Historical library

The historical Library of Diodore of Sicily, written in Greek at first century BC, is composed in the beginning of 40 books of which there remains only 15 today about it. This universal history, i.e. which sticks to a history of humanity in all the known geographical surfaces, covers a vast period, mythological beginning of the world with Jules César. It draws its sources in a multitude of ancient authors that Diodore compiled, without originality but with effectiveness.

There remain to us from now on the books of I with V devoted to the mythical history of the Barbares and the Greek and the books from XI to XX treating the period of 480 with 302 av. J. - C., like some fragments of other books (books VI with X being devoted to the history of the Trojan War at the end of the medic Guerres). Books I with V offer a history of the people of the Antiquity which mixes geographical descriptions and mythology:

Egyptian with book I;
Assyrian, Babylonian, Scythian and Indian with book II;
Ethiopian, Libyan and Telamones with book III;
Greek with book IV;
People of the Mediterranean Western with the book V.

The historical Bibliothèque is one of the most complete sources - and more anciennes - concerning the beginning of the hellenistic time, about the conquests of Alexandre Large the (book XVII) and especially of the Diadoques (books XVIII to XX). The historical Bibliothèque offers to the famous characters of the Greek world a choice place; one can quote:

Périclès with book XII;
Denys Old the with books XII and XIV;
Epaminondas with book XV;
Philippe II with book XVI;
Alexandre Large the with book XVII;
the Diadoques with books XVIII to XX.

Diodore of Sicily shows us by this work the historical designs of the beginning of the Roman Empire. Diodore indeed agrees the right to rent or blame according to convictions morals and own policies with the Greek elites of its time. While insisting on the role of the tychè (good fortune) and of the paradoxon (the strange one), on the glorious acts and the weaknesses of the human heart, Diodore delivers a relatively reliable historical speech, and by very priceless lower part being given the loss of the contemporary historians of Alexandre and diadoques (Aristobule, Clitarque, Hiéronymos de Cardia, Douris de Samos, etc)

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