T H E AN C I EN T
G REEK H I S TO RIA N S
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P R E F AC E
TH I S volume cons ists of the Lane Lectures which
I had the h onour of delivering at Harvard Uni
versity in S pring 1908 under the auspices of the
Classical D epartment
They are printed very
nearly as they were originally written though
some of my kind h earers if they should glance
through may detect a good many passages which
were omitted in the Lecture Hall The book
amounts to a historical survey of Greek historio
graphy down to the first century B C and such
as it is I dedicate it to M r Gardiner M Lane
who founded the lec tur ership some years ago in the
interests of humanistic study
The lecture on Herodotus would have gained
much if M r M acau s admirable work on the last
three Books had appeared in time for me to use it
It was satisfactory to find that he had established
the priority of those Books with a convincing array
of arguments I have inconsistently included his
edition of V I L I X in the Bibliography ; for the
purpose of the list is to make a general acknow
ledgment of obligations which in lectures of this
kind could not conveniently be acknowledged in
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v ii
ANC IEN T GRE E K H I S T O R I A NS
viii
con
questions
detail There are not very ma y
nected with the Greek historians which I have not
at one time or another talked over with my friend
M r M ahaffy and I feel sure that I owe h im much
which neither of us could now verify
n
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Sep tem ber 5, 1908
.
C O N TE N TS
I
.
TH E RIS E or G REEK H I STO RY m Iowa
1 Th e H istori ca l Asp ec t of th e Epic s
.
2
.
The Fou n dati on
Th e S u c c essors
4
.
5
.
H istory b y H ec atae u s
of H e ca tae u s : 5 3 Early Myth o
of
.
graph ers
Early H istori an s
S um m
ar
y
H ER O DO TUS
TH UCY DI DES
1
H is Li fe
2
H i s Princ iples
.
.
an d
G row th
th e
of
of
h is
Work
H istor iography
:
.
ac c u rac
y
v
an d r ele an c e
3
.
4
.
Mod ern Critic i sm s on hi s Com p e tenc
H is Tr eatm e nt of n on c on te m p orary H istory
-
TH UCYDI DES
continu ed
)
(
2
Th e S peec h es
Dram atic Treatm ent of
3
.
Rationalisti c Vi e w
4
.
l
.
.
of
th e histori as p ersonae
H istory
Poli tic al An alysis
V TH E DEVELOPMENT O F G REE K
TH UCYDI DES
.
H I S TO
R O RAP H Y A FTE R
1
The G e n e r ation
2
.
ph on , Cr atippu s, Ph ilistu s)
Th e Influ en c e of Rh e toric
.
Th e Influ e n c e of
.
3
afi er
ix
G
Th u c yd id es
Phi losop h y
Antiquariani sm
I
an d
Xen o
(
th e Rise of
A N C I ENT GREEK H I S T O R I A N S
x
LEGI‘
.
VI
.
PO LY BI U S
VII TH E
.
an d POS EID O NI US
(
)
INF LU EN CE or G R EE K
G
V III
.
VI EWS
ON
RO
A
M N
H I sr om o
'
RAP H Y
OF
TH E
AN CI E N TS
C
O NC E R N I N G
TH E
USE
OF
H IS TO RY
APPE NDIX
.
Th e Re hand lin g
-
of
hi s H istory b y
Th u cydi d es
26 1
BI BLI OG RAP H Y
26 7
I NDEX
27 3
TH E AN C IEN T G REEK H I STO R IAN S
L EC T U R E
I
IN
TH E R I SE O F G REE K H I S TO RY
I O N IA
I N these lectures I propose to trace th e genesis
and the development of the historical literature
of the Greeks I will attempt to bring into a
connected View the pri nciples the governing ideas
and the methods of the Greek historians and to
relate them to th e general movements of Greek
thought and Greek history
I need hardly
apologiz e for devoting much of our time to
Herodotus and Thucydides who however familiar
to us from childhood have the secret of engaging
an interest that is never exhausted and
never
grows stale As a Hellenist I shall be happy if
I succeed in illustrating the fact that as in poetry
and letters generally as in art as in philosophy
and in m athematics so too in history our debt to
the Greeks transcends calculation
They were
not the first to chronicle human events but they
were the first to apply criticism And that means
they originated history
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2
AN CI E N T GRE E K H I S T O R I AN S L E CT
.
1
.
The histor ical asp ect of the Ep ics
L ong before history in the proper sense of
the word came to be written the early Greeks
possessed a literature which was equivalent to
history for them and was accepted with unreserved
credence — their epic poems The Homeric lays
not only entertained the imagination but also
satisfied what we may call the historical interest
of the audiences who heard them recited This
interest in history was practical not antiquarian ;
the story of the past made a direct appeal to their
pride while it was associated with their religious
piety towards their ancestors
Every self re
specting city sought to connect it self through its
ancient clans wit h the Homeric heroes and this
constit u ted the highest title to prestige in the
Greek world
The poems which could confer
such a title were looked up to as authoritative
historical documents In disputes about territory
the I liad was appealed to as a valid witness The
enormous authority of H omer the deep hold
which the Troj an epics had won on the minds
and hearts of the Greeks may partly explain the
pu zzle why it was so long before it occurred to
them to record recent or contemporary events
For when we consider the early growth of their
political intelligence the paucity of their historical
records must strike us with surprise
In the
seventh century they were far advanced in political
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THE E P I C S AS H I ST O RY
3
experience Sparta for instance had a compli
c ate d constitution ; yearly magistrates had been
introduced at Athens The number of the small
independent states which had to live together
some of which had S pecial relations to one another
tended to develop the political sense Intensity
of political life had been the outcome of the
institution of the p olis and the Hellenic world
was the scene of numerous and various ex pe ri
ments in government
In these conditions
political literature originated Archilochus Tyr
tae u s Solon and Th eognis were the most eminent
of the ancient publicists who dealt with current
politics in metrical pamphlets B ut the Greeks
of this period felt no impulse to record their
experiences in historical records ; the only history
they cared for was still furnished by the epics
Long before this Egypt and Assyria had
abundant contemporary records narratives of
conquests and achievements inscribed for the
glorification of some powerful monarch But the
early Greeks even despots were free from the
kind of self consciousness which prompted an
Assur bani pal to draw up a narrative of his
deeds ; Periander and Peisistratus did not think
of securing posthumous fame by such appeals to
posterity Had Peisistratus been an oriental ruler
he would have invited his literary friends to
celebrate his own career ; being a Greek of his
time he appointed a committee of men of letters
to edit the Homeric poems There were indeed
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AN C I ENT GRE E K H I S T O R I ANS LE CT
4
.
some records kept in the seventh century and
perhaps sooner which at a later time were to
prove useful ; but they were bare enumerations
of names such as lists of magistrates or priests
Now it is important to realise that the historical
interest of the Greeks of those days c oncentrated
as it was on the epic traditions was active and
productive The epics were still growing in the
seventh century though the period of growth was
soon to be over It is almost certain that the
I liad and O dyssey did not reach the fulness of
their present compass much before 6 00 B C
I
need only ask you to recall the lectures which
M r Gilbert Murray delivered at this University
last year ; some things he said happen to
prepare the way for the consideration of the
origins of historiography He insisted rightly as
I think on the fact that the groundwork and
rincipal
motives
of
the
Homeric
epics
were
p
historical ; and he showed with admirable insight
how the development of the poems in its s u cces
sive stages responded to and reflected the ideas
manners and tastes of successi v e periods
But
besides this moral and social criticism which M r
M urray traced there was another kind of criticism
which betrayed the spirit of historical inquiry
The epics relating to the Troj an war which
existed let us say about 800 B C in order to fix
our ideas would raise in an inquiring mind many
questions as to the course of the war its final
c onclusion the fortunes of many heroes who took
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THE E P I C S AS H I ST O RY
5
part in it — questions to which Homer gave no
answer To quench the thirst for such informa
tion was the office of later poets who r elated
events which the older bards did not kno w or
assumed as known They had to fill up interstices
and to explain inconsistencies and this process
necessarily entailed a definite consideration of
chronological sequence an element which the
original creators of myth do not take into serious
account It is impossible to say how far these
later poets of the Homeric school drew upon
local legends how far upon their own invention
but in their hands the traditions of the Troj an
expedition and its heroes were wro ught into a
corpu s of Troj an epics chronologically connected
in which the I liad and the O dyssey had their
places
The new instinct for systematizing tradition
gave rise at the same time to the school of
genealogical poets of which Hesiod was the most
distinguished and perhaps the fir st Their aim
was to work into a consistent system the relation
ships of the gods and heroes deriv ing them from
the primeval beings who generated the world
and tracing thereby to the origin of things the
pedigrees of the royal families which ruled in
1
the states of Hellas
The interest in genealogies
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v
H esiod s Theogony c ontains a rst c ru d e id e a of a h istor of c i ilisa
h ic h e id ent
tion in th e ege nd of th e i e Age s of m an ,
ring s u p to
e re
d ate an o d er ersion in h ch the age s
ou r
The fanc if u notion
fou r ag es nam e d after four
of m arking th e d e g e neration of th e rac e
inter o ating th e ag e of H om e ric h e roes
m e ta s is im ro e d u on
efore th e as t or iron age
’
1
l
b
l
l
l
Fv
v
p v
w i
p
by
.
w
p l
w
by
F
v
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l
L E CT
AN CI ENT G R EE K H I S T O R I AN S
6
.
linking actual families with legendary heroes was
“
closely allied to the interest in origins connect
ing the foundations of cities with the heroic age
This interest gave rise to a group of what we
may call local epics approximating in style and
character to the Hesiodic school recordi ng the
mythical origins (
the pedigrees of
m im i c) and
the founders
We know for instance of the
which may
Cor inthiaca ascribed to E umelus
have been the source of certain later sections of
the I liad ; of the N au pac tian poem ; of the
P hor onis which took its name from Phoroneus
rep u ted the first King of Argos
In all this intellectual activity we can recog nise
in a crude form the instinct of historical inquiry
guided by the ideas of consistency and chrono
logical order The genealogies inevitably bro u ght
chronology into the foreground
We can also
see that the poets possessed a certain kind of
historical sense They were conscious up to a
certain point of the diff erences between their own
civilisation and that of the heroic age and this
consciousness expressed itself in the archaism
which we can observe in the I liad and Odyssey
The poets always retained for instance the
obsolete bron z e armour of antiquity
O ne epic poem belonging to the seventh or
perhaps th e sixth century claims a special mention
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1
I n th is
righ ts
in
all
c onnex ion
th e
u su r
p
Mah afl’y
ers
P r ose Wr iter s i
(
2
Cp Mu rray R is e of
,
.
of
notes an
p owe
r
“
th rough ou t
.
,
the Gr eek Ep ic ,
p
.
y to
ea ly
anx iet
16 2
.
r
w he
sh o
G
re e k
r e d it
ary
h isto y
r
”
8
LECT
AN C I E N T GREEK H I S T O R I ANS
The later poets of the Homeric school and the
poets of the Hesiodic school worked in obedience
to the need of systematic arrangement and chrono
logical order There was n o absolute chronology
no dates ; but time sequence determined the com
pletion of the Trojan cycle and the relation of the
Troj an to other cycles (
such as the Theban ) and
in the very nature of the su bject it controlled the
genealogical poems Scattered and contradictory
traditions were harmoniz ed more or less into a
superficially consistent pict u re of the past by the
activity of these poets Their work must have
counted for a great deal in both satisfying and
stimulating the self consciousness of the Greeks
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2
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Thef ou ndation o
h
i
stor
f
y by H
ecataeus
It might be expected that such an examination
of the ancient literature and traditions though
carried out with n o under thought of questioning
their truth as a whole would have so wn the germs
of criticism and prepared the way for in credulity
This is a difficult question as our knowledge of
this literature is so fragmentary We can point
at least to the notorious scepticism of S tesich orus
about the sto ry of Helen But we can do mor e
The truth seems to be that towards the end of the
epic period there arose in Ionia a spirit which it
would be going too far to describe as incred u lous
but which was certain ly flippant and sceptical and
might at any moment break out into positive
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R I SE O F C R I T I C I S M
9
incredulity This S pirit is revealed as M r M urray
has well shown in some late parts of the I liad
especially in the episode of the Beguiling of Z eus
it appears in the O dyssey in the lay of D emodocus
which tells of the punishmen t of Ares and
Aphrodite by the inj ured husband Hephaestus
S uch tendencies to scepticism evolved by the
Ionian temper were reinforced by the rise of
Ionian science and philosophy
Science and
philosophy meant criticism and it would not b e
long before criticism which the early thinkers
applied to the material world would be system ati
cally applied to human tradition also and the
result would be in some form or other the
distinction of history from myth
At the same time the mythopoeic instinct of
the Greeks was still potent and still felicitous in
its operation But myth assumed a ne w shape
S u pernatural beings no longer appeared u pon the
stage ; and with the exception of oracles omens
and visions the supernatural m ise en scene was
discarded
Fictions gathered round historical
persons contemporary or recent but all these
stories such as the saving of Cypselus the wooers
of Agarista the ring of Polycrates kept well
withi n the fence of the possibilities of human
experience
They are not in the crude sense
incredible cim a m 93 xa G was Big This new order
of myths corresponds to a ne w interest whic h we
might call the philosophy of life it is reflected in
the gno m ic poetry of the period
Sages have
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LECT
AN CI ENT GREEK H I S T O R I AN S
10
taken the place of heroes ; the Septemvirate of
W ise M en was one of the mythical creations
The authority of D elphi is established beside the
au thority of Homer and D elphi seems to have
been a centre for fiction of this order
N ow let us suppose that before the end of the
sixth century a thoughtful man began to reflect
upon the past fortunes of the Greeks He would
be struck by the fact that the character of their
history had completely changed The age of the
heroes as described in the epics was marked by
divine interventions frequent intercourse between
gods and men startling metamorphoses and all
kinds of miracles H ow was it that the character
of human experience had changed and that s u ch
marvels had ceased to happen ? It was inevitable
that th e question should be asked : can we believe
the epic poets and take all they tell us for literal
fact ? And we find that before 500 B C a philo
sopher of Ionia Xenophanes had arraigned the
credibility of Homer and Hesiod
H e rej ected
the anthropomorphisms of popular theology and
branded the Greek myths as ancient fictions (
wad
oy
a
6 m Wp o ép w )
His rationalism was in the
interest of cosmic law He was applying whether
explicitly or not the principle formulated by later
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1
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It is b eh eved th at m u ch a ou t th e sam e tim e a
ester n G reek,
Th eag e ne s of Rh eg u m , was attem ting to inte r ret H om er a e or c al
g
Ac cordi ng to Tatian ad v Gr aecos 3 1, h e ou rishe d in the tim e of
s e s ; sc h o
V e n to I l T 6 7 (
Cam
533 e d
e kker h e was th e
r st to
i
,
w
by
l
r ite on
on
H om
.
er , and
.
.
.
h e introd uc e
p
p
fl
B
)
d all g o ica l int p
.
e
Diony siu s Thrax (
B ekker Anecd Gr
g ram m
,
ar
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.
r
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er
re tation
ll
i ly
fi
th e
l
sc h o
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l with
7 29) su gge sts th at h e d ea t
H E C A TA E U S
11
rationalists that what was possible once is possible
still and what is incredible now is incredible
always And he was also concerned in the cause
of ethics to denounce the attribution to the gods
of conduct condemned by the contemporary moral
1
standards of Greece!
Besides the efforts of I onian men of science to
explain nature by reason besides the dawn of
philosophy — there was another fact which con
tributed in the second part of the sixth century to
widen the horiz on of intelligent minds in Ion ia
The power of Persia had been extended to the
Aegean and the Asiatic Greeks had been incor
A natural c onse
p orate d in the Persian empire
u ence was the stimulation of interest and curiosity
q
among those Greeks about the other lands of the
great realm to which they were now attached and
their new position provided facilities for gratifying
this curiosity
Oriental geography and history
presented to the Greeks a new field of study and
this exercised as we shall see an important infl u
ence in bringing history to the birth
Its birth is associated with the name of H ecataeu s
of M iletus He was first and foremost a geo
grapher
I do not dispute the title of A nax i
mander to be called the father of geography
but H ec atae u s may be considered one of the
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rem ar ka
I t is
l
bj
bl
e
th at
—th e
X
ph an
eno
pi p o m s on q a i
nd th
h i nativ h om
Coloph on
El a ; b t no t a
of th s
wo k
ti ng to know h ow h h and l d d fi nit
O r igin of
c o onisation of h is ad o ti e h om e
I t ou d b e interes
h a e su r i ed
historic a
l
v
i
su
vv
tradit on s
.
.
ec ts
p v
w l
es
s
w
r ote
e
e
u
two
e
c
e
u
e
,
r c es
e
e
a
e e
e
s
r
e
s
e
12
L ECT
AN CI E N T GREEK H I S T O R I ANS
.
founders of geographical science ; his chief c on
Born
tr ib u tions to knowledge were in that field
perhaps near the middle of the sixth century he
not only travelled in Greek lands and on the
shores of the Black Sea but explored the interior
par ts of the Persian empire and Egypt which had
been annexed by Cambyses Perhaps his travels
extended to southern Spain
Everywhere he
collected facts for a geographical work which was
published under the title of a M ap of the Wor ld
But this work ranged beyond the sphere of pure
geography There is no doubt that it contained
besides descriptions of countries and places a great
deal of ethnography and history and especially it
introduced the Greeks to oriental history and
sketched for the first time the successive monarchies
of Assyria M edia and Persia The writer almost
certainly touched upon the Ionian history of his
own day in which he himself played a part
Herodotus you may remember m entions advice
tendered by H ec atae u s to the Ionians on more
than one occasion advice which they did not
follow The most likely person to record advice
which has not been followed is the adviser ; and
we m ay pretty confidently assume that the source
of Herodotus was H ec atae u s himsel f
H e cataeus thus initiated the c omposition of
modern h istory though only in a work which was
geographical in its title and main argument He
also wrote a work on the ancient history of Greece
It was a prose compilation from the genealogical
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H E C A TA EU S
13
epics But though its title G enealogi es shows
how potent the influence of the epics was it was
a critical investigation The opening words are
striking and might have stirred a reader to ex
pe c tanc y of a thoro u ghgoing and drastic revision
of what c urrently passed for the ancient history of
“
Hellas
What I write here says H ec atae u s
“
is the account which I considered to be true
For the stories of the Greeks are numerous and in
my opinion ridiculo u s
The actual fragments of
the work would not enable us to j udge to what
lengths his scepticism ventured The few instances
of rationalistic interpretation which we can note are
of a sufficiently innocent kind but show us that
while he did not adopt the doctrine of Xenophanes
that the myths are fictions he applied a canon of
inner probability For instance he explained the
hound of Hades which Heracles was related to
have dragged up from the under world as the
name of a terrible serpent which haunted Taenaru m
Again he transported the home of Geryones and
his cattle from distant Spain to the more access ible
pastures of Epirus
But a clearer View of the attitude of H ec atae u s
may be derived from certain passages in Herodotus
to which I shall have to draw attention in the n ext
lecture We shall then see that his scepticism in
regard to the ancient history of the Greeks had
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p b bl
pl
p
lw
ork th at H erodotu s
It seem s ro a e it was from his ge og ra hic a
a fe m a e
deri e d th e ex anation of th e ege n d of th e n u r sm g of C ru s
a
om an nam e d S p ako,
h ch
d og , as m eaning th at h e was su c k e d
Pr iasek)
sig ni e d d og i n th e Me d c ang uag e (
1
v
fi
l
i l
l
by w
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y
by
w i
l
14
L E CT
AN C I ENT GREEK H I S T O R I AN S
.
been stimulated by the acquaintance he mad e
in Egypt wi th the h istorical traditions of the
Egyptians
There he made the dis covery that
in days when gods were supposed to be walking
abroad on the hills and in the vales of Hell as
Egypt at the distance of a f ew days voyage was
It
m anaged exclusively by mere human beings
was an obvious inference that the age of the gods
in Greece must be relegated to as remote a date as
the age of the gods in Egypt and that the heroic
age of the not very distant ancestors of the existing
Greeks must be divested of the supernatural
atmosphere with which poetical fable had enc om
passed it W e may conclude that the prefatory
announcement of H ecatae u s was not excessive
and that his rationalism was more complete than
the few meagre fragments of the work might lead
us to suppose
H ec ataeu s as I have said wrote in prose
His
choice of prose was a proof of hi s competence and
a condition of his achievement B u t prose had in
all probability been used already at M iletus for the
treatment of a historical subj ect The very exist
ence of Cadmus the M ilesian has been called in
question by some modern critics and he is certainly
a misty fi ure The evidence seems to me —
though
I speak wi th d iffid enc e — to point to the concl usion
that he existed and was one of the earliest prose
1
M y idea of Cadmus is that he
writers of I onia
.
,
’
.
,
.
,
.
.
,
,
.
,
,
.
,
g
.
,
.
1
6 ;
Ch ief
l y
P in
,
sou rces
N H
.
.
y
b
for Cadm u s : Dion s H al De Ti me 23 ; S tra o i 2
3 1, vii 56 ;
os e h u s , c Ap
i 2 ; S u id as , su b
v
.
.
J
.
p
.
.
.
.
.
.
AN C I E N T G R EEK H I S T O R I AN S
16
LEcr
.
diff erence of form The ep op oioi had now to be
di stinguished fro m the log op oioi the epic poets
who composed verse from the logo poets who
composed prose
The log op oioi were also c alled
log ogr ap hoi which means exactly th e same thing
only emphasizing the fact that they used the pen
H eracleitu s and S ophr on were as much logographers
as H ec ataeu s
History had at first no distinctive na m e The
term la op l) did not then mean what it came to
Y et as it was used by the I onians
m ean later
we may say that it suggested the new element
which discriminated the log oi of H ecataeu s from
the epics (
and as I sugges t from Cadmus ) Y ou
remember how in H omer a legal dispute is bro ught
before a la m p a man of skill who inquires into the
alleged facts and decides what the true facts are
We saw
fo Toplq meant an inquisition of this kind
that the later epic poets did a certain amount of
inquiring and c omparing and in s o far as they d id
th is they were leading up to histo ry B ut in the
preface to the G enealogi es of H ec ataeu s the con
a historical inquiry stands revealed
c e tion of
p
He endeavoured to deal with his data more or less
lik e a Za -r a p and to elicit the truth applying
canons of common sense Of course his methods
were unsound ; but in his aim and eff ort he was a
pioneer and prose as he saw was the right vehicle
for moving along the new paths which he opened up
The rise of prose was probably a condition of
the rise of history ; it is al m ost inconceivable that
.
,
-
.
,
,
.
.
.
'
r
r
,
,
.
.
,
,
,
.
'
'
.
,
,
.
,
.
’
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
H E C A TA EU S
17
history could have emerged from its S hell if the
new vehicle of critical thought had not been there
to carry it It was not indeed a foregone con
elusion that H ec atae us should choose prose V erse
and prose were still rivals they had not yet
clearly differentiated their S pheres
If Cadmu s
had recorded the foundation of M iletus in prose
Xenophanes related the foundation of Colophon
in metre
Parmenides was writing verse wh ile
H erac leitu s was expressing his deeper thoughts
in prose ; it is not insignificant that H e racle itu s
was incomparably the greater thinker In the
choice of prose the founder of history displayed
his insight
Both sides of the activity of H ec atae u s the
genealogical in which he is a mythographer the
geographical in which he is also a historian had a
far reaching influence on the development of Greek
historiography ; and announce on the very th res
hold its weakness and its strength In treating
“
their ancient history the Greeks were always
to remain und er the i nfluence of the epics : the
sceptre was never to fall from the hands of Homer
and Hesiod ; and the historical investigation of
early Greece was never to be anything but at best
a more or less clarified and arbitrarily rationalised
mythography
On the other hand it was the
treatment of Persia and the East in the Geography
“
a
of H ec tae u s that inaugurated
modern and
.
.
,
.
,
.
,
.
1
.
,
,
,
-
.
.
,
”
Th e fragm e nts d o not e nable u s to app re c iate h is s tyle Ac c ording
to H erm og enes (
De g en d i e ii 12) h is p rose h ad a c h arm b u t h e was less
1
.
.
caref u
.
l in com position th an H
.
erod otu s .
,
18
AN C I ENT GREEK H I S T O R I AN S
LECT
.
contemporary history in which the Greeks
achieved such high excellence
”
“
.
3
.
M ythogr ap her s
E ar ly
The
I may take “ ancient
history first
G enealogi es of H e c atae u s soon led to ne w works
on the same s ubj ect
In the next generation
P h erec yd es of Leros who settled at Athens
and Ac u silau s of Argos — they seem to have
flo u rished before the middle of the fifth century
—
again served up the epic legends in prose
These writers have no claim to the title of
historians ; they were simply mythographers and
it would be well al ways to describe them as such
The work of P h erecyd es was distinguished by
its comprehensiveness He modifie d the traditions
for various reasons but not on any systematic
principle For instance on chronological grounds
h e makes P h ilam m on instead of Orpheus ac c om
pany the Argonauts
In order to connect the
poet Homer with the poet Orpheus he invents
genealogical intermediaries The interpolation of
links in pedigrees is a feature of h is method ;
and here he is working simply on the lines and in
the spirit of the later epic poets themselves If
he modifies a legend it is not to rationalise but
rath er in the interests of popular superstition
The old legend made Apollo slay the Cycl opes
because they furnished Z eus with the thunder
bolts which destroyed Asclepius P herec yd es makes
.
.
,
,
.
.
.
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
.
.
M YTH O GRAP HERS
19
slay not the Cycl opes but the sons of the
Cycl opes evidently to indulge the popular belief
that the Cycl opes are still busy with the manu
facture of thunder
We may say then that
P he rec yd es was a systematiz er of the epic tradi
tions on conservative lines contrasting not o nly
with the rev olutionary method of H ec ataeu s but
with the freer treatment of the legends by the
Attic tragedians
In A c usilau s we can detect th e influence of
He cannot resist the temptation to
H ecatae u s
ratio nalise up to a certain point
He will not
admit for instance that Z eus could change him
self into a bull and so he holds the animal which
carried off Europa to have been a mere common
bull sent by Z e u s not the metamorphosed god
He describes the fleece of Colchis as not golden
but purple and explains that it was empurpled by
M ore interesting than these halting
sea water
concessions to improbable probability is his recon
struction of th e ca u ses of the Trojan war He
asked himself why the goddess Aphrodite should
have un ited herself to the Trojan Anchises S uch
an occurrence as the union of a god d ess with a
mortal required a motive
He found it in an
oracle that the descendants of Anchises should
reign when the kingdom of Priam h ad fa llen
When her son Aeneas grew to manhood the
obj ect of Aphrodite was to bring about the fall
h im
,
1
.
,
,
.
.
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
-
.
.
.
.
.
,
Wilam owitz Molle nd orff
y
p l
For th e stor of Ce h a u s and
Proc ris a s to d in th e e c s , Ph erec y d e s su sti tu te d h at seem s to h a e
tr ad ition of th e Ceph alid ae
ertsch , P her ek S tu d ien,
2
ee n th e fam i
1
b
-
l
ly
pi
,
I sy llos, 65
.
.
b
B
w
.
p
v
.
.
LE CT
AN C I ENT GREEK H I S T O R I AN S
20
.
of Priam s dyn asty and for th is purpose she caused
Paris to fall in love with Helen
Then when
Helen had been carried off she helped the Troj ans
in order that they might not in de3 pair at defeat
surrender Helen and save the throne of Priam
The story of the j udgment of Paris which accord
ing to the Cyp r ia was the original cause of the
war is thus rej ected and the war is attributed to
the ambitious schemes and M achiavellian policy
of Aphrodite This is rationalism of a sort The
accepted view ascribed the cause of a great move
ment to the vanity of a goddess ; A c u silaus
retaining the action of the goddess explained her
m otive as political ambition and so
raising the
transaction to a higher level fancied that he made
it more credible
A later writer H erod or u s of Heraclea carried
the method of H ec atae u s much further than
It will be enough to illustrate the
A c u silau s
character of his mythography by one instance
The legend told that Apollo and Poseidon bu ilt
the walls of Troy for King Laomedon According
to H er od oru s what really happened was this
Laomedon built the walls in the ordinary way but
he defrayed the expenses by the sacred treasures
which had been accumulated in the shrines of
Poseidon and Apollo This is an example of the
method of interpretation by which H erod orus
sought to explain away the mirac ulous 1
’
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
,
.
.
,
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
.
.
.
.
,
,
.
.
1
Mu rray has
Gr eek Liter atu r e,
inte re sting
an
pp
.
127
sq
.
s e ction on
H erodotu s in his H is tory
f
o
M YTH O GRAP HERS
21
The work of P h er ec yd e s then represents a
conservative reaction against the ratio n alism of
The compilations of A c u silau s re
H e catae u s
present a co m promise between rationalism and
conservatism but leaning heavily to the conserva
tiv e side
H er od or u s took up the rationalistic
method of H ec atae u s and developed it further
Reason was a gainer by the work of H ec ataeus it
is a landmark in the progress of criticis m ; but th e
Hecataean method could not advance positive
kno wledge It led beyond H e rod or u s to Palae
ph atu s and Euemerus ; it led ultimately nowhere
and I will not follow it It was not the m yth o
graph er s but the Attic tragedians whose criticism
of myth ology was interesting and illuminating
Aeschylus by moralising and Euripides by dis
crediting it
.
,
.
.
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
E ar ly H istor ians
4
.
H e c ataeu s
the historian as distinguished from
the mythographer h ad two immediate successors
who took up the s u bj ect of oriental history in
which he had shown the way Charon of Lamp
sac u s
composed a history of Persia coming down
at least as far as the destruction of the fleet of
M ard oniu s by a storm off M ount Athos in 492 B C
but probably including the invasion of Xerxes
of which he was in the fullest se nse a contem
,
,
,
.
1
.
.
