuela. 2003. The Fragments of the Methodists, Volume One: Text and translation.
Studies in Ancient Medicine 24.1. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.
Tecusan collects the scattered fragments of the Methodist school of medicine and provides a facing-page
translation of each item; the texts are Greek and Latin and span more than five centuries. The Methodists
advocated a simple therapeutic system and eschewed theory; Galen strenuously attacked them. Available
for purchase online: the series and the volume.
van der Eijk, Philip J. 20002001. Diocles of Carystus: A collection of the fragments with translation
and commentary. 2 vols. Studies in Ancient Medicine 2223. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.
Van der Eijk provides a careful edition of the numerous fragments (Greek, Latin, Arabic), with facing-page
English translation and an extensive commentary. Diocles was an influential doctor of the 4th century BCE,
whose complete fragments are collected here for the first time. Available for purchase online:
the series and Volume 1 and Volume 2.
HIPPOCRATES
Hippocrates of the island of Kos was a historical person (active c. 440370 BCE) whose ideas about the
practice of medicine influenced his contemporaries; see Longrigg 1989. Beyond that, little that is certain can
be said, although there are rich biographical traditions from Antiquity, extensively exploited in Jouanna 1999,
but compare Smith 1990 and Pinault 1992 for more skeptical views. It is fair, but rare, to view Hippocrates
and many of the items in the Hippocratic corpus as members of the Presocratics and contributors to the
debates about the nature of science and the cosmos. When the librarians in Alexandrian acquired books
from all over the Greek world, dozens of treatises by a wide variety of authors were assigned to Hippocrates;
however, at most only a few of them could possibly be by the historical Hippocrates. Nevertheless, that
corpus remained influential, and it even increased its influence through being canonized. Nearly all
subsequent ancient medical writers defined themselves and their work by reference to the Hippocratic
corpus, and some later works (notably the books On the Heart and the Oath) were inserted into the
corpus. Temkin 1991 provides a good example of a study of that history of reception; Smith 1990 studies the
process whereby certain later works came to be added to the corpus. Two studies of the influence and use
of the ideas in the Hippocratic corpus are Grmek 1989 and van der Eijk 2005. The study of the Hippocratic
corpus continues as a chief component of the study of ancient medicine: the Lanne
philologique(see Scholarly Aids) lists an average of more than forty entries per year since 1990 for
Hippocrates (some of those touching on the Hippocratic corpus only peripherally), far more than the dozen
or so per year on mathematicians (Euclid, Archimedes, and Apollonios together) or the twenty or so per year
on astronomy (Aratos, Geminus, Cleomedes, and Ptolemy together)these estimates are very rough, but
they are indicative.
Grmek, Mirko D. 1989. Translated by Mireille Muellner and Leonard Muellner. Diseases in the ancient
Greek world. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press.
Grmek applies palaeopathology to ancient Greek medicine and obtains fascinating insights on diseases
pervading the Hippocratic corpus, such as phthisis (tuberculosis) and kausos (malaria), examines several
Hippocratic cases in Epidemics 1 and 6, and explores the Pythagorean bean-prohibition and the postclassical spread of leprosy. He is optimistic about retrospective diagnosis.
Jouanna, Jacques. 1999. Translated by M. B. DeBevoise. Hippocrates. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins

Univ. Press.
Jouanna engagingly reconstitutes the figure of Hippocrates as a leading physician of his era, placing him on
Kos and supplying from the evidence a biography, with birth, education, travels, and philosophy. Jouanna,
despite the work of Smith 1990 (and earlier), accepts the ancient legends about schools at Kos and Knidos.
Longrigg, James. 1989. Presocratic philosophy and Hippocratic medicine. History of Science27.1: 1
39.
Longrigg argues that the Hippocratic corpusespecially Sacred Disease, Nature of Man, Ancient Medicine,
and Airs, Waters, Placesshows evidence of seeking unifying hypotheses and materialistic explanations,
which aligns them with the Ionian philosophers, Empedocles, and Diogenes of Apollonia. Others see less
rationalistic trends in the corpus, including those works.
Pinault, Jody R. 1992. Hippocratic lives and legends. Studies in Ancient Medicine 4. Leiden, The
Netherlands: Brill.
Pinault studies the biographical fictions that sprouted around Hippocrates, especially how he cured the
Athenian plague, how he detected King Perdiccass lovesickness, and how he refused to serve the Persian
king Artaxerxes. Available for purchase online: the series and volume.
Potter, Paul. 1988. A short handbook of Hippocratic medicine. Sillery, QC: ditions du Sphinx.
Potter provides a very useful short introduction to the contents, nature, and study of the Hippocratic corpus.
He provides capsule summaries of each work and a systematic overview of the notable features of
Hippocratic medicine.
Smith, Wesley D., ed. and trans. 1990. Hippocrates: Pseudepigraphic works. Studies in Ancient
Medicine 2. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.
Smith edits and translates the letters attributed to Hippocrates and shows how they influenced the
biographical tradition. As he did in his Hippocratic Tradition (Smith [1979]), Smith is careful with evidence,
and he rejects many later developments: we know less about Hippocrates than we think. The series is
available online for purchase.
Temkin, Owsei. 1991. Hippocrates in a world of pagans and Christians. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
Univ. Press.
Temkin studies the reception of Hippocrates in the lst to 6th centuries CE. Hippocrates remained exemplary
for writers like Soranos or Galen, and the Hippocratic legends (cf. Pinault 1992) were widely received.
Christian authors begin to grapple with Hippocratic concepts in the 2nd century CE, but ascetics disparaged
medicine.
van der Eijk, Philip J. 2005. Hippocrates in context: Papers read at the XIth International Hippocrates
Colloquium, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, 2731 August 2002. Studies in Ancient Medicine 31.
Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.
The twenty-nine papers of this conference very thoroughly explore five kinds of context of Hippocrates:
epistemological (e.g., on the nature of causation, of human beings, of science), social, non-Hippocratic
medical (e.g., Diocles, Praxagoras, Plato, Aristotle, and Theophrastus), discursive, and later reception (e.g.,
in the papyri, in Aretaios, and in Galen). Available for purchase online: theseries and the book.
HELLENISTIC, GALEN, BYZANTINE
Two facts dominate Greek medicine of the Hellenistic era and after: the development of numerous
competing schools of medicine and Galen. After the closing of the Hippocratic corpus, several medical
writers achieved some influence: for extracts see Longrigg 2001. Among these are especially Diocles of
Karystos (see van der Eijk 20002001, cited under Medicine: Editions of Texts) and Praxagoras of Kos
(c. 300 BCE; last edited and translated in 1958 by Steckerl). Apparently working under the sponsorship of the
Ptolemies in Alexandria, the physician Herophilos of Khalkedon (c. 270 BCE) made significant discoveries in
anatomy, especially about the nerves (thus more firmly establishing the craniocentric model of cognition)
and systematized pulse lore into a useful diagnostic technique; see Staden 1989 (cited under Medicine:
Editions of Texts). Herophilos also founded a school of physicians that existed until the early lst century CE,
focused on pulse lore and Hippocratic exegesis. His slightly younger contemporary Erasistratos of Ioulis
(c. 250 BCE) was connected with the Peripatetics but founded his own medical school, still active in Galens
time, which Galen repeatedly attacked. Erasistratos advocated a mechanical model of the body, with the
heart functioning as a pump (he hypothesized the capillaries but not the circulation of the blood), and he
rejected phlebotomy. Around the same time, Philinos of Kos founded a school of medicine called Empiricist
because its members rejected most theoretical formulations, Hippocratic or otherwise, and adhered to
empirical results and tested therapies, especially drugs (see Frede 1988); Galen also attacked them. The
mild remedies prescribed by Asklepiades of Bithynia garnered him many patients, but his anti-teleological
theories ensured that Galen and others would reject his books; seeVallance 1990. One of his students,
Themison of Laodikaia, seems to have founded the school of medicine called Methodist; their program was
a brief and efficient medical education and simple remedies, mostly drugs; see Tecusan 2003 (cited
under Medicine: Editions of Texts); they too were attacked by Galen. Finally, Athenaios of Attaleia (c. 50 CE)
founded a school of medicine that focused on the role of the pneuma (as propounded by the Stoics), and
hence came to be called Pneumaticist. Galen, who saw himself as mastering all of medicine and who
advocated a harmony of Plato and Hippocrates, is our primary and often sole source for much of Hellenistic
medicine. He wrote more surviving Greek than any prior writer. Johnston 2006 provides an exemplary
edition and translation of one work; Singer 1997 translates fifteen. Nutton 2013 surveys all of ancient
medicine and is especially good on Galen; and Hankinson 2008 provides a broad and deep survey of Galen.
Frede, Michael. 1988. The empiricist attitude towards reason and theory. Apeiron 21.2: 7997.
Frede points out that a kind of continuum exists between practical and theoretical knowledge, since
something must motivate the first successful trial, and that the Empiricists disagreed about how much one
ought to accept or seek theoretical knowledge. He thinks it likely that Empiricist attitudes evolved over time.
Available online.
Hankinson, R. J., ed. 2008. The Cambridge companion to Galen. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ.
Press.
Hankinson and eleven others contribute fourteen studies, among which see especially Hankinson on
Galens philosophy of nature, Rocca on his anatomy, Debru on his physiology, van der Eijk on his therapy,
and Vogt on his pharmacy.
Johnston, Ian. 2006. Galen on diseases and symptoms. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Johnston introduces and translates four works on the systematic study of the nature and causation of
diseases and symptoms: Differentiae of Diseases, Causes of Diseases, Differentiae of Symptoms, and the
three books of Causes of Symptoms. Diseases are related to tissues and organs, but symptoms are
classified by affected function. Available online for purchase.
Longrigg, James. 2001. Greek medicine: From the heroic to the Hellenistic age: A source book.
London: Duckworth.
Longrigg provides translations of texts, primarily from the 5th to 3rd centuries BCE; there is good
representation of Alcmaeon, the Hippocratic corpus, Philistion, Plato, Diocles, Aristotle, Praxagoras,
Herophilos, and Erasistratos. Texts are presented in their preserved context, and the translations are often
annotated.
Nutton, Vivian. 2013. Ancient medicine. 2d ed. London: Routledge.

Magisterial survey of the whole field, organized chronologically, with three chapters on Hippocrates, one
covering Plato to Praxagoras, two on Hellenistic medicine, two on medicine under Rome, one each on
Methodists and Pneumaticists, and two on Galen. Chapters on medicine in Late Antiquity and before
Hippocrates complete the presentation. Available online for purchase.
Scarborough, John, ed. 1985. Symposium on Byzantine medicine. Dumbarton Oaks Papers 38.
Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection.
Scarborough advances the study of Byzantine medicine through the twenty-one papers he solicited for the
symposium, especially Duffy on the teaching and practice of medicine in the 6th and 7th centuries, Stannard
on materia medica, Bliquez on surgical instruments and practice, and Savage-Smith on ophthalmology.
Singer, Peter N., trans. 1997. Galen: Selected works. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
Singer translates, with brief notes, fifteen short works: the three in Boudon-Millot 2007 (cited underMedicine:
Editions of Texts), several on regimen, the Pulse for Beginners, two on the relation of soul to body, Fetal
Formation, two protreptic works, and the three books of the work On Mixtures.
Vallance, John T. 1990. The lost theory of Asclepiades of Bithynia. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
Vallance reconstructs from the fragments the theory enunciated by Asklepiades in the early lst century BCE:
balanced and regular motion of microscopic particles in the body constitutes health and irregularities or
blockages explain disease, which can be alleviated with mild treatments, primarily of regimen.
DIETETICS AND REGIMEN
All human cultures classify their foods, some being considered better in one way or another and others
worse, either to be eaten only faute de mieux or else not to be eaten at all. Typically, local and native foods
are classified as good, familiar, and healthful, whereas foreign or exotic foods are dangerous or unethical;
too narrow a diet is widely regarded as deleterious. Very often, the specification of which animals are edible
is highly marked. Some of these preferences are firmly physiological, arising from small differences in
digestive capacity (e.g., the East Asian avoidance of animal milk). Greek medicine from the beginning, and
in every school, emphasized the key role of proper diet and regimen to the maintenance of health and the
cure of disease. Within that agreed framework, extensive debates were held on just which diet was correct
for which person, at what time, and under what circumstances. Moreover, various theories were developed
to explain the role of diet, such as the humoral theory (in which foods tended to create different humors, and
so diet must be balanced to produce a humoral balance), theories by Erasistratos or by Athenaios centered
on pneuma (in which proper functioning of the pneuma depended on proper diet), or the corpuscular theory
of Asklepiades (in which free and clear passage of the corpuscles meant health and was achieved by a
balanced diet). Although the modern germ theory of disease does not ipso facto negate dietary theories of
health, modern medicine has tended to de-emphasize the role of diet until very recently; somewhat
ironically, modern studies increasingly show that a Mediterranean diet is the most healthful. Joly 1967
1972, plus Joly and Byl 2003, make available the key texts on diet from the Hippocratic corpus. Grant
2000 translates Galens primary works on diet and regimen; and Grant 1997 translates Oribasiuss dietary
advice, mostly concocted from Galen. Copious data on food in the Greco-Roman world, mostly based on
Greek medical writers (and Roman agronomists, see Roman Science: Agronomy), is provided in dictionary
form in Dalby 2003, and in digested and organized form in Wilkins and Hill 2006.
Dalby, Andrew. 2003. Food in the ancient world from AZ. London: Routledge.
Dalby covers primarily c. 700 BCE to c. 500 CE in this comprehensive dictionary of food items, spices,
authors, and related topics (e.g., Cynics, Drunkenness, Furniture, Humoral Theory, Kottabos, Luxury,
Nutrition, Pompeii, Symposion, Triclinium, Vomiting, and Women); each entry is supplied with a
bibliography. Greek, Latin, and Linnaean indexes of the foods are included. Available for purchase online
Grant, Mark David. 1997. Dieting for an emperor: A translation of books 1 and 4 of Oribasius Medical
Compilations with an introduction and commentary. Studies in Ancient Medicine 15. Leiden, The
Netherlands: Brill.
Oribasiuss compilation was based largely on Galen and dedicated to Emperor Julian; Books 1 and 4
concern baked goods, fruits, and vegetables. Grant explains how diet fit into the system of humoral
medicine, investigates the system of dietary recommendations given by Oribasius, and provides a detailed
index of the foodstuffs. Available for purchase online: the series and volume.
Grant, Mark David. 2000. Galen on food and diet. London: Routledge.
Grant translates and annotates the pseudo-Galenic On the Humours and five dietetic works: On Black Bile,
On Uneven Bad Temperament (on the effects of imbalanced regimen), Causes of Disease, On Barley Soup,
and the three books of On the Powers of Foods, which is Galens most important dietetic work.
Joly, Robert. 19671972. Hippocrate. Vol. 6.12. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
The works here edited and translated, Regimen, Regimen in Acute Diseases, Nutriment, and Use of Liquids,
are the primary texts of Greek dietetic medicine, likely written by a variety of authors:Regimen in Acute
Diseases and Use of Liquids offer healing diets. Joly provides an orienting introduction, an analysis of the
work On Regimen (v. 6.1; see Joly and Byl 2003), and an edition with facing-page French translation of the
four works, supplemented with notes. Available for purchase online: the series, Tome VI, 1re
partie and Tome VI, 2e partie.
Joly, Robert, and Simon Byl. 2003. Hippocrate: Du Rgime. 2d ed. Corpus Medicorum Graecorum
1.2.4. Berlin: Akademie Verlag.
Written c. 400 BCE and addressed to men of wealth and leisure. The four books of the work cover human
origins, human health (environment, diet, lifestyle), regimen (bathing and exercise), and dreams. The dietary
prescriptions are adjusted for work habits, age, season of the year, and weather. Joly provides an edition,
facing-page French translation, and extensive notes; Byl updated the volume. Available for purchase online:
the series and the volume.
Wilkins, John M., and Shaun Hill. 2006. Food in the ancient world. Oxford: Blackwell.
Topical survey of the contexts and kinds of food used in Antiquity, including chapters on food in ancient
thought and in medical practice as well as types of food (grains and pulses, meat and fish, and wine).
PHARMACY
When faced with illness, all human cultures selectively prescribe plants or other substances not normally
eaten: Sometimes these special plants and substances are consumed (drugs), sometimes they are applied
to the surface of the body, especially at the sites of pain or damage (plasters). There is no strict
demarcation between foods and drugs in ancient cultures: Mesopotamian drugs were dissolved in beer;
Egyptian recipes often included honey; and Greek pharmaka included many herbs commonly found on
food; cf. Dalby 2003 (cited under Medicine: Dietetics and Regimen). Most cultures prescribe both simples
(a single plant or substance) as well as compounds (mixtures of varying complexity and differing
justification). The early Greek epics record a few simples, including a likely import, the no-pain
of Odyssey Book 4. The use of exotics and imports becomes a common theme throughout Greek medicine.
The Hippocratic corpus in several places offers lists of remedies, and Totelin 2008 is a study of their content
and structure, including their use of exotics. Herophilos considered drugs a powerful form of remedy, and
Hellenistic pharmacology developed increasingly complex remedies, many of them preserved in extensive
extracts by Galen: see Fabricius 1972 andDebru 1997. Galen himself developed an elaborate theory of the
degrees of hot/cold and wet/dry of drugs, which persisted as the model for many centuries. Although the
lists in the Hippocratic corpus and in Galens extracts are extensive, the earliest extant herbal in its own right
is by Dioscorides, which has been extensively studied: see Scarborough and Nutton 1982 and Riddle 1985.
One of the earliest and most beautiful manuscripts preserved from Antiquity is the Vienna Dioscorides, on
which see Gerstinger 1970 and Brubaker 2002. Scarborough has been studying Greek pharmacy for many
years, covering a wide range, and much of his work is gathered in Scarborough 2010.
Brubaker, Leslie. 2002. The Vienna Dioskorides and Anicia Juliana. In Byzantine garden culture.
Edited by Antony Littlewood, Henry Maguire, and Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, 189214.
Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection.
Brubaker explores the manuscript, supplying many images, which for a given simple (herb or substance)
normally provides a single image facing a corresponding page of text and has some annotations derived
from Krateuas (c. 80 BCE) and Galen. Brubaker shows that it was used by readers interested in its contents
and was not merely a display copy.
Debru, Armelle, ed. 1997. Galen on pharmacology: Philosophy, history and medicine: Proceedings of
the Vth International Galen Colloquium, Lille, 1618 March 1995. Studies in Ancient Medicine 16.
Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.
Thirteen papers in German, French, and English on various aspects of Galens pharmacy, such as Jacques
on compound medicines, Nutton and Stein each on theriac, Keyser on sympathy and efficacy, and Ihm on
poisons. Available for purchase online: the series and volume.
Fabricius, Cajus. 1972. Galens Exzerpte aus lteren Pharmakologen. Ars Medica/Abteilung 2,
griechisch-lateinische Medizin 2. Berlin: De Gruyter.
Fabricius demonstrates through careful structural analysis of Galens pharmacological works that they are
largely composed of nearly verbatim extracts of pharmacists, primarily Apollonios Mus (c. 10 BCE), Heras
(c. 10 BCE), Andromachos Jr. (c. 75 CE), Damokrates (c. 80 CE), Asklepiades the pharmacist (c. 95 CE),
Kriton (c. 100 CE), and Arkhigenes (c. 105 CE). Available online for purchase.
Gerstinger, Hans. 1970. Codex Vindobonensis med. Gr. 1 der sterreichischen Nationalbibliothek. 2
vols. Codices selecti phototypice impressi 12. Graz, Austria: Akademische Druck- u. Verlagsanstalt.
Beautiful photographic printing of the Codex Anicia Iuliana from 512 CE, an illustrated and alphabetized
edition of Dioscorides (plus the Carmen de Virtutibus Herbarum, c. 250 CE, several works by
Euteknios, c. 350 CE, and others); Volume 1 is a commentary by Gerstinger. See alsoBrubaker 2002.
Riddle, John M. 1985. Dioscorides on pharmacy and medicine. Austin: Univ. of Texas Press.

Riddle analyzes the five books of the herbal of Dioscorides (c. 65 CE) and discerns the drug affinity system
latent in the text, which groups herbs that have similar observed physiological effects. This influenced the
later system of drug intensities (of hot/cold and wet/dry) used by Galen, but the accurate pharmacognosy
of Dioscorides was otherwise neglected.
Scarborough, John. 2010. Pharmacy and drug lore in antiquity: Greece, Rome, Byzantium. Farnham,
UK: Ashgate.
Scarborough gathers fourteen of his papers on ancient pharmacy (published 19772002), with twenty-four
pages of addenda and corrigenda, making them all more accessible. Two concern Byzantine herbal
pharmacy, two concern Roman medicine, and one each treat Kriton, Soranos, and Galen; the others focus
on Greek pharmacy (Hippocrates, Theophrastus, or Nicander).
Scarborough, John, and Vivian Nutton. 1982. The Preface of Dioscorides Materia Medica:
Introduction, translation, and commentary. Transactions and Studies of the College of Physicians of
Philadelphia 4.3: 187227.
The writers offer a thoroughly documented introduction, demonstrating the importance of Dioscorides work,
and they produce the first English translation in over three centuries and an extensive commentary on the
history, language, and pharmacy; more recently, Lily Y. Beck, De material medica (Hildesheim, Germany:
Olms-Weidmann, 2005), is a translation of the whole. Scarborough and Nutton set Dioscorides in his context
and supply the foundation for understanding his work.
Totelin, Laurence. 2008. Hippocratic recipes: Oral and written transmission of pharmacological
knowledge in fifth- and fourth-century Greece. Studies in Ancient Medicine 34. Leiden, The
Netherlands: Brill.
Totelin studies the numerous pharmaceutical recipes in the Hippocratic corpus and shows the likely large
role of oral transmission. Other topics include the role of exotic ingredients and of symbolism (i.e.,
sympathetic magic) in the choice of ingredients. Available for purchase online: the series andvolume, with
link to online content for subscribers.
SURGERY
Greek medicine always maintained that surgery should be the last resort; the Hippocratic Oath even banned
it entirely. The development of powerful inhalational anesthetics (chloroform, ether, and nitrous oxide) in the
middle of the 19th century, and their subsequent wide use, has tended to efface the prior history of
anesthesia and, thus, to suggest that surgery was avoided because surgeons had no means of anesthesia.
However, it is clear that opium, henbane, mandrake, and other substances were used as painkillers in
Antiquity. The known risk of suppuration (i.e., what we would recognize as infection) no doubt contributed
to a desire to avoid surgery. But likely the primary Greek motivation for eschewing surgery was that it was
invasive and damaging, and Greek cultural values included a strong distaste for mutilation. Nevertheless,
bones were set, wounds cleaned and closed, and skull fractures treated, some by trepanation (the drilling of
a hole to remove damaged bone); on that form of surgery, see Hanson 1999. Other surgical works in the
Hippocratic corpus include instructions on reducing dislocations and setting fractures, using in some cases
mechanical devices. One lightly invasive surgical practice became extremely widespread in Greek medicine:
phlebotomy, which was opposed by Erasistratos and his school and avoided by some other later doctors;
seeBrain 1986. The practice was justified on the theoretical ground that some diseases involved fever and
redness, i.e., an excess of the hot and wet humor, which was blood, and thus those diseases could be cured
or treated by removing blood; the practice persisted into the early 19th century.Dean-Jones 1994 (cited
under Medicine: Gynecology) has suggested that the original justification was to induce in men the same
sort of healthful bleeding that occurs naturally in women. Hellenistic medicine advanced surgical procedure,
based on the anatomical explorations of Herophilos and Erasistratos, and as shown in the Hellenistic
treatise On the Heart included in the Hippocratic corpus: Harris 1973. The works of the Hellenistic surgeons
are preserved only in small fragments, gathered in Michler 1968 from citations (mainly in Celsus, Galen, and
Oribasius) and in Marganne 1998 from papyri. Galens surgical experience was broad, and he wrote many
works of anatomy: part of his major summary is in Duckworth 1962; and for briefer instructional works,
see Garofalo and Debru 2005. Majno 1991, written by a surgeon, offers a medical view of the
accomplishments of the ancient surgeons.
Brain, Peter, trans. 1986. Galen on bloodletting: A study of the origins, development and validity of
his opinions, with a translation of the three works. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Brain translates three works of Galen on phlebotomy and explores the development of Galens views on the
treatment. Phlebotomy enters Greek medicine c. 460 BCE and, by the end of the century, is a standard
practice; but Erasistratos opposed it, and four centuries later Galen is eager to refute him.
Duckworth, W. L. H. 1962. Galen: On anatomical procedures, the later books. Cambridge, UK:
Galen, late in his career, wrote a work in fifteen books on anatomy and dissection, of which books 915
survive only in a 9th-century Arabic version, which is here translated. They cover brain, face and pharynx,
larynx, generative organs, veins and arteries, cranial nerves, and spinal nerves.
Garofalo, Ivan, and Armelle Debru, eds. 2005. Galien. Vol. 7, Les os pour les dbutants: Lanatomie
des muscles. Collection des Universits de France: Srie grecque 441. Paris: Socit ddition Les
Belles Lettres.
Garofalo and Debru provide an edition with facing-page French translation of two shorter works on
anatomy, On Bones for Beginners and The Anatomy of Muscles, which are instructional rather than (as so
often with Galen) polemical. Available for purchase online: the series and volume.
Hanson, Maury. 1999. Hippocrates: On head wounds. Corpus Medicorum Graecorum 1.4.1. Berlin:
Akademie Verlag.
Hanson, himself a retired surgeon, provides an edition, English translation, and commentary in a work that is
sensitive both to the ancient modes of thought and to the surgical realities. The Hippocratic author
distinguishes three kinds of skull fracture: the break, the crush, and the in-crush (depressed), and
prescribes sensible diagnostics and interventions for each. Available online: the series, volume.
Harris, Charles R. S. 1973. The heart and the vascular system in ancient Greek medicine from
Alcmaeon to Galen. Oxford: Clarendon.
Chronological survey of what the Greeks knew or believed about the heart and the vessels connected to it,
including discussions of the cardiocentric theories of Aristotle, Diocles, and Praxagoras, as well as the
discoveries of Herophilos (sensory and motor nerves leading to the brain) and Erasistratos (pump action of
the heart).
Majno, Guido. 1991. The healing hand: Man and wound in the ancient world. Cambridge, MA:
Harvard Univ. Press.
See pp. 141206 and 313338. First edition 1975. Majno surveys what is known of surgery and wound
treatment among the Greeks (other cultures in other chapters) and offers incisive medical analysis of the
various conditions, of the procedures, and of the medicines used on wounds. Available online for purchase.
Marganne, Marie-Hlne. 1998. La chirurgie dans lgypte grco-romaine daprs les papyrus
littraires grecs. Studies in Ancient Medicine 17. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.

