Abstract

This chapter covers “classical Antiquity” in the broad sense, that is, cultures from 650 bce until 550 ce in which prestigious knowledge was formulated in Greek.Throughout this period, prestigious knowledge was supposed to be “theory” in the original sense of “something seen”, not something to be used (medicine and rhetoric being the noteworthy exceptions). This was connected to social degradation not only of manual work (ideally the chore of slaves) but of anything connected to it; and it was expressed in the creation of philosophy, at first close to inspired wisdom but soon (as definitively established by Aristotle) expressed in reasoned argument not only about what was known but also about the conditions for knowing.Along with philosophy, specialized branches of knowledge arose B apart from medicine and history only known through surviving texts from Aristotle and the Hellenistic period onward. The Roman conquest of the Hellenistic Empires led to a transfer of political power to the Latin-speaking West, but prestigious knowledge was still formulated in Greek, Latin being nothing but a language of popularization except when Roman history or law were the topics.A first group of text examples illustrate early natural philosophy and preceding cosmogonic wisdom, together with Hippocratic medicine and history. Aristotle is presented both by texts which also in modern terms deal with philosophy and by texts dealing with particular disciplines (political history, natural history, etc.). Hellenistic and post-Hellenistic special sciences are represented by astronomy, astrology, medicine, mathematics (both mathematics itself and texts discussing mathematics “from the outside”) and grammar. A few texts, finally, exemplify the Latin popularization of Greek knowledge.