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I have been translating sections of De Rerum Natura (and plan to continue), and I found something interesting I wanted to share, upon which I will likely build later. Lucretius discusses the difficult task of translating scientific Greek vocabulary into Latin metaphors, and I feel that (overwhelmingly) most translators gloss over Lucertius' specific innovations by employing the word "atom" or "atoms", which can be misleading for several reasons. Instead, I found that (usually) Munro best preserv…

I believe I have found several places in The Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Book X where atoms are referred to something other than ἄτομος (and declensions thereof). Here are those found in Ep. Her. and Pyth.: ATOMA — “elements” (Bailey), “particles” (Munro) ATOMOI — “atoms” (Bailey) ATOMOIΣ — “atoms” (Bailey) ATOMOΣ — “atom” (Bailey) ATOMOYΣ — “first beginnings”, “atoms” (Bailey) ATOMΩMON — “atoms” (Bailey) ATOMΩN — “atoms” (Bailey) ATOMῼ — “atom” (Bailey) Here are additional words (I believe) …

I also note his use of ΣΠEPMATA or σπέρματα (spérmata, "seeds") in The Lives of Eminent Philosopher X.74 This makes Lucretius' use of SEMINA more of a literal Greek-Latin translation and less of a poetic innovation.