Marganne provides an introduction on ancient surgery, then an edition with facing-page French translation of
seven revealing surgical papyri, followed by a chapter on other medical papyri that mention surgery.
Available for purchase online: the series and volume.
Michler, Markwart. 1968. Die Alexandrinischen Chirurgen: Eine Sammlung und Auswertung ihrer
Fragmente. Die Hellenistische Chirurgie 1. Wiesbaden, Germany: Franz Steiner.
Michler collects, edits, and translates into German the fragments of forty-two surgeons from Herophilos
(c. 270 BCE) and Erasistratos (c. 250 BCE) to the 1st century CE; many of the fragments are pharmaceutical
recipes for wound treatments, but there are also significant procedural fragments (excision of cancers and
bladder stones, obstetrical interventions).
GYNECOLOGY
Greatly debated is the degree to which one may speak of human nature as being composed of distinct male
and female natures; however, it seems to be agreed that the ancient Greeks (and Romans) definitely
considered that men and women were distinct in important and essential ways. (Every ancient culture of
which we have definite knowledge can be shown to have a similar outlook, differing perhaps in degree or
precise scope of its notions as to where the distinctions are to be seen.) That outlook affected every aspect
of Greek and Roman thought, including their medical thought. As far as we can tell, men wrote all surviving
works of Greek medicine, although many of those works are anonymous, and there are twenty-one female
medical or pharmaceutical writers listed in Keyser and Irby-Massie 2008 (cited under Scholarly Aids), p.
1029. It is thus no surprise that Greek medicine presumes that the ordinary patient is male (in fact, many of
the treatises seem to presume that the ordinary patient is a wealthy male of leisure). Moreover, only in texts
concerned with reproduction are female patients considered; in these, a variety of unquestioned
assumptions are made about the female body in contrast to the male body (see Dean-Jones 1994).
Nevertheless, three Hippocratic treatises on reproduction, which are likely to have originally formed parts of
one work, do call into the question some widespread Greek assumptions about the processes of
reproduction, and, e.g., propose that both men and women contribute something like seed to form the fetus;
see Lonie 1981 and Potter 2012. In addition, Lloyd 1983 is a study of the role of those treatises within the
overall Hippocratic discourse. Another treatise of gynecology that survives, by Soranos of Ephesos, is edited
in Ilberg 1927 and translated into English in Temkin 1956; seeBurguire, et al. 2003 for a French translation.
Finally, Flemming 2000 primarily studies Roman views of women, but many of the sources used are Greek
writers, and they are thus informative about Greek views as well.
Burguire, P., Danielle Gourevitch, and Yves Malinas. 2003. Soranos dphse: Maladies des
femmes. 4 vols. Collection des Universits de France: Srie grecque 315, 331, 365, 396. Paris:
Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
The editors provide a text and facing-page French translation, plus explanatory notes. The preserved Greek
text is quite damaged, and Ilberg 1927 has attempted a restoration; these editors prefer a quite different
ordering (based on Caelius Aurelianus, Mustio, and Atios), but alas do not always provide a concordance
to Ilberg. Available for purchase online: series, volumes 1, 2, 3, and 4.
Dean-Jones, Lesley. 1994. Womens bodies in classical Greek science. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
Dean-Jones explores the representations of the female body in the Hippocratic corpus and Aristotle and
shows how menstruation was central to their concepts of the female body, with respect to physiology,
pathology, and reproduction. Available online through subscription from University of Michigan.
Flemming, Rebecca. 2000. Medicine and the making of Roman women: Gender, nature, and authority
from Celsus to Galen. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
Flemming translates and comments upon selected texts about women in the medical writers (Part 2: before
Galen; Part 3: in Galen), revealing what they show about Roman views of women and womens roles in
medicine as patients and practitioners. In Part 1, Flemming also provides an introduction to Roman
medicine.
Ilberg, Johannes, ed. 1927. Sorani Gynaeciorum libri IV. Corpus Medicorum Graecorum 4. Berlin:
Akademie Verlag.
Ilberg edits and indexes the surviving texts of the Methodist physician Soranos of Ephesos (c. 120 CE),
especially his work on womens health and disease, which primarily focuses on reproductive medicine. This
text is translated in Temkin 1956; Burguire, et al. 2003 provides a differently ordered text. Available
online: series and volume.
Lloyd, G. E. R. 1983. Science, folklore and ideology: Studies in the life sciences in ancient Greece.
Lloyds study of two issues in the development of Greek biology (assimilation and criticism of traditional
beliefs, and challenges to prevailing ideologies) includes, as the second of its three topics, medical and
biological theories about women in the Hippocratic corpus (where some treatises question traditional beliefs)
and in Aristotle (who rationalizes traditional beliefs). (See also Biology (Plants and Animals)).
Lonie, Iain M. 1981. The Hippocratic treatises On Generation, On the Nature of the Child,
Diseases IV. Ars Medica: Texte und Untersuchungen zur Quellenkunde der Alten Medizin 2.7.
Berlin: De Gruyter.
Lonie translates and comments upon the three treatises, providing extensive medical interpretation, shows
how they are a unity, and what is their relation to the rest of the corpus; the book made these texts far more
accessible in English than previously. Available online.
Potter, Paul. 2012. Hippocrates, volume 10: Generation: Nature of the Child: Diseases 4: Nature of
Women and Barrenness. Loeb Classical Library 520. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.
This volume, by an expert on Hippocrates, provides a text and a new English translation of key works of
Hippocratic gynecology. The double treatise Nature of Women and Barrenness is likely by a different author
than the triad now labeled Generation and Nature of the Child and Diseases 4, and provides numerous
pharmaceutical recipes (including for abortion), with a very different outlook on gynecology. Available for
purchase online: the series and book.
Temkin, Owsei. 1956. Soranus Gynaecology. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press.
Temkin provides a translation of the text of Ilberg 1927, for the first and only time into English, hewing close
to the Greek and eschewing modernisms. There is an extensive index of materia medica, and brief notes.
Soranoss concern is strongly focused on the mother, and he contraindicates aggressive interventions.
PHYSIOGNOMY
To us, the human face is very individual and expressive, and we feel that we can infer mood, intent, and
even character by closely reading the faces of those about us. Mesopotamian divination records similar
practices, and the widespread custom of wearing ritual masks is an implicit evidence of the same
understanding. Ancient Greeks too believed that faces were revelatory, and not only faces, but also
gestures, posture, walk, and the whole habitus of the body. Just as animals and humans were compared,
especially for character (see Biology (Plants and Animals)), so in the physiognomy of humans, animal
metaphors were exploited and imputed animal characters were inferred. Cicero preserves an anecdote
about Socrates upon whom an otherwise unknown Zopyros practices physiognomy, and, in any case
Aristotle, in his History of Animals, offers numerous analogies of character. Greek philosophers, having
inferred the existence of a human soul separate from the body, thereupon developed theories to explain how
the soul and body conform to one another, a move that provided a theoretical basis for physiognomy:
see Tsouna 1998. The earliest extant treatises of physiognomy are part of the Aristotelian corpus, and they
seem to have been written by Peripatetics in the early 3rd century BCE: see Vogt 1999. Animal analogies
continued to play an important role: see Stok 1998 and Zucker 2006. The 2nd century CE saw a revival, or at
least a broad application, of physiognomy, especially by the orators of that era, notably Polemon: seeBarton
1994, Gleason 1994, and especially Swain 2007. Doctors continued to be interested, as Galen shows
(see Debru 2003). The practice persisted in the Islamic world (Polemon is primarily preserved in Arabic) and
into the Renaissance, but it seems to have been thoroughly discredited by the modern travesties of
phrenology and then craniometry.
Barton, Tamsyn S. 1994. Power and knowledge: Astrology, physiognomics, and medicine under the
Roman Empire. Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Press.
Provides a Foucauldian reading of the three topics, examining physiognomy (pp. 95131) as practiced by
Polemon, who indeed exploited physiognomy in his rhetoric to defeat opponents; but it must be noted that
his success was contingent upon the social acceptance of the contents and results of the scientific practices.
Debru, Armelle. 2003. Lanimalit des parties du corps chez Galien. In Rationnel et irrationnel dans la
mdecine ancienne et mdivale. Edited by Nicoletta Palmieri, 99110. Centre Jean Palerne:
Mmoires 26. Saint-tienne, France: Universit de Saint-tienne.
Galen uses animal analogies to explain the process of digestion and assimilation: The stomach and other
organs and parts are each like an animal that chooses, attracts, and seizes its proper food; this remains an
analogy, although Plato and Aristotle had spoken of the animal-like nature of the heart and the generative
organs.
Gleason, Maud W. 1994. Making men: Sophists and self-presentation in ancient Rome. Princeton,
NJ: Princeton Univ. Press.
Studies the rhetorical practice and self-presentation of Polemon (and Favorinus), showing among other
results how Polemon exploited physiognomic concepts in his oratory.
Stok, Fabio. 1998. La fisiognomica tra teoria e pratica. In Sciences exactes et sciences appliques
Alexandrie. Centre Jean-Palerne: Mmoires 16. Edited by Gilbert Argoud and Jean-Yves Guillaumin,
173187. Saint-tienne, France: Universit de Saint-tienne.
Stok explores the extent to which biographers exploited physiognomic concepts and concludes that whereas
Plutarch did not, Suetonius did practice physiognomy, but on a basis different from that propounded in the
extant physiognomic treatises.
Swain, Simon, ed. 2007. Seeing the face, seeing the soul: Polemons physiognomy from classical
antiquity to medieval Islam. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
Four texts are edited, two Arabic versions of Polemon, plus Adamantius and the Anonymous Latinus; and
there are three contributions on ancient physiognomy by Boys-Stones, Swain, and Elsner as well as English
translations by Hoyland, Ghersetti, and Repath. (There are also three contributions on Arabic physiognomy.)
Tsouna, Voula. 1998. Doubts about other minds and the science of physiognomics. Classical
Quarterly 48.1: 175186.
DOI: 10.1093/cq/48.1.175Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Physiognomy attempted to detect persistent mental state, i.e., character and disposition, not transient
mental state; physiognomical data were signs indicating an interior reality and, as such, not infallible; that is
because the mind and body influence one another over time so that the face, e.g., comes to resemble the
soul. Available online by subscription.
Vogt, Sabine. 1999. Aristoteles, Physiognomonika. Aristoteles Werke in deutscher bersetzung 18.6.
Berlin: Akademie Verlag.
The treatise on physiognomy in the Aristotelian corpus is actually two treatises (neither by Aristotle), the
second with a more practical focus. Vogt translates both, in the standard German series, and provides an
extensive and careful commentary plus a thorough (pp. 35186) introduction to physiognomy.
Zucker, Arnaud. 2006. La physiognomonie antique et le langage animal du corps. Rursus1.58.

DOI: 10.4000/rursus.58Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Physiognomers from Aristotle onward often deployed animal examples because, argues Zucker, they were
implicitly exploiting the kind of comparative anatomy seen in Aristotles works on animals (and already
implicit in Platos account of animal origins). Zucker explains this as an instance of analogy, but he denies
that it was anthropomorphism.
VETERINARY
Medicine may be considered the practical application to human health of knowledge gained about biology,
i.e., the effects of things eaten and the activities of the body. Wherever people have kept animals, they have
been concerned about the health of those animals. One of the earliest Egyptian medical papyri, the Kahun
papyrus, records veterinary treatments of herd animals, and early Mesopotamian sources show the
existence of specialists in veterinary medicine. Most of the evidence for Greek (and Roman) veterinary
science concerns equids and bovines, the most valuable animals in their economy. The earliest extant
Greek text to discuss veterinary medicine is by Xenophon, although a fragment of the 5th-century writer
Simon is preserved: see Widdra 1965. Due to factors as yet unclear, the evidence for Greek and Roman
veterinary medicine is very sparse from that time until the 4th century CE, and even the 4th-century Greek
texts are primarily preserved in several 9th-century Byzantine compilations: see Fischer 1988, and see also
the survey of Doyen 1981. (As noted, in Editions of Texts, the primary preliminary task in studying ancient
science is to obtain a reliable text: for the veterinary medical texts, that has yet to be completed.)
Nevertheless, the science and its texts must have existed, as the scattered evidence shows, e.g., the
Roman writer Varro, Country Matters 2.13, 2.10, mentions the medicus of the animals who will have
writings (scripta) on the subject, and he cites dozens of names of lost Greek writers on agronomy, some of
whom likely wrote on veterinary medicine, as Fischer 1988 argues. Moreover, the Roman writer Columella
includes veterinary matters in Books 67 of his work (see Roman Science: Medicine, Imperial), and several
Latin veterinary treatises are extant, see Roman Science: Medicine, Late Antiqueall are likely based in
part on lost Greek sources. Recent work has made these extant but hitherto obscure Greek texts more
accessible: see McCabe 2007 and Doyen-Higuet 2006; see also the special study Doyen-Higuet 2012.
Doyen, Anne-Marie. 1981. Les textes dHippiatrie grecque: Bilan et perspectives. LAntiquit
Classique 50:258273.
DOI: 10.3406/antiq.1981.2009Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Doyen surveys the manuscripts available, and the problems of the chronology of the authors; a useful
preliminary for any edition. Available online by subscription.
Doyen-Higuet, Anne-Marie. 2006. Lepitom de la collection dhippiatrie grecque: Histoire du texte,

dition critique, traduction et notes. Vol. 1. Publications de lInstitut orientaliste de Louvain 54.
Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium: Universit catholique de Louvain, Institut orientaliste.
Alongside the extensive collection of horse-medicine (McCabe 2007), there is also a shorter epitome, in
multiple versions, of which this volume (providing introduction, history of the text, and bibliography)
commences the first edition. The versions relate in complex ways, which are laid out in documents on a CD
included with the book.
Doyen-Higuet, Anne-Marie. 2012. Contribution ltude du lexique hippiatrique grec. In Le cheval,

