[A short history of hearing research. I. Antiquity]

This review describes important steps in the history of basic research on the function of the hearing organ. The present, first part revisits the period between Empedocles and Galen, focussing on the ideas of Empedocles and Aristotle. It is unlikely that they knew the cochlea. Based upon a more general theory of interaction, however, Empedocles in the fifth century B.C. compared the hearing organ with a bell and claimed that it is capable of not only receiving, but also generating sound. Using Empedocles's theories of sound and the four elements, Aristotle proposed that sound is sensed by an air-filled resonant cavity in the head located behind the eardrum. The postulated cavity may have been identified with, or at least included, the middle ear. Aristotle's ideas dominated the theory of hearing for two millenniums.