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94-778: Many of these Greco-Roman sympathizers to Hellenistic Judaism, which had a monotheistic or henotheistic Pagan background, were worshippers of Caelus (the Roman name/equivalent to Yahweh ). Some modern scholars of Judaic studies, such as A. Thomas Kraabel , believe the God-fearers named in the New Testament (such as Cornelius the Centurion ) to be a fictional invention of the Acts of the Apostles . More generally, God-fearing has come to mean someone who

188-588: A major focal point for the development of Christian thought . The Musaeum , or Shrine to the Muses, which included the library and school, was founded by Ptolemy I . The institution was from the beginning intended as a great international school and library. The library, eventually containing more than a half million volumes, was mostly in Greek. It was intended to serve as a repository for every work of classical Greek literature that could be found. The genre of bucolic poetry

282-938: A philosophical treatise, the Diatribai , based on the teachings of his mentor Epictetus . Best known of the late Greek historians to modern readers is Plutarch of Chaeronea , who died about AD 119. His Parallel Lives of great Greek and Roman leaders has been read by every generation since the work was first published. His other surviving work is the Moralia , a collection of essays on ethical, religious, political, physical, and literary topics. During later times, so-called " commonplace books ," usually describing historical anecdotes, became quite popular. Surviving examples of this popular genre include works such as Aulus Gellius 's Attic Nights , Athenaeus of Naucratis 's Deipnosophistae , and Claudius Aelianus 's De Natura Animalium and Varia Historia . The physician Galen lived during

376-513: A voluminous collection of biographies of nearly every Greek philosopher who ever lived. Unfortunately, Diogenes Laërtius often fails to cite his sources and many modern historians consider his testimony unreliable. Nonetheless, in spite of this, he remains the only available source on the lives of many early Greek philosophers. His book is not entirely without merit; it does preserve a tremendous wealth of information that otherwise would not have been preserved. His biography of Epicurus , for instance,

470-548: A way to express the monotheistic god of Judaism ( Yahweh ). Juvenal identifies the Jewish God with Caelus as the highest heaven (summum caelum) , saying that Jews worship the numen of Caelus; Petronius uses similar language. Florus has a passage describing the Holy of Holies in the Temple of Jerusalem as housing a "sky" (caelum) under a golden vine. A golden vine, perhaps

564-448: Is a systematic account of creation and of the gods. The writings of Homer and Hesiod were held in extremely high regard throughout antiquity and were viewed by many ancient authors as the foundational texts behind ancient Greek religion ; Homer told the story of a heroic past, which Hesiod bracketed with a creation narrative and an account of the practical realities of contemporary daily life. Lyric poetry received its name from

658-487: Is certain that their roots reach far back before his time (see Homeric Question ). The Iliad is a narrative of a single episode spanning over the course of a ten-day-period from near the end of the ten years of the Trojan War. It centers on the person of Achilles , who embodied the Greek heroic ideal. The Odyssey is an account of the adventures of Odysseus , one of the warriors at Troy . After ten years fighting

752-663: Is described in the New Testament as "a worshipper of God" ( Acts 16:14 ); the Roman soldier Cornelius and the Ethiopian eunuch are also considered by modern scholars as God-fearers who converted to Christianity. In Paul's message of salvation through faith in Christ as opposed to submission under the Mosaic Law, many God-fearers found an essentially Jewish group to which they could belong without

846-622: Is honestly religious. Since the mid-1980s, a growing number of scholars of Judaic studies and history of Judaism became interested in the subject of God-fearers and their relationship with Hellenistic Judaism and early Christianity . According to the popular opinion, Jews that lived in the Greco-Roman world during the Hellenistic and Roman period were not involved in active missionary efforts of mass conversion among Pagans , although many historians disagree. As Jews emigrated and settled in

940-455: Is known for certain about the life of the philosopher Pythagoras of Samos and no writings by him have survived to the present day, but an impressive corpus of poetic writings written by his pupil Empedocles of Acragas has survived, making Empedocles one of the most widely attested Pre-Socratic philosophers . A large number of fragments written by the philosophers Heraclitus of Ephesus and Democritus of Abdera have also survived. Of all

1034-512: Is known mainly from later summaries. He is credited with being the first person to measure the Earth's circumference. Much that was written by the mathematicians Euclid and Archimedes has been preserved. Euclid is known for his Elements , much of which was drawn from his predecessor Eudoxus of Cnidus . The Elements is a treatise on geometry, and it has exerted a continuing influence on mathematics. From Archimedes several treatises have come down to