,
,
H is H ar ai
46 5-4 B C
Com
.
any
p
.
roof
see
(
p
ar e
b elow p
S hw t
,
c
p bli h d ft
I annot
a ti l
in P ly Wi owa
ly n exce pt from th H a oi
s m
’
.
ar z s
th at th e P er s ica wa
29)
r
se e m s
au
c e
ere
v b
to h a
a
-
r
e
ss
ee n
u
.
e
e
s
c
r
a
er
see
.
AN C I EN T GREEK H I S T O R I A N S
22
LEc r
.
His narrative was probably brief b ut as
one of the first historical works which descended
to the writer s own age it possessed considerable
importance for the growth of historical composi
tion There was another writer of the same period
who was perhaps equally important and treated
the same subj ect as Charon D ionysius of M ilet us
likewise wrote a his tory of Persia which came
down to the death of D arius and included the
defeat at M arathon B u t he followed this up by a
continuation which had still greater interest eu
titled The S equ el to the R eign o
f D arius ; which
”
narrated the events of the Persian war
Now while these works of Charon and D io
nysiu s included very important episodes in the
history of Greece they were properly and formally
histories of Persia The first Greek writers who
wr ote modern history wrote of Greece only inci
dentally Their theme was the great empire which
had subj ugated a part of Greece and attempted
to s ubj u gate it all The circumstance that the
writers who undertook to record the relations of
Gree ce with Persia conceived those relations as
part of the history of the Persian state had an
advantage for the u nity of the s ubj ect To write
1
porary
,
.
’
.
.
.
,
.
,
.
.
.
,
,
,
.
1
3
l
This
y si
is th e m ost natura infere nc e from Dion
7 E XAM / [ Kw r e Kat Xdpwvos Thy a irr ipv izrr beeow
’
.
wxbr wv
Gea
9
The
(
as
(
p
Letter to P omp ey.
H erodotu s) 1rpoex
een
rior to the
v b
P er sica of H ellanic us ca nnot ha e
osition of H erodotu s Vil 1X )
O ne fragm ent of Dion siu s (
P er sica) h as
een
.
c om
'
us ,
p
-
.
y
.
b
p reserved
in the
i
c od
n
6
1
6
o
a
sch o ia on H e rodotu s (
a
;
Il
r i felfi
)
( My
ns) : Ai ov iiai os 6
Mthfiatos H avé ouenv Ouoncigea fia i r afir ov My er S e e S tein ’s H er odotus (
ed
m e ntion th is so i tar fr a m e nt, ec ause it does
43 8
vol ii
1869
g
’
not a
ear in Mu er s E H G
l
.
B
.
‘
'
.
.
pp
,
.
p
ll
.
.
I
l
.
.
y
b
.
24
AN CI E N T GREEK H I S T O R I A N S
L ECT
.
It held a somewhat u nd ignifie d position between
Persia and free Greece
The I onian point of
view was therefore different necessarily from the
Spartan or the Athenian ; and the I onians had
some re ason to feel that their actions were open to
misconstruction and that a rOle not too heroic
would gain in their own telling In any case the
story of th e Great Invasion told at M iletus would
h ave a considerably d iff erent colouring from the
same story related at Susa or at Athens W e m ay
reasonably suspect that the history of the war by
D ionysius had a value for Ionian self love ; that it
may have done less than j ustice to the victorious
Greeks ; but that it probably did more j ustice to
Persia than the enemy would have received from
an Athenian writer
This Ionian logos of the
Persian war was we may conj ecture a challenge
to unreserved admirers of Athens ; we shall see
in th e next lecture how such a challenge was
taken u p
There is an other writer of this early school of
historians whose name I ca nnot pass over the
Carian Greek S c ylax of C aryanda
He was
employed by D arius to survey the course of the
river Indus and he published an account of his
exploration
But he also wrote a work of con
temporary history which centred round the figure
of his fellow —
countryman H eracleid es Prince of
M ylasae who deserted the Persian cause and
helped the Greeks in the invasion of Xerxes A
chance ray of light has recently been shed on
.
,
,
,
,
,
.
.
-
.
,
,
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,
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
.
S CY L AX
25
H erac leid es
by an Egyptian papyrus which con
tains a fragment of the work of the historian
S osylu s on the Second Punic war
This frag
ment relates to a naval action probably the battle
fo ught at the mouth of the Ebro in 217 B C The
author illustrates a point in the naval tactics by
comparing a certain action of H e rac le id es which
thwarted a Phoenician man oeuvre at the battle of
Artem isium The episode is not mentioned by
Herodotus (
though he refers to H er ac leid es else
where ) and it probably comes from the work of
“
How far that work was what could be
S c ylax
called biographical we cannot tell but it is at least
noteworthy as the earliest Greek book we know of
that made an individual the centre of a historical
narrative
We shall not wrong these early historians if we
describe them as credulous an d uncritical
The
able literary critic D ionysius of Halicarnassus in
whose days many of their works were still in exist
ence says that their aim was si m ply to co m pile
and
publish traditions and records
witho u t
adding or subtracting anything
and he appr e
ciates their style as clear concise appropriate to
the subj ect bare of any artificial technique though
not careless or nngrac ef ul
,
1
.
,
.
.
.
7
.
,
.
.
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
3
'
.
1
sqq
.
2
Edite d , inter
,
1906
O n th is
wo k
us t
r
be
see
p
en,
H er m es ,
G utsc h m id , K leine S chr if ten , iv
art of a
De Thu cy did e 5
p
by Wilck
discu s sed
ete d , and
x li
pp
.
.
103
.
th ough t it m
3
pr
.
l
arg e
wo k
Diony sm
r
s
1) Cad m u s ,
grou s of h istorians : (
2) Eug eon, Deioch u s , Eu d em u s ,
(
w
,
and
Wilc ke n
,
op
.
.
p
ci t
.
.
144,
pp
.
wh o
125- 6
.
l
d istingu ish e s th re e c h r ono ogic al
h om h e ass oc iate s with Ar iste as ;
Dem ocle s
,
H ec ataeu s ,
Ac u s ilau s ,
LECT
AN CI E NT GREEK H I S T O R I AN S
26
.
The historic al impulse initiated by H ec ataeu s
extended after a time beyond I onia into the neigh
b our ing land of Lydia which had been permeated
by Greek culture under the last Lydian kings
The Lydian Xanthus composed in Greek a history
of his country for which he used local traditions
and perhaps consulted inscriptions in the pala ce of
1
Sardis
B ut in th e development of historiography
he is less important than two other writers who
like him wrote during the latter half of the fifth
century Antiochus of Syracuse and H ellanic u s of
Lesbos
Antiochus composed a work on the
history of the western Greeks
He investigated
the early history of S icily and Italy and the plan
So
tation of the Greek colonies in those lands
far he was dealing with the subj ect of origins in
which the early historians inherited an interest
from their epic predecessors whose legends they
supplemented and modified by local traditions
The epic itself had here a late o ffshoot in the
(
poem which P anyassis of Halicarnassus produced
towards the middle of the fifth centu ry on the
colonisation of th e I onian towns ) B ut the great
,
.
.
,
,
,
.
.
.
,
,
.
.
p
p
Charon , Melesagoras ( e rha s Alon/ li m os 6 M i kfiai os has falle n out after
‘
r at
os 6
3 ) H ellan ic u s , Dam astes , X e n om e d e s ,
Em i M oi
anth u s , Ka t (
(
45 0 B C
015
ould rou g h
m ark th e d i is ion
Th e
et e e n 2 an d 3
x110!
ork of Eu ge on (
Eu ag on) of S am os was a e a e d to c 200 B C in a
d s ute e t e e n S am os an d Priene h ich was d ec id e d
se e
Rhod e s (
Gr eek I n scr ip tions i n the B r itis h Mus eu m , c c c c ni 109,
Dei och us
r ote a c h ronic e of C zic u s
For De m oc le s s e e S tra o i 58 and xi i
55 1 ; for Dam aste s , R H G 11 64 7
Th e
ork
h ic h
asse d u nder
A)m ele sag oras (
th e n am e of (
F H G i i 2 1) was a frau d : se e Wi lam owitz
Molle nd orfl , An tigon os von Kary s tos ,
24
1
G uts ch m id , Kleine S chr if ten , iv
307 sqq
"
w
ip
.
w
.
ly
v
b w
w
w
l
b w
pp l
.
y
.
.
.
.
.
w
.
.
.
'
.
p
pp
.
.
w
.
.
.
X
.
.
.
.
by
b
p
.
.
ANT I OC H U S
H ELL AN I C U S
27
significance of Antiochus is that he wrote the
modern and contemporary history of an important
section of the Greek world
A comprehen sive
history of western Hellas was a step towards a
comprehensive history of Hellas as a whole
His contemporary H ellanic u s of Lesbos indi
c ated and prepared the way for a further advance ;
and it is important to grasp his significan ce in our
development
It has been usual to classify him
with the elder successors of H e c atae u s because h e
wrote in Ionic Greek and covered practically all
the fields which they had covered But he broke
new ground and became as has been said “ the
corner stone of the historical tradition of the
Greeks
The range of his literary activity was
wide He wrote on the history of Persia ; on the
customs of the barbarians on the mythical period
of Greece ; on the origins of the Greek cities in
Asia on the later history of Greece and especially
the history of Athens His principal achie vement
was the construction of a systematic chronology
which laid the foundations for subsequent research
The subj ect of chronology must have been
pressed on the attention of H ec ataeu s not only
by hi s research into Greek genealogies but by
his study of Egyptian and oriental history The
Greeks had not yet invented any method of
chronicling events
They had as we saw no
chronological records except lists of names like
those of the priestesses of Hera at Argos of the
archons at Athens of the priests of Poseidon at
.
.
,
,
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
”
-
.
.
.
.
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
,
,
AN C I EN T GREEK H I ST O R I AN S LECT
28
.
Halicarnassus It was only rarely that a name in
th ese lists would yield the precise date of an event
such as the archonship of Solon which s upplied at
once the date of his reforms Beyond these very
barren records the only data were the genealogies
These furnished a very rough method of reckoning
periods of time by generations
But there must
have been considerable perplexity how the genera
tion unit should be calculated in terms of years
Ultimately it became usual to reckon three
generations as equivalent to a hundred years so
B ut there
that the u nit was roughly 33 years
are early traces of another system which equated
the generation with 23 years a principle which
would yield widely di fferent res u lts
There was
another system based on 40 years It is probable
that H ec ataeu s reckoned generally with genera
tions and not y ears as his units for the more
“
distant past But for modern history he had
valuable auxiliary data of a precise kind
The
oriental monarchies had an exact method of reckon
ing by means of the regnal years of the kings and
records of events dated in this way were preserved
These dates at once supplied synchronisms with
events in Greek history and fixed a number of
chronological landmarks such as the capture of
Sardis
But it is not likely that chronology was
treated by H ec atae u s more carefully or m eth od i
cally than by Herodotus its fundamental import
ance was not realised till later
.
,
.
.
.
-
.
,
.
1
,
.
.
,
,
,
”
.
.
,
.
,
.
.
1
S ee H er odotu s i 7
.
22 g e nerations = 505
y ears
.
H EL L A N I C U S
29
The problem which H ellan ic u s undertook was
to reconstruct a complete chronicle of Greek
history with the help of the genealogies lists such
as that of the Athenian archons and the oriental
dates It is possible that attempts had been made
to work out this highly speculative problem already
Charon had compiled a book called the H ar oi of
Lampsacus It is generally assumed to have been
a local history or chronicle of his native city But
the frag m ents s u ggest that it had a wider range
than the affairs of Lampsacus Perhaps the work
consisted of annals dated by yearly m agistrates of
Lampsacus but recording as well as local events
other events also of general his torical interest
We have a parallel in a vast number of medieval
chronicles which possess at once a local and a
general side Annals of Paderborn for instance
take special account of Paderborn aff airs but also
record the general history of the Western Empire
1
This is only a conj ecture and in any case it was
reserved for H ellanic u s even if he had the help of
previous attempts to achieve the construction of a
chronicle which in its main lines found general
acceptance and influenced the course of s u bsequent
chronological study
He made the list of the
Argive priestesses of Hera the framework of his
general chronicle of Greece
He also compiled a
special chronicle of Attic history in which events
were naturally a rranged under the archo n years
,
,
,
.
.
.
.
.
,
,
,
,
.
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
.
2
.
,
289 90
We h a e no d ata to c on ec ture
O f S eec k ; see K lio iv
’
r ai of S am os
th e s c o e of Euge on s H o
‘
1
52 to th e Am b rac ian-Ac ar nanian war of 429 D C
Ku llm er re fe rs
1
.
p
pp
-
.
.
v
j
.
p
.
.
.
30
AN C I E N T GREEK H I S T O R I AN S
u ser .
In its fir st form
from the year 6 83 2 onward
this work came down to the year 4 11 A fter the
termination of the Peloponn esian war the author
continued it to 404
The notices of events
were brief but it was n ot without a certain poli
tical colouring evincing sym pathy with Athenian
democratic patriotism
W ithout enterin g upon a minute criticism of
the method of H ellanic u s it is en ough to say that
mistaking the character of mythical traditions b e
erected an ingenious edifice on foundatio ns which
had no solidity
The most perfect genealogies
could not even approximately determine absolute
dates ; and the genealogies were full of inc onsist
had to be overcome by arbitrary
enc ieS which
interpolations and manipulations M oreover quite
recent events which had not been recorded at the
time might present almost ins u perable difficulties
to a chronographer
One case which we can
control will illustrate how dangerous the proced ure
of H ellanic u s was If he had consulted a certain
inscription which we are fortunate enough to h ave
recovered he could have found that several military
events which he chronicled occurred in the same
archonship corresponding to the latter half of
4 59 B C and the former half of 4 58 B C
Ignorant
of th is authentic evidence he distributed these
2
events over three archonships
Y et these events
-
,
.
.
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
'
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
.
.
.
.
,
.
1
l
S ee Leh m ann—
Hau pt in K li o vi
.
pp
.
127
1
s qq .
Ap ollodoru s
u sed
the
ear ier e d ition.
2
We
c an
Diod orus for
be
th e
ly
virtu a l
c ertain
th at th e
p e iod of th Fifty Y
r
e
e ar s
l y
c h rono og
de
p
e nd e d
on
p
E horu s and
H ellanic us, so f ar
of
AN C I E N T GREEK H I ST O R I AN S
32
LECT
.
elusion at which M ahaffy arrived more th an
twenty fiv e years ago that there are no well
established exact dates in Greek history before the
1
seventh cen tury
For the seventh and even for
the sixth there are only a few Nay we can hardly
say that a clear and definite chronicle begins before
44 5 B C the year of the Thirty Y ears Peace
It is to be deplored that the early historians
failed to realise how desirable it was to rec kon
time by a fixed chronological era The practical
Romans dated historical events from the F ou nda
tion of th e City The Greeks might have adopted
for instance the year of the invasion of Xerxes
They could have d ated Before and Af ter pO 7 6 m
M ndu d w and [1 e 7 a M fia d as we do VVltll our
era But the most natural and perhaps the best
chronological starting point would have been the
Troj an war It did not matter in the least that
the actu al date of that event could n ot be known
with certainty so long as a definite year was fixed
upon Our era is not the true date of the Nativity ;
the true date cannot be ascertained but this does
not a ffect the utility of the conventional era Now
as a m atter of fact the Troj an war was occasion
ally used as a sort of reference date by fifth
2
century historians and it is much to be regretted
that H ellanic u s did not systematically adopt this
-
,
.
,
.
’
.
.
.
,
.
,
.
.
,
,
c
a
.
/e
7r
,
,
.
,
-
.
,
.
.
,
,
,
ly list of O ly m p ian victo s c onst c ted by
H ipp ia of Elis w ith out tru stw o th y d ata has recently b en d isc ssed by
H m
A Ko t (
xx xix
pp 224 sqq
who confi rm s in essential
points th c onc l sions of Mahafly
1
Th e
su
bj
ec t
of th e ear
r
s
r
er
r e
.
e
2
es
.
.
.
.
’
u
H erod otus ii 145 ad
,
.
fin
.
,
.
e
ru
u
H E L L AN I C U S
33
method of reckon ing The years of magistrates
or priests are not only clumsy but convey
no chronological idea For it is to be observed
that when dates are expressed by cardinal numbers
proceeding from a fixed year not only is calculation
simplified but the numbers present to the mental
vision a clear historical perspective
But recognising the defects both in the mechan
ism and in the methods of H ellanic u s who
attempted the impossible we must gi v e him credit
for having fram ed the ideal of a chronological
system which should embrace all the known facts
of history ; and if he established many erroneous
dates it is probable that he also rescued some
that were correct
.
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
5
.
S u m m ar y
To sum up (1) The historical study of their
past by the Greeks arose out of th e epic tradition
and was a continuation of the work of the later
epic poets
The tradition of the Homeric and
Hesiodic poets maintained its control to the end
What we would designate as the post mythical
or historical period overlapped by m eans of gene
alogies with the mythical period ; the existing
families of Greece were connected i n line of
blood with the heroes and thereby with the gods
The genealogical principle lying at the base of
their historical reconstru ction hindered the Greeks
from drawing a hard and fast lin e between the
mythical and the historical age The historians
.
.
.
-
.
,
,
.
D
34
AN CI EN T GREE K H I ST O R I AN S
LECT
.
wh o approached the
s u bj ect never got beyond
criticism of details and rationalistic interpretation
of miracles B ut (
2 ) at the very time when the
study of mythological tradition began to assume a
more critical character the interest of the G reek s
expanded to the “ modern history and in stitu
tions of non Greek states and here they were in
a region not mythical but historical This intel
lectual movement originated in Ionia ; its main
cause was the Persian conquest and the resulting
co ntact of Ionian thinkers with oriental history
The rise of Ionian science not only promoted the
spirit of criticism but also created an interest in
geography for the study of which the new political
status of Ionia furnished opportunities ; but it was
principally the new vision of oriental history that
brought to birth Greek historiography
It was
“
from the modern history of the East that the
“
Greeks went on to study the modern history of
Hellas And the struggle with Persia in the first
twenty years of the fifth century impelled them
to begin to write histories of their own time
Further as I will attempt to show more fully in
the next lecture their contact with the traditions
of non G reek lands within the Persian em pire
suggested to the Greeks a new kind of criticis m of
their own mythical traditions In all three fields
of ancient modern and contemporary history as
well as in the allied sphere of geography H ec atae us
was a pioneer his originality lay in responding to
the stimulus from the non Greek world
.
,
-
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
.
”
.
.
,
,
s
.
,
,
,
,
-
.
S U MM ARY
35
The work of H ellanic u s who conceiv ed the idea
of a general history of Greece and laid the slippery
foundations of its chronology has brought us to a
date fro m which we shall have to retrace our steps
to exami ne the work of a greater writer than any
of those who have claimed our attention to day
We have only considered th ose points of light
obsc u red by time which form the Ionian constel la
tion ; we have yet to examine a star of the first
magnitude which is still as luminous as ever
Herodotus (
we must not call him an Ionian ) will
be the subj ect of the next lecture
,
,
-
.
,
,
.
.
L E C T U RE
II
US
H E RO DO T
IN
the last lecture the necessities of our subj ect
obliged us to consider works of which only scraps
have survived and of which we can form only dim
ideas by groping methods although we may feel
tolerably confident as to the general character
and val u e of the literature to which they belong
The nam es of their authors are forgotten by the
w orld and their chief function now is to tantalise
the special student of literat u re or history To day
w e come to a work which time has not been
allowed to destroy or diminish
Of the life of Herodotus son of Lyx es of
H alicarnassus we know hardly anything except
what may be gleaned from his own statements
B orn early in the fifth century he left his birth
place before 4 5 4 B C banished by L ygdam is the
tyrant who put his cousin P anyassis the epic
poet to death H e staye d apparently for so m e
time in Samos and then went to A thens whence
he proceeded to Italy as one of th e first citizens
4 43
of the new colony of Th u rii (
He sur
of the Peloponnesian war
v iv e d the first years
,
,
.
,
-
.
.
,
,
,
.
,
.
.
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
36
HERO D OTU S
LECT II
.
37
4
1
0
3
(
Into this framework we have to
fit his travels which included the coasts of th e
Euxine Babylon Phoenicia Egypt and probably
Cyrene It is not n ecessary to discuss the dis
pu ted subj ect of the chronology of his j ourneys
I need only say that his most important j ourneys
those to Babylonia and Egypt were probably
while
undertaken in the later period of his life
he was a citi zen of Th ur ii
The years which
elapsed between his banishment from his native
city and his departure for his new home seem to
have been Spent in Greece perhaps chiefly at
Athens and to have been devoted as we shall
see to investigating and composing the story of
the invasion of Xerxes Though he may naturally
have visited Athens again on his way to or from
the East there is no evidence to entitle u s to
presume as some have thought that he deserted
Th urii permanently and dwelled at Athens during
the last years of his life
The argument of his history is a narrative of
the relations between the Greeks and the oriental
powers from the accession of Croesus to the
capture of Sestos in 47 8 B C —a modern history
in th e fullest sense of the term The div ision into
nine Books is not due to the author himself for
,
,
,
,
,
.
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
2
.
.
.
.
,
1
B.C
.
D C
.
.
The
Th ere
v1i
13 7
.
re fere n c e
writt n
e
2
233
.
vii
Com
p
—
pa
c p Th u c
(
c p Th u c
(
.
.
to
wh ich
yd i d s ii
ss ag e s
.
ii
.
.
v b
ha
2)
and
e
ix 7 3
.
e
.
p
c annot
ee n
w itten b
r
efore
43 1 0
-
ply 43 1
6 7 ) im pli s 43 0 D
Cp l o iii 160 ; and v 7 7
in i 98 d o
n ot i m ply th at th e wo d
w
e
v
Artaxerxes
425 D C )
d e ath (
h is
ar e th e
after
lvi 2 15 8
.
are
.
.
C
c p Th u c
(
.
.
.
a s
.
ii 23 ) im
.
.
es
.
cp
.
Macau
e rtine nt re m arks of
.
r
’
Zoe
u th , R he i nisches
s note a d
Wac hsm
s
.
ere
.
Mus eum
,
38
AN C I ENT GREEK HI ST O RIAN S
LECT
.
in his day such divisions had not yet come into
fashion
But the Alexandrine editor who was
responsible for it was a man of extraordinary
insight His distribution perfectly exhibits the
construction of the book and could not be im
proved by any change But it can be rendered
more perspicuous by observing that each of the
nine Books is truly a sub division and that the
1
primary partition is a threefold one
The work
falls naturally into three sections each consisting
of three parts
The first section or triad of
Books comprises the reigns of Cyrus and Cambyses
and the accession of D ari u s the second deals with
the reign of D arius ; the third with that of
Xerxes
The first is mainly concerned with
Asia including Egypt ; the second with E urope ;
the third with Hellas The fir st displays the rise
and the triumphs of the power of Persia ; the
last relates the defeat of Persia by Greece ; while
the middle triad represents a chequered picture
Persian failure in Scythia and at M arathon Greek
And each of th e nine sub
failure in Ionia
div isio ns has a leading theme which constitutes
a minor unity Cyrus is the theme of the first
Book Egypt of the second Scythia of the fourth
the Ionian rebellion of the fifth M arathon of the
sixth
The seventh describes the invasion of
Xerxes up to his success at Thermopylae ; the
eighth relates the reversal of fortu ne at Salamis ;
the final triumphs of Greece at Plataea and M yc ale
.
.
.
-
.
,
,
.
,
,
.
.
,
,
.
.
,
,
,
,
.
1
This has
b een w ll b
e
ght ou t
r ou
by Mac an
.
40
AN CI ENT GRE E K H IST ORIAN S
LECT
.
invasion of Xerxes ; and that it was in the course
of his travels that he conceived the idea of a
“
larger work of which the Invasion of Xerxes
should form the finale
The idea doubtless
shaped itself gradually ; and the first six Books
were not composed in the order in which they
stand
But the author has worked with such
skill that only a searching analysis has detected
the series of facts which demonstrate the priority
of the last three Books and make it clear that
the Persian war was his original inspiration
At whatever moment the idea of expanding
his original history to its fuller compass presented
itself whether it was suggested by his j ourneys
or prompted him to become a traveller it was
certainly connected closely with his travels and
the occ urrence of long geographical excursus is
one of the most strikin g features of the expansion
S o strongly marked indeed is the geographical
element so long are the geographical sections in
the work of Herodotus that some critics ha ve
been led to think that considerable parts of it
were originally intended to form part of a
”
,
.
.
1
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
w ere m ad e subsequently th s in V 93 and 108
n
to p a ag
in th e books w hic h a
r f
a li
in o d r
th e
late n om position It is p obable th at the wh ol wo k n v
b tw
vi ion and th is would b s ffic i nt to explain the nf l
iv d a fi n al
r
fill d p om i of ii 213 wh i h is th ins fli i nt b t only eal a g m ent
fo th hypoth i th at th ninth Book i not c om pl t
[H ow g at ito s
this h ypoth sis is Ma an sh ows at l ng th ih
O n th e oth e h and it
th at H rod ot s inte nd ed to inc l d e in th
a ly
s e m s not im p obabl
po tion of h is wo k a s m m a y of Babylonian h isto y
My )
li kely than that in i 106 and 184 h is eferring
this s m s to m e m o
to anoth er work
1
er
u
ec e
S om e few add itions
ar e
e e re
ere
r i
r
r
e
u
re
.
e
e
e
u
u
c e
s
c
r
ee
e
e
e
r
r
r
c
,
.
,
r
re e
,
es s
e
es
.
s
v
se
e
e
ss
c
re
e
e
c es
ii
u
:
er
r
e
u
r
r
e
er
u
u
u
r
u
u
e
r
.
e
u
r
.
.
r
r
u
e e
,
.
e
r
ci
e
r
HERO D OTUS
II
41
geography and were afterwards incorporated in
his history There is nothin g that compels us to
adopt a hypothesis of this kind Association with
geography was a characteristic of the early
h istorical literature of the Greeks and these
excursus in Herodotus attest the influence of the
Hecataean school and were natural in the work
of a historian who was himself a traveller And
it is worth observing that when he was writing
both Egypt and Scythia the subj ects of his
longest historic o geographical digressions had a
particular practical interest for the Athenians ;
and of the Greek p u blic it was unquestionably
the Athenians to whom the historian designed
his work pre eminently to appeal I need only
remind you of the Athenian adventure in Egypt
in the middle of the fifth century and of the
voyage of Pericles in the Euxine Sea It has
even been conj ectured that this Periclean expedi
tion (
444 B C ) was the occasion of the historian s
visit to the Pontic regions However this may
be it is not insignificant in j udging these digres
sions that Egypt and Scythia possessed at the
time Herodotus wrote an interest of a political
kin d subordinate indeed to that of Persia but
distinctly actual
It is also to be noted that the digressions in
general had an artistic j ustification They are an
1
epic feature deliberately designed ; one of the
epic notes of the work Homer was the literary
,
.
.
,
,
.
,
,
-
,
-
.
.
’
.
.
.
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
.
.
,
.
1
He
say
s e
xp
re s s
ly that
‘
1r oo0i1
xac
p
'
are a
fe ature of his
wo k
r
,
iv 30
.
.
AN CI ENT GREE K HI ST O RIAN S
42
LEcr
.
master of Herodotus ; without imitating him in
any obvio u s way the first great m aster of prose
studied and cau ght the secrets of his eff ects By
means of digressions he achieved epic variety
We cannot do better than read the observations
l
of the accomplished literary critic D ionysius
“
Herodot u s knew that every narrative of great
length wearies the ears of the b earer if it dwell
without a break on the same subj ect ; but if
pauses are introduced at intervals it affects the
mi nd agreeably
And so he desired to lend
variety to his work and imitated Homer If we
take up his book we admire it to the last syllable
and al ways want more
Besides diversifying his work with digressions
and episodes H erodotu s adopted another epic
feature not less characteristic Like Homer the
historian makes his characters speak He intro
duces not only short and pointed conversations
but dialogues and orations of consid erable length
For instance Xerxes M ard oniu s and Artab anus
make each a speech in Coun cil before it is decide d
to invade Greece I may recall the conversations
of Solon with Croesus of Xerxes with Artab anus
and with D emaratus ; and the speech m ade by
the Corinthian envoy when the Spartans were
considering the policy of forcing Athens to restore
2
the P eisistratid s
If the historian were charged
,
.
.
.
,
,
,
.
.
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
.
Letter to P om p eias , 3
1
81t
2
.
13
v
.
.
4
92
.
Longinu s
.
l
c a ls
H erodotus banpm w
r ar os, De
.
Com
pa
re
S tah
l
’
l
s artic e
m e ntione d
in the
B ibliog aph y
r
.
HERO D OTUS
II
43
with abusing this artifice by introduci ng in the
Corinthian envoy s speech a long episode fro m
Corinthian h istory which is really quite irrelevant
he coul d appeal to the discourses of Phoenix and
Nestor in Homer ; and this case illustrates the
fact that in introducing speeches he was influenced
by the Ionian epic and not by the Athenian drama
It is impossible to say whether any of the older
prose writers had adopted this practice which
makes the scenes vivid and the work alive The
bits of H ec ataeu s we possess are too brief to
j udge ; but I may note that in one case at least
1
he put words into the mouth of an actor
The Homeric qualities of Herodotus which
commu nicate to his history an epic flavour accord
with the obj ect to produce a work which like
Homer should fascinate the minds of m en It
was his aim to hold his audience or readers
entertained ; to do for his own world in prose
what Homer had done for the ancient world in
numbers We cannot tell how far any of his
prose predecessors had sought to make their
works attractive or entertaining or whether the
influence of epic poetry affected their method
of presentation
But we may confidently say
that Herodotus was the first who discerned in
“
modern histo ry the possibilities of a treat m ent
’
,
,
.
,
.
.
,
,
.
.
2
,
.
1
i
.
p
Fr
.
353
.
33
.
Longinus , De
(
Th e
state m e nt
weigh t
in
s u bl
.
Cp Mah afi’y P r os e Wr iter s ,
Vi ta Thu c 3 8, h as not m u c h
.
Marc ell inu s
,
,
.
.
2
c h ie
Th u c y did es i
fly p
,
p
e rh a
.
s on
is not; c onc lns ive
23
ly
,
of
H erod otu s
.
