Delphic Maxims

Carved into the stone of Apollo's temple at Delphi were 147 short commands — moral precepts meant to guide a good Greek life.‌​‍​‍​‍​‌​‌​‍​‍​‌​‌​‍​‍​‍​‍​‌​‌​‌​‌​‌​‌​‌​‍​‍​‌​‍​‌​‌​‌​‍​‍​‍​‍ These are the Delphic Maxims, and they represent one of the oldest surviving ethical codes in Western civilisation.

The two most famous maxims — "Know Thyself" (gnōthi seauton) and "Nothing in Excess" (mēden agan) — were inscribed at the entrance to the temple itself. Ancient tradition attributed them to the Seven Sages of Greece, legendary wise men including Thales of Miletus and Solon of Athens. According to Pausanias, the maxims were offerings to Apollo, god of reason, prophecy, and self-knowledge.

The full list of 147 maxims was preserved on a stone stele discovered in 1966 at Ai-Khanoum, a Greek colony in what is now Afghanistan — proof that colonists carried these precepts to the far edges of the Hellenistic world. The maxims range from grand philosophical commands to practical social advice: "Rule your wife" sits alongside "Honour the gods" and "Know what you have learned." Some are startlingly modern: "Exercise nobility of character," "Do not tire of learning," "Return a kindness."

"Know Thyself" became the foundational command of Western philosophy. Socrates adopted it as the starting point of all inquiry. Plato quotes it repeatedly. Centuries later, Descartes' "I think, therefore I am" can be read as a direct response to the Delphic challenge. The maxim appears in contexts from medieval monasteries to modern psychotherapy — arguably the most influential two words ever carved in stone.

"Nothing in Excess" captures the Greek ideal of sophrosyne — moderation, self-restraint, balance. It was a warning against hubris, the overreaching pride that destroyed kings and heroes throughout Greek tragedy. Together these maxims defined what it meant to live wisely in the ancient world.

The Delphic Maxims are not mythology in the narrative sense — no gods battle, no heroes quest. But they are the distilled moral code of the same civilisation that produced those stories, and their influence on philosophy, ethics, and religion has outlasted every temple built to house them.