animal de guerre et de loisir dans lantiquit et au Moyen ge. Edited by Stavros Lazaris, 213222.
Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols.
In addition to the many precise terms and distinctions of medical vocabulary for the horse, Doyen-Higuet
here demonstrates a similar richness and complexity for terms concerning all aspects of the foot of the
horse.
Fischer, Klaus-Dietrich. 1988. Ancient veterinary medicine: A survey of Greek and Latin sources and
some recent scholarship. Medizinhistorisches Journal 23.34: 191209.
Fischer has headed a research group exploring the corpus of veterinary medicine for many years and here
surveys the surviving texts (their content and structure), the existing scholarship (with analytic bibliography),
and the open problems. Available online by purchase or subscription.
McCabe, Anne. 2007. A Byzantine encyclopaedia of horse medicine: The sources, compilation, and
transmission of the Hippiatrica. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
McCabe provides a thorough and detailed study of the evolution of the large and complex, but unified,
corpus of the Hippiatrica, which Byzantine excerptors and synthesizers created from earlier texts for
practical use. She analyzes the sources, form, and evolution of the corpus, with chapters on seven of its
component authors.
Widdra, Klaus, ed. 1965. Xenophon Reitkunst. Schriften und Quellen der Alten Welt 16. Berlin:
Akademie Verlag.
Widdra edits and translates the fragment by Simon of Athens (c. 435 BCE), as well as the complete text of
Xenophon (c. 380 BCE); although both writers focus on riding, especially in cavalry, they also refer to the
care of the horse, and Simons fragment is preserved in the Hippiatrica.
Alchemy
Human mastery of fire has long been considered pivotal in the development of our culture(s), and early
humans exploited fire to alter materials and even produce new materials. Annealing flint for knapping, and
cooking food for eating, are each transformations and improvements induced by fire. The creation of pottery,
bread, metals, and glass, each from substances with properties unlike the end product, are the distant roots
of the science of materials that was later called alchemy. Early Greek thinkers accepted the challenges of
explaining observable changes of stuff, and they included some attempt to explain the kinds of changes that
produce pottery, bread, metals, or glass. Herakleitos hypothesized a key dynamic role for fire, probably to
explain natural transformations by analogy with those produced by human agency. To explain material
transformations, Empedocles hypothesized four roots, which later became the four elements of Fire, Air,
Water, and Earth. Plato, in the Timaeus, accepts those four, analyzes them by geometry, and thereby
explains how they transform one into another; for him, metals are a kind of purified water, gold being the
most pure. Aristotle reconfigured the analysis, using instead perceptible properties that he held to be more
fundamental than the elements, namely the pairs of opposites hot/cold and wet/dry, which combine and
rearrange to form elements and compounds: see Bolzan 1976 and de Haas and Mansfeld 2004. Our
concept of element is radically distinct from the ancient Greek concept, as is our concept of
metal: Halleux 1981 explores the complexity underlying metal. Aristotles successors explored the
natures of elements, especially Theophrastus in works (now lost) on water and on metals, as well as two
extant works, On Fire (Coutant 1971) and On Stones (Eichholz 1965). The fusion of these theories with
long-practiced techniques resulted, by the 2nd century BCE, in the discipline called alchemy, although the
precise origins remain disputed. The earliest extant texts are c. 300 CE, for example the papyri edited
in Halleux 1981, or the partially preserved encyclopedia of Zosimos, but they refer to earlier workers, such
as Maria (see Patai 1982). Those texts show us that the alchemists developed many techniques that remain
in use, such as the bain-marie (Patai 1982) or various forms of distillation apparatus (Wilson 2002). The
model of materials that was created by these scientists persisted throughout Antiquity and into the
Renaissance. Antoine Lavoisier (b. 1743d. 1794) first proposed the modern concept of an element in 1783,
and the revived atomic theory of John Dalton (b. 1766d. 1844) was only slowly accepted over the course of
the 19th century.
Bolzan, J. E. 1976. Chemical combination according to Aristotle. Ambix 23.3: 134144.

DOI: 10.1179/amb.1976.23.3.134Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Building on the work of Joachim, Journal of Philology (1903), and based on a close reading of
Aristotles Generation and Corruption, Bolzan argues that Aristotles theory of combination allows for
differences in degree of the principles hot/cold and wet/dry, and that homoimerous compounds contain their
constituents in definite proportions.
Coutant, Victor C. B. 1971. De Igne: A post-Aristotelian view of the nature of fire. Assen, The
Netherlands: Van Gorcum.
Coutant edits this work on the element Fire, which Theophrastus argues is quite distinct from the elements
Air, Water, and Earth, for example, in being generated, dynamic, and variable, in requiring fuel, and in
suffering extinction; Coutant provides a facing-page English translation (oddly, on the left), and a brief
commentary.
de Haas, Frans, and Jaap Mansfeld, eds. 2004. Aristotles On Generation and Corruption I. Oxford:
Clarendon.
The editors offer a dozen papers on the chapters of the first book of Aristotles work on the elements and
their transformations, which primarily focuses on the theoretical underpinnings of elemental transformation;
the essays are primarily philosophical in approach.
Eichholz, D. E. 1965. Theophrastus: De Lapidibus. Oxford: Clarendon.

Theophrastus wrote treatises On Fire (cf. Coutant 1971), On Water (lost), On Winds (cf. Coutant and
Eichenlaub 1975, cited under Meteorologika), On Metals (lost), and this work On Stones, i.e., on substances
that are made from the element Earth (metals are made from Water). Eichholz edits the text, with a facingpage English translation plus extensive introduction and commentary.
Halleux, Robert. 1974. Le problme des metaux dans la science antique. Bibliothque de la Facult
de Philosophie et Lettres de lUniversit de Lige 209. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
Halleux investigates the evolving concept of metal in the Presocratics, Plato, Aristotle, Theophrastus,
Straton of Lampsakos, and a variety of Hellenistic authors. Although Greeks knew about such materials as
antimony, copper, electrum, gold, iron, lead, mercury, silver, and tin, their concepts about these fusible and
malleable substances do not map neatly onto our modern term metal.
Halleux, Robert. 1981. Les alchimistes Grecs. Vol. 1, Papyrus de Leyde: Papyrus de Stockholm:
Fragments de recettes. Collection des Universits de France: Srie grecque 281. Paris: Socit
ddition Les Belles Lettres.
The two lengthy papyri (c. 290 CE) are the most copious extant sources for alchemical recipes; Halleux
provides an edition, facing-page French translation, explanatory notes, and a very useful lexicon of
alchemical terms. The Leiden papyrus contains primarily recipes for silver; the Stockholm papyrus recipes
for gemstones and fabric dyes. Available for purchase online: the series and book.
Patai, Raphael. 1982. Maria the Jewess: Founding mother of alchemy. Ambix 29.3: 177197.
DOI: 10.1179/amb.1982.29.3.177Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation

Most data about Maria derives from Zosimos of Panopolis (c. 300 CE), who cites her work On Furnaces and
Instruments, which included the bain-marie and the tribikos (triple-outlet still); based on those passages,
Patai elucidates her procedures and doctrines: Nature is a unity, humans are analogous to metals, and both
undergo transformation.
Wilson, C. Anne. 2002. Distilling, sublimation, and the four elements: The aims and achievements of
the earliest Greek chemists. In Science and mathematics in ancient Greek culture. Edited by C. J.
Tuplin and T. E. Rihll, 306322. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
Wilson gives a prcis of ancient alchemy, closely based on the texts and the chemical possibilities, focusing
on the Phusika kai Mustika text, and evidences from the Hellenistic period for distillation of water, wine,
pitch, and mercury.
Paradoxography
Hellenistic authors beginning with Callimachus (c. 265 BCE) began to collect accounts of marvels and
wonders of the natural world, which they called paradoxa, thus creating the discipline of paradoxography.
Earlier writers had included natural marvels in their works, such as the marvelous lands and creatures in
the Odyssey, the extreme items from the extremes of the earth in Herodotos (on which see Romm 1992,
cited under Geography), or the anomalous cases included in the Hippocratic corpus, Epidemics, and the
Aristotelian corpus, Problems. The novelty in paradoxography was the gathering of solely marvels, without
any narrative or discursive framework, into self-standing works. Their intent is not very clear but probably
included the desire to show the full range of phenomena in the world as well as to provide difficult or edge
cases to spark further thought. Several works are extant, but each was revised and edited numerous times
in Antiquity, so none of them can be precisely dated or uniquely attributed; three are entirely anonymous,
and the one attributed to Aristotle cannot be earlier than c. 250 BCE. Those uncertainties, of intent, content,
and origin, probably explain why little work has been done on these texts. Giannini 1966 provides an edition
of the corpus, and a survey of the works is provided in Giannini 1964. A more recent surveySchepens and
Delcroix 1996attempts an analysis of the characteristics of the genre. Dorandi 1999, a careful edition of
Antigonus, makes some of the problems of attribution and text clear.
Dorandi, Tiziano, ed. 1999. Antigone de Caryste: Fragments. Collection des Universits de France:
Srie grecque 393. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
Dorandi edits, and provides a facing-page French translation of, the fragments most certainly attributable to
the 3rd-century BCE writer of biographies and art history; he discusses the attribution to this man of
homonyms of various paradoxographical works. Available for purchase online: theseries and book.
Giannini, Alexander. 1964. Studi sulla paradossografia greca II. Acme: Annali della Facolt di lettere
e filosofia dellUniversit degli studi di Milano 17:99140.
Giannini briefly surveys paradoxographers from Callimachus through Bolos, Philostephanos, Archelaos of
Chersonesos, Antigonos of Carystos, Myrsilos, Philon of Heraclea, and many others to the Imperial era, and
includes the historians Ephoros and Theopompos.
Giannini, Alexander, ed. 1966. Paradoxographorum Graecorum Reliquiae. Classici Grecie Latini 3.
Milan: Istituto Editoriale Italiano.
Giannini edits and provides a facing-page Latin translation of the fragments and texts of paradoxographers,
especially the longer texts, attributed to Antigonos (pp. 32109), Apollonios (120143), and Phlegon (pp.
169220), plus the pseudo-Aristotelian Mirabilia (pp. 221314).
Schepens, Guido, and Kris Delcroix. 1996. Ancient paradoxography. In La letteratura di consumo nel
mondo Greco-Latino. Edited by Oronzo Pecere and Antonio Stramaglia, 373460. Cassino, Italy:
Universit degli Studi di Cassino.
The authors delineate the salient characteristics of paradoxogrphy: wonders that are reliably attested
(therefore attributed to an authority), often excerpted from longer or fuller works (thus contingent upon
extensive libraries), intended as cases to be studied, and systematically arranged. Paradoxography proper
is Hellenistic, but Herodotos is its grandfather.
Roman Science
Roman science here means science in Latin based on Greek science. (Alternatively, one might classify all
Roman-era science, whether written in Greek or in Latin, as Roman.) By any definition, it is something of
an anomaly. Members of other ancient cultures who encountered Greek science either eschewed it entirely,
or practiced it in Greek. Likewise, outsiders rarely adopted the science of ancient cultures other than the
Greeks. The anomaly of Roman science can be explained by noting two things: that Greek science is far
less bound to specifics of Greek culture than were the sciences of other ancient cultures encountered by the
Romans; and that Roman culture was unusually prone, among ancient cultures that encountered the
Greeks, to assimilate, i.e., bring home and master, the cultural products of its subjected peoples. Roman
culture privileged authorities and centers, founders and origins, plus utility and security. Roman authorities
encountering Greek sciences thus preferred to assimilate what was established as certain, what promoted
their own power, and what served their own ends. Thus, some sciences were scarcely assimilated, such as
mathematics, optics, and harmonics; others were adopted in partial ways, such as astrology (for its alleged
predictive value) and cosmology (for its view of an ordered and hierarchical cosmos), but not so much
astronomy (which merely predicted the positions of orbiting bodies): see Roman Science: Astrology and
Cosmology. Likewise, descriptive geography was useful because territory to be ruled must be known,
whereas mathematical geography was out of scope: see Roman Science: Geography. Those sciences most
fully utilized by the Romans include agronomy, architecture, mechanics, and medicine. In some early cases,
the man of authority assimilated the science by composing a work, e.g., Varro (see Cardauns 2001) or
especially Cato (see Roman Science: Agronomy), but more often the Roman expert is the client of some
man of authority, as, for example, Vitruvius (see Roman Science: Architecture) or Mela (see Roman
Science: Geography) or Musa (see Roman Science: Medicine, Imperial). Foreign wisdom represented a risk
to Romans, since it might undermine their own authority; thus, it must be managed carefully, either by
exclusion, as often for astrology (seeCramer 1954, cited under Roman Science: Astrology and Cosmology),
or by transformation into something that would support Roman ways, as Lucretius attempted to do with
Epicureanism (seeGigon 1978; Melville, et al. 1997; Sedley 1998). Nicolet 1997 surveys some of the ways in
which Romans assimilated various sciences. Rawson 1985, Wallace-Hadrill 1988, and Keyser 2010attempt
to explain the whole phenomenon of Roman assimilation of Greek science. Conversely, Greek writers of the
Roman era, although explicitly continuing the tradition of Greek science, were deeply influenced by their new
context. Thus, many Greek scientific texts of the Roman era reflect to some degree Latin patterns of thought
and argument: Lehoux 2012 studies how scientific writers of the Roman era, primarily Cicero, Seneca,
Ptolemy, and Galen, presented science to themselves and their readers. It is possible to follow him and
categorize all Greek writers of the Roman era as examples of Roman science: see, among others, the
Greek writers Dioscorides in Pharmacy; Galen in Hellenistic, Galen, Byzantine, Heron in Mechanics
Including Pneumatics, Ptolemy in Astronomy,Geography, Harmonics, and Optics; and Soranos
in Gynecology; note also the works by Flemming 2000, cited under Medicine: Gynecology; Grant
1997 and Grant 2000, cited under Medicine: Dietetics and Regimen; and Barton 1994, Gleason
1994 and Swain 2007, cited under Medicine: Physiognomy. (Similarly, Greek writers of the early Byzantine
period can be seen as reflecting later Roman developments, in addition to being seen as building upon the
long Greek tradition.) For scholarly aids, see Scholarly Aids; for journals, see Journals.
Cardauns, Burkhart. 2001. Marcus Terentius Varro: Einfhrung in sein Werk. Heidelberg, Germany:
Winter.
Cardauns knows the work of Varro well, and here he provides a short introduction to all its aspects, including
the agronomy, i.e., the work On Country Matters (De Re Rustica, pp. 1429) and the encyclopedic works
(pp. 7781). Each section provides orienting bibliography and a summary of the content.
Gigon, Olof, ed. 1978. Lucrce: Huit exposs, suivis de discussions. Entretiens sur lAntiquit
classique 24. Vandoeuvres-Geneva, Switzerland: Fondation Hardt.
The Fondation Hardt sponsors resident scholars and symposia, which are published in the
seriesEntretiens available online; this volume focuses on Lucretius, with essays by, e.g., Furley (history of
humanity), Schrijvers (argument by analogy), and Gigon (debt to Ennius).
Keyser, Paul T. 2010. Science. In The Oxford handbook of Roman studies. Edited by Alessandro
Barchiesi and Walter Scheidel, 859881. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199211524.001.0001Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
The Romans uniquely adopted Greek science into their own language, assimilating and exploiting the more
pragmatic results in the fields of agronomy, mechanics, and medicine, either by a wise leader (as Cato) or
under the auctoritas of a patron (as Vitruvius under Augustus), always preferring authoritative founders,
prescriptive answers, and mastery (or exclusion) of foreign wisdom.
Lehoux, Daryn. 2012. What did the Romans know? An inquiry into science and worldmaking.
Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226471150.001.0001Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Lehoux explores the fundamentally ethical universe of Roman thinkers, showing how that assumption
contextualized and formed their knowledge of nature; he focuses on Roman efforts aimed at understanding
and exploring the natural world. Lehoux emphasizes the role of Roman forensic oratory in the presentation
of scientific evidence and theories, but Greek forensic oratory had long been an influence, especially on
Greek medical texts. Available to subscribers online.
Melville, Ronald, Don Fowler, and Peta Fowler. 1997. Lucretius on the nature of the universe. Oxford:
Oxford Univ. Press.
Melville (a retired civil servant) translated Lucretiuss poem as a labor of love, and his translation is
augmented with a brief introduction and notes by the erudite and sensitive Latinists Fowler and Fowler. They
set the work in its sociopolitical and literary context, showing how it negotiates with a wide variety of
antecedents.
Nicolet, Claude, ed. 1997. Les littratures techniques dans lantiquit romaine: Statut, public et
destination, tradition: Sept exposs, suivis de discussions. Entretiens sur lAntiquit Classique 42.
Vandoeuvres-Geneva, Switzerland: Fondation Hardt.
This volume of the Entretiens contains essays by, e.g., Gros (illustrations in Vitruvius), Fleury (mechanics,
primarily in Vitruvius), and De Laine (the genre and political context of the work of Frontinus, an
administrative handbook). Available for purchase online.
Rawson, Elizabeth. 1985. Intellectual life in the late Roman Republic. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ.
Press.
In the two-part work, Rawson first composes a synthesis of the intellectual world of c. 10050 BCE in Rome,
often citing Varro; Part 2 treats various disciplines in turn, e.g., mathematics including optics, harmonics, and
astronomy (but not astrology: chapter 11), medicine (chapter 12), architecture and allied subjects (chapter
13), and geography (chapter 17).
Sedley, David. 1998. Lucretius and the transformation of Greek wisdom. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
Univ. Press.
Sedley studies the origins and structure of Lucretiuss poem: the poet used Epicurus, especially his book On
Nature, rather than more recent Epicureans, and he drew poetic inspiration from Empedocles as an epic and
didactic poet. Lucretius carefully deploys language to stress the universality of his message for his Roman
audience. Available online with subscription.
Wallace-Hadrill, Andrew. 1988. Review article: Greek knowledge, Roman power. Classical
Philology 83.3: 224233.
In an essay-review of Rawson 1985, Wallace-Hadrill argues that Romans were ready to learn from the
Greek wisdom they had pillaged because they understood that knowledge is power, and their absorption of
disciplines was not homogenous; they neglected or despised the mathematical arts of arithmetic, astronomy,
geometry, and music as well as geography and physics. Available to subscribers online.
EDITIONS OF TEXTS
Making the texts of the works available is the first challenge, and the necessary foundation for any reliable
results of the study of ancient Roman science. Moreover, to make the work as widely available as possible,
a good translation, with suitable explanatory commentary, is needed. For works that came to be regarded as
canonical, such as Cato, Celsus, Lucretius, or Varro, good texts have long been available, but for many
works the only edition is very old or not reliable. Likewise, reliable English translations are available only for
some of the texts. The works listed here are exemplary efforts in that direction. The two earliest extant texts
of Roman science, Catos On Agriculture and Lucretiuss On the Nature of Things, are each regarded as
classics and thus have long been available in good editions: for Cato see Mazzarino 1982 and Flach
2005 (cited underRoman Science: Agronomy); for Lucretius see Bailey 1947. Similarly well treated are
Varro On Country Matters (see Flach 19962002) and the imperial-era medical writer Celsus (see Marx
2002); and for Manilius, see Goold 1977 (cited under Roman Science: Astrology and Cosmology). Recent
editions of Late writers of Late Antiquity have appeared in several series: in the Corpus Medicorum
Latinorum series, see Bendz and Pape 19902002; in the Bud series, see Maire 2002; and in the Loeb
series, see Kaster 2011.
Bailey, Cyril. 1947. Lucretius: De rervm natvra libri sex, ed. with prolegomena, critical apparatus,
translation, and commentary. 3 vols. Oxford: Clarendon.
Volume 1 contains a lengthy introduction, the text and facing-page translation, whereas the extensive
commentary fills volumes 23; the work also includes a brief appendix translating the Arabic version of the
Syriac version of a fragment of Theophrastus, Meteorology. Baileys work and text remain standard and
impressive.
Bendz, Gerhard, and Ingeborg Pape. 19902002. Caelii Aureliani Celerum passionum libri III,
Tardarum passionum libri V. 2 vols. Corpus Medicorum Latinorum 6.1. Berlin: Akademie Verlag.
The Berlin academy has been slowly editing the texts of Latin and Greek medicine; the first Latin edition was
Marx, ed. Celsus (Leipzig: Teubner, 1915). This is the most recent Latin text to appear, with facing-page
German translation, and extensive indexes. Caelius Aurelianus (c. 445 CE) translated the Greek of Soranos,
providing numerous citations of earlier medical writers. Available free online: the series; these volumes.
Flach, Dieter. 19962002. Marcus Terentius Varro: Gesprche ber die Landwirtschaft. 3 vols. Texte
zur Forschung 6567. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft.
Flach provides a thorough edition, careful German translation, and extensive commentary. This supersedes
the Bud edition by Heurgon (Vol. 1, 1978) and Guiraud (Vols. 23, 1995, 1997), which in turn superseded
the very old edition in the Loeb (1934). An updated one-volume version appeared (2006), without the
commentary.
Kaster, Robert A., ed. 2011. Macrobius: Saturnalia. 3 vols. Loeb Classical Library 510, 511, 512.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.

