Titus Lucretius Carus ( / ˈ t aɪ t ə s l uː ˈ k r iː ʃ ə s / TY -təs loo- KREE -shəs , Latin: [ˈtitus luˈkreːti.us ˈkaːrus] ; c. 99 – c. 55 BC ) was a Roman poet and philosopher . His only known work is the philosophical poem De rerum natura , a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism , which usually is translated into English as On the Nature of Things —and somewhat less often as On the Nature of the Universe . Very little is known about Lucretius's life; the only certainty is that he was either a friend or client of Gaius Memmius , to whom the poem was addressed and dedicated. De rerum natura was a considerable influence on the Augustan poets , particularly Virgil (in his Aeneid and Georgics , and to a lesser extent on the Eclogues ) and Horace . The work was almost lost during the Middle Ages , but was rediscovered in 1417 in a monastery in Germany by Poggio Bracciolini and it played an important role both in the development of atomism (Lucretius was an important influence on Pierre Gassendi ) and the efforts of various figures of the Enlightenment era to construct a new Christian humanism .
58-405: And now, good Memmius, receptive ears And keen intelligence detached from cares I pray you bring to true philosophy De rerum natura (tr. Melville) 1.50 If I must speak, my noble Memmius, As nature's majesty now known demands De rerum natura (tr. Melville) 5.6 Virtually nothing is known about the life of Lucretius, and there is insufficient basis for a confident assertion of
116-685: A Jerusalem city-state under the control of United Nations Trusteeship Council . Although the plan had some international support and the UN accepted this proposal (and still officially holds the stance that Jerusalem should be held under this regime), implementation of the plan failed as the 1948 Palestine war broke out with the 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine , ultimately resulting in Jerusalem being split into West Jerusalem and East Jerusalem . Israel would eventually gain control of East Jerusalem in
174-657: A city-state. In Northern and Central Italy during the medieval and Renaissance periods, city-states — with various amounts of associated land — became the standard form of polity. Some of them, despite being de facto independent states, were formally part of the Holy Roman Empire . The era of the Italian states, in particular from the 11th to the 15th centuries, featured remarkable economic development, trade, manufacture, and mercantile capitalism, together with increasing urbanization, with remarkable influence throughout much of
232-641: A federation, and as such can be accurately described as non-sovereign city-states with a high degree of autonomy, include: The Sovereign State of the Bektashi Order is a proposed city-state in Albanian capital of Tirana which will be established if approved by the Albanian Parliament and a national referendum. The state, which would be led by the Bektashi Order , is planned to be similar in structure to
290-539: A high degree of autonomy and are often confused for city-states. Hong Kong , Macau , and cities of the United Arab Emirates —most notably Dubai and Abu Dhabi —are often cited as such. Historical city-states included Sumerian cities such as Uruk and Ur ; Ancient Egyptian city-states, such as Thebes and Memphis ; the Phoenician cities (such as Tyre and Sidon ); the five Philistine city-states;
348-404: A part of it. Until September 1870, the city of Rome had been controlled by the pope as part of his Papal States . When King Victor Emmanuel II seized the city in 1870, Pope Pius IX refused to recognize the newly formed Kingdom of Italy . Because he could not travel without effectively acknowledging the authority of the king, Pius IX and his successors each claimed to be a " Prisoner in
406-450: A population of less than 1,000 (mostly clergymen), it is by far the smallest sovereign country in the world. The Principality of Monaco is a very small independent city-state bordering France. Monaco-Ville (the ancient fortified city) and Monaco's well-known area Monte Carlo are districts of a continuous urban zone, not distinct cities, though they were three separate municipalities ( communes ) until 1917. The Principality of Monaco and
464-553: A regional power at the time, needed to define their territories for negotiation with the European powers so the Siamese government established a nation-state system, incorporated their tributary cities ( Lan Xang , Cambodia and some Malay cities) into their territory and abolished the mueang and the tributary system. In early Philippine history, the barangay was a complex sociopolitical unit which scholars have historically considered
522-534: A single city; in the cases of Luxembourg, Djibouti and Kuwait, this primate city is so dominant as to give its name to the country. These countries are distinct from true city-states such as Singapore in that they comprise both their primate city (such as Luxembourg City ) and a number of peripheral cities and towns (such as Esch-sur-Alzette and ten other towns in Luxembourg) with autonomous municipal authorities , and may also include substantial rural areas (such as
580-408: A stronger variety of copper and not necessarily a wholly individual material. Lucretius is believed to be the first to put forward a theory of the successive uses of first wood and stone, then copper and bronze, and finally iron. Although his theory lay dormant for many centuries, it was revived in the nineteenth century and he has been credited with originating the concept of the three-age system that
