Plutarch, De primo frigido, Harold Cherniss (Translator), William C. Helmbold (Translator), 16

Search the Perseus Catalog for:

← Previous Next →

[16] Then, too, air is everywhere equal; though neither winter nor cold is identical everywhere. It is no accident that some parts of the world are cold and damp, while others are hot and dry; it is due to the existence of a single substance that includes coldness and wetness in one. The greater part of Africa is hot and without water; while those who have travelled through Scythia, Thrace, and Pontus¹ report that these regions have great lakes or marshes and are traversed by many deep rivers. As for the regions that lie between, those that are near lakes and marshes are especially cold because of the exhalations from the water, Posidonius,² then, in affirming that the freshness and moistness of marsh air is the reason for the cold, has done nothing to disturb the plausibility of the argument; he has, rather, made it more plausible. For fresh air would not always seem colder if cold did not take its origin from moisture. So Homer³ spoke more truly when he affirmed

The river-air blows chill before the dawn,

thereby indicating the source of coldness.

Our senses, moreover, often deceive us and we imagine, when we touch cold garments or cold wool, that we are touching moist objects: this is because wet and cold have a common substance and their natures have a close affinity and relationship. In very cold climates the low temperature often breaks vessels whether they are of bronze or of clay - not, of course, when they are empty, but only when they are full and the water exerts pressure by means of its coldness. Theophrastus,⁴ to be sure, declares that the air breaks these vessels, using the liquid as a spike. But take care⁵ that there isn’t more wit than truth in such a remark! For if it were so, vessels full of pitch or of milk would more readily be broken by the air.⁶

Water, however, seems to be cold of itself, and primordially so. It is the antithesis, in its coldness, to the heat of fire, just as in its wetness to the dryness of fire, and in its heaviness to the other’s lightness. To sum up: fire is of a disintegrating and separative nature, while water is adhesive and retentive, holding and gluing together by means of its moistness. Empedocles⁷ alluded to this, when, as often as he mentioned them, he termed Fire a Destructive Strife and Water Tenacious Love. For the nourishment of fire is that which can be changed into fire and only things that have affinity and a close relationship to it can be so changed; while its opposites, like water, are not easily changed to fire. Water itself is practically incombustible, and it renders matter such as damp grass and moist timber very hard to consume; the greenness in them produces a dusky, dull flame because, by dint of cold, it struggles against heat as against its natural enemy.

De primo frigido. Plutarch. Harold Cherniss (Translator), William C. Helmbold (Translator). Cambridge, MA. 1957.

Sponsored by Perseus Project, Tufts University.

Funding provided by The National Endowment for the Humanities.

Current edition Perseus

On the Principle of Cold (English) (Plutarch. Moralia, Vol. XII. Cherniss, Harold and William C. Helmbold, translators. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1957 (printing).)

Editions (1)

Περὶ τοῦ πρώτως ψυχροῦ Perseus (Plutarch. Plutarchi Chaeronensis Moralia, Vol V. Vernardakēs, Grēgorios N., editor. Leipzig: Teubner, 1893.) — 16 focus

