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CHAPTER I. PREHISTORIC SCIENCE
"These figures," says Mortillet, "are certainly not exaggerated. It is even probable that they are below the truth. Constantly new discoveries are being made that tend to remove farther back the date of man's appearance." We see, then, according to this estimate, that about a quarter of a million years have elapsed since man evolved to a state that could properly be called human. This guess is as good as another, and it may advantageously be kept in mind, as it will enable us all along to understand better than we might otherwise be able to do the tremendous force of certain prejudices and preconceptions which recent man inherited from his prehistoric ancestor. Ideas which had passed current as unquestioned truths for one hundred thousand years or so are not easily cast aside.
In going back, in imagination, to the beginning of the prehistoric period, we must of course reflect, in accordance with modern ideas on the subject, that there was no year, no millennium even, when it could be said expressly: "This being was hitherto a primate, he is now a man." The transition period must have been enormously long, and the changes from generation to generation, even from century to century, must have been very slight. In speaking of the extent of the age of man this must be borne in mind: it must be recalled that, even if the period were not vague for other reasons, the vagueness of its beginning must make it indeterminate.
Bibliographical Notes.--A great mass of literature has been produced in recent years dealing with various phases of the history of prehistoric man. No single work known to the writer deals comprehensively with the scientific attainments of early man; indeed, the subject is usually ignored, except where practical phases of the mechanical arts are in question. But of course any attempt to consider the condition of primitive man talies into account, by inference at least, his knowledge and attainments. Therefore, most works on anthropology, ethnology, and primitive culture may be expected to throw some light on our present subject. Works dealing with the social and mental conditions of existing savages are also of importance, since it is now an accepted belief that the ancestors of civilized races evolved along similar lines and passed through corresponding stages of nascent culture. Herbert Spencer's Descriptive Sociology presents an unequalled mass of facts regarding existing primitive races, but, unfortunately, its inartistic method of arrangement makes it repellent to the general reader. E. B. Tyler's Primitive Culture and Anthropology; Lord Avebury's Prehistoric Times, The Origin of Civilization, and The Primitive Condition of Man; W. Boyd Dawkin's Cave-Hunting and Early Man in Britain; and Edward Clodd's Childhood of the World and Story of Primitive Man are deservedly popular. Paul Topinard's Elements d'Anthropologie Generale is one of the best-known and most comprehensive French works on the technical phases of anthropology; but Mortillet's Le Prehistorique has a more popular interest, owing to its chapters on primitive industries, though this work also contains much that is rather technical. Among periodicals, the Revue de l'Ecole d'Anthropologie de Paris, published by the professors, treats of all phases of anthropology, and the American Anthropologist, edited by F. W. Hodge for the American Anthropological Association, and intended as "a medium of communication between students of all branches of anthropology," contains much that is of interest from the present stand-point. The last-named journal devotes a good deal of space to Indian languages.
CHAPTER II. EGYPTIAN SCIENCE
1 (p. 34). Sir J. Norman Lockyer, The Dawn of Astronomy; a study
of the temple worship and mythology of the ancient Egyptians,
London, 1894.
2 (p. 43). G. Maspero, Histoire Ancie-nne des Peuples de l'Orient
Classique, Paris, 1895. Translated as (1) The Dawn of
Civilization, (2) The Struggle of the Nations, (3) The Passing of
the Empires, 3 vols., London and New York, 1894-1900. Professor
Maspero is one of the most famous of living Orientalists. His
most important special studies have to do with Egyptology, but
his writings cover the entire field of Oriental antiquity. He is
a notable stylist, and his works are at once readable and
authoritative.
3 (p. 44). Adolf Erman, Life in Ancient Egypt, London, 1894, p.
352. (Translated from the original German work entitled Aegypten
und aegyptisches Leben in Alterthum, Tilbigen, 1887.) An
altogether admirable work, full of interest for the general
reader, though based on the most erudite studies.
4 (p. 47). Erman, op. cit., pp. 356, 357.
5 (p. 48). Erman, op. cit., p. 357. The work on Egyptian medicine
here referred to is Georg Ebers' edition of an Egyptian document
discovered by the explorer whose name it bears. It remains the
most important source of our knowledge of Egyptian medicine. As
mentioned in the text, this document dates from the eighteenth
dynasty--that is to say, from about the fifteenth or sixteenth
century, B.C., a relatively late period of Egyptian history.
6 (p. 49). Erman, op. cit., p. 357.
7 (p. 50). The History of Herodotus, pp. 85-90. There are
numerous translations of the famous work of the "father of
history," one of the most recent and authoritative being that of
G. C. Macaulay, M.A., in two volumes, Macmillan & Co., London and
New York, 1890.
8 (p. 50). The Historical Library of Diodorus the Sicilian,
London, 1700. This most famous of ancient world histories is
difficult to obtain in an English version. The most recently
published translation known to the writer is that of G. Booth,
London, 1814.
9 (p. 51). Erman, op. cit., p. 357.