638-414: A tributary relationship now described as mandala or as over-lapping sovereignty , in which smaller city-states paid tribute to larger ones that paid tribute to still larger ones—until reaching the apex in cities like Ayutthaya , Bagan , Bangkok and others that served as centers of Southeast Asian royalty. The system existed until the 19th century, when colonization by European powers occurred. Siam ,
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#1732851698633696-540: A valuable work of universal history , if only for the example which it gave to such later chroniclers as Prosper of Aquitaine , Cassiodorus , and Victor of Tunnuna to continue his annals. In conformity with the Chronicon of Eusebius (early 4th century), Jerome dated Creation to 5201 BC. The Chronicle includes a chronology of the events of Greek mythology , based on the work of Hellenistic scholars such as Apollodorus , Diodorus Siculus , and Eusebius . While many of
754-462: Is found in Jerome's Chronicon , where he contends that Lucretius "was driven mad by a love potion , and when, during the intervals of his insanity, he had written a number of books, which were later emended by Cicero, he killed himself by his own hand in the 44th year of his life." The claim that he was driven mad by a love potion, although defended by such scholars as Reale and Catan, is often dismissed as
812-480: The 2nd-most-densely populated country in the world after Monaco. Singapore was part of the Federation of Malaysia for two years before it was expelled from the federation in 1965, becoming an independent republic , a city and a sovereign country. The Economist refers to the nation as the "world's only fully functioning city-state". In particular, it has its own currency , a large commercial airport , one of
870-737: The Berber city-states of the Garamantes ; the city-states of ancient Greece (the poleis such as Athens , Sparta , Thebes , and Corinth ); the Roman Republic (which grew from a city-state into a vast empire); the Italian city-states from the Middle Ages to the early modern period, such as Florence , Siena , Ferrara , Milan (which as they grew in power began to dominate neighboring cities) and Genoa and Venice , which became powerful thalassocracies ;
928-623: The Décapole (1354–1679) in the Alsace, or the Old Swiss Confederacy ( c. 1300 – 1798). The Swiss cantons of Zürich , Bern , Lucerne , Fribourg , Solothurn , Basel , Schaffhausen , and Geneva originated as city-states. After the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, some cities – then members of different confederacies – officially became sovereign city-states, such as
986-633: The Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (1806–11 and again 1813–71), the Free City of Frankfurt upon Main (1815–66), the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg (1806–11 and again 1814–71), the Free and Hanseatic City of Lübeck (1806–11 and again 1813–71), and the Free City of Kraków (1815–1846). Under Habsburg rule the city of Fiume had the status of a corpus separatum (1779–1919), which – while falling short of an independent sovereignty – had many attributes of
1044-818: The Kingdom of Dublin , as city-states. In Cyprus , the Phoenician settlement of Kition (in present-day Larnaca) was a city-state that existed from around 800 BC until the end of the 4th century BC. Some of the most well-known examples of city-state culture in human history are the ancient Greek city-states and the merchant city-states of Renaissance Italy , which organised themselves as independent centers. The success of regional units coexisting as autonomous actors in loose geographical and cultural unity, as in Italy and Greece , often prevented their amalgamation into larger national units. However, such small political entities often survived only for short periods because they lacked
1102-630: The Mayan and other cultures of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica (including cities such as Chichen Itza , Tikal , Copán and Monte Albán ); the central Asian cities along the Silk Road ; the city-states of the Swahili coast ; Ragusa ; states of the medieval Russian lands such as Novgorod and Pskov ; and many others. Danish historian Poul Holm has classed the Viking colonial cities in medieval Ireland , most importantly
1160-587: The Peace of Westphalia of 1648. Some, like three of the earlier Hanseatic cities – Bremen , Hamburg and Lübeck – pooled their economic relations with foreign powers and were able to wield considerable diplomatic clout. Individual cities often made protective alliances with other cities or with neighbouring regions, including the Hanseatic League (1358 – 17th century), the Swabian League of Cities (1331–1389),
1218-703: The Six-Day War in 1967. The Klaipėda Region or Memel Territory was defined by the Treaty of Versailles in 1920 when it was put under the administration of the Council of Ambassadors . The Memel Territory was to remain under the control of the League of Nations until a future day when the people of the region would be allowed to vote on whether the land would return to Germany or not. The then predominantly ethnic German Memel Territory ( Prussian Lithuanians and Memellanders constituted
