Ancient literature

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Ancient literature comprises religious and scientific documents, tales, poetry and plays, royal edicts and declarations, and other forms of writing that were recorded on a variety of media, including stone, stone tablets, papyri, palm leaves, and metal. Before the spread of writing, oral literature did not always survive well, though some texts and fragments have persisted. One can conclude that an unknown number of written works too have likely not survived the ravages of time and are therefore lost. August Nitschke sees some fairy tales as literary survivals dating back to Ice Age and Stone Age narrators.[1][example needed]

List of ancient texts[]

Bronze Age[]

See also: Sumerian literature, Akkadian literature, Ancient Egyptian literature, Hittite texts, and Ugaritic texts

Early Bronze Age: 3rd millennium BC (approximate dates shown). The earliest written literature dates from about 2600 BC (classical Sumerian).[2] The earliest literary author known by name is Enheduanna, a Sumerian priestess and public figure dating to ca. 24th century BC.[3] Certain literary texts are difficult to date, such as the Egyptian Book of the Dead, which was recorded in the Papyrus of Ani around 1240 BC, but other versions of the book probably date from about the 18th century BC.

Middle Bronze Age: ca. 2000 to 1600 BC (approximate dates shown)

Late Bronze Age: ca. 1600 to 1200 BC (approximate dates shown)

Iron Age[]

See also: Sanskrit literature

Iron Age texts predating Classical Antiquity: 12th to 8th centuries BCE

Classical Antiquity[]

Further information: Ancient Greek literature, Syriac literature, Latin literature, Indian literature, Ancient Hebrew writings, Avesta, Chinese literature, and Tamil literature
See also: 7th century BC in poetry, 6th century BC in poetry, 5th century BC in poetry, 4th century BC in poetry, 3rd century BC in poetry, 2nd century BC in poetry, and 1st century BC in poetry

8th century BCE[]

7th century BCE[]

  • Vedic Sanskrit
    • Shulba Sutra (containing geometry related to fire-altar construction)
      • Manava Sulbasutra
      • Baudhayana sutra
    • Shatapatha Brahmana - Commentary on the Vedas
    • Nirukta (technical treatise on etymology, lexical category and the semantics of Sanskrit words)
    • Kausitaka Upanishad
  • Greek:
    • Hesiod: The Theogony and Works and Days
    • Archilochus
    • Alcman
    • Semonides of Amorgos
    • Solon
    • Mimnermus
    • Stesichorus
  • Chinese
    • Classic of Poetry (Shījīng),
    • Classic of Documents (Shūjīng) (authentic portions),
    • Classic of Changes (I Ching)

6th century BCE[]

5th century BCE[]

  • Sanskrit:
  • Avestan: Yasht
  • Chinese:
  • Greek:
    • Pindar: Odes
    • Herodotus: The Histories of Herodotus
    • Thucydides: History of the Peloponnesian War
    • Aeschylus: The Suppliants, The Persians, Seven Against Thebes, Oresteia
    • Sophocles: Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone, Electra and other plays
    • Euripides: Alcestis, Medea, Heracleidae, Hippolytus, Andromache, Hecuba, The Suppliants, Electra, Heracles, Trojan Women, Iphigeneia in Tauris, Ion, Helen, Phoenician Women, Orestes, Bacchae, Iphigeneia at Aulis, Cyclops, Rhesus
    • Aristophanes: The Acharnians, The Knights, The Clouds, The Wasps, Peace, The Birds, Lysistrata, Thesmophoriazusae, The Frogs, Ecclesiazousae, Plutus
  • Hebrew: date of the extant text of the Torah

4th century BCE[]

3rd century BCE[]

  • Avestan: Avesta
  • Etruscan: Liber Linteus Zagrabiensis (Linen Book of Zagreb)
  • Sanskrit:
  • Sinhalese (Elu): Sīhalattakathā or Hela Atuwā (Pali commentaries of Buddhist teachings that were translated into Sinhalese after the introduction of Buddhism to Sri Lanka)[24]
  • Tamil:
  • Hebrew: Ecclesiastes
  • Greek:
    • Apollonius of Rhodes: Argonautica
    • Callimachus (310/305-240 B.C.), lyric poet
    • Manetho: Aegyptiaca
    • Theocritus, lyric poet
  • Latin:
    • Lucius Livius Andronicus (c. 280/260 BCE — c. 200 BCE), translator, founder of Roman drama
    • Gnaeus Naevius (ca. 264 — 201 BCE), dramatist, epic poet
    • Titus Maccius Plautus (c. 254 — 184 BCE), dramatist, composer of comedies: Poenulus, Miles Gloriosus, and other plays
    • Quintus Fabius Pictor (3rd century BCE), historian
    • Lucius Cincius Alimentus (3rd century BCE), military historian and antiquarian