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1128-488: Is merely a fictional representation intended to expound Plato's own opinions who has very little to do with the historical figure of the same name. The debate over the extent to which Plato's portrayal of Socrates represents the actual Socrates's ideas is known as the Socratic problem . Plato expressed his ideas through dialogues, that is, written works purporting to describe conversations between different individuals. Some of

1222-444: Is sometimes thought to have been written by Euripides' son, or to have been a posthumous reproduction of a play by Euripides. Euripides pushed the limits of the tragic genre and many of the elements in his plays were more typical of comedy than tragedy. His play Alcestis , for instance, has often been categorized as a " problem play " or perhaps even as a work of tragicomedy rather than a true tragedy due to its comedic elements and

1316-517: Is traditionally attributed to Aeschylus, and Rhesus , which is traditionally attributed to Euripides, are, however, questioned. There are seven surviving tragedies attributed to Aeschylus. Three of these plays, Agamemnon , The Libation-Bearers , and The Eumenides , form a trilogy known as the Oresteia . One of these plays, Prometheus Bound , however, may actually be the work of Aeschylus's son Euphorion . Seven works of Sophocles have survived,

1410-578: Is widely considered to be one of the most important and influential philosophical thinkers of all time. The first sentence of his Metaphysics reads: "All men by nature desire to know." He has, therefore, been called the "Father of those who know." His medieval disciple Thomas Aquinas referred to him simply as "the Philosopher". Aristotle was a student at Plato's Academy , and like his teacher, he wrote dialogues, or conversations. However, none of these exist today. The body of writings that have come down to

1504-454: The Dionysiaca , the longest surviving epic poem from antiquity. He also wrote a poetic paraphrase of The Gospel of John . Nonnus probably lived sometime during the late fourth century AD or early fifth century AD. The historian Polybius was born about 200 BC. He was brought to Rome as a hostage in 168. In Rome he became a friend of the general Scipio Aemilianus. He probably accompanied

1598-448: The Attic dialect . Choral performances were a common tradition in all Greek city-states. The Athenians credited a man named Thespis with having invented drama by introducing the first actor, whose primary purpose was to interact with the leader of the chorus. Later playwrights expanded the number of actors to three, allowing for greater freedom in storytelling. In the age that followed

1692-507: The Etruscan discipline of divination, Caelus Nocturnus was placed in the sunless north opposite to Sol to represent the polar extremities of the axis (see cardo ). This alignment was fundamental to the drawing of a templum (sacred space) for the practice of augury . The name Caelus occurs in dedicatory inscriptions in connection to the cult of Mithras . The Mithraic Caelus is sometimes depicted allegorically as an eagle bending over

1786-643: The Golden Fleece from the land of Colchis . The poet Aratus wrote the hexameter poem Phaenomena , a poetic rendition of Eudoxus of Cnidus 's treatise on the stars written in the fourth century BC. During the Hellenistic period , the Old Comedy of the Classical Era was replaced by New Comedy . The most notable writer of New Comedy was the Athenian playwright Menander . None of Menander's plays have survived to

1880-500: The Greco-Persian Wars , the awakened national spirit of Athens was expressed in hundreds of tragedies based on heroic and legendary themes of the past. The tragic plays grew out of simple choral songs and dialogues performed at festivals of the god Dionysus . In the classical period, performances included three tragedies and one pastoral drama, depicting four different episodes of the same myth. Wealthy citizens were chosen to bear

1974-655: The Ibis , which was directed against his former pupil Apollonius. He also compiled a prose treatise entitled the Pinakes , in which he catalogued all the major works held in the Library of Alexandria. The Alexandrian poet Apollonius of Rhodes is best known for his epic poem the Argonautica , which narrates the adventures of Jason and his shipmates the Argonauts on their quest to retrieve

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2068-591: The Muses , though this was probably a mere translation of Ouranos from a Greek source. Caelus substituted for Uranus in Latin versions of the myth of Saturn ( Cronus ) castrating his heavenly father, from whose severed genitals, cast upon the sea, the goddess Venus ( Aphrodite ) was born. In his work On the Nature of the Gods , Cicero presents a Stoic allegory of the myth in which

2162-753: The Renaissance , European authors in general, including Dante Alighieri , William Shakespeare , John Milton , and James Joyce , have all drawn heavily on classical themes and motifs. This period of Greek literature stretches from Homer until the fourth century BC and the rise of Alexander the Great . The earliest known Greek writings are Mycenaean , written in the Linear B syllabary on clay tablets. These documents contain prosaic records largely concerned with trade (lists, inventories, receipts, etc.); no real literature has been discovered. Michael Ventris and John Chadwick ,

