ABSTRACT
Thales lived in a time when, even in the case of works that became famous, it was not customary to pay attention to the life of their authors and, in theory, we should expect to know nothing or almost nothing about Thales’ life. The archonship of this Damasias is associated with an anomaly: he remained in office for a second year and for the first two months of a third year, when he was deposed following a revolt by which the Athenians managed to prevent the transformation of Damasias into an autocrat. The hypothesis that all these reports are false is baseless and difficult to sustain: the alternative, that they are grounded in real facts, is much more likely and more credible. The story concerning Thales’ purchase and exploitation of oil presses in Miletus and on the island of Chios is well known, as are the stories concerning his advice to the authorities of Miletus and to Croesus.
