From the book
Empedocles’ Complete Fragments, Volume I
Empedocles of Acragas · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordAres is the divine name opening B1282's list of powers absent from the community's worship.
- In EmpedoclesThe verse says that there was no god Ares among those people; instead, Cypris was queen.
- In this edition“Among them” is essential to the negative claim.
- A place to readAres is first among the gods not present among the people ruled by Cypris.
Meaning
Ares is the divine name opening B1282's list of powers absent from the community's worship. His conventional martial associations are reinforced locally by the immediately following Battle-Din. The fragment names him rather than giving an etymology or a physical definition.
Use in the book
The verse says that there was no god Ares among those people; instead, Cypris was queen. Together with the exclusion of Battle-Din and the refusal of bloody sacrifice, this places the community under an order in which the usual signs of violence are displaced. The passage does not assert that Ares does not exist anywhere, or provide a separate argument against the traditional gods.
Nor should Ares be automatically identified with the cosmic Strife. Their martial and separating associations allow comparison, but B1282 does not make that equation. The careful reading keeps the local theological arrangement in view: the names characterize the community's allegiance and mode of life. Ares is a figure whose absence matters in that portrait.
Places to read
- B 128.1–3Ares is first among the gods not present among the people ruled by Cypris.
Translation in this edition
“Among them” is essential to the negative claim. Omitting it would convert the scene into an unrestricted denial of Ares and misrepresent the scope of the surviving statement.