2256-482: The Roman provinces of the Empire, Judaism became an appealing religion to a number of Pagans, for many reasons; God-fearers and proselytes that underwent full conversion were Greeks or Romans , and came from all social classes : they were mostly women and freedmen ( liberti ), but there were also artisans , soldiers and few people of high status, like patricians and senators . Despite their allegiance to Judaism,

2350-672: The Successors (especially the Ptolemies) and under Roman rule. Romans of literary or rhetorical inclination looked to Greek models, and Greek literature of all types continued to be read and produced both by native speakers of Greek and later by Roman authors as well. A notable characteristic of this period was the expansion of literary criticism as a genre, particularly as exemplified by Demetrius, Pseudo-Longinus and Dionysius of Halicarnassus. The New Testament , written by various authors in varying qualities of Koine Greek also hails from this period,

2444-483: The "world" or cosmos , along with terra (earth), mare (sea), and aer (air). In his work on the cosmological systems of antiquity, the Dutch Renaissance humanist Gerardus Vossius deals extensively with Caelus and his duality as both a god and a place that the other gods inhabit. The ante-Nicene Christian writer Lactantius routinely uses the Latin theonyms Caelus, Saturn, and Jupiter to refer to

2538-473: The 2nd century AD. He was a careful student of anatomy, and his works exerted a powerful influence on medicine for the next 1,400 years. Strabo , who died about AD 23, was a geographer and historian. His Historical Sketches in 47 volumes has nearly all been lost. His Geographical Sketches remains the only existing ancient book covering the whole range of people and countries known to the Greeks and Romans through

2632-749: The Ancient Greek theatre of Miletus, some sitting places seem to have been reserved for the God fearer. In the Hebrew Bible , there is some recognition of Gentile monotheistic worship as being directed toward the God of the Jews . This forms the category of yir’ei HaShem / yir’ei Shamayim ( Hebrew : יראי השם , meaning "Fearers of the Name"/"Fearers of Heaven", " the Name " being a Jewish euphemism for Yahweh , cf. Psalm 115:11 ). This

2726-531: The Ancient Orators , and On the Arrangement of Words . The historians Appian of Alexandria and Arrian of Nicomedia both lived in the second century AD. Appian wrote on Rome and its conquests, while Arrian is remembered for his work on the campaigns of Alexander the Great. Arrian served in the Roman army. His book therefore concentrates heavily on the military aspects of Alexander's life. Arrian also wrote

2820-488: The City Dionysia. Even today, The Frogs still appeals to modern audiences. A commercially successful modern musical adaptation of it was performed on Broadway in 2004. The third dramatic genre was the satyr play . Although the genre was popular, only one complete example of a satyr play has survived: Cyclops by Euripides . Large portions of a second satyr play, Ichneutae by Sophocles, have been recovered from

2914-836: The God-fearers were exempted from paying the " Jewish tax " ( fiscus Judaicus ). Martin Goodman stated that Jews converted non-Jews by passively living by example. Non-Jews were given a choice on how to respond. But he notes that some Jews, like the Pharisees , were mostly interested in converting other Jews. The class of God-fearers existed between the 1st and the 3rd century CE . They are mentioned in Latin and Greek literature , Flavius Josephus ' and Philo 's historical works, rabbinic literature , early Christian writings , and other contemporary sources such as synagogue inscriptions from Diaspora communities ( Palestine , Rome , and Asia Minor ). In

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3008-469: The God-fearers were only "partial" converts, engaged in certain Jewish rites and traditions without taking a step further to actual conversion to Judaism , which would have required full adherence to the 613 Mitzvot (including various prohibitions such as kashrut , circumcision , Shabbat observance, etc.) that were generally unattractive to would-be Gentile (largely Greek) converts. The rite of circumcision

3102-747: The Judaizers that demanded circumcision for Gentile converts , and opposed them; he stressed instead that faith in Christ constituted a New Covenant with God, a covenant which essentially provides the justification and salvation for Gentiles from the harsh edicts of the Mosaic Law , a New Covenant that did not require circumcision (see also Justification by faith , Pauline passages supporting antinomianism , Abrogation of Old Covenant laws ). Lydia of Thyatira , who became Paul's first convert to Christianity in Europe,

3196-757: The New Testament and early Christian writings , the Greek terms God-fearers and God-worshippers are used to indicate those Pagans who attached themselves in varying degrees to Hellenistic Judaism without becoming full converts, and are referred to primarily in the Gospel of Luke ( 7:1–10 ) and more extensively in the Acts of the Apostles, which describes the Apostolic Age of the 1st century . So Paul stood up, and motioning with his hand said: "Men of Israel, and you that fear God (οἱ φοβούμενοι τὸν θεόν), listen". Brethren, sons of