The Loeb Library offers pocket-sized editions with facing-page English translation of Greek and Latin texts of
Greek and Roman antiquity; besides Macrobius there are over a dozen other volumes of Roman science,
including agronomists, Celsus, Frontinus, Lucretius, Pliny, and Seneca. This work by Macrobius is an
encyclopedic dialogue retailing obscure data. Available for purchase: the series,volume 1; volume 2;
and volume 3.
Maire, Brigitte. 2002. Gargilius Martialis: Les remdes tirs des lgumes et des fruits. Collection des
universits de France: Srie latine 367. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
This series (often called the Bud) offers editions with facing-page French translation of Greek and Latin
texts of Greek and Roman antiquity; the series includes Boethius, Frontinus, Martianus Capella, Pomponius
Mela, Seneca, Vitruvius, agronomists, astrologers, encyclopedists, and other medical writers. This work by a
North African (c. 245 CE) provides practical remedies based on traditional lore. Available for purchase:
the series and volume.
Marx, Friedrich. 2002. A. Cornelii Celsi quae supersunt. Corpus Medicorum Latinorum 1. Berlin:
Akademie Verlag.
Originally published in 1915. Marx includes the fragments of the lost portions of Celsuss encyclopedia as
well as the whole of the section On Medicine. Despite its age, not yet superseded, although a missing
segment of the text has been found: U. Capitani, Il recupero di un passo di Celso in un codice del De
medicina conservato a Toledo, Maia 26 (1974): 161212. Available free online: the series and volume.
Mazzarino, Antonio. 1982. M. Porci Catonis De Agri Cvltvra. Leipzig: Teubner.

Catos brief work is written in an archaic form of Latin, and the best manuscript was last seen in the 16th
century, so the editor is faced with extra challenges. Cato gives advice both scientific and economic
addressed to the wealthy landowner running a productive country estate. See also Flach 2005 (cited
under Roman Science: Agronomy).
AGRONOMY
Every culture that practices agriculture builds up over time a body of knowledge about the crops they raise
and the factors affecting the raising of those crops. Traditional cultures usually attribute much of the process
to various divinities, as did the early Greeks; but already Hesiod attempts to set forth a list of rules by which
farmers can reliably regulate their activities for a successful harvest. Greeks after Hesiod wrote extensively
about the theory and practice of agriculture; however, essentially every such work is lost and all that remains
is an early Byzantine collection, the Geoponica, which contains bits and pieces of earlier works. The
Romans too built up a body of knowledge, some of which can be perceived in the De Agri Cultura of Cato
(c. 160 BCE); see Boscherini 1970, Astin 2000, and Flach 2005; for additional bibliography, see Suerbaum
2004. When the Romans sacked Carthage in 146 BCE, they made sure to preserve the massive work of
Mago, and they had it translated into Latin; that too is lost, but the deed tells the tale: The Romans were
eager to assimilate knowledge that was possibly useful, and surely Magos data were useful for the new
territory and province of Africa (roughly Tunisia and eastern coastal Algeria) that the Romans then began
to rule and farm. Latin writers in the 2nd and lst centuries BCE (some influenced by the Greek writings that
were then becoming available) were also numerous, and their works are now almost entirely lost, except for
scraps preserved by later authors; these are surveyed in Martin 1971 and edited inSperanza 1971. After
Cato, the earliest extant Roman writer of agronomy was the polymath M. Terentius Varro, whose
work Country Matters explains how he operated his estate; see Cardauns 2001 (cited under Roman
Science) and Martin 1971. Although Vergil is primarily received as a writer of literary works,
his Georgics was composed as an exploration of the science of farming, as Ross 1987 demonstrates. Later
authors continued the tradition, with variation, such as Columella in the middle of the lst century CE (No
2002) and the land surveyors of the 2nd century and later (Campbell 2000).
Astin, Alan E. 2000. Cato the censor. Oxford: Clarendon.

Originally published in 1978. Astin composes a political and social biography of Cato, who reached the
highest ranks of Roman politics, and provides two chapters (9 and 11) on aspects of his work De Agri
Cultura, which conveys his experience running a large farm staffed by slaves, producing olive oil or wine and
operated for profit.
Boscherini, Silvano. 1970. Lingua e scienza greca nel de Agri Cultura di Catone. Rome: Edizioni
dellAteneo.
Despite Catos self-presentation as purely Roman, his work on agriculture extensively exploited Greek
scientific traditions, both for content and for expression. Boscherini provides an extensive yet compact
survey of those, e.g., even Catos notorious encomium of cabbage has a Greek origin (pp. 6378).
Campbell, J. Brian. 2000. The writings of the Roman land surveyors: Introduction, text, translation
and commentary. London: Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies.
Campbell provides an edition and facing-page English translation, with commentary, for the surveyors
(gromatici) who laid out fields: Frontinus (on whom see Roman Science: Architecture), Agennius (c. 400 CE),
Hyginus agrimensor (c. 100 CE), Siculus Flaccus (c. 150 CE), Hyginus gromaticus (c. 200 CE?), and Balbus
(c. 105 CE?), most or all of whom are seldom studied.
Flach, Dieter. 2005. Marcus Porcius Cato: ber den Ackerbau. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner.
Flach argues that Cato deliberately used archaistic Latin, redolent of the Twelve Tables laws, and thus
produces a new edition, with following German translation and brief notes, and modern reconstructed
drawings of his olive press, his wine press, and the structure containing both.
Martin, Ren. 1971. Recherches sur les agronomes Latins et leurs conceptions conomiques et
sociales. Paris: Socit ddition Belles Lettres.
Martin surveys agronomic writings, from the fragmentary authors who preceded Cato, especially Saserna,
through Vergil and Varro to Columella and Pliny. The evolution of agricultural economy and practice, in
particular the growth of grand estates, drove the evolution of the treatises.
No, Eralda. 2002. Il progetto di Columella: Profilo sociale, economico, culturale. Como, Italy:
Edizioni New Press.
No studies the agronomy of Columella from an economic and social outlook, arguing that his relation to
innovation and tradition can be explained on economic grounds and that his intended audience was much
wider than wealthy elites.
Ross, David O., Jr. 1987. Virgils elements: Physics and poetry in the Georgics. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton Univ. Press.
Treating the four books of Vergils Georgics in sequence, Ross shows how Vergil took ownership of the
Greek scientific tradition and popular conceptions so that there is rarely a single source for any specific
datum. The four elements are the basis of the science exploited by Vergil.
Speranza, Felicianus. 1971. Scriptorum Romanorum De Re Rustica Reliquiae. Messina, Italy:

