Thales, Testimonia, Part 1: Person (P)

LCL 525: 210-211

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EARLY GREEK PHILOSOPHY II

THALES [11 DK]

P Chronology (P1)

P1 (< A1) Diog. Laert.

a 1.37–38

φησὶ δ᾽ ᾽Απολλόδωρος ἐν τοῖς Χρονικοῖς [FGrHist 244 F28] γεγενῆσθαι αὐτὸν κατὰ τὸ πρῶτον ἔτος τῆς τριακοστῆς πέμπτης1 ᾽Ολυμπιάδος. ἐτελεύτησε δ᾽ ἐτῶν ἑβδομήκοντα ὀκτώ, ἤ, ὡς Σωσικράτης φησίν [Frag. 1 Giannattasio Andria], ἐνενήκοντα· τελευτῆσαι γὰρ ἐπὶ τῆς πεντηκοστῆς ὀγδόης ᾽Ολυμπιάδος, γεγονότα κατὰ Κροῖσον [. . .].

b 1.22

καὶ πρῶτος σοφὸς ὠνομάσθη ἄρχοντος ᾽Αθήνησι Δαμασίου, καθ᾽ ὃν καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ σοφοὶ ἐκλήθησαν, ὥς φησι Δημήτριος ὁ Φαληρεὺς ἐν τῇ τῶν Ἀρχόντων ἀναγραφῇ [Frag. 149 Wehrli].

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THALES

THALES

P Chronology (P1)

P1 (< A1) Diogenes Laertius

a

Apollodorus in his Chronicles says that he was born in the first year of the 35th Olympiad [= 640/39].1 He died at the age of seventy-eight; or, as Sosicrates says, at ninety; for he died during the 58th Olympiad [= 548/44], having lived at the time of Croesus [. . .].2

b

And he was first called a “sage” when Damasius was archon in Athens [= 582/81]; it was during this time that the Seven Sages were named, as Demetrius of Phalerum says in his Catalog of the Archons [cf. R2–R4].

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DOI: 10.4159/DLCL.thales-person.2016