;
h e wa s th inking
44
AN CI ENT GREE K H I ST O RIAN S
LECT
.
which was epic and not Hesiodic but Homeric
in spirit and style
His theme the struggle of Greece with the
O rient possessed for him a deeper meaning than
the political result of the Persian war
It was
the contact and collision of two different types of
civilisation of peoples of two different characters
and different political institutions
In the last
division of his work where the final struggle of
Persia and Greece is related this contrast between
the slavery of the barbarian and the liberty of the
Greek between oriental autocracy and Hellenic
constitutionalism is ever present and is forcibly
brought out But the contrast of Hellenic with
oriental culture pervades the whole work ; it
informs the unity of the external theme with the
deeper unity of an inner meaning It is the key
note of the history of Herodotus The digressions
and stories which delay the action besides their
intrinsic interest, and besides their epic use as
pleasant pauses have also the value of so unding
that note and of contributing distinctly but
witho u t emphasis or iteration towards impressing
that contrast on the reader s mind The intervie w
for example of Croesus with Solon the self con
fid ent Eastern potentate with the thoughtful self
controlled Greek strikes this chord loudly ; and most
of the oriental and Hellenic stories are calculat ed
to suggest the antithesis which finds its supreme
expression and is more elaborately wrought out
in the final collision of the Persian wars
,
,
.
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
,
.
.
.
,
,
,
,
,
’
,
.
-
,
,
,
,
,
,
.
HE R O D OTUS
’
Ii
45
In the execution of this conception the Hero
dotean work has assumed the character of a study
in the history of civilisation Just as the Homeric
poems present a large and living picture of the
culture of ancient Greece so the history of Hero
d otu s gives us panoramic views of the Hellenic
civili sation of the sixth century and describes the
cultures of all the Eastern peoples who directly or
indirectly come within range
And if it is a study in the history of civilisation
we may also say that it has certain features of a
universal history
It is not universal either in
Not in time ; it does not
S pace or in time
attempt to go back far in Greek history and only
touches upon the ancient period incidentally Not
in space for it hardly touches upon the Western
Greeks at all and does not include what H ecatae us
would have supplied about the peoples of the
Western M editerranean
B ut it has the higher
quality of what we mean by universal history or
Weltg eschichte in focussing under one point of
view and fitting into a connected narrative th e
histories of the various peoples who came into
relations with one another within a given range ;
so that they are drawn out of their isolation and
recognised to have a meaning greater or less in
the common history of man W ithin that range
which is determined by h is theme Herodotus
is irreproachably comprehensive ; and his book
though he never formulates the idea is a lesson
in the unity of history
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AN CI ENT GRE EK HI STO RIAN S
46
LECT
.
Although Herodotu s does not enter upon the
history of the heroic period h e has frequently
occasion to refer to m ythical tradition and here
he S hows himself distinctly a sceptic N ot that
he was a rationalist in regard to theology generally
or had any clear and consistent philosophi cal View
He looked upon human life as under the control
of s u perhuman powers who in exercising their
incalculable government were prompted by motives
of envy and nemesis or righteo u s anger who acted
to some extent on principles of j ustice and retrib u
tion and wh o might communicate knowledge to
men by means of oracles portents or dreams
But any further converse of gods with m en any
d ivine appearances alleged to have happened in
recent times Herodotus is not prepared to accept
though he is never dogmatic His philosophy was
not strong enough to deny that the gods had ever
carried on the sort of intercourse with men that is
described in the epics or generated human progeny ;
for his ultimate line between the divine and the
human was n ot fast But it was a great comfort
for common sense and everyday experience to p ush
the age in which such things could happen as far
back as possible
Herodotus reveals u nm istak
ably his incredulity about all the mythical wonders
in which according to tradition ancestors of
living people some fifteen or twenty generations
back played bright or shady parts He accepted
the genealogies but when he got to Perseus or
Heracles he did not regard them as sons of a god
,
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AN CI E N T GRE EK
48
H I ST O RIAN S LECT
.
to comprehend the reason for this scepticism which
I touched on this
h e derived from H e c atae us
point in the first lectu re It was not due to the
can ons of I onian science or to the influence of
Ionian philosophy It was due to the study of
comparative mythology which had opened for
H ec atae u s a new perspective of the world s history
The Egyptian studies which Herodotus pursued in
the footsteps of the M ilesian traveller taught him
that human history in that country went back for
thousands of years before the age of the gods was
reached The Egyptians for instance had a god
corresponding to Heracles and they reckoned that
years had elapsed since he had appeared in
Egypt
Hence the conclusion which Herodotus
accepts that there was an ancient god Heracles
but that he must be sharp ly distinguished from
th e hu m an son of Amphitryo n ancestor of the
1
Heracleidae
The Greek tradition that th e age in
which gods walked the earth was still current some
eight or nine hun d red years ago could not be true
For even apart from the suggestions of compara
tive mythology it was inadmissible to suppose that
while Egypt was in a prosaic age of mere m en
Greece was trodden by deities and the scene of
miracles ; and the Egyptian tradition was vouched
for by records
The argument demolished the
received mythology of the heroic age so far as it
was superhuman
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im ila ly Pan son of P n lope Diony sus
disti ngu i sh d f om th sy nonym o s god
1
S
r
e
e
r
e
e
,
u
s.
son of
S em e
l
e , are
to b e
HERO D OTU S
II
49
Herodotus deserves credit for having accepted
the argument to which conte m porary writers like
Ph erecyd es were deaf ; and if h e asks pardon fro m
the gods and heroes for his boldness this does not
mean that he felt hesitation or reluctance ; it was
merely an insincere and graceful genu flex ion He
was doing what a Christian preacher sometimes
does when having delivered an extremely heterodox
sermon he winds up with a formal homage to
orthodox dogma Herodotus is extrem ely cour
teou s perhaps ironically courteous to both parties
He says as it wer e to the gods and heroes
“
Please do not be angry with me —supposing you
to exist But at this time of day you know one
m u st really draw the line somewhere
On the
other hand he says to the infidels who disbelieve
“
in oracular prophecy I know you will think me
credulous But still in this case the evidence is so
remarkably clear that I do not see my way to
The mythological argument h ow
resisting it
ever of which I am speaking was not due to
Herodotus himself He may have put it in his
own way and added some points b u t he owed it
as I have said to H ec atae u s It has long been
recognised that his description of Egypt is not an
original work put together exclusively from his
own observations and inquiries b u t largely repro
duces the account which H ec ataeu s had given
When Herodotus
in his M ap of the Wor ld
visited Egypt he doubtless had the book of
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” 1
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,
1
Cp
.
viii
.
77
.
,
AN CI ENT GRE E K H I STORIAN S
50
L ECT
.
’
H ec ataeu s
with him and used it like a barrister s
brief for cross examining the temple servants and
guiding him in his investigations
He added
corrections and new information but the great
Ionian supplied the groundwork
He does not
say so ; he does not ackno wledge his debt to
H ec atae u s ; for as you know the ancients had
very di ff erent views from the moderns about
literary O bligations
It was not the fashion or
etiquette to name your authorities except for some
special reason — for instance to criticiz e them or
to display yo u r own learning ; and you were not
considered a plagiarist if you plundered somebody
else s work without mentioning his name Heca
tae u s brought ou t the importance of the Nile by
the striking phrase that Egypt was the gift of the
river ; Herodotus adopts the phrase as if it were
his own O ne of the most convincing tests by
which suspected plagiarism can be established is
the occurrence of th e same mistakes Now Hero
d otu s reproduces the errors which H e c atae u s had
committed about the hippopotamus
But there
are a whole series of points in which we can trace
the contact between the two writers in regard to
Egypt As for the mythology we are left in no
doubt because Herodotus names H ecatae u s in this
connexion
Whe n H e c atae u s was in Thebes he
told his pedigree to the priests and c onnected him
self with a god in the sixteenth generation And
the priests did to him what they did to me though
I did not relate m y pedigree
They took him into
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HERO D OTU S
11
51
the hall of the temple and showed him wooden
statues of the high priests The high priesthood
descends from father to son and each high priest
sets up his own statue in his lifetime
They
counted 3 45 Statues and they set this genealogy
against that of H e cataeu s but they did not derive
their pedigree from a god or a hero
The author s motive in naming his predecessor
here is obviously to rally him for having “ given
himself away by stating his own genealogy and
divi ne ancestry to the priests
I was not so
incautious is the implication But we have no
right to infer that H ec atae u s had not already
d rawn the sceptical conclusions which Herodotus
explai ns The sceptical words with which Heca
tae u s introduced his G enealogi es S how that he was
not deaf to the lessons in history which he learned
in Egyptian temples His very expression when
“
he says that the log oi of the Hellenes are absurd
not “ the stories of the poets suggests the con
trast of non Hellenes whose log oi he had compared
The distinction of what the Greeks say from what
the Persians Phoenicians or Egyptians say often
recurs in Herodotus and is an echo I believe
from H ec atae u s
But we have another proo f
Herodotus cites the Egyptian priests as dating
the age of the gods in relation to the reign of
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,
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,
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”
1
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”
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”
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”
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-
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,
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,
,
,
2
.
1
2
n
.
143
wo ld
on
.
Wh en H erod otu s c ite s
that h e m
u
.
ol
El Omi/ s s s ay , it is
e
I i
som eti m e s as s um ed
or som e oth e r on an write r )
I n th at c ase h e
H e cata eu s (
”
/ es
H e i s r ea
s ai d at I a n
qu oting Cl lt lS II lS of H ec ataeu s
th at i s, on th e c u rre nt m th o og of e ic tr adition
e ans
v
ha
what
d
.
lly
y
.
‘
l y
p
.
52
AN C I ENT GREE K HI STORIAN S
LECT
.
A m asis
As the visit of H ec atae u s to Egypt
would have fallen not long after the death of
Am asis the dating indicates that Herodotus was
copying the statement of H ec atae u s
The note of scepticism perhaps we may say the
characteristic note of Ionian scepticism is struck
in the first paragraphs of the Herodotean work
It opens with the statement of a theory that the
wars of the Greeks and Persians were the mani
fe station of a secular antagonism between Asia
and E urope — what our English historian Freeman
was fond of calling the Eternal Question This at
least is the abstract way we should formulate the
tenor of the statement which I may abbreviate as
“
follows
The quarrel began thus : Phoenician
traders carried off from Argos 10 the king s
daughter S ubsequently Greek adventurers fro m
Crete carried off the princess B u m pa from Tyre
The next aggression came fro m the Greek side
when the Argonauts ravished M edea fr o m Colchis
The Asiatic reply to this outrage was the rape of
Helen by Paris The Trojan war which followed
generated in Asia a feeling of hostility to the
Greeks and the Persian war was the ultimate
issue of this feeling
But the theory was not
originated by Herodotus He disavows all reS pon
It was a theory of the Persians he tells
sib ility
us and he states it only to set it aside in his
ironical way
The whole passage reads as if it might be the
condensation of a friendly discussion between a
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HERO D OTUS
11
53
Greek and a Persian as to the responsibility for
It was u ndeniable that the
th e Persian war
Persians and not the Greeks had been the aggr es
sors ; the conquest of Ionia by Cyrus had been the
beginning
The Persian advocate co u ld only
remove the blame from Asia by going farther
back The summary I gave of the argument does
not reproduce its flavour and I will take the
liberty of throwing it into the form of a dialogue
P er sian The Greeks had no business in Asia
They belong to Europe and they should have
stayed there Their expedition against Troy was
the first trespass ; it began their encroachments
on a continent which belongs to Asiatic peoples of
whom the Persians are the heirs
G r eek Oh but you are forgetting that on that
occasion the Trojans were the off enders ; Paris
carried of Hele n
P er sian That was no su fficient reason ; but
if it were the act of Paris was only a
e ven
reprisal for the Greek crimes of carrying off
M edea and Europa And the Asiatics were far
too sensible to make a cau sa helli of such fooli sh
elopements
G r eek Well if you go back so far you m ust
What about the rape of Io
go back farther still
from Argos ?
P er sian Well yes I admit it
That was a
Phoenician bu siness and we Persians must allow
that the Phoenicians began the mischief tho ugh
we hold you really responsible through your folly
.
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AN C I ENT GREE K H I S TORIAN S
54
L
’
‘
ECI
.
in taking such an affair seriously
O nly fools
would make war on account of such escapade s
M e n of the world know that if these women were
carried off they were not more reluctant than
1
they should b e
Evidently we have here an invention of Ionian
The nature of the argument dealing as it
esp r it
does entirely with Greek legend shows that the
Persian was a fictitious disp u tant and the attr ib u
tion of the theory to a Persian is an e ffect of
literary subtlety quite in the manner of V oltaire
Though Herodotus thought little of this specula
tion about ancient wrongs he seems to have taken
it as seriously meant
Whatever we think about
all this he says I will begin with the first Eastern
monarch wh o undoubtedly committed inj ustice
against Greece Croesus who subd u ed Ionia without
provocation
But it is highly significant that he
should p lace in the portals of his work a speculation
which set mythical tradition in a ridiculous light
The passage I have discussed is one of several
that evince those acute tendencies in the Hellenic
mind which culminated in the movement of the
Sophists For instance the story of the wife of
I n taph er ne s
She chose to save her brother rather
than h er husband or children on the ground that
husband and children might be replaced b ut she
could never have another brother That is a clever
Ionian subtlety ; there is no reason to suppose that
it was invented in the period of the Sophists Or
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”
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,
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,
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.
1
luta ch
P
r
‘
,
Hep!Ti): H podé r ov
Kar ondelas,
2, takes th is q u ite
serious
ly
.
AN C I E NT GREE K HI STORIAN S LECT
56
.
recognised in an ode of Pindar not later than 47 3
and it was then probably a commonplace
B C
We may suspect that we h ave to do with some
publication of the first half of the fifth century
Now there is one feature common to these
passages
Greek ideas and reflexions are trans
ferred to an Eastern setting or connected with
Persian h istory
Their origin was assuredly
Io nian
They betray the nai ve interest of the
Ionians in their masters and show the Greek mind
proj ecting its own reflexions into a world of which
it had only a half—
knowledge with the instinct
of making that world more interesting and sym
path etic
But I m ust return to the scepticism of H erodo
tus I have already observed that in th e historical
post Ho m eric period the mythopoeic faculty of
the Greeks did not slumber but myth now took
th e form of the historical anecdote or as the
Germans call it
historische Novelle
Here
1
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2
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3
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”
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,
1
P y th ii 87 -8
Th e c e ar a usion
.
2
.
.
l
O tanes , in h is d efe nc e
of
d em ocrac
y
,
to the
s
e
e
e
c
r
e
a
a
u
is
e
3
e
er
e
-
v
e e
r
r
e
a
es
e
s
r
r
r
sa
u
ec
e
e
r
e
e
r
a
z er
e ur
r u
e
u
r
.
u
r
,
,
es
e
r
s
ue
e
ce
.
ce
s
.
e
.
e
er
r
c
cr c
e
er
e
cr
e
,
e
,
e
s e
e
e
r
r
,
a
e
s
ru er
x
e
,
u
e
e
e
e
c
r
e
.
e
r
e
c
res
e
u
re c
e
e
ec au s e ,
e
,
ere
s
u
u sa
e
c
e
r
ec
re
e
.
re
c
ec
-
c
er
e
e
r
e
e
th e lot sy ste m d oes not ne c e ssitate
c onst tu t on u nd er
e
r
i
of
by any
m ans an Ath nian o ig in —It m ay b
d that the p ulia
c onj ec tu
p ivil g d p o i tion wh i h O tan s and h is d escend ant w said to have
h l d in th P sian al m s ggest d th id a of t ansfe ri ng th is s ingula ly
H ll ni d is us s i on to S
id wa
xem pt d f om s b
O tan s it is
of the
tho gh h w s th l ad ing o g ni
j tion to th ki ngs b
ig n d all laim
ons p i ac y h
to th
th on wh ic h Da i s s c ed
l no s bj t an anom alo s p osition wh ich in
H w s th s n ith
H en
G e e h ad a so t of pa all l in th m m b sh ip of a d m o a y
b liev d in d em oc ac y and wh n h e did not
th s gg estion th t O t n
f llow c on p i ato s obtain d fo h im self p s onally and hi
on v inc h
fam ily th f eed om wh i c h a d m o a y b tow
I h a e b en h r e pr ssing diss nt f om th vi ew of som critics that
n
th p assag s e num erate d ind i cat sop h istic infl
Athe nian
i
ll
HERO DO TUS
II
57
th ey showed consummate felicity in constr u cting
stories with historical backgroun d historical actors
historical motives and possessing many of th em
a perpetual value because they are seasoned with
worldly wisdom and enshrine some criticism of li fe
These tales diff er from th e old myths not only in
the tenden cy to point a moral but also in the
circumstance that for the most part they do not
involve physical impossibilities though they may
imply highly improbable coincidences or what we
may call psychical or political impossibilities The
work of Herodotus is richly furn ished with these
tales ; he had a wonderful f lair for a good story ;
and the gracious garrulity with which he tells his
toric al an ecdotes is one of the charms which will
secure him readers till the world s end Gibbon
“
happily observed that Herodotus
sometimes
writes for ch ildren and sometimes for ph ilo
sophers
the anecdotes he relates often appeal
to both
He accepts them generally at their face
val ue and most of them h ave been taken as more
or less literally true till very recent times The
story of the intercourse between Croesus and
Solon was rej ected as fiction only because it seemed
impossible to reconcile it with chronology
But
we are now more sceptical about good stories of
th is type and we have come to see how often they
,
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
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’
.
.
,
.
l
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,
l
wv
i
ll
p
i
A
I t m ay b e he d , h o e er , that th s is sti an O en qu e st on
frag m ent of an anon m ou s Dia ogu e, d i sc o ered
G re nf e l and H unt
r e r e sents S o on as i n
on a
he n
(Or yr hyn chu s P apyri , iv No
560
I f this ere S O , th e m ee ting ith
Pe isistratu s ec am e ty rant (
os si e
Croe su s ou d ecom e c h rono ogic a l
1
y
.
b
w l b
l
.
l
p
lyp
v
bl
w
.
by
l
l
.
I i w
w
AN CI EN T GREE K HI ST ORIAN S
58
L ECT
.
are wrought upon or woven into some an cient
m ot
if which is adapted to a historical setting
The tale of the funeral pyre of Croesus sprang
from the burning of the Assyrian god Sandan ; it
was an u p to date ver sion of the legend of Sar
The story of the ring O f Polycrates
d anap alu s
turns on an old motive the finding of something
lost in a fish s belly but its point in connexion with
Polycrates has been explained only the other day
The casting of the ring into the sea was sy m bolic
of thalassocracy ; it was the same mythical ring
as that of M inos which in th e poem of Bacchylides
Theseus sought in the halls of A m phitrite ; its
1
recovery was fatal to the ruler of the seas
Herodotus is the Homer of this later for m of
historical myths in which the supernatural
machinery consisted of oracles or signi ficant
dreams or m arvellous coincidences
They corre
sp on d e d to his waveri ng standard of the credible
and probable which generally excluded what
seemed physically impossible
For i nstance he
positi v ely refuses to b elieve that statues assumed
2
a sitting posture
He duly records the story that
a certain man dived under water a distance of
several miles
It was the private O pinion of
Herodotus that that man arrived in a boat
,
,
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,
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-
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’
,
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,
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,
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3
.
X
‘
S Re in ach ,
e r x es et l H e lle sp ont,
in th e R evu e ar cheologique, ser
1 s qq , 1905
4, vol vi
Th e s m olic m arr ag e of th e Dog e s of Ve nic e
ith th e H ad riati c i s th e s am e stor , and R e in ac h a s o nd s the sam e
e rx e s and th e H e es ont H erod vi i 35)
m otif u nd e r y ing the stor of
(
rac ti se d
and th e r ite
the Ph oc aeans , ih i 16 5, and
th e onians,
Ar istot e . A0 r 23
1
.
.
.
w
pp
.
l
2
v
l
.
86
.
.
y b
.
y
by
p
X
i
y
ll p
.
l
fi
.
by
.
’
.
.
.
3
.
viii
.
8
.
I
.
HERO D OTUS
II
59
Perhaps the story of the m iraculous deliverance of
D elphi from the Persians may be taken to illustrate
the ill d efined limits O f his faith Their oracle
declared to the D elphian priests that the god would
himself provide for the safety of his sanctuary and
when the Persians came they were repelled with
great havoc by lightning and by the fall of huge
boulders from Parnassus Herodotus relates this
without any hint of scepticism though he em
ph asize s the mirac u lous nature of the events Now
you observe that there is nothing i m possible in the
alleged physical occurrences the marvel lies in the
O pportunity of the coincidence and the fulfilment
of the oracular announcement Against a marvel
of this order Herodotus had no prej udice But
another miracle was said to have happened on
the sam e occasion Certain sacred ar m s which
were preserved within the shrine and were too
sacred to be profaned by human touch were
suddenly discovered lying in a heap in fro nt of the
temple A rationalist — Euripides for instance
would find no difficulty in such an occurrence
assuming the fact to be certain
Herodotus
accepts it as a genuine marvel without any
suggestion that human agency notwithstanding
D elphic asseverations to the contrary might have
been concerned in the matter ; and the notable
thing is that he considers it less wonderful than
the intervention of the physical forces which over
whelmed the Persians I f such a phenomenon as
1
-
.
,
,
,
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,
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,
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,
.
1
viii
3 6 39
-
.
.
A N C I E N T G R E E K HI ST O RIAN S
60
LECT
.
the removal of the arms presented itself to us
for criticism — supposing the fact were assured
beyond a doubt and supposing human agency
were absolutely excluded by the circumstances
we should regard it as something incomparably
more extraordinary than the unqu estionably wonder
ful coincidence of the storm of lightning
Here
in fact Herodotus has failed to draw the line at
what is physically impossible The truth is that
his faith and doubt are alike instinctive ; he had
never thought the problem out for himself ; he
had never clearly defined the border between the
d omains of the credible and the incredible
And
so in t his episode he has no sooner given us a
lesson in faith than he relapses into reserve For
there was yet another marvel to be told It was
said that two armed warriors of superhuman
stature pursued the flying Persians and dealt death
among their broken ranks But Herodotus care
fully avoids the responsibility of accepting this
story
He gives it on the authority of the
“
Persians ; he qualifies it by the phrase as I
am informed
and he adds that the D elphians
identified the two warriors with local heroes
The contrast of the nazvete of Herodotus with
his scepticism imparts to his epic a very piquant
quality Credulity alternates with a cautious re
serve whi ch is especially noticeable when he is
,
l
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,
,
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.
.
’
.
,
ll
v b
I d o not ad d th e fa of th e rocks for th is m ight h a e ee n eng ineered
Th e roc ks ere sho n to H erodotus in the te m e of Ath e na Pronai a
this was ust th e sort of e i d enc e h ic h ould im ress him
ch
(
l
w
.
j
w
v
w
pl
w
.
'
p
.
HERO D OTU S
n
61
aware of more than one version of an occurrence
He is an expert in the art of not committing
“
f
himsel
He says in one passage
I am bo und
to state what is said but I am not bound to
1
believe
O f the tale that Z alm oxis lived for
three years in a subterranean chamber b e pro
“
fesses agnosticism ; I do not disbelieve nor do I
absolutely believe it
Occasionally he criticiz es
and rejects a story for instance the charge against
th e A lc m aeonid s of treachery at M arathon ; but
his common practice is to state conflicting accounts
and leave th e matter there This m ethod as it
happens is much m ore satisfactory to a modern
critic than if Herodotus had selected one version
or had attempted to blend different versions to
gether But it shows him in the light of a collector
of historical material and an accomplished artist in
arranging and presenting it rather than as what we
mean by a historian who considers it his business
to sift the evidence and decide if possible between
conflicting accounts
We are often tempted to think of Herodotus as
an Ionian although he was not a native of Ionia
He wrote in I onic ; and he cannot be severed from
the school of the Ionian historians to whom his
work owed a great deal more than appears on the
surface But if he had heard himself described
as an Ionian writer he would have been vastly
indignant
He is at great pains to dissociate
himself from I onia and Ionian interests In his
.
.
,
,
”
.
,
” 2
.
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
,
,
.
.
,
,
.
,
.
.
1
vu .
152
.
2
iv 96
.
.
62
AN CIEN T GRE EK HI ST O RIAN S LECT
.
account of the Ionian revolt and of the part which
the Ionians played in the war with Xerxes he
shows a hardly veiled contempt for a people which
as he says had been thrice enslaved He tells us
that th e name Ionian was one of no great repute
He is careful to record without any comment the
Scythian O pinion that the I onians were the most
1
cowardly and unmanly people in the world
He
takes frequent opportun ities of criticizing ad versely
the views of I onian writers N ow I think we may
say that this antagonistic attitude was not due
entirely or principally to the fact that he belonged
by birth to D orian Halicarnass u s He does indeed
insist on the diff erence of D or ian and Ionian but the
contrast on which his anti Ionian feeling depended
was one within th e Ionian race itself— the distinction
of the Athenians from the Ionians of Asia We saw
that Herodotus was at Athens before he went to
Italy and his connexion with Athens impressed its
mark on his political views
He was a warm
admirer of the Athenians and looked with favour
and enthusiasm on their empire He participated
in their experiment of colonising Th u rii became a
citizen of their daughter city But even if we had
not this external proof of his political sympathy
his work testifies to it abun d antly
The whole
account not only of the M arathonian campaign but
of the war with Xerxes is one that redounds to the
glory of Athens and fiatters Athenian pride It is
in fact written mainly from the Athenian p oint of
,
,
.
,
”
.
,
,
.
.
.
,
-
.
,
.
,
.
,
-
.
,
.
.
,
1
iv 142
.
.
,
ANCIENT GREE K HI STORIAN S LECT
64
.
listened to it is a conjecture of Eduard M eyer
which has some plausibility since we find that a
famous picturesque phrase used by the orator
liken ing the dead soldiers to the spring taken out
of the year was adopted by the historian and
‘
placed in a new setting
Admiration for the Athenian empire in the
third quarter of the fifth century meant admiration
for Pericles the chief inspirer of Athenian policy
and the sympathy of Herod otus with Pericles is
revealed in the single passage in which he mentions
him where he records the anecdote of his mother s
dream that a lion would be born to her
It is
revealed too in sympathy with the Alc m ae onid
3
family
His strong phil Athenian feelings cannot be
disconnected from his tone of prej ud ice and dis
Whe n the
par age m ent in treating the Io nians
immediate danger of Persian subj ection was over
and the Ionian cities which had been leagued with
Athens as an equal were brought to sub m it to
her as a mistress there was little love lost The
Ionian record of the war was one which would
have failed to satisfy Athenian patriots as certainly
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
’
,
2
.
,
,
.
-
.
,
.
,
1
v n
.
v
2
16 2
vi
.
Alc m aeonid
121
.
.
b
It h as e en suggested
th at th is s m ath of H e rod otu s m ay e x ain h is c u riou s treatm ent of
Th e m is tocle s To th s state sm an Athe ns c h ie
o e d th e d ec is e roe
a e d i n th e war , an d th ou gh h i s g ood c ou ns e s ar e re c ognised , h e is
sh e
a so tre ate d in an u n fr iend
s
r t of d etr ac tion , and r e re sente d as an
m trigu er rath er than as a state sm an
Th is ooks as if the m em or of
3
.
71
r e sts
y p
on
y
.
pl y
l
th e
tradition
pl
i
ly pi i
re
fl
istoc
j
ere
i
u st c e
.
l
Afterwa d s
u nd e r
in H erod otus
e c te d
h im
les w
.
a
c ou d ,
r
and
,
fly w
l
l
.
Th e m
.
th is
p
iv
p
l ob
artia
Th u c y d id es
m ad e a
s c u ration
point of
l
y
w
ere
d oing
HER O D O TUS
65
as the Herodotean narrative must have failed to
please the I onians Herodotus expressly argued
“
h
that the At enians were truly the savio u rs of
1
Greece ; but he did more he gave currency and
authority to a story which embodied Athenian
tradition and j ustified Athenian empire and with
such cunning and tact that it has been permanently
effective His admiration for Athens was bound
up with his belief in democratic freedom Until
the P eisistratid s were overthrown he says Athens
was an ordinary undistinguished city ; but when
the Athenians abolished the tyranny and won their
freedom they became by far the first state in
Greece
Herodotus then was a phil Athenian democrat
If the story is true that the Athenians bestowed
on him ten talents (
about
dollars ) in recog
nition of the merits of his work it was a small
remuneration for the service he rendered to the
renown of their city? But that he did this service
does not degrade his work into anything that
could be described as a partisan publication in the
off ensive sense It was pragmatical ; it reflected
the author s political beliefs and exhibited a strong
bias in the preference given to Athenian sources
But it was the work of a historian who cannot help
being partial ; it was not the work of a partisan
who becomes a historian for the sake of his cause
.
,
.
.
,
,
,
2
.
-
.
,
.
’
,
.
.
1
3
i
bl
e
H is
mi
l
,
13 9
2
10 p
1
m xono
et
a s, 26
.
,
1rp6 1 or, v .
'
.
78
.
r ov
Th ere is noth ing inc re d
Hep! r fis Hp066art of h is
ork at Ath ens 0 44 5 D C
i n th e stor th at h e rec ite d
ooks
ork th e n c ons isted of th e ast th ree
P
w
u ta rch ,
'
y
l
p
B
.
w
.
.
.
.
AN C IENT GREE K
66
H I STORIAN S
LECT
.
