Anaximander Without the <i>Apeiron</i>: Making Sense of Aristotle’s and Theophrastusʼ Reports

Abstract In the case of Anaximander, there are two sources of indirect reports or of what Diels called testimonia: 1) Aristotle’s works and 2) Theophrastus’ lost writing Physikai Doxai , which is to be reconstructed by means of reports in other doxographers. Usually, it is assumed that both sources of testimonia complement each other. However, at least as regards Anaximander’s alleged principle of the Apeiron , there is a deep gap between Aristotle’s and Theophrastus’ testimonies, as while Aristotle interprets Anaximander in pluralistic terms (not mentioning the Apeiron anywhere), Theophrastus attributes a monistic concept of the Apeiron to him. The comparison of how Aristotle and Theophrastus approached Anaximander suggests that both tried to categorise or conceptualise the original cosmogonical mass by means of principles. Thus, it was only Theophrastus who introduced the concept of the Apeiron as a designation of the original mass from which the world subsequently developed.