Talk:Aesop

message: Stuff is all gone, page told me to tell you.
Aesop is legendary, not real; the real author of Aesop's fables is Phaedrus.  I'll get around to fixing this in the actual article sometime soon, but I thought I'd go ahead and give the heads up beforehand here. Eric Herboso  09:49, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Admins 

message: A hash of the material has been made by a well-meaning editor attempting to separate an (apocryphal?) Aesop from Aesop's Fables, There is no Aesop aside from the Fables and there is no single canonic collection of Aesop's Fables, to the surprise of many. I am putting 'merge' suggestions on both articles, so that we can build one strong inclusive introduction to Aesop's Fables as a unified phenomenon. --Wetman 3 July 2005 00:42 (UTC)
:See Talk:Aesop's Fables. --Plastictv 3 July 2005 04:03 (UTC)
::A cursory glance at this article and its references shows that it is in fact a discussion, not of an "Aesop", but of Aesop's Fables. --Wetman 02:23, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Suggested merge [[Aesop]] and [[Aesop's Fables]]

message: The section on his life does not mention dates (although the intro mentions something). I realize that this info is highly debated but the section on his life should at least mention the conjecture about when he lived (even it is redundant with the intro).
--Mcorazao 20:10, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: How could one apply dates to a phantom figure for whom there is no accepted single corpus of work? Aesopica is simply a genre of Greco-Roman animal fables. Reading the introduction to the Loeb Classical Library, or any other good edition of Aesopica will help return one to reality.--Wetman 00:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dates? 

message: 'The roots of fables go back all the way to India, where they were associated with Kasyapa, a mystical sage, and they were subsequently adopted by the early Buddhists.'
But there was no communication between Greece and India or China in the 6th century; this must be false. Unless 'roots' means there were fables in India and China too. Unless this is referenced soon, I'll take it out. Dast 08:37, 10 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm pretty sure there was communication between Greece and India and the 6th Century, by way of Persia; there was certainly trade. But that doesn't validate the claim made about the roots of these fables. thx1138 06:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Roots in India, China! 

message: It starts out:
"Most of what are known as Aesopic fables is a compilation of tales from various sources, many of which originated with authors who lived long before Aesop. Aesop himself is said to have composed many fables, which were passed down by oral tradition. Socrates was thought to have spent his time turning Aesop’s fables into verse while he was in prison. Demetrius Phalereus, another Greek philosopher, made the first collection of these fables around 300 BC. This was later translated into Latin by Phaedrus, a slave himself, around 25 BC. The fables from these two collections..."
WHAT two collections?  That paragraph was describing multiple translations of ONE collection.  What is the second one?  Where did it come from?  Was the translation so bad that all the fables changed?  If so that should be mentioned.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Skintigh (talk • contribs) 16:21, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  This article makes no sense 

message: "The 31st Sura of the Qu'ran refers to a man named Lokman. "There is also a link between Aesop and Islam. The prophet Mohamed mentioned 'Lokman,' said to be the wisest man in the east, in the 31st sura of the Koran. In Arab folklore, Lokman supposedly lived around 1100 B.C.E. and was an Ethiopian. His father, it was said, was descended from the biblical figure Job. Some of his tales may have been adapted by Aesop some five centuries after his death." [Aesop: Biography from Answers.com, , accessed September 22, 2008.] Quoted beneath the headings, "Biography: Aesop" and "Thrown from Cliff." Often confused with Aesop, and having lived several centuries earlier, Aesop's fables may be derived from the works of Lokman.
I'm not familiar with this Lokman, but having serious doubts of these claims and seeing the bogus cites have moved me to remove it and place it here.66.190.29.150 (talk) 14:38, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Anyone have credible sites for this material(taken from wiki)