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#17328516986331276-539: The Vatican City . The idea has been proposed by Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama and leader of the Bektashi Order Baba Mondi in the hope that sovereignty would help promote moderate Muslim values instead of radical ideologies. The Sovereign State of the Bektashi Order would be surrounded by the suburbs of eastern Tirana and would be the smallest nation in the world . The London independence movement seeks
1334-581: The 20th century West Berlin , though lacking sovereignty, functioned from 1948 until 1990 as a state legally not belonging to any other state, but ruled by the Western Allies . They allowed – notwithstanding their overlordship as occupant powers – its internal organisation as one state simultaneously being a city, officially called Berlin (West). Though West Berlin maintained close ties to the West German Federal Republic, it never legally formed
1392-590: The British-led occupation of Istanbul recognised Turkey as de jure sovereign, while the Greek occupation of Smyrna was an attempted annexation . The 1923 Treaty of Lausanne re-established Turkish control of both areas. The Shanghai International Settlement (1845–1943) was an international zone with its own legal system, postal service, and currency. The international zone within the city of Tangier , in North Africa
1450-607: The Mediterranean world and Europe as a whole. During this time, most of the Italian city-states were ruled by one person, such as the Signoria or by a dynasty, such as the House of Gonzaga and the House of Sforza . In the history of Mainland Southeast Asia , aristocratic groups, Buddhist leaders, and others organized settlements into autonomous or semi-autonomous city-states. These were referred to as mueang , and were usually related in
1508-516: The Nature of Things" or "On the Nature of the Universe") transmits the ideas of Epicureanism , which includes atomism and cosmology . Lucretius was the first writer known to introduce Roman readers to Epicurean philosophy. The poem, written in some 7,400 dactylic hexameters , is divided into six untitled books, and explores Epicurean physics through richly poetic language and metaphors . Lucretius presents
1566-663: The Vatican ", unable to leave the 0.44 km (0.17 sq mi) papal enclave once they had ascended the papal throne . The impasse was resolved in 1929 by the Lateran Treaties negotiated by the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini between King Victor Emmanuel III and Pope Pius XI . Under this treaty, Vatican City was recognized as an independent state, with the Pope as its head. The Vatican City State has its own citizenship , diplomatic corps , flag , and postage stamps . With
1624-423: The assumption that humans are necessarily superior to animals, noting that mammalian mothers in the wild recognize and nurture their offspring as do human mothers. Despite his advocacy of empiricism and his many correct conjectures about atomism and the nature of the physical world, Lucretius concludes his first book stressing the absurdity of the (by then well-established) spherical Earth theory as it related to
1682-590: The birth of Lucretius in the 90s BC and his death in the 50s BC, in agreement with the poem's many allusions to the tumultuous state of political affairs in Rome and its civil strife . Lucretius probably was a member of the aristocratic gens Lucretia , and his work shows an intimate knowledge of the luxurious lifestyle in Rome. Lucretius's love of the countryside invites speculation that he inhabited family-owned rural estates, as did many wealthy Roman families, and he certainly
1740-516: The busiest trans-shipment maritime ports in the world , and fully fledged armed forces to safeguard the nation's sovereignty against potential regional aggressors. Singapore is also referred to as the only island city-state in the world by WorldAtlas. A number of other small states share many of these characteristics, and are sometimes cited as modern city-states. Luxembourg , Djibouti , Qatar , Brunei , Kuwait , Bahrain , and Malta are each politically and economically centered on
1798-450: The candidates most commonly discussed. Out of these, Singapore is the largest and most populous, and is generally considered to be the last real city-state left in the world, with full sovereignty, international borders, its own currency , a robust military , and substantial international influence in its own right. The Economist refers to the nation as the "world's only fully functioning city-state". Several non-sovereign cities enjoy
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1856-472: The causes of things and has cast beneath his feet all fears, unavoidable fate, and the din of the devouring Underworld." Lucretius was an early thinker in what grew to become the study of evolution . He believed that nature experiments endlessly across the aeons, and the organisms that adapt best to their environment have the best chance of surviving. Living organisms survived because of the commensurate relationship between their strength, speed, or intellect and
1914-555: The city of Fiume (now in Croatia and, since the end of World War II, known as Rijeka ) and rural areas to its north, with a corridor to its west connecting it to Italy . Under the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine of 1947, Mandatory Palestine was to be partitioned into three states: a Jewish state of Israel , an Arab state of Palestine , and a corpus separatum ( Latin for " separated body ") consisting of
