Free audiobooks
Free audiobooks of ancient texts and sacred writings
Listen free to 37 complete books from the ancient world, 946 hours in all: Homer, Plato, Aristotle, Herodotus, Plutarch, Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, Josephus, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Bhagavad Gita, the Tao Te Ching, Gilgamesh and the early Christian writers. No account, no sign-up.
Each one reads a new English translation made in 2026 from the original language, read aloud by a synthetic (AI) voice, with the words highlighted as they are spoken. Download any book as MP3 files or keep it on your phone for offline listening.
- 37 audiobooks
- 946 hours
- 4,255 parts
- Free, no sign-up
- MP3 download
Greek and Roman epic, myth and drama
5 books · 40 hThe Iliad
Homer 14 h 10 min
The anger of Achilles at Troy: all 24 books in plain modern prose, from the Greek.
The Odyssey
Homer 10 h 38 min
Odysseus finds his way home: all 24 books in plain modern prose, from the Greek.
The Complete Works of Virgil
Virgil 12 h 21 min
The Aeneid, the Georgics and the Eclogues, every line in modern prose from the Latin.
Works & Days · Theogony
Hesiod 1 h 41 min
Theogony and Works and Days: the birth of the gods, Pandora, Prometheus, the Five Ages.
The Bacchae
Euripides 1 h 6 min
Euripides’ tragedy of Dionysus and King Pentheus at Thebes, from the Greek.
Greek and Roman philosophy
7 books · 293 hRepublic · Laws · Timaeus · Crito
Plato 74 h 53 min
The Republic and the Laws complete, with the Timaeus and the Crito, from the Greek.
The Complete Works of Aristotle
Aristotle 124 h 13 min
All 46 surviving works, from the Organon to the Poetics, with Bekker numbers kept.
Meditations
Marcus Aurelius 3 h 50 min
The emperor’s private notebook, all twelve books, from the Greek.
Letters to Lucilius
Seneca 17 h 5 min
All 124 Letters to Lucilius, on time, fear, friendship, wealth and death, from the Latin.
On the Nature of Things
Lucretius 6 h 54 min
On the Nature of Things: atoms, void and the case against fearing death, all six books.
The Fragments
Heraclitus 14 min
All 127 surviving fragments of the Obscure, each with its number and source.
The Moralia
Plutarch 65 h 20 min
All 71 essays, from On Superstition to the Table Talk, from the Greek.
History and biography
6 books · 249 hThe Histories
Herodotus 21 h 47 min
The first history book: Croesus, Marathon, Thermopylae, Salamis, all nine books.
The Complete Works of Tacitus
Tacitus 25 h 51 min
The Annals, Histories, Agricola, Germania and Dialogue on Orators, from the Latin.
Parallel Lives
Plutarch 62 h 8 min
Plutarch’s paired Greek and Roman lives, from Theseus to Caesar, every Life and Comparison.
Letters, Panegyricus & Natural History
Pliny the Younger & Pliny the Elder 71 h 21 min
The Younger Pliny’s Letters and Panegyricus, and his uncle’s complete Natural History.
The Complete Works
Josephus 58 h 7 min
The Jewish War, Antiquities, Against Apion and the Life: first-century Judea and Rome.
The Life of Apollonius of Tyana
Philostratus 10 h 1 min
Philostratus on the wandering first-century sage Apollonius, all eight books.
Sacred texts and scripture
5 books · 17 hThe Dead Sea Scrolls
The Qumran Community 4 h 5 min
Five sectarian works from Qumran, including the Community Rule and the War Scroll.
The Septuagint Apocrypha
Anonymous (Septuagint) 6 h 46 min
1 and 2 Maccabees, Sirach and the Wisdom of Solomon, from the Septuagint Greek.
The Sibylline Oracles
The Sibyl 4 h 7 min
Fourteen books of prophecy in the Sibyl’s voice, written by Jews and Christians.
The Bhagavad Gita
Vyasa 1 h 34 min
Krishna and Arjuna on duty, action and the self: seven hundred verses from the Sanskrit.
Ancient Near East and Egypt
3 books · 5 hThe Epic of Gilgamesh
Anonymous (Akkadian) 1 h 44 min
The oldest epic on earth, from the Akkadian, with lost passages marked.
The Baal Cycle
Ilimilku the Scribe 54 min
The Ugaritic epic of the storm-god Baal, line for line from six clay tablets.
Berossus & Manetho
Berossus & Manetho 2 h 19 min
Every surviving fragment of the lost histories of Babylon and Egypt.
Jewish and early Christian writers
10 books · 335 hThe Complete Works
Philo of Alexandria 57 h 6 min
Every surviving Greek treatise of the Jewish philosopher of first-century Alexandria.
The Apostolic Fathers
Clement, Ignatius, Polycarp & others 7 h 24 min
The Didache, Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Polycarp, Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas.
Apologies & Dialogue with Trypho
Justin Martyr 8 h 40 min
The Apologies and the Dialogue with Trypho, from the Greek.
Against Heresies
Irenaeus of Lyons 19 h 5 min
Against Heresies: five books on the Gnostic systems, written around 180 CE.
Exhortation, Instructor & Miscellanies
Clement of Alexandria 32 h 56 min
The Exhortation, the Instructor and the Miscellanies: the whole trilogy, from the Greek.
Apology & the Major Treatises
Tertullian 37 h 28 min
The Apology, Against Marcion and the major treatises: eighteen works from the Latin.
Commentaries & Homilies
Origen 32 h 43 min
Commentaries on John and Matthew, and homilies on Luke and Jeremiah.
Cyprian & Lactantius
Cyprian & Lactantius 36 h 59 min
Cyprian’s treatises and letters and Lactantius’ Divine Institutes, from the Latin.
The Works of Eusebius of Caesarea
Eusebius of Caesarea 81 h 55 min
The Church History, the Life of Constantine, the Preparation and Demonstration of the Gospel, and more.
A later classic
1 book · 7 hAround the World in Eighty Days
Jules Verne 6 h 36 min
Phileas Fogg’s wager, all 37 chapters, newly translated from the 1873 French.
Questions
Are these audiobooks really free?
Yes. All 37 audiobooks are free to stream and to download, with no account and no sign-up. The translations and the audiobooks are released under the CC BY 4.0 licence.
Who reads them?
A synthetic (AI) voice reads every book, the same voice across the whole library. The translations were also made with AI and checked against the originals: how the books are made and the accuracy checks. If you prefer a human narrator, many of these works have human-read editions elsewhere.
Are these the old public-domain translations?
No. Each audiobook reads a new English translation made in 2026 directly from the original language (Greek, Latin, Akkadian, Sanskrit, classical Chinese and others), not a translation from the 1800s.
Can I download them?
Yes. Every listening page has a Download button that saves the book as MP3 files: on a phone, Get file keeps the book on the phone, and Backup to Files saves an MP3 copy you can play in any app.
Can I listen offline?
Yes. Once a book is saved with Get file, its listening page plays it with no connection, and the home page lists it under On this phone.
Can I read along while I listen?
Yes. The text is on the listening page and each word is highlighted as it is spoken. Every book can also be read on its own page or downloaded as an EPUB.