Epicurus' Public Domain Translations - All At Once In One Place

Great - thanks very much Tau Phi!

This is excellent, very clear and will certainly prove helpful. Although the idea is simple, I do not think I have seen it done before. A link to this should probably be on the main page, as it really has the essential texts, in a beautifully accessible format. Thank you!

Tau Phi when I click on the pdf I get a window that shows this:

Have you tried getting the PDF generator to produce a table of contents with the names of the letters and name for major sections like the Principal Doctrines, Will of Epicurus, etc? That would probably be more useful than the page thumbnails, if that's possible. And yes I agree with Bryan's suggestion and I will rework a section of the front page to make it easier to see where to find versions of the texts like this.

That looks great and thank you Tau Phi!

Added to the "Files" section here.

File

Diogenes Laertius Book X - Core Texts of Epicurus - Three Public Domain Versions In One PDF - By Tau Phi

Tau Phi's Edition of The Yonge, Bailey, and Hicks Translations of core parts of Diogenes Laertius Book X. The PDF is bookmarked with direct links to the letters of Epicurus and to the Principal Doctrines.

Cassius

April 22, 2025 at 2:43 PM

Tau Phi, I included you as one of the people who can edit that section, so if you make revisions you should be able to upload them there yourself -- or just flag me and I'll do it. Thanks again!

Thanks, TauPhi. I have downloaded. I bought the translations collection Emily Austin recommended at the end of her book (e.g. "The Epicurean Reader," Inwood and Gerson) but I will be checking this out.

Tau Phi ---

I've been working with Book ten myself recently and in looking back over the versions that I have here at the site and in various other places, I find it very difficult to line up some paragraphs between the three versions because it appears that different translators are using different text arrangements and/or line numbers.

When I was working with the Lucretius texts I ended up using the Rouse/Loeb as "canonical" for numbering purposes, and then I forced the other translations to fit.

Did you do something similar with this PDF, or did you not run into such issues for some reason? If you used one version as the "master" reference for line numbering, which did you use?

Yes I was happy to see you, TauPhi, did not follow Bailey's order for the letter to Herodotus. Giving little explanations why his translation is missing/moved in some places is the perfect way to deal with it.

Bryan you are probably here one of the most expert on the full text of Diogenes Laertius. To which would you look for the best order for all of Book X? If not Bailey, Hicks?

(I see an example of such a note in Herodotus 61 of the PDF. I don't know how many such notes there are, but it would be a desirable to maybe include a statement as to what/which order the PDF follows?)

Tau Phi I know what you've already done has been a huge amount of work, but let me ask this: Does the method of assembly you used make it possible with reasonable effort to:

1 - Do the same thing for the rest of DIogenes Laertius so that we have the full Book X in one place? That makes it much easier for word searching.

2 - In cutting and pasting from the PDF I am seeing a problem that I've had with other PDFs of my own in the past -- there's something wrong with the constructions involving "f" that corrupts the words. For example, here is paste of Herodotus from Hicks 44: Note the 'o ering" and "aner" and " inds." Do you get the same thing? Is there anything we can do to fix this - if we need to we can spell check and hand edit but that will need to be done before generating the PDF. We can get you some help with that if it would help.

Quote

Hicks, 1925 This is because each atom is separated from the rest by void, which is incapable of o ering any resistance to the rebound; while it is the solidity of the atom which makes it rebound aner a collision, however short the distance to which it rebounds, when it lnds itself imprisoned in a mass of entangling atoms.

Most editors follow the same order, and those who have proposed changes to that order have lost the argument over time (and thus have only added unnecessary confusion). As far as I have seen, the order followed in this PDF is the one currently being published by Cambridge.

The ‘f’ issue is also occurring on my computer.

Thank you Tau Phi! This is a huge effort and I appreciate any of it you can complete!

I've been continuing to work on a format that I can use as a web version in similar side-by-side as in the Lucretius page, but the differences in line numberings between the editions are really a bear.

I'll proceed as best I can using the Hicks/Loeb as the standard, but because there are all sorts of differences in groupings (plus decisions as to whether to include scholium) the finished product will hopefully match the original content, but not have consistent line numbering. I'm not sure there's much way to deal with any of this other than do the best we can, and then point to PDFS of the original editions so people can check the PDFs to verify the originals. I suspect Tau Phi's is going to be more precise than mine (it definitely is so far) so when his full book ten comes out I'll do my best to bring a web version in conformity with his.

Bryan when you referred to the Cambridge edition, I am guessing you are talking about the academic one that's mostly in Greek. Do you know how closely the Loeb/Hicks conforms to that? I don't know that there's a much better choice than that one (Loeb/Hicks), if we want to pick one of the public domains as the "standard."

The Cambridge edition conforms to the general sequence of the Loeb (except at 120, which it splits by placing 121 in between — though this is only a matter of numbering; the text remains in the same order). Using the Hicks/Loeb as the standard will work.

Well, here's a first draft of a web version, but I am not at all confident of some of the line divisions, and as to to the Greek version matching the divisions, it will be pure luck if some of them match

It's going to take more effort to make this usable, but if Tau Phi is able to produce a more careful version in PDF, then I'll eventually make mine conform to his. I'd suggest that anyone who has time to volunteer focus on Tau Phi's version of the full book, and then I'll eventually get mine into shape from that.

EpicureanFriends Side-By-Side Diogenes Laertius Ten

It seems that for many of the cells, the final sentence in Greek is placed into the next cell. A few examples: