Editing Hecataeus of Abdera

{{Short description|Greek philosopher and historian (c.360–c.290 BC)}}
{{distinguish|Hecataeus of Miletus}}
'''Hecataeus''' of [[Abdera, Thrace|Abdera]] ({{langx|el|Ἑκαταῖος ὁ Ἀβδηρίτης}}; {{Circa}} 360 BC &ndash; c. 290 BC<ref>{{harvtxt|Hornblower|Spawforth|2003|p=[https://archive.org/details/oxfordclassicald0000unse_w0u7/page/670/mode/2up?view=theater 671]}}</ref>) was an [[Ancient Greece|ancient Greek]] historian and [[Ethnography|ethnographer]].{{Sfn|Dillery|1998|p=255}} None of his works survive; his writings are attested by later authors in various [[Literary fragment|literary fragments]], in particular his ''Aegyptica'', a work on the society and culture of the [[Ancient Egypt|Egyptians]], and ''On the Hyperboreans''. He is one of the authors (''[[FGrHist]]'' 264) whose fragments were collected in [[Felix Jacoby]]'s ''[[Fragmente der griechischen Historiker]]''.<ref>Jacoby's work has been updated by ''[[Brill's New Jacoby]]''; see {{harvtxt|Lang|2012}}.</ref> 

Historian John Dillery called Hecataeus "a figure of extraordinary importance for the study of Greek and non-Greek [cultures] in the [[Hellenistic period]]."{{Sfn|Dillery|1998|p=255}}

{{anchor|Biography|History}}

==Life==
Hecataeus was generally associated with [[Abdera, Thrace|Abdera]] (Gr: Ἄβδηρα), a [[Greek colonisation|Greek colony]] on the coast of [[Thrace]] near the mouth of the [[Nestos (river)|Néstos River]].

[[Diodorus Siculus]] (fl. 1st century BCE) wrote that Hecataeus visited [[Thebes, Egypt|Thebes]] in the times of [[Ptolemy I Soter]] (r. 305 – 282 BCE) and composed a history of Egypt. Diodorus comments that many additional Greeks went to and wrote about Egypt in the same period.<ref>[[Diodorus Siculus]], [https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Diodorus_Siculus/1C*.html#46.8 1.46.8].</ref> The 10th-century [[Byzantine Empire|Byzantine]] encyclopedia the ''[[Suda]]'' gives him the honorific title "critic [[grammarian]]" and says that he lived in the time of the successors to [[Alexander the Great|Alexander]].<ref>[[Klaus Meister]] "Hecataeus" (2) of Abdera in ''[[Oxford Classical Dictionary]]'' 3rd. ed. [[Oxford]]; [[Oxford University Press]] 1999 p.671</ref>{{Sfn|Dillery|1998|p=255}} According to 3rd-century CE philosopher [[Diogenes Laertius]], Hecataeus was a student of the [[Philosophical skepticism|skeptic]] [[Pyrrho]] (c. 360 – 270 BCE).<ref>{{harvtxt|Diogenes Laertius|1925|loc=[https://www.loebclassics.com/view/diogenes_laertius-lives_eminent_philosophers_book_ix_chapter_11_pyrrho/1925/pb_LCL185.483.xml 9.69 (pp. 482, 482)]}}.</ref>

