The ancient Greek historians (Harvard lectures) by J. B. Bury.

188 ANCIENT GREEK HISTORIANS LECT.

were in the sphere of philology; but the antiquarian
tastes which found their fullest satisfaction there,
and afterwards at Pergamon also, in the shadow of
large libraries, were introduced by the Peripatetic
movement, and did not fail to affect historiography. We can notice this influence in the work
of Timaeus, who, though he was thoroughly incapable of philosophical ideas and made scurrilous
attacks on Aristotle, shared with the Aristotelian
school the passion for collecting facts of all kinds,
and was so trivial in its indulgence that he was
called an "old rag woman " (ypaocvXxecrTpa).
The creation of antiquarian study is one of the
numerous precious services of the Greeks to the
progress of human culture. Its distinction is that,
apparently and in its immediate aspect, it is disinterested. The Greeks described it as -roXv7rparyuoaSvvI7, attending to what is not one's business, a
singularly felicitous phrase for a sphere which has
no relation to human life. The Roman word for
antiquarianism had a similar significance: curiositas,
superfluous care for what is practically unimportant,
or, in fact, the love of useless knowledge. But
although curiositas came to be an instinct in men
who could not have assigned any reason of utility
for their pursuits, it must be remembered that it
sprang from a certain side of the general philosophical theory of Aristotle, and, thus having a place
in a system, had originally a justification outside
itself. It may be called useless in a narrow sense
of the term, but from another point of view, as I