3290-503: The Persian Cyrus expel his brother from the throne, another famous work relating to Persian history is his Cyropaedia . Xenophon also wrote three works in praise of the philosopher Socrates : The Apology of Socrates to the Jury , The Symposium , and Memorabilia . Although both Xenophon and Plato knew Socrates, their accounts are very different. Many comparisons have been made between

3384-460: The Soul , and Rhetoric . By 338 BC all of the Greek city-states except Sparta had been united by Philip II of Macedon . Philip's son Alexander the Great extended his father's conquests greatly. Athens lost its preeminent status as the leader of Greek culture, and it was replaced temporarily by Alexandria , Egypt . The city of Alexandria in northern Egypt became, from the 3rd century BC,

3478-462: The account of the military historian and the account of the poet-philosopher. Many important and influential philosophers lived during the fifth and fourth centuries BC. Among the earliest Greek philosophers were the three so-called " Milesian philosophers ": Thales of Miletus , Anaximander , and Anaximenes . Of these philosophers' writings, however, only one fragment from Anaximander preserved by Simplicius of Cilicia has survived. Very little

3572-489: The author of the book of Acts of the Apostles and the Byzantine Era historian Procopius of Caesarea . A third historian of ancient Greece, Xenophon of Athens , began his Hellenica where Thucydides ended his work about 411 BC and carried his history to 362 BC. Xenophon's most famous work is his book The Anabasis , a detailed, first-hand account of his participation in a Greek mercenary army that tried to help

3666-516: The beginning of Sophocles's career. Oedipus the King , the most famous of the three, was written around 429 BC at the midpoint of Sophocles's career. Oedipus at Colonus , the second of the three plays chronologically, was actually Sophocles's last play and was performed in 401 BC, after Sophocles's death. There are nineteen surviving plays attributed to Euripides . The most well-known of these plays are Medea , Hippolytus , and Bacchae . Rhesus

3760-435: The best-known of these include: The Apology of Socrates , a purported record of the speech Socrates gave at his trial; Phaedo , a description of the last conversation between Socrates and his disciples before his execution; The Symposium , a dialogue over the nature of love ; and The Republic , widely regarded as Plato's most important work, a long dialogue describing the ideal government. Aristotle of Stagira

3854-411: The castration signifies "that the highest heavenly aether, that seed-fire which generates all things, did not require the equivalent of human genitals to proceed in its generative work." For Macrobius , the severing marks off Chaos from fixed and measured Time (Saturn) as determined by the revolving Heavens (Caelum). The semina rerum ("seeds" of things that exist physically) come from Caelum and are

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3948-519: The classical philosophers, however, Socrates , Plato , and Aristotle are generally considered the most important and influential. Socrates did not write any books himself and modern scholars debate whether or not Plato's portrayal of him is accurate. Some scholars contend that many of his ideas, or at least a vague approximation of them, are expressed in Plato's early socratic dialogues . Meanwhile, other scholars have argued that Plato's portrayal of Socrates

4042-532: The distinctions between them were frequently blurred. Among the found papyri , the most frequently found are the works of Homer , in 1680 fragments, Demosthenes , 204 fragments, and Euripides , 170 papyri. At the beginning of Greek literature stand the two monumental works of Homer , the Iliad and the Odyssey . The figure of Homer is shrouded in mystery. Although the works as they now stand are credited to him, it

4136-519: The distinctions in the Acts of the Apostles, it is thought that they did not become gerim tzedekim , which required circumcision , although the evidence across the centuries varies widely and the meaning of the term may have included all kinds of sympathetic Gentiles, proselytes or not. There are also around 300 text references (4th century BCE to 3rd century CE) to a sect of Hypsistarians , some of whom practiced Sabbath and which many scholars see as sympathizers with Judaism related to God-fearers. In

4230-737: The early Archaic period , are the two epic poems the Iliad and the Odyssey , set in an idealized archaic past today identified as having some relation to the Mycenaean era . These two epics, along with the Homeric Hymns and the two poems of Hesiod , the Theogony and Works and Days , constituted the major foundations of the Greek literary tradition that would continue into the Classical , Hellenistic , and Roman periods . The lyric poets Sappho , Alcaeus , and Pindar were highly influential during

4324-516: The early Hellenistic era. The third part takes the story to the beginning of Caesar's wars in Gaul, now France. Dionysius of Halicarnassus lived late in the first century BC. His history of Rome from its origins to the First Punic War (264 to 241 BC) is written from a Roman point of view, but it is carefully researched. He also wrote a number of other treatises, including On Imitation , Commentaries on