2nd century BCE[]

  • Sanskrit
    • Patanjali(Founder of Yoga School of Philosophy):Mahābhāṣya(Treatise on grammar and linguistics),Patanjalatantra(medical text),Yoga sūtras
    • Badrayana(Founder of Vedanta School of Philosophy):Brahma Sutras
    • Manu:Manusmriti(Laws of Manu)
  • Avestan: Vendidad
  • Chinese: Sima Qian: Records of the Grand Historian (Shǐjì)
  • Aramaic: Book of Daniel
  • Hebrew: Sirach
  • Greek
    • Polybius: The Histories
    • Book of Wisdom
    • Septuagint
  • Latin:
    • Terence (195/185 BCE — 159 BCE), comic dramatist: The Brothers, The Girl from Andros, Eunuchus, The Self-Tormentor
    • Quintus Ennius (239 BCE — c. 169 BCE), poet
    • Marcus Pacuvius (ca. 220 BCE — 130 BCE), tragic dramatist, poet
    • Statius Caecilius (220 BCEE — 168/166 BCE), comic dramatist
    • Marcius Porcius Cato (234 BCE — 149 BCE), generalist, topical writer
    • Gaius Acilius (2nd century BCE), historian
    • Lucius Accius (170 BCE — c. 86 BCE), tragic dramatist, philologist
    • Gaius Lucilius (c. 160's BCE — 103/2 BCE), satirist
    • Quintus Lutatius Catulus (2nd century BCE), public officer, epigrammatist
    • Aulus Furius Antias (2nd century BCE), poet
    • Gaius Julius Caesar Strabo Vopiscus (130 BCE — 87 BCE), public officer, tragic dramatist
    • Lucius Pomponius Bononiensis (2nd century BCE), comic dramatist, satirist
    • Lucius Cassius Hemina (2nd century BCE), historian
    • Lucius Calpurnius Piso Frugi (2nd century BCE), historian
    • Manius Manilius (2nd century BCE), public officer, jurist
    • Lucius Coelius Antipater (2nd century BCE), jurist, historian
    • Publius Sempronius Asellio (158 BCE — after 91 BCE), military officer, historian
    • (2nd century BCE), jurist
    • Lucius Afranius (2nd & 1st centuries BCE), comic dramatist
    • Titus Albucius (2nd & 1st centuries BCE), orator
    • Publius Rutilius Rufus (158 BCE — after 78 BCE), jurist
    • Quintus Lutatius Catulus (2nd & 1st centuries BCE), public officer, poet
    • Lucius Aelius Stilo Praeconinus (154 BCE — 74 BCE), philologist
    • Quintus Claudius Quadrigarius (2nd & 1st centuries BCE), historian
    • Valerius Antias (2nd & 1st centuries BCE), historian
    • Lucius Cornelius Sisenna (121 BCE — 67 BCE), soldier, historian
    • Quintus Cornificius (2nd & 1st centuries BCE), rhetorician

1st century BC[]

See also: Middle Persian literature
  • Latin:
    • Cicero: Catiline Orations, Pro Caelio, Dream of Scipio
    • Julius Caesar: Gallic Wars, Civil War
    • Virgil: Eclogues, Georgics and Aeneid
    • Lucretius: On the Nature of Things
    • Livy: History of Rome (Ab Urbe Condita)

1st century CE[]

  • Sanskrit
  • Chinese: Ban Gu: Book of Han (Hànshū)
  • Greek:
    • Plutarch: Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans
    • Josephus: The Jewish War, Antiquities of the Jews, Against Apion
    • The books of the New Testament of the Christian Bible and the Didache
  • Latin: see Classical Latin
    • Tacitus: Germania
    • Ovid: Metamorphoses; also Tristia and Epistulae ex Ponto written during his exile
    • Pliny the Elder: Natural History
    • Petronius: Satyricon
    • Seneca the Younger: Phaedra, Dialogues
    • Statius: Thebaid; also Silvae and unfinished Achilleid

2nd century[]

  • Sanskrit: Aśvaghoṣa: Buddhacharita (Acts of the Buddha)
  • Pahlavi:
  • Greek:
    • Arrian: Anabasis Alexandri
    • Marcus Aurelius: Meditations
    • Epictetus and Arrian: Enchiridion
    • Ptolemy: Almagest
    • Athenaeus: The Banquet of the Learned
    • Pausanias: Description of Greece
    • Longus: Daphnis and Chloe
    • Lucian: True History
    • The Shepherd of Hermas
  • Latin: see Classical Latin
    • Apuleius: The Golden Ass
    • Lucius Ampelius: Liber Memorialis
    • Suetonius: Lives of the Twelve Caesars
    • Tertullian: Apologeticus

3rd century[]

