CHAPTER IV

PARMENIDES OF ELEA

Life. 84. PARMENIDES, son of Pyres, was a citizen of Hyele, Elea, or Velia, a colony founded in Oinotria by refugees from Phokaia in 540-39 B.C.1 Diogenes tells us that he "flourished" in Ol. LXIX. (504-500 B.C.), and this was doubtless the date given by Apollodoros. On the other hand, Plato says that Parmenides came to Athens in his sixty-fifth year, accompanied by Zeno, and conversed with Sokrates, who was then quite young. Now Sokrates was just over seventy when he was put to death in 399 B.C.; and therefore, if we suppose him to have been an ephebos, that is, from eighteen to twenty years old, at the time of his interview with Parmenides, we get 451-449 B.C. as the date of that event. I do not hesitate to accept Plato's statement, especially as

1 Diog. ix. 21 (R. P. 111). For the foundation of Elea, see Herod. i. 165 sqq. It was on the coast of Lucania, south of Poseidonia (Paestum). 2 Diog. ix. 23 (R. P. 111). Cf. Diels, Rhein. Mus. xxxi. p. 34; and Jacoby, pp. 231 sqq.

3 Plato, Parm. 127 b (R. P. III d). There are, as Zeller has shown, a certain number of anachronisms in Plato, but there is not one of this character. In the first place, we have exact figures as to the ages of Parmenides and Zeno, which imply that the latter was twenty-five years younger than the former, not forty as Apollodoros said. In the second place, Plato refers to this meeting in two other places (Tht. 183 e 7 and Soph. 217 c 5), which do not seem to be mere references to the dialogue

we have independent evidence of the visit of Zeno to Athens, where Perikles is said to have "heard" him.1 The date given by Apollodoros, on the other hand, depends solely on that of the foundation of Elea, which he had adopted as the floruit of Xenophanes. Parmenides is born in that year, just as Zeno is born in the year when Parmenides "flourished." Why any one should prefer these transparent combinations to the testimony of Plato, I am at a loss to understand, though it is equally a mystery why Apollodoros himself should have overlooked such precise data.

We have seen already ($55) that Aristotle

mentions a statement which made Parmenides the disciple of Xenophanes; but the value of this testimony is diminished by the doubtful way in which he speaks, and it is more than likely that he is only referring to what Plato says in the Sophist? It is, we also saw, very improbable that Xenophanes founded the school of Elea, though it is quite possible he visited that city. He tells us himself that, in his ninety-second year, he was still wandering up and down (fr. 8). At that time Parmenides would be well advanced in life. And we must not overlook the statement of Sotion, preserved to us by Diogenes, that, though Parmenides "heard" Xenophanes, he did not "follow" him. According to this account, our philosopher was the "associate" of a Pythagorean, Ameinias, son of Diochaitas, "a poor but noble man to whom he afterwards built a shrine as to a hero." It was

entitled Parmenides. No parallel can be quoted for an anachronism so glaring and deliberate as this would be. E. Meyer (Gesch. des Alterth. iv. § 509, Anm.) also regards the meeting of Sokrates and Parmenides as historical.

1 Plut. Per. 4, 3. See below, p. 358, n. 2.

2 See above, Chap. II. p. 140, n. 2.

"

Ameinias and not Xenophanes that "converted Parmenides to the philosophic life. This does not read like an invention, and we must remember that the Alexandrians had information about the history of Southern Italy which we have not. The shrine erected by Parmenides would still be there in later days, like the grave of Pythagoras at Metapontion. It should also be mentioned that Strabo describes Parmenides and Zeno as Pythagoreans, and that Kebes talks of a "Parmenidean and Pythagorean way of life." Zeller explains all this by supposing that, like Empedokles, Parmenides approved of and followed the Pythagorean mode of life without adopting the Pythagorean system. It is possibly true that Parmenides believed in a "philosophic life" (§ 35), and that he got the idea from the Pythagoreans; but there is very little trace, either in his writings or in what we are told about him, of his having been in any way affected by the religious side of Pythagoreanism. The writing of Empedokles is obviously modelled upon that of Parmenides, and yet there is an impassable gulf between the two. The touch of charlatanism, which is so strange a feature in the copy, is altogether absent from the model. It is true, no doubt, that there are traces of Orphic ideas in the poem of Parmenides;

1 Diog. ix. 21 (R. P. 111), reading 'Aμeivía Aloxaíra with Diels (Hermes, xxxv. p. 197). Sotion, in his Successions, separated Parmenides from Xenophanes and associated him with the Pythagoreans (Dox. pp. 146, 148, 166).

