Author : James S. Romm
Release : 2019-07-16
Genre : History
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 706/5 ( reviews)
Book Synopsis The Edges of the Earth in Ancient Thought by : James S. Romm
Download or read book The Edges of the Earth in Ancient Thought written by James S. Romm. This book was released on 2019-07-16. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For the Greeks and Romans the earth's farthest perimeter was a realm radically different from what they perceived as central and human. The alien qualities of these "edges of the earth" became the basis of a literary tradition that endured throughout antiquity and into the Renaissance, despite the growing challenges of emerging scientific perspectives. Here James Romm surveys this tradition, revealing that the Greeks, and to a somewhat lesser extent the Romans, saw geography not as a branch of physical science but as an important literary genre.