[16] ἔπειτα πανταχοῦ μέν ἐστιν ἀὴρ ἴσος, οὐ πανταχοῦ δὲ χειμὼν ὅμοιος οὐδὲ ψῦχος. ἀλλὰ ταῦτα μὲν τὰ μέρη ψυχρὰ καὶ κάθυγρα, ταῦτα δὲ ξηρὰ καὶ θερμὰ τῆς οἰκουμένης οὐ κατὰ τύχην, ἀλλὰ τῷ μίαν οὐσίαν ψυχρότητος καὶ ὑγρότητος 20 951f εἶναι. Λιβύης μὲν γὰρ ἔνθερμος πολλὴ καὶ ἄνυδρος, Σκυθίαν δὲ καὶ Θρᾴκην καὶ Πόντον οἱ πεπλανημένοι λίμνας τε μεγάλας ἔχειν καὶ ποταμοῖς διαρρεῖσθαι βαθέσι καὶ πολλοῖς ἱστοροῦσιν αὐτῶν τε τῶν ἐν μέσῳ τόπων τὰ παράλιμνα καὶ ἑλώδη ψῦχος 25 ἔχει μάλιστα διὰ τὰς ἀπὸ τῶν ὑγρῶν ἀναθυμιάσεις Ποσειδώνιος δὲ τῆς ψυχρότητος αἰτίαν εἰπὼν τὸ πρόσφατον εἶναι τὸν ἕλειον ἀέρα καὶ νοτερὸν οὐκ ἔλυσε τὸ πιθανόν, ἀλλὰ πιθανώτερον ἐποίησεν οὐ γὰρ ἂν ἐφαίνετο τοῦ ἀέρος ὁ πρόσφατος ἀεὶ ψυχρότερος, εἰ μὴ τὸ ψυχρὸν ἐν τοῖς. ὑγροῖς τὴν γένεσιν εἶχε. βέλτιον οὖν Ὅμηρος εἰπὼν 5 952a

αὔρη δʼ ἐκ ποταμοῦ ψυχρὴ πνέει ἠῶθι πρό,

τὴν πηγὴν τῆς ψυχρότητος ἔδειξεν. ἔτι τοίνυν ἡ μὲν αἴσθησις πολλάκις ἡμᾶς ἐξαπατᾷ, ὅταν ἱματίων ἢ ἐρίων ψυχρῶν θιγγάνωμεν, οἰομένους ὑγρῶν θιγγάνειν διὰ τὸ κοινὴν ἀμφοτέροις οὐσίαν ὑπάρχειν 10 καὶ τὰς φύσεις σύνεγγυς εἶναι καὶ οἰκείας. ἐν δὲ τοῖς δυσχειμέροις κλίμασι πολλὰ ῥηγνύει τὸ ψῦχος ἀγγεῖα καὶ χαλκᾶ καὶ κεραμεᾶ· κενὸν δʼ οὐδὲν ἀλλὰ πάντα πλήρη, βιαζομένου τῇ ψυχρότητι τοῦ ὕδατος. καίτοι φησὶ Θεόφραστος τὸν ἀέρα ῥηγνύειν τὰ ἀγγεῖα 15 τῷ ὑγρῷ καθάπερ ἥλῳ χρώμενον· ὅρα δὲ μὴ τοῦτο 952b κομψῶς μᾶλλον ἢ ἀληθῶς εἰρημένον ἐστίν· ἔδει γὰρ τὰ πίττης γέμοντα μᾶλλον ῥήγνυσθαι ὑπὸ τοῦ ἀέρος καὶ τὰ γάλακτος.. ἀλλʼ ἔοικε τὸ ὕδωρ ἐξ ἑαυτοῦ ψυχρὸν εἶναι καὶ πρώτως· ἀντίκειται γὰρ τῇ ψυχρότητι 20 πρὸς τὴν θερμότητα τοῦ πυρός, ὥσπερ τῇ ὑγρότητι πρὸς τὴν ξηρότητα καὶ τῇ βαρύτητι πρὸς τὴν κουφότητα. καὶ ὅλως τὸ μὲν πῦρ διαστατικόν ἐστι· καὶ διαιρετικόν, τὸ δʼ ὕδωρ κολλητικὸν καὶ σχετικόν, τῇ ὑγρότητι συνέχον καὶ πῆττον· ᾗ καὶ 25 παρέσχεν Ἐμπεδοκλῆς ὑπόνοιαν, ὡς τὸ μὲν πῦρ νεῖκος οὐλόμενον σχεδύνην δὲ φιλότητα τὸ ὑγρὸν 952c ἑκάστοτε προσαγορεύων ἐπεὶ, τροφὴ μὲν· πυρὸς τὸ μεταβάλλον εἰς πῦρ, μεταβάλλει δὲ τὸ συγγενὲς; καὶ οἰκεῖον, τὸ δʼ ἐναντίον δυσμετάβλητον, ὡς τὸ ὕδωρ 5 καὶ αὐτὸ μὲν ὡς ἔπος εἰπεῖν ἄκαυστόν ἐστιν, ὕλην δὲ καὶ πόαν νοτερὰν καὶ ξύλα βεβρεγμένα δυσκαῆ παρέχει, καὶ φλόγα ζοφερὰν καὶ ἀμβλεῖαν ὑπὸ χλωρότητος ἀναδίδωσι τῷ ψυχρῷ μαχόμενον πρὸς τὸ θερμὸν ὡς φύσει πολέμιον. 10

