Stephani Byzantii Ethnica, Volumen II: Delta - Iota

This comprehensive geographical encyclopaedia, compiled around 530 A.D., catalogues some 3,600 names of places, mountains, lakes, rivers, waters and peoples from the ancient world. Particular attention is paid to the etymology of names and the grammatical derivations of the Ethnika . For cultural historical information – here with the evidence of the attributed quotations – Stephanos is often the sole source. This new critical edition replaces A. Meineke’s long obsolete edition of 1849. The text of the directly recorded epitomes is accompanied by an apparatus of parallel terms which takes account of both the sources of the encyclopaedia and its later users. This first translation of the encyclopaedia in a modern language and the notes (particularly on language, onomastics and topography) open up the work to a wide circle of scholars engaged in studies of antiquity. Das um 530 n. Chr. verfasste Lexikon, gleichsam ein byzantinischer Brockhaus der antiken Welt, verzeichnet ca. 3.600 Orts-, Berg-, Gewässer- und Völkernamen, deren Ursprung und Ableitungen es erklärt. Die Gründungslegenden und die Fülle kulturhistorischer Nachrichten machen es zu einem Quellentext der Polisforschung; zudem erweist sich der Zitatenschatz als reiche Fundgrube literarischer Fragmente. Band 2 (Delta - Kappa) erschien 2008.