Something more particular must be said about
the Herodotean story of the Persian invasion A
self fl atter ing version of the war had become a
tradition at Athens We have an earl y sketch of
it in a poetical form in the P er sae of Aeschylus
but Herodotus was probably the first
47 2
(
to write it down in a historical form some twenty
years later Oral traditions (
gathered at Athens
Sparta D elphi and elsewhere ) appear profusely in
his work as every one knows But he could not
have constructed his history of the course of the
war from oral traditions alone or composed s u ch
a narrative of events in which he was too young
to take part thirty y ears or so afterwards wit hout
the help of some earlier record W e have seen
that he depended on H ecatae u s for Egypt though
this was j ust one of the portions of his work where
autopsy and information collected orally might
There is little doubt that H ec ataeus
h ave su fficed
was his main g u ide for early oriental history and
that the same writer was also used for the des cr ip
tions of Scythia and Libya along with other
geographical works of the Ionian school When
we come to the invasio n of D arius and Xerxes we
find as we might expect clear indications that
Herodotus here too had a written guide Through
out the narrative in the last three Books of the
events after M arathon to the end of the second
invasion the historian has naturally to pass back
wards and forwards from the Persians to the
Greeks
N ow there is a remarkable contrast
.
-
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
.
,
HERO D OTUS
67
between the character of the narrative when the
writer takes us to Susa or to the Persian ca m p
and when he transports us to the cities or tents of
the Greeks In the accounts of what the Greeks
did we are constantly confronted with more than
one story representi ng v arious oral traditions which
reflect different local interests
But when we
follow the movements of the Persians we have a
continuous chronological narrative by no means
always credible but all of a piece and marked by
enumerations and details which point to a more or
less contemporary written source and a source of
which Persian not Greek history was formally the
subject This source contributes the main thread
of the narrative round which Herodotus has
wrought all th e additional supplementary and
illustrative material he managed to collect
The
chronology of Persian events after M arathon is
orderly and distinct contrasting with the u n
certainties which beset the digressions on Greek
history such as that on the Spartan kings
Cleom enes and D emaratus
Now we know of a
history of the Persian war prior to Herodotus
the book of D ionysius of M iletus
I spoke of
it in the last lect u re and I also pointed ou t
that the Persian history of Charon of Lamp
may not im probably have come down
sacu s
to the invasion of Xerxes
Either of these
books would satisfy the condition that the
war was treated as an episode in Persian
not Greek history so that it is not unlikely
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
AN CIENT GR EEK HI STORIAN S LECT
68
.
that one of these may have been the so u rce of
Herodotus
Into the warp thus fu rnished by an older writer
is wrought a woof of Athenian tradition varied
here and there by tiss u e from other sources And
it is n oteworthy how in the last three Books com
prising the invasion of Xerxes the i m minence of
a di vine direction of human aff airs is strongly
accentuated The sceptical tone is less apparent
here than in other parts of the work From the
begin ning of the seventh Book the dominant note
is changed at least this is the impression I receive ;
the atmosphere becomes charged with a certain
solemnity ; it is I think we might say rather
Athenian than Ionian
Is this difference due
to the influence of th ose Athenian dramas which
had glori fied the subj ect the tragedies of P hry
n i e hus and Aeschylus ?
The catastrophe which b efals the Persian ex
p ed ition is not conceived as the work of j ealous
gods annoyed by the conspicuous wealth or success
of mere mortals It is rather a divine punishment
of the insolence and rashness that are o ften born of
prosperity This is the Aeschylean doctrine
1
.
,
.
,
,
.
.
,
,
,
.
,
.
.
Z
TO L Ko
eu s
¢p
1
Aa/O Tfj s
I
m i
ov u or wv
p
S o Leh m ann H au t
-
.
'
in
th e h
évreo Tw
Th e re
ad
i ni t , 46
.
2
.
e r s
s
r
s
e
u
u
c
r
ad
u rc e
To w
e
f m epx dlw rwv dy a v
i flv vog
is
littl
e
500-490
rs
u
e
r
r
Bpi
e i
e
B c
a
vid
.
f e w d ates
Diony sius
=
ts
t
z
for
e nc e
B ook
a
s ou rc e of
this
l y
Ch rono og
we get s uggest a Persian
S ee vi 18, 42 ad ini t 43
s V
.
VI .
.
in i t
P er sae 827
.
.
In
Agam
.
749,
Ae sc h ylu s
‘
3,001 o y é pwv M yos) th at
a la
i ar os é v (
a
h
w
(
eads to u na
ea sa e woe
ne c e ssar i
'
ly l
3
'
-
isto y of th y a
i s onspic o s ly ab sent b t th
o
Ch a on o
h i to y a th i
(
kind
A
'
pp
bl
.
w
j
v lga doct in
ino d in t ly in eased
re e c ts
ealth ,
the
r
u
a e
r
r
cr
e
,
HERO D OTU S
11
Z
eus
is
a
69
visits h e avi ly
se l f
glo iou s sp irit v au l ts
j u d ge
All w h ose
wh o
r
-
i
too h gh
.
This Athen ian in fluence in the last Books of
Herodotus accords with m y co nj ecture that Athens
was his headquarters dur ing a part of the te n years
or so which elapsed between his banishment and
his sailing for Italy
Herodotus then made a considerable use of
older writers — of whom he only names H e c atae u s
and usually for the purpose of h inting something
uncomplimentary As the works of these writers
have perished it is very difficult to form a fair
estimate of the achievements of Herodotus himself
as a historical investigator— apart from his tra ns
c end e nt gifts as an artist and man of letters
His
great service consisted probably in the collection
of unwritten material concerning modern Greek
history ; this floating matter he wrought with
masterly skill into a framework of facts constructed
by predecessors His maxims of historical criticism
may be set down as three (
1) Suspect superhuman
and miraculous occurrences which contradict
ordinary experience But this in his application
.
1
,
.
,
.
.
,
.
A
,
lb y
p
w
y w l
v
v b v y
l
w l
v b
b
p b
v
p
B
ou d h a e
orks on h istor
plete i rar of G reek rose
ee n
er
m u c h arger
sm al in 4 50 B C , and i t
ould not h a e
ee n
er
in 43 0 B C
It is d if c ult to s u
ose th at H erod otu s
ou d not h a e
een
ac u ainte d
ee n
u lish e d , or
ith all th e h istoric a iteratur e th at h ad
q
th at th e orks of Diony s m s and Ch aron c ou d h a e e sc a e d h im
esid e s
1
b
c om
v y
.
.
w
l
.
.
fi
w
pp
ly
w
ll
i
w
pl
pl
w b
bl
l
.
h om h e re fer s i s S c y lax (
h istor an to
H ec ataeu s th e on
iv
b ut
h e m entions h im a s an ex orer an d n ot as an au thor th ou gh o i ou s
h i s rief ac c ou nt of th e e x oration is take n from th e r e ort of S c y lax
Cou d h e h a e fai e d to kno th e ook of th is Carian wr ter on H e rac leid e s
art
a ed
I t IS re m ar ka e th at h e ign ore s th e
of M as a ?
see S osy lu s f rag m e nt, m e ntione d a o e
H e rac le id e s of Arte m isium (
121
Th e ge ogra h ic a
orks of th e onian s
H e rac le id e s is m entione d
b
l
yl
v
l
v
are r efe rre d
to i n iv 36
.
.
.
.
.
,
i
p
lw
p
p
bv
ly
.
pl y by
bv p
I
,
.
ANC IENT GREEK HI STORIAN S LECT
70
.
of it leaves a wide room for portents and it does
not cover oracles and dreams (2) When you are
confr onted by conflicting evidence or diff ering
versions of the same event keep an O pen mind ;
d
h
i
But
this
oes
not
save
m
au dz alter a m
r tem
a
p
from a biassed acceptance of Athenian tradition
3 ) Autopsy and fir st hand oral information are
(
superior to stories at second hand whether written
1
“
i
or oral
This tends to take the na ve form I
know for I was there myself and it placed the
historian at the mercy of the vergers an d guides in
Egyptian temples
I may illustrate by a couple of examples how
Herodotus was sometimes unfortu nate in his in
f ormation gathered ou the S pot
When he visited
E gyp t he saw on the great Pyramid inscriptions
which disappeared in the M iddle Ages Probably
they were of religious import appropriate to a
royal tomb But Herodotus te lls us that they
enumerated the sums of money which were ex
pended ou the onions and leeks consumed by the
workmen who built the pyramid This was the
interpretation with which the guide satis fied the
2
Greek traveller s curiosity
The other instance
,
,
.
,
'
.
.
-
,
,
.
”
,
,
.
.
.
,
.
.
’
.
ii 99 I h av littl d o bt th at H e odot visited and
exam in d th
battl fi ld of Plata a O d iffic lti in c onst cting
th battle (l id at d by G nd y Woodh o
and Ma an) f om his
d
iption a e not n obj tion W m ay m m b that th ac o nt of
th e b attl of T a i m n by Polybi us wh o h ad vi it d th plac and was
of m il ita y
c ienc
l nd s itself to d iff e ent int preta tions
a m ast
Th f atu s of th e Pa of Th rm opylae as d sc ib d by H odotus
og nis d by any t avell
c an b
to day
b ut h e ca n h ar dly have b een
1
Com
pare
e
,
e
.
e uc
e sc r
,
.
s
e
ru
e,
e
Wied e m ann
,
ad
.
e
e
-
inste ad of E
.
H er ii 125
.
e
er
e
.
W
.
r
c
e
u
e
er
r
er
.
e
s
e
r
.
S ee
re
r
c
e
ss
th e r e , for h e orie nts i t N S
2
e
.
ru
re
es
u
u se ,
,
re
e rec
ur
.
us
r
,
e
s
r
er
e
e
ec
u
e
e
a
r
e
.
e
r
e
.
e
e
e
e
g
.
er
72
AN CIENT GREEK HI S TO RIAN S LECT
.
ment of the impossible numbers of the army of
Xerxes exhibits an in competence which is almost
incredible and is alone en ough to stamp Herodotus
as more of an epic poet than a historian
It
matters not whether he worked out the arithmetic
for himself or accepted it entirely on authority ;
this is a case in which to accept is as heinous as to
invent Heinous for a historian ; and if we j udge
Herodotus by the lowest standard as a historian of
a war this case invalidates his claim to competence
But as an epic story teller he escapes triumphantly
His catalogue of the Persian host is a counterpart
to the Catalogue of the I liad
‘
.
.
,
.
-
.
"
[ GOO V 8 di s 31
’
L
dordbs
’
p é vm s
em a r a
‘
Ka ‘
r
ékefas
.
His incompetence in military matters is shown in
another way in his account of the campaign of
Thermopylae and Artemisium The key to their
actions lay — and it req u ired no technical training
or experience to discern this — in th e close con
n ex ion and interdepe ndence of the Persian land
army and the Persian fleet a fact which governed
the Greek measures for defence
Herodotus
though he mentions several things which imply
this and enable us more or less to penetrate the
strategy of the combatants fa ils completely to
realise the situation and treats the naval and the
land operations as if they were independent
In his relation of the Persian war Herodotus
does not neglect the chronology and it is perhaps
as satisfactory as we could expect
But it may
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
.
HERO D OTU S
II
73
fa irly
be questioned whether the credit for this is
not to be imputed to an earlier writer — D io nysius
or Charon— whom he had the discretion to follow
It is significant that he does not give any formal
date which a Greek reader could easily in terpret
until he m entions almost by the way that the
Persian invasion of Attica occ u rred in the archon
ship of C alliad es
But while chronology fares
pretty well in the last three Books the whole work
shows that while the author copied the dates which
his sources supplied he never attempted to grapple
with the chronological diffi culties of Greek history
although so many of the episodes which he related
raised the problem of synchronizing Hellenic tradi
tion with oriental records We have no reason to
suppose that he avoided the problem because he
j udged it insol u ble ; his indifference to it is another
manifestation of his epic quasi historical mind
The fir st phase of Greek historiography culmi
nates and achieves its glory in Herodotus He
reflects its features — its eager research into geo
graphy and ethnograp h y (
the indispensable ground
work of history ) and its predominant interest in
the East He adopts from H ec atae u s a critical
attitude towards the ancient myths aided by a
rudimentary comparative mythology But these
.
,
,
,
l
.
,
,
,
,
.
-
.
,
.
,
.
,
.
l
y
by
y
y
r efe r ence to th e
e ar of Mar ath on ,
H e sig na i ses th e e ars 490-481
E e n if h e
b ut h e d oes not m e nt on th e e on m ou s arc h on of th at ear
had d one so a read er ould h a e re quir e d a i st of Att c arc h ons , i n ord e r
H e rod otus d oes not as s s t h i s r ead e rs
to fo lo h is d ate s inte l ge nt
Th u c d id e s
oint h ic h th e c ou d rea ise
ac k f rom a x e d
r ec koning
er e e ntir e
in th e air , and h e d ated
ith ou t su c h a oint d ates
saw th at
e ar of th e Pe o onn e s an war
rst
ac k ar d from th e
1
by
b
l w
w
w
b
i
w
li
fi
p
fi y
p y
v
ly
p w
w
l
i
.
y
lp
ly
i
l
l
.
.
i
.
v
y
74
AN CIENT GREEK HI STORIAN S
m or n
elements are transfigu red by the magic of his epic
art and th e spell of a higher historical idea He
was the H omer of th e Persian war and that war
originally inspired him
His work presents a
picture of sixth century civilisation ; and it is
also a universal history in so far as it gathers the
greater part of the known world into a narrative
which is concentrated upon a single issue It is
fortunate for literature that he was not too critical ;
if his criticism had been more penetrating and less
nai ve he could not have been a second Homer He
belonged entirely in temper and mentality to the
period before the sophistic illumination which he
lived to see but not to understand Before his
death the first truly critical historian of the world
had begun to compose O ur attention will next
be claimed by Thucydides
.
,
.
.
' '
,
.
,
.
,
.
.
LE CTURE III
TH
1 H is life
.
U C YD I DES
and
the g r owth o
h
f is
wor k
T H U C YD I DE S belonged by descent to the princely
family of Thrace into which M iltiades the hero
of M ar a
thon had married He was thus a cousin
of the statesman Cimon and he inherited a rich
estate with gold mines in Thrace And so while
he was an Athenian citizen and connected with a
distinguished family of Athens he had an inde
pendent p zed a ter r e in a foreign country His
mind was moulded under the influence of that
intellectual revolution which we ass oc iat e with
the comprehens i ve name of th e Sophists the
illumination which Was flooding the educated
world of Hellas with the radiance of reason
Without accepting the positive docf f ines of any
particular teacher he learned the greatest lesson
of these thinkers : he learned to consider and
criticiz e facts unprej udiced by authority and
tradition
He ca me to be at home in the
“
way of thinking which analysed
m odern
politics and ethic s and applied logic to every
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
'
.
,
.
,
,
,
,
75
AN CIENT GREEK H I STORIAN S LECT
76
.
thing in the world We might illustrate how
intense and deep reaching the S ophistic move
ment was in the third quarter of the fifth century
by pointing to the diff erence between Herodotus
and Thucydides If you took up the two works
without knowing the dates of their composition
you would think there might be a hundred years
development between them But then consider
the difference between S ophocles and Euripides
Thucydides must have been at least twenty five
years old some thin k he was as much as forty
when the Peloponnesian war broke out in 431
B C
At the very beginning he formed the
resol ution to record it and in the first year s of
the war at least the composition of the history
was nearly contemporary with the events
In
4 24 B C he was elected to the high o ffice of a
strategos and appointed to command in Thrace ;
and the loss of Amphipolis led to his c ondem na
tion and banishment For twenty years he did
not see Athens and while he probably lived for
the most part on h is Thracian estate he also
travelled to collect material for his work
It
seems certain that he visited Sic ily for his
narrative of the Athenian expedition could not
have been written by one who had not seen
1
Syr ac u se with his own eyes
After the end of
the war he was allowed to return to Athens in
by the decree of O enob iu s) He did not
404 B C (
.
-
,
,
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.
.
-
,
,
.
.
,
,
,
.
.
.
.
,
,
,
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,
.
.
1
That h e knew S parta is
134 4
.
.
.
.
a
l
egi tim ate
inf erence from i 10 2, and
.
.
III
THUCYD I D E S
77
die before 3 9 9 B C ; perhaps he was no longer
alive in 3 9 6 B C and he left his book u nfinish ed
It is evident how these biographical facts and
they are a lmost all we know about the man bear
upon his historical work His family connexion
at Athens provided him perhaps with exceptional
facilities for obtaining authentic information while
his military training and experience qualified him
to be the historian of a war His second home in
Thrace gave him an interest independent of
Athens and helped him to regard the Athenian
empire with a certain detachment which would
have been less easy for one who was a pure
blooded citiz en and had no home outside Attica
His banishment operated in the same direction
and aff orded him opportunities for intercourse
with the antagonists of his country
The in
tellectu al movement which invaded Athens when
he was a young man was a condition of his mental
growth ; if he had belonged to an earlier genera
tion he could not have been Thucydides
B u t if all these circumstances helped and con
d ition e d the achievements of a profoundly original
m in d which always thought for itself we must
seek the stimulus which aroused the historical
faculty of Thucydides in— the Athenian empire
If it was the wonder of the Greek rep u lse of the
Persian host} that inspired the epic spirit of
.
.
1
.
.
.
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
.
,
.
.
,
,
,
.
1
fl i ting sto i s a to th m ann and th pla of his
wa
notaph
hown
t
H i tom b wh i h m y h av b n a
plac of th fam ily of h is kin m an Cim on nea
i n th b yi ng—
Th ere
w
ere c on
s
d eath
e
Ath e ns ,
the Melitid gate
.
,
ur
.
r e
c
s
a
c
e
e
e
er
e
ee
e
ce
,
s
ce
s
a
s
,
r
78
AN CIENT GRE EK HI ST O RIAN S L
ECI‘
‘
.
Herodotus it was the phenomenon of the Empire
of Athens a new thing in the history of Hellas
an empire governed by a democracy a new thing
in the history of the world — th at captured the
cooler but intense interest of Thucydides He
did not take up his pen to celebrate ; his aim was
to understa nd — to observe critically how that
empire behaved in the struggle which was to test
its powers It has not I think been sufficiently
realised what an original stroke of geni u s it was
to form the idea of recording the history of the
war at the very moment of its outbreak Con
temporary history in the strictest meaning of the
term was thus initiated
Thucydides watched
the events for the purpose of recording the m ;
he collected the material while it was fresh from
the making Further he designed a history which
should be simply a history of the war and of the
relations of the militant states which should con
fine itself to its theme and not deviate into
geography or anthropology or other things Thus
“
he was the founder of political history in the
S pecial sense in which we are accustomed to use
the term
Widely divergent vie ws are held as to the way
in which the work of Thucydides was constructed
and the stages by which it reached its final though
incomplete state
This question is not one of
merely meritorious curiosity which may be left
to the commentator as his exclusive concern ; it
affects our general conception of the historian s
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
.
.
.
,
,
,
.
”
.
.
’
tr
ier
AN C IENT GREEK HI ST O RIAN S
80
.
his book was to be simply a history of the war
of ten years The course of the Sicilian expedi
tion began a new war which he determined also
to record as a chronologically separate episode
Then the c atastrophe of 404 B C set in a new
li ght the significance of all that had happened
since the original outbreak of hostilities in 43 1 B C
and imparted to the whole series of events a uni ty
of meaning which they would hardly have acquired
if the struggle had been terminated in 404 B C not
by the fall of Athens but by a second edition of
the Fifty Years Peace Hence Thucydides rose
to the larger conception of producing a history of
the whole period of twenty seven years
Accordingly he found on his return to Athens
that h e had three things to do
He had to
compose the history of the ambiguous interval
between the Fifty Years Peace and the Sicilian
war Secondly he had to work up the rough
copy and material of the last ten years This was
done fully and triumphantly for the Sicilian
episode but of the rest we only possess the nu
revised draft of the years 4 12 and 411 known as
Book v i i i for which perhaps in respect to its
literary shape and certainly in respect to its
matter (
by means of supplem entary information
procurable at Athens ) mu ch had to be done
In the third place it was desirable and even
necessary to make some additions and alterations
in the original completed but still u npublished
.
.
,
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,
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’
.
-
.
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’
,
.
.
1
,
,
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,
,
,
.
,
,
,
1
,
p s b efo
Perha
re
his
retu rn
.
THUCY D I DE S
III
81
history of the first ten years so as to bring it
internally as well as externally into the light of the
higher unity This was a natural thought and it
appears to me the only hypothesis that explains
the facts without constr aint
,
.
,
1
.
H is p r incip les
2
.
f
o
histor iogr ap hy
accu r acy
and r elevance
In his Introduction Thuc ydides announces a
new conception of historical writing He sets up
a new standard of truth or accurate reproduction
of facts and a new ideal of historical research ;
j udged by which he finds Herodotus and the
—
Ionian histor ians wantingl H e c ond emi is them
“
expressly for aiming at providing
good read
ing as we should say rather than facts and
for narrating stories the trut h of which cannot
possibly be tested He does not seek himself to
furnish entertainment or to win a popular success
but to construct a record which shall be per
He warns
m anently valuable because it is true
h is readers that they will find nothing mythical
in his work
He saw as we see that the
of whom
m ythical element pervaded Herodotus (
evidently he was chiefly thinking ) no less than
Homer
His own experience in ascertaining
as nothing else
c on temp or ar y facts taught him
co u ld do how soon and how easily events are
.
,
,
“
’
w
u
”
,
,
,
,
.
,
2
.
.
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
1
2
ppendi
I vert to this im portant point in Lectu
c tiv
S ee A
I nst
ru
x
e
.
.
re
re
V
III
.
G
82
AN C IENT GREEK HI STORIAN S
LEGl‘
.
wont to pass into the borders of m yth ; he learned
thereb y 11
1
6 3 631
; e
fiec ti v e
n
i on
regard to historic alm
It was i ndeed of
i mportance for the future of history
that Thucydides conceived the new idea of re
cording the war at its commencement It made
all the diff erence to his work that he formed the
resolve in 43 1 B C and not after the war was over
Writing the history of the present is always a
very diff erent thing from writing the history of
the distant past The history of the distant past
depends entirely on literary and documentary
sources the history of the present always involves
But the
u nwritten material as well as doc u ments
difference was much greater in the days of
Thucydides than it is now To day a writer
sitting down to compose a history of his own
time wo u ld depend mainly on written material
— on o fficial reports o fficial documents of various
kinds and on the daily press He would supple
ment this so far as he could by information
derived personally from men of aff airs or by his
own experience if he had witnessed or taken part
in public events ; but the main body of his work
would depend on written sources The ancient
historian; on the contrary in consequence of the
comparative pa u city of offi cial reports and the
absence of our modern organiz ation for collecting
and circulating news would have to be his own
j ournalist and do all the labo u r of obtaining
facts orally from the most likely sources ; and
W
.
.
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.
.
.
.
-
.
,
,
,
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,
,
,
.
,
,
THU CY D I D E S
111
83
his success might largely depend on accidental
facilities
His work would rest mainly on in
formation obtained orally by his own inqu iries
supplemented by such documents as were avail
able s u ch as the texts of treaties or o fficial
instructions or letters ; whereas the m odern work
is based principally on printed or written informa
tion supplemented by such private information as
may be accessible It is clear that the an cient
conditions made the historian s task more d ifficult
an d
demanded from him greater e n ergy and
initiative Few things would be more interesting
than a literary diary of Thucydides telling of his
interviews with his informan ts and showing his
ways of collecting and sifting his material But
it was part of his artistic method to cover up all
the traces of his procedure in his finished narrative
He had to compare and criticiz e the various
accounts he received of each transaction ; but his
literary art required that he should present the
final conclusions of his research without i ndicating
I t is probable that he
divergences of evidence
suppressed entirely details abo u t which he could
not satisfy himself
He was very chary of
mentio ning reports or allegations concern ing which
he felt in doubt ; in the few cases in which h e
disclaims certainty we may suppose that he
1
accepted the statement as probable
He does
not name his inform ants ; nor does he even tell
.
,
,
,
.
’
,
.
,
.
.
,
.
.
.
1
For instance
Aé rer ai ), i 118 3
Nic 1as , vii 86
‘
.
.
.
:
of
; of
th e
an s
iv
th e m ot
w
er
es of
of
th e orac
l
to th e
e
Arc h id am us , ii
.
18 5 ;
.
p
bs
a
S arta ns (
of th e e n d of
84
AN CIENT GREEK HI S TORIAN S LECT
.
us on what occasions he was himself an eye witness
of what he describes
We may make guesses
but we can only S peak with assurance of the
O perations which he conducted as strategos
We are able however to gain a slight glimpse
into the historian s workshop because some parts
of his work have been left incomplete
The
eighth Book is only a preliminary draft In it
we find accounts emanating from diff erent inform
ants Athenian and Peloponnesian wr itten out so
as to form a continuous narrative yet containing
contradictions as to matters of fact as well as differ
e mees in tendency
I t is possible for instance to
detect that some of the Peloponnesian informants
were favourable to Astyoch u s the Lacedaemonian
commander and others were not It is evident
that we have material which has only been pro
visionally sifted Again the texts of the three
suc cessive treaties of alliance between Persia and
2
Sparta are given ver b atim and if we consider the
transitory significance of the first two it seem s
improbable that Thucydides intended to reproduce
th em in ex tenso in his final draft They were
m aterial— material according to a plausible con
j ectu re furnished by Alcibiades These facts and
the unsatisfactory nature of the account of the
oligarchic revolution as compared with the finished
portions of the work confirm what the style and
the absence of speeches had long ago s uggested
-
,
.
.
,
,
’
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,
,
,
1
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,
,
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,
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,
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
,
,
1
l p l s a ti l m ntion d in th B ibliog aph y
vii i 18 37 58
S e e H o za fe
’
r
c e
e
e
e
2
.
,
,
.
r
.
m
THUCYD I D ES
85
that Book v i i i was a first draft which if the
writer had lived wo u ld have appeared in a very
diff erent shape
In the fifth Book it m ay also be shown that
there was still revision to be done though this
section was in a more advanced state than Book
Here we find a whole series of docu m entary
V 111
texts Now it was not in accordance with the
artistic method of Thucydides or of ancient his
torians in general to introduce into the narrative
matter heterogeneous in style ; and it is almost
incredible that he would have ad m itted texts not
written in Attic Greek We must I think con
elude that we have here material which was to be
wrought in during a final revision
In the finished part of the history we can some
times penetrate to the source of information It
is easy to see that h e con sulted Plataeans as to the
siege of Plataea and that he received information
from Spartans as well as from Athenians about
the episode of Pylos and S phac teria We can
sometimes divine that he has derived h is state
ments from the O fficial instructions given to m ilitary
commanders ; and it has been acutely shown that
h is enumeration of the allies of the two O pposing
powers at the beginning of the war was based on
the instrument of th e Thirty Years Peace Some
times the formulae O f decrees or treaties peer
through the Th u cydidean summary
.
,
,
.
,
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,
,
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,
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,
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’
1
.
2
.
1
Moll nd o ff
By Wilam owit —
Moll nd o ff
Wil m owit —
Cp ii 24 ; iv 16
Bibli og aph y )
.
see
(
.
.
.
r
.
r
e
z
a
.
z
e
r
,
Die Thu kydi d es—
legen d e
ANCIENT GREEK HI S T ORIAN S
86
LECT
.
We have then to take the finished product
which Thucydides furnishes on trust We have
not any considerable body of independent evidence
for testi ng his accuracy but so far as we can test
it by the chance testimonies of original documents
in those parts which
he comes out triumphantly (
he completed ) and there can be no question that
the stress which he laid on accuracy was not a
phrase
The serious criticisms which can be
brought against him in regard to facts concern
not what he states b u t what he omits to state
For instance the important measure which Athens
adopted in 4 24 B C of raising the tribute of the
subj ect states is passed over entirely though it is
a pertinent fact in the sto ry of the war ; we have
learned it in recent years by the discovery of parts
of the stone decree We cannot discern his reasons
for recounting some passages of military history at
great length and passing over others (
such as the
,
.
,
,
,
,
1
.
.
,
.
.
,
.
S om e
v y
ly
b
b ut to er e ar sc ri es For
instan ce , An d oc id e s in i 5 1, Meth one for Methana i n iv 45 (
c p Wi a
m owitz-Molle nd orff , 0p
I t is un qu estion a e th at h e m akes gra e
to ogra h ic a m s ta ke s in h is ac c ount of th e e isod e of P os-S p h ac teria
H e h as c om ete
m i sc onc e i e d the siz e of th e e ntranc e s to th e b ay , and
h e gi e s th e e ngth of S p h ac ter ia as 15 sta d e s , h ereas it is rea l 24
Th ese errors h a e le d G r u nd to d e n that Thu c d ides h ad e er isited
1
errors are
d ue
not to
th e
au th or
.
p
p
l i
pl ly
l
v
v
p
v
bl
l
v
.
.
.
.
yl
.
w
y
ly
v
.
y
y
v
ow
wh o h as sh own that th e wh ol na ati ve
th e s pot ; w hile R M B
(
is oth wise in a o d anc w ith th top og ph y ) th inks that his m asu e
My vi w is that h fi t w ot th sto y f om nfo
m nt w e w ong
m ation s ppli d by y wi tn s s wh o gav
h im a g n al th o gh pa tly
and th at h e aft wa d s t t d i t on th s pot
inacc at id ea of th pla
o s of
h
vi s th
b t om itt d to
and p ob ably add d loc al to
W h av a s om wh at s im ila a in th d s iption of N w Ca
di tanc
It is ind eed p ossible th atth e bl nd r
th g by Polyb i s ( e b low p
in th l ngth of th i sland m ay hav b n xagge ated by a sc ib e s p n
pos d to c onf sion W th ( o ) —Th topograp h y of th
wa
Fo
idat d by G n d y
s iege of Plataea h as b een l
.
cc
er
e
s
er
r
u
e
ur
a
r
.
e
e
e
se
es ,
e
s ex
e
se
,
e
e
e
err r
r
e
e cr
e
r
u
es e
re
r
e
u
e
u
e uc
r
i
.
e
e
er
r
r
e
r
e
u
r c
,
e
e
er
uc
e
r
e
ce,
e
u
rs
es e
rr
e
ra
e
e-
e
e
e
e
e,
e
x
s
e
e
e
r
.
r
s
u rr
.
i
e
ee
LS
r
ru
r
r
e
e
L€ .
.
