Greek Wisdom Literature

Literary/ Cultural Context Essay

Nikolaos Lazaridis (Sacramento City College)

Ed. by Vaios Liapis, Open University of Cyprus
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.1.1: Greek Writing and Culture: Archaic, Classical, Hellenistic and Imperial, -800--100.
Vol. editors: Jonathan Burgess (University of Toronto), Giacomo Fedeli (University of Exeter), Emily Kneebone (University of Nottingham), Vaios Liapis (Open University of Cyprus), Elodie Paillard (University of Sydney), Mali Skotheim (Ashoka University), Laura Swift (The Open University)

Domains

Literature Topic

Dates

Date of occurrence c.-800-400

Places

Ancient Greece (Location)

Genres and Modes

Aphorisms/ Maxims/ Proverbs

I. Definitions

By wisdom literature we mean works or compilations offering instruction upon moral or practical issues of life within a community of people. In the context of Greek literature, wisdom material includes mainly proverbs (Greek: paroimiai), maxims (Greek: gnomai), or longer apophthegms and anecdotes (Greek: apophthegmata and chreiai).

Distinction between these types of wisdom material is often blurry, and has given considerable trouble to scholars both in antiquity (e.g., Aristotle and his student Theophrastus) and in modern times. On the basis of such criteria as (a) type and frequency of usage, (b) form and style, and (c) theme, we may define proverb</…

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

1277 words

Citation: Lazaridis, Nikolaos. "Greek Wisdom Literature". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 25 September 2008 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=5546, accessed 24 November 2024.]

Save this article