IONIANS

ionians, the name given by the greeks to one of the principal divisions of the hellenic peoples. in historic times it was applied to the inhabitants of (1) attica, where some believed the ionians to have originated; (2) parts of euboea; (3) the cycladic islands, except melos and thera; (4) a section of the west coast of asia minor, from the gulf of smyrna to that of iasus (see ionia); (5) colonies from any of the foregoing, notably in thrace, propontis and pontus in the west, and in egypt (naucratis, daphnae); some authorities have found traces of an ancient ionian population in (6) north-eastern peloponnese. the meaning and derivation of the name are not known. it occurs in two forms, [greek: iawones] and [greek: iones] (compare [greek: chaones] and [greek: chones] in epirus)--not counting the name [greek: ionios] applied to the open sea west of greece. in the traditional genealogy of the hellenes, ion, the ancestor of the ionians, is brother of achaeus and son of xuthus (who held peloponnese after the dispersal of the children of hellen). but this genealogy, though it is attributed to hesiod, is apparently post-homeric; and it is clear that the ionian name had independent and varied uses and meanings in very early times. in homer the word [greek: iawones] occurs as a name of inhabitants of attica, with the epithet [greek: elkechitones] (il. xiii. 685 = "trail-vest"), describing some point of costume, and later regarded as imputing effeminacy. the homeric _hymn to apollo of delos_ (7th century) describes an ionian population in the cyclades with a loose religious league about the delian sanctuary. the same word [greek: iawon] (_javan_) appears in hebrew literature of the 8th and 7th centuries, to denote one group of the "japhetic" peoples of asia minor, cyprus and perhaps rhodes: "by these were the isles of the nations divided, in their lands, every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations," a comprehensive expression for the island-strewn regions farther west (gen. x. 10). in ezek. xxvii. 13, 19, _javan_ trades with tyre in slaves, bronze-work, iron and drugs. later allusions show that on semitic lips _javan_ meant western traders in general. in persian _yauna_ was the generic term for greeks.[1] the earliest explicit greek account of the ionians is given in the 5th century by herodotus (i. 45, 56, 143-145, v. 66, vii. 94, viii. 44-46). the "children of ion" originated in north-eastern peloponnese; and traces of them remained in troezen and cynuria. expelled by the achaeans (who seem to have entered peloponnese about four generations before the dorian invasion) they invaded and dominated attica; and about the time of the dorian invasion took the lead under the attic branch of the neleids of pylus (hdt. i. 147, v. 65) in the colonization of the cyclades and of asiatic ionia, which in homer is still "carian." many of the colonists, however, were not ionians, but refugees from other parts of greece, between euboea and argolis (hdt. i. 146); others looked on attica as their first home, though the true ionians were intruders there. the pan-ionian sanctuary of poseidon on the asiatic promontory of mycale was regarded as perpetuating a cult from peloponnesian achaea, and the league of twelve cities which maintained it, as imitated from an achaean dodecapolis, and as claiming (absurdly, according to herodotus i. 143) purer descent than other ionians. in herodotus's account of the first greek intercourse with egypt (about 664 b c.) he describes "ionian and carian" adventurers and mercenaries in the delta. later the commoner antithesis is between ionian and dorian, first (probably) in the colonial regions of asia minor, and later more universally. in the 5th century the name "ionian" was already falling into discredit. causes of this were (1) the peace-loving luxury (born of commercial wealth and contact with oriental life) of the great ionian cities of asia; (2) the tameness with which they submitted first to lydia and to persia, then to athenian pretensions, then to sparta, and finally to persia again; (3) the decadence and downfall of athens, which still counted as ionian and had claimed (since solon's time) seniority among "ionian" states. in the later 4th century the name survives only (a) as a geographical expression for part of the coast of asia minor, (b) in european greece as the name of that section of the northern amphictyony in which athens and its colonies were reckoned. the traditional history of asiatic ionia is generally accepted, and in its broad outlines is probably well founded. common to all groups of ionians in the aegean is a dialect of greek which has [eta] for [alpha] (in attic only partially) and (in asiatic ionian especially) [kappa] for [pi] in certain words. herodotus states that there were four distinct dialects in asiatic ionia itself (i. 142) and the dialect of attica differed widely from