Talk:Aesop

Date of sources

"Aristotle is our earliest source, followed by Herodotus"... y'what? Aristotle lived a century AFTER Herodotus, so he can't be an earlier source!

tired of seeing Nuremberg Chronicle pics

If I have to see one more Classical Greek with blonde hair, someone is going to die. Stop posting Nuremberg Chronicle pics. Wikipedia is not for neo-nazis. Datus (talk) 00:56, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Given that even Aesop's existence is under dispute I think a little leeway can be taken in showing likenesses of him. The image you removed at the very least showed one of the earliest images of him in print which I think overbalances the fact that he might not have been blond if he actually existed.Poshzombie (talk) 04:08, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Given that he is mostly believed to be of African descent it is a little strange to show only Europeanized pseudo-depictions.

I agree. And if you find a free image of him with an African likeness please feel free to add it to the article. My point was that the picture in question should not be removed since it's one of the earliest depictions of him in print. That he is depicted from an aryan-centric perspective is unfortunate but the picture has historical value nonetheless.--Poshzombie (talk) 17:01, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Why not simply add a phrase to the caption explaining that? For instance: "shown here in a highly unlikely depiction as a blond Caucasian."--Skintigh (talk) 16:29, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

"mostly believed"? Please. The earliest sources make him either Thracian or Anatolian.

I'm sure that if the ancient African civilizations had been literate or known how to paint they would have portrayed him as black. The important thing is this German picture being a very early one. If you find an earlier one feel free to add it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.173.25.9 (talk) 16:13, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

I think we can logically assume that there is little significance in the colour of his hair, particularly one such picture dating to a century for which we cannot yet make any conclusions on matters of such nature. I see no viable reason to delete a classical illustration depicting Aesop. Also, I fail to grasp how the Nazi argument is of any relevance here.--Agon (talk) 13:05, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Info

Does anyone else have better information on Aesop? More specifics??

Admins

Stuff is all gone, page told me to tell you.

Aesop is legendary, not real; the real author of Aesop's fables is Phaedrus. I'll get around to fixing this in the actual article sometime soon, but I thought I'd go ahead and give the heads up beforehand here. Eric Herboso 09:49, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Picture?

That picture is a misrepresentation of Aesop. Enough people ALREADY think he was white.

Aesop's Fables

i think it's a good idea to move most the info under the Aesop's Fables section to the article Aesop's Fables itself. So i'm going to do it. :) --Plastictv 2 July 2005 14:46 (UTC)

Suggested merge Aesop and Aesop's Fables

A hash of the material has been made by a well-meaning editor attempting to separate an (apocryphal?) Aesop from Aesop's Fables, There is no Aesop aside from the Fables and there is no single canonic collection of Aesop's Fables, to the surprise of many. I am putting 'merge' suggestions on both articles, so that we can build one strong inclusive introduction to Aesop's Fables as a unified phenomenon. --Wetman 3 July 2005 00:42 (UTC)

See Talk:Aesop's Fables. --Plastictv 3 July 2005 04:03 (UTC)

A cursory glance at this article and its references shows that it is in fact a discussion, not of an "Aesop", but of Aesop's Fables. --Wetman 02:23, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Unencyclopedic texts added by unknown user

The following, posted by an unregistered user, is unencyclopedic, opinionated and not very relevant but appears to be original. i feel that it belongs more to the talk page. :) --Plastictv 13:48, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

Aesop [rightly considered one of the greatest writers of all time. The first great writer of great short fiction who ever lived, and first among all the literary greats of all time. Widely and variously translated and illustrated. Sadly, so popular for so long that you have to try to find him among many later imitators. (Aesop’s are the pithy ones well founded in reality, with a razor sharp point. A good rule in trying to separate his from the pack is “If it shows the slightest sign of sentimentality, esp about animals, Aesop didn’t write that one.“) Many of his stories have entered the language as popular phrases that reference the point of the story quickly (sour grapes, dog in the manger, etc) and have long been, and are used, daily, by many who have no idea who wrote it. Now that’s real immortality for you if you like. Very few, if any writers reach the level of brevity, wisdom and genius attained by Aesop (probably something to do with his not being paid by the word). Deeply illuminating about humanity, and often clever beyond belief. Knows what a story is and exactly how long, or rather short, it should be. Understands people all too well. It is said the oracle at Delphi put Aesop to death out of jealousy. I‘m not surprised. If most writers had been half as good as Aesop, there‘d have been a lot more martyrs for literature over the years. Yes, you really should read Aesop, it‘s not many writers get thrown over cliffs by the rich and famous for being too good at story-telling. And here we have the earliest and still the greatest fiction writer of them all being taught to fly the hard way by a powerful vested interest. The lesson is clear I think. Certainly it must be clear to writers, for they have nearly all tried never to equal his genius, with great success.]