==Works==
No complete works of Hecataeus have survived, and knowledge of his writing exists only in passages (called "[[Literary fragment|fragments]]") from works by other ancient writers, most of which concern [[religion]]. Eight fragments survive from his book about the [[Hyperborea|Hyperboreans]], the mythical people of the far north. Six fragments survive from his ''Aegyptiaca'' and regard Egyptian philosophy, priests, [[Ancient Egyptian deities|gods]], [[Egyptian temple|sanctuaries]], [[Moses]], and wine; they also mention the 4th century BCE Greek philosopher [[Clearchus of Soli]] and the school of [[gymnosophists]].<ref>Stoneman, Richard. ''The Greek Experience of India: From Alexander to the Indo-Greeks'', Princeton University Press, 2019, p 142</ref> Hecataeus wrote the work ''Aegyptiaca''<ref>Wachsmuth (1895), Trüdinger (1918), Burton (1972)</ref> ({{Circa}} 320 – 305 BCE)<ref>{{harvtxt|Lang|2012|loc=Biographical Essay}}.</ref> or ''On the Egyptians''.<ref>Jacoby (1943), Murray (1970), Fraser (1972)</ref> Both suggestions{{Clarification needed|reason=Referent of "both suggestions" is unclear.|date=May 2025}} are based on known titles of other [[Ethnography|ethnographic]] works which contain an account of Egypt's customs, religious beliefs and geography. The single largest fragment from this lost work is held to be Diodorus' account of the [[Ramesseum]], the tomb of [[Ramesses II]], who is often referred to by the Greek rendition of his name, Ozymandias  (i.47-50).{{fact|date=May 2016}} According to Montanari, in Hecataeus's writing, Egypt is "strongly idealised" and depicted as a country "exemplary in its customs and political institutions".<ref>{{harvtxt|Montanari|2022|p=900}}.</ref> Hecataeus' excursus on the Jews in ''Aegyptiaca'' was the first mention of them in [[Ancient Greek literature|ancient Greek literature]]. It was subsequently paraphrased in Diodorus Siculus 40.3.8.

Diodorus Siculus' ethnography of Egypt (''[[Bibliotheca historica]],'' Book I) represents by far the largest number of fragments. Diodorus mostly paraphrases Hecataeus, thus it is difficult to extract Hecataeus's actual writings (as in [[Karl Wilhelm Ludwig Müller]]'s ''Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum''). Diodorus (ii.47.1-2) and [[Apollonius of Rhodes]] tell of another work by Hecataeus, ''On the Hyperboreans''.<ref>{{cite book| title=Pseudo-Hecataeus: "On the Jews"  |last=Bar-Kochva |first=Bezalel |authorlink=Bezalel Bar-Kochva | chapter=The Structure of an Ethnographical Work | chapter-url=http://content.cdlib.org/xtf/view?docId=ft3290051c&chunk.id=d0e8538&toc.depth=1&toc.id=d0e8019&brand=eschol |year=1997 |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=9780520268845}}</ref> The early Christian theologian [[Clement of Alexandria]] (c. 150 – c. 215 CE) (''[[Stromata]]'' 5.113) cites a work by Hecataeus entitled "On [[Abraham]] and the Egyptians". According to Clement, Hecataeus was his source of verses from [[Sophocles]] that praise monotheism and condemn idolatry.<ref name="Doran_Charlesworth">R. Doran, ''Pseudo-Hecataeus (Second Century B.C.-First Century A.D.). A New Translation and Introduction'', in [[James H. Charlesworth]] (1985), ''The Old Testament Pseudoepigrapha'', Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company Inc., Volume 2, {{ISBN|0-385-09630-5}} (Vol. 1), {{ISBN|0-385-18813-7}} (Vol. 2), p. 906</ref> The main fragment explicitly attributed to Hecataeus in Jewish and Christian literature is found in [[Josephus]] (''Apion'' 1.175&ndash;205), who argues in this fragment that learned Greeks (including [[Aristotle]]) admired the Jews.<ref name="Doran_Charlesworth" /> The work is considered spurious in the ''[[Oxford Classical Dictionary]]'',<ref>''OCD''<sup>3</sup> p.671</ref> and, according to ''[[Brill's New Pauly]]'', its author was probably a [[Hellenistic Judaism|Hellenised Jew]].<ref>''[[Brill's New Pauly]]'', [https://referenceworks-brill-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/display/entries/NPOE/e505840.xml s.v. Hecataeus (4)].</ref>

