From the book
Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II
Empedocles of Acragas · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordHepesthai means to follow; athroai describes the emissions as gathered or occurring in a mass.
- In this workAfter the stone's emissions clear the capping air, Alexander's report makes iron follow its own outflow.
- In this editionThe participial sequence in the report is compressed, but its distinction between emitted material and the following iron should be preserved.
- A place to readMakes iron accompany its emissions after obstruction is removed.
Meaning
Hepesthai means to follow; athroai describes the emissions as gathered or occurring in a mass. The phrase identifies the distinctive step by which a source body is said to move with material emitted from it.
Use in the book
After the stone's emissions clear the capping air, Alexander's report makes iron follow its own outflow. The matching passages in the stone explain the direction assigned to that outflow and the iron accompanying it. The explanation is therefore more than an account of material exchange between bodies: it needs a link between emission and translation of the whole source.
Alexander repeatedly tests that link. If the source follows what it emits, the stone should also follow its emissions; iron might move toward other things without the stone; and other pairs of bodies with matching effluences and pores should attract. These questions reveal why “following” is a substantive mechanical commitment rather than an innocuous narrative verb. The excerpt does not supply the force law or bodily coupling that would answer them.
Places to read
- A 89 (testimony)2Alexander of Aphrodisias, Questions, first excerpt. Makes iron accompany its emissions after obstruction is removed.
- A 89 (polemical)2Alexander of Aphrodisias, Questions, second excerpt. Tests whether following emission predicts unwanted motions and attractions.
Translation in this edition
The participial sequence in the report is compressed, but its distinction between emitted material and the following iron should be preserved. No modern concept of recoil, field, or momentum is stated.