all other forms of ionic. earlier phases of ionic forms are dominant in the language of homer. most ionian states exhibit also traces of the fourfold tribal divisions named after the "children of ion"; but additional tribes occur locally. (hdt. v. 66, 69.) all reputed colonies from attica (except ephesus and colophon) kept also the feast of apaturia; and many worshipped apollo patrous as the reputed father of ion. the few observations hitherto made on the sites of ionian cities indicate continuity of settlement and culture as far back as the latest phases of the mycenaean (late minoan iii.) age and not farther, supporting thus far the traditional foundation dates. the theory of e. curtius (1856-1890) that the ionians originated in asia minor and spread thence through the cyclades to euboea and attica deserts ancient tradition on linguistic and ethnological grounds of doubtful value. ad. holm supports it (_gesch. gr._, berlin, 1886, i. 86), but a. von gutschmid (_beitr. z. gesch. d. alten orients_, leipzig, 1856, 124 ff.) and e. meyer (_philologus_ nf. 2, 1889, p. 268 ff.; nf. 3, 1890, p. 479 ff.) follow herodotus with qualifications. j. b. bury (_eng. hist. rev._ xv. 228), though he regards the ionian peoples as of european origin, thinks that they may have got their name from some part of the asiatic coast. ionian culture and art, though little known in their earlier phases, derive their inspiration on the one side from those of the old aegean (minoan) civilization, on the other from the oriental (mainly assyrian) models which penetrated to the coast through the hittite civilization of asia minor. egyptian influence is almost absent until the time of psammetichus, but then becomes predominant for a while. local and regional peculiarities, however, disappear almost wholly in the 5th and 4th centuries, under the overpowering influence of athens. authorities.--besides the sections on _ionians_ in the general histories of greece and the references given in g. busolt, _griechische geschichte_, i. (2nd ed., gotha, 1893), pp. 262, 277 ff., see e. curtius, _die ionier vor der ionischen wanderung_ (berlin, 1855), and papers in _gott. gel. anz._ (1856), p. 1152 f. and (1859), p. 2021 f.; _jahrb. f. kl. philol._ 83 (1860), p. 449 f.; _hermes_ 25 (1890), p. 141 f.; a. von gutschmid, _beitrage z. gesch. d. alten orients_ (leipzig, 1856), p. 124 ff.; e. meyer, _philologus_ 47 (nf. 2, 1889), p. 268 ff. and 49 (nf. 3, 1890), p. 479 ff.; v. boehlau, _aus ionischen und aolischen necropolen_ (cassel, 1897); h. w. smyth, _the ionic dialect_ (1889). p. cauer, "de dialecto attica vetustiore quaestiones epigraphicae," in g. curtius, _studien z. gr. u. lat. gramm._ 8 (1875), p. 223, 399; karsten, _de titulorum ionicorum dialecto_ (halle, 1882); f. bechtel, _die inschriften des ion. dialekts_ (gottingen, 1877). for the political history of the ionian greeks see greece: _history_, and ionia; for the special history and characteristics of individual ionian cities, the respective names. (j. l. m.) footnote: [1] _yunan_ is still a popular synonym for _oroum_, a greek, among the arabs; in india _yavana_ was long the generic name for all foreigners from the north and west, a use dating probably from alexander's day and the graeco-bactrian monarchs. ionian school of philosophy. under this name are included a number of philosophers of the 6th and 5th centuries b.c. mainly ionians by birth, they are united by a local tie and represent all that was best in the early ionian intellect. it is a most interesting fact in the history of greek thought that its birth took place not in greece but in the colonies on the eastern shores of the aegean sea. but not only geographically do these philosophers form a school; they are one in method and aim. they all sought to explain the material universe as given in sensible perception; their explanation was in terms of matter, movement, force. in this they differed from the eleatics and the pythagoreans who thought in the abstract, and explained knowledge and existence in metaphysical terminology. in tracing the development of their ideas, two periods may be distinguished. the earliest thinkers down to heraclitus endeavoured to find a material substance of which all things consist; heraclitus, by his principle of universal flux, took a new line and explained everything in terms of force, movement, dynamic energy. the former asked the question, "what is the substratum of the things we see?"; the latter, "how did the sensible world become what it is; of what nature was the motive force?" the first name in the list of the ionian philosophers--and, indeed, in the history of european thought--is that of thales (q.v.). he first, so far as we know, sought to go behind the infinite multiplicity of phenomena in the hope of finding an infinite unity from which all difference has been evolved. this unity he decided is water ([greek: panta hydor