Editing Flat Earth (section)

====Greece====
=====Poets=====
Both [[Homer]]<ref>''Iliad'', 28. 606.</ref> and [[Hesiod]]<ref>''The Shield of Heracles'', pp. 314–6, transl. Hugh G. Evelyn-White, 1914.</ref> described a disc cosmography on the [[Shield of Achilles]].<ref>''The Shield of Achilles and the Poetics of Ekphrasis'', Andrew Sprague Becker, Rowman & Littlefield, 1995, p. 148.</ref><ref>Professor of Classics (Emeritus) Mark W. Edwards in his ''The Iliad. A Commentary'' (1991, p. 231) has noted of Homer's usage of the flat Earth disc in the ''Iliad'': "Okeanos...surrounds the pictures on the shield and he surrounds the disc of the Earth on which men and women work out their lives." Quoted in ''The Shield of Achilles and the Poetics of Ekphrasis'', Andrew Sprague Becker, Rowman & Littlefield, 1995, p. 148.</ref> This poetic tradition of an Earth-encircling (''gaiaokhos'') sea ([[Oceanus]]) and a disc also appears in [[Stasinus]] of Cyprus,<ref>Stasinus of Cyprus wrote in his Cypria (lost, only preserved in fragment) that Oceanus surrounded the entire Earth: ''deep eddying Oceanus'' and that the Earth was flat with ''furthest bounds'', these quotes are found preserved in Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae, VIII. 334B.</ref> [[Mimnermus]],<ref>Mimnermus of Colophon (630BC) details a flat-Earth model, with the sun (Helios) bathing at the edges of Oceanus that surround the Earth (Mimnermus, frg. 11).</ref> [[Aeschylus]],<ref>''Seven against Thebes'', verse 305; ''Prometheus Bound'', 1, 136; 530; 665 (which also describe the 'edges' of the Earth).</ref> and [[Apollonius Rhodius]].<ref>Apollonius Rhodius, in his ''Argonautica'' (3rd century BC) included numerous flat-Earth references (IV. 590 ff): "Now that river, rising from the ends of the Earth, where are the portals and mansions of Nyx (Night), on one side bursts forth upon the beach of Okeanos."</ref>

Homer's description of the disc cosmography on the shield of Achilles with the encircling ocean is repeated far later in [[Quintus Smyrnaeus]]' ''[[Posthomerica]]'' (4th century AD), which continues the narration of the Trojan War.<ref>''Posthomerica'' (V. 14). "Here [on the shield of Achilles] Tethys' all-embracing arms were wrought, and Okeanos fathomless flow. The outrushing flood of Rivers crying to the echoing hills all round, to right, to left, rolled o'er the land."  Translation by Way, A.S. 1913.</ref>

=====Philosophers=====
[[Image:Anaximander world map (mul).svg|thumb|right|Possible rendering of Anaximander's world map<ref>According to John Mansley Robinson, ''An Introduction to Early Greek Philosophy'', Houghton and Mifflin, 1968.</ref>]]
Several [[Pre-Socratic philosophy|pre-Socratic philosophers]] believed that the world was flat: [[Thales of Miletus|Thales]] (c. 550&nbsp;BC) according to several sources,<ref>{{Cite book |title=The Physical World of the Greeks |last=Sambursky |first=Samuel |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |isbn=9780691024110 |date=August 1987|pages=12}}</ref> and [[Leucippus]] (c. 440&nbsp;BC) and [[Democritus]] (c. 460–370&nbsp;BC) according to Aristotle.<ref name=Burch>{{Cite journal |last= Burch |first= George Bosworth |title= The Counter-Earth |journal= Osiris |volume= 11 |publisher= Saint Catherines Press |issue= 1 |date= 1954 |pages= 267–94 |doi= 10.1086/368583 |s2cid= 144330867 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |first= Didier |last= De Fontaine |title= Flat worlds: Today and in antiquity |journal= Memorie della Società Astronomica Italiana |volume= 1 |issue= 3 |pages= 257–62 |date= 2002 |url= http://www.mse.berkeley.edu/faculty/deFontaine/flatworlds.html |access-date= August 3, 2007 |bibcode= 2002MmSAI..73S.257D |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20070825010821/http://www.mse.berkeley.edu/faculty/deFontaine/flatworlds.html |archive-date= August 25, 2007 |url-status= dead }}</ref><ref>Aristotle, ''De Caelo'', 294b13–21</ref>

