Leonid Zhmud The Origin of the History of Science in Classical Antiquity

Phaedrus (274c–d), where, for the first time in
the Greek tradition, this god is called the
pro¯tos heurete¯s of numbers and count-
ing (i.e., arithmetic), geometry, astronomy, writing, and even the games of
draughts and dice.
47
Interestingly, Aristoxenus refers not to Plato, but directly
to the Egyptians, probably taking Socrates’ story of Thoth’s inventions as his-
torical evidence. Meanwhile, Phaedrus himself seems to regard this story as
Socrates’ fabrication (275b 3–4), as he does the story of cicadas preceding it.
Hence, Plato gives the reader to understand that the story should not be taken
too seriously.
48
Which does not mean, however, that we ought not to look for
possible sources (both Greek and Egyptian) of the tradition in which Thoth fig-
ures as the inventor of sciences.
Though Thoth had been known to the Greeks under the name of Hermes at
least since the founding of Naucratis (seventh century BC),
49
Plato was the first
to mention him under his own name.
50
Relying on the Egyptian tradition and,
44
See above, 223 n. 37.
45
See e.g.
Cat. 12a 6; APr 41a 26, 50a 37; APo 71a 32f., 73b 20f., 76b 7; Top. 120b 3,
142b 7, 149a 30;
SE 166a 33, 173b 8; Met. 986a 18, 990a 9; Pol. 1261b 29, 1264b
20;
Rhet. 1407b 3. Revealingly, Aristotle criticizes the definitions of odd and even
contemporary to him (
Top. 142b 6f.; 149a 30; SE 173b 8).
46
Under the derivatives I mean even times odd, odd times even and other similar kinds
of numbers considered in propositions IX, 32–34 of the
Elements. See Philolaus (44
B 5); Pl.
Parm. 143e–144a; Arist. fr. 199 Rose.
47
Qeúq … prõton @riqmón te kaì logismòn eûre$n … Éti dè petteía~ te kaì ku-
beía~, kaì d3 kaì grámmata (274c–d); grámmata … mn2mh~ te gàr kaì sofía~
fármakon (274e). Cf. l2qh~ fármak^ (Eur. fr. 578 Nauck).
48
Hackforth, R.
Plato’s Phaedrus, Cambridge 1952, 157 n. 2; Heitsch, E. Platon.
Phaidros, Göttingen 1993, 188f. To be sure, in Philebus (18b–d), Thoth figures
again as the inventor of writing.
49
See already Hdt. II, 68, 138.
50
The next was Aristoxenus, which points again to Plato as the source of this version.

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3. The origin of number
225
still more, on the identification of Thoth with the wise and ingenious Hermes,
classical literature after Plato makes Thoth the inventor of writing, sciences,
law, and even language itself.
51
Meanwhile, Egyptian notions of Thoth were
somewhat different. He was supposed to be the sage counselor of Re, the law-
giver, the keeper of all sorts of wisdom. He was also the patron of scribes, as-
sociated as such with the calendar and the art of counting. On the other hand,
Egyptian literature makes practically no mention of Thoth as the
inventor of
what Greek and Roman authors attributed to him.
52
Egyptians, as well as the
Greeks of the Homeric age, regarded their gods as patrons, protectors, and
givers of wise and useful things, hardly as their inventors (1.1). At least, this as-
pect of the gods’ activities was never brought to the foreground.
53
Plato prob-
ably did know Thoth as the patron of writing and scribes, but it was all he really
needed to know; the other elements of his story going back to Greek, not Egyp-
tian, tradition.
Most of the authors of the sixth and fifth centuries ascribe the discovery of
writing, arithmetic, and astronomy to Palamedes, who was already recognized
as a sage in the archaic epoch,
54
whereas in Aeschylus’