Includes bibliographical references (pages 261-268) and indexes.

"Although none of their original writings have come down to us complete, patient detective work enables us to reconstruct the crucial questions they asked and their absorbing answers. Here Jonathan Barnes brings together the surviving Presocratic fragments in their original contexts, allowing modern readers to get to grips with these pioneering thinkers whose ideas remain at the centre of philosophical debate. The revised edition of the collection has been undated to take account of further research and a major new papyrus of Empedocles."--Jacket.