1972-515: The city of Monaco (each having specific powers) govern the same territory. Though they maintain a small military , largely for ceremonial purposes, they would still have to rely on France for defence in the face of an aggressive power. Singapore is an island city-state in Southeast Asia bordering Malaysia to the north and Indonesia to the south. 6 million people live and work within 728.3 square kilometres (281.2 sq mi), making Singapore
2030-468: The context of the sovereign state to which they belong. Historian Mogens Herman Hansen describes this aspect of self-government as: "The city-state is a self-governing, but not necessarily independent political unit." A city with more limited self-government may be referred to as an independent city . Some non-sovereign cities which have a high degree of autonomy, and have been described as city-states, include: Some cities that are constituent states in
2088-487: The dates of Lucretius's birth or death in other sources. Another, yet briefer, note is found in the Chronicon of Donatus's pupil, Jerome . Writing four centuries after Lucretius's death, he enters under the 171st Olympiad : "Titus Lucretius the poet is born." If Jerome is accurate about Lucretius's age (43) when Lucretius died (discussed below), then it may be concluded he was born in 99 or 98 BC. Less specific estimates place
2146-624: The development in turn of crude huts, use and kindling of fire, clothing, language, family, and city-states . He believed that smelting of metal, and perhaps too, the firing of pottery, was discovered by accident: for example, the result of a forest fire. He does specify, however, that the use of copper followed the use of stones and branches and preceded the use of iron. Lucretius seems to equate copper with bronze , an alloy of copper and tin that has much greater resilience than copper; both copper and bronze were superseded by iron during his millennium (1000 BC to 1 BC). He may have considered bronze to be
2204-468: The dominant organizational pattern among the various peoples of the Philippine archipelago . These sociopolitical units were sometimes also referred to as barangay states, but are more properly referred to using the technical term polity . Evidence suggests a considerable degree of independence as city states ruled by Datus , Rajahs and Sultans . Early chroniclers record that the name evolved from
2262-465: The earlier sections contain legendary characters and events that are not necessarily historically factual, there may be scattered remnants of historical events of late Mycenean Greece from entries of the 12th century BC. (See the historicity of the Iliad . Notably, Jerome's date for the capture of Troy of 1183 BC corresponds remarkably well with the destruction layer of Troy VIIa , the main candidate for
2320-460: The external dynamics of their environment. Prior to Charles Darwin 's 1859 publication of On the Origin of Species , the natural philosophy of Lucretius typified one of the foremost non- teleological and mechanistic accounts of the creation and evolution of life. In contrast to modern thought on the subject, he did not believe that new species evolved from previously existing ones. Lucretius challenged
2378-511: The historical inspiration of legendary Troy, dated to c. 1190 BC .) Homer himself is dated to 940 BC, while modern scholarship usually dates him after 800 BC. From Adam until the 14th year of Valens (AD 377), 5,579 years; this places Adam in 5201 BC City-state List of forms of government A city-state is an independent sovereign city which serves as the center of political, economic, and cultural life over its contiguous territory. They have existed in many parts of
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2436-534: The other ethnic groups), situated between the river and the town of that name, was occupied by Lithuania in the Klaipėda Revolt of 1923. Some proposals for the partition of the Ottoman Empire envisaged international zones at Istanbul /Constantinople or the wider Turkish straits , and possibly also at İzmir /Smyrna. Although the allies of World War I occupied both after the 1918 Armistice of Mudros ,
2494-413: The personally favored infinite Earth hypothesis which did not make reference to outer bodies. While Epicurus left open the possibility for free will by arguing for the uncertainty of the paths of atoms , Lucretius viewed the soul or mind as emerging from fortuitous arrangements of distinct particles. Chronicon (Jerome) The Chronicon ( Chronicle ) or Temporum liber ( Book of Times )
2552-405: The principles of atomism , the nature of the mind and soul , explanations of sensation and thought, the development of the world and its phenomena , and explains a variety of celestial and terrestrial phenomena . The universe described in the poem operates according to these physical principles, guided by fortuna , "chance", and not the divine intervention of the traditional Roman deities and
2610-491: The religious explanations of the natural world. Within this work, Lucretius makes reference to the cultural and technological development of humans in his use of available materials, tools, and weapons through prehistory to Lucretius's own time. He specifies the earliest weapons as hands, nails, and teeth. These were followed by stones, branches, and fire (once humans could kindle and control it). He then refers to "tough iron" and copper in that order, but goes on to say that copper