Universit degli Studi.
This rather rare book offers an edition of the fragments of the agronomists who wrote before Varro,
especially the Latin translation commissioned by the Senate of the Carthaginian (Punic) work of Mago.
Suerbaum, Werner. 2004. Cato Censorius in der Forschung des 20. Jahrhunderts: Eine kommentierte
chronologische Bibliographie fr 19001999 nebst systematischen Hinweisen und einer Darstellung
des Schriftstellers M. Porcius Cato (234149 v. Chr.). Hildesheim, Germany: Olms.
Suerbaum provides a thorough and annotated bibliography, collecting works published primarily in classics
venues, and he organizes them by category (works that appear in multiple categories are fully cited only
once).
ARCHITECTURE
The name of this discipline, derived from Greek, is explained as meaning the chief (archi) of the
construction or building (tekto); Vitruvius exploits that notion and presents his work as showing how the
good architect can take charge of all aspects of the work (see especially Book 1.1). By the time of Vitruvius,
Roman culture already had a well-developed tradition of building, especially the roads and the aqueducts. A
notable early road and aqueduct were built in 312 BCE under the authority of Ap. Claudius Caecus (i.e.,
Appius . . .), hence named the Appian Road (Via Appia) and the Appian Aqueduct (Aqua Appia); both
were built under military pressure during an early phase of Romes conquest of Italy. It is unclear how much
Greek (or Etruscan) influence contributed to the design of that system. However, the Aqua Appia was
essentially a subterranean tunnel, such as had been used for hundreds of years all around the
Mediterranean and as built by Eupalinos on Samos (and described by Herodotos); the first raised aqueduct
built by Romans was the Aqua Marcia(144 BCE). The subterranean tunnel style of aqueduct lacked an
inverted siphon, whose principle had first been addressed by Philon, c. 200 BCE (see Mechanics Including
Pneumatics), and was exploited in the aqueduct of Pergamon built under Eumenes II, c. 180 BCE. For
Vitruvius, not only were the techniques of town planning and building construction part of the architects
profession, so also were matters of water supply (his Book 8), the measurement and display of time (Book
9), and machines for use in buildingand in war (Book 10). On the last topic, see also Roman Science:
Mechanics and Metrology. Apparently only Vitruvius saw all these as a unity, or at least no other similarly
comprehensive work is known from Antiquity. Vitruvius has remained a classic especially for those
interested in the artistry of architecture, and many editions and studies are available; for the text,
see Callebat, et al. 19692009; for a translation and commentary, see Rowland and Howe 1999; for a recent
study, see McEwen 2003. A little more than one century after Vitruvius, another Roman, Iulius Frontinus,
composed a work of architecture, in particular on the aqueducts of Rome. This book contains less material
on construction and more on regulation and water flow, and scholars have debated its intent: Peachin
2004 and Rodgers 2004 arrive at differing conclusions.
Callebat, Louis, Marie-Thrse Cam, Philippe Fleury, et al., eds. 19692009. Vitruve: De larchitecture.
Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
This long-interrupted multivolume, multi-editor series was completed after forty years with the appearance of
Volume 5 (each volume covers one of Vitruviuss ten books, which each treat a different topic); Volume 8
(1973) and Volume 9 (1969) are now seriously out of date. This is an edition, with facing-page French
translation, plus extensive and illustrated explanatory notes. Available online for purchase.
McEwen, Indra Kagis. 2003. Vitruvius: Writing the body of architecture. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Argues that Vitruvius intended his work to be the means by which Augustuss body would become congruent
with his domain. The four chapters are: the Angelic body (the form of the book itself), the Herculean body
(Vitruvius himself), the body beautiful (proportion and geometry in architecture), and the body of the
emperor (Augustuss building program and his Prima Porta statue).
Peachin, Michael. 2004. Frontinus and the curae of the curator aquarum. Heidelberger Althistorische
Beitrge und Epigraphische Studien 39. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner.

Peachin argues that Frontinuss work constituted a political pamphlet, advocating cooperation with
Frontinuss administrative reform that all concessions of aqueduct water to individuals should be proper
imperial grants. According to Peachin, such a pamphlet would be more in accord with the typical ad hoc
Roman procedures.
Rodgers, Robert H. 2004. Frontinus: De Aquaeductu Urbis Romae: Edited with introduction and
commentary. Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries 42. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ.
Press.
Iulius Frontinus was appointed by Nerva as curator of the aqueducts, and he wrote this treatise as an aidememoire and for the benefit of his successors in the office, providing history and technical data. Rodgers
provides a new edition and extensive commentary, with tables summarizing technical details (pp. 350358).
Rowland, Ingrid D., and Thomas Noble Howe. 1999. Vitruvius: Ten books on architecture.
Rowland provides the translation and Howe the extensive commentary and lavish and very clear
illustrations. Vitruvius composed his ten books c. 25 BCE. They cover siting, materials, temples in general,
types of temples, public buildings, private buildings, finishing, water, sundials and clocks, and machines (for
building and war). Books 910 extensively exploit Greek material.
ASTROLOGY AND COSMOLOGY
The Romans, like all cultures in the temperate zone, struggled to regulate an annual, i.e., solar, calendar
that contained lunar months; by their own account, they did not solve this problem until Iulius Caesar
introduced in 45 BCE a Greek calendar constructed by Sosigenes on the basis of earlier Greek calendars
created by astronomers in Alexandria, and one that was specialized for the Roman people. Before they
began to grapple with Greek astronomy, little or no evidence exists that they had any special interest in the
planets, and their use of the fixed stars was similar to that recorded for Greeks (e.g., in Hesiod and Aratos)
as markers of agricultural seasons. Among the various schools of Greek thought (see General Overviews:
Surveys), although Lucretius had explained Epicurus in a manner congenial to Romans, most Romans
seem to have found the Stoa, the school of Zeno of Citium, the most congenial. An influential member of
that school in the early lst century BCE was Poseidonios of Apamea, a friend of Cicero, and a strong
advocate of the Stoic doctrines of fate and necessityand of the consequent validity of divination, including
astrology. That early influence, and other factors, resulted in Stoic views of the cosmos and of astrology
dominating at Rome. An account of that influence, and the varying responses at Rome, may be found
in Cramer 1954, although other factors, such as, for example, Nigidius, who is studied in Della Casa 1962,
must be considered. Works on astrology or cosmology in Latin include notably Maniliuss poem explaining
determinism in the cosmos, edited and translated in Goold 1977, Germanicuss translation of Aratoss poem,
in turn edited and translated in Le Boeuffle 1975, and Hyginuss summary of astral mythology, likewise
edited and translated in Le Boeuffle 1983. Two later works of the same sort, but not from a strictly Stoic
point of view, are Apuleiuss translation of the pseudo-Aristotelian On the Cosmos, on which see Harrison
2000, and Censorinuss gift-book, edited inRapisarda 1991 and translated in Parker 2007).
Cramer, Frederick H. 1954. Astrology in Roman law and politics. Memoirs of the American
Cramer provides a comprehensive survey of the growth of astrology in the Hellenistic era and its
transmission to Rome, and he explores its social and political role until the early 3rd century. In Part 2,
Cramer exploits the often-neglected evidence of laws prohibiting astrology. Although outdated in many
details, this remains a useful synthesis.
Della Casa, Adriana. 1962. Nigidio Figulo. Rome: Edizioni dellAteneo.

Della Casa attempts to reconstruct the life and works of this influential but now mysterious thinker, who
according to Cicero revived Pythagoreanism for the Romans, promoted astrology, and seems to have
written works on biology and on meteorologika.
Goold, George P. 1977. Manilius Astronomica. Loeb Classical Library 469. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
Univ. Press.
This earliest extant astrological treatise in Greek or Latin was written by Manilius around 15 CE, and its five
books of hexameters present a Stoic conception of a world bound by fate. Goold edits and provides a
facing-page English translation, with brief notes, and an extensive introductory analysis. Available for
purchase: series; volume.
Harrison, Stephen J. 2000. Philosophical exposition: De Mundo and De Platone. In Apuleius: A Latin
sophist. By Stephen J. Harrison, 174195. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.
Apuleius, among other works, composed (c. 160 CE) a Latin translation of the pseudo-Aristotelian On the
Cosmos, which became very popular in the West during Late Antiquity. Harrison provides a systematic
introduction to the work, its date, structure, and differences from the original. Availableonline for purchase.
Le Boeuffle, Andr. 1975. Germanicus: Les phnomnes dAratos. Collection des universits de
France: Srie latine 219. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
The poem of Aratos was repeatedly translated into Latin, and this is the earliest extant version, by
Germanicus Iulius Caesar (c. 15 CE), adoptive son of Tiberius. This is an edition with facing-page French
translation, plus notes, and an introduction exploring the relation of Germanicuss version to the others;
another exploration of that relation is G. Maurach, Germanicus und sein Arat (1978). Available for
purchase: series; this volume.
Le Boeuffle, Andr. 1983. Hygin: Lastronomie. Collection des universits de France: Srie latine
262. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
Iulius Hyginus (c. 10 BCE), freedman of Augustus, wrote a treatise on agriculture, and this work in four
books: (1) cosmography; (2) legends about constellations, planets, and the Milky Way; (3) description of the
constellations; (4) the topics of Greek spherics. Le Boeuffle edits the work, with facing-page French
translation and extensive introduction and notes. Available for purchase: theseries; this volume.
Parker, Holt N. 2007. The birthday book: Censorinus. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.
Parker translates the work of Censorinus and provides helpful notes; see Rapisarda 1991 for the text.
Rapisarda, Carmelo A. 1991. Censorinus: De die natali Liber ad Q. Caerellium. Edizioni e saggi
universitari di filologia classica 47. Bologna, Italy: Ptron.
Censorinus wrote this book about time, calendars, human growth, and the power of the stars as a birthday
present for his friend in 238 CE, and Rapisarda provides an edition followed by an Italian translation, plus an
extensive commentary on the wide variety of data provided by Censorinus.
ENCYCLOPEDISM
Greek science was marked from its origin by vigorous debates and dissents; although some matters were
generally agreed (the central role of logic, the geocentric model, health as somehow a balance), much was
in dispute, even items that we casually consider to have been agreed. It was therefore characteristic of
Greek writing about science to collect opinions for various purposes, for example as Aristotle does at the
start of many investigations. Theophrastus composed a work,Physical Opinions, that simply listed existing
opinions on many topics; many later writers did the same. Epicurus attempted to summarize all his physical
theories in one long book, On Nature, and some members of the Stoic school appear to have attempted the
same. Romans seeking to assimilate Greek learning were not attracted to the endless debate. Instead, they
sought settled answers and authoritative reliable results. It thus became characteristic for Romans to
compose encyclopedias, summarizing all knowledge on a given topic. Vitruviuss work On
Architectureadvertises itself as the summary of all that the architect needs to know, and already Varro had
attempted to summarize all that was worthwhile in Greek thought in the nine books of his Disciplines, on
grammar, rhetoric, dialectic, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, music, medicine, and architecture:
see Cardauns 2001 (cited under Roman Science). The work of Celsus, On Medicine, constitutes the
surviving books of his encyclopedia, organized approximately on Varros plan: see Schulze
2001 andSpencer 19351938, cited under Roman Science: Medicine, Imperial. The work of Seneca, Natural
Questions, offers an encyclopedic coverage of one topic of Greek science: see Hine 2010. The grandest of
the extant Roman encyclopedias, thirty-six books plus index, covering everything, arranged as if by a
quartermaster, is by the old soldier Pliny, who died in the eruption of Vesuvius while trying to study it and
rescue people; for various forms of analysis of Plinys book, see Beagon 1992, French and Greenaway
1986, and Murphy 2004. The production of encyclopedias by Romans continued through the end of
Antiquity: Ampelius in the 3rd century, edited and translated in Arnaud-Lindet 1993; Martianus Capella
perhaps c. 480 CE, studied in Bovey 2003; Cassiodorus c. 580 CE, translated with notes in Halporn and
Vessey 2004; and the textbook of the Latin Middle Ages, theEtymologies of Isidore of Seville, c. 625 CE,
translated and annotated in Barney, et al. 2006.
Arnaud-Lindet, Marie-Pierre. 1993. Ampelius: Aide-mmoire (Liber memorialis). Collection des

Universits de France, Srie latine 308. Paris: Socit ddition Les Belles Lettres.
Ampelius summarized Roman knowledge c. 180 CE for his student, the later emperor Macrinus (thus
ensuring the survival of the book); it describes the five zones and four elements of the earth (1),
descending from fire, i.e., the stars (23), through air, i.e., the winds (45), to earth (6) and water (7).
Available for purchase: the series; this volume.
Barney, Stephen A., W. J. Lewis, Jennifer A. Beach, and Oliver Berghof. 2006. The etymologies of
Isidore of Seville. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
Isidore wrote an encyclopedia (c. 625 CE) in twenty topical books, organized around etymologies, assuming
that names are keys to natures. It was intended for the educated man who lacked extensive libraries, and it
dominated medieval Western European learning. This is the first complete English translation and comes
with an explanatory introduction. Available online for purchase.
Beagon, Mary. 1992. Roman nature: The thought of Pliny the Elder. Oxford: Clarendon.
Pliny composed the largest extant Roman encyclopedia, published 77 CE. Beagon seeks to view Pliny not
as a mere compiler, but as an author with some outlook and intent, and she sees the unifying principle of his
work as the relationship between nature and the pinnacle of creation, humanity, as Stoicism taught.
Bovey, Muriel. 2003. Disciplinae cyclicae: Lorganisation du savoir dans loeuvre de Martianus
Capella. Polymnia: Studi di Filologia Classica 3. Trieste, Italy: Edizioni Universit di Trieste.
Martianus composed an encyclopedic work (c. 480 CE?) organized as a myth about the marriage of
Philology to the god Mercury; Books 69 concern geometry, arithmetic, astronomy, and harmonics. Bovey
interprets the work as a theological rereading of pagan culture, unifying the human and divine realms via
scholarship.
French, Roger, and Frank Greenaway, eds. 1986. Science in the early Roman Empire: Pliny the Elder,
his sources and influence. Totowa, NJ: Barnes and Noble.

