 Literary devices appear to have been extensively employed in the Silloi. Diogenes Laertius tells us (9.111) that the Silloi was divided into three books. In the first book Timon spoke solely in the first person, whereas the second and third took the form of dialogues between Timon himself and the early (late 6th c. BCE) philosopher  Xenophanes.  Timon is said to have questioned Xenophanes about every philosopher—the older ones in the second book and the more recent in the third book—and Xenophanes answered him. The work as a whole, however, was devoted to abuse and ridicule of non-Pyrrhonist philosophers. It looks as if part of the work was modeled after the famous scene in Odyssey Book XI where Odysseus visits the underworld; several fragments include the words ‘I saw’ or ‘I recognized’ (where the person seen or recognized is a dead philosopher), and this formula is highly reminiscent of Odysseus’ language in describing his encounters with his dead comrades. There are other echoes of Homer as well, most notably from the early books of the Iliad, the effect being to represent philosophical disputants as literal combatants. Clayman (2009), chapter 3 identifies two other likely scenes: “Marketplace of Ideas” in which philosophers are shown selling their ideas, and “Hyde Park Corner”, in which philosophers address crowds. Clayman, however, convincingly argues against the hypothesis of a fishing scene, accepted by several earlier scholars; the fragments that have been taken to depict philosophers as fishers or as fish frequently do not need to be, or even lend themselves especially to being, interpreted in this way.