According to the 10th century [[Byzantine Empire|Byzantine]] encyclopedia the ''[[Suda]]'', Hecataeus wrote a treatise on [[Homer]] and [[Hesiod]], entitled ''On the Poetry of Homer and Hesiod'' ({{lang|grc|Περὶ τῆς ποιήσεως Ὁμήρου καὶ Ἡσιόδου}}).<ref>''[[Suda]]'' [https://www.cs.uky.edu/~raphael/sol/sol-entries/epsilon/359 ε 359] = ''[[Fragmente der griechischen Historiker|BNJ]]'', [https://scholarlyeditions-brill-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/reader/urn:cts:greekLit:fgrh.0264.bnjo-2-tr1-eng:t1 F 264 T1]; ''[[Brill's New Pauly]]'', [https://referenceworks-brillonline-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/entries/brill-s-new-pauly/hecataeus-e505840#e505880 s.v. Hecataeus (4)].</ref> Nothing of this work survives, however, and it is mentioned by no other ancient source.<ref>''[[Brill's New Pauly]]'', [https://referenceworks-brillonline-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/entries/brill-s-new-pauly/hecataeus-e505840#e505880 s.v. Hecataeus (4)].</ref>

==References==
===Citations===
{{reflist|30em}}

=== Bibliography ===

* {{citation |last=Dillery |first=John |title=Hecataeus of Abdera: Hyperboreans, Egypt, and the "Interpretatio Graeca" |date=1998 |journal=Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte |volume=47 |issue=3 |pages=255&ndash;275 |jstor=4436508}}

* {{citation|author=Diogenes Laertius|author-link=Diogenes Laertius|translator-last=Hicks|translator-first=R. D.|title=Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Volume II: Books 6-10|year=1925|publisher=Harvard University Press|location=Cambridge, Massachusetts|isbn=978-0-674-99204-7|url=https://www.loebclassics.com/view/LCL185/1925/volume.xml}}.
* {{citation|last=Lang|first=Philippa|editor-last=Worthington|editor-first=Ian|contribution=Hekataios (264)|title=Brill's New Jacoby, Part III|year=2012|publisher=[[Brill (publisher)|Brill]]|location=Leiden|doi=10.1163/1873-5363_bnj_a264}}.
* {{citation |last=Montanari |first=Franco |chapter=VIII. Historiography |title=History of Ancient Greek Literature |year=2022 |publisher=De Gruyter |location=Berlin|isbn=9783110419924|doi=10.1515/9783110426328|s2cid=248687280 }}.
* {{citation |editor-last=Smith |editor-first=William |editor-link=William Smith (lexicographer) |contribution=Hecataeus (2) |title=Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology |title-link=Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology |year=1873 |publisher=John Murray |location=London |contribution-url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0104:entry=hecataeus-bio-3 }}.
* {{citation |last=Walton |first=Francis R. |title=The Messenger of God in Hecataeus of Abdera |journal=Harvard Theological Review |date=October 1955 |volume=48 |issue=4 |pages=255&ndash;257 |doi=10.1017/S0017816000025244 |s2cid=163376359 }}.
* {{citation |editor-last1=Hornblower |editor-first1=Simon |editor-link1=Simon Hornblower |editor-last2=Spawforth |editor-first2=Antony |contribution=Hecataeus (2) |title=Oxford Classical Dictionary |title-link=Oxford Classical Dictionary |year=2003 |edition=3rd rev. |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=0-19-860641-9 |contribution-url=https://archive.org/details/oxfordclassicald0000unse_w0u7/page/670/mode/2up?view=theater |contribution-url-access=registration }}.

== Further reading ==
*{{citation |last=Murray |first=Oswyn |title=Hecataeus of Abdera and Pharaonic Kingship |journal=The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology |date=August 1970 |volume=56 |pages=141&ndash;171 |doi=10.2307/3856050 |jstor=3856050 }}.
==External links==
* [https://archive.org/stream/diefragmenteder00krangoog#page/n496/mode/2up Greek text of Hecataeus' fragments] in ''{{lang|de|[[Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker]]}}''

{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hecataeus, Abdera}}
[[Category:Hellenistic-era historians]]
[[Category:Abderites]]
[[Category:4th-century BC Greek historians]]
[[Category:Ancient Greeks in Egypt]]
[[Category:Year of birth unknown]]
[[Category:Year of death unknown]]