French and Greenaway present a dozen essays on aspects of science in Pliny, e.g., Nutton on medicine,
Scarborough on pharmacy, Morton on plants, Bodson on animals, Healy on minerals and metals, and
Pedersen on astronomy.
Halporn, James W., and Mark Vessey. 2004. Cassiodorus: Institutions of Divine and Secular
Learning, and On the Soul. Liverpool, UK: Liverpool Univ. Press.
Vessey provides the introduction to Halporns annotated translation of the two works; the
encyclopedic Institutions (c. 580 CE) surveys Christian learning in Book 1 and secular learning much more
briefly in Book 2, covering the trivium (grammar, rhetoric, dialectic) and the quadrivium (arithmetic, music,
geormetry, astronomy), all seven declared subordinate to Bible study.
Hine, Harry M. 2010. Lucius Annaeus Seneca: Natural Questions. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.
Senecas book (c. 62 CE) treats topics that formed the ancient discipline, in Greek science, ofmeteorologika:
rivers, weather, winds, earthquakes, meteors and comets, and lightning and thunder, with unusually frequent
citations of predecessors. Hine provides a fresh English translation of the work, with brief notes. Preview
available online.
Murphy, Trevor. 2004. Pliny the Elders Natural History: The empire in the encyclopedia. Oxford:
Oxford Univ. Press.
Murphy analyzes the structure and purpose of Plinys 36+1 book encyclopedia: the prefixed analytical
index facilitated browsing through the thirty-six books of facts arranged like trophies on parade, displaying
Romes hegemony over the geographical world and the world of natural facts. The numerous marvels
illustrate the diverse powers of nature and of Rome over nature.
GEOGRAPHY
Early Romans, like all peoples everywhere, knew well their own neighborhood, but as they expanded their
conquests through the Italian Peninsula and began to tie their empire together with roads, they needed ways
to record and understand their larger land. Conquered land was laid out for retired soldiers in surveyed
grids, but, until the lst century BCE, no hint survives of geography more elaborate than descriptions of trips
taken. In the lst century BCE Cicero briefly considered a geographical work but was defeated by the need
for mathematics. Varro produced a long-lostperiplous of the Mediterranean and provided, there or
elsewhere, geographical data occasionally excerpted by Pliny. Caesar divided Gaul into three regions, laid
out as for conquest, and Sallust included geographical excursuses in his Iugurtha and in his nowfragmentary Histories (one of the excursuses in the Histories was a periplous of the Black Sea). The
Romans had adopted the Greek genre of descriptive geography, including especially the periplous. Early in
the imperial era, Vipsanius Agrippa constructed a map of the new realm: see Grilli 1990. That map remains
a rare exception, and the evidence for Roman geography suggests that Roman conception of space was
primarily hodological, i.e., arranged by routes and paths rather than cartographic, although it is unlikely that
the distinction was absolute: see Brodersen 1995, plus Talbert and Brodersen 2004. A hodological view of
the world could be seen as an advantage for those whose experience and use of space is primarily to reach
known destinations along known routes. The earliest extant Roman geographical book, by Mela, is
a periplous of the entire inhabited world: see Romer 1998. Based on data about early Roman
geography, Nicolet 1991 studies how concepts of space and empire interacted in the early Roman Empire.
In Late Antiquity, and possibly before, Romans createditineraria (itineraries), annotated lists of stopping
places with distances between them; Adams and Laurence 2001 studies the genre, and Talbert
2007 studies an early extant itinerarium. From Late Antiquity we also have the Peutinger map, a
horizontally stretched map of the Roman Empire that seems to be an illustrated version of an itinerary:
see Talbert 2010.
Adams, Colin, and Ray Laurence, eds. 2001. Travel and geography in the Roman Empire. London:
Routledge.
Adams and Laurence present six essays, showing the importance of itineraria: Broderson on the
presentation of geographical knowledge; Salway on itineraria; Laurence on Roman Britain; Kolb on
the cursus publicus (imperial transport system); Coulston on the evidence from Trajans column; and Adams
on travel within Egypt. Available online for purchase.
Brodersen, Kai. 1995. Terra Cognita: Studien zur rmischen Raumerfassung. Spudasmata 59.
Hildesheim, Germany: Olms.
Brodersen studies the ways in which Romans conceived of space and concludes that cartography took
second place to a hodological outlook (i.e., based on routes or itineraries). This is true at all scales and
draws a connection between Roman geography and the methods and practices of thegromatici (as
in Roman Science: Agronomy).
Grilli, Alberto. 1990. La geografia di Agrippa. In Bimillenario di Agrippa. Pubblicazioni dello

Dipartimento di Archeologia, Filologia Classica e loro Tradizioni ns 132. Edited by Aldo CeresaGastaldo, 127146. Genoa, Italy: Universit di Genova.
Vipsanius Agrippa (c. 15 BCE) wrote a book of geography and constructed a world map, which probably
resembled the Peutinger map (see Talbert 2010); Pliny cites his work, for various distances. Grilli studies
what little can be known about Agrippas geography.
Nicolet, Claude. 1991. Space, geography, and politics in the early Roman Empire. Jerome Lectures
19. Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Press.
Translated by Hlne Leclerc from Linventaire du monde: Gographie et politique aux origines de lempire
romain (Paris: Fayard, 1988). Nicolet studies the imperial ideology within the geography found in
Augustuss Res Gestae, Agrippas fragmentary work, the Roman census, and other sources, to elucidate the
awareness by the Romans of the territorial reality of the empire and its representation as a world empire.
Romer, Frank E. 1998. Pomponius Melas description of the world. Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan.
Mela composed three books of descriptive geography (c. 43 CE); they describe the interior coasts of the
Mediterranean and Black Seas and then (Book 3) the exterior coast of the inhabited world (i.e., Eurasia and
Africa), much of which was barely known to Mediterranean peoples. Romer translates this earliest extant
Latin geography into English, with numerous notes.
Talbert, Richard. 2007. Author, audience and the Roman Empire in the Antonine Itinerary.
InHerrschen und Verwalten: Der Alltag der rmischen Administration in der Hohen Kaiserzeit. Klner
historische Abhandlungen 46. Edited by Rudolf Haensch and Johannes Heinrichs, 256270.
Cologne: Bhlau.
This anonymous collection of itineraries was composed c. 300 CE, and Talbert reflects upon the work as a
whole, repetitious yet patchy and disruptively organized. Talbert suggests it was compiled, perhaps from
expense records, for private use, although no explanation so far suggested explains its survival.
Talbert, Richard. 2010. Romes world: The Peutinger map reconsidered. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
Univ. Press.
The map first published by Peutinger is a medieval copy of an early-4th-century CE Roman map that shows
the Roman highways linking towns, in the fashion of an itinerary (and greatly stretched east-west for display
on a wall). Talbert argues that it was probably produced to celebrate Diocletians restoration of peace and
order. Available online for purchase.
Talbert, Richard, and Kai Brodersen, eds. 2004. Space in the Roman world: Its perception and
presentation. Antike Kultur und Geschichte 5. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers.
The editors present five papers that together explore how space was perceived and presented among the
Romans: Geus discusses the work of Eratosthenes and Stckelberger that of Ptolemy in order to set up a
cartographic contrast to the itineraria discussed by Salway, the pilgrims narratives discussed by Hunt, and
the Peutinger map discussed by Talbert.
MECHANICS AND METROLOGY
The skill of the Romans in building is widely recognized and is still visible in their aqueducts, roads, and
walls. Such buildings required, or at least would benefit from having, the use of machines such as cranes,
pulleys, and winches. Plutarch records that when the Romans besieged Syracuse in the late 3rd
century BCE, they were impressed by the ability of the defenders to deploy machines of war. Certainly during
their wars against Pyrrhos in south Italy, as well as against the Carthaginians in Sicily or when Hannibal
came to Italy, it is probable that the Romans found themselves faced with catapults. It thus seems very likely
that their reception and assimilation of Greek mechanical science could have been more eager than for
other sciences. And indeed, in writing about architecture, Vitruvius includes a book on machines as well as
one on clocks, including mechanical devices (plus one on working with water that includes mechanical
water-lifting devices). All three of those books draw heavily on Greek sources. Fleury 1993 explores the
devices of Vitruvius; compare alsoDrachmann 1963 (cited under Mechanics Including Pneumatics), which
devotes some space to Vitruvius. The Roman land surveyors used a pair of simple devices, the libra and
the groma, as well as a Greek device, the dioptra: Lewis 2001 surveys the available evidence on those
devices. Perhaps due to the misfortune of lost texts, no other Latin work on mechanics appears to exist
before the late 4th century, when the mysterious (and anonymous) work On Military Matters (De Rebus
Bellicis) was composed; scholars disagree about its intent and the practicality of the devices described:
see Giardina 1989 and Liebeschuetz 2006. Nevertheless, it is clear that the Romans gladly exploited
catapult technology, and Rihll 2007 provides a good exploration of that story. Related to mechanics is the
task of measuring, whether to weigh a stone for a catapult (or a sack of grain for sale) or to measure the
length of a road (or a portion of a building). Many Greeks wrote works, now mostly lost, detailing
conversions between units. A Latin work on the topic from Late Antiquity takes the form of a poem, and it
provides a rare description from Antiquity of the process of determining density, the discovery of which by
Archimedes is recounted by Vitruvius (the earliest extant account). Geus 2007 provides an edition and
facing-page German translation, with commentary, of the poem.
Fleury, Philippe. 1993. La mcanique de Vitruve. Caen, France: Universit de Caen.

Fleury gives an amply illustrated analytical reading of Vitruvius, Book 10, organized topically, as follows:
first, theoretical mechanics and its fundamental elements and, then, practical mechanics, in seven chapters.
Fleurys practical mechanics consists of civil engineering, water-lifting devices, the watermill, the water
organ, the hodometer, artillery, and siege engines.
Geus, Klaus. 2007. [Remmius Favinus], Gedicht ber Gewichts- und Maeinheiten (Carmen de
ponderibus et mensuris). Oberhaid, Germany: Utopica.
This brief didactic poem of 208 verses is of uncertain date (Geus says 6th c., but it could be much earlier,
and Geus tentatively suggests 350400 CE) and describes measures of weight and volume, then the
method of determining specific gravity using a balance and immersion.
Giardina, Andrea, ed. 1989. Le cose della guerra: De rebus bellicis. Milan: Fondazione Lorenzo Valla.
The anonymous treatise on machines (c. 370 CE) proposes various reforms, including to military machines,
often argued to be fantastical. Giardina edits the text, with facing-page Italian translation, and provides color
plates of the manuscript illustrations plus a commentary. Noteworthy is that the author from Late Antiquity is
explicitly proposing innovations.
Lewis, M. J. T. 2001. Surveying instruments of Greece and Rome. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ.
Press.
Lewis explores the range of devices constructed in antiquity for surveying; most of the data derive from
Roman sources, although the sole complete extant text is Herons Dioptra (a Greek text of the 1st
century CE). The primary devices are the dioptra, the two Roman devices libra and groma, and the
hodometer (in Vitruvius). Practical applications included the construction of roads, aqueducts, and tunnels.
Liebeschuetz, J. H. W. G. 2006. Realism and phantasy: The Anonymous de rebus bellicis and its
afterlife. In Decline and change in late antiquity: Religion, barbarians and their historiography. Edited
by J. H. W. G. Liebeschuetz. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate.
Liebeschuetz argues that the treatise is a playful treatment of genuine problems (the proposals for financial
and military reform are trite or else vague), and the author introduces the mechanics proposals to relieve
boredom. It is neither a technical manual nor an introduction to military science but a book of very
imaginative marvels. Reprinted from The Roman and Byzantine Army in the East, edited by Edward
Dabrowa (Cracow, Poland: Drukarnja Uniwersytetu Jagielloskiego, 1994), pp. 119139.
Rihll, Tracey. 2007. The catapult: A history. Yardley, PA: Westholme.

Rihll traces the history of the Greco-Roman catapult to 600 CE, based closely on the sources and
archaeology. Rihll grants more to development and use than most historians of science or technology and
suggests several new views, e.g., that the one-armed catapult was a 4th-centuryBCE invention that preceded
the classic two-armed torsion catapult.
MEDICINE, IMPERIAL
Early Roman medicine, like early Greek medicine, was likely composed of traditional remedies and charms
or prayers. Every culture discovers plants that are believed to heal certain ailments, and such simple
remedies surely existed in Italy. Moreover, early Romans surely practiced simple gross restorative surgeries:
replacing displaced bones, removing foreign objects, and retaining leaking blood. All of these interventions,
and whatever else was practiced, is known to have been the province of the man of authority, i.e.,
respectively, the leader of the army or the paterfamilias (head of the household). It seems likely that
beginning in the 3rd century BCE, during their wars against the Greeks of south Italy and then of Syracuse,
the Romans would have encountered Greek doctors and possibly used their services. Pliny does record that
the first city-doctor of Rome was hired at the end of the 3rd century. Catos On Agriculture emphasizes his
preference for native Roman remedies dispensed under the authority of the paterfamilias, and Pliny records
that Cato stridently warned his son to avoid the murderous Greek doctors. By c. 100 BCE, when Asklepiades
of Bithynia was practicing in Rome (see Vallance 1990, cited under Medicine: Hellenistic, Galen, Byzantine),
Greek medicine was the preferred medicine. Fragments of Latin writers from the lst century BCE attest to a
growing study of Greek medicine by Romans (e.g., Musa, see Michler 1993), and the two earliest extant
Latin works on medicine, Celsuss eight books from his encyclopedia (see Spencer 19351938 and Schulze
2001; for the edition, see Marx 2002, cited under Roman Science: Editions of Texts), and Scriboniuss brief
handbook of pharmaceutical recipes, edited in Sconocchia 1993, both confirm that impression. Several
scholars have written useful surveys of Roman medicine: seeScarborough 1976, Jackson 1988, and Cruse
2004. The papers in Mudry and Pigeaud 1991 provide insights on a variety of specific issues in Roman
medicine of this era.
Cruse, Audrey. 2004. Roman medicine. Stroud, UK: Tempus.

