Ancient Greeks are defined as having had a deep interest in every aspect of reality that could be considered to be astonishing or extraordinary. This interest reaches its peak in the Hellenistic period with the emergence of the lists of curious or inexplicable phenomena that are known as "paradoxography".
While interest in Nature's inexplicable phenomena can be noted since the earliest Greek cultural expression, the Homeric poems, and can be seen in most Greek genres and literary trends, it is not possible to talk about a type of literature focused specifically on the compilation of mirabiliauntil the beginning of the 3rd Century BC, when Callimachus wrote for the first time a work of the paradoxographical genre.