282 HEIDEL. 



by successors that an eminent student of ancient history mournfully 

 ■denounces the procedure as plagiarism. ^° Without concerning our- 

 selves with moral judgments we may content ourselves with sig- 

 nalizing the solid basis of what we call the tradition. Unfortunately 

 there exists for this literary kind no such exhaustive treatise as we 

 possess for the doxographers ; but the complexity and the generally 

 fragmentary state of the materials amply explain its absence.^ -"^ Of 

 the historico-geographical tradition we do, however, know enough to 

 be able in most cases to tell whether a given writer belongs to it or not. 

 Now a survey of our sources of information regarding the earlier 

 Greek thinkers, with whom we are at present chiefly concerned, is 

 worth making for many reasons. ^Ye may disregard as sufficiently 

 appraised those which fall to the doxographic tradition; but for Thales 

 and Anaximander we must clearly take account of others. Thus 

 Herodotus refers to the prediction of an eclipse of the sun by Thales, 

 to the report current among the Greeks that he di\'erted the waters of 

 the Halys and so enabled Croesus to cross, and to his advice to the 

 lonians to form a federal state in order to maintain their independence; 

 he mentions, besides, the explanation of the Nile floods as due to the 

 Etesian winds, wliich later An-iters of the historico-geographical 

 tradition attribute to Thales. ^^ We know, then, not to go farther 

 into details nor to pass final judgment in disputable matters, that 

 Thales figured as a man of science in the historico-geographical tradi- 

 tion even before Herodotus. Duly considered this certain fact is of 

 prime importance. It is unfortunate on all accounts that Herodotus 



90 Hermann Peter, Wahrheit und Kunst, Geschichtschrcibung rind PJagiat 

 im klassischen Altertum, 1911. He nowhere shows the least comprehension 

 of the facts of human nature which underlie the creation of a tradition in art 

 and literature. 



9 1 F. Jacoby, Uber die Entwicklung der griechischen Historiographie, KUo, 

 vol. IX, has attempted a sketch which is the best available, but requires much 

 revision and, in particular, an extension to include the connections of history 

 with other scientific interests. Berger's GescMchie der wissenschaftlichen 

 Erdkunde der Griechen-, 1903, is even less satisfactory for similar reasons, 

 though it has great merits in certain respects. 



92 Hdt. 1.74; 1.75; 1.170; 2.20. For the various exi:)lanations of the 

 inundations of the Nile see Diets, Dox. Gr., pp. 384-6. Diels {ibid. p. 228 sq.) 

 suggests that Pseudo-Plutarch derived these data from Thcophrastus; this is 

 possible, but by no means certain. In any case they derive ultimately from 

 works belonging to the geographical tradition, including Hecataeus. Anaxi- 

 mander does not figure in the hst, but this is doubtless due either to an over- 

 sight or possibly to confusion between him and Anaxagoras, who is credited 

 with an explanation ahnost certainly older than he. A studv of the entire 

 tradition regarding Thales will be found instructive, but would here be out of 

 place. 