message: I want to reopen this discussion - the topics and material in these two articles are hopelessly intermixed. I don't think they should be merged - both are already overlong - but all the material on the fables (which make up most of the article on Aesop) should be moved to Aesop's Fables.
The article on "Aesop" should:
:Point at the beginning to the article on the Fables;
:Discuss the possibility that there was a historical Aesop;
:Explain that most of the stories we have of his life are almost certainly mythical, and go through the sources chronologically and systematically.
The article on "Aesop's Fables" should:
:Point at the beginning to the article on Aesop;
:Explain at the beginning at they come from very heterogeneous sources and that there is much debate about the various lines of transmission;
:Go through the sources we have for the fables chronologically and systematically.
:Since there's so much information, much of it should be spun off to separate articles (some of which already exist) on Phaedrus, Babrius, the prose Romulus, etc. Probably the various surviving anonymous Greek collections shouldn't be a separate article but should be discussed fully in "Aesop's Fables." 
I made a start by moving a short section about the nature of fables from this article to "Aesop's Fables." 207.68.240.26 (talk) 16:41, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: It seems to make sense at the moment to divide the material in some way like this. In the light of this, my opinion is that the "List of some fables by Aesop" section of this article should be removed; there is a good section listing fables in the Aesop's Fables article and the idea of wikilinking to the individual animals here doesn't seem that useful.--Annielogue (talk) 19:28, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

text: I was one of those who took part in the discussion of making a clear distinction between an article on Aesop and another dealing with the fables over on the Aesop's Fables discussion page and until now have left the one here alone. However, since the issues flagged up at the start of the article since September had not been dealt with, and since there was an unhelpful overlap between 'biography' and depiction of the fables in the final section, I've now attempted to unclutter the article. I apologise if I seem to have stepped on anyone's toes. I certainly agree with Annielogue that a list of fables was entirely unnecessary here and have deleted that. Mzilikazi1939 (talk) 14:08, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Clarifying the distinction between [[Aesop]] and [[Aesop's Fables]] 

message: K. Q. Duane  K. Q. Duane (talk) 19:55, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: '''Support BC'''

message: * Johnbod (talk) 14:40, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: '''Support BCE'''

message: I disagree. There has absolutely been a preference for the use of AD (After Death) and BC (Before Christ), as far back as Christ and Christendom has advanced civilization. In fact, the very first time I'd ever seen BCE (Before Common Era) and CE (Common Era) was in Israel, about 15 years ago. It's bad enough that anti-Christian sentiment and revisionist history has taken hold in certain academic arenas but this underhanded effort to totally REWRITE history is unconscionable and should be condemned at every turn!K. Q. Duane (talk) 20:00, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  2015 comment 

message: The guideline suggests that images "should be relevant and increase readers' understanding of the subject matter. In general, images should depict the concepts described in the text of the article."  The liberal sprinkling of imaginative representations from the two millennia after his death fail to achieve this; would it be a good idea to remove some of them?--Old Moonraker (talk) 06:28, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: In the absence of much solid information about Aesop, the article has necessarily to centre upon the impact of the Aesop persona on people down the ages. The images are necessary evidence of this and are therefore perfectly in accord with WP policy. The important thing is that they should be varied in terms of time, geography and portrayal, which the choice here appears to be. Mzilikazi1939 (talk) 17:34, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreeing that demonstrating the subject's historical significance is relevant. In what way does the current selection of images assist with this, please? --Old Moonraker (talk) 20:12, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