4418-426: The early development of the Greek poetic tradition. Aeschylus is the earliest Greek tragic playwright for whom any plays have survived complete. Sophocles is famous for his tragedies about Oedipus , particularly Oedipus the King and Antigone . Euripides is known for his plays which often pushed the boundaries of the tragic genre. The comedic playwright Aristophanes wrote in the genre of Old Comedy , while

4512-410: The elements which create the world. The divine spatial abstraction Caelum is a synonym for Olympus as a metaphorical heavenly abode of the divine, both identified with and distinguished from the mountain in ancient Greece named as the home of the gods. Varro says that the Greeks call Caelum (or Caelus) "Olympus." As a representation of space, Caelum is one of the components of the mundus ,

4606-501: The expense of costuming and training the chorus as a public and religious duty. Attendance at the festival performances was regarded as an act of worship. Performances were held in the great open-air theater of Dionysus in Athens. The poets competed for the prizes offered for the best plays. All fully surviving Greek tragedies are conventionally attributed to Aeschylus , Sophocles or Euripides . The authorship of Prometheus Bound , which

4700-473: The fact that it has a happy ending. Like tragedy, comedy arose from a ritual in honor of Dionysus , but in this case the plays were full of frank obscenity, abuse, and insult. At Athens , the comedies became an official part of the festival celebration in 486 BC, and prizes were offered for the best productions. As with the tragedians, few works remain of the great comedic writers. The only complete surviving works of classical comedy are eleven plays written by

4794-531: The fact that it was originally sung by individuals or a chorus accompanied by the instrument called the lyre . Despite the name, the lyric poetry in this general meaning was divided in four genres, two of which were not accompanied by cithara , but by flute. These two latter genres were elegiac poetry and iambic poetry . Both were written in the Ionic dialect . Elegiac poems were written in elegiac couplets and iambic poems were written in iambic trimeter . The first of

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4888-407: The family of Abraham, and those among you that fear God (ἐν ὑμῖν φοβούμενοι τὸν θεόν), to us has been sent the message of this salvation. Judaizing Gentiles and God-fearers are considered by modern scholars to be of significant importance to the growth of early Christianity ; they represented a group of Gentiles who shared religious ideas and practices with Jews, to one degree or another. However,

4982-554: The figure of Augustus . As Caelus Nocturnus , he was the god of the night-time, starry sky. In a passage from Plautus , Nocturnus is regarded as the opposite of Sol , the Sun god. Nocturnus appears in several inscriptions found in Dalmatia and Italy , in the company of other deities who are found also in the cosmological schema of Martianus Capella , based on the Etruscan tradition. In

5076-617: The form of an arch, a conventional sign of deity ( velificatio ) that "recalls the vault of the firmament ." He is balanced and paired with the personification of Earth at the bottom of the cuirass. (These two figures have also been identified as Saturn and the Magna Mater , to represent the new Saturnian " Golden Age " of Augustan ideology.) On an altar of the Lares now held by the Vatican , Caelus in his chariot appears along with Apollo - Sol above

5170-430: The general to Spain and North Africa in the wars against Carthage. He was with Scipio at the destruction of Carthage in 146. Diodorus Siculus was a Greek historian who lived in the 1st century BC, around the time of Julius Caesar and Augustus. He wrote a universal history , Bibliotheca Historica , in 40 books. Of these, the first five and the 11th through the 20th remain. The first two parts covered history through

5264-584: The god of nocturnal thunder, as "purely Roman." Caelus begins to appear regularly in Augustan art and in connection with the cult of Mithras during the Imperial era . Vitruvius includes him among celestial gods whose temple-buildings ( aedes ) should be built open to the sky. As a sky god, he became identified with Jupiter, as indicated by an inscription that reads Optimus Maximus Caelus Aeternus Iup<pi>ter . According to Cicero and Hyginus , Caelus

5358-591: The history of Sicily and Italy to the year 264 BC, which is where Polybius begins his work. Timaeus also wrote the Olympionikai , a valuable chronological study of the Olympic Games. Ancient biography , or bios , as distinct from modern biography, was a genre of Greek (and Roman) literature interested in describing the goals, achievements, failures, and character of ancient historical persons and whether or not they should be imitated. Authors of ancient bios , such as

5452-489: The late first century BC or early first century AD, during the latter part of the Hellenistic Era. The discovery of several fragments of Lollianos's Phoenician Tale reveal the existence of a genre of ancient Greek picaresque novel . While the transition from city-state to empire affected philosophy a great deal, shifting the emphasis from political theory to personal ethics, Greek letters continued to flourish both under