  • Avestan: Khordeh Avesta (Zoroastrian prayer book)
  • Pahlavi: Mani: Shabuhragan (Manichaean holy book)
  • Chinese:
    • Chen Shou: Records of Three Kingdoms (Sānguó Zhì)
    • Zhang Hua: Bowuzhi
  • Greek: Plotinus: Enneads
  • Latin: see Late Latin
    • Distichs of Cato
  • Hebrew: Mishnah
  • Pali (Sri Lanka): Dīpavaṃsa

Late Antiquity[]

See also: 4th century in poetry and 5th century in poetry

4th century[]

  • Latin: see Late Latin
    • Augustine of Hippo: Confessions, On Christian Doctrine
    • Faltonia Betitia Proba: Cento Vergilianus de laudibus Christi ("A Virgilian Cento Concerning the Glory of Christ")
    • Apicius (De re coquinaria, "On the Subject of Cooking")
    • Pervigilium Veneris ("Vigil of Venus")
  • Sanskrit
    • Asanga:Dharma-dharmata-vibhaga(Distinguishing Phenomena and Pure Being),Mahāyānasaṃgraha (Summary of the Great Vehicle)
    • Vasubandhu:Verses on the Treasury of the Abhidharma,Pañcaskandhaprakaraṇa (Explanation of the Five Aggregates),Pañcaskandhaprakaraṇa (Explanation of the Five Aggregates),Vyākhyāyukti ("Proper Mode of Exposition"),Vādavidhi ("Rules for Debate"),Dharmadharmatāvibhāgavṛtti (Commentary on Distinguishing Elements from Reality),Madhyāntavibhāgabhāṣya (Commentary on Distinguishing the Middle from the Extremes),Mahāyānasūtrālaṃkārabhāṣya (Commentary on the Ornament to the Great Vehicle Discourses)
    • Dignāga:Pramāṇa-samuccaya (Compendium of Valid Cognition),Hetucakra (The wheel of reason)
    • Haribhadra:Anekāntajayapatākā [The Victory Banner of Anekantavada (Relativism)],Dhūrtākhyāna (The Rogue's Stories),Yogadṛṣṭisamuccaya (An Array of Views on Yoga),Ṣaḍdarśanasamuccaya (Compendium of Six Philosophies)
  • Syriac: Aphrahat, Ephrem the Syrian
  • Aramaic: Jerusalem Talmud
  • Pali (Sri Lanka): Mahāvaṃsa

5th century[]

  • Chinese:
    • Bao Zhao: Fu on the Ruined City (蕪城賦, Wú chéng fù)
    • Fan Ye: Book of the Later Han (後漢書, Hòuhànshū)
  • Sanskrit:
  • Tamil:[25]
  • Pahlavi:
  • Pali (Sri Lanka)
  • Latin: see Late Latin
    • Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus: De Re Militari
    • Augustine of Hippo: The City of God
    • Paulus Orosius: Seven Books of History Against the Pagans
    • Jerome: Vulgate
    • Prudentius: Psychomachia
    • Consentius's grammar
    • Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite: De Coelesti Hierarchia (Περὶ τῆς Οὐρανίας Ἱεραρχίας, "On the Celestial Hierarchy"), Mystical Theology
    • Socrates of Constantinople: Historia Ecclesiastica

6th century[]

  • Sinhalese:
    • Wansaththppakāsinī (Sinhalese translation of the Pali Mahāvaṃsa)[28]
    • Sigiriya Poems ( Poems written by visitors to the citadel of Sigiriya)

