Dicaearchus of MessanaMessina is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, Italy, and the capital of the province of Messina. It has a population of c...
was a
GreekThe Greeks , also known as Hellenes, are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighbouring regions, who can also be found in diaspora communities around the world....
philosopher, cartographer,
geographerA geographer is a scientist whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's physical environment and human habitat.Though geographers are historically known as people who make maps, map making is actually the field of study of cartography, a subset of geography...
,
mathematicianA mathematician is a person whose primary area of study and/or research is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with particular problems related to logic, space, transformations, numbers and more general ideas which encompass these concepts...
and
authorAn author is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created...
. Dicaearchus was
AristotleAristotle was a Greek philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. He wrote on many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology.Together with Plato and Socrates , Aristotle is one of...
's student in the
LyceumA Lyceum can be*an educational institution , or*a public hall used for cultural events like concerts.*Mount Lyceum...
. Very little of his work remains extant. He wrote on the
historyHistory is the study of the human past, with special attention to the written record. Scholars who write about history are called historians. It is a field of research which uses a narrative to examine and analyse the sequence of events, and it often attempts to investigate objectively the patterns...
and
geographyGeography is the study of the Earth and its lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...
of
GreeceGreece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkan Peninsula....
, of which his most important work was his
Life of Greece. He made important contributions to the field of
cartographyCartography is the study and practice of making geographical maps. Combining science, aesthetics, and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality can be modeled in ways that communicate spatial information effectively.The fundamental problems of cartography are to:*Set the map's...
, where he was among the first to use
geographical coordinatesA geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system that enables every location on Earth to be specified in three coordinates, using mainly a spherical coordinate system....
. He also wrote books on
philosophyPhilosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems concerning matters such as existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing these questions by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on reasoned...
and
politicsPolitics is a process by which groups of people make decisions. The term is generally applied to behavior within civil governments, but politics has been observed in all human group interactions, including corporate, academic and religious institutions...
.
He was the son of one Pheidias, and born at
MessanaMessina is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, Italy, and the capital of the province of Messina. It has a population of c...
in
SicilySicily is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is an autonomous region of Italy. Several much smaller islands surrounding it are considered to be part of Sicily....
, though he passed the greater part of his life in
GreeceGreece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkan Peninsula....
, and especially in Peloponnesus.
Dicaearchus of MessanaMessina is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, Italy, and the capital of the province of Messina. It has a population of c...
was a
GreekThe Greeks , also known as Hellenes, are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighbouring regions, who can also be found in diaspora communities around the world....
philosopher, cartographer,
geographerA geographer is a scientist whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's physical environment and human habitat.Though geographers are historically known as people who make maps, map making is actually the field of study of cartography, a subset of geography...
,
mathematicianA mathematician is a person whose primary area of study and/or research is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with particular problems related to logic, space, transformations, numbers and more general ideas which encompass these concepts...
and
authorAn author is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created...
. Dicaearchus was
AristotleAristotle was a Greek philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. He wrote on many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology.Together with Plato and Socrates , Aristotle is one of...
's student in the
LyceumA Lyceum can be*an educational institution , or*a public hall used for cultural events like concerts.*Mount Lyceum...
. Very little of his work remains extant. He wrote on the
historyHistory is the study of the human past, with special attention to the written record. Scholars who write about history are called historians. It is a field of research which uses a narrative to examine and analyse the sequence of events, and it often attempts to investigate objectively the patterns...
and
geographyGeography is the study of the Earth and its lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...
of
GreeceGreece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkan Peninsula....
, of which his most important work was his
Life of Greece. He made important contributions to the field of
cartographyCartography is the study and practice of making geographical maps. Combining science, aesthetics, and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality can be modeled in ways that communicate spatial information effectively.The fundamental problems of cartography are to:*Set the map's...
, where he was among the first to use
geographical coordinatesA geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system that enables every location on Earth to be specified in three coordinates, using mainly a spherical coordinate system....
. He also wrote books on
philosophyPhilosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems concerning matters such as existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing these questions by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on reasoned...
and
politicsPolitics is a process by which groups of people make decisions. The term is generally applied to behavior within civil governments, but politics has been observed in all human group interactions, including corporate, academic and religious institutions...
.
Life
He was the son of one Pheidias, and born at
MessanaMessina is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, Italy, and the capital of the province of Messina. It has a population of c...
in
SicilySicily is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is an autonomous region of Italy. Several much smaller islands surrounding it are considered to be part of Sicily....
, though he passed the greater part of his life in
GreeceGreece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkan Peninsula....
, and especially in Peloponnesus. He was a disciple of
AristotleAristotle was a Greek philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. He wrote on many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology.Together with Plato and Socrates , Aristotle is one of...