5546-601: The later playwright Menander was an early pioneer of New Comedy . The historians Herodotus of Halicarnassus and Thucydides , who both lived during the fifth century BC, wrote accounts of events that happened shortly before and during their own lifetimes. The philosopher Plato wrote dialogues, usually centered around his teacher Socrates , dealing with various philosophical subjects, whereas his student Aristotle wrote numerous treatises, which later became highly influential. Important later writers included Apollonius of Rhodes , who wrote The Argonautica , an epic poem about

5640-591: The lives of orators and poets (such as Philostratus 's Lives of the Sophists ), school and reference biographies that offered a short sketch of someone including their ancestry, major events and accomplishments, and death, autobiographies, commentaries and memoirs where the subject presents his own life, and historical/political biography focusing on the lives of those active in the military, among other categories. Eratosthenes of Alexandria ( c. 276 BC – c.  195/194 BC), wrote on astronomy and geography, but his work

5734-470: The lyric poets was probably Archilochus of Paros , 7th century BC, the most important iambic poet. Only fragments remain of his work, as is the case with most of the poets. The few remnants suggest that he was an embittered adventurer who led a very turbulent life. Many lyric poems were written in the Aeolic dialect . Lyric poems often employed highly varied poetic meters. The most famous of all lyric poets were

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5828-428: The most acclaimed of which are the three Theban plays , which center around the story of Oedipus and his offspring. The Theban Trilogy consists of Oedipus the King , Oedipus at Colonus , and Antigone . Although the plays are often called a "trilogy," they were written many years apart. Antigone , the last of the three plays sequentially, was actually first to be written, having been composed in 441 BC, towards

5922-496: The most important works being the Gospels and the Epistles of Saint Paul . The poet Quintus of Smyrna , who probably lived during the late fourth century AD, wrote Posthomerica , an epic poem narrating the story of the fall of Troy, beginning where the Iliad left off. About the same time and in a similar Homeric style, an unknown poet composed the Blemyomachia , a now fragmentary epic about conflict between Romans and Blemmyes . The poet Nonnus of Panopolis wrote

6016-494: The necessity of their accepting Jewish Law. Aside from earning Paul's group a wide following, this view was generalized in the eventual conclusion that converts to Christianity need not first accept all Jewish Law (see Apostolic Decree ), a fact indispensable to the spread of the early Christians which would eventually lead to the distinction between Judaism and Christianity as two separate religions . Caelus Caelus or Coelus ( / ˈ s iː l ə s / ; SEE -ləs )

6110-445: The one mentioned, was sent by the Hasmonean king Aristobulus to Pompeius Magnus after his defeat of Jerusalem , and was later displayed in the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus . Ancient Greek literature Ancient Greek literature is literature written in the Ancient Greek language from the earliest texts until the time of the Byzantine Empire . The earliest surviving works of ancient Greek literature, dating back to

6204-450: The one that has received the most lasting recognition is The Frogs , which simultaneously satirizes and immortalizes the two giants of Athenian tragedy: Aeschylus and Euripides. When it was performed for the first time at the Lenaia Festival in 405 BC, just one year after the death of Euripides, the Athenians awarded it first prize. It was the only Greek play that was ever given an encore performance, which took place two months later at

6298-457: The original decipherers of Linear B, state that literature almost certainly existed in Mycenaean Greece , but it was either not written down or, if it was, it was on parchment or wooden tablets, which did not survive the destruction of the Mycenaean palaces in the twelfth century BC . Greek literature was divided into well-defined literary genres, each one having a compulsory formal structure, about both dialect and metrics. The first division

6392-408: The outstanding center of Greek culture. It also soon attracted a large Jewish population, making it the largest center for Jewish scholarship in the ancient world. The Septuagint , a Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible was reputed to have been initiated in Alexandria. Philo , a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher, operated out of Alexandria at the turn of the Common Era . In addition, it later became

6486-580: The playwright Aristophanes . These are a treasure trove of comic presentation. He poked fun at everyone and every institution. In The Birds , he ridicules Athenian democracy . In The Clouds , he attacks the philosopher Socrates . In Lysistrata , he denounces war. Aristophanes has been praised highly for his dramatic skill and artistry. John Lemprière 's Bibliotheca Classica describes him as, quite simply, "the greatest comic dramatist in world literature: by his side Molière seems dull and Shakespeare clownish." Of all Aristophanes's plays, however,

6580-440: The present day in their complete form, but one play, The Bad-Tempered Man , has survived to the present day in a near-complete form. Most of another play entitled The Girl from Samos and large portions of another five have also survived. The historian Timaeus was born in Sicily but spent most of his life in Athens . His History , though lost, is significant because of its influence on Polybius . In 38 books it covered