Translations (1)

Concerning the First Principle of Cold Perseus (Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals, Vol. V. Goodwin, William W., editor; Fetherstone, F., translator. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company; Cambridge: Press of John Wilson and Son, 1874.) — 16 focus

[16] Therefore the air is of an equal temper in all places, but winter is not in all places alike nor equally cold; but some parts of the habitable world are cold and moist, others hot and dry, not by chance, but because there is but one substance of heat and dryness. For the greatest part of Africa is hot and without water. But they that have travelled Scythia, Thrace, and the Pontic regions report them to be full of vast lakes, and large and deep rivers. And as for those regions lying between, those parts that join upon lakes and marshes are most cold by reason of the exhalations from the water. Posidouius therefore, affirming the freshness and moistness of the air of marshes to be the cause of its cold, has no way disturbed the probability of our argument, but rather added to the strength of it; for the air would not always be the colder the fresher it is, unless cold has its original from moisture. And therefore Homer much more truly shows us the fountain of cold, when he says,

Chill from the river blows the wind

Before the coming morn.

Then again it many times happens that our sense deceives us. So that when we feel cold garments or cold wool, we believe we feel them to be moist, by reason of the substance which is common to both, and of their natures which are coherent and familiar one with another. But in climates where the cold is extreme, it oftentimes breaks and cracks both pots and vessels, whether made of earth or brass,—none empty, but all full, the cold giving force and might to the liquor within,—which made Theophrastus say, that the air breaks those vessels, making use of the cold as of a hammer; whether more eloquently or more truly spoken, I leave you to judge. For then vessels full of pitch or milk should be more subject to be broken by the air.

But water seems to be cold of itself, and that primitively too; for in respect of the coldness of it, it is opposite to the heat of the fire; as to drought in respect of its moisture, and to ponderosity in regard of its lightness. Lastly, fire is altogether of a dissipating and dividing nature; water, of a nature to fasten and contain, holding and joining together by virtue of its moisture. Which was the reason why Empedocles called fire a pernicious contention, but water a tenacious friendship. For the nourishment of fire is that which changes into fire, and it changes that which is as it were of kin and familiar to it. What is contrary to it, as water, cannot be changed by it, or at least only with great difficulty. True it is, that as for itself, as I may so say, it cannot be burned; but as for green wood and wet straw, it overcomes them with much struggling, while the heat and cold contending together, by reason of their moisture and their natural antipathy, produce only a dull flame, clouded with smoke, that makes little progress upon the materials.

Notes on the current edition

On the Principle of Cold

1. Plutarch may be thinking of the old kingdom of Pontus, which included tracts south, east, and north of the Black Sea.

2. The fragment has not yet been numbered in L. Edelstein’s forthcoming collection; for the literature see A.J.P. lvii (1936), p. 301 and n. 61.

3. Odyssey, v. 469.

4. The fragment is apparently omitted by Wimmer.

5. This seems to be addressed to Favorinus’s Peripatetic sympathies.

6. That is, than those full of water.

7. Diels-Kranz, Frag. der Vorsok. 5, i, p. 318, frag. B 19. Plutarch seems to have mistaken Empedocles’ meaning, though some would invoke frag. B 34. In general, while Plutarch is said to have written ten books on Empedocles (Lamprias catalogue no. 43), he does not seek the difficult poet’s meaning very carefully.

Plutarch De primo frigido 16

Harold Cherniss (Translator), William C. Helmbold (Translator)

Search the Perseus Catalog for:

Current edition Perseus

Notes on the current edition

Stable identifiers