PHERECYDES OF LEROS, Greek mythographer, fl. c. 454 B.C. He is probably identical with Pherecydes of Athens, al though the two are distinguished by Suidas (also by I. Lipsius, Quaestiones logographicae, 1886). Numerous fragments of his genealogies of the gods and heroes, variously called lo-ropiat, rey EaXoylat, Aiyrox9OvEs have been preserved (see C. W. Miiller's Frog. hist. graec. vol. i., pp. xxxiv., 7o; Jacob, Frag. d. gr. His toriker I., p. 58).
See Christ-Schmid, Geschichte der griechischen Litteratur (bibl.). PHERECYDES OF SYROS, Greek philosopher (or rather philosophical theologian), flourished during the 6th century B.C. He was sometimes reckoned one of the Seven Wise Men, and is said to have been the teacher of Pythagoras. With the possible exception of Cadmus (q.v.) of Miletus, he was the first Greek prose-writer. He belonged to the circle of Peisistratus at Athens, and was the founder of an Orphic community. He was credited with having originated the doctrine of metempsychosis (q.v.),
while Cicero and Augustine assert that he was the first to teach the immortality of the soul. Of his astronomical studies he left a proof in the "heliotropion," a cave at Syros which served to determine the annual turning-point of the sun.
In his cosmogonic treatise on nature and the gods, called IIEvri,u,vxos (Preller's correction of Suidas, who has grTai.ivx os from the five elementary principles: aether, fire, air, water, earth), he enunciated a system in which science, allegory and mythology were blended. A fragment of the "sacred marriage" of Zas and Chthonie has been found on an Egyptian papyrus.
See H. Diels, Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, Bd. II. (4th ed., ; also 0. Kern, De Orphei, Epimenidis Pherecydis theogoniis (1888) ; D. Speliotopoulos, Ilept 4)ep€Kin5ou v (Athens, 189o) ; T. perz, Greek Thinkers (Eng. trs., 19o1) ; B. P. Grenfell, New Classical Fragments (1897) ; H. Weil, Etudes sur l'antiquite grecque (P900).