10 (p. 52). The Papyrus Rhind is a sort of mathematical hand-book
of the ancient Egyptians; it was made in the time of the Hyksos
Kings (about 2000 B.C.), but is a copy of an older book. It is
now preserved in the British Museum.
The most accessible recent sources of information as to the
social conditions of the ancient Egyptians are the works of
Maspero and Erman, above mentioned; and the various publications
of W. M. Flinders Petrie, The Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh,
London, 1883; Tanis I., London, 1885; Tanis H., Nebesheh, and
Defe-nnel, London, 1887; Ten Years' Diggings, London, 1892; Syria
and Egypt from the Tel-el-Amar-na Letters, London, 1898, etc. The
various works of Professor Petrie, recording his explorations
from year to year, give the fullest available insight into
Egyptian archaeology.
CHAPTER III. SCIENCE OF BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA
1 (p. 57). The Medes. Some difference of opinion exists among
historians as to the exact ethnic relations of the conquerors;
the precise date of the fall of Nineveh is also in doubt.
2 (p. 57). Darius. The familiar Hebrew narrative ascribes the
first Persian conquest of Babylon to Darius, but inscriptions of
Cyrus and of Nabonidus, the Babylonian king, make it certain that
Cyrus was the real conqueror. These inscriptions are preserved on
cylinders of baked clay, of the type made familiar by the
excavation of the past fifty years, and they are invaluable
historical documents.
3 (p. 58). Berosus. The fragments of Berosus have been translated
by L. P. Cory, and included in his Ancient Fragments of
Phenician, Chaldean, Egyptian, and Other Writers, London, 1826,
second edition, 1832.
4 (p. 58). Chaldean learning. Recent writers reserve the name
Chaldean for the later period of Babylonian history-- the time
when the Greeks came in contact with the Mesopotamians--in
contradistinction to the earlier periods which are revealed to us
by the archaeological records.
5 (p. 59) King Sargon of Agade. The date given for this early
king must not be accepted as absolute; but it is probably
approximately correct.
6 (p. 59). Nippur. See the account of the early expeditions as
recorded by the director, Dr. John P. Peters, Nippur, or
explorations and adventures, etc., New York and London, 1897.
7 (p. 62). Fritz Hommel, Geschichte Babyloniens und Assyriens,
Berlin, 1885.
8 (p. 63). R. Campbell Thompson, Reports of the Magicians and
Astrologers of Nineveh and Babylon, London, 1900, p. xix.
9 (p. 64). George Smith, The Assyrian Canon, p. 21.
10 (p. 64). Thompson, op. cit., p. xix.
11 (p. 65). Thompson, op. cit., p. 2.
12 (p. 67). Thompson, op. cit., p. xvi.
13 (p. 68). Sextus Empiricus, author of Adversus Mathematicos,
lived about 200 A.D.
14 (p. 68). R. Campbell Thompson, op. cit., p. xxiv.
15 (p. 72). Records of the Past (editor, Samuel Birch), Vol.
III., p. 139.
16 (p. 72). Ibid., Vol. V., p. 16.
17 (p. 72). Quoted in Records of the Past, Vol. III., p. 143,
from the Translations of the Society of Biblical Archeology, vol.
II., p. 58.
18 (p. 73). Records of the Past, vol. L, p. 131.
19 (p. 73). Ibid., vol. V., p. 171.
20 (p. 74). Ibid., vol. V., p. 169.
21 (p. 74). Joachim Menant, La Bibliotheque du Palais de Ninive,
Paris, 188o.
22 (p. 76). Code of Khamurabi. This famous inscription is on a
block of black diorite nearly eight feet in height. It was
discovered at Susa by the French expedition under M. de Morgan,
in December, 1902. We quote the translation given in The
Historians' History of the World, edited by Henry Smith Williams,
London and New York, 1904, Vol. I, p. 510.
23 (p. 77). The Historical Library of Diodorus Siculus, p. 519.
24 (p. 82). George S. Goodspeed, Ph.D., History of the
Babylonians and Assyrians, New York, 1902.
25 (p. 82). George Rawlinson, Great Oriental Monarchies, (second
edition, London, 1871), Vol. III., pp. 75 ff.
Of the books mentioned above, that of Hommel is particularly full
in reference to culture development; Goodspeed's small volume
gives an excellent condensed account; the original documents as
translated in the various volumes of Records of the Past are full
of interest; and Menant's little book is altogether admirable.
The work of excavation is still going on in old Babylonia, and
newly discovered texts add from time to time to our knowledge,
but A. H. Layard's Nineveh and its Remains (London, 1849) still
has importance as a record of the most important early
discoveries. The general histories of Antiquity of Duncker,
Lenormant, Maspero, and Meyer give full treatment of Babylonian
and Assyrian development. Special histories of Babylonia and
Assyria, in addition to these named above, are Tiele's
Babylonisch-Assyrische Geschichte (Zwei Tiele, Gotha, 1886-1888);
Winckler's Geschichte Babyloniens und Assyriens (Berlin,
1885-1888), and Rogers' History of Babylonia and Assyria, New
York and London, 1900, the last of which, however, deals almost
exclusively with political history. Certain phases of science,
particularly with reference to chronology and cosmology, are
treated by Edward Meyer (Geschichte des Alterthum, Vol. I.,
Stuttgart, 1884), and by P. Jensen (Die Kosmologie der
Babylonier, Strassburg, 1890), but no comprehensive specific
treatment of the subject in its entirety has yet been attempted.
