Who Are ‘the Ancients’?

Abstract

Who are ‘the Ancients’? This article is intended to study the meaning of the expression ‘the Ancients’ in the Anonymus Londiniensis papyrus; and in so doing, also to attribute a more feasible interpretation to such appellation. The perusal of the occurrences in the papyrus suggests that the identification of ‘the Ancients’ with the Aristotelians might be accurate. Our claim lies in some striking analogies drawn from Aristotle, as well as in the use of the same expression in the medical literature coeval to the Anonymus papyrus. After having provided insight into these textual witnesses, there seems to be enough room to believe that the scribe of the papyrus could have made reference to the Peripatetics, and not to Plato or his heirs, in the first case; and as regards the second occurrence, to the pre-Socratics, either to Heraclitus or to Empedocles.

Keywords

• Anonymus Londiniensis
• Aristotle
• Plato
• Hippocrates
• diaeresis
• Galen