6674-469: The present probably represents lectures that he delivered at his own school in Athens, the Lyceum . Even from these books, the enormous range of his interests is evident: He explored matters other than those that are today considered philosophical; the extant treatises cover logic, the physical and biological sciences, ethics, politics, and constitutional government. Among Aristotle's most notable works are Politics , Nicomachean Ethics , Poetics , On

6768-456: The present. Among them are Measurement of the Circle , in which he worked out the value of pi; The Method of Mechanical Theorems , on his work in mechanics; The Sand Reckoner ; and On Floating Bodies . A manuscript of his works is currently being studied. Very little has survived of prose fiction from the Hellenistic Era. The Milesiaka by Aristides of Miletos was probably written during

6862-444: The second century BC. The Milesiaka itself has not survived to the present day in its complete form, but various references to it have survived. The book established a whole new genre of so-called " Milesian tales ," of which The Golden Ass by the later Roman writer Apuleius is a prime example. The ancient Greek novels Chaereas and Callirhoe by Chariton and Metiochus and Parthenope were probably both written during

6956-605: The site of Oxyrhynchus in Egypt among the Oxyrhynchus Papyri . Two notable historians who lived during the Classical Era were Herodotus of Halicarnassus and Thucydides . Herodotus is commonly called "The Father of History." His book The Histories is among the oldest works of prose literature in existence. Thucydides's book History of the Peloponnesian War greatly influenced later writers and historians, including

7050-404: The so-called " Nine Lyric Poets ". Of all the lyric poets, Sappho of Lesbos (c. 630 – c. 570 BC) was by far the most widely revered. In antiquity, her poems were regarded with the same degree of respect as the poems of Homer. Only one of her poems, " Ode to Aphrodite ", has survived to the present day in its original, completed form. In addition to Sappho, her contemporary Alcaeus of Lesbos

7144-525: The sphere of heaven marked with symbols of the planets or the zodiac . In a Mithraic context he is associated with Cautes and can appear as Caelus Aeternus ("Eternal Sky"). A form of Ahura-Mazda is invoked in Latin as Caelus Aeternus Iupiter . The walls of some mithrea feature allegorical depictions of the cosmos with Oceanus and Caelus. The mithraeum of Dieburg represents the tripartite world with Caelus, Oceanus, and Tellus below Phaeton -Heliodromus. Some Roman writers used Caelus or Caelum as

7238-564: The third century BC. The Aetia was lost during the Middle Ages, but, over the course of the twentieth century, much of it was recovered due to new discoveries of ancient papyri. Scholars initially denigrated it as "second-rate", showing great learning, but lacking true "art". Over the course of the century, scholarly appraisal of it greatly improved, with many scholars now seeing it in a much more positive light. Callimachus also wrote short poems for special occasions and at least one short epic,

7332-650: The three divine hypostases of the Neoplatonic school of Plotinus : the First God (Caelus), Intellect (Saturn), and Soul, son of the Intelligible (Jupiter). It is generally, though not universally, agreed that Caelus is depicted on the cuirass of the Augustus of Prima Porta , at the very top above the four horses of the Sun god's quadriga . He is a mature, bearded man who holds a cloak over his head so that it billows in

7426-502: The time of Augustus . Pausanias , who lived in the 2nd century AD, was also a geographer. His Description of Greece is a travel guide describing the geography and mythic history of Greece during the second century. The book takes the form of a tour of Greece, starting in Athens and ending in Naupactus . The scientist of the Roman period who had the greatest influence on later generations

7520-607: The universe endured until Copernicus , Galileo , Kepler , and other early modern astronomers replaced it with heliocentrism . Epictetus ( c. 55 AD – 135 AD) was associated with the moral philosophy of the Stoics . His teachings were collected by his pupil Arrian in the Discourses and the Encheiridion (Manual of Study). Diogenes Laërtius , who lived in the third century AD, wrote Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers ,

7614-475: The voyage of the Argonauts ; Archimedes , who wrote groundbreaking mathematical treatises; and Plutarch , who wrote mainly biographies and essays. The second-century AD writer Lucian of Samosata was a Greek, who wrote primarily works of satire . Ancient Greek literature has had a profound impact on later Greek literature and also western literature at large. In particular, many ancient Roman authors drew inspiration from their Greek predecessors. Ever since

7708-445: The war, he spends another ten years sailing back home to his wife and family. Penelope was considered the ideal female; Homer depicted her as the ideal female based on her commitment, modesty, purity, and respect during her marriage to Odysseus. During his ten-year voyage, he loses all of his comrades and ships and makes his way home to Ithaca disguised as a beggar. Both of these works were based on ancient legends. The Homeric dialect