Cruse surveys the social and material context of Roman medicine, with copious images (more than thirty in
color), exploiting archaeological evidence primarily from Britain, in eight chapters: two on Greek
antecedents; one on materia medica; one on aqueducts, sewers, baths, and hospitals; two on religious and
medical healing, respectively; one on the palaeopathology of Romans; and one on the Roman doctors.
Jackson, Ralph. 1988. Doctors and diseases in the Roman Empire. Norman: Univ. of Oklahoma
Press.
Jackson offers a topical survey of Roman medicine, with an archaeological imprint, bringing material
evidence to bear on regimen, doctors, gynecology, military medicine, magic, and death. Translated extracts
and numerous photographs supplement one another to produce an informative narrative whose
chronological focus is the lst century BCE to the lst century CE.
Michler, Markwart. 1993. Principis medicus: Antonius Musa. In Aufstieg und Niedergang der
rmischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung II: Principat. Vol.
37.1. Edited by Hildegard Temporini, 757785. Berlin: De Gruyter.
Musa was a student or follower of Asklepiades (c. 105 BCE), who, like the latter, typically prescribed baths,
mild diets, and mild medicines and who thus saved the sickly Augustus in 23 BCE. Michler surveys what can
be known of his life and medical practice. Available online for purchase.
Mudry, Philippe, and Jackie Pigeaud, eds. 1991. Les coles mdicales Rome. Universit de
Lausanne: Publications de la Facult des Lettres 33. Geneva, Switzerland: Librairie Droz.
Mudry and Pigeaud edit eighteen essays on Roman medicine from a conference (in French, English, and
Italian), a minority on Latin medicine in Late Antiquity. See especially Pigeaud on the foundations of
Methodist theory, Capitani on the short-lived Pythagorean school of the vegetarian Sextius at Rome, and
Scarborough on Methodist pharmaceutics.
Scarborough, John. 1976. Roman medicine. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Univ. Press.
Originally published in 1969. This amply illustrated, still standard, and valuable survey explores Greek
antecedents, Cato and medical encyclopedists, and the pragmatic deployment of medicine in the Roman
realm; four appendixes broaden the focus to, e.g., veterinary medicine. Scarborough seeks the Roman view
of medicine, and his interpretations are founded on a good knowledge of the medical data.
Schulze, Christian. 2001. Celsus. Studienbcher Antike 6. Hildesheim, Germany: Olms.

Schulze concisely surveys Celsuss books on medicine, including his preliminary sketch of medical history,
his four books on regimen (including remarks on anatomy), two books on pharmacy, and two books on
surgery. Schulze appends a bibliography of 512 items (pp. 97150), indexed by an outline.
Sconocchia, Sergio. 1993. Lopera di Scribonio Largo e la letteratura medica del 1 sec. d.C.
InAufstieg und Niedergang der rmischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der
neueren Forschung II: Principat. Vol. 37.1. Edited by Hildegard Temporini, 843922. Berlin: De
Gruyter.
Sconocchia, who has edited Scribonius for Teubner (1983), here surveys his presence and role in
contemporary Latin medicine, especially in Celsus (c. 25 CE), and his work as a reflection of actual practice.
(There is also a long section on his use of Latin.) Available online for purchase.
Spencer, Walter G. 19351938. Celsus: On Medicine. 3 vols. Loeb Classical Library 292, 304, 336.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.

This is the most recent translation of Celsus into English (no longer under copyright, see online). Celsus
composed an encyclopedia on various topics, including five books on agriculture, and the only surviving
portion, these eight books on medicine, which cover dietetics, pharmacology, and surgery; he is more
explicit in his citation of sources than are most ancient authors. Available for purchase online: series; volume
1; volume 2; volume 3.
MEDICINE, LATE ANTIQUE
A sufficient number of significant Latin texts on medicine from Late Antiquity exist to warrant their own
section. By the early 4th century CE the Roman Empire was significantly Christian; by the end of the century,
the urban areas were predominantly Christian. The Christian reaction to, reception of, and assimilation of,
Greco-Roman culture, including science, constitute a vast and complex topic. But these texts indicate that in
the Latin West, medical science continued, albeit in altered form. (Similar conclusions can be reached about
Greek medicine in the Greek eastern area of the empire.) The contributors to Langslow and Maire
2010 study many aspects of this period and its transformation of medicine. The transformation can already
be seen in the (probably pagan) writer Gargilius Martialis of the mid-3rd century CE: see Riddle 1984. One of
the major texts of late Latin medicine is Caelius Aurelianuss large work, which is in part (and perhaps
mainly) a translation of the Greek of Soranos of Ephesos (c. 120 CE): Caelius is edited in Bendz and Pape
19902002 (cited under Roman Science: Editions of Texts); he is translated in Drabkin 1950; and he is
studied by the contributors to Mudry 1999 and in van der Eijk 1999. Another Latin doctor of this era was
Theodorus Priscianus, who composed a pharmaceutical handbook: see Fraisse 2003. Evidence exists of an
active school of medicine in Ravenna, one of whose representatives was Agnellus, whose teaching, like that
of the scholars in Alexandria (see Sorabji 1990, cited under Surveys), involved composing commentaries on
the great figures of the past, in this case, Galen: see Palmieri 2005. Veterinary medicine played a significant
role in the late Latin medical texts, notably the work of Pelagonius, edited in Fischer 1980. (On veterinary
medicine, see also Medicine: Veterinary.)
Drabkin, Israel E. 1950. Caelius Aurelianus: On Acute Diseases and on Chronic Diseases. Chicago:
Univ. of Chicago Press.
Drabkin edits and on the facing pages provides the sole English translation of this Latin translation (and
adaptation?) of Soranuss two lost Greek works from Late Antiquity on diseases acute (sudden and shortterm) and chronic (enduring); the edition is superseded by Bendz and Pape 19902002(cited under Roman
Science: Editions of Texts).
Fischer, Klaus-Dietrich, ed. 1980. Pelagonii Ars veterinaria. Leipzig: Teubner.

The book of Pelagonius (c. 375 CE) is the earliest extant Latin work specifically on horse medicine; it takes
the form of thirty-five letters to friends, each on a specific topic, with pharmacological (not surgical)
remedies. Fischer edits this and provides a linguistic and medical commentary.
Fraisse, Anne. 2003. Mdecine rationnelle et irrationnelle dans le livre I des Euporista de Thodore
Priscien. In Rationnel et irrationnel dans la mdecine ancienne et mdival. Centre Jean Palerne:
Mmoires 26. Edited by Nicoletta Palmieri, 183192. Saint-tienne, France: Universit de Sainttienne.
Theodorus Priscianus (c. 370 CE) adheres to the Greek Rational school of medicine: He cites and exploits
doctors such as Hippocrates and Galen, explains diseases using humors, and prescribes interventions such
as purges, diet, and venesection. However, he also prescribes many quasi-magical drugs. (The volume also
offers five essays on Galen.)
Langslow, David, and Brigitte Maire, eds. 2010. Body, disease and treatment in a changing world:
Latin texts and contexts in ancient and medieval medicine. Lausanne, Switzerland: ditions BHMS.
Langslow and Maire edit twenty-six essays on three topics: medical language, Latin transformations of
earlier texts, and specific sets of medical terms; most focus on Latin works of Late Antiquity, especially
Maire on Mustio the gynecologist, Cronier on the alphabetic Latin version of Dioscorides, and Gitton-Ripoll
on the preparation of medicines. Available online.
Mudry, Philippe, ed. 1999. Le trait des maladies aigus et des maladies chroniques de Caelius
Aurelianus: Nouvelles approches. Nantes, France: Universit de Nantes.
Mudry presents eleven papers on Caelius and his work, including, e.g., Stok on the structure and sources of
his works, van der Eijk on his Methodism, and Gourevitch on diseases of women; connections with his
source, Soranus, are explored throughout.
Palmieri, Nicoletta, ed. 2005. Agnellus de Ravenne: Lectures galniques: Le De pulsibus ad

tirones. Centre Jean Palerne: Mmoires 28. Saint-tienne, France: Universit de Saint-tienne.
Agnellus taught and practiced medicine at Ravenna (c. 605 CE), emphasizing both preventative and curative
interventions. Palmieri edits (with the assistance of Ivan Garofalo), and provides a facing-page French
translation (oddly, on the left), and extensive commentary, for Agnelluss commentary, which oscillates
between theory and practice, i.e., his instructions on pulse-lore.
Riddle, John M. 1984. Gargilius Martialis as a medical writer. Journal of the History of Medicine and
Allied Sciences 39.4: 408429.
DOI: 10.1093/jhmas/39.4.408Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation
Gargilius wrote a partly surviving work on remedies from readily available plants, e.g., radish or
pomegranate, addressed to wealthy landowners: see Maire 2002, cited under Roman Science: Editions of
Texts. Riddle here studies what can be known of the life and work of Gargilius, who emphasized experiential
medicine in contrast to Greek theory.
van der Eijk, Philip J. 1999. Antiquarianism and criticism: Forms and functions of medical
doxography in Methodism (Soranus and Caelius Aurelianus). In Ancient histories of medicine.
Edited by Philip J. van der Eijk, 397452. Studies in Ancient Medicine 20. Leiden, The Netherlands:
Brill.
Members of the Methodist school of medicine were active medical historians and yet also lacked respect for
authority and valued independence of mind; moreover, their official doctrines were in a constant state of
revision. That fact is clarified by this study of the two extant Methodist writers. Available for purchase:
the series and volume.

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General Overviews

ORIGINS AND EARLY DEVELOPMENT

Gregory, Andrew. 2007. Ancient Greek cosmogony. London: Duckworth.

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Association Guillaume Bud and Socit international de bibliographie classique. 1924.Lanne

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Zalta, Edward N., ed. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

Archive for History of Exact Sciences. 1960.

Bulletin of the History of Medicine. 1933.

Journal for the History of Astronomy. 1970.

Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences. 1946.

SCIAMVS: Sources and Commentaries in Exact Sciences. 2000.

Berggren, J. L. 1984. History of Greek mathematics: A survey of recent research. Historia

Cuomo, Serafina. 2001. Ancient mathematics. New York: Routledge.

Obbink, Dirk. 2006. Anubio: Carmen astrologicum elegiadum. Leipzig: Teubner.

Pingree, David E. 1976. Dorothei Sidonii Carmen Astrologicum: Interpretationem Arabicam in

Dicks, D. R. 1960. Geographical fragments of Hipparchus. University of London Classical Studies 1.

Freeland, Cynthia A. 1990. Scientific explanation and empirical data in

Taub, Liba Chaia. 2003. Ancient meteorology. London: Routledge.

Mechanics Including Pneumatics

Whitehead, David. 2010. Apollodorus Mechanicus: Siege-matters (). Historia

Whitehead, David, and P. H. Blyth. 2004. Athenaeus Mechanicus: On Machines. Historia

Biology (Plants and Animals)

Littr, mile. 18391861. Oeuvres compltes dHippocrate. 10 vols. Paris: Baillire.

Jouanna, Jacques. 1999. Translated by M. B. DeBevoise. Hippocrates. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins

HELLENISTIC, GALEN, BYZANTINE

Nutton, Vivian. 2013. Ancient medicine. 2d ed. London: Routledge.

DIETETICS AND REGIMEN

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Zucker, Arnaud. 2006. La physiognomonie antique et le langage animal du corps. Rursus1.58.

Doyen-Higuet, Anne-Marie. 2006. Lepitom de la collection dhippiatrie grecque: Histoire du texte,

Doyen-Higuet, Anne-Marie. 2012. Contribution ltude du lexique hippiatrique grec. In Le cheval,

Bolzan, J. E. 1976. Chemical combination according to Aristotle. Ambix 23.3: 134144.

Eichholz, D. E. 1965. Theophrastus: De Lapidibus. Oxford: Clarendon.

DOI: 10.1179/amb.1982.29.3.177Save Citation Export Citation E-mail Citation

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Mazzarino, Antonio. 1982. M. Porci Catonis De Agri Cvltvra. Leipzig: Teubner.

Astin, Alan E. 2000. Cato the censor. Oxford: Clarendon.

Speranza, Felicianus. 1971. Scriptorum Romanorum De Re Rustica Reliquiae. Messina, Italy:

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ASTROLOGY AND COSMOLOGY

Della Casa, Adriana. 1962. Nigidio Figulo. Rome: Edizioni dellAteneo.

Arnaud-Lindet, Marie-Pierre. 1993. Ampelius: Aide-mmoire (Liber memorialis). Collection des

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Grilli, Alberto. 1990. La geografia di Agrippa. In Bimillenario di Agrippa. Pubblicazioni dello

MECHANICS AND METROLOGY

Fleury, Philippe. 1993. La mcanique de Vitruve. Caen, France: Universit de Caen.

Rihll, Tracey. 2007. The catapult: A history. Yardley, PA: Westholme.

Cruse, Audrey. 2004. Roman medicine. Stroud, UK: Tempus.

Schulze, Christian. 2001. Celsus. Studienbcher Antike 6. Hildesheim, Germany: Olms.

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MEDICINE, LATE ANTIQUE

Fischer, Klaus-Dietrich, ed. 1980. Pelagonii Ars veterinaria. Leipzig: Teubner.

Palmieri, Nicoletta, ed. 2005. Agnellus de Ravenne: Lectures galniques: Le De pulsibus ad

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