Oikoumenē (The Inhabited World)
The whole inhabited earth, imagined as a single bounded landmass that could be mapped and described in one continuous account.
The oikoumenē is the 'inhabited world' — Europe, Asia, and Libya (Africa) taken together as one object to be charted and described. The concept grew out of early Ionian world-mapping by Anaximander and Hecataeus of Miletus (6th century BCE), was given mathematical dimensions by Eratosthenes (3rd century BCE), and frames Strabo's Geography, written for the statesman and the educated reader. It captured the ambition to grasp the entire human-occupied world as a single coherent whole.
How it traveled
- Geographiae ChrestomathiaAmaseia · 24explains
- Naturalis HistoriaRomeexplains
- Geographiae expositio compendiaria—explains
- Orationes 14Smyrnaexplains
- Scholia in Dionysii Byzantii per Bosporum navigationem (scholia vetera)—explains
- Paraphrases in Dioynsium Periegetam—explains
- Apotelesmatica (= Tetrabiblos)Alexandriaexplains
- Scholia in Dionysii Periegetae orbis descriptionem (scholia vetera)—explains
- Ad Nicomedem regem, vv. 1-980—explains
- Anonymi summaria ratio geographiae in sphaera intelligendae—explains
Key passages(20)
Geographiae expositio compendiaria · Anonymi Geographiae Expositio Compendiaria
Naturalis Historia · Pliny, the Elder
Scholia in Dionysii Byzantii per Bosporum navigationem (scholia vetera) · Scholia in Dionysium Periegetam
Geographiae Chrestomathia · Anonymous
Geographiae expositio compendiaria · Anonymi Geographiae Expositio Compendiaria
Geographiae expositio compendiaria · Anonymi Geographiae Expositio Compendiaria
Geographiae expositio compendiaria · Anonymi Geographiae Expositio Compendiaria
Geographiae Chrestomathia · Anonymous
Naturalis Historia · Pliny, the Elder
Ad Nicomedem regem, vv. 1-980 · Pseudo-Scymnus
Scholia in Dionysii Periegetae orbis descriptionem (scholia vetera) · Scholia in Dionysium Periegetam
Ad Nicomedem regem, vv. 1-980 · Pseudo-Scymnus
Geographiae expositio compendiaria · Anonymi Geographiae Expositio Compendiaria
Geographiae expositio compendiaria · Anonymi Geographiae Expositio Compendiaria
Geographiae expositio compendiaria · Anonymi Geographiae Expositio Compendiaria