Lives of Eminent Philosophers (1.11.116-1.11.120)

Pherecydes, the son of Babys, and a native of Syros according to Alexander in his Successions of Philosophers, was a pupil of Pittacus. Theopompus

tells us that he was the first who wrote in Greek on nature and the gods.

Many wonderful stories are told about him. He was walking along the beach in Samos and saw a ship running before the wind; he exclaimed that in no long time she would go down, and, even as he watched her, down she went. And as he was drinking water which had been drawn up from a well he predicted that on the third day there would be an earthquake; which came to pass. And on his way from Olympia he advised Perilaus, his host in Messene, to move thence with all belonging to him; but Perilaus could not be persuaded, and Messene was afterwards taken.[*]

He bade the Lacedaemonians set no store by gold or silver, as Theopompus says in his Mirabilia. He told them he had received this command from Heracles in a dream; and the same night Heracles enjoined upon the kings to obey Pherecydes. But some fasten this story upon Pythagoras.

Hermippus relates that on the eve of war between Ephesus and Magnesia he favoured the cause of the Ephesians, and inquired of some one passing by where he came from, and on receiving the reply From Ephesus, he said, Drag me by the legs and place me in the territory of Magnesia; and take a message to your countrymen that after their victory they must bury me there, and that this is the last injunction of Pherecydes.

The man gave the message; a day later the Ephesians attacked and defeated the Magnesians; they found Pherecydes dead and buried him on the spot with great honours. Another

version is that he came to Delphi and hurled himself down from Mount Corycus. But Aristoxenus in his work On Pythagoras and his School affirms that he died a natural death and was buried by Pythagoras in Delos; another account again is that he died of a verminous disease, that Pythagoras was also present and inquired how he was, that he thrust his finger through the doorway and exclaimed, My skin tells its own tale, a phrase subsequently applied by the grammarians as equivalent to getting worse, although some wrongly understand it to mean all is going well.

He maintained that the divine name for table is θυωρός, or that which takes care of offerings.

Andron of Ephesus says that there were two natives of Syros who bore the name of Pherecydes: the one was an astronomer, the other was the son of Babys and a theologian, teacher of Pythagoras. Eratosthenes, however, says that there was only one Pherecydes of Syros, the other Pherecydes being an Athenian and a genealogist.

There is preserved a work by Pherecydes of Syros, a work which begins thus: Zeus and Time and Earth were from all eternity, and Earth was called Γῆ because Zeus gave her earth (γῆ) as guerdon (γέρας). His sun-dial is also preserved in the island of Syros.

Duris in the second book of his Horae gives the inscription on his tomb as follows[*]:

All knowledge that a man may have had I;

Yet tell Pythagoras, were more thereby,

That first of all Greeks is he; I speak no lie.

Ion of Chios says of him[*]:

With manly worth endowed and modesty,

Though he be dead, his soul lives happily,

If wise Pythagoras indeed saw light

And read the destinies of men aright.

There is also an epigram of my own in the Pherecratean metre[*]:

The famous Pherecydes, to whom Syros gave birth,