estin]). it is impossible to discover precisely what he conceived to be the relation of this unity to the plurality of phenomena. later writers from whom we derive our knowledge of thales attributed to him ideas which seem to have been conceived by subsequent thinkers. thus the suggestion preserved by stobaeus that he conceived water to be endowed with mind is discredited by the specific statement of aristotle that the earlier physicists (_physiologi_) did not distinguish the material from the moving cause, and that before anaxagoras no one postulated creative intelligence. again in the _de anima_ (i. 5) aristotle quotes the statement that thales attributed to water a divine intelligence, and criticizes it as an inference from later speculations. it is probably safest to credit thales with the bare mechanical conception of a universal material cause, leaving pantheistic ideas to a later period of thought. the successors of thales were anaximander and anaximenes, who also sought for a primal substance of things. anaximander postulated a corporeal substance intermediate between air and fire on the one hand, and between earth and water on the other hand. this substance he called "the infinite" ([greek: to apeiron]). unlike thales, he was struck by the infinite variety in things; he felt that all differences are finite, that they have emerged from primal unity (first called [greek: arche] by him) into which they must ultimately return, that the infinite one has been, is, and always will be, the same, indeterminate but immutable. change, growth and decay he explained on the principle of mechanical compensation ([greek: didonai gar auta tisin kai diken tes adikias]). anaximenes, pupil of anaximander, seems to have rebelled against the extreme materialism of his master. perceiving that air is necessary to life, that the universe is surrounded by air, he was convinced that out of air all things have resulted. the process by which things grow is twofold, condensation ([greek: pyknosis]) and rarefaction ([greek: araiosis]), or, in other words, _heat_ and _cold_. from the former process result cloud, water and stone; from the latter, fire and aether. this theory is closely allied to that of thales, but it is superior in that it specifies the processes of change. further, it is difficult not to accept cicero's statement that anaximenes made air a conscious deity; we are, at all events, justified in regarding anaximenes as a link (perhaps an unconscious link) between crude hylozoism (q.v.) and definitely metaphysical theories of existence. we have seen that thales recognized change, but attempted no explanation; that anaximander spoke of change in two directions; that anaximenes called these two directions by specific names. from this last, the transition to the doctrine of heraclitus is easy. he felt that change is the essential fact of experience and pointed out that any merely physical explanation of plurality is inherently impossible. the many is of sense; unity is of thought. being is intelligible only in terms of becoming. that which is, is what it is in virtue of its perpetually changing relations ([greek: panta rei kai ouden menei]). by this recognition of the necessary correlation of being and not-being, heraclitus is in a very real sense the father of metaphysical and scientific speculation, and in him the ionian school of philosophy reached its highest point. yet there is reason to doubt the view of hegel and lassalle that heraclitus recognized the fundamental distinction of subject and object and the relations of mind and matter. like the early ionians he postulated a primary substance, fire, out of which all things have emerged and into which all must return. this elemental fire is in itself a divine rational process, the harmony of which constitutes the law of the universe. human knowledge consists in the comprehension of this all-pervading harmony as embodied in the manifold of perception; the senses are "bad witnesses" in that they report multiplicity as fixed and existent in itself rather than in its relation to the one. this theory gives birth to a sort of ethical by-product whose dominant note is harmony, the subordination of the individual to the universal reason; moral failure is proportionate to the degree in which the individual declines to recognize his personal transience in relation to the eternal unity. from the same principle there follows the doctrine of immortality. the individual, like the phenomena of sense, comes out of the infinite and again is merged; hence on the one hand he is never a separate entity at all, while on the other hand he exists in the infinite and must continue to exist. moreover, the soul approaches most nearly to perfection when it is least differentiated from elemental fire; it follows that "while we live our souls are dead within us, but when we die our souls are restored to life." this doctrine