CHAPTER IV. THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ALPHABET
1 (p. 87). Vicomte E. de Rouge, Memoire sur l'Origine Egyptienne
de l'Alphabet Phinicien, Paris, 1874.
2 (p. 88). See the various publications of Mr. Arthur Evans.
3 (p. 80). Aztec and Maya writing. These pictographs are still in
the main undecipherable, and opinions differ as to the exact
stage of development which they represent.
4 (p. 90). E. A. Wallace Budge's First Steps in Egyptian, London,
1895, is an excellent elementary work on the Egyptian writing.
Professor Erman's Egyptian Grammar, London, 1894, is the work of
perhaps the foremost living Egyptologist.
5 (P. 93). Extant examples of Babylonian and Assyrian writing
give opportunity to compare earlier and later systems, so the
fact of evolution from the pictorial to the phonetic system rests
on something more than mere theory.
6 (p. 96). Friedrich Delitzsch, Assyrischc Lesestucke mit
grammatischen Tabellen und vollstdndigem Glossar einfiihrung in
die assyrische und babylonische Keilschrift-litteratur bis hinauf
zu Hammurabi, Leipzig, 1900.
7 (p. 97). It does not appear that the Babylonians thcmselves
ever gave up the old system of writing, so long as they retained
political autonomy.
8 (p. 101). See Isaac Taylor's History of the Alphabet; an
Account of the origin and Development of Letters, new edition, 2
vols., London, 1899.
For facsimiles of the various scripts, see Henry Smith Williams'
History of the Art Of Writing, 4 vols, New York and London,
1902-1903.
CHAPTER V. THE BEGINNINGS OF GREEK SCIENCE
1 (p. III). Anaximander, as recorded by Plutarch, vol. VIII-. See
Arthur Fairbanks'First Philosophers of Greece: an Edition and
Translation of the Remaining Fragments of the Pre-Socratic
Philosophers, together with a Translation of the more Important
Accounts of their Opinions Contained in the Early Epitomcs of
their Works, London, 1898. This highly scholarly and extremely
useful book contains the Greek text as well as translations.
CHAPTER VI. THE EARLY GREEK PHILOSOPHERS IN ITALY
1 (p. 117). George Henry Lewes, A Biographical History of
Philosophy from its Origin in Greece down to the Present Day,
enlarged edition, New York, 1888, p. 17.
2 (p. 121). Diogenes Laertius, The Lives and Opinions of Eminent
Philosophers, C. D. Yonge's translation, London, 1853, VIII., p.
153.
3 (p. 121). Alexander, Successions of Philosophers.
4 (p. 122). "All over its centre." Presumably this is intended to
refer to the entire equatorial region.
5 (p. 125). Laertius, op. cit., pp. 348-351.
6 (p. 128). Arthur Fairbanks, The First Philosophers of Greece
London, 1898, pp. 67-717.
7 (p. 129). Ibid., p. 838.
8 (p. 130). Ibid., p. 109.
9 (p. 130). Heinrich Ritter, The History of Ancient Philosophy,
translated from the German by A. J. W. Morrison, 4 vols., London,
1838, vol, I., p. 463.
10 (p. 131). Ibid., p. 465.
11 (p. 132). George Henry Lewes, op. cit., p. 81.
12 (p. 135). Fairbanks, op. cit., p. 201.
13 (p. 136). Ibid., P. 234.
14 (p. 137). Ibid., p. 189.
15 (p. 137). Ibid., P. 220.
16 (p. 138). Ibid., p. 189.
17 (p. 138). Ibid., p. 191.
CHAPTER VII. GREEK SCIENCE IN THE EARLY ATTIC PERIOD
1 (p. 150). Theodor Gomperz, Greek Thinkers: a History of Ancient
Philosophy (translated from the German by Laurie Magnes), New
York, 190 1, pp. 220, 221.
2 (p. 153). Aristotle's Treatise on Respiration, ch. ii.
3 (p. 159). Fairbanks' translation of the fragments of
Anaxagoras, in The First Philosophers of Greece, pp. 239-243.
CHAPTER VIII. POST-SOCRATIC SCIENCE AT ATHENS
1 (p. 180). Alfred William Bern, The Philosophy of Greece
Considered in Relation to the Character and History of its
People, London, 1898, p. 186.
2 (p. 183). Aristotle, quoted in William Whewell's History of the
Inductive Sciences (second edition, London, 1847), Vol. II., p.
161.
CHAPTER IX. GREEK SCIENCE OF THE ALEXANDRIAN OR HELLENISTIC
PERIOD
1 (p. 195). Tertullian's Apologeticus.
2 (p. 205). We quote the quaint old translation of North, printed
in 1657.
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