Diotimos Library · Greek Antiquity Collection · Bilingual Edition
Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II
The Greek and Latin of Hermann Diels · New English translation and notes.
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English Page · Branch 22 of 126
The Life · A 1 §§ 64–66
Ancient Greek and Latin
p. 34Diogenes Laertius VIII 64
τὰ δ' αὐτὰ καὶ Τίμαιος εἴρηκε, τὴν αἰτίαν ἅμα παρατιθέμενος τοῦ δημοτικὸν εἶναι τὸν ἄνδρα. φησὶ γὰρ ὅτι κληθεὶς ὑπό τινος τῶν ἀρχόντων, ὡς προβαίνοντος τοῦ δείπνου τὸ ποτὸν οὐκ εἰσεφέρετο, τῶν ἄλλων ἡσυχαζόντων, μισοπονήρως διατεθεὶς ἐκέλευσεν εἰσφέρειν· ὁ δὲ κεκληκὼς ἀναμένειν ἔφη τὸν τῆς βουλῆς ὑπηρέτην. ὡς δὲ παρεγένετο, ἐγενήθη συμποσίαρχος, τοῦ κεκληκότος δηλονότι καταστήσαντος, ὃς ὑπεγράφετο τυραννίδος ἀρχήν· ἐκέλευσε γὰρ ἢ πίνειν ἢ καταχεῖσθαι τῆς κεφαλῆς. τότε μὲν οὖν ὁ Ἐμπεδοκλῆς ἡσύχασε· τῆι δ' ὑστεραίαι εἰσαγαγὼν εἰς δικαστήριον ἀπέκτεινε καταδικάσας ἀμφοτέρους, τόν τε κλήτορα καὶ τὸν συμποσίαρχον. ἀρχὴ μὲν οὖν αὐτῶι τῆς πολιτείας ἥδε.
Diogenes Laertius VIII 65
πάλιν δὲ Ἄκρωνος τοῦ ἰατροῦ τόπον αἰτοῦντος παρὰ τῆς βουλῆς εἰς κατασκευὴν πατρώιου μνήματος διὰ τὴν ἐν τοῖς ἰατροῖς ἀκρότητα παρελθὼν ὁ Ἐμπεδοκλῆς ἐκώλυσε, τά τε ἄλλα περὶ ἰσότητος διαλεχθεὶς καί τι καὶ τοιοῦτον ἐρωτήσας· τί δὲ ἐπιγράψομεν ἐλεγεῖον; ἢ τοῦτο· ἄκρον … ἀκροτάτης; τινὲς δὲ τὸν δεύτερον στίχον οὕτω προφέρονται· ἀκροτάτης κορυφῆς τύμβος ἄκρος κατέχει. τοῦτό τινες Σιμωνίδου φασὶν εἶναι.
Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II: The Life
p. 35The dinner that revealed a tyranny; Acron's tomb; the Thousand dissolved
Diogenes Laertius VIII 64
Timaeus says the same, and gives at the same time the reason why the man was on the people's side. He says that Empedocles was invited to dinner by one of the magistrates, and that as the meal went on no drink was brought in; the others kept quiet, but he, taking it ill, told them to bring it. His host said they were waiting for the servant of the council. When the man arrived he was made master of the feast — appointed, plainly, by the host — and he sketched out the beginnings of a tyranny: he ordered the guests either to drink or have the wine poured over their heads. Empedocles said nothing at the time; but the next day he brought both of them into court, the host and the master of the feast, secured their conviction and had them put to death. This was the beginning of his public life.
Diogenes Laertius VIII 65
Again, when Acron the physician asked the council for a plot on which to build a monument to his father, on the strength of his pre-eminence among physicians, Empedocles came forward and blocked it. He argued at length about equality, and put among other things this question: "And what elegiac couplet shall we inscribe on it? This one? — 'The topmost … of the topmost'?" Some quote the second line in this form instead: "the topmost tomb holds the topmost peak." Some say the couplet is by Simonides.
Socrates
Reading Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II · The Life · A 1 §§ 64–66
Ask about a concept, passage, contradiction, or connection.
Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.About This Reading Edition
Empedocles survives not only through his poems but through the ancient writers who described his life, doctrines, medicine, cosmology, and extraordinary reputation. Volume II gathers the testimonia: ninety-nine numbered reports drawn from fifty-two authors across nine centuries. The English introduction appears full width; each Greek or Latin testimony then faces its new English translation.
Historical Text and Translation
The Greek and Latin reading text follows Hermann Diels’s third edition of Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker (1912), retaining the supplied edition’s Diels-Kranz numbering and editorial signs. These witnesses must be read as a chain of transmission: many preserve valuable evidence, while others summarize, dispute, reshape, or repeat earlier accounts.
About Diotimos Editions
Diotimos Editions prepared the new English translation, introduction, notes, and reception appendices for this volume. The translation keeps each witness distinct and preserves its technical vocabulary, argumentative posture, and relationship to the surviving poetry in Volume I.
Rights
The ancient source works and Hermann Diels’s 1912 Greek and Latin edition are in the public domain. The 2026 English translation, introduction, notes, and editorial matter are original to this edition and remain © 2026 Diotimos.