is at once the assertion and the denial of the self, and furnishes a striking parallel between european thought in its earliest stages and the fundamental principles of buddhism. knowledge of the self is one with knowledge of the universal logos (reason); such knowledge is the basis not only of conduct but of existence itself in its only real sense. thus far the ionian philosophers had held the field of thought. each succeeding thinker had more or less assumed the methods of thales, and had approached the problem of existence from the empirical side. about the time of heraclitus, however, there sprang up a totally new philosophical spirit. parmenides and zeno (see eleatic school) enunciated the principle that "nothing is born of nothing." hence the problem becomes a dialectical a priori speculation wherein the laws of thought transcend the sense-given data of experience. it was therefore left for the later ionians to frame an eclectic system, a synthesis of being and not-being, a correlation of universal mobility and absolute permanence. this examination of diametrically opposed tendencies resulted in several different theories. it will be sufficient here to deal with anaxagoras, diogenes of apollonia, archelaus and hippo, leaving empedocles, leucippus and democritus to special articles (q.v.). the latter three do not belong strictly to the ionian school. anaxagoras (q.v.) elaborated a quasi-dualistic theory according to which all things have existed from the beginning. originally they existed in infinitesimal fragments, infinite in number and devoid of arrangement. amongst these fragments were the seeds of all things which have since emerged by the process of aggregation and segregation, wherein homogeneous fragments came together. these processes are the work of nous ([greek: nous]) which governs and arranges. but this nous, or mind, is not incorporeal; it is the thinnest of all things; its action on the particle is conceived materially. it originated a rotatory movement, which arising in one point gradually extended till the whole was in motion, which motion continues and will continue infinitely. by this motion things are gradually constructed not entirely of homogeneous particles (the homoeomere, [greek: homoiomere]) but in each thing with a majority of a certain kind of particle. it is this aggregation which we describe variously as birth, death, maturity, decay, and of which the senses give inaccurate reports. his vague dualism works a very distinct advance upon the crude hylozoism of the early ionians (see atom), and the criticisms of plato and aristotle show how highly his work was esteemed. the great danger is that we should credit him with more than he actually thought. his _nous_ was not a spiritual force; it was no omnipotent deity; it is not a pantheistic world-soul. but by isolating reason from all other growths, by representing it as the motor-energy of the cosmos, in popularizing a term which suggested personality and will, anaxagoras gave an impetus to ideas which were the basis of aristotelian philosophy in greece and in europe at large. in diogenes of apollonia we find a return to anaximenes. diogenes (q.v.) began by insisting on the necessity of there being only one principle of things, herein contradicting the pluralism of heraclitus. this principle is that of the universal homogeneity of nature; all things are at bottom the same, or interaction would be impossible ([greek: panta ta eonta apo tou autou heteroiousthai kai to auto einai]). this universal substance is air. but diogenes went much farther than anaximenes by attributing to air not only infinity and eternity but also intelligence. this intelligence alone would have produced the orderly arrangement which we observe in nature, and is the basis of human thought by the physical process of inhalation. another pupil of anaxagoras was archelaus of miletus (q.v.). his work was mainly the combination of previous views, except that he is said to have introduced an ethical side into the ionian philosophy. "justice and injustice," he said, "are not natural but legal." he endeavoured to overcome the dualism of anaxagoras, and in so doing approached more nearly to the older ionians. the last of the ionians whom we need mention is hippo (q.v.), who, like archelaus, is intellectually amongst the earlier members of the school. he thought that the source of all things was moisture ([greek: to hygron]), and is by aristotle coupled with thales (_metaphysics_, a 3). bibliography.--ritter and preller, ch. i.; zeller's _history of greek philosophy_; j. burnet, _early greek philosophy_ (1892); fairbanks, _the first philosophers of greece_ (1898); grote, _history of greece_, ch. viii.; windelband, _history of ancient philosophy_ (1899); benn, _the greek philosophers_ (1883) and _the philosophy of greece_ (1898); th. gomperz, _greek thinkers_ (eng. trans. vol. i., l. magnus, 1901).