ABSTRACT
The importance of Arabic sources for the recovery of lost Greek works and the textual improvement of those extant has long been recognized by both classicists and Arabists. A written document undergoes alteration in the process of its physical transmission from the moment of its origin to the final state in which it has been preserved. Assessing the relation which the extant document bears to its lost archetype constitutes the foundation of all textual criticism; it also plays a major role in analyzing the transmission of Greek material into Arabic and subsequently within Arabic. General information about Greek authors and their sayings is found predominantly in two genres or traditions of Arabic works: in gnomologia, and in bio-bibliographies.