text: I mentioned geographical paramaters are important too, which in part justifies the otherwise poor Japanese woodcut. But that also illustrates a point made in the text, as do the coin in that section and the paintings that follow it. The Classical statue at the head of the article is all we have referring to antiquity, which leaves two mediaeval book illustrations and one from the Renaissance, two of which illustrate Aesop as a hunchback. All that could be claimed as redundant is one of the latter, although the one from Spain also demonstrates the genre of frontispieces illustrating events in his stories which, if not mentioned in this text, is certainly mentioned elsewhere in articles dealing with Aesop. That really leaves only the illustration by Hartmann  which, I'd be inclined to agree, isn't particularly functional in terms of the guidelines. But let's see if anyone else joins the discussion before taking any action. Mzilikazi1939 (talk) 21:12, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: It was the prominent position given to Hartmann Schedel that set me to review the included images. The claim that the coin is a near-contemporary representation, even if not a strong one, saves it from consideration for deletion.--Old Moonraker (talk) 05:38, 25 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I have to agree about the Hartmann image. It doesn't seem to fill any chronological or interpretational gap. It's one of those standardised woodcut "portraits" - could be Homer in a different hat (I'm only half-joking here) - and it's near-contemporaneous with the much more informative, anonymous Spanish print below. Haploidavey (talk) 10:38, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

text: I've deleted the Schedel picture, since it's obviously redundant. There was discussion about its appropriateness back in 2008, although not wholly relevant. It was argued in its favour then that it was one of the earliest printed depictions of Aesop, but we now have an earlier. The discussion about a blonde Aesop was beside the point, since there wasn't colour printing in 1493, so the picture doesn't even have the merit of authenticity. It had been hand-coloured later. Thanks for raising the point, Old Moonraker. Mzilikazi1939 (talk) 14:08, 25 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Happy with that: it was the worst one!--Old Moonraker (talk) 14:19, 25 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I was asked to comment but haven't had time, and see that it's all sorted now. Dougweller (talk) 15:27, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Image profusion 

message: I can't see why story teller was removed, not every reader will understand fabulist. Dougweller (talk) 16:43, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I've reverted the reversion of my various if quick changes to the lead, which had obvious problems. We seem to have some WP:OWNy issues here, & futher changes should be discussed here first. Not only did he revert to a version with no link to fable, but his last version removed completely what was previously an Easter Egg link to Aesop's Fables!  Not good enough.  Johnbod (talk) 16:55, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

text: Accusations of ownership are invariably made when poor editorship is reverted. In point of fact, I came to the article as a late editor concerned with the rather weak standard of some parts of it. I'd accept 'story-teller' in place of 'fabulist' if it makes the meaning clearer. However, the needless repetition of 'a fabulist or story teller credited with a number of fables now collectively known as Aesop's Fables' is sheer sloppy writing. That's why I reverted, coupled with his moving mention of the alternative names by which Aesop went into a context where it does not fit so well. And Johnbod seems not to have noticed that there is a link to the Fables article immediately following the title of this article. He admits that his changes were hasty. I hope he will now give the matter further consideration. Mzilikazi1939 (talk) 18:44, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes I have & it is still better as it is. Nobody who is sure they have arrived at the right article reads the hat-note cruft, and the repetition - only twice - of fables is fine. Certainly better than removing both links for heaven's sake!  Not to mention the various other bits of tidying-up you reverted. But let's see what others think. Johnbod (talk) 23:22, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why was story teller removed? 

message: Is this the reason "some archaeologists" have identified Aesop as the subject of the contemporary sculpture? No wonder other  authorities disagree, or perhaps it's just an personal interpretation by the contributor here. Tagged , but maybe there's something in Zanker (1995) that covers it; were there artistic conventions of the time to indicate that the subject was "intellectual"? Bring the reference and prove my misgivings misplaced! --Old Moonraker (talk) 21:58, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't intend editing this article, but the so-called "Aesop" sculpture's the subject of lengthy, in-depth and well-sourced discussion in Lisa Trentin's "What’s In A Hump? Re-examining the Hunchback in the Villa Albani-Torlonia," Cambridge Classical Journal, 55, 2009, pp. 130-156. I've done no more than glance at it but thought it might be useful. For anyone interested, here's an Academia.edu link.  Haploidavey (talk) 22:21, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, the source does say more-or-less that! With grateful thanks to  User:Haploidavey, I will remove the tag.  I too don't intend to make any major edits here.--Old Moonraker (talk) 22:34, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Statue "bearing an intellectual appearance" 