7802-465: The works of Nepos and Plutarch 's Parallel Lives imitated many of the same sources and techniques of the contemporary historiographies of ancient Greece, notably including the works of Herodotus and Thucydides . There were various forms of ancient biographies, including philosophical biographies that brought out the moral character of their subject (such as Diogenes Laertius 's Lives of Eminent Philosophers ), literary biographies which discussed

7896-419: Was a native of Boeotia in central Greece , and is thought to have lived and worked around 700 BC. Hesiod's two extant poems are Works and Days and the Theogony . Works and Days is a faithful depiction of the poverty-stricken country life he knew so well, and it sets forth principles and rules for farmers. It vividly describes the ages of mankind, beginning with a long-past Golden Age . The Theogony

7990-435: Was a primordial god of the sky in Roman mythology and theology , iconography , and literature (compare caelum , the Latin word for " sky " or " heaven ", hence English " celestial "). The deity's name usually appears in masculine grammatical form when he is conceived of as a male generative force. The name of Caelus indicates that he was the Roman counterpart of the Greek god Uranus (Οὐρανός, Ouranos ), who

8084-448: Was also notable for monodic lyric poetry. The poetry written by Alcman was considered beautiful, even though he wrote exclusively in the Doric dialect , which was normally considered unpleasant to hear. The later poet Pindar of Thebes was renowned for his choral lyric poetry. All surviving works of Greek drama were composed by playwrights from Athens and are written exclusively in

8178-404: Was an archaic language based on Ionic dialect mixed with some element of Aeolic dialect and Attic dialect , the latter due to the Athenian edition of the 6th century BC. The epic verse was the hexameter . The other great poet of the preclassical period was Hesiod . Unlike Homer, Hesiod refers to himself in his poetry. Nonetheless, nothing is known about him from any external source. He

8272-523: Was between prose and poetry. Within poetry there were three super-genres: epic, lyric and drama. The common European terminology about literary genres is directly derived from the ancient Greek terminology. Lyric and drama were further divided into more genres: lyric in four ( elegiac , iambic , monodic lyric and choral lyric ); drama in three ( tragedy , comedy and pastoral drama ). Prose literature can largely be said to begin with Herodotus . Over time, several genres of prose literature developed, but

8366-767: Was developed by later rabbinic literature into the concept of Noahides , i. e. Gentiles that follow the Seven Laws of Noah , which rabbinic writings assigned to the Noahic Covenant . The Greek and Latin terms that refer to God-fearers ( theosebeis , sebomenoi , phoboumenoi , metuentes ) are found in ancient literature ( Greek , Roman , and Jewish ) and synagogue inscriptions discovered in Aphrodisias , Panticapaeum , Tralles , Sardis , Venosa , Lorium (in Rome ), Rhodes , Deliler ( Philadelphia ) and Miletus . Judging from

8460-413: Was especially unappealing and execrable in Classical civilization because it was the custom to spend an hour a day or so exercising nude in the gymnasium and in Roman baths , therefore Jewish men did not want to be seen in public deprived of their foreskins . Hellenistic and Roman culture both found circumcision to be cruel and repulsive. The Apostle Paul in his letters fiercely criticized

8554-507: Was first developed by the poet Theocritus . The Roman Virgil later wrote his Eclogues in this genre. Callimachus , a scholar at the Library of Alexandria , composed the Aetia ("Causes"), a long poem written in four volumes of elegiac couplets describing the legendary origins of obscure customs, festivals, and names, which he probably wrote in several stages over the course of many years in

8648-490: Was of major importance in the theogonies of the Greeks, and the Jewish god Yahweh . Varro couples him with Terra (Earth) as pater et mater (father and mother), and says that they are "great deities" ( dei magni ) in the theology of the mysteries at Samothrace . Although Caelus is not known to have had a cult at Rome, not all scholars consider him a Greek import given a Latin name; he has been associated with Summanus ,

8742-415: Was the son of Aether and Dies ("Day" or "Daylight"). Caelus and Dies were in this tradition the parents of Mercury . With Trivia , Caelus was the father of the distinctively Roman god Janus , as well as of Saturn and Ops . Caelus was also the father of one of the three Jupiters , the fathers of the other two being Aether and Saturn instead. In one tradition, Caelus was the father with Tellus of

8836-475: Was undoubtedly the astronomer Ptolemy . He lived during the 2nd century AD, though little is known of his life. His masterpiece, originally entitled The Mathematical Collection , has come to the present under the title Almagest , as it was translated by Arab astronomers with that title. It was Ptolemy who devised a detailed description of an Earth-centered universe , a notion that dominated astronomical thinking for more than 1,300 years. The Ptolemaic view of

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