The term arche — Greek for beginning, principle, original substance, ruling element — enters the depth-psychology corpus along two intertwined axes. The first is etymological and philosophical: Edinger establishes arche as the foundational Milesian concept denoting the primordial stuff from which all things derive, cognate with prima materia in alchemy and ancestor to such words as archetype, archaeology, and monarchy. The second axis is cosmological and structural: Vernant and the classical scholars demonstrate that arche functions simultaneously as temporal origin and as governing principle — that which encompasses and rules, which cannot itself have an arche without being limited. Anaximander's apeiron is arche of all things precisely because nothing is arche of it. Hillman extends this into psychology through Plato's archai, the first principles Nous and Ananke, underscoring that first principles in a psychic universe are never merely logical but always dynamic, even errant. Jung's corpus treats the archetype as the psychological heir of the arche — an originating, structural, energic principle that, like Anaximander's apeiron, can never be fully circumscribed by consciousness. The tension between arche as recoverable origin and arche as inexhaustible governing ground remains productive and unresolved across the corpus, constituting one of depth psychology's most consequential inheritances from pre-Socratic thought.
The other fundamental concept of the Milesians is the term arche. It means beginning; principle; original substance; in German, urstoff, ruling element. In alchemy the term arche was translated as prima materia or first matter.
Edinger provides the canonical depth-psychological definition of arche, directly equating it with the alchemical prima materia and grounding the archetype concept in Milesian natural philosophy.
, The Psyche in Antiquity, Book One Early Greek Philosophy thesis
"there is no arche to the apeiron, for that would be its limit .... That is why it has no arche, but is the arche of other things; it envelops and governs everything."
Vernant cites Aristotle on Anaximander to establish arche's dual logic — that the unlimited cannot itself be limited by a prior principle, yet is the governing arche of all bounded things.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983thesis
Anaximander, in contrast, declares that there was nothing that was arche with respect to the apeiron (since that had always existed), but that the apeiron was arche for all the rest — that it encompassed (periechein) and governed (kybernan) everything.
Vernant contrasts the mythic-royal logic of divine succession with Anaximander's philosophical arche, showing how the concept shifts from political sovereignty to cosmological governing principle.
, The Origins of Greek Thought, 1982thesis
Plato says that it is not fire or water or the four elements that are the true archai. There are two: Nous and Ananke, Reason and Necessity.
Hillman uses Plato's identification of the archai as Nous and Ananke to argue that first principles in a psychic universe are irreducibly dual — rational and errant — with profound consequences for archetypal psychology.
, Mythic Figures, 2007thesis
In the course of analysis the ego changes its standpoint. It finds a broader context. The personal, the contemporary, relates to the larger perspective — if large enough, the perspective of eternity.
Edinger situates the individual analytic encounter within the historical depth of the psyche's development, implying that contact with archetypal origins (arche) is itself therapeutically constitutive.
, The Psyche in Antiquity, Book One: Early Greek Philosophy From Thales to Plotinus, 1999supporting
There are modern words which have physis as a root: physics, physical, physician, physiology, physiognomy and so on. Physis is still a living entity in our evolving language.
Edinger's parallel treatment of physis alongside arche underscores that pre-Socratic first principles survive as living conceptual organisms in modern psychological vocabulary.
, The Psyche in Antiquity, Book One: Early Greek Philosophy From Thales to Plotinus, 1999supporting
These Greek words, Arendt observes, originally had to do with 'beginning,' with setting something into motion, as well as with leading; while the complementary verb prattein originally referred to the achievement or completion of a course of action.
Drawing on Arendt, this passage traces archein — the verbal cognate of arche — as denoting both origination and leadership, illuminating the political-psychological valence embedded in the concept of beginning.
, Encounters with the Soul: Active Imagination as Developed by C. G. Jung, 1981supporting
archai, Gnostic, 22 archaic: God-image, 345 residues in dreams, 347
Jung's index entry clusters Gnostic archai with archaic God-images and dream residues, confirming the terminological lineage from pre-Socratic first principles through Gnosticism to analytic psychology.
, Alchemical Studies, 1967supporting
the self-constellating archetypes and the resultant situations steadily gain in numinosity, indeed are sometimes imbued with a positively eerie daemonism and bring the danger of psychosis threateningly close.
Edinger conveys Jung's insistence that the archetype — psychological descendant of the arche — is not an abstract formula but an overwhelming energic force capable of destabilizing consciousness.
, The New God-Image: A Study of Jung's Key Letters Concerning the Evolution of the Western God-Image, 1996supporting
the genesis themes remain integrated with a vast royal epic that depicts the clash of successive generations of gods and various sacred powers for dominion over the world.
Vernant contextualizes the mythic substrate from which the philosophical concept of arche emerged, showing how cosmogonic sovereignty narratives prefigure the rational discourse of originating principles.
, The Origins of Greek Thought, 1982aside