’
e
.
e
AN CIENT GREEK H I STORIAN S LECT
88
.
events recorded He disdains personal gossip and
anecdotes ; he had no use for the spicy memoirs O f
Ion and S te sim b r otu s He rigidly abstains from
dropping any information about the private life of
Pericles Cleon or any other politician ; and the
exception which he makes in the case of Alcibiades
only serves to show the reason for the rule because
those sides of the life of Alcibiades which Th u c y
d id es notices had in his view distinct political
conseque nces in determin ing the attitude of the
Athenians towards him Further he excludes the
inter nal history of the states with whose political
inter relations he is concerned except when the
internal aff ected directly or was bound up with
the external as in the case of the plague and of
th e domestic sed itiou s
He does not give any
information abo u t the political parties at Athens
though some of his statements imply their exist
ence till he comes to the oligarchical revolution
His outlook as W ilam owitz has O bserved is not
bounded by the Pnyx but by the Empire
There are of course digressions in Thucydides
but with hardly an exception they are either
closely relevant or introduced for some special
purpose
The history of the growth of the Athenian
empire is in form an excursus ; but we might
fairly say that it properly belongs to the pro
legomena ; it is distinctly relevant to the subj ect
of the book and had the special purpose O f supple
m e nting and correcting H e llanic u s
The digression
.
.
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,
.
THU CYD I D E S
111
89
on the fo rtunes of Pausanias is also a relevant
though certainly not necessary explanation of the
Athen ian demand that the Lacedaemonians should
expel a pollution ; but the account which follows
of the later career of Them i stocles is wholly
unconnected with the Peloponnesian war
I
will however show hereafter that the author
had a special motive in introducing it
The
valuable chapter on early Athens with its ar c h ae o
logical evidence is strictly to the point for its
purpose is to illustrate the historian s acute remark
that the distress O f the country people at coming
to live in the city was due to habits derived from
the early history of Attica A sketch of the early
history of Sicily was almost indispensable for the
elucidation of the narrative ; a knowledge of the
island and its cities could not be take n for granted
in the Athenian public The description of the
O d rysean kingdom of S italc es was u n questionably
due to the author s personal interest in Thrace ;
but it had the obj ect of suggesting a contrast
between the power and resources of Thrace and
Scythia with those of the Greek states
The story of the fall of the Athenian tyrants
in Book
which is an excursus in the true
(
sense of the word was in troduced to correct popular
errors The other passage in which Thucydides
seems for a moment non Thucydidean is where
he sketches the history of the fair of D elos quotes
,
,
,
,
.
.
,
1
,
,
’
.
.
2
’
.
,
.
-
,
1
note s
2
p
b
A
art of i t
een
u
th e n in
ii 96 -7 ;
.
wo l d
Cp
.
ii
.
u se
29
.
.
natu ra
lly h av
pp
e a
eare d
in
a
footnote , h ad foot
90
AN CIEN T GREE K
H ISTO RIA N S
L
EGI‘.
from a Homeric hymn and deviates into the
history of culture I cannot help suspecting that
here too he is correcting s ome current misappre
h en sion
If he may legitimately be criticiz ed for
turning aside from his subj ect to correct errors
which may seem trivial enough and if he is some
times reprimanded for having elsewhere captiously
noted a couple of small blunders in Herodotus it
must be remembered that it was of importance
to illustrate his doctrine that tradition cannot be
taken on trust and that the facile methods of
current historiography inevitably led to inaccuracy
The digressions then in Thucydides which can
fairly be called digressions are diff erent in character
from the digressions and amplitudes of Herodotus
The critic D ionysius considered it a point of
inferiority in Thucydides as compared with Hero
d otu s that he pursued his subj ect steadily and
kept to his argu m ent without pausing by the way
and providing his readers wit h variety ; and he
“
s u pposed that i n the two or three places where
the historian did digress his motive was to relieve
the narrative by a pleasant pause The criticis m
would have been more elucidating if D ionysius had
pointed out that while Herodotus was influenced by
the epic the artistic method of Thucydides must
rather be compared with that of the drama Thu cy
d id es adheres as closely to his argument as a tragic
poet and such variety as was secured in tragedy
by the interj ection of choral odes he obtains by the
speeches which he intersperses in the narrative
,
.
.
,
,
,
.
.
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
.
AN CIENT GREEK HI STORIAN S LECT
92
.
detailed explanation and analysis of th e commercial
basis on which the Athenian power rested and of
the mercantile interests of other states which were
affected and endangered by her empire
It is
however only in quite recent times that economical
and commercial factors in historical develop
ment h ave begun to receive their due and
perhaps it may be said rather more than their
due They have come so much to the front that
some writers are tempted to explain all historical
phenomena by economic causes This illustrates
h ow the tendencies of the present react upon our
conceptions of the past
These factors of such
immense importance in the present age certainly
did not play anything like the same part in the
ancient world and if the ancient h istorians con
sid erab ly underrated them we may easily fall into
the error of o v errating them
We m ay be sure
that the interests of Athens presented themselves
to statesmen as to Thucydides primarily under the
political and not the economical point of view
Thucydides created political history ; economic
history is a di scovery of the nineteenth century
Perhaps the gravest accusation which has been
brought against the competency of Thucydides is
that he misunderstood if he did not intentionally
misrepresent th e causes of th e Peloponnesian war
The charge has been formulated and pressed in
different ways by a German and by an English
1
scholar
Their indictments do not appear to me
H Ni
d F M Co fo d
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THU CYD I D E S
11
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93
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to be successful The historian s account which
can only be refuted by proofs of internal disc rep
ancy or of insufficiency seems to be both con
sistent and with certain reserves adequate
It will not be amiss to make a preliminary
observation on two words which Thucydides
uses in the sense of cause — a in a and wpé d c
has almost the same history as the Latin
a iTla
equivalent canssa Its proper sense was griev
“
ance or ground of blame
charge and in
1
Thucydides it generally either means this or
even when we can most appropriately translate it
by cause impli es a charge or imputation
p6
c
b a q is an alleged reason which may be either
true or false ; ultimately it became virtually
restricted to a false or minor reason and S O
equivalent to
pretext
I n Thucydides it is
not so restricted ; he employs it in both ways
And from meaning an alleged reason it is evident
how easily it could come to m ean a reason
whether alleged or not ; in other words a
“
motive or an occasion so that here it ap
“
cause
rox im ate d very closely to the sense of
p
This various use of the word does not imply any con
“
fusion of thought ; we use the word reason with
similar elasticity ; the context decides the sense
When a war breaks out there are two things to
be explained which must be kept distinct wh y the
aggressors go to war at all and why they go to
war at the time they actually do This distinction
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But c p iv 87 4
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AN CIENT GREEK H I S TORIAN S
94
LECl‘
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is crucial for instance in the case of the outbreak
of the Franco Prussian war of 187 0 In som e
cases the ans wer to both qu estion s is th e same ;
there may be no reason for the war beyond the
partic u lar circu m stances which lead immediately to
its declaration In the case of the Peloponnesian
war T h u c yd id es is careful to insist that this was
not so
There was a permanent motive for
hostility of such a kind that war sooner or later
might be counted on as a certainty ; there were
also particular transactions which determined its
actual outbreak at a particular m oment When the
Lacedaemonians took steps to break the peace of
course they did not mention the permanent and really
impelling motive namely j ealousy of Athenian
aggrandisement but rested their declaration on
certain recent actions on the part of Athens
Thucydides puts it thus
The true motiv e (p6
¢a a e) though it was not expressed in words I
consider to have been the fear which the growth O f
the Athenian power caused to the Lacedaemonians
but the publicly allege d grounds of complaint
—
a Zn a
) which provoked the war I will proceed to
(
explain and he enters upon the stories O f Corcyra
and Potidaea
Thucydides accepted the c onvic
tions expressed both by the Corcyraean ambassador
in his S peech at Athens and by Pericles that a war
was unavoidable and that it was merely a question
how long it might be postponed and we certainly
cannot prove that this j udgment was wrong
The distinctio n then between the real m otive
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96
AN CIE NT GREEK HI STO RIAN S LECT
.
he ought to have assigned it the most prominent
place in the foreground
But a carefu l examina
tion will S how I think that the narrative is com
p letely con sistent and embodies a closely reasoned
account of the causes an d motives at work
The most casu al reader receives the u nm i stak
able impression that the Corinthians were the prime
instigators of the war driving the Lacedaemonians
into action The two aff airs in which their interests
were exclusively involved the aff air of Corcyra and
the affair of Potidaea are those which th e author
designates as the direct occas ion of the war ; and
the leading part taken by Corinth is emphasized
by the reproduction of two Corinthian speeches
voic ing Peloponnesian dissatisfaction
If the
deepest concern of Corinth was the action which
Athens had taken in regard to M egara by ex
cluding h er from the markets of the Athenian
empire and thereby threatening her with eco
nomic ruin then it must be allowed that Th ucy
In their speeches
d id e s was entirely misinformed
at Sparta the Corinthian envoys do not m ention
the M egarian name and the author expressly states
that their eagerness to have war declared imme
diately was due to their anxiety for Potidaea
Can we discover any proof as to the real interest
of Corinth in the M egarian question ?
When the Corcyraean aff air occu rred Corinth
was S O far from being anxi ous for war that she did
all she could to secure the goodwill and neutrality
of Athens And she did not come with her hands
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THU CY D I D E S
111
97
mpty She did not merely urge her claims on
Athenian gratitude for past services
She pro
4 33
posed a deal (
Some time before this
Athens h ad already initiated new designs on
M egara by a decree excluding M egarian wares
from Athens itself Corinth now said to her in
effect : Leave us a free hand in dealing with
Corcyra and we will leave you a free hand in deal
ing with M egara
The Corinthian ambassador
p u t this diplomatically at least in his speech
before the popular Assembly
He did not say :
You have improper designs on M egara and we will
conni v e He said : Your conduct in regard to
M egara has been open to suspicio n ; you can allay
these suspicions by doing what we ask
It came
to the sam e thing
This proposition on the part of Corinth shows
that in her eyes the in dependence of M egara was
not of c rucial importance
Her interests there
weighed much less than her interests elsewhere
It was the alli ance of Athens with Corcyr a fol
lowed by the affair of Potidaea that determined
the collision of Corinth wi th Athens and it was
this collision that precipitated a war which wo uld
in any cas e have come later
The M egarian
decrees did not determ in e the action of Corinth
and it was Corinth s action which was decisive
On the other hand once war was decided on by
Corin th and the war party at Sparta the griev
a nce of M egara formed an impos ing item in the
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42 2
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AN CIENT GREEK H I STORIAN S LECT
98
.
list of Peloponnesian complaints and the general
indictment of Atheni an poli cy In this in di ctment
the alli ance of Athens with Corcyra though it had
been the first of the eff ectiv e causes which led to
the war could not appear at all ; it could not be
represented as either illegal or immoral The
attack on Potidaea could form a count ; but it
arose ou t of a complicated situ ation and a great
deal could be said on both sides It was therefore
an obvious stroke of diplomatic tactics to move the
M egarian question into the foremost place and
represent the cruelty of Athens to M egara as the
principal of her o ffences
The Lacedae m onians
said : Yield on this qu e stion and there will be no
war It was a dem and whic h no proud state in
the position of Athens could hav e granted and
concession would have been simply an invitation
for further commands Th e reply was : We deny
your right to dictate but we are perfectly willing
to submit all your complaints to arbitration in
accordance wi th the in strument of the Thirty
Years Peace
This is a perfectly consistent and in telligible
account of the origin of the war ; is there any
reason for supposing that it is not true 2 The
only positive evi dence to which an appeal can be
made for rej ecting it is that of Aristophanes who
attributes the outbreak to the second M egarian
decree This was the natural superficial vi ew on
accoun t of the prom inence which h ad been gi ven
to that decree in the final negotiation ; and it is
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AN CIENT GREEK H I S TORIAN S LECT
100
.
livered
at Sparta ; and he has reproduced the drift
of these important pieces of evidence
Both in
what they say and in what they do not say they
bear out the j ustice of his construction and his
perspective
It is a distinct question What were the guiding
motives of the Athenian policy in regard to
M egara ? Thucydides does not consider it b e
cause it did not seem to him to have determined
the outbreak O f the war and was therefore in a
narrow sense irrelevant ; a modern historian would
not venture to treat it in this way The O bj ect O f
Athens was undoubtedly to recover control of the
M egarid which she had in recent times won and
lost ; and to do this without violating the Thirty
Years Peace she resorted to economical pressure
which would starve her neighbou r into voluntary
submission
M egara had a double value Her
control would give Athens the power of blocking
the land route between the Peloponnesus and
Boeotia and would also secure to her a direct
access to the Corinthian Gulf for her commerce
or her troops
We cannot say which of these
consequences of the geographical position of
M egara counted more with Athenia n statesmen
in their unarmed aggression against a neighbour
with whom their relations had long been u n
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bly xplain d
c ial o t b tw
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the geogra h ic a im ortanc e of
r u e
e
ee n East an d West, tak ing as his
th e Megari d as a c om m er
”
‘
“
erar d s
law of isthm u se s ; and th ose wh o do not
te xt hat h e c a s
nfe re nc e s as a c riti c ism of Thu c d ides m u st r ec ognise the
acc e t h is
1
val
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w
p
u e of
M Cornford has
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vestigation
h i s in
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THU CYD I D E S
m
101
friendly ; whether they were actuated rather by
“
the long view of the use of a port on the
Corinthian Gulf for adding a western to their
eastern emp ire or by the more obvious v iew O f
erecting a barrier against the Peloponnesus At
Sparta we may be sure it was the second danger
which wo u ld create more alarm But however
this may be there is nothing to show that if there
had been no aff air of Corcyra and no a ffair of
Potidaea the M egarian question by itself would
have caused the outbreak of the war at the time
But the criticism to which Thucydides has been
exposed illustrates the disadvantages of his method
when it is pressed too far His principle is to
mention only eff ective policies and to mention
them for the first time when they begin to
becom e effective
If M egara was a pawn in
Athen ian schemes of aggrandisement in western
Greece it was never moved and in saying nothing
of this aspect of the M egarian question the
historian is true to his method If in 43 3 B C
or before some Athenian politicians had their
eyes on Sicily and Italy the policy had no
results till 427 B C and therefore in passing over
with a bare mention the fact that Athens in
accepting the Corcyraean proposals in 433 B C
recognised Italy and Sicily as within the range of
her interests he is again true to his method
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102
ANC IEN T GREE K H I ST O RIAN S LECT
.
4
.
H is tr eatm en t o
f
n on- contemp or ar y
histor y
Thucyd ides not only showed Greece how con
temporary history should be stu died and recorded ;
he also gave a specimen of a new way of handling
He prefixed to his work
th e history of past ages
a general sketch of the history of Hellas which
D ionysius of Halicarnassus who by no means
appreciated its merits j ustly described as equ iva
lent to an independent work
This sketch is
amaz ing in its power and insight We must re
member that it is confined strictly to one side of
the historical develop m ent
It is intended to
answer a defin ite question : how it was that
before qu ite recent times no large and powerful
state had arisen in Greece ; and to explain the
small scale of the military and political enter
prises of the past It does not touch on con
“
period of the
stitutional history at all and the
tyrants is only emp hasized beca use their non
aggressive policy was a relevant point in the
exposition Within the limits to which it strictly
adheres this outline is a most closely reas oned
argument and was the revelation of a totally new
way of treating history We cannot endorse it
all ; and of the Homeric and pre Homeric civilisa
tion in Greece we have come to know within the
last thirty years more than Thucydides could
discover But criticism of details is not to the
point ; his sketch remains a S hining example of
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104
AN CIENT GREEK H I STO RIAN S LECT
.
inferred
that such a fact meant the eminence
of a leading state in Greece at the time and
showed that an examination of the traditions
about it poin ted to a general lack of resources
He accepted M inos ; and his instinct in em
phasiz ing the Cretan thalassocracy seems to be
j ustified by the recent discoveries in Crete
When he comes to a later time he seizes with
a sure eye as the greatest and most important
fact of the two centuries before the Persian war
the revival of nautical powers and the growth of
navies
In his ac u te arguments he employs methods
which may be called modern For instance he
points to the culture of backward parts of Greece
as a survival of a culture which at one time in
the past prevailed generally He quotes Homer
as a witness for the conditions of his own age
without any reserve ; but when he quotes him
in evidence for facts about the Trojan war he
adds a clause of caution His proof of a Carian
population in the islands is not literary but
archaeological
Carian tombs which were dis
covered in his own day when D elos was purified
The outline of the growth of the Athenian
empire after the Persian wars is an exercise of a
different kind No history of this period existed
exc ept what was furnished by the brief chronicle
of H ellanic u s The account of Thucydides is an
original c ontribution and embodies the results of
H e comments on the work
his own inquiries
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III
THUCYD I D E S
105
of H ellanic u s notic ing its inadequacy and alleging
that it was chronologically inaccurate H ellanic u s
as we saw found a place for every event in an
archon year and I gave an instance of the errors
into which he fell through pretending to know
too much Thucydides gives no absolute dates
and very few chronological indications of any
kind It looks at first sight as if H ellanic u s
m i ght have retorted on Thucydides that he had
a curious notion of chronological precision But
the point of the Thucydidean criticism was j ust
this that there were no certain or su fficient data
for such precision and that the chronological
exactness of H ellanic u s was an illusion
We
may suspect further that in the order in which
he placed some of the events b e corrected
his predecessor
How far his corrections for
which he must have relied on the memories of
older men were right we cannot say But in
any case here too he gave his contemporaries
a salutary lesson in scepticism
He pointedly
abstains from referring at all to the archon
1
years
In his view the arch on years which ran
from July to J u ly were inconvenient and nu
suitable for a chronicle of military events and
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l to m a k th e b ginning of th
by th a h on th e S pa tan ph o and th
th i la t d ting wh ic h he puts fi st sh ow
(
wh i h h a al o b n conjec tur d in i
I n th e Pentekontaeteri s
.
H e is
c ar e f u
r
e
e
loponn sian wa (ii 2)
A g ive pri stes s of H e a
th infl uenc e of H ellanic
S im ila ly wh en h e starts af sh aft th T n Y a s Wa th d at is
B t we m ay legitim ately c riti i
k d by arch on and eph o v 25
m
him fo not h aving indi c at d form ally th ch onolog y of th four y a
A d ate is obvio sly want d in
485 2) wh ich are treated in B ook I
(
Pe
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s
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e
ee
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’
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r,
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s
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c ze
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24
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er
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r
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a
c
r,
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rc
s
re
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ar
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e
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us,
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c
r
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r
u
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e
rs
106
AN CIENT GRE E K H I STORIAN S
LECT I II
.
liable to lead to serious inacc u racies
F or this
reason he based his O wn military history on the
natural division of the year into summer and
winter That strict chronology was indispensable
for accurate history Thucydides was fully con
v in c e d
He proved it by casting his own work
into the form of annals He was an artist and
he could not have failed to see as clearly as his
critics (
like D ionysius of Halicarnassus ) that the
annalistic frame was an awkward impediment to
any plan of artistic construction The two claims
of chronological accuracy and a pleasing literary
arrangement are not irreconcilable as other
historians like Gibbon have S hown ; but Th ney
d id e s did not attempt to combine them and it
was characteristic that he S hould have preferred
the demand of historical precision to the exigencies
of literary art His artistic powers were displayed
n ot in the architecture of his work but in a
certain dramatic mode of treatment which will
b e considered in the next lecture
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108
AN C IENT G R EEK H I STORIAN S L
‘
ECI
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historian lives in the same milieu in the
same sphere of ideas and thus has more points of
common sympathy w ith the political actors of his
time ; but on the other hand he cannot generally
avoid the bias of personal views of his own The
historian of a past epoch may hope to be more
impartial but he cann ot hope to divest hi m self
beyond a certain point of the standards and
measures of his own age ; they are inwoven in
the tissue of his mind and they must affect his
attempts to reconstruct the past
Thucydides has concealed this inevitable sub
The
j ec tiv e element by his dramatic method
persons who play leading parts in the public affairs
which he relates reveal their characters and person
alities so far as is required by their actions and
The author like a dramatist remains
S peeches
in the background only sometimes comin g forward
to introduce them with a description as brief as in
a playbill or to indicate what men thought about
them or the impression they made on their con
temporaries His rule is to commit himself to no
personal j udgments and to this rule there are very
few exceptions
The characters of some of the political personages
are partly indicated in the speeches of which I
must n ow speak They are an essential feature
of the Thucydidean art Herodotus had set the
example but Thucydides u sed S peeches for diff erent
purposes and on a different scale and adapted them
to a different method He states explicitly how
porar y
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THUCYD I D E S
IV
109
the speeches are to be taken and what they repre
sent In some cases he heard speeches delivered
but it was impossible for him to remember them
accurately and in other cases he had to depend on
the oral reports of others His general rule was
to take the general drift and intention of the
S peaker and from this text compose what he might
probably have said It is clear that this principle
gave great latitude to the author and that the
rese m blances O f the Thucydidean speeches to those
actually spoken must have varied widely according
to his information They are all distinctly Thney
d id ean in style j ust as the various characters in a
play of Euripides all use S imilar diction Homo
n
e ity in style was a canon of most ancient men
e
g
of letters ; they shrank from introducing lengthy
quotations or inserting the ipsissi m a ver b a of doc u
Occasionally Thucydides has probably
m ents
indicated personal mannerisms For instance in a
S peech of Alcibiades there are one or two expressions
which are intended to suggest his characteristically
“
forcible style
But this has been done wit h
great reserve Thucydides in his portrai ture does
not depend on mannerisms
The speeches of
Pericles produce the e ff ect of the lofty earnestness
of a patriotic statesman who is somewhat of an
idealist ; the speech of Cleon is that of a bullying
pedagogue But the diction is the sa m e So in
Aeschylus the nurse maunders though she speaks
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110
AN CI ENT GREE K HI S TORIAN S LECT
.
’
Aeschylean ; and the nai vete of the policeman in
Sophocles is su fficiently revealed though he does
not S peak a policeman s language
But though Thucydides is always Thucydides
yet within the compass of his style there are
remarkable variations It is outside my scope to
enter upon this subj ect in any detail to do j ustice
to the styles of the writers who come before us
But in the
would require another set of lectures
case of Thucydides I suspect that his different
sty les have a certain meaning for the treatment of
his subj ect It is patent to any reader that there
is a difference between the narrative and the
speeches and that there are marked diff erences in
the speeches themselves Obscurity is a reproach
which has constantly been brought against him
and of which he cannot be acquitted But it is
not true of his work as a whole The narrative is
generally clear and straightforward
If it stood
alone we should never dream of describing him
as O bscure Nor is this description true of the
indiscriminately
Some are lucid and
S peeches
simple others excessively O bscure ; in others again
we have perfectly simple passages beside sections
which with D ionysius we may designate as
conundrums or as darker than dark sayings of
I have taken obscurity and difficulty
H erac le itu s
—diffi culty which the Greeks felt no less than we
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s ion
b een ightly poi nt d o t by M haffy th at it is a m i sapp ehen
plain th ob c ities of Th c y d id s a d e to ond nsation of
Gr eek
H i s “ c ond nsed in ex p ession b t not i n th o g ht (
I t h as
to
ex
th ou ght
.
r
e
e
e
e
Liter atu r e, ii 1
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s ur
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u
r
a
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r
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s
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c
u
ANCIENT GREE K H I STORIAN S LECT
112
.
their happiness was also the term of their life
B ut this is a paraphrase and it does n ot give the
e ffect of the Greek The literal translation is
“
For whom lif e was made commensurate to be
happy in and to die in alike
Even this fails to
(
bring out th e force O f the aorist tense e da mo fia a
which suggests the familiar Greek saying that a
man s life cannot be j u dged happy till after his
death ) But if the English is O bsc ure and intoler
able to a Greek ear such as that of D ionysius the
Greek was hardly less so
N ow is there any significance in this remarkable
v ariation in style
Is it purely capricious ? Does
Thucydides break into dithyrambic prose j ust
when and simply because he is in the mood ?
S uch caprice would not be artistic and it would
n ot be Greek If th e diff erence in style corre
s ond e d to the distinction between narrative and
p
speeches the explanation would be ready The
speeches in any case serve the artistic purpose of
pa u ses in the action ; they introduce the variety
which Herodot u s sec u red by digressions ; they
fulfil somewha t the function of choruses in the
drama And so we should not be surprised to
find a corresponding variety in the diction and
technique
But the difference in style extends
into the S peeches themselves
The explanation which I would submit to you
is that when Thucydides adopts what we may
f airly call his unnatural style w h en he is involved
he is always making points of his
and O bscure
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THUCYD I D E S
own
113
In support of this view I allege the follow
1) The meditation on the
ing considerations
(
party struggles in Greek states though not a
belongs to this category
It interru pts
S peech
the action ; it is in fact a S peech of the author
And it is one of the flagrant examples of the
unnatural style and is commented on as such by
Here then the author undisguisedly
D ionysius
adopts this style for his own reflexions
2)
(
Secondly take the M elian dialogue N ow whether
we think as some do that such a conference was
never held or believe — and this is my opinion
that it was held all agree that the actual conversa
tion is in the main fictitious I will return to this
dialogue in another connexion I would point out
now that it is a clear case in which the unnatural
style is employed for a political study of the
author
Contrast it as D ionysius contrasts it
with another dialogue that between Archidamus
and the Plataeans This is in the natural style
and O bviously gives the simple tenor of what
3 ) M y third proof lies
passed on the occasion (
in the contrast bet ween two of the speeches of
Pericles The speech he delivered before the war
is so lucid and straightfor ward in style as to have
satisfied D ionysius ; and at the same ti m e it is
perfectly appropriate to the situation and no
doubt gives the general drift of the Periclean
argument On the other hand the speech which
he delivers in self defence when he became u n
popular is marked in part by those obsc u rities
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AN C IEN T GRE EK HI ST O RIAN S LECT
114
.
which excited the cen sure of D ionysius and is
also distinguished by unsuitable statements which
could not have been addressed by any statesman
1
to a public whose favour he desired to recover
I infer that when Thucydides writes in the
u n natural style
h e intends the reader to under
stand that he has here to do with the author
himself— that the author is making points When
he writes in the nat ural style he is producing
documentary evidence The speech of Pericles on
the eve of the war is virtually a document
Let me make an application of this inference
which I think has some interest The Ep itap hios
of Pericles is
composed on the whole in the
2
unnatural style
It enshrines as I believe some
utterances of Pericles himself ; but the style is
generally contorted and obscure tho ugh we for
give or may even find a certain pleasure in this
so lofty is the S pirit and so fine the thoughts
Now it is to be noted that unlike other speeches
this funeral address does not cast any direct light
on the events of the war and that its tone is out
of keeping with the occasion
There was no
great action no conspicuous deed of valour in
the first year of the war yet th is oration over
the Athenians who fell in it is pitched in a key
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3
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1
I point o
ut
afte r
2
th e
Th e
e nd of
e
pig
Appendix that
in th e
of th e
Thuc y did ean Peric les
.
This was
pos
e d or
wrought over
.
11 45) m ay h av e b ee n su gg e sted
(
Molle nd orff H er m es ii p 294
3
c om
th e war
r am
,
it was
,
b v
o s er ed
.
.
by a
.
by Dionysius
.
on th e
say ing of
G org
virt e
u
of
wom
en
ias Wilam owitz
.
