Memory tricks used by ancient Greeks

Simonides of Ceos

The brine

Simonides of Ceos was a 5th-century BCE lyric poet; the story of his memory feat is told by Cicero in De Oratore and later by Quintilian.

The Mind Palace

The brine

The 'method of loci,' a technique for memorizing information by associating it with specific locations in an imagined physical space, is popularly referred to as the 'memory palace' or 'mind palace.'

Mnemosyne

The brine

Mnemosyne is the personification of memory in Greek mythology and, by Zeus, the mother of the nine Muses; her name comes from the same Greek root as the words for remembrance.

The banquet hall's roof collapsed

The brine

Simonides had just been called outside when the banquet hall's roof collapsed, and he identified the crushed guests by remembering where each had sat.

To deliver lengthy speeches without notes

The brine

Orators used the method of loci to deliver lengthy speeches without notes, storing each point at a familiar spot along an imagined route.

Writing

The brine

Writing: King Thamus told the god Theuth, its inventor, that letters would bring forgetfulness, a remedy for reminding rather than remembering.

Artificial memory

The brine

Ancient Greeks and Romans recognised two forms of memory: natural memory, which is inborn, and artificial memory, which is trained through memory techniques.

Places

The brine

Loci is the plural of the Latin locus, meaning place, so the method stores each memory at one of a series of familiar places.

Mnemonics

The brine

Mnemonics comes from the Ancient Greek mnēmonikos, 'of memory', which shares its root mnēmē with Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory.

Sophists

The brine

Memory devices were much cultivated by Greek sophists and philosophers and are frequently referred to by Plato and Aristotle.