Cratylus

Cratylus is the name of a dialogue by Plato. Most modern scholars agree that it was written mostly during Plato's so-called middle period.

In the dialogue, Socrates is asked by two men, Cratylus and Hermogenes, to tell them whether names are "e;conventional"e; or "e;natural"e;, that is, whether language is a system of arbitrary signs or whether words have an intrinsic relation to the things they signify.