Brill’s New Pauly: Encyclopaedia of the Ancient World

Encyclopedias have been with us since ancient times, and they reflect their editors’ views and their times. Ancient writers such as Aristotle, Varro, and Pliny the elder compiled encyclopedic works. The word “encyclopedia” or “encyclopaedia” is from the Greek (enkyklios paideia, meaning general or well‐rounded education). The notion of an encyclopedia’s format developed through the centuries. During the eighteenth century, Diderot and other French enlightenment authors laboured on such a work. The guiding principle of these writers was that it was possible to know the world “through human reason and that knowledge of the world could be presented...