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Among the Romans, the first to attempt to summarize ancient knowledge was Marcus Terentius Varro (116-27 BC), whose ''Antiquitatum rerum humanarum et divinarum libri XLI''<ref>https://archive.org/details/4737996</ref> have only endured as fragments and extracts in other later authors and encyclopedists. For Varro, the path to knowledge was the etymology, as it was for the much later Visigoth, St. Isidore of Seville, probably the last to use Varro's work for his own encyclopedia, the ''Etymologies''<ref>https://sfponline.org/Uploads/2002/st%20isidore%20in%20english.pdf</ref>. For Varro the term ''verbum'' ("word") came from ''veritas'' ("truth"), which legitimized that procedure. A work of 41 books, 25 were devoted to human affairs and the rest to the divinity of the pagan gods.  The original work disappeared over the years, due to various medieval recasts.

Among the Romans, the first to attempt to summarize ancient knowledge was Marcus Terentius Varro (116-27 BC), whose ''Antiquitatum rerum humanarum et divinarum libri XLI''<ref>https://archive.org/details/4737996</ref> have only endured as fragments and extracts in other later authors and encyclopedists. For Varro, the path to knowledge was the etymology, as it was for the much later Visigoth, St. Isidore of Seville, probably the last to use Varro's work for his own encyclopedia, the ''Etymologies''<ref>https://sfponline.org/Uploads/2002/st%20isidore%20in%20english.pdf</ref>. For Varro the term ''verbum'' ("word") came from ''veritas'' ("truth"), which legitimized that procedure. A work of 41 books, 25 were devoted to human affairs and the rest to the divinity of the pagan gods.  The original work disappeared over the years, due to various medieval recasts.

 

Towards the beginning of the first century of our era, Aulo Cornelio Celsus wrote ''De Artibus'' (''ca''. 30 BC), an encyclopedia in 26 books which covered subjects of agriculture, war, rhetoric, philosophy, law, and medicine, with this last subject - called ''De Medicina'' - having survived to modern times<ref>https://archive.org/details/demedicina02celsuoft/page/xii</ref>.  A few years later would come one of the best-known works of antiquity, the ''Naturalis Historia'' (''Natural History'') by [[Pliny the Elder]]<ref>https://archive.org/details/plinysnaturalhis00plinrich/page/n8</ref>. He compiled a work of 37 chapters that cover the history of art and architecture, medicine, geography, geology and all aspects of the world around him, releasing it in 77 AD. He stated in his prologue that he had compiled twenty thousand facts from two thousand titles of two hundred different authors, and added that many others came from his own experience.

Towards the beginning of the first century of our era, Aulo Cornelio Celsus wrote ''De Artibus'' (''ca''. 30 BC), an encyclopedia in 26 books which covered subjects of agriculture, war, rhetoric, philosophy, law, and medicine, with this last subject - called ''De Medicina'' - having survived to modern times<ref>https://archive.org/details/demedicina02celsuoft/page/xii</ref>.  A few years later would come one of the best-known works of antiquity, the ''Naturalis Historia'' (''Natural History'') by [[Pliny the Elder]]<ref>https://archive.org/details/plinysnaturalhis00plinrich/page/n8</ref>. He compiled a work of 37 chapters that cover the history of art and architecture, medicine, geography, geology and all aspects of the world around him, releasing it in 77 AD. He stated in his prologue that he had compiled twenty thousand facts from two thousand titles of two hundred different authors, and added that many others came from his own experience.