, and a friend of
TheophrastusTheophrastus , a Greek native of Eressos in Lesbos, was the successor of Aristotle in the Peripatetic school. His interests were wide-ranging, extending from biology and physics to ethics and metaphysics. His two surviving botanical works, Enquiry into Plants and On the Causes of Plants, were an...
, to whom he dedicated some of his writings. He died about 285 BC.
Writings
Dicaearchus was highly esteemed by the ancients as a philosopher and as a man of most extensive information upon a great variety of things. His work is known only from the many fragmentary quotations of later writers. His works were geographical, political or historical, philosophical, and mathematical; but it is difficult to draw up an accurate list of them, since many which are quoted as distinct works appear to have been only sections of greater ones. The fragments extant, moreover, do not always enable us to form a clear notion of the works to which they once belonged. The geographical works of Dicaearchus were, according to
StraboStrabo was a Greek historian, geographer and philosopher.-Life:Strabo was born in a wealthy family from Amaseia in Pontus , which had recently become part of the Roman Empire.. He studied under various geographers and philosophers; first in Nysa, later in Rome...
, criticised in many respects by
PolybiusPolybius was a Greek historian of the Hellenistic Period noted for his book called The Histories covering in detail the period of 220–146 BC...
; and Strabo himself is dissatisfied with his descriptions of western and northern
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
, where Dicaearchus had never visited.
Among his geographical works may be mentioned:
- Life of Greece - The Bios Hellados, in three books is Dicaearchus’ most famous work. In the mid 1st century BC it inspired Jason of Nysa
Jason of Nysa, a Stoic philosopher, son of Menecrates, and, on his mother's side, grandson of Posidonius, of whom also he was the disciple and successor at the Stoic school at Rhodes. He therefore flourished after the middle of the 1st century BC...
’s Bios Hellados and VarroVarro was a Roman cognomen carried by:*Gaius Terentius Varro, the consul defeated at the battle of Cannae*Marcus Terentius Varro, sometimes known as Varro Reatinus, the scholar*Publius Terentius Varro or Varro Atacinus, the poet...
's De Vita Populi Romani. It exists in only 24 fragments, but he apparently attempted to write a biography of the Greek nation from earliest times to the reign of Philip IIPhilip II of Macedon, Philip II of Macedon, Philip II of Macedon, ( — φίλος = friend + ίππος = horse — transliterated 382 – 336 BC, was an ancient Greek king (basileus) of Macedon from 359 BC until his assassination in 336. He was the father of Alexander the Great and Philip...
. The most famous passages are those cited by Varro and PorphyryPorphyry of Tyre was a Neoplatonic philosopher who was born in Tyre in what is now Lebanon. He is particularly important for the history of philosophy because he edited and published the Enneads, the only collection of the work of his teacher Plotinus. He also wrote many works himself on a wide...
which suggest a dualistic view of progress. For example, the invention of agriculture alleviates hunger through the creation of surplus, but surplus in turn proves to be an incitement to greed which leads to war. Every human advance solves one problem but also engenders another. Passages which detailed human institutions and their history suggest he thought these could arrest decline. For example, his definition of country , family , and tribe , is about the right ordering of human relations within the polis. Dicaearchus apparently explained the saying, "sharing stops choking", as a reference to how humans learned to distribute surplus fairly. Many fragments are interested in the origins of the music and culture of Greece. This is in contrast to the debased symposiastic Greek culture of which he complains in some of his other works. His interest in defining Greek culture in its heyday is thus partly polemical: he wishes to attack current fashions in music by reminding his readership of their original forms. The link between political decline and cultural debasement (as they saw it) was also made by his fellow Peripatetic and friend AristoxenusAristoxenus of Tarentum was a Greek peripatetic philosopher, and writer on music and rhythm.He was taught first by his father Spintharus, a pupil of Socrates and also a musician, and later by the Pythagoreans, Lamprus of Erythrae and Xenophilus, from whom he learned the theory of music...
. In a celebrated passage, he compared the introduction of the ‘New Music’ into Greek theatres to the barbarization of the PoseidoniatesPaestum is the classical Roman name of a major Graeco-Roman city in the Campania region of Italy. It is located in the north of Cilento, near the coast about 85 km SE of Naples in the province of Salerno, and belongs to the commune of Capaccio, officially also named...
in the Bay of Naples.
- Circuit of the Earth - This work was probably the text written in explanation of the geographical maps which Dicaearchus had constructed and given to Theophrastus, and which seem to have comprised the whole world, as far as it was then known.
- Description of Greece - A work of this title dedicated to Theophrastus, and consisting of 150 iambic verses, is still extant under the name of Dicaearchus; but its form and spirit are both unworthy of Dicaearchus, and it is in all probability the production of a much later writer, who made a metrical paraphrase of the portion of the Circuit of the Earth which referred to Greece.