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ Karimi, Edith (2016). Mimetische Bildung durch Märchen: Phantasie, Narration, Moral [Mimetic education through Märchen: phantasy, narration, morality]. European Studies in Education (in German). Vol. 34. Münster: Waxmann Verlag. p. 110. ISBN 9783830984726. Retrieved 2018-10-25. Manche Märchen ordnet [August] Nitschke den Jägern und Hirten der letzten Eiszeit zu, andere den Bauern und Fischern im Mesolithikum, wieder andere den Seefahrern der Meglithgesellschaft oder den Helden der Indogermanen. [August Nitschke assigns many fairy-tales to the hunters and herders of the last Ice Age, other ones to the farmers and fisherfolk of the Mesolithic, and still other ones to the seafarers of the megalith cultures or to the heroes of the Indo-European peoples.]
  2. ^ Grimbly, Shona (2000). Encyclopedia of the Ancient World. Taylor & Francis. p. 216. ISBN 978-1-57958-281-4. The earliest written literature dates from about 2600 BC, when the Sumerians started to write down their long epic poems.
  3. ^ "Why Has No One Ever Heard of the World's First Poet?". Literary Hub. 2017-06-22. Retrieved 2019-01-19.
  4. ^ Toby A. H. Wilkinson: Early Dynastic Egypt. Routledge, London/New York 2001, ISBN 0-415-26011-6.
  5. ^ Jones, Mark (2006). Criminals of the Bible: Twenty-Five Case Studies of Biblical Crimes and Outlaws. FaithWalk Publishing. p. 6. ISBN 978-1-932902-64-8. The Sumerian code of Urukagina was written around 2400 BC.
  6. ^ a b Stephanie Dalley, ed. (2000). Myths from Mesopotamia: Creation, the Flood, Gilgamesh, and Others. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-953836-2.
  7. ^ Eccles, Sir John Carew (1989). Evolution of the Brain: Creation of the Self. Routledge. p. 115. ISBN 978-0-415-03224-7. The Epic of Gilgamesh, written in Sumer about 2200 BC.
  8. ^ Miriam., Lichtheim (2006). The Old and Middle Kingdoms. University of California press. p. 23. ISBN 9780520248427. OCLC 889165092.
  9. ^ a b c d e James P. Allen (2015). Middle Egyptian Literature: Eight Literary Works of the Middle Kingdom. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-107-08743-9.
  10. ^ Dalley, Stephanie, ed. (2000). "Etana (pp. 189ff.)". Myths from Mesopotamia. Creation, The Flood, Gilgamesh, and Others. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0199538360.
  11. ^ Noonan, John T. (1987). Bribes. University of California Press. p. 4. ISBN 978-0-520-06154-5. The Poor Man of Nippur dates from about 1500 BC.
  12. ^ Thorkild Jacobsen (1978). The treasures of darkness: a history of Mesopotamian religion. Yale University Press. pp. 167–168, 231. “Perhaps it was brought east with the Amorites of the First Dynasty of Babylon.”
  13. ^ Miriam Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature, vol.2, 1980, p.203
  14. ^ a b Alan Lenzi (2008). "The Uruk List of Kings and Sages and Late Mesopotamian Scholarship". Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions. 8 (2): 137–169. doi:10.1163/156921208786611764.
  15. ^ Berlin, Adele (2005). "Psalms and the literature of exile: Psalms 137, 44, 69, and 78". In Flint, Peter W.; Miller, Patrick D.; Brunell, Aaron; Roberts, Ryan (eds.). The Book of Psalms: Composition and Reception. Supplements to Vetus Testamentum: Formation and interpretation of Old Testament literature. Vol. 99. Leiden: Brill. p. 66. ISBN 9789004136427. Retrieved 7 June 2020. The dating of psalms is notoriously difficult [...]. Moreover, dating the psalms also follows more general trends in dating biblical texts, the favored period having moved from the Maccabean period, to the maonarchical period, to the Persian period, wherein today much of the Hebrew Bible is thought to have taken shape. To say that a psalm speaks of the destruction and exile is to date it no earlier than 586 BCE; I would place all these psalms in the exilic or postexilic period.
  16. ^ Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: "Ajahn Sujato - A Practical Guide to Reading The Suttas - March 2018". YouTube.
  17. ^ according to ancient Jewish and Christian tradition, and some modern scholars; see above inline citations.
  18. ^ Talmud, Bava Bathra 146
  19. ^ Mishnah, Pirqe Avoth 1:1
  20. ^ Josephus, Flavius (1926). "11:8". The Life. Against Apion. (Loeb Classical Library). Loeb Classical Library. p. 448. ISBN 978-0-674-99205-4. For we have not an innumerable multitude of books among us, disagreeing from and contradicting one another (as the Greeks have) but only 22 books, which are justly believed to be divine; and of them, five belong to Moses, which contain his laws, and the traditions of the origin of mankind till his death.
  21. ^ Stuart, Douglas K (2006). New American Commentary Vol. II: Exodus. Holman Reference. p. 826. ISBN 978-0-8054-0102-8.
  22. ^ "Introduction to the Pentateuch. Introduction to Genesis.". ESV Study Bible (1st ed.). Crossway. 2008. p. XLII, 29–30. ISBN 978-1-4335-0241-5.
  23. ^ RA Torrey, ed. (1994). "I-XI". The Fundamentals: A Testimony to the Truth (11th ed.). Baker Academic. ISBN 978-0-8010-1264-8.
  24. ^ Sri Lankan Journal of Librarianship and Information Management Vol.4, Nos.,3&4 (July – Dec.2011) pp. 1 -58
  25. ^ Zvelebil, Kamil (1973). The Smile of Murugan on Tamil literature of South India. Leiden: Brill. ISBN 9789004035911.
  26. ^ The Consolation of Philosophy (Oxford World's Classics), Introduction (2000)
  27. ^ Dante placed Boethius the “last of the Romans and first of the Scholastics” among the doctors in his Paradise (see The Divine Comedy).
  28. ^ "International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, Volume 11, Issue 7, July 2021 682" (PDF). International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications. 11. 2021.
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