Aesop Rock is a hip-hop artist who uses Aesop's name to allude to his creative, verbose, imagery soaked lyrics.

Was he black?

Well, was aesop black? YOYOKER 11:47, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

That's what I would like to know, especially since there is no proof to make such a claim. Basically there are NO actual images or discriptions of him, other then he was "ugly", from his time period, although the ones portrayed by classical Greeks and Romans are not that of a person who was of African origin. So where is the proof that Aesop was of "African" descent? Can anyone provide legit sources? And please do not tell me Maximus Planudes 'cause that's like me, a 20th century person, giving a description of Caesar, who lived centuries before me and having it pass as first hand accounts thousands of centuries down the line; given the fact that Planudes lived centuries after Aesop and he spoke a dialect of Greek different from the dialects which were around during the time of Aesop, I totally would not call him a "creditable" source. From what I know traditionally Aesop was a Greek slave. Oh, and the little doozey below is packed with errors I don't know were to beginning:

His given name, Aesop, is the Ancient Greek word for "Ethiop", the archaic word for a dark-skinned person of African origin.

That explanation above makes as much sense as Mr. Portokalos quote: "Kimono, kimono, kimono. Ha! Of course! Kimono is come from the Greek word himona, is mean winter. So, what do you wear in the wintertime to stay warm? A robe. You see: robe, himona=kimono. There you go!" 2+2=5.

The word Aesop did not exist in an "archaic" form the way its described here because there never WAS such an "Archaic" word to mean what it suggested in this article. Archaic refers to the period in Greece which followed the dark ages, 800 BCE to about 500 BCE. There were numerious Greek dialects which were spoken at that time. Each dialectic then branches out to its individual dialects, each dialect can in turn be divided into countless local idioms, with their own numerous idiomatic variations. New historical finds and discoveries have given modern scholars a better understand of the ancient Greek dialects which existed back then, more so then what a 13th century monk would have understood. Ancient Greek "archaic" dialects are known to scholars. So which dialect is "Aesop" suppose to be derived from to mean "Ethiop", hmmm? Is the Attic, Ionic, Arcadocypriot, Aeolic, Achaean, North-Western, Doric, Homeric Greek? I'd like to hear this fable. [rolleyes] So what is Aesop's ethymology and from which of the many Greek dialects is it derived from? Cause it sure isn't what is suggested in this article...the ancient Greek words Αισωπος and Αιθίοψ are not even close. If you break down the word Αιθίοψ(the actual ancient Greek word for Ethiop) its derived from two Greek words: the Greek αιθ "of burnt aether=Greek word for burn/shine", and the Greek οψ "the face or visage." Put the two together and you get Αιθίοψ=of burn face. The Greek name Αισωπος(Aisopos aka Aesop), unlike what is falsely claimed in this article, does not have such a meaning. This article really needs to be reworked and facted based on certain things. ~Mallaccaos, 2 May 2006

"Aesop" has no authentic historic existence apart from "Aesop's Fables", a collection that has always varied in its content according to which manuscripts you follow, so that there is no corpus: see the article Aesop's Fables. Any "personal" information about an "Aesop" is fantasy. The urgent concerns over the tint of a person's skin are modern. So the question "was Aesop black?" is based on so many misconceptions that it is unanswerable. --Wetman 08:37, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

That's exactly what I was trying to point out above. The word which this article was trying to claim his name meant Ethiopian in archaic Greek was false. There is no personal info which describes him, so the assumption that he was of "African" descent or whatever is wrong. I think saying: "The place of Aesop's birth is uncertain – Thrace, Phrygia, Aethiopia, Samos, Athens and Sardis all claim the honour." is more appropriate and leaves the door open to him being from Aethiopia or Athenian or Phrygian or whatever, which is s more accurate claim then just claiming him of African descent when we do not know. ~Mallaccaos, 8 May 2006