2668-426: The resources to defend themselves against incursions by larger states (such as Roman conquest of Greece). Thus they inevitably gave way to larger organisations of society, including the empire and the nation-state . In the Holy Roman Empire (962–1806) over 80 Free Imperial Cities came to enjoy considerable autonomy in the Middle Ages and in early modern times, buttressed legally by international law following
2726-423: The result of historical confusion, or anti-Epicurean bias. In some accounts the administration of the toxic aphrodisiac is attributed to his wife Lucilia . Regardless, Jerome's image of Lucretius as a lovesick, mad poet continued to have significant influence on modern scholarship until quite recently, although it now is accepted that such a report is inaccurate. His poem De rerum natura (usually translated as "On
2784-412: The sparsely-populated Éislek forest of northern Luxembourg). Occasionally, microstates with high population densities such as San Marino are cited as city-states, despite lacking a large urban centre. Some cities or urban areas, while not sovereign states, may nevertheless be constituent states of a federation , or enjoy a high degree of autonomy. As such, they function as "city-states" within
2842-522: The term balangay , which refers to a plank boat widely used by various cultures of the Philippine archipelago prior to the arrival of European colonizers. The Free City of Danzig was a semi- autonomous city-state that existed between 1920 and 1939, consisting of the Baltic Sea port of Danzig (now Gdańsk , Poland ) and nearly 200 towns in the surrounding areas. It was created on 15 November 1920 under
2900-425: The terms of Article 100 (Section XI of Part III) of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles after the end of World War I . After a prolonged period where the city of Fiume enjoyed considerable autonomy under Habsburg rule (see Corpus separatum (Fiume) ), The Free State of Fiume was proclaimed as a fully independent free state which existed between 1920 and 1924. Its territory of 28 km (11 sq mi) comprised
2958-458: The world since the dawn of history, including cities such as Rome , Carthage , Athens and Sparta and the Italian city-states during the Middle Ages and Renaissance , such as Florence , Venice , Genoa and Milan . With the rise of nation states worldwide, there remains some disagreement on the number of modern city-states that still exist; Singapore , Monaco and Vatican City are
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#17328516986333016-472: Was a universal chronicle written by Jerome . It was one of his earliest attempts at history. It was composed c. 380 in Constantinople ; this is a translation into Latin of the chronological tables which compose the second part of the Chronicon of Eusebius , with a supplement covering the period from 325 to 379. Despite numerous errors taken from Eusebius, and some of his own, Jerome produced
3074-691: Was an independent territory situated in Central Europe between northern Italy and Yugoslavia, facing the north part of the Adriatic Sea, under direct responsibility of the United Nations Security Council in the aftermath of World War II, from 1947 to 1954. The UN attempted to make the Free Territory of Trieste into a city state, but it never gained real independence and in 1954 its territory was divided between Italy and Yugoslavia . In
3132-615: Was approximately 373 km (144 sq mi). It was at first under the joint administration of France, Spain, and the United Kingdom, plus later Portugal, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the United States. The international zone was initially attached to Morocco. It then became a French-Spanish protectorate from 1923 until 29 October 1956, when it was reintegrated into the state of Morocco. The Free Territory of Trieste
3190-474: Was born), and it so happened that on the very same day Lucretius the poet passed away." However, although Lucretius certainly lived and died around the time that Virgil and Cicero flourished , the information in this particular testimony is internally inconsistent: if Virgil was born in 70 BC, his 17th birthday would be in 53. The two consuls of 70 BC, Pompey and Crassus , stood together as consuls again in 55, not 53. Another note regarding Lucretius's biography
3248-522: Was expensively educated with a mastery of Latin, Greek, literature, and philosophy. A brief biographical note is found in Aelius Donatus 's Life of Virgil , which seems to be derived from an earlier work by Suetonius . The note reads: "The first years of his life Virgil spent in Cremona until the assumption of his toga virilis on his 17th birthday (when the same two men held the consulate as when he
3306-467: Was formalised from 1834 by C. J. Thomsen . In a letter by Cicero to his brother Quintus in February 54 BC, Cicero said: "The poems of Lucretius are as you write: they exhibit many flashes of genius , and yet show great mastership." In the work of another author in late Republican Rome, Virgil writes in the second book of his Georgics , apparently referring to Lucretius, "Happy is he who has discovered
3364-424: Was the primary means of tilling the soil and the basis of weaponry until, "by slow degrees", the iron sword became predominant (it still was in his day) and "the bronze sickle fell into disrepute" as iron ploughs were introduced. He had earlier envisaged a pre-technological, pre-literary kind of human whose life was lived "in the fashion of wild beasts roaming at large". From this beginning, he theorised, there followed
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