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 56 · I.56.heading–I.56.1.2

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Ancient Greek Page · Branch 842 of 879

Book I Chapter 56 · I.56.heading–I.56.1.2

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Ancient Greek

p. 1680

Κεφάλαιον ΝϚʹ

I.56.heading

Περὶ ἁφῆς.

1.1

I.56.1.1

⟨Διδύμου.⟩

Ἀριστοτέλους. Ἅπτεσθαι δὲ διὰ τοῦ μεταξὺ σώματος τῆς σαρκὸς καὶ τοῦ ἁπτοῦ. τὸ δὴ τοιοῦτον ⟨ἢ τὸν⟩ ἀέρα ἢ τὸ ὕδωρ ὑπάρχειν, ἢ ἐκ τούτων τι κοινόν.

1.2

I.56.1.2

Λανθάνειν δὲ ἐπί τε τῆς γεύσεως καὶ τῆς ἁφῆς διὰ τὸ μὴ διὰ μακροῦ γίγνεσθαι, καθάπερ ἐπὶ τῶν ὁρατῶν καὶ ἀκουστῶν καὶ ὀσφραντῶν.

Stobaeus, Volume I: Book I Chapter 56

p. 1681

Chapter 56 · Touch

I.56.heading

On touch.²⁰⁴⁶

1.1 · The body between flesh and object

I.56.1.1

⟨Didymus.⟩

Aristotle. We perceive by touch through the body between the flesh and what is touched. Such a body is ⟨either⟩ air or water, or something common to both.²⁰⁴⁷

1.2 · Why the medium goes unnoticed

I.56.1.2

In taste and touch this goes unnoticed because the process does not occur over a long distance, as it does in the case of things seen, heard, and smelled.²⁰⁴⁸

2046.The heading is transmitted in the margin of F and in the text of P, and also occurs in the Laurentian collection. Unlike the preceding three chapter headings, it is not described here as an editorial restoration. The chapter contains one excerpt, whose final sentence turns from contact perception to the origin of bodily movement.

2047.The supplied attribution identifies Didymus, Physics fragment 17, Diels p. 456. The printed tou haptou, what is touched, is Diels’s correction of the manuscript wording. Meineke supplied ē ton before air; either conveys the conjunction, while the Greek article needs no separate English word. The final alternative is left as something common to both, without specifying its composition.

2048.The intervening medium or its action is understood as what goes unnoticed. The explanation contrasts the short distance involved in touch and taste with the greater separation possible in the other three senses; it does not deny a medium in the former two.

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.