Thales thought that the Earth floated in water like a log.<ref>Aristotle, ''De Caelo'', II. 13. 3; 294a 28: "Many others say the Earth rests upon water. This... is the oldest theory that has been preserved, and is attributed to Thales of Miletus."</ref> It has been argued, however, that Thales actually believed in a spherical Earth.<ref>{{cite book |title=Thales of Miletus: the beginnings of Western science and philosophy |last=O'Grady |first=Patricia F. |author-link=Patricia O'Grady|date=2002 |publisher=[[Ashgate Publishing]] |isbn=9780754605331 |location=[[Aldershot]] |pages=87–107}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Pseudo-Plutarch |title=Placita Philosophorum |at=V.&nbsp;3, Ch.&nbsp;10 |url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0404%3Abook%3D3%3Achapter%3D10 |publisher=Perseus Digital Library |access-date=December 24, 2014 }}</ref> [[Anaximander]] (c. 550&nbsp;BC) believed that the Earth was a short cylinder with a flat, circular top that remained stable because it was the same distance from all things.<ref>[[Hippolytus of Rome|Hippolytus]], ''Refutation of all Heresies'', i. 6.</ref><ref>{{Cite journal| author = [[Anaximander]] | editor-last = Fairbanks | editor-first = Arthur | translator-last = Fairbanks | translator-first = Arthur  | title = Fragments and Commentary | journal = The Hanover Historical Texts Project | url = http://history.hanover.edu/texts/presoc/anaximan.html }} (Plut., ''Strom.'' 2; ''Dox''. 579).</ref> [[Anaximenes of Miletus]] believed that "the Earth is flat and rides on air; in the same way the Sun and the Moon and the other heavenly bodies, which are all fiery, ride the air because of their flatness".<ref>Hippolytus, ''Refutation of all Heresies'', i. 7; Cf. Aristotle, ''De Caelo'', 294b13–21.</ref> [[Xenophanes]] (c. 500&nbsp;BC) thought that the Earth was flat, with its upper side touching the air, and the lower side extending without limit.<ref>Xenophanes [[Diels-Kranz|DK]] 21B28, quoted in Achilles, ''Introduction to Aratus'' 4.</ref>

Belief in a flat Earth continued into the 5th century BC. [[Anaxagoras]] (c. 450&nbsp;BC) agreed that the Earth was flat,<ref>[[Diogenes Laërtius]], ii. 8.</ref> and his pupil [[Archelaus (philosopher)|Archelaus]] believed that the flat Earth was depressed in the middle like a saucer, to allow for the fact that the Sun does not rise and set at the same time for everyone.<ref>Hippolytus, ''Refutation of all Heresies'', i. 9.</ref>

=====Historians=====
[[Hecataeus of Miletus]] believed that the Earth was flat and surrounded by water.<ref>FGrH F 18a.</ref> [[Herodotus]] in his ''[[Histories (Herodotus)|Histories]]'' ridiculed the belief that water encircled the world,<ref>Herodotus knew of the conventional view, according to which the river Ocean runs around a circular flat Earth (4.8), and of the division of the world into three – Jacoby, RE Suppl. 2.352 ff, yet rejected this personal belief (''Histories'', 2. 21; 4. 8; 4. 36).</ref> yet most classicists agree that he still believed Earth was flat because of his descriptions of literal "ends" or "edges" of the Earth.<ref>''The history of Herodotus'', George Rawlinson, Appleton and company, 1889, p. 409.</ref>