message: I think this article could be improved by having an infobox. What type is most suitable? It could be infobox writter,  infobox philosopher, infobox person... (talk) user:Al83tito  19:00, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: After looking more into it, it looks like infobox writer could be the most suitable, as Aesop is frequently labeled as a fabulist or storyteller. I have looked through the article to see who has he influenced, and added those names to that "Influenced" parameter in the infobox. However, the list is incomplete, and anyone else more knowledgeable on the subject should make additions and corrections to that list. user:Al83tito  20:08, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Infobox for this article? 

message: On 26 January 2014 (i.e. just in the last few weeks), User:Mzilikazi1939 changed this article from the standard form of writing dates in the English language to CE/BCE. As he well knows, this violates WP:MOS, specifically WP:ERA, which requires that any change to an article's date style first be discussed on the talk page and justified with article-specific reasons before consensus is established and the article is then ready to be changed. As is clearly evident to everyone, none of these steps have taken place in this case.
Instead, in the to and fro of the last few weeks as Aesop has gone back and forth between the Queen's English and CE/BCE, Mzilikazi and his friends have claimed that the comments much further up this talk page and dated 21 months ago constitute the necessary discussion and consensus for the change of 26/01/14. Apart from the obvious fact that the article remained in the standard English state for 20 months continuously (May 2012 to January 2014), those comments were never enough to justify the change to CE/BCE even back then. This is of course because, as mentioned earlier, WP:ERA requires that article-specific reasons be given and consensus established. Neither occured then. What we see from 2012 can at best be called a disgrace; it was merely Dougweller and his friends making the laughably fallacious and tendentious claim that because there were more of them, they should automatically get their way without having to justify their case or convince anyone of it. The "discussion" went quiet in its unresolved state and the change from the Queen's English (which the article has used since its creation and the overwhelming majority of the time since then) to CE/BCE therefore didn't proceed, at least until 20 months later when Mzilikazi decided to try again, this time without any attempt to follow the proper procedure.
If Mzilikazi and his friends want to legitimately change Aesop from the established English language abbreviations to CE/BCE then by all means discuss it here and follow the proper process. Stop trying to ram through your illegal change with constant back and forth editing. (WP Editor 2011 (talk) 10:18, 16 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Um, everyone else is wrong and you are right? That's what led to your one week block before. Dougweller (talk) 11:17, 16 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I see WPEditor is making a new charge of deviation from 'Queen's English'. Since the articles address themselves to academic issues, one should look to academic usage in England. It varies, of course, but at least one Classical encyclopedia from the impeccably English Oxford University Press uses B/CE dating throughout, including in its article on Aesop. In addition, 'article specific' reasons were offered for this style of dating as early as 2012 on the talk page here and these have never been acknowledged or addressed by WPEditor. Mzilikazi1939 (talk) 02:57, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: He's been blocked indefinitely. Dougweller (talk) 10:02, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unauthorised change 

