Historiography and Mythography in the Aristotelian Mirabilia

Stefan Schorn · Robert Mayhew

Oct 2023 · Taylor & Francis

About this ebook

This is the first full-length volume in English that focuses on the historiographical section of the Mirabilia or De mirabilibus auscultationibus (On Marvelous Things Heard), attributed to Aristotle but not in fact by him.

The central section of the Mirabilia, namely §§ 78–151, for the most part deals with historiographical material, with many of its entries having some relationship to ancient Greek historians of the 4th and 3rd centuries BC. The chapters in this volume discuss various aspects of this portion of the text, including textual issues involving toponyms; possible structural principles behind the organization of this section; the passages on Theopompus and Timaeus; mythography; the philosopher Heracleides of Pontos; Homeric exegesis; and the interrelationship between pseudo-Plutarch’s On Rivers, a section of the historian Stobaeus’ Geography, and the Mirabilia.

Historiography and Mythography in the Aristotelian Mirabilia is an invaluable resource for scholars and students of this text, and of Greek philosophy, historiography, and literature more broadly.

About the author

Stefan Schorn is Professor of Ancient History at KU Leuven. He has published extensively on fragmentary Greek historiography and he is Editor-in-Chief of Die Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker Continued. Part IV: Biography and Antiquarian Literature.

Robert Mayhew is Professor of Philosophy at Seton Hall University. He has published extensively on ancient philosophy, and especially on Aristotle and other Peripatetics. His most recent book is Aristotle’s Lost Homeric Problems: Textual Studies, and among his current projects is an edition of the fragments of Aristotle’s lost Zoika.