Timaeus
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~80,400 words · 382 passages
Cite this work
- APAPlato. (n.d.). Timaeus. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/plato/timaeus
- MLAPlato. Timaeus. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/plato/timaeus.
- ChicagoPlato. Timaeus. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/plato/timaeus.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
The account of how the world was made: a divine craftsman ordering chaos while looking at an eternal model, together with a cosmology, a physics of the four elements and a human physiology.
Context and history
Through the Latin Middle Ages this was very nearly the only Plato the West could read, which is why it shaped Christian thinking about creation far more than the rest of his work. It is also the source of Atlantis, mentioned here and in the Critias and in no other ancient text.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
caste of priests among the ancient Athenians, and another of artisans; also castes of shepherds, hunters, and husbandmen, and lastly of warriors, who, like the warriors of Egypt, were separated from the rest, and carried shields and spears, a custom which the goddess first taught you, and then the Asiatics, and we among Asiatics first received from her. Observe again, what care the law took in the pursuit of wisdom, searching out the deep things of the world, and applying them to the use of man. The spot of earth which the goddess chose had the best of climates, and produced the wisest men; in no other was she herself, the philosopher and warrior goddess, so likely to have votaries. And there you dwelt as became the children of the gods, excelling all men in virtue, and many famous actions are recorded of you. The most famous of them all was the overthrow of the island of Atlantis. This great island lay over against the Pillars of Heracles, in extent greater than Libya and Asia put together, and was the passage to other islands and to a great ocean of which the Mediterranean sea was only the harbour; and within the Pillars the empire of Atlantis reached in Europe to Tyrrhenia and in Libya to Egypt. This mighty power was arrayed against Egypt and Hellas and all the countries bordering on the Mediterranean. Then your city did bravely, and won renown over the whole earth. For at the peril of her own existence, and when the other Hellenes had deserted her, she repelled the invader, and of her own accord gave liberty to all the nations within the Pillars. A little while afterwards there were great earthquakes and floods, and your warrior race all sank into the earth; and the great island of Atlantis also disappeared in the sea.…