Hide browse bar Your current position in the text is marked in blue. Click anywhere in the line to jump to another position:
chapter:
chapter 1chapter 2chapter 3chapter 4chapter 5chapter 6chapter 7chapter 8chapter 9chapter 10chapter 11chapter 12chapter 13chapter 14chapter 15chapter 16chapter 17chapter 18chapter 19chapter 20chapter 21chapter 22chapter 23chapter 24chapter 25chapter 26chapter 27chapter 28chapter 29chapter 30chapter 31chapter 32chapter 33chapter 34chapter 35chapter 36chapter 37chapter 38chapter 39chapter 40chapter 41chapter 42chapter 43chapter 44chapter 45chapter 46chapter 47chapter 48chapter 49chapter 50chapter 51chapter 52chapter 53chapter 54chapter 55chapter 56chapter 57chapter 58chapter 59chapter 60chapter 61chapter 62chapter 63chapter 64chapter 65chapter 66chapter 67chapter 68chapter 69chapter 70chapter 71chapter 72chapter 73chapter 74chapter 75chapter 76chapter 77chapter 78chapter 79chapter 80chapter 81chapter 82chapter 83chapter 84chapter 85chapter 86chapter 87chapter 88chapter 89chapter 90chapter 91chapter 92chapter 93chapter 94chapter 95chapter 96chapter 97chapter 98chapter 99chapter 100chapter 101chapter 102chapter 103chapter 104chapter 105chapter 106chapter 107chapter 108chapter 109chapter 110chapter 111chapter 112chapter 113chapter 114chapter 115chapter 116chapter 117chapter 118chapter 119chapter 120chapter 121chapter 121Achapter 121Bchapter 121Cchapter 121Dchapter 121Echapter 121Fchapter 122chapter 123chapter 124chapter 125chapter 126chapter 127chapter 128chapter 129chapter 130chapter 131chapter 132chapter 133chapter 134chapter 135chapter 136chapter 137chapter 138chapter 139chapter 140chapter 141chapter 142chapter 143chapter 144chapter 145chapter 146chapter 147chapter 148chapter 149chapter 150chapter 151chapter 152chapter 153chapter 154chapter 155chapter 156chapter 157chapter 158chapter 159chapter 160chapter 161chapter 162chapter 163chapter 164chapter 165chapter 166chapter 167chapter 168chapter 169chapter 170chapter 171chapter 172chapter 173chapter 174chapter 175chapter 176chapter 177chapter 178chapter 179chapter 180chapter 181chapter 182
This text is part of:
Search the Perseus Catalog for:
2.
Now before Psammetichus became king of Egypt,1 the Egyptians believed that they were the oldest people on earth. But ever since Psammetichus became king and wished to find out which people were the oldest, they have believed that the Phrygians were older than they, and they than everybody else.
[2]
Psammetichus, when he was in no way able to learn by inquiry which people had first come into being, devised a plan by which he took two newborn children of the common people and gave them to a shepherd to bring up among his flocks. He gave instructions that no one was to speak a word in their hearing; they were to stay by themselves in a lonely hut, and in due time the shepherd was to bring goats and give the children their milk and do everything else necessary.
[3]
Psammetichus did this, and gave these instructions, because he wanted to hear what speech would first come from the children, when they were past the age of indistinct babbling. And he had his wish; for one day, when the shepherd had done as he was told for two years, both children ran to him stretching out their hands and calling “Bekos!” as he opened the door and entered.
[4]
When he first heard this, he kept quiet about it; but when, coming often and paying careful attention, he kept hearing this same word, he told his master at last and brought the children into the king's presence as required. Psammetichus then heard them himself, and asked to what language the word “Bekos” belonged; he found it to be a Phrygian word, signifying bread.
[5]
Reasoning from this, the Egyptians acknowledged that the Phrygians were older than they. This is the story which I heard from the priests of Hephaestus'2 temple at Memphis; the Greeks say among many foolish things that Psammetichus had the children reared by women whose tongues he had cut out.
Herodotus, with an English translation by A. D. Godley. Cambridge. Harvard University Press. 1920.
The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text.
Purchase a copy of this text (not necessarily the same edition) from Amazon.com
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.
show
Browse Bar
hide
Places (automatically extracted)
View a map of the most frequently mentioned places in this document.
Sort places
alphabetically,
as they appear on the page,
by frequency
Click on a place to search for it in this document.
Memphis (Egypt) (1)Click on a place to search for it in this document.
Egypt (Egypt) (1)
Download Pleiades ancient places geospacial dataset for this text.
hide
Dates (automatically extracted)
Sort dates
alphabetically,
as they appear on the page,
by frequency
Click on a date to search for it in this document.
664 BC (1)Click on a date to search for it in this document.
hide
References (43 total)
- Cross-references to this page
(8):
- Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 1.3.1
- Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 1.pos=2.1
- Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 1.pos=2.2
- Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, KG 3.5.2
- Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), PHRY´GIA
- William Watson Goodwin, Syntax of the Moods and Tenses of the Greek Verb, Chapter IV
- Basil L. Gildersleeve, Syntax of Classical Greek, The Article
- Basil L. Gildersleeve, Syntax of Classical Greek, Forms of the subject.
- Cross-references in general dictionaries to this page
(35):
- LSJ, ἄσημος
- LSJ, ἀντίος
- LSJ, βα^σι^λ-εύω
- LSJ, βέκος
- LSJ, βεκκεσέληνος
- LSJ, δίαιτα
- LSJ, διαπράσσω
- LSJ, δι-ετής
- LSJ, ἐπα^γι_νέω
- LSJ, ἐπί
- LSJ, ἐπιμελ-έομαι
- LSJ, ἐπιτεχν-άομαι
- LSJ, ἐπιτυγχάνω
- LSJ, ἐθέλω
- LSJ, φων-έω
- LSJ, φων-ή
- LSJ, γίγνομαι
- LSJ, ἱερ-εύς
- LSJ, κνύζ-ημα
- LSJ, νεο-γνός
- LSJ, ὀρέγω
- LSJ, πόρος
- LSJ, ποίμν-ιον
- LSJ, πολύς
- LSJ, πρέσβυ^ς
- LSJ, πρότερος
- LSJ, προσπίπτω
- LSJ, ῥήγνυ_μι
- LSJ, σταθμόομαι
- LSJ, στέγ-η
- LSJ, συγχωρ-έω
- LSJ, τοιοῦτος
- LSJ, τρέφω
- LSJ, τροφ-ή
- LSJ, ὥρα
hide
Search
hideStable Identifiers
hide
Display Preferences