3

2 Strabo, vi. I, p. 252 (p. 195, n. 1); Ceb. Tab. 2 (R. P. 111 c). This Kebes is not the Kebes of the Phaedo; but he certainly lived some time before Lucian, who speaks of him as a well-known writer. A Cynic of the name is mentioned by Athenaios (156 d). The statements of Strabo are of the greatest value; for they are based upon historians now lost.

3 O. Kern in Arch. iii. pp. 173 sqq. We know too little, however, of the apocalyptic poems of the sixth century B. C. to be sure of the details. All we can say is that Parmenides has taken the form of his poem from

but they are all to be found either in the allegorical introduction or in the second part of the poem, and we need not therefore take them very seriously. Now Parmenides was a western Hellene, and he had probably been a Pythagorean, so it is not a little remarkable that he should be so free from the common

tendency of his age and country. It is here, if anywhere, that we may trace the influence of Xenophanes. As regards his relation to the Pythagorean system, we shall have something to say later on. At present we need only note further that, like most of the older philosophers, he took part in politics; and Speusippos recorded that he legislated for his native city. Others

add that the magistrates of Elea made the citizens swear every year to abide by the laws which Parmenides had given them.1

85. Parmenides was really the first philosopher to The poem. expound his system in metrical language. As there is some confusion on this subject, it deserves a few words of explanation. In writing of Empedokles, Mr. J. A. Symonds said: "The age in which he lived had not yet thrown off the form of poetry in philosophical composition. Even Parmenides had committed his austere theories to hexameter verse." Now this is wrongly put. The earliest philosophers, Anaximander, Anaximenes, and Herakleitos, all wrote in prose, and the only Greeks who ever wrote philosophy in verse

some such source. See Diels, "Ueber die poetischen Vorbilder des Parmenides" (Berl. Sitzb. 1896), and the Introduction to his Parmenides Lehrgedicht, pp. 9 sqq.

1 Diog. ix. 23 (R. P. 111). Plut. adv. Col. 1226 a, Пapμeviôns dè tǹv ἑαυτοῦ πατρίδα διεκόσμησε νόμοις ἀρίστοις, ὥστε τὰς ἀρχὰς καθ ̓ ἕκαστον ἐνιαυτὸν ἐξορκοῦν τοὺς πολίτας ἐμμενεῖν τοῖς Παρμενίδου νόμοις. Strabo, vi. I. p. 252, (Ελέαν) ἐξ ἧς Παρμενίδης καὶ Ζήνων ἐγένοντο ἄνδρες Πυθαγόρειοι. δοκεῖ δέ μοι καὶ δι ̓ ἐκείνους καὶ ἔτι πρότερον εὐνομηθῆναι.

at all were just these two, Parmenides and Empedokles; for Xenophanes was not primarily a philosopher any more than Epicharmos. Empedokles copied Parmenides; and he, no doubt, was influenced by Xenophanes and the Orphics. But the thing was an innovation, and one that did not maintain itself.

The fragments of Parmenides are preserved for the most part by Simplicius, who fortunately inserted them in his commentary, because in his time the original work was already rare.1 I follow the arrangement of Diels.

(1)

The car that bears me carried me as far as ever my heart desired, since it brought me and set me on the renowned way of the goddess, which alone leads the man who knows through all things. On that way was I borne along; for on 5 it did the wise steeds carry me, drawing my car, and maidens showed the way. And the axle, glowing in the socket-for it was urged round by the whirling wheels at each endgave forth a sound as of a pipe, when the daughters of the Sun, hasting to convey me into the light, threw back their 10 veils from off their faces and left the abode of Night.

2

There are the gates of the ways of Night and Day, fitted above with a lintel and below with a threshold of stone. They themselves, high in the air, are closed by mighty doors, and Avenging Justice keeps the keys that fit them. Her did 15 the maidens entreat with gentle words and cunningly persuade to unfasten without demur the bolted bars from the gates. Then, when the doors were thrown back, they disclosed a wide opening, when their brazen posts fitted with rivets and nails swung back one after the other. Straight through them, 20 on the broad way, did the maidens guide the horses and the

1 Simpl. Phys. 144, 25 (R. P. 117). Simplicius, of course, had the library of the Academy at his command. Diels notes, however, that Proclus seems to have used a different MS.

2 For these see Hesiod, Theog. 748.