- On the heights of mountains - A work which may have been part of his Circuit of the Earth. It was the earliest known attempt to measure the heights of various mountains by triangulation
In trigonometry and geometry, triangulation is the process of determining the location of a point by measuring angles to it from known points at either end of a fixed baseline, rather than measuring distances to the point directly...
.
- Descent into (the Cave of) Trophonius - A work which consisted of several books, and, as we may infer from the fragments quoted from it, contained an account of the degenerate and licentious proceedings of the priests in the cave of Trophonius
Trophonius or Trophonios was a Greek hero or daimon or god - it was never certain which one - with a rich mythological tradition and an oracular cult at Lebadaea in Boeotia....
.
- Some other works, such as Spartan Constitution , Olympic Dialogue , Panathenaic Dialogue , and several others, seem to have been merely chapters of the Life of Greece.
Of a political nature was:
- Three-city Dialogue (Tripolitikos - ) - A work which has been the subject of much dispute. It was probably a study of comparative government. Following Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. He wrote on many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology.Together with Plato and Socrates , Aristotle is one of...
, Dicaearchus divided all governments into three categories: the democratic, aristocratic, and monarchical, He advocated a "mixed" government, echoing the Spartan system, in which elements of all three categories play a part. This may have been an inspiration for CiceroMarcus Tullius Cicero was a Roman philosopher, statesman, lawyer, political theorist, and Roman constitutionalist. Cicero is widely considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists.Cicero is generally perceived to be one of the most versatile minds of ancient Rome...
's De Republica.
Among his philosophical works may be mentioned:
- Lesbian Books - In three books, which derived its name from the fact that the scene of the philosophical dialogue was laid at Mytilene
Mytilene is the capital city of Lesbos, a Greek island in the Aegean Sea, and capital of Lesbos Prefecture and the Northern Aegean region. It is built on the southeast edge of the island...
in Lesbos. In it Dicaearchus endeavoured to prove that the soul was mortal. Cicero when speaking of a work On the Soul, probably means this work.
- Corinthian Dialogue - In three books, was a sort of supplement to the Lesbiakoi. It is probably the same work as the one which Cicero, in another passage, calls On Human Destruction .
A work
On the Sacrifice at Illium seems to have referred to the sacrifice which
Alexander the GreatAlexander III of Macedon, popularly known as Alexander the Great , was an Ancient Greek king of Macedon who created one of the largest empires in ancient history...
performed at
IlliumTroy is a legendary city and center of the Trojan War, as described in the Epic Cycle and especially in the Iliad, one of the two epic poems attributed to Homer...
.
There are lastly some other works which are of a grammatical nature, and may be the productions of Dicaearchus, viz.
On Alcaeus , and
Summaries of the plots of Euripides and Sophocles , but may have been the works of Dicaearchus, a grammarian of Lacedaemon, who, according to the
SudaThe Suda or Souda is a massive 10th century historical encyclopedia of the ancient Mediterranean world, formerly wrongfully attributed to an author called Suidas. The text belongs to the Byzantine Empire and was written in Greek...
, was a disciple of
AristarchusAristarchus or Aristarch of Samothrace was a grammarian noted as the most influential of all scholars of Homeric poetry...
, and seems to be alluded to in
ApolloniusApollonius Dyscolus is considered one of the greatest of the Greek grammarians. He was born at Alexandria, son of Mnesitheus. The dates for his life are not known. His son Aelius Herodianus was born c...
.
Sources
- David C. Mirhady, "Dicaearchus of Messana: The Sources, Texts and Translations," in Fortenbaugh, W., Schütrumpf, E., (editors) Dicaearchus of Messana: Text, Translation, and Discussion. Transaction Publishers. (2001). ISBN 0-7658-0093-4
Further reading
Editions
- Fortenbaugh, W., Schütrumpf, E.
Eckart Schütrumpf is a professor of classics at the University of Colorado at Boulder known for his work on political, ethical, rhetorical and poetic issues in Aristotle, Plato, Cicero, and other ancient writers. In 2005 he won a prestigious research prize from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation...
, (editors) Dicaearchus of Messana: Text, Translation, and Discussion. Transaction Publishers. (2001). ISBN 0-7658-0093-4
- Wehrli, F., Dikaiarchos. Die Schule des Aristoteles. Texte und Kommentar, Hft. 1. Schwabe. 2nd edition (1967)
Studies
- Alonso-Núñez, J.M., 'Approaches to world history in the Hellenistic period: Dicaearchus and Agatharchides' Athenaeum 85 (1997) 53-67
- Bodei Giglioni, G., 'Dicearco e la riflessione sul passato' Rivista Storica Italiana 98 (1986) 629-652
- Cooper, C., 'Aristoxenus, Περὶ Βίων and Peripatetic biography' Mouseion 2(3) (2002) 307-339
- Purcell, N., 'The way we used to eat: diet, community, and history at Rome' American Journal of Philology 124 (2003) 329-358