ABSTRACT
Ancient philosophers did not introduce a discipline or branch of philosophy called, or straightforwardly identifiable as, “philosophy of language.” Nonetheless, they did explore a number of topics which we would classify under this heading. This chapter offers an introduction to the most important of these topics: the nature, origin, and development of language; the relationship between language, thought, and reality; theories of truth; speech-acts; parts of speech and other grammatical issues; linguistic ambiguity. There are a few other relevant topics with which ancient philosophers engaged but which we have not included, not only for space limitations but also because the ancients did not inquire into them in primarily language-related contexts: for example, universals, modalities, logical form, ineffability (for broad introductions cf. Kneale and Kneale 1962 and Mortley 1986). We have adopted a historical perspective, from the Sophists to Augustine, focusing only on the major philosophers and schools, and highlighting thematic and doctrinal continuity and dialectical development.
