Many texts that survive from the ancient world reflect that world's need to define and control its own nature. This accessible German study aims to provide a comprehensive but non-technical overview of the ways in which Greek and Roman philosophers discussed and debated the theory of culture and society. Drawing on a broad range of texts, including literary, philosophical and legal documents, the study looks at the role of myth in this ancient theory, the ways in which thinkers saw the natural and animal world around them, cosmology, science and politics. It is a chronological survey that begins with Homer and Hesiod and concludes with the outlook of the poets and philosophers of the 1st century AD. German text.