AN C IENT GREE K H I ST O RIAN S LECT
116
.
rebels of M ytilene was in accordance with the
With the spirit ; but
sp ir it of Periclean policy
it might have been argued that it was not in
accordance with the letter and the logic ; and
this I think is one of the points which Cleon s
S peech is in tended to suggest
It is notable that
while the speaker makes as I think an O blique
hit at Periclean idealism and strikes an anti
Periclean note in his dispraise of knowledge and
c riticism at the same time he iterates phrases
“
which occur in the Periclean speeches : Empire
“
D o not play the vi rtuous
means tyranny
Thucydides is here studying not only the contrast
bet ween the two politicians but also the difficulties
inherent in the Periclean imperialism
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2
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D r am atic
i
t
h
storiae
tr eatm ent o
h
e
f
personae
The speeches in general served two purposes
In the first place they were used by the author
to explain the facts and elements of a situation
as well as underl y ing motives and ideas In some
cases the speech was only a dramatic d isg u ise of
a study of his own Thus the characters of the
two protagonist cities Athens and Sparta are
delineated in a S peech of a third party the Corin
thian s : the author of this famo u s comparison was
unquestionably Thucydides himself But in other
cases he uses the actual expositions of politicians
genuine political documents S O far as the main
tenor went — as the most useful means of explaining
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THU CYD I D E S
IV
117
a situation The comparative advantages of the
two contending powers for the coming war are
stated in two speeches from opposite points of
view The prospects and difficulties O f the Sicilian
expedition are set forth by the same means
The speeches had the second function — and
here I return to th e point from which I set out
of serving the obj ective dramatic method of
indicating character which Thucydides chose to
adopt
The speeches of Pericles Cleon B rasid as
Nicias and Alcibiades taken in co nj unction with
their actions reveal as much of their characters as
seemed to the author necessary for the matter in
hand ; that is those sides O f their nature which
in his opinion governed their p u blic actions or
affected their political influence The general
plan was that the men as well as the events
should speak or be made to S peak for themselves
with little or no direct comment from the writer
This method produced the illusion that the
actors showed themselves to the reader ind epen
It really meant that the
d e ntly of the author
author had framed a psychological estimate of
them as a dramatist constructs his characters
an estimate founded on his knowledge of their
actions but nevertheless no more than his own
subj ective interpretation
The reader is here
almost as completely in the author s hands as in
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2
I n th e
B
ru ns
p ch of th Co inth ian and th fi t of P icl s
B ibliog aph y ) w th fi t to t d y y t m ati ally th
an i nt h i to ians in d pi ting
h a ac te
I am m h
know n b ook
w ll—
s e c ond s
se e
(
b
e
c e
e
r
as
r
m eth od s of th e
inde te d to h is
ee
s
r
s
e
rs
e
.
e
s u
c
c
er
rs
s
r
s e
r
.
e
.
c
e
uc
AN CIENT GREE K HI STORIAN S LECT
118
.
a drama He has not the means of forming a
corrective j udgment for himself ; for he does not
know how the historian has arrived at his results
The application of the method may be O bserved
in the cases of Cleon and Nicias Thucydides held
a distinct view of the character of Cleon as a poli
He allows us to see it reflected from Cle on s
tic ian
actions and from the O pinions of people about
him When he describes Cleon as an influenti al
leader of the demos who was very violent
in m anner and speech he only states a fact which
was undoubtedly notorious and admitted
The
oration of Cleon on th e Lesbian question exhibits
his fashion of rating the people like a pedagogue
The drastic j udgment that if C le on s command
at Pylos ended in disaster this would be a great
blessing for it would rid the city of Cleon is not
recorded as the historian s own sarcasm ; it is
mentioned as the O pinion of some people at
Athens But as th e people who thought so are
“
called sensible
the di sguise is here
very thin ; the writer permits his own assent to
be visible
No reader of the scenes in which
Cleon appears would be left in any doubt that
Cleon in the author s estimation was a pestilent
Thu cydide
d emagogue ; but in one passage
entirely abandons his dramatic reserve and ascribes
the worst motives to the politician for his unwill
ingness to bring the war to a close
The po rtrait of Nicias the conscientious patriot
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16
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1
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120
AN CIEN T GREEK HI S T O RIAN S
is irony of a kind in which Thucydides rarely
indulges ; behind it l urks the suppressed j udgment
that Athens was unfortunate in the trust wh ich
she reposed in Nicias the model of irreproachable
respectability
In the case of Alcibiades the historian dwells
on the extravagance and display of his private life
because they had a direct influence on the feelings
of the Athenians towards him and aff ected his
public career and the course of the war But here
too the character is revealed in actions and words ;
insolence and ambition come out in his orations
and as I have already O bserved some strong phrases
seem to be characteristic of his man ner Th u cy
d id es refra ins from commenting on his character but
points out his services and S hows that the Athenians
regarded him with a suspicious apprehension which
prevented them from profiting by his ability
In th e cases of Themistocles Pericles and
Antiphon the author departs from his usual
practice and gives characterising j udgments of
his own In the case of Themistocles this might
be considered a necessary exception as he does not
come into the main narrative and cannot reveal
himself dr amatically The same reason might be
held p artly to apply to Pericles since the greater
part of his hfework was over when he comes on
the stage
The favourable notice of Antiphon s
ability might also be explained by the fact that
h e had h ardl y appeared in the political arena be fore
the year of the rev olution and his appearance then
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THUCYD I D E S
IV
12 1
was so brief The eulogy on Antiphon indeed has
a personal note which betrays perhaps a friendship
It is however futile to seek to explain or explain
away th ese exceptions
The truth is that in
general Thucydides is dramatic but he has not
carried his method to extremes
It is noteworthy that nearly all the j udgments
which he pronounces concern intelligence and
political ability This is the case with Themi
stoc les
Pericles Antiphon Th eram enes and
H erm oc rates
They all receive greater or less
praise for political capacity which in the case of
Themistocles is said to have a m ounted to genius
The case of H yperb olu s demands a few words
because it illustrates the method of Thucydides
and his political leanings In the years between
the Fifty Years Peace and the Sicilian Expedition
the division of parties u n der the op posing lead ers
Nicias and Alcibiades paralysed the foreign policy
of Athens and hindered continuity of action The
situation was so serious that the only way out
seemed that proposed by the demagogue Hyper
bolus — a trial of ostracism which would expel one
of the rivals and secure unity Alcibiades fru s
trated this device by combining if not with his
rival at least with a sufficiently large oligarchical
faction to procure the ostracism of H ype rb olu s
Thucydides does not say a word about this affair
though of course he was perfectly aware of the
facts and though they had an immediate bearing
on the foreign policy of Athens We must suppose
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12 2
AN CIENT GREE K H I ST O RIAN S
LEC’l‘
.
that as the purpose of the ostracism was defeated
and the relative positions of the two leaders were
not altered by the vote he considered it super
fl u ou s to record the occurrence
It will b e
admitted ho wever that a modern historian who
allowed himself such an omission or carried his
principle of exclusion so far would not escape
censorious criticism But in another connexion
Th u cydides refers to the ostracism without dating
it or in any way suggesting its S ignificance
H y perb olu s was killed in 4 11 B C at Sam os
Thucydides records this and mentions that Hyper
bolus had b een ostracized This is the only place
where he names the demagogue who in the years
following C leon s death had been one of the m ost
infl u ential speakers in the E cclesia We m ight
suspect that in ignoring this politician just as he
ignored men of the same type like E uc rates and
L ysic les he exercised a reserve which was equi
valent to an adverse criticism a negative expression
of contempt ; but no doubt is permitted by the
words in which he paints his memory black
H ype rb olu s was ostracized we are tol d not
because he was esteemed dangerous but because
he was an unprincipled sc oundrel and a disgrace
to the city The same epithet (
noxflnpos) is here
applied to H yperb olu s wh ich was appl ied to him
by Aristophanes
We may note how Thucydides
violates here his own principle of relevance At
this moment H yper b olus is not interesting or
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Knig hts
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1304
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124
AN CIENT GREEK H I ST O RIAN S
LECI‘.
on another ground It has been thought that he
vi ewed the whole war under the scheme of a
tragedy in which the Sicilian expedition was the
er ip eteia or
reversal of fortune for Athens
p
This idea has recently been developed in a new
shape by M r F M Cornford in a brilliant study
which seeks to establish that the historian read
Aeschylean conceptions into the events of the war
and mounted it like a tragedy with the dark
Hybris Peitho and Eros
figur es of Tyche
moving in the background and prompting the
human actors
That such a conception should
be read by an ingenious scholar in a work which
impresses the ordinary reader as entirely m atter
of fact in its treatment of political transactions
illustrates what a wonderful book the history Of
Thucydides is
The truth is I think that the
style O f Thucydides was influenced by the Attic
drama no less than by the rhetoric O f Gorgias and
it is one of the merits of Mr C om ford s mono
graph to have illustrated this influence But that
the tragic phrases and remini scences and the occa
siou al use O f tragic irony cannot be held to have
more than a stylistic significance and that Thucy
d id es did not intend to cast the war into the typical
scheme of a tragic development will be apparent if
we consider his own clear statements
His View of the causes of the collapse of Athens
displays the difference between his own outlook on
human aff airs and that of Herodotus The older
historian pourtraying the collapse of the Persian
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THUCYD I D E S
125
power discerns in the development of the plot
imminent above the actors a superhuman control
and the occult operation of nemesis
The o nly
external influence recognised by the younger writer
appears in the form of the incalculable ele m ent
which he calls Tyche Chance Herodotus inter
preted history and life in the sense that the decline
of a state or of a man from a post of comman d ing
eminence was due to the action of a supernatural
power which would not tolerate the exaltation
which invariably leads to i m moderate elation of soul
and O ften to acts of insolence and rashness In
one of the speeches in Thucydides this anthropo
pathic idea is translated into the dry formula
It
is the nature of human things to decline
But
it can hardly be said that he believed unreservedly
in this principle (
which may be found in Ionian
philosoph ers ) as a certain fact And his analysis
of the course of the war and his explanation
of its issue show that the O peration of the incal
cu lab le element O f chance need not be decisive
It contributed to the decline of the Athenian
power but that power migh t have survived and
defied its o u trages if it had not bee n for human
mismanagement
In the early stage of the war there were two
cases of the play of the incalculable There was
first of all the plague But though severe maim
ing and weakening more than anything else the
O ff ensive power of the State for years to come it
was not crushing it did not spell doom ; one of its
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AN C IEN T GREEK HI ST O RIAN S
126
LECT
.
gravest consequences was the psychical eff ect upon
th e Athenians for which Pericles suff ered
The
other s ur prise of fortune was a kind one the
combination of circumstances which helped the
Athenians to their stroke of luck at Pylos This
elated them as the pestilence had cast them down
Instead of grasping th e O pportunity of making
advantageous terms and bringing to an end a war
which they would gladly have concluded on any
terms a few years before they were incited to
hopes of new conquest
But the consequences
were by no means d isastrous ; the Peace of 421
B C le ft the balance of power much the same
They had recovered from the effects Of the
plague and the war when they undertook the
conquest of Sicily in 415 B C The catastrophe of
that enterprise was
inning of a gradual
decline which was de
tic dissen
sions in Athens and afterwaf rc s by the intervention
of Persia A modern histoorian has designated the
t of insanity an instance
Sicilian expedition as
’
of a whole people gone m ad analogous to the case
Bu t this was
O f England in the Crimean war
not the O pinion of Thucydides He says and he
is speaking in his own name that it was not an
error of j udgment in the design or in the calcula
tion of strength and would have been a success if
it had been pr operly supported and carried out
The verdict O f the modern writer was influenced
partly by ethical considerations ; the verdict of
Thucydides did not take ethics into account ; he
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AN CIENT GREEK HI STORIAN S LECT
12 8
.
with that of a great Athenian statesman of a form er
age Themistocles They were both banished from
Athens ; both conspired with her enemies against
her ; and Alcibiades like Themistocles became a
trusted adviser of the Persians
But another
point of likeness is indicated by Thucydides h ay
It is not for nothing that he describes
p om 9
Themistocles and Pausanias as the most magni
ficent or luxurious of the Greeks of their tim e
k ap po é o c)
That was a weak point in the case
(
of Themistocles as in that O f Alcibiades it led to
the suspicion of tyranny This parallel suggests
that one motive of the digression on Themistocles
was to point it At all events it throws light on
the View of the historian Athens produced three
men who had the faculty which cannot be learned
by study for guiding the aff airs of a great state
Themistocles Pericles and Alcibiades
Two of
them fell into the snare of luxurious splendour
which ruined their careers Pericles avoided that
pitfall and won and retained the public confidence
This contrast I would observe gives special point
to a famous phrase in the Ep itap hios Pericles
he was not
himself was (p k dxah os n
ii ek ia q
Xapfl rpcis
he indulged his private tastes without
undue or obtrusive expense
This analysis which is furnished by the his
eli minates entirely the
torian s own comments
dim superstitious notions of doom and nemesis
which do d u ty for Providence in Herodotus and
dispense the spectator from any deeper study Of
,
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THU CYD I D E S
IV
129
the course and causes of events Thucydides deals
with purely human elements ; human brains bear
the ultimate responsib ility
There is nothing
mysterious about the fact that e iie
hts can not be
forhse en The course of events says Pericles may
sometimes be as incalculable by reason as the
thoughts of a man s mind Thu cydides does not
regard the plague as a divine d is—
It
jz n
pe nga
iq
was S imply an occurrence which ehifld n ot be fore
seen exactly as you may not foresee the moves of
your enemy Herodotu s credits the oracles with
mysterious knowledge ; Thucydides oc c asionally
refers to oracles but their sole significance for h im 1
lies in the psychical e ff ect they produce on those
who believe them Of the oracle which predicted
that the war would last twenty seven years he drily
O bserves that it is the only one to which people
who put their faith in oracles can point as having
been certainly fulfilled Here he was at the same
standpoint as Anaxagoras and Pericles
The
philosophers who had established the reign of law
had not written in vain for Thucydides
Chance
means for him the same kind of thing that it
means for us ; it does not signify the interference
of an external will or caprice ; it simply represents
an element which cannot be foretold He recog
h ises the O peration of the u nknown ; he does not
“
recognise the presence of things occult
And
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1
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2
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p
ly
y
l
lp
H e s eaks ind eed strange of the frequ e nc of s o ar ec i s e s d u ring
as if th e
h ad s om e s ig ni c anc e for th e h um an rac e ;
th e war (
1 23
we m ay ond e r h at c om m ent Anaxagoras ou d h a e m ad e
2
6 1(
on H erac le itu s)
Cp G om p erz , Gr i echische Den ker , i
1
.
w
.
.
w
y
.
p
fi
w l
.
v
.
.
K
13 0
AN CIENT GREEK HI ST O RIAN S
he reduces the u nknown to its m inimum of S igui
fic an c e for human lif e
The great philosopher
“
D emocritus of Abdera had said : Chance is an
idol which men fashioned to excuse their own
mental incapacity As a matter of fact chance
seldom conflicts with wisdom In most affairs Of
life an intelligent mind can exercise clairvoyance
1
with success
These words O f D emocritus
might serve as a motto for Thucydides
The elements for the conception of the war as
a tragedy in the proper sense of the word were
absent from his interpretation of the course of
history
There was no mysterious controlling
force no doom or retribution no inevitable decree
of fate no moral principle at stake The lessons
which the catastrophe conveyed were not moral or
cathartic The war was full of instructive lessons
for statesmen and generals but those lessons were
assuredly of a very d ifferent or der from the lessons
of Aeschylus and Sophocles And the occasional
use of phraseology which the tragedians charged
with meaning should not mislead us Just as a
writer of the present day who is completely inno
cent of any traffic with the supernatural may
employ such terms as fate doom nemesis so
Thucydides could borrow the personified ab strac
tions of tragedy for purposes of expression without
meaning to suggest anything occult If I say that
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1
su b
h as
Mu ll ac h
iv
H er m ocr a tis (
Dem ocritu s
p er son a
i ts
prudenc
us e s ;
e.
,
in
.
it is the
F r ag
,
62
sam e
.
.
P hil
.
4 ) th at i n
for
b oth
16 7
.
Thu c y dide s
war th e inc
and
bse v s
alc ulable l m nt
c ond u c e s
O
e e
to
r e
e
c au tion and
AN C IENT GREEK HI ST O RIANS LECT
13 2
.
”
1
war
When this criticism is examined it will be
found that it mainly touches the ar r ang em ent of
2
the first Book but it shows that the narrative
produced upon D ionysius the impression that
Thucydides was unpatriotic
On the other hand it is held by some modern
critics that the accou nt of the beginnings and first
years of the war is virtually a defence of the policy
of Pericles and it is even insinuated that the
author manipulated facts concealing some and
mitigating others with the purpose of presenting
that policy in a favourable light
This view
evidently contradicts that of D ionysius ; it implies
that Thucydides sympathized with Athens during
the Periclean r é gime and at the outbreak of the
war
The fact that the narrative can convey two such
contradictory impressions is a certificate of the
author s critical impartiality
The censure of
D ionysius is based on the conventional principle of
later times that it is a histor ian s duty to be patri
otic at all c osts to sacrifice his critical j u dgment ;
and it is superfluous to refute his charge of ill
will On the other hand the theory that Thu cy
did es was an unreserved admirer of Pericles and
deliberately intended to exalt and defend his policy
almost as a partisan has so m e p r im a f acie plausi
b ility and as it has a direct bearing on the writer s
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
,
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.
’
.
’
,
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,
,
,
’
,
,
Letter to P om p ei/us , 3 9
But h e a s o am e s Th uc did e s , 3 4, 5 , for th e c hoic e of his su ect
Th e war was 097 6 «axes odr e eiir vxhs, and therefore should b e forgotten and
ig nored
osterit
1
.
l bl
2
.
y
‘
by p
y
.
.
'
bj
.
THU CYD I D E S
133
attitude to history and politics we must consider
it more particularly
We have seen how Thucydides S peaks in the
highest terms of the political ability of Pericles and
was convinced that if he had lived or had a
successor as able as himself the war would have
terminated favourably for Athens But this general
convicti on would be quite compatible with dis
criminating criticism
The tribute which he has
paid to Pericles does not imply that he saw eye to
eye with the statesman in all things or held his
political faith There are proofs in my opinion
that he exercised here as in other cases a cold
independent j udgment and had no scruples in
exhibiting weak points
The speeches of Pericles claim our special atten
tion I may begin by pointing out that the praise
1
which Pericles bestows in the Ep itap hios on the
democratic constitution of Athens implying that
it was an ideal form of government is not in
accordance with the view of Thucydides who
expressly states that in his O pinion th e short lived
p oli teia which was established in Athens after the
fall of the Four Hundred was not merely superior
to democracy but was the only good constitution
I n other
that Athens h ad enj oyed in his lifetime
words he did not consider democracy a good con
In the second place we may feel con
stitu tion
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2
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1
2
n
.
37
viii
.
.
97
¢ alvow at efi w
r ev
.
faavr es
oh i r ei
ll
fixwr a Oi;
«a t 00x
'
'
.
I s the
or is it an a us ion to th e wdr pros
7rp63r ov
re ser
'
ve
1ro>u r ela
p
é i rl 7
vov
’
ly tim
of ear
é 1r l 7
’
’
A6nvai oi
S im ply cautiousness
es 2
,
13 4
ANC IENT GRE E K HI S TORIAN S LECT
.
fide nt
that the eloquent and fascinating portrait of
Athens dra wn by Pericles did not in the historian s
O pinion correspond to reality
It was the Peri
clean ideal And Thucydides knew perfectly well
that the claim that Athens was the school of liberal
education for Greece would have been scouted
by other states ; and as a matter of fact it did not
become anything of the kind till af ter the P elopon
mesian war
Again it seems more than doubtful
whether Thu cydides approved of the Periclean
policy of bringing all the inhabitants of Attica into
the city The length at which he dwells on the
unpleasant consequences of this arrangement his
pains in showing how distasteful it was to the
people suggest that he considered it a measure of
highly questionable W isdom
He certainly looked on Pericles as the most
successful statesman wh o had recently guided the
c ounsels of Athens But he saw him like all his
other dr am atis p er sonae in a dry light and as I
have suggested he has presented one side of the
statesman s mind with a certain veiled irony
The dramatic detachment of Thucydides readily
produced the impression that he was unpatriotic
He allo ws every party to state their case as
strongly and persuasively as possible But while
he wrote not as a patriot but as a historian it is
Athens not Sparta the Athenian Empire not the
Peloponnesian Confederacy in which the interest
of the narrative centres throughout As to the
questions at stake and the issues involved in the
’
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13 6
AN CIENT GREEK HI STORIAN S
c
r
.
j ustice Pericles takes the same line tho ugh with
more cyn icism as a modern British chauvinist con
te m ptu ou s of those whom he calls the Little Eng
landers He sneers at their conscience which he
suggests is a cloak for cowardice Alcibiades in
advocating the Sicilian expedition points out the
necessity to imperial states of an active and aggres
sive policy H erm oc rates the enem y of Athens
does not complain of such a policy on grounds
“
of morality ; he says : I can fully pardon the
Athenians for their grasping policy ; I do not
blame those who seek empire but those who are
ready to submit for it has always been the natural
instinct of man to rule him who yields and to resist
the aggressor
The excuse which both H e r m ocrates and
Athenians urge for the acquisition of empire is
the instinct of human nature B u t Pericles also
attempted what may be called a j ustification on
In the Funeral Oration he draws
h igher grounds
a picture of the grandeur and the cu ltu r e Of
Athens There he so much as says is the ideal
which our city by winning power and wealth
through an empire which was certainly not built
on foundations of j ustice has realised for the
admiration and imitation of Hellas Such things
cannot be achieved by timid j ustice and stay at
home piety This is the leit m otif of the Funeral
Oration
Thus the historian kept before himself and
keeps before us the fact that the empire cannot be
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THUCYD I D ES
13 7
defended on grounds of j ustice that it could not be
maintained except by f or ce m aj eu r e and that if
slavery was an extreme word for the condition of
the subject states they were generally reluctant
under the yoke It is further to be observed that
when Thucydides makes occasional reflexions of
his own he never takes j ustice or morality into
account from which we may infer that in h is
estimation those conceptions did not illuminate
the subj ect
He recognised that the ideal of
j ustice was an actual psychological force and co u ld
not be neglected by statesmen any more than
popular religion But he did not consider it worth
while to apply the standard of j ustice in estimating
political transactions j u st as he did not ask whether
an action was pleasing to the gods
The speech of D iod otu s advocating lenient
treatment for the rebels of M ytilene is interesting
in this connexion As the speaker played no part
in history except here the harangue m ust be intro
d u ced solely for the sake of its arguments
Its
chief interest is that it repudiates the intrusion of
j ustice into the question ; the S peaker reproaches
Cleon for having dragged in so irrelevant a con
sideration and bases his own view entirely on
reasons of state Thucydides with his usual reti
cence abstains from co m ment though the tone of
his narrative suggests that he sympathiz ed with the
lenient policy ; but the fact that he chose these
speeches of Cleon and D iod otu s for working up
and that he has worked them up largely in the
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,
AN CIENT GREE K HI STORIAN S
13 8
LEC'l‘
.
style which he employs when he is not docu
mentary shows that his inter est lay in the log ic o
f
,
p olicy
.
In the light of the debate on M ytilene we may
consider the notorious debate of the Athenian and
M elos you remember
M elian representatives
was an independent state Athens had made an
attempt to force her into her empire in 4 26 B C ;
the idea was not resumed till 4 16 B C but in the
meantime the relations of the two states had been
hostile When the expedition reached the island
the generals sent envoys to demand submission
They were admitted to a round table conference
with members of the M elian government and
Thucydides gives in the form of a dialogue what
purposes to be the tenor of the debate That such
a conference was held there cannot be a reasonable
doubt nor is it improbable that Thucydides had
something to work upon There is no difficulty in
s u pposing that he might have heard enough fro m
some one who knew to furnish him with a text
The note of the dialogu e is the elimination of
j ustice from the discussion by the Athenians
“
Lass unsern Herr Gott aus dem Spass
The
field of the argument is confined to policy and
reason of state When the M elians essay to find
an issue from this restricted ground by observing
that being innocent of wrong they expect a
heaven sent chance to intervene in their favour
the Athenians retort that gods as well as men
recognise it to be a law of nature that the weaker
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-
,
14 0
AN C IEN T GRE EK HI STORIAN S LECT
.
obloquy the cond u ct of Athens and even of making
it appear an ill omened prelude to the disastro us
expedition against Sicily This theory will not in
my opinion bear examination Thucydides as we
have seen did not consider that the Sicilian expedi
tion was ill advised in principle and he does not
hint that any c onsequences bad or good for Athens
ensued from the conquest of M elos
The truth is I think that Thucydides took the
opportunity of the round table conference to
exhibit pure and unvarnished the springs of
political action The motives and arguments of
the Athenians W hether wisely or unwisely applied
in th is particular case were nothing new ; they
were the same which lay at the foundation of all
their empire building This was the first case of a
new annexation since th e outbreak of the war and
it was the first occasion offered to the historian to
analyse imperial policy from the point of View of
aggression ; he had already examined it from the
point of view of preservation The M elian dialogue
only develops more undisguisedly and expressly
and the circumstance that no public was present
gave the au thor the artistic pretext for candour
what is to be fo u nd in all the arg u mentative
that not j ustice b ut reason of state is the
S peeches
governing consideration which guides the action of
cities and claims the interest of historians
We are now in a position to understand the
H is obj ec t is to ex am ine
attitu de of Thucydides
,
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an d
l p olitical
r evea
ac tions
f r om
an
ex clu sively
THUCYD I D E S
IV
14 1
f view He does not consider moral
standards ; his method is realistic and detached ;
he takes history as it is and examines it on its own
merits This detached anal ytical treatment is illus
trated by the earliest political prose pamphlet we
possess written by a contemporary of the historian
in the early years of th e war ; I mean the short
tract on the Athenian Constitution The author
was an oligarch and declares without reserve his
personal hostility to the democracy but it is not a
polemical work
He detaches himself from his
own feelings places himself at the point of view of
democrats and examines democracy exclusively in
this light Applying his acute logic he demon
strates that the institutions of Athens could hardly
be improved upon
The writer is intellectually
allied to Thucydides in the d etachment of his atti
tude and the logical restriction of the issue under
a partic u lar point of View
Now when Th u cydides offers reflexions in
a on events
r ia
r
o
er
s
o
n
his criticisms on the
p p
p
policy of Athens for instance or on the value of an
Athenian politician are generally determined by
the co nsideration whether they were conducive to
success or failure in the war In h is appreciation
of B rasidas he places himself at the point of view
of Sparta and recognises that this general s con
duct policy and character were conducive to the
extension of Spartan power in competiti on with
Athens He takes the obj ects of the conflicting
states as given without approving or condemning ;
o
l
i
t
i
calp oin t (
p
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,
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,
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,
’
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,
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,
142
AN CIENT GREEK HI S TORIAN S LECT
.
and in recording acts and m ethods his rare verdicts
of praise or blame are confined to the question
whether those acts and methods were calculated to
achieve their obj ect ; j ust as in characteri zing a
man he refers only to his intellectual powers He
off ers no opinion whether the aims were j ustifiable
or admirable ; he applies no ethical standard to
policies or politicians
Of course he was fully conscious of ethical
questions which arise in connexion with high
politics and these questions raise their heads in
the dramatic parts of the work In the speeches
j ustice and expediency are frequently distinguished
and opposed A speaker for examp le according
to circumstances is concerned to show that a
co urse which is j ust is also expedient or that
expedience ought to be preferred to j ustice
S ometimes the consideration of justice is briefly
It appears as a psychical
d ismissed as irrelevant
factor actually O perative in international transac
tions a principle to which at least homage of the
lips was paid by which praise and blame were
popularly awarded and which therefore had to be
taken into account But its r ole was slig ht and
subordinate : the dramatist could not ignore it
tho u gh he allows it as small a range as he can the
th inker dismissed it
There is not so far as I can discover any reason
for believing that Thucydides thought or intended
to suggest that an uncompromising policy of self
interest conduced to the fall of the Athenian
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,
AN CIENT GREEK HI ST ORIAN S LECT
14 4
.
— ente rtained an ideal
Italy for the Italians Italy
freed from the stranger : and in the service of this
ideal he desired to see his speculative science of
politics applied Thucydides had no political aim
in view ; he was purely a historian ; his interest
was to investigate the actual policy of Athens in
maintaining and losing h er empire But it was
part of the method of both alike to eliminate
conventional sentiment and morality
A certain use of the term ap wé by Thucydides
has an interest in this connexion It is sometim es
said that he did not assign great importance to the
action and r ole of individuals This seems to m e
a mistake due to the circumstance that he does
not draw personal portraits in the manner of sub
sequent historians
For it is evident that he
considered the brains and wisdom of him whom he
calls the first man as largely responsible for the
success of Athenian policy before the P elopon
n e sian war
We can read between the lines that
in his view the P e isistratids Themistocles and
Alcibiades were also forces which co u nted for a
great deal The pre eminent significance of the
individual was a tenet of M achiavelli and his con
a classical feature of the Renaissance)
temporaries (
it was a prince an individual brain and will to
w hich he looked for the deliverance and regenera
tionof Italy Both wr iters conceived the indi vidual
purely from the intellectual
a s a political factor
side Now Thucydides has used ape ni in his notice
o f the oligarch Antiphon to express the intelli
,
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'
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TH U C Y D I DE S
IV
14 5
gence dexterity and will power of a competent
statesman in sharp contradistinction to the con
The
v entional spa nof the popular conception
equivalent by which we can
only appropriate
render in a modern language this Thucydidean
spew; is a key word of M achiavelli s system vir tii
a quality possessed by men like Francesco Sforza
1
and Cesare Borgia
It must be understoo d that this attitude of
Thucydides only concerns international politics
the subject of his work D omestic politics lie
except incidentally outside his scope When he
turns aside to describe the disintegrating influence
of party faction on the internal conditions of
Greek states he recognises the important O pera
tion of ethical beliefs and religious sanction s in
holding a society together But where national
aims are at stake and international rivalries are in
motion no corresponding beliefs and sanctions
appear possessing the same indefeasible value for
the success and prosperity of a state
There is
irony in his remark that the Lacedaemonians after
the first war had come to an end ascribed their
own want of success to the fact that they h ad
refused the Athenian proposition to submit the
Peloponnesian grievances to arbitration in accord
ance with the Thirty Years Peace It is note
worthy that ln the Funeral O ration of Pericles
-
,
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’
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,
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,
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,
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,
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,
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’
.
,
1
S
inc w
c om pa
e
re d
parag aph I ob rve that Mu y h ad l ad y
in h is h p te on Th y di d s H to y of
i p n?to m la (
riti ng
th is
this
r
'
r
e
r
'
c
a
a re
rra
se
,
r
uc
e
,
is
r
146
AN CIENT GREEK H I S TORIAN S LECI
'‘
.
where he pourtrays the qualities of his countrym en
there is not a single word about those conventional
v irtues in which Nicias shon e
The Athenians are
praised for their political intelligen ce and versa
tility for their ad venturous activity for enlight
ened freedom in their intercourse with strangers
and for other excellent t h ings N ot a word is said
of their piety and they were certainly pious We
are told that they have accomplished much and
reached the heights by their own talents and their
own toil
Th e re is not a word not a single per
f u nc tory phrase of assistance or favour from
heaven Of religion or of morality in the con
v ention al sense
there is not a syllable from the
beginning to the end of this brilliant speech
Pericles could hardly have avoided at least som e
conventional reference to the gods in the speech
he actually delivered at the sepulture
that
Thucydides overlooked it is significant
If this appreciation of the historian is sym pa
thetic I h O p e you will not suppose that I belong
to the band of devotees who make a cult of Thucy
Such
d id es and can see no defects in their idol
devotees existed in ancient as well as in modern
times and the historian s ancient indiscriminating
admirers received a very proper rebuke from
I have already
D ionysius of Halicarnassus
suggested that he carried his method of exclusi on
and omission too far His treatment of individuals
displays a more serio us limitation in his idea of
historical reconstruction
Thucydides does not
,
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14 8
ANC IENT GREEK HI STORIAN S LECT
.
impress upon it But within the limits of the task
he attempted Thucydides was a master in the craft
of investigating contemporary events and it may
be doubted whether within those limits the nine
teenth century wo u ld have much to teach him
If
he had admitted his readers into the secrets of his
workshop if he h ad more clearly displayed his raw
material and shown how he arrived at his conclu
sion if he had argued and discussed he might have
e x ercised a greater influence than he did on the
m ethods of subsequent Greek historians
His ih
complete work posth u mously published had an
immediate and far reaching result in establishing
political history ; and in the next lecture we shall
see how men of the younger generation recei ved a
stimulus from him
But although the value and
greatness of his work were at once recognised
and he always remained the one and undisputed
authority on the period he had treated yet for
several centu ries after his immediate successors
his history seems to have been little read except
by scholars ; he was a great name not a living
influence as a teacher or a model His style with
its old —
fashioned and wilful beauty repelled and
other ideals of history sharply O pposed to his
came into fashion It was not till the first century
with the return to Attic models that the
B C
interest in his work revived ; and from that time
2
we can trace his influence on leading writers do wn
.