Given that any information about this man seem to be anecdotal at best, wouldn't a modern work of an academic analysing the works be just a good as source as what we've got. The things in the fables and the way they are put seem pretty un hellenic to me in their subjects and style. The way he makes Zeus as a character would indicate that he was from pretty far away. Certainally these tales were 'Exotic' enough to the ears of Planudes for him to picture a 'dark sknned thick lipped' Aesop, and would have also sounded as such to a Greek audience. Clearly, I don't have the eloquotion, knowledge of literature or geography to produce this theoretical article, but things like this are important to African historians and one may well be produced soon, and then we will have enough to comment on to at least acknowledge some people feel this way without it being all weasel words. Courtesy of Gavla 13:33, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

I've found a legitmate scholarly source making the argument that he was a Black African, and have added a reference to it. - SimonP 21:16, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

How coulda "legitimate" source discuss the Blackness or not of a phantom figure for whom there is no accepted single corpus of work? Aesopica is simply a genre of Greco-Roman animal fables. Reading the introduction to the Loeb Classical Library, or any other good edition of Aesopica will help return one to reality.--Wetman 00:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

If his existance is really this obviously mythical, and I do trust yr expertise on this one, I propose that the solution is simply to make this case stronger at the beginning of the article, and make it clear to the readers that all further discussions of the man are almost certainally further discussions of the myth. An article on the mythological 'Aesop' still belongs at the title 'Aesop' and if Lobban is discussing the history of the myth and image, that's still legitimate. Courtesy of Gavla 13:06, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

People seem to forgot that Maximus Planudes was a Byzantine monk who lived centuries after the first tales of Aesop were told in the Greek world. So what might have been "exotic" to the ear of a Byzantine monk who lived in 14th century AD might not have been exotic nor 'dark skinned thick lipped' viewed to ancient Greeks who lived in the 6th millennium BC. As for these animals being "exotic" ancient Greeks were no strangers to exotic animals given depictions of exotic animals have been found in ancient art and painting since Minoan times. We don't have to look any further then the exotic animals painted on the walls of Thera for evidence of this. Cheers and take care. ;-) Mala 01 August 2007

I Think He Was An African Slave With A Greek Master. Just Wondering Though, Why Are Africans Always Used As Slaves? SapientiaSativa 03:53, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Firstly, please capitalize properly; writing so thoroughly improperly makes people take you less seriously. Secondly, in the ancient world everyone was used as slaves by everyone else. On the rare occasion a Greek city fought, say, some black Carthaginians, yes, the Greeks might have taken black slaves. By the same token, there would then be Greek slaves in Africa. Just because it was mostly one-way when Europeans started the big slave trade in the Age of Exploration doesn't mean it always was. In fact, most of the slaves in any given Greek city were either Greeks from other cities or non-Greeks from areas bordering on Greece; in other words, the places from which the city was most likely to have prisoners of war. Finally, there is evidence that Aesop was from somewhere in Africa... However, there is also evidence that he was from various other places, and none of the evidence of his origins is sufficient to be considered truth, nor is any evidence of his existence scientifically falsifiable. Essentially, much like Homer, he may have existed, and he may not, but unless we find something as concrete as words written and signed by his own hand that can be carbon dated to the proper era, we are unlikely ever to know. I suggest leaving all the information in the Aesop article, but make certain to label it as scholarly speculation. (I do mostly agree with the argument against Αιθίοψ becoming Αίσωπος, but please remember that not all derived words clearly resemble their antecedents. For an extreme example, note that the French "loup garou" is, in fact, derived from the Latin-Germanic portmanteau "vir wulf," even as is the less-changed English "werewolf." It's not impossible, merely unlikely.) —Preceding

unsigned comment added by 204.52.215.100 (talk) 20:57, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

The FACTS: a) He was a slave, hence very possibly could be a black African; b) His given name to some extent does suggest Nubian orgini; c) A the killer fact: His FABLES are in ESSENCE AFRICAN FABLES WITH AFRICAN ANIMALS (lions, giraffes and such...)!!! They have the same structure and construct. Unless you believe Africans in Southern or Western Africa learnt how to tell stories from the Greek... which of course is absurd... d) A lot of his stories are carbon copies of West African stories (i.e. The Hare and the Tortoise is an Ashante fable). e) It is also documented that African slaves often served as storytellers for children in Roman and Greek society.

