Stobaeus, Volume I

Name: Stobaeus, Volume I
Author: John Stobaeus

Greek with an independent English translation.

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Stobaeus, Volume IBook I Chapter 15 · I.15.3b–I.15.5.1

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Ancient Greek Page · Branch 186 of 879

Book I Chapter 15 · I.15.3b–I.15.5.1

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Ancient Greek

p. 368

3b ⟨Ἀετίου⟩

I.15.3b

Σχῆμά ἐστιν ἐπιφάνεια καὶ περιγραφὴ καὶ πέρας σώματος.

4 Πλάτωνος

I.15.4

Πλάτων ἔφησε σφαιροειδῆ τὸν κόσμον ὑπάρχειν. Λέγει γὰρ οὕτως ἐν τῷ Τιμαίῳ· “Σχῆμα δ’ ἔδωκεν αὐτῷ τὸ πρέπον καὶ τὸ συγγενές· τῷ δὲ πάντα ζῷα ἐν αὑτῷ περιέχειν μέλλοντι ζῴῳ πρέπον ἂν εἴη σχῆμα τὸ περιειληφὸς ἐν αὑτῷ πάνθ’ ὁπόσα σχήματα. Διὸ καὶ σφαιροειδές, ἐκ μέσου πάντῃ πρὸς τὰς τελευτὰς ἴσον ἀπέχον, κυκλοτερὲς αὐτὸ ἐτορνεύσατο, πάντων τελεώτατον ὁμοιότατόν τε αὐτὸ ἑαυτῷ σχημάτων, νομίσας μυρίῳ κάλλιον ὅμοιον ἀνομοίου.”

5 Ἐν ταὐτῷ · 1

I.15.5.1

Τοῦ γὰρ παντὸς οὐρανοῦ σφαιροειδοῦς ὄντος, ὅσα μὲν ἀφιστῶτα ἴσον τοῦ μέσου γέγονεν ἔσχατα, ὁμοίως αὐτὰ χρὴ ἔσχατα προσπεφυκέναι, τὸ δὲ μέσον τὰ αὐτὰ μέτρα τῶν ἐσχάτων ἀφεστηκὸς ἐν τῷ καταντικρὺ νομίζειν δεῖ πάντων εἶναι· τοῦ δὴ κόσμου ταύτῃ πεφυκότος τί τῶν εἰρημένων ἄνω τις ἢ κάτω τιθέμενος [οὐ] οὐκ ἐν δίκῃ δόξει τὸ μηδὲν προσῆκον ὄνομα λέγειν;

Stobaeus, Volume I: Book I Chapter 15

p. 369

3b ⟨Aëtius, Opinions⟩

I.15.3b

A shape is the surface, outline, and boundary of a body.⁴²⁹

4 Plato, Timaeus 33b

I.15.4

Plato said that the world is spherical. For he says in the Timaeus: “He gave it the shape fitting and akin to it. For a living creature destined to contain all living creatures within itself, the fitting shape would be one containing within itself all the shapes there are. So he turned it into a rounded sphere, equidistant from the center to its extremities in every direction, the most complete of all shapes and the most like itself; for he judged likeness immeasurably more beautiful than unlikeness.”⁴³⁰

5 Plato, Timaeus 62d-63a, part 1

I.15.5.1

For since the whole heaven is spherical, all the extremities that lie at an equal distance from the center must be alike in their character as extremities; and the center, equally distant from the extremities, must be understood to lie directly opposite all of them. Since the world is constituted in this way, if someone designates any of these as “up” or “down,” will he [not] not rightly be thought to use a wholly unsuitable name?⁴³¹

429.Perigraphē means the outline or circumscription of something. The definition treats shape in terms of the boundary of a body. The attribution to Aëtius is supplied by Wachsmuth, as are the Aëtian attributions in excerpt 6.

430.The maker is the craftsman of the Timaeus; the creature fashioned is the world itself. Etorneusato evokes shaping something on a lathe. The passage relates the sphere’s symmetry and completeness to the world’s inclusion of all living creatures. The comparison concerns likeness within the shape, not a comparison between two separate worlds.

431.The transmitted heading is “In the same work.” The argument concerns whether a spherical whole has an intrinsically upper or lower region. Wachsmuth brackets a duplicated negative before the ordinary rhetorical question. The bracketed “not” should be omitted when reading the continuous English; the question then expects assent.

About This Reading Edition

Stobaeus gathered Greek philosophy and poetry for his son Septimius. Volume I presents the dedication testimony, On Arithmetic, Book I through chapter 60, and the ancient contents of all four books. This complete bilingual edition includes an introduction and 2,117 explanatory notes.

Historical Text and Translation

The Greek follows Curt Wachsmuth’s 1884 Volume I, checked against the supplied scan. Gaps, lost-chapter headings, and uncertain attributions remain visible. Chapter 2 includes a labeled proposed reconstruction. The appendix outlines Books I–IV; the full texts of Books II–IV are outside this volume. Reader pages preserve the companion PDF’s numbering.

About Diotimos Editions

Diotimos Editions prepared this independent English translation directly from the Greek. Prose and verse retain their distinct forms, with mixed passages preserving their quoted verse. Every passage is paired with its Greek and identified by the edition’s reference number. All 2,117 notes remain linked to their passages, with continuous numbering across the introduction and text.

Rights

Stobaeus’s ancient Greek work and Wachsmuth’s 1884 printing are in the public domain. The independent English translation, introduction, and explanatory notes are © 2026 Diotimos Editions. The complete supplied edition is available as PDF, EPUB, Word, and Markdown. The PDF retains the fixed page locations used by the companion lexicon.