message: Did Aesop have any sons or daughters of his own? His numerous affairs, despite it being stated that he was uglier than homemade soup, is well-chronicled here, so I was wondering....  --67.231.40.21 (talk) 03:17, 4 April 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Aesop's children? 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: I don't want to get into an edit war, and surely this must have been discussed somewhere, but I can't find it. Why isn't the name spelled Æsop? Dpbsmith (talk) 23:14, 19 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Because that Anglo-Saxon letter is a superannuated convention. Most printed sources now use Aesop. In the old days Æ used to represent approximately the initial sound of French Ésope, which is used over there to this day. Neither represent the sound or letters in Greek Αἴσωπος (Aisōpos) and pronunciation of the initial sound is different in Greece today from what it was anciently. Language shifts constantly and insisting on outmoded spellings would be pedantic when they serve no useful function. You'll notice that the Oxford Classical Dictionary prefers simple 'Ae'. Then look at American 'esthetic' where English still prefers initial 'ae'. "I rest my case, M'Lud"! Mzilikazi1939 (talk) 09:12, 20 April 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why not "Æsop?" 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: "Still problematic is the story by Phaedrus which has Aesop in Athens, telling the fable of the frogs who asked for a king, during the reign of Peisistratos, which occurred decades after the presumed date of Aesop's death."
According to legend, Aesop died in 564.  In the article about Peisistratos it says: "Peisistratos (Greek: Πεισίστρατος; died 528/7 BC), Latinized Pisistratus, the son of Hippocrates, was a ruler of ancient Athens during most of the period between 561 and 527 BC.[citation needed] His legacy lies primarily in his instituting the Panathenaic Festival, historically assigned the date of 566 B.C., and the consequent first attempt at producing a definitive version of the Homeric epics."
The dates seem to line up with Aesop's death.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.35.238.94 (talk) 04:50, 17 August 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Peisistratos 

message: I removed the section about the obscur question of Aesop origin. This section has never been a point of discussion among scholars since we don't have any description of this so called Aesop (apart the source claiming an origin in Phrygia or in Thrace). As a result, this paragraphe hasn't place in wikipedia. Wikipedia is NOT an afrocentrist, spiritist, fabulist,... blog but an encyclopaedia which had to provide its readers with valuable informations.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.164.53.42 (talk) 21:17, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: And it had already been restored by the time you posted the above, just as it was restored every other time it was removed. Feel free to make a case for removing it, but don't just drop by and remove 20% of the article. Meters (talk) 21:21, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

text: The section you deleted has 27 citations. Obviously, there are a lot of authors who would disagree with you that the topic is of no interest to scholars. If you have rebutting testimony from other, possibly more-reliable sources to add, please feel free to do so, rather than arbitrarily removing such a heavily documented section.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:24, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: The subject is obviously contentious and therefore WP:bold deletion is unacceptable. Wikipedia:Consensus must therefore be reached before another attempt at deletion. Otherwise the remedy for WP:Disruption is laid out in the guidelines, to which the editor's attention has already been drawn. Sweetpool50 (talk) 23:33, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

text:  And the second rule of responsible scholarship is to mention alternative accounts, if only to refute them, which the 'African' section does. A well-attested tradition going back a thousand years has to be acknowledged. Sweetpool50 (talk) 10:25, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm guessing that User:Gelias01 is User:87.164.53.42 - no big deal so long as it doesn't happen again. Doug Weller talk 10:53, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  I removed the section of the African origin of Aesop 

message: Ive seen some reference to this, is it a thing or just an occasional typo that made it to the covers of some books? Mrrealtime (talk) 17:39, 3 December 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: It's  a typo. Look at earlier posts for discussion of the name's Greek origin, spelling and pronunciation. Sweetpool50 (talk) 18:19, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

text: It's difficult to talk about something for which you provide no online example. In this from Amazon and this from a hip-hop magazine, it's an online typo when you look at the product. Sweetpool50 (talk) 07:36, 4 December 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spelling alternate : Aseop 

message: In all likelihood the possibility of African origin was actually posited by the fact that Memnon of Ethiopia had a friend by the same name in the Trojan War.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tabbycatlove (talk • contribs) 08:56, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Etymology of "Aethiopia" leading to speculation of African origin: untrue?  

message: The story of Aesop and Rhodope belonging to one slave owner was not invented in XVIII century. Herodotus, in "An Account of Egypt" talks about it.
If Rhodope is mentioned, it may make sense to add that source. 
Vlad Patryshev (talk) 16:20, 2 May 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rhodope 

message: Please add back Aesop's ancient Greek ethnicity as his article always correctly mentioned in the first sentence. It was edited out by an account which has now been blocked for sockpuppeting. HighDunker (talk) 03:17, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Done. Sweetpool50 (talk) 07:33, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  About a recent edit