Only in EUROPOCENTRIC person could ever state that Aesop was most likely white. Most likely he was black. He was a black slave. One thing is definite: His fables were based on the structure of African fables. Maruti 14:24, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

The structure of fables is pretty universal; most cultures have produced something very similar without needing to "learn" it from each other. Do you think the Indian fables predating Aesop came from African sources as well? Some of the individual fables may well be of African origin (must be if they involve giraffes - lions, on the other hand, had once lived in Greece and there were plenty of stories about them and depictions of them). That doesn't make Aesop, if he existed, African. He could have heard them from African fellow-slaves, or they could have been added to the corpus centuries later - we don't have his original collection and it's a matter of educated guesswork which fables were in it. The earliest sources say he was either Thracian or Anatolian; as for using his slave-status as evidence - rubbish. Slaves in the ancient world could be of ANY ethnicity, and in the Archaic period were most likely to be from somewhere nearby, so a Thracian or Anatolian slave is more likely in the Greek areas traditionally associated with Aesop than an African one. (I have to say, I've never understood "Afrocentrism" - it seems to me to be, ironically, curiously Eurocentric. It accepts the Eurocentric idea that it is only the traditional European canon that has cultural value: it just tries to appropriate that value by attributing that canon to Africans. There are plenty of actual African cultural achievements - why not celebrate those instead?)

Dates?

The section on his life does not mention dates (although the intro mentions something). I realize that this info is highly debated but the section on his life should at least mention the conjecture about when he lived (even it is redundant with the intro). --Mcorazao 20:10, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

How could one apply dates to a phantom figure for whom there is no accepted single corpus of work? Aesopica is simply a genre of Greco-Roman animal fables. Reading the introduction to the Loeb Classical Library, or any other good edition of Aesopica will help return one to reality.--Wetman 00:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

OK I have never read this book nor have I ever been overtly concerned about the possible race of a possibly fictional person but I must say that the existence of some unusual to ancient Greece animals doesn't say much does it? It's not as if the Greeks were isolationists when it came to incorporating new a)stories b) fables c) deities d)anything else they fancied into their culture really. That doesn't mean that, if he existed, he wasn't black. It just means that we need much more solid "proofs" to arrive to such a conclusion. However I don't really think the relative section of the article needs any editing. 87.203.207.221 ( rnylk, forgot my password, now I'll have to get a new one)

Roots in India, China!

'The roots of fables go back all the way to India, where they were associated with Kasyapa, a mystical sage, and they were subsequently adopted by the early Buddhists.'

But there was no communication between Greece and India or China in the 6th century; this must be false. Unless 'roots' means there were fables in India and China too. Unless this is referenced soon, I'll take it out. Dast 08:37, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure there was communication between Greece and India and the 6th Century, by way of Persia; there was certainly trade. But that doesn't validate the claim made about the roots of these fables. thx1138 06:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

This article makes no sense

It starts out:

"Most of what are known as Aesopic fables is a compilation of tales from various sources, many of which originated with authors who lived long before Aesop. Aesop himself is said to have composed many fables, which were passed down by oral tradition. Socrates was thought to have spent his time turning Aesop’s fables into verse while he was in prison. Demetrius Phalereus, another Greek philosopher, made the first collection of these fables around 300 BC. This was later translated into Latin by Phaedrus, a slave himself, around 25 BC. The fables from these two collections..."

WHAT two collections? That paragraph was describing multiple translations of ONE collection. What is the second one? Where did it come from? Was the translation so bad that all the fables changed? If so that should be mentioned. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Skintigh (talk • contribs) 16:21, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Anyone have credible sites for this material(taken from wiki)

"The 31st Sura of the Qu'ran refers to a man named Lokman. Often confused with Aesop, and having lived several centuries earlier, Aesop's fables may be derived from the works of Lokman."

I'm not familiar with this Lokman, but having serious doubts of these claims and seeing the bogus cites have moved me to remove it and place it here.66.190.29.150 (talk) 14:38, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

==

"He continues by pointing out that the stories are populated by animals present in Africa, many of the animals being quite foreign to Greece and Europe. [1]"

I know the above comment is sourced but I would like to see some mention of those foreign animals. Though I recognize I've not read all of Aesop's fables, I only remember the lion as the only non-European beast mentioned. Yet it should be noted that in Aesop's time and as late as the 1st century BCE, lions did inhabit Thrace and weren't more exotic to Ancient Greeks than, say, brown bears.--150.244.23.2 (talk) 02:40, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Caption to the second illustration

"why did you remove my explanation of the caption from Aesop? DS (talk) 16:41, 7 December 2009 (UTC)"

2nd sentence of the caption read(s): "Note the alternate spelling "Esopus", with a long s, and the truncated 'p'."

I removed it because the information is irrelevant, being merely standard typographic form of the period and also because "Esopus" can hardly be considered an "alternate" (i.e. alternative) spelling for use today, merely a medieval form. (Gpeterw (talk) 13:38, 14 December 2009 (UTC))