Philosophy Before Socrates (Second Edition)
The second edition of Philosophy Before Socrates has been updated and expanded to reflect important new discoveries and the most recent scholarship. Changes and additions have been made throughout, the most significant of which are found in the chapters on the Pythagoreans, Parmenides, Zeno, Anaxagoras, and Empedocles, and the new chapter on Philolaus. The translations of some passages have been revised, as have some interpretations and discussions. A new Appendix provides translations of three Hippocratic writings and the Derveni papyrus.
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Since its publication in 1994, Richard McKirahan’s Philosophy Before Socrates has become the standard sourcebook in Presocratic philosophy. It provides a wide survey of Greek science, metaphysics, and moral and political philosophy, from their roots in myth to the philosophers and Sophists of the fifth century. A comprehensive selection of fragments and testimonia, translated by the author, is presented in the context of a thorough and accessible discussion. An introductory chapter deals with the sources of Presocratic and Sophistic texts and the special problems of interpretation they present.
In its second edition, this work has been updated and expanded to reflect important new discoveries and the most recent scholarship. Changes and additions have been made throughout, the most significant of which are found in the chapters on the Pythagoreans, Parmenides, Zeno, Anaxagoras, and Empedocles, and the new chapter on Philolaus. The translations of some passages have been revised, as have some interpretations and discussions. A new Appendix provides translations of three Hippocratic writings and the Derveni papyrus.
Review of the First Edition:
“McKirahan has written a comprehensive guide which steers totally clear of either simplification or mystification. Philosophy Before Socrates combines impeccable translations of the primary texts with commentary that is historically responsible and philosophically stimulating, firm guidance with unobtrusiveness. He encourages his readers to think for themselves, but he gives them a great deal of help in the way of background information, scholarly aids, and skillful dissection of competing interpretations. What stands out above all is the up-to-date scholarship and analytical acumen, the sensitivity to social context and the accessibility. The book is a great achievement: it will rapidly establish itself as the standard course-text for introducing students to early Greek philosophy.”
—A. A. Long, Professor of Classics and Irving G. Stone Professor of Literature, University of California, Berkeley
Contents:
Preface to the First Edition
Acknowledgments to the First Edition
Preface to the Second Edition
Acknowledgments to the Second Edition
Maps
Abbreviations
1. The Sources of Early Greek Philosophy
2. Hesiod and the Beginnings of Greek Philosophy and Science
3. Miletus in the Sixth Century: The Cultural Setting for the Beginnings of Philosophy
4. Thales of Miletus
5. Anaximander of Miletus
6. Anaximenes of Miletus
7. Xenophanes of Colophon
8. The Early Ionian Achievement
9. Pythagoras of Samos and the Pythagoreans
10. Heraclitus of Ephesus
11. Parmenides of Elea
12. Zeno of Elea
13. Anaxagoras of Clazomenae
14. Empedocles of Acragas
15. Melissus of Samos
16. Fifth-Century Atomism: Leucippus and Democritus
17. Diogenes of Apollonia
18. Philolaus of Croton
19. Early Greek Moral Thought and the Fifth-Century Sophists
20. The Nomos–Phusis Debate
Appendix: Some Contemporary Texts
Introduction
The Nature of Man
Ancient Medicine
The Art
The Derveni Papyrus
Bibliography
Concordance with Diels-Kranz
Index of Passages Translated
Subject Index
About the Author:
Richard D. McKirahan is Edwin Clarence Norton Professor of Classics and Professor of Philosophy at Pomona College.
