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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Ancient Greek and Latin Page · Branch 26 of 126
The Life · A 1 §§ 69–70
Ancient Greek and Latin
p. 42Diogenes Laertius VIII 69
Ἕρμιππος δέ φησι Πάνθειάν τινα Ἀκραγαντίνην ἀπηλπισμένην ὑπὸ τῶν ἰατρῶν θεραπεῦσαι αὐτὸν καὶ διὰ τοῦτο τὴν θυσίαν ἐπιτελεῖν· τοὺς δὲ κληθέντας εἶναι πρὸς τοὺς ὀγδοήκοντα. Ἱππόβοτος δέ φησιν ἐξαναστάντα αὐτὸν ὡδευκέναι ὡς ἐπὶ τὴν Αἴτνην, εἶτα παραγενόμενον ἐπὶ τοὺς κρατῆρας τοῦ πυρὸς ἐναλέσθαι καὶ ἀφανισθῆναι, βουλόμενον τὴν περὶ αὑτοῦ φήμην βεβαιῶσαι ὅτι γεγόνοι θεός, ὕστερον δὲ γνωσθῆναι, ἀναρριπισθείσης αὐτοῦ μιᾶς τῶν κρηπίδων· χαλκᾶς γὰρ εἴθιστο ὑποδεῖσθαι. πρὸς τοῦθ' ὁ Παυσανίας ἀντέλεγε.
Diogenes Laertius VIII 70
Διόδωρος δ' ὁ Ἐφέσιος περὶ Ἀναξιμάνδρου γράφων φησὶν ὅτι τοῦτον ἐζηλώκει, τραγικὸν ἀσκῶν τῦφον καὶ σεμνὴν ἀναλαβὼν ἐσθῆτα. τοῖς Σελινουντίοις ἐμπεσόντος λοιμοῦ διὰ τὰς ἀπὸ τοῦ παρακειμένου ποταμοῦ δυσωδίας, ὥστε καὶ αὐτοὺς φθείρεσθαι καὶ τὰς γυναῖκας δυστοκεῖν, ἐπινοῆσαι τὸν Ἐμπεδοκλέα καὶ δύο τινὰς ποταμοὺς τῶν σύνεγγυς ἐπαγαγεῖν ἰδίαις δαπάναις· καὶ καταμίξαντα γλυκῆναι τὰ ῥεύματα.
Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II: The Life
p. 43The leap into Etna, the bronze sandal, and the rivers of Selinus
Diogenes Laertius VIII 69
Hermippus says that he cured a woman of Acragas named Panthea, whom the physicians had given up, and that this was why he was holding the sacrifice; and that those invited numbered about eighty. Hippobotus says that he got up and made his way toward Etna, and that when he reached the craters of fire he leapt in and vanished, wishing to confirm the report about himself that he had become a god — but that he was found out later, when one of his sandals was thrown up by the fire, since he was in the habit of wearing bronze ones. Pausanias denied this story.
Diogenes Laertius VIII 70
Diodorus of Ephesus, writing about Anaximander, says that Empedocles emulated him, cultivating a tragic pomp and assuming solemn dress. — When a plague fell upon the people of Selinus through the foul air from the river beside the town, so that the people themselves were dying and the women miscarrying, Empedocles conceived a plan and brought in two of the neighbouring rivers at his own expense; and by mixing them he sweetened the waters.
Biography: three more deaths, and one piece of public engineering.
The leap into Etna is the story everyone knows, and it is the least well attested thing in this Life. It rests on Hippobotus, a late compiler; the bronze sandal thrown back out of the volcano is a detail from comedy rather than from history; and Pausanias, who was there, contradicted it. It survives because it is a good ending, and because a man who wrote B 112 invites it. The Selinus rivers are the opposite kind of report: a named town, a named disease, a named remedy paid for out of his own pocket — and the coins of Selinus struck in that period show a river-god sacrificing at an altar, which is as close to independent confirmation as this material ever comes.
20 ἐκώλυε Reiske: the manuscripts read ἐκωλύθη. — 26–27 γεγόνοιν in B¹P¹: γεγόνει in F. — 28 Pausanias' denial comes in Heraclides' dialogue. — 31 on the plague at Selinus compare Head, Historia Numorum, pp. 147 ff.
Socrates
Reading Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II · The Life · A 1 §§ 69–70
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.