,
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1
dpxam é v
weari
r e xal (
2
es
Dexippus
t
and
kos,
Dionysiu s ,
p
Proco iu s
are
0 611
/
1rep2 crux
instances
.
.
.
16 5
.
THU CYD I D ES
14 9
to one of the latest Byzantine historians Grito
bulus But this influence was of a superficial kind :
it concerned style and ph r aseology it was generally
1
a mere mechanical imitation
And the historians
whom he would himself have most esteemed were
not those who came under his own influ ence
,
‘
.
.
.
1
The
lar oplav
vile
im i tation
am pd¢ew
ser
of
Th uc y d id es
is
ridic uled
in Luc ian s was as?
’
LE CTURE
V
TH E D E VE L O PM E N T O F G RE E K H I S TO R I O G RAPH Y
A
F TE R
TH
U C Y D I DE S
The g en er ation after Thu cydides
1
.
T H U C YD I DE S had set up a new standard and
proposed a ne w model for hi storical investigation
He taught the Greeks to write contemporary
political history ; this was the permanent result
of his work But the secret of his critical methods
may be said to have perished with him ; it has
been reserved for modern students fully to appre
ciate his critical acumen and to estimate the
immense labours which underlay the construction
of his history but are carefully concealed like the
foundation stones of a building Influences cam e
into play in the fourth century which drove history
along other paths tha n those which he marked out ;
the best of the principles which his work had
inculcated did not become canonical ; and his
historical treatment was not sympathetic under
the new intellectual constellations
The age succeeding his death was perhaps not
favourable to the composition of political history
.
.
,
.
.
l
.
1
Th is
is
b
v
an o se r ation of von
150
Wilam owitz Monendorfi
'
-
.
152
AN CIENT GREEK HI STORIAN S LECT
.
would have written the life of some mediocre
hero of the stamp of Agesilau s
So far as
history is concerned his true v ocation was to
write memoirs The A nabasis is a memoir and
it is the most successful of his works It has the
defects which memoirs usually have but it has
the merits the freshness the human interest of
a personal document The adventures of the Ten
Thousand are alive for ever in Xenophon s pages
He took up the story of the Peloponnesian war
where Thucydides had left it and he carried down
the history of Greece from that date to the fall
of the Theban supremacy in the work whi ch we
know as the H ellenica By this work his powers
as a historian must be j udged
Some of its
characteristics are due to the superficial lessons
which the author learned from the founder of
political history In the first portion of the book
he employed strictly the annalistic plan of Th ney
d id es
He adopted the device of introducing
speeches and the obj ective method of allowing the
actors to reveal themselves in their acts and words
He does not himself pourtray their characters as he
pourtrays Cyrus and the generals in the A nabasis
But he never goes down below the surface of
events he never analyses the deeper motives ; and
he writes with little disguise of his own predilections
His history is an apotheosis of Agesilau s ; he does
not conceal his strong philo Laconian leanings or
his hatred of Thebes ; he pointedly ignores Epam i
.
,
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’
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,
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1
.
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1
B
.
i
.
an d
B
.
ii to iii
.
.
10
.
XEN O PHON
15 3
n ond as
His ideas about historical happenings were
those of the average conventional Athenian ; and
he as cribes the fall of the Spartan supremacy to
divine nemesis avenging the treacherous occupa
tion of the Theban ci tadel He cannot resist the
commonplace attraction of commonplace moralis
ing ; he tells anecdotes which his austere prede
cessor would have disdained ; but he has learned
from Thucydides to keep to the matter in hand
Other works of Xenophon had more influence
than the H ellenica on subsequent historiography ;
or as it wo u ld probably be safer to say reflected an
interest which was to become not only permanent
in literature but a conspicuous feature in history
I am referring to biography Interest deliberate
and serious interest in individual personalities had
been awakened by the sophistic illumination ; and
Euripid es probably did as much as any single man
to heighten and deepen it
A new branch of
literature biography emerged ; and the word Bios
life acquired a new meaning charged with the
whole contents of a man s actions and character
Biography was founded by Isocrates and the pupils
of S ocrates The earliest biography we possess is
the E vag or as of Isocrates and it is to this model
th at we owe the second the Ag esilau s of Xeno
phon In other works of Isocrates also there are
biographical sketches and perhaps the portraits in
the A n abasis were due to his infl uenc e
We can
.
,
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,
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.
,
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,
,
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,
’
.
.
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,
1
1
Th e y
re m
ind
in th e S upp lian ts
u s of
of
th e
Eur
c h ar ac te r-
ipid
es
86 1
(
p o t aits of
r r
the d e ad
Argive
l
ead ers
154
AN C IENT GREE K HI STORIAN S LECT
.
see too that the original personality of Socrates
wh ich made a deep impression on his disciples was
e ff ective in helping to establish this kind of litera
ture ; mos t of them used their pens ; and the
incidental portraiture of P lato and the M em oirs
of Xenophon which are not a Life have their
significance for the rise of biography I have not
to follow its further development or to sho w how
it was stimulated by the Peripatetic school}l
As a literary art ancient biography reached its
highest perfection in Plutarch s gallery of great
men That series is invaluable to us because the
author consulted many books which are now lost ;
but he was not a historian ; his interest was ethical
What we are here concerned to note is that
after Xenophon and Isocrates historians generally
considered sketches of character and biographical
facts to be part of their business It was a feature
which was flagrantly liable to abuse and often
led to irrelevancies which would have shocked
Th u cydides B ut although in practice ancient
character portraits tended to be conventional and
uninstructive it was in principle an important
advance to recognise that the analysis of character
and perso nality has historical value and cannot
be con fined within the limits which Thucydides
had allowed
The continuation of Thuc ydides was taken up
by anoth er wr iter who seems to have had a truer
,
,
,
,
,
.
’
.
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
.
,
,
-
,
,
.
1
F or th e se
re m arks
bl wo k Di
ad m ira
e
r
e
g
i
on th e r se of
—
r i echis ch r om is cke
biog aph y I
r
B iogr ap hie
ve
ha
u se d
F
‘
.
Leo s
AN CIENT GREEK HI STORIAN S LECT
15 6
.
Th e opom pu s ; but the w eight of evidence in
my
,
opinion is entirely against that theory ; while
there is nothing inconsistent with the authorship
of C ratipp u s (
the only other admissible claimant
which was advocated by Blass As no relics of
the work of C ratippu s have been preserved in
literature we have no direct positive evidence for
the identification The case rests (1) on the argu
ment by exclusion ; the claims made for other
candidates cannot be reconciled with the character
of the fragment ; (
2 ) on the circumstance that
the few things we know about Cratippu s corre
s ond to the indications of the new text
The
p
narrative bears the stamp of an original composition
by a contemporary (
like that of Thucydides and
,
.
,
.
.
,
Th e only oth er ; for the c laim putforward for Androtion by G de S anctis
1
.
B ibliog aph y) is ob io sly o t of co rt I t no gh to say h
th at th na ativ of th
am paig n s of Agesilau s ould not p o sibly hav
app ea
d in And otion Atti h i to y —Th c as against Th opom pus
wh o is onsid
d to b e th
by Wilam owit —
a th o
Mou ndo ff and
E M y
h as b en tat d im p tially by G enfell and H nt who
h ow v
in li ne to th i th o y and h a b n fo c ibly p s nted by
D S ancti
I will not go ov th e argum nt whi h th y hav p t so
w ll B t I wo ld em phasi th at th few positiv indications of contact
betw n th e p apy s and f agm nts of Th opom p s m ay b othe wi e
ac o nt d fo
a
Th op om p
wo ld nat ally have s d Cratipp s) ;
(
th at w h at w know abo t th li f of Th op om p s
nsatisf c to y as it is
and
nl ik ly th at h w ot h is H ll ni a befo e 350
C
en d
s it h i g h ly
to wh ic h th e ad vo at
of h is au tho ship ar fo ced
th t th h yp oth sis —
wa
o t—th t th H ll n i
nti ly d i ff
nt n th e styl of t eat
to
i
ont dic t d by a p assag
P hilipp i
of Po phy i s
m nt f om th
ang
3
it d by D S n ti in h is t act p 9) and
P
E s bi
p
(
by th e way in whic h Diony sius (n h is app e iation in th L tt to
b oth wo k c losely tog th and desc ibes the
6 ) ssoc iat
P om p ia
W ith o t th
h i to iog aph y
faint st s gg stion that
of h is
c h a ac t
w o k p s nt d a adic al c ont a t to th lat [S inc the
a li
th
in the
wa w itt n pap s h av app a d by W A G oligh
ab ov
E ngli h H i to i l R i ew Ap il 1908 an d W Rh y Rob t in the
Classical Re i ew J n e 1908 a gu ing ag ainst the Th eopom p us theo y !
see
(
r
e
rr
e
re
e
e
er ,
s
s
c
s
r
u
e
e
u
c a.
e
r
r ae
us ,
ea
e
.
ev
.
x
s
c
u
s
r
e
e
s
re e
r
er
e
r
s
s
v
ev
,
u
r
,
,
r
e
e
u
a
u
a
c
u
e
.
r u
.
e
er
r
er
r s
.
,
e
e
re
r
r
r
s
e
r
e
i
e
.
.
e
e
s
,
,
B
r c
e
r
r
c
ere
r
e
,
s
r
e
r
u
e
u
e
e
e
r
r
er
,
r ca
r
re e
es
re
e
es
er
r
e
a
s,
,
,
u e
i
e
r
e
u
e
ra
c
,
u
ur
e
s e
,
.
e
r
e
r
s c
e
e
e
e
e
c
a
s
ee
e
e
r
u e
s
e
e
c
r
e
e
ere
z
,
us
u
r
e
e
u
e
r
r
s
e
re s
e
.
u
ze
ru
er
a
e
u
e
r
r
er
e
is e
.
ar
.
u
u
u
s
e
s
ee
c
c
e
e
er ,
.
’
ere
e
e
u
e c
r
c
.
u
v
er
.
s
e
e
.
er ,
er s ,
r
.
C R A TI P P U S
15 7
even more so than Xenophon s H ellenica ) not
compiled from books
We can see that it was
written without kno wledge of Xenophon s work
The lower limit of its date can hardly be later
1
than about 350 B C
Now C r atipp u s we kn ow
was a younger conte m porary of Th u c yd id esf and
his literary activity must have been subsequent
to the death of Thucydides (
3 96 B C ) whose
c
work he continued ; so that chronology as well as
subj ect accords with the hypothesis of his author
ship
There are no speeches and one of the
things we know about C ratipp u s is that he
disapproved of the speeches in Thucydides and
considered the absence of them in the last Book
a proof that Thucydides had come to regard them
as undesirable
The narrative is lucid and simple
unadorned by rhetorical phrases and free from
didactic commonplaces It is also extremely dull ;
but it would be illegitimate to j u dge from this
particular section that the work as a whole could
not have evoked the praise implied by Plutarch
If nothing were left to us of Thucydides but
say the last thirty chapters of the third Book
with the tedious account of the Acarnanian opera
tions of D emosthenes what a dull wr iter we should
esteem him We can see that the author was not
given to passing personal criticisms ; no hard words
are said of any one ; a slight approbation is accorded
to an act of Conon ; and one much mutilated
’
,
.
’
.
.
,
,
’
.
.
.
.
,
3
.
,
.
.
,
,
,
,
.
-
1
E
.
c ian
2
M Walker th inks
war
.
it was
.
Dionys iu s, De Thu cydide,
16
.
written b efo e
r
the
e nd
of the
Pho
AN CIEN T GREEK HI STORIAN S
15 8
LEGT
.
passage contains apparently a characteristic of a
statesman whose identity can hardly be deter
mined
This evidence does not enable us to
decide whether Cratippu s adopted the objective
method of Thucydides in regard to the personalities
of the historical actors But in other matters at
least he condescended to his readers He explains
the relations and actions of political parties ; he
traces the growth of anti Spartan feeling in Greece ;
and of the constitution of Boeotia he gives as clear
an account as could be desired in a handbook an
account which shows us that we were ignorant of its
real nature The general impression I gain from
the fragment is that if the work had survived
it would occupy a distinctly higher place than the
H ellenica of Xenophon though the author did
not possess Xenophon s technical knowledge of
warfare
The discovery of Grenfell and Hunt has added
to our knowledge of facts but for ou r present
purpose its interest lies in showing on what lines
the writing of contemporary history founded by
Thucydides might have developed in the hands
of men not endowed with his brain power and
originality but c ompetent and diligent if it had
not been diverted from an independent path by
forces which I will presently notice
,
1
.
.
.
-
,
.
,
’
.
,
,
,
-
,
,
,
.
passag on which noth ing p asive has been s gge ted is in
b w and dub ol m w
wh
f y ap (
aw fi l o
Kn p
c ol x
That
s
are th e li ght l
Could it pos ibly b Diony sius of S y ac us
S parta was int ste d in som e of hi proce edings d esc ibed by Diodorus
m ention of h im h e and a
xi
7 8 m igh t c onceivably have led to
d ig ssion on h i p olic y
1
Th e
.
.
ere o ;
,
s
c ue
a
id
.
re
.
v va
r
s
.
s
.
‘
r ev ur
s
,
i
v
r
‘
r
‘
r
e
r
a
,
'
e
s
ere
v
u
ers u
e,
,
er
16 0
AN CIENT GREEK H ISTORIAN S war
.
is thus appraised by C icero who thoug h he lived
in a day when other styles of history were in
“
fashion had a keen literary sense
P hilistus
he writes to his brother Quintus who was e ngaged
“
in reading the Sicilian author is a writer of
the first rank pithy sagacious concise al m ost
a miniature Thucydides
Cicero s portrait sug
gests that P hilistu s displayed Thucydidean qualities
beyond conciseness and the faculty of keeping
strictly to the point ; and this we know from
other evidence The court of the old fox (
veter ator
)
D ionysius the Elder of whom he was an inti m ate
confidant before his disgrace was a school of
statecraft and political casuistry in which the
imitator of Thucydides could well learn to stu dy
political phenomena fro m the non moral attitude
of his exemplar But the mere fact that Philistus
undertook to write in detail the early history of
Sicily raises a presumption that he was l ess
sceptical than the Athenian ; and as a matter of
fact he did not disdain to record wonders and
omens such as the appearance of a swarm of bees
alighting on the mane of a horse which was taken
to presignify the reign of D ionysius
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
,
,
”
,
1
’
.
.
,
,
,
-
.
,
,
2
.
2
.
The influ ence o
r hetor ic
f
D ur ing the period in which these three his
torians, P hilistu s, Cr atipp us,
1 “
f
r
.
Capitalis
ii 11
.
2
.
c re
I give th
b
.
a
r
r
.
e
rre
Cicero, Div 1 33 = fr 48
.
,
,
b e vis p en p sill s Th ydi d s ad Q
ende ings of Ty
ll and Pu se ol ii d 2 p 136
er ac u tu s
e r
and Xenophon wrote
.
Cp fr 57
.
.
u
u
r
.
e
uc
r, v
.
.
e
.
.
,
.
.
I S O CRATE S
16 1
the ed u cated Greek world was succumbing to the
spell of two influences towards which Th u cydides
had been detached and independent
I refer to
rhetoric and philosophy You are all familiar with
the immense influence which Isocrates exerted on
literature and education He was not a man of
genius yet at no age perhaps can we find a single
man who in this sphere held such a magisterial
position Greeks from every part of the world
repaired to his school at Athens and his rules for
style were canonical I need not illustrate this
but will go on to show how he affected the develop
ment of historiography and especially thro ugh two
eminent admirers E phorus and The opom p u s
And first of all I may point out how the
political view of which Isocrates was the most
conspicuous exponent a ffected history The rise
of M acedon in the middle of the fourth century
and the gradual fulfilment of the aspiration for
the union of Greece under M acedonian direction
brought to the front what was virtually a n ew
conception of Hellenic history Hitherto history
had been either sectional the histories of particular
states or groups or had been concerned with
particular episodes s u ch as the j oint efforts of the
Greek states against the Persian or inter Hellenic
wars B u t the idea of Greek u nity preached by
Isocrates and taking the special form of u n ity u nder
M acedonian leadership against Persia reacted upon
history and no fewer than three works were
written in the days of Philip and Alexander
,
.
.
.
,
,
,
.
,
.
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
-
.
,
,
,
,
M
I
A
R
O
N
S
T
S
I
H
K
E
E
R
G
T
N
I
E
C
N
A
2
16
LECT
,
d
i
ea
of
the
unity
o
f
r
w
c
e
e
h
i
h
w
Two
of
them
have
va
is
n
h
ed
i
story
h
k
r
ee
G
leav ing not a trace except the mere record of
th eir existence One was by Z oil u s whose nam e
is b etter r emembered for his carping criticism s
of H o m er which earned him the nick nam e of
1
H om er o m astia Homer s scourge
The other was
by his pupil Anaximenes who was one of the
teachers of Alexander Both these historians were
s ubmerged in oblivion by the success of the third
Ephorus of Cyme He is said to have been a
pupil of Isocrates but I do not think that this is
established 2 The work to which he devoted his
life beg inning with the mythical origins of Greece
and embracing the barbarian peoples With which
the Greeks came into contact was probably
intended to terminate with the year 3 34 when
Alexander crossed into Asia but only reached
as far as 3 56 in consequence of the author s
death
It became and remained one of the
standard works of antiquity and established what
“
has been aptly described as the vulgate of Greek
history
It is u sual to designate this book which
although it has perished is inwoven in the narra
a
w
tiv es of our later authorities so that we kno
sa
good d eal abo u t it indirectly as the first univer l
ut
B
history ; and so it is described by Polybius
i
n
sense
it is i m portant to discriminate the precise
which we can admit this description We m ust
in sp ir e d b y th e
,
.
.
,
’
'
-
,
.
,
.
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
,
’
,
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
.
.
2
w
w
il p
’
H is ork c am e d o n to Ph i s d e ath
”
a
r
t
E
Wissowa
Cp S c h artz ,
p h oros , i n Pau
1
.
w
.
.
ly
-
.
16 4
ANCIEN T GRE EK HI ST ORIAN S
LECI
‘‘
.
method The author seems to have had a wide
acquaintance with the whole range of historical
and geographical literature and he did not copy
u ncritically
He was fully conscious of the value
of first hand information and we may note his
ac u te observation wondering how far he applied
it that in the history of modern times the m ost
detailed accounts are the most credible but for
ancient history those who profess to know m ost
particulars are the least worthy of belief His
c ritical principles led him formally to throw over
the purely mythical period and begin with the
return of the Heracleidae ; but he did not carry
o ut consistently th is counsel of wisdom ; in the
c ourse of his narrative he introduced myths and
indulged in the crude methods of rationalising
which had been initiated by the Ionians
I cannot enter into a detailed account of the
work of Ephorus and must be content just to
m ention characteristics for which the influence of
Isocrates is responsible
Among them may b e
noticed the interruption of the narrative by m oral
ising platitudes ; the introduction of elaborate
even when an army was
I soc ratean speeches
facing the enemy ; and the passion for panegyrics
T hese features and his conventional battle scenes
which conformed more or less to a mo d el schem e
manifest the s ame ten d ency to sacrifice truth to
e ff ect History is becoming epideictic like ora
tory and poetry and desires to show off And this
is what is meant by saying that historiography was
.
,
.
-
,
,
,
,
.
.
,
,
.
-
,
,
,
,
.
,
.
TH E O P O M P U S
16 5
drawn under the pern icious influence of rhetoric
One does not mean by that the cultivation of
a clear agreeable and rhythmical style one mean s
the tendency to seek first of all and almost at any
cost what may be called rhetorical effects
The other famous historian of the I soc ratean
school T he opom pu s continued the work of Th ney
did es in his H ellenica which covered the same
period as Cr atipp u s and for which he must have
derived his material mai nly from older works such
as those of C r atippu s himself and Xenophon
His more important e ff ort was the P hilipp ica a
history of Greek aff airs in the time of Philip and
here he was in the fu ll sense an original contem
ff
orar y writer
He
too
was
a
ected b y th e
p
national idea of Isocrates ; h e saw in the M ace
d onian power a unifying principle and he made
it the pivot of his contemporary h istory But it
is notable that he called that history n ot M ace
donica but P h ilippic a
It was a new thing to
“
treat a period as the age of Philip
He was probably the most interesting historian
of the fourth century
But som e have even
pronounc ed him truly great worthy to rank near
Thucydides The evidence is sufficient to disprove
such a clai m
The I soc r atean features which were
common to him with Ephorus are decisive And
if we observe that he was more concerned with
.
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
1
.
,
,
'
,
.
,
.
,
.
.
,
.
2
.
.
This
wo k (wh i
p bl
was not u i sh ed
334) c ons iste d of fifty - eight ooks
2
S ee Wac h sm u th , E inlei tu ng 537 sqq
1
r
ch
B
.
.
b
e f ore
324
B C
.
.
,
cp.
frag s 108,
.
16 6
AN CIENT GREEK HI STORIAN S LECT
.
the private morality of men of action than with
their political or m ilitary capacity that he served
u
p miracles and fables and related a figment of his
own invention concerning the imaginary land of
M erope beyond the ocean where the golden age
1
is still a reality we may see that any comparison
with Thucydides is almost ludicrously inappro
r iate
He seems to have been a man of restless
p
vanity endowed with what we might call an epi
deictic temper While Ephorus devoted his life
to study without personal ambitio n Theopom pus
travelled about eager to cut a figure in the world
like Gorgias and others of the early sophists H e
“
had a temper revealed in his writings and
infusing a S pice which was lacking in the flavour
less works of Ephor u s and Cratippu s He was
a psychological analyst and he was more inclined
to be censorious than panegyrical
The critic
D ionysius says that his great aim was to dive
into the profundities of the human soul and
discover the secret wickedness almost invariably
2
lurking beneath the semblance of virtu e
In j udging these new tendencies to which
history succumbed under the I socr atean r é gime we
must bear in mind that they responded to the taste
of the public which Isocrates did much to educate
In old days Homer and the epic poets satisfied the
,
,
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
.
”
,
,
.
,
.
.
,
.
1
and
He
s aid e x
01Ta
’
p
re ss
ly th at in m yth
xa vr es
I u6ura a vy y pd x
/
S tra
Letter to P om p ey , 6 , 7
u dge s i n H ad es
m th c a
u nc tu a s e erit of Th e op om p us
y i l j
p
l v
.
y
he
would o
u tdo
bo i 2
“
I s ppos
c on d
t th i
.
2
s
,
u
uc
”
.
.
.
e,
e r
H erod otus , Ctesias,
35
.
add s
tria
ls
Diony s iu s ,
of
th e d ead
“
th at the
wi th
the
16 8
A N C I E N T G R E E K H I S TORIANS
mm
reason s in his y outh he found a new hom e at
A thens where he devoted the rest of his long life 1
to a h istory of Sicily and Italy He not onl
y
ransacked literature but travelled for the purpose
of his work sparing neither time nor money to
gain accurate information about the ill known
western nations Iberians Celts and Ligurians
H e made a special investigation of chronology and
was the first to introduce into Greek historio
graphy the clumsy inconvenient method of
r eckoning time by the O l m iac years
His work
y p
in thirty three B ooks ) came down to 3 20 B C b ut
(
he continued it in a history of Agathocles and in
a later book which reac hed to 26 4 B C and ln
cluded the campaigns of Pyrrhus Timaeus was
not only used extensively by subsequent historians
especially by D iod orus but his history was recog
nised as an authoritative storehouse of inform ation
by the scholars and poets of Alexandria such as
Apollonius Lycophron Callimachus and Erato
sthenes The material furnished by this means has
enabled G eff cken to restore the general c onstruc
tion of the first two B oo ks of his chief work deal
ing with the mythical history and geography of
S icily and Italy For us his merit lies in his in
d ustriou s collection of ethnographical facts and
local legends material which is still of value ; b ut
this merit would never have su fficed to secure him
the popularity and authority which he enj oyed for
many generations after his d eath if his history had
,
,
.
,
,
-
,
,
,
.
,
,
.
-
.
.
,
,
.
.
.
,
,
,
,
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
1
3 40-256
B C
.
.
l
e xi e d
3 17 D
.
C.
TI M AEU S
16 9
not possessed other features which we should mark
as his weak points When he came to Athens he
studied rhetoric under a pupil of Isocrates and his
work had characteristics which we expect from the
I soc ratean school such as speeches packed with
commonplaces and the conventional administration
of praise and blame He had also weaknesses of
his own
He was a thorough pedant without
sense of proportion or the faculty to discriminate
weighty from trivial things ; interested in discon
ne c ted details ; fond of fables and marvels
He
was also something of a mystic He sought to
for instance that to every sinner punish
S how
ment unmistakable as such was meted out and
that coincidences of date h ad a transcendent signi
fic anc e ; he was ever on the watch for the revelation
of mysterious or daemon ic influences in historical
events Again his history of the con temporary period
must have been far from impartial His ex trava
gant admiration of Timoleon was the counterpart
of his failure to recognise any but the worst qualities
of Agathocles whom he hated on account of his
own banishment which had embittered his mind
Living in the Attic atmosphere and trained in
I socratean rhetoric we should expect to find Timaeus
conforming to th e canons of Attic style B u t it
appears that he adopted a ne w kin d of writing
which bade farewell to the traditions of Attic taste
It is impossible to decide whether he struck out
this new way for himself or came under the
influence of H egesias of M agn esia who is always
.
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17 0
AN CI ENT GREE K HI STORIANS LECT
.
designated as the founder of th e famous school of
style which came to be known as the Asianic As
we do not know the precise dates of the life of
H egesias we cannot say whether he and Timaeus
were independent of each other
The literary
parentage of this new style is to b e sought in the
prose of the elder sophists like Gorgias and Alci
damas but it outdid anything that Gorgias in his
most frigid moments h ad been tempted to essay
It produces the impression of a bacchic revel of
rhythms and verbal eff ects This Asianic move
ment triumphed the general public lost the power
of appreciating Attic measure and Attic sanity
and the new style was predominant for two
hundred years Nor did it d isappear when the
reaction came and Attic models again came into
fashion On the contrary as Norden has shown
the two styles the archaic and the modern con
tended for mastery throughout the ages of the
Roman Empire
For instance in the fourth
century A D we have a great archaic rhetorician
L ib an iu s thrilling Antioch with his eloquence
while a great modern sophist H im erius was teach
ing the art of style at Athens
Of the modern style in its early or Asianic
period we have very few specimens but we kn ow
that it comprised two distinct kinds — the pretty
style and the bombastic style
The bombastic
suited the taste of grandiose Hellenistic princes
and it so happens that the one considerable exam ple
we possess of it is a long inscription of Antiochus
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17 2
ANCIENT GREEK HI STORIANS
F or H e ll as h ath
Ev en th e
l ost h alf h e r vi sion
Th eb an tow n
,
on e e ye
knoc ke d
LEC'l‘
.
out,
.
This means in plain language : Athens and
Thebes are in Greece what the sun and moon are
in the sky ; or they m ay be likened to the two
eyes of Greece and Alexander in destroying
Thebes has deprived Greece of one eye I have
made an attempt to imitate the rhythm though it
is indeed impossible to catch the effect in another
lang u age or perhaps to appreciate it even in the
Greek
But the example will illustrate the
poetical character of the Asianic style Is not
this passage what one m ight look for in the
chorus of a third rate historical tragedy ?
The popularity which Timaeus enjoyed for a
c ouple of centuries mirrors the public taste and he
would hardly have enj oyed it if he had adhered to
the canons of Attic style which drew a sharp line
between poetry and prose But there was another
school of historical art bidding for public favour in
the days of Timaeus It was initiated by Duris
of Samos a pupil of Theophrastus He becam e
through some stroke of luck tyrant of Samos and
he wrote a history of Greece from 3 7 0 B C to 281
a biography of Agathocles and a chronicle of his
He declared war on what I may call
native city
the conventio nal school of Ephorus and Theo
pompus asserting that these writers failed to excite
the pleasure which history di ff erently treated is
capable of affording
They lacked he said
M im esis is the nearest Greek equ ivalent
sis
m im e
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,
D URIS
17 3
“
of realism
and we S hall not be far from the
mark if we say that what D uris demanded was
realism and if we call his school the realistic
D uris was intensely interested in the
school
th eatre ; he wrote books on tragedy and the
history of art ; and it was thi s interest in drama
that inspired him with the idea that historia ns
should aim at producing the same kinds of eff ect
as dram atists
He required for instance that
they should introduce their personages dressed in
the costu m es appropriate to the time and circum
But his chief point of insistence was that
stances
the feelings of the readers should be moved and
harrowed by highly wro u ght pathetic scenes con
j ured up by the writer s imagination ; while they
were also to be entertained by anecdotes and
goss ip and amorous stories He achieved a success
with the public and naturally his success was
followed up by others F or example P h ylarc h u s
who wrote an important history of the years 2 7 2
“
is blamed by Polybius as feminine
220 B C
1
because he aimed at moving his readers to tears
That was the influence of D uris
There was a good deal to be said for the instinct
of D uris in his reaction against conventionalism
The power of realising and vividly describing scenes
of the past is a high merit in a historical writer
provided he has the material necessary for con
a true picture
But this proviso is
str u c ting
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1
We
m u st re m e m
Phylarc h u s
as a
p
b
er
lybi
th at Po
artisan of
Cleom
us
was dis
ene s
.
po
se d
to b e
v
bl
u nfa ou ra
e
to
17 4
AN CIENT GREEK H I ST O RIANS LECT
.
’
sure to be overlooked when the writer s first con
sideratio n is not tru th but effect And so it was
with D uris His school like the conventionalists
subordinated history in the Thucydidean sense to
literary art
The conventionalists appealed to
taste the realists appealed also to the emoti ons
The former ed ified the latter excited But for both
alike history was simply a branch of rhetoric
We may regret this corruption as we call it of
history But it is m ore to the purpose to under
stand the Greek point of view It is not easy
for us to realise the importance which the art of
rhetoric possessed for the Greeks as a purveyor of
aesthetic pleasure Indeed the hi story of Greek
rhetoric testifies perhaps as impressively as the
history of Greek plasti c to the large part which
aesthetic pleasure p layed in Greek life For the
later Greeks the declamations of rhetoricia
ns
which we find intolerably tedi ous to read had as
intense an aesthetic value as the Homeric poems
for the ir remote ancestors and were listened to
with as eagerly attentive and as critical ears
People went to hear a rhetorical display j ust as we
go to hear a symphony And this interest lasted
down to late Gra c co Roman times Greek prose
was always an art in as full a sense as the poetry
from which it sprang regulated by principles and
canons which have no counterpart in modern
languages even in French and required prolonged
study and practice And rhetoric came to fulfil
for Greek audiences the same role which had been
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17 6
ANC IENT GREEK H I ST O RIANS LECT
‘
.
1
and some other trustworthy sources with a
rigorous rej ection of the literature which was
written m obs 52w Ka i Oéa p o not only I am afraid
as we say for the gallery but for the stalls too
The great popular success was won by Cleitarchus
2
a rhetor of Colophon who made the most of the
possibilities of his theme and captured his public by
This
fantastic descriptions of the gorgeous East
quasi historical work became the standard book on
the subj ect and seems to have exerted a deep
influence on th e traditional history of Alexander
But while such romances captivated the public
those plain veracious reports of Ptolemy Aristo
bulus and N earc h u s have an important place in
the development of historiography They founded
8
a new branch of historical literature which in the
next generations was represented by the Me m oirs
of Pyrrhus and of Aratus to h e succeeded in Rom an
days by the Commentaries of Julius Caesar the
M emoirs of C orb ulo and Trajan s history of his
The Commentaries of Caesar ful
D acian wars
filled indeed in a most subtle way the function
of political pamphlets but the plain businesslike
u nad orned relation has its literary parentage in the
memoirs of the generals of Alexander And it is
,
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”
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1
Es
pec ially
O c ean
2
He
the
wo k
r
of
Nearc h u s
on
h is
voyage
in the
I ndian
.
w rote ab out th e
y F om the c iticisms
that his style was m arked by
of Longinu s and D m tri s it app a
features wh ich h e ald d th A iani sc hool
3 We m a ind
d com pa e p a ts of Xenophon s Anabas is And the
y
work of Nearchus m ay rem ind us of the epo t which Scylax m ade for
e
e
r
ee
e
e nd of
u
th e fourth
e
,
e
s
r
c
c e ntu r
.
r
r
rs
.
’
r
.
r
Darius
.
r
HIERONY M U S
17 7
not I think unreasonable to c onj ecture that these
memoirs were the m odel or insp iration of an ex c ep
tional work of this period which fulfille d as it
would appear the demands which Thucydides
made on historiography Hieronymus of Cardia
a soldier and statesman who had served under
E umenes and Antigonus G onatas wrote a history
of the D iadochi and Epigoni from the death of
Alexander to about 26 6 B C
His sole concern
seems to have been to record facts accurately ; he
used official despatches and in general he told only
W hat h e knew of his own knowledge or from
credible information But his style was careless ;
he disdained rhetoric The Greeks would not read
what did not gratify their aesthetic sense ; and a
work like that of Hieronymus had no more chance
in competition with D uris than the M emoir of
Ptolemy against the sensational and rhetorical
story of C leitarc h u s
Speculating on what we
casually learn about th is lost book we may
suppose that if it had survived we should regard
Hieronymus as a third in a triumvirate of Greek
historians along with Thucydides and Polybius
We saw in the fir st lectures how th e Persian
conquest of Asia M inor and invasion of Greece
played a determining part in the rise of history
Similarly the Greek conquest of the Persian
empire had a decisive influence on its develop
ment I have pointed out some of the ways in
wh ich this second great stimulus from the Orient
operated
Just as it was in consequence of
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N
17 8
AN CIENT GREEK HI S TORIANS war
.
the destru ction of M iletus and the Persian war
th at the intellectual primacy in Greece passed
from Ionia to Athens so it was a consequence of
the expansion of Hellas by Alexander that the
primacy passed away from Athens to Alexandria
and other places — passed back we might say to
the East ; and this affected h istory as well as other
branches of literature Again the opening up of the
distant countries of Asia stimulated and ministered
to the romantic history which gratified th e popular
appetite for sensation
On the other hand the
reports and blue books of Alexander s generals
founded a new kind of history which esche wed
rhetoric addressed no appeal to the public and had
very few exponents Another result of Alexander s
work was the rise of the idea of the oecu m ene —the
realisation of the i nhabited world as a whole of
‘
which ac count must be taken
This idea had
indeed no immediate influence on history We
can trace its influence in the Stoic philosophy and
it gave rise to the conception of th e Romans that
their dominion was potentially conterminous with
the or bis ter m r u m As a historical principle it
then began to become e ffective as we can see in
the universal histories of the first century B C and
it prepared the way for the Christian conception
of world history
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p
J
Kae rst, Die an tike I d ea der OeIr/um ene in zhr er p olitiachm
Com ar e
wad Ir/ultur ellen B edeu tu ng , 1903
1
'
'
.
.
AN CIENT GREE K HI STORIANS
180
LECT
.
the most d istinguished names S ome papyr us frag
ments of the Ap olog ia of Antiphon have been pub
lish e d the other day by Nicole but welcome thou h
g
they are they do not amount to very much 1
It has been happily observed by W ilam owitz 2
that these political pamphlets of which the book
of S tesim b r otu s was one of the first were the
prose successors of the Elegies of Solon and
Th e ognis
The most eff ective and important
fl ysh eets emanated from the men who were dis
satisfied with the democracy and desired to sub sti
tute oligarchy or polity ; they were dealing with
burning questions and they did not spare persons
The book of S tesim b rotu s which seem s to have
been entitled Concer ning Them istocles Thu cydides
and P er ic les had struck the personal note
The
Athenian history of the fifth century was per
verted by these wr iters into a history of dem a
g ogu es and this perversion had a decisive influence
on Athenian thinkers of the following century
The pup ils of Socrates were only too ready to
ad e t a
view which held up to obloquy the
p
democracy which had taken the life of their
master
We have the scheme of the Athenian
demagogues in Plato s G orgi as in the P olitikos of
Antisthenes in the D ialog ues of Aeschines in the
P hilipp ika of The opom p u s in the A thenian Con
It was somewhat as if the
s titu tion of Aristotle
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1
2
Ap ologie
’
L
The
s am e
’
P an egyr i c
6
(
.
S
404
parta
.
of
B C.
.
)
d An tip hon ,
’
l
on
M y os 1rep2m
a ur doews,
p b bl
va Bal )
1907 (
G ene
p
-
e
.
has m ad e it ro a e that one
ortion of the
am h et of an onian who
soc rate s was aim e d against th e
and in fa our of
r ote agai ns t th e Ath enian s u rem ac
I
w
sc h o ar
p
p
p l
y
I
v
P O LITI CAL LITERATURE
181
sources of the American history of the nineteenth
centu ry were lost an d a reactionary publicist
wrote a book to make out that a series of dem a
i
o
c Presidents was the key to the history of
g g
the United States
This literature contemporary with Th u cydides
must have had a considerable effect in creating an
interest in Athenian history It corrupted history
but it also quickened it It was the obj ect for
instance of T heram e nes and his followers to prove
that polity the form of government which they
desired was not an innovation but the true and
original Athenian constitu tion the
mm
p os
‘
ia
and that the existing democracy was a
perversion which had been generated and fostered
in the interests of demagogues
The historical
question what was the nature of the m i p oe
o7t
ta
and the Solonian reform thus becam e a
question of burning political interest We m ay
illu strate it by the controversies not yet extinct
as to the nature of the Reformation in England
between Church parties which in the interests of
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7r af r
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7 e
i
7
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r
,
i
f
'
7r
ir e
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,
To th e literature
b long the p fi h m é of Th y
h m t i al
m ach s
D C ) th e p am p h l t f om w h i h A istotle d erived m
403
Ly sias
kfio
iwwd p
fo his A0
; th en lat (
pl 0m) K
vulga ly as ib d to
n t m am
pl woN t
[Th pu l of th
d in
m in t and c aref l t d y by
H odes Attic u s h as b n di
1
u
.
1r.
er
,
a
f a al
:
er
bj
e
.
ee
,
e ct
r
e
.
'
r
no
.
on th is s u
B
av
e
c
,
uc
1re
e 1re
‘
7 0
ar a
r e as,
sc u sse
ra s
s
r
.
zz e
ov eur
ac r
r
u e
a
'
a er
cr
u
rov
r
e
s u
S tud ien zu r Geschichte a nd Ku ltu r d es A lter tu m s , ii I ,
E Drerup , 1908 (
rom a
arie t of ind ic a
H is so ution is e r inte re sti ng
Pad er orn)
x c
an
tions h e c onc u d es that it was ritten in the su m m er of
Ath e nian e onging to th e art of Th eram enes , and is a p olitic al
o itics of th e h ou r. Th essa , th e
am h et concerning th e Ath e nian
a d isg ui se
S o an rish atriot m igh t p u t
eing m ere
nom inal su ec t,
oh em ian
If Drer up is right,
a
ea for H om e Ru e in th e m ou th of a
s eec h
of Th rasym ac h us birép Aapt
h is fu rth e r infere nc e th at th e
.
.
p
b
p l
pl
oalwu
.
bl
bj
was a
b
l
l
b
v y
w
p y
p l
.
p
th e
v
F
y
.
ly
l
roc h ure of
.
B
sam e sort se e m s
I
p
.
probable !
.
.
by
ly
182
ANCIENT GREEK H I ST O RIANS LECT
.
the ir own ecclesiastical views place different
interpretations u pon historical e v ents
Aristotle s Constitu tion of A thens may itself b e
regarded from one point of v iew as belonging to
the political literature of the fourth century To
describe it as a pa m phlet is as absurd as it wo uld
be so to describe the work of Herodotus Its
main pur pose was scientific ; but the author was
deeply interested in the politics of the day and his
book had an intentional bearing on the contem
2
It was due to his own views as
p orary situation
a politician and not to his c uriosity as a historian
that he used as authorities flysheet literature
especially a polemical pamphlet dating from the
last years of the fifth century and expressing the
anti democratic conception of Athenian history
which prevailed in the circle of Th eram enes
But the Constitu tion o
A
t
h
ens is only one of
f
15 8 Greek constitutions and some not Greek
which were co m piled by Aristotle or under his
direction
Their purpose was to supply actual
material for a scientific study of political pheno
mena And thus Aristotle possesses the great
significance that he was the founder of c onstitu
tional history the precursor of Waitz and Stubbs
The Constitu tion of A thens the only one of the
collection we possess was th e one most likely to
be aff ected by Aristotle s political prej udices Its
weaknesses are evident It consists of two parts
a sketch of the constitutional changes to the end
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’
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1
As
Nissen h as d one
2
.
Com
pa Ba
re
u er ,
p
.
274
.
184
AN CIENT GREEK HI ST O RIANS LECT
.
seems to have reflected very little on the subject
or rather to have confined his reflexions with in very
narrowly d rawn lines The formalism of his con
ception is most evident in the way in which he
treats or fails to treat the Athenian empire To
a modern student who should undertake to write
a constitutional history of Athens one of the most
important problems would be to examine how the
democracy governed the empire and how the
empire reacted on it
Aristotle dismisses the
empire in about four lines (
0
M oreover
although he has traced the constitutional changes
in relation to the political crises which brought
them abo u t he has in general his eye merely on
the dead mach inery ; he tells us the names of the
parts but he does not show how the machine
worked
Even when we come to the democracy
of the fourth century we get only a full account
of the official organization and the formal pro
ced u re ; no e ff ort is made to gain an insight into
the political efficiency of the institutions
It is
doubtful whether even here he consulted the laws
themselves or rather used an analysis written by
1
somebody else
And if in this historical treatise
he fails to show the actual working of the consti
tution and to explain the u nwritten S taatsr echt
h is scientific treatise the P olitics does not supply
this want
Plato troubled himself little with history but
it is not improbable that one of his speculations
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,
1
S ee
Wilam owitz
,
op
.
cat. 1. c .
7
.
PLAT O
185
s uggested the idea of the first history of civili sa
tion In the L aws where he descends to lower
h eights nearer to the actual conditions of terres
trial society Plato has sketched a reconstruction
of the development of the human race
It is
gover ned by the idea of cataclysms such as
del uges or pestilences which wiped out the human
race leaving only a re m nant which had to begin
at the very beginning and weave civilisation like
the web of Penelope all over again The latest of
these periodic cataclysms was a deluge and the
few survivors who had gained safety on the tops
of high hills found themselves without the means
of travelling and without arts ; the metals had
disappeared and there were no means of felling
“
timber
The desolation of these primitive men
would create in them a feeling of affection and
friendship towards one another ; and they would
have no occasion to fight for their subsistence ; for
they would have a pasture in abundance
also
abundance of clothin g bedding and dwellings and
utensils ; so that they were not very poor
And
they were not rich as there was no gold or silver
“
But the community which has neither poverty
nor riches will always have the noblest principles
there is no insolence or injustice nor again are
there any contentions or envyings among them
Plato draws here the picture of an age which is
ethically golden ; although h e does not use the
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”
1
.
yl
Th e c c e of d egenerate
Laws , 6 7 8-9, trans! Jowett
R ep u blic i ii is a seq ue nc e in th oug h t, not in tim e
1
.
v
.
.
.
s tate s
in
186
AN CIENT GREE K HI ST O RIAN S
LECT
.
expression
He th en sketches the patriarchal
government of primitive societies appealing to
Homer s description of the C yc lepes ; the rise of
agriculture and of city life ; the beginnings of
legislation which became necessary when men who
had different laws in their separate life came to live
together He shows how this gathering into large
communities suspended patriarchal rule and brought
about a monarchical or aristocratic government
Up to this point we suppose that we are reviewing
the general development of mankind throughout
the whole earth
Then suddenly by a sort of
legerdemain the philosopher changes this universal
scene to the plain of Troy and continues the
imaginary record from the foundation of Ilion The
rest is a curious commentary on the history of
Greece It turns on the idea that the Heracleidae
The object of the
m issed a great opportunity
D orian institutions which they introduced was
Plato alleges to protect the entir e Hellenic race
against the barbarians and if they had only legis
lated with more far sighted wisdom they might
have secured a permanent union or confederacy of
the H ellenic world strong to resist all assaults of
the barbarians
As history this is absurd ; the
in terest lies in Plato s r e flex ion of the national
Hellenic idea which was preached by Isocrates
N or indeed does Plato intend it to be taken more
literally than the previous imaginary reconstruc
tion of the progress of man from his prim eval
conditions
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’
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.
188
AN CIENT GREEK HI STORIANS LECI
’
‘
.
were in the sphere of philology but the antiquarian
tastes which found their fullest satisfaction there
and afterwards at Pergamon also in the shadow of
large libraries were introduced by the Peripatetic
movement and did not fail to aff ect historio
graphy We can notice this influence in the work
of Timaeus who though he was thoroughly incap
able of philosophical ideas and m ade scurrilo us
attacks on Aristotle shared with the Aristotelian
school the passion for collecting facts of all kinds
and was so trivial in its indulgence that he was
called an O ld rag woman
The creation of antiquarian study is one of the
numerous precious services of the Greeks to the
progress of human culture Its distinction is that
apparently and in its i m mediate aspect it is dis
interested The Greeks described it as n oh pwy
tin) attending to what is not one s business a
p
singularly felicitous phrase for a S phere which has
no relation to human life The Roman word for
antiquarianism had a similar significance : cu riosi tas
s u perfluous care for what is practically unimportant
or in fact the love of useless knowledge But
although cu r iositas came to be an instinct in m en
who could not have assigned any reason of utility
for their pursuits it must be remembered that it
l
oso
hi
pra
g
from
a
certain
side
of
the
general
n
S
p
i
h
c al theory of Aristotle and thus having a place
p
in a system had originally a j ustification outside
itself It may be cal led useless in a narrow sens e
of the term but from another point of View as I
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
,
,
,
.
,
vvr
.
’
ec
,
,
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,
,
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,
,
,
,
,
,
.
,
,
ANTI QU ARIAN I S M
189
will show in a subsequent lecture it has a h u man
value and is therefore ultimately not disinterested
Altho ugh the ancient antiquarians tended to be
rather learned than critical and in criticis m to be
l than luminous there were
rather minute and finic a
brilliant exceptions such as Eratosthenes the
greatest and most original geographer of the ancient
world His studies in physical science helped h im
to prosecute his antiquarian researches with fresh
ness of insight I would in particular point out
his attitude to Homer One of the most serious
impediments blocking the way to a scientific
examination of early Greece was the orthodox
belief in Homer s omniscience and infallibility— a
belief which survived the attacks of Ionian ph iloso
Eratosthenes
ph er s and the irony of Thucydides
boldly asserted the principle that the critic in study
ing Homer must remember that the poet s know
ledge was lim ited by the conditions of his age which
1
was a comparatively ignorant age
This was an
im po rtant step in historical criticism
Ancient antiquarians did not work out principles
of m ethod nor did they beyond the collection of
libraries provide facilities for research like the
bibliographies and innumerable works of reference
which are compiled for the convenience of modern
students It is somewhat surprising that archives
were not systematically transcribed and official
documents collected The idea was not un k nown
C rater u s who seems to have been a contemporary
,
.
,
,
,
.
.
,
,
.
’
.
’
,
.
.
,
,
,
,
.
,
.
.
,
1
S trabo,
v u
.
3 6 ;
.
cp
.
l
a so
—
1 23 25
.
.
190
AN CIENT GREEK H I ST O RIAN S
LECT V
.
of Theophrastus compiled a corpus of the Attic
decrees of the fifth century arranged in chrono
logical order The traveller P olem on of Ilion was
such a diligent copyist of inscriptions that he earned
the name of stone rapper (
Among the
sté loko
p as )
Romans M u c ianu s the friend of the Emperor
V espasian collected and edited a large corpus of
official documents probably including re ports of the
proceedings of the Senate (
ac ta senatu s) during the
last age of the Republic
As this collection included
reports of public speeches by leading orators and
statesmen the motive of M uc ianus in compiling it
may have been an interest in oratory rather than in
history S uch labours were in any case exceptional
Greece did not create scientific philology any
more than scientific history B ut the movem ent
set on foot by the Peripatetic school was invaluable
both for preserving the records and exploring the
recesses of the p ast ; and however uncritical or
crude the m ethods of ancient antiquarians m ay
appear to us they represent a prominent stage in
the a d vance of knowledge
But while their dis
interested passion for research affected the recon
struction of past history contemporary history
was composed by men who subordinated truth to
rhetorical e ffect There were few exceptions con
s ic u ou sly Hieronymus whom I have mentioned
p
and Polybius to whom the next lecture will b e
devoted
,
,
.
,
,
-
.
,
,
,
,
1
.
,
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.
,
,
,
,
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,
,
.
,
,
,
.
1
Tacitus Dial
,
.
37
.
192
AN CIENT GREEK HI ST O RIANS LECT
.
Rome befor e he was allowed to retur n to Greece
and during th at time he conceived the idea of his
work and wrote a considerable part of it (
at least
fifteen Books ) His original design was to relate
the history of the advance of Roman conquest
thro u gh a period of fifty three years from the eve
of the Second Punic war (
2 20 B C ) to the Rom an
conquest of M acedonia (
16 8
He explains
very fully why he chose his starting point There
broke ou t almost at the same moment three
great conflicts : the war of Rome with Carthage
the war of the Leagues in Greece (
in which the
Achaeans and Philip were ranged against the
Aetolians ) and the war in the East bet ween
An tiochus and Ptolemy P hilopator Up to that
epoch events happening in the various q uarters
of the world were unconnected and did not bear
upon each other either in their purposes or in their
issues
But from this time Italian and African
aff airs begin to come into relation with Asiatic
and Greek aff airs and history begins to assum e
the form not of strewn d isiecta m em br a but of a
single organic body
But while Polybius marks this date as the
proper beginning of his work he goes back farther
in a long introduction filling two Books in which
he sketches the earlier history of the relations of
Rome with Carthage including the First P unic
,
.
,
-
.
.
-
.
,
,
.
,
.
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
1
i 3 4
.
.
.
This
ity
un
d oe s
v
not
becom
d ing
e
l
the defeat of
S e cond Punic war ent to
c ear
th e
Carth age ; b ut th e Eastern e ents ur
d eterm ine th e su se quent inter ention of Rom e
b
v
till
after
w
.
VI
POLYBIUS
193
war and the pre vious history of the Achaean
League Thus so far as the lands of the Western
M e d iterranean are concerned his history began
where Timaeus had left off; as he expressly notes
He signalises the m otif of his work in imposing
“
phrases
O ur own times have witnessed a
miracle and it consists in this Fortune moved
almost all the aff airs of the world to wards one
quarter and constrained all things to tend to one
and the same goal And so it is the special note
of my work to bring under one purvie w for my
readers the means and the m anipulations which
fortune employed for this end
This idea was
my principal motive and stimulus
It was an
additional reason that in our time no one h ad
attempted a universal history
Subsequent events the fall of Carthage and the
annexation of Greece in 14 6 B C led Polybius to
extend his plan and fix this later year as the term
of his history In its augmented form it reached
the considerable bulk of forty Books of which
only the first five have been preserved co m pletely
though of many of the others we possess long
excerpts He seems to have finished the com
position of the whole work about the year 13 4
but he continued to insert many additions and
corrections u p to 120 B C These supplemen ts are
often in contradiction with other passages for he
died wi thout submitting the book to a systematic
revision
Indeed he had allowed the original
.
,
,
1
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.
,
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,
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,
,
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,
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,
,
.
1
i 5 1
.
.
.
ANCIENT GREEK HI STORIANS
19 4
LEOI‘
.
introduction whi ch expounded the first schem e
of his history to remain unchanged and sim ply
1
inserted a statement of his revised plan
O f the
later additions the most interesting are thos e
which were suggested by the author s visit to
Spa in about 13 3 B C and those which allude to
the revolutionary movement of the Gracchi
O f the latter I shall have something more to
say
I have observed that the history of Polybius
follows on to that of Timaeus and it is to be
noted that in his chronological arrangement he
has adopted the awkward reckoning by Olympiads
which Timaeus introduced but he supplements it
by the years of the Roman Consuls and other
3
marks of time
In the first portion of his work
216
up to the y ear of Cannae (
he pursues
continuously the history of each of the various
states without interruption ; but after that he
adopts the annalistic method and synchronizes
events in d ifferent parts of the world under the
same year
,
,
,
.
’
.
.
.
,
,
,
.
,
.
pl
pl
O ld an i 1-5 and iii 13 ; new an iii 46
It h as een sho n that in h is d e sc ri tion of New Carth ag e Po ius
After h e had seen the lac e b e
was in error as to th e orientation
x 11 4) a c orrec tion of c urrent s tatem ents as to the circum
inserte d (
f erenc e , b ut eft th e oth er errors u nc orrected S ee Cunz, P olybius, 8 8.q
end ix
and S trac han Da id son, S elections , A
h
3 T
h e eginn ing of th e Polyb ian ear, h o e er, d id not coincide it
0 Oct
th at of th e O m iad ( ulY) , b u t fe l som e th r ee m onth s ater (
um n
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This di is
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f
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.
AN CIENT GRE EK HI ST O RIANS LECT
196
.
of the alleged construction on the ground that it
was required to complete the last hexad The
theory has a certain plausibility but we have to
remember that Polybius changed and enlarged his
plan in the course of its composition and I find
it difficult to believe that if he had deliberately
adopted a definite scheme of this kind he would
have failed to draw attention to it in the preface
to his first or thir d Book His solicitude that the
reader should fully grasp his plan and arrange
m ent is hardly reconcilable with his silence on suc h
a leading point
The symmetry is not clearly
c onvincing as in the case of Herodotus
But whether this incomplete symmetry is due
to the design of the author or only to the discern
ment of an ingenious reader Polybius has shown
a fine artistic sense of propriety in fixing the place
which he chose for his acco u nt of the institutions
The third Book concludes with the
of Rome
d efeat of Cannae whi ch set the mistress of Italy
f ace to face with the prospect of the extinction of
her power How was it that brought to bay she
baffled the triumphant invader recovered Italy
and conquered Carthage
The historian em pha
siz es the problem Of course the measures her
g overnment adopted after the disaster were wise
B ut a sagacious policy at the last moment would
not have availed if Rome had not been what she
was The explanation lay P olyb iu s b eligved in her
institutions And so he interrupts the narrative
of the Punic war at this point to describe the
,
.
,
,
,
,
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,
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,
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,
,
,
,
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,
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,
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.
,
_
h
POLYBIU S
197
institutions which saved Rome
He has seized
the instant at which the reader s interest is most
fully prepa r ed and awake to learn the lesson s
which those institutions have to give
Polybius is not less express than Thucydides
in asserting the principle that accurate representa
tion of facts was the fundamental duty of the
historian
He lays down that three things are
requisite for performing such a task as his : the
study and criticis m of sources
that is
personal knowledge of lands and places and
7
thirdly political experience
He was himself a
man of action and had acquired political and
military experience before he became a historian
so that he fulfilled the third co ndition ; an d he
was most conscientious in endeavouri ng to satisfy
the two other self i m posed requirements He pos
sessed a wide acquaintance with historical litera
ture and criticiz ed the authorities who m he used
with fearless indepe nden ce of j udgme nt He was
“
not taken in by authority and he decli ned to
render unreserved credit to a writer on the ground
that he was a contemporary or a m an of character
For instance he criticizes the views of the Roman
historian Fabius on the causes of the P u nic war
“
There are some he observes
who think that
because he lived at the time and was a aR om an
senator he should be believed without m ore ado
Whereas I consider his authority high but not
.
.
.
fi
,
.
,
,
,
-
.
,
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,
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,
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2
,
,
.
,
1
In
Book
events in G
Th e
VI .
re e c e
.
int v
er
e ning
S ee ii i 118
.
.
B ooks
IV
.
an d
v
.
i
d eal W th
2
111.
9
s
.
yn
c h ronou s
19 8
AN CIENT GREE K HI STORIANS
c
r
.
absolute or such as to dispense the reader from
forming his own j udgment on the facts them
selves
Polybius was also a traveller and he travelled
for the purpose of historical investigation in
accordance with his belief that topographical
autopsy was a primary qualification for writing
history He passes severe criticisms on Ti m ae us
“
who he says always lived in one place and on
Z eno of Rhodes for the blunders they comm itted
through ignorance of geography
He was in
tim ately acq u ainted with Greece itself ; ll his de
scription of the battle of Sellasia was censured
by D elb rii c k but has been successfully defended
by Kromayer He tra v elled in Italy and Sicily ;
he visited Africa in an official capacity ; he went
with Scipio to Spain and explored the coast of
the Atlantic returning to Italy by Southern Gaul
and the Alps
The historians of whom Polybius seems to have
most highly approved were Ephorus and Aratus
The M emoirs of the Achaean statesman naturally
appealed to him as an Achaean politician but also
because they satisfied his doctrine that history is
a practical and not an antiquarian study Written
by a man of action whose interests were directly
practical they gave the kind of instruction which
it was the main fu nction of history in the esteem
of Polybius to give On the other hand Ephorus
”
.
,
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,
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,
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,
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,
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,
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,
,
,
,
.
,
Th ere is ind e ed in x vi 16
of My c e nae rel ativ e to Corinth
1
,
.
.
.
5, a
c ur ious
statem ent as
to the
position
200
AN CIENT GREEK HI STORIAN S
um
.
1
as it traces causes
His history is pragmatical
and because it is pragmatical it is also apodeictic
N ow what does Polybius understand by caus es ?
He is careful to enlarge on the distin ction between
cause and beginning (
a in a and
s j) and he illus
trates it by examples
For instance while the
beginning of the Persian war of Alexander the
Great was his crossing over into Asia the causes
are sought by Polybi u s as far back as the expedi
2
tion of Cyrus and the wars of Agesilau s But
it cannot be said that he goes very deep into the
question of historical causes He conceives causa
tion in an external and mechanical way and he
does not proceed beyond the idea of simple one
sided causation to the idea of reciprocity or of action
and reaction which is often required to express
adequately the relations of historical phenomena
The view of Polybius on causation in general
is more interesting than his applications of it to
particular cases Until he was well on in years
and had virtually completed his work he shared
the popular beli ef that apart from the regularly
operating natural and human causes a superhum an
power which m en call Tyche exerts a control
over events and diverts them in unexpected ways
This popular view had been presented in a quasi
philosophical dress by D emetrius of Phaleron
3 doubtless made a deep
whose treatise H p} : a
.
,
,
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,
’
’
r
c
,
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,
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,
,
,
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.
,
,
,
,
,
.
,
5
e
.
7
2
iii 6
3 7 3 ; cp iii 1 3
ere
ent
s
t
n
d
c
o
a
n
t
n
u
m
e
3
a
r
r
a
t
i
e
n
e
u
t
s
g
It i s not re ser ed , b
g
u t the
n
s
C
o
u
s
i
n
l
l
o
o
A
t
o
P utarch into h is Cons olation
p
transferre d
1
11.
.
p
.
.
by l
v
.
.
.
l
.
wo k of von Scale (ee Bi bliog ap hy )
r
.
s
r
.
l
w
POLYBIUS
v1
201
impression on the mind of Polybius for its
influence on a number of passages in his work
has been proved by von Scala
The event of
16 7 th e fall of the M acedonian monarchy the
new step in the resistless advance of the western
world power in whose chariot wheels Polybius
himself and his country were caught up might
well seem a powerful confirmation of the theories
of the wise man of Phaleron Though Polybi u s
traces the causes of the success of Rome to its
history and constitution he writes as follows in
the preface to the original plan of his work :
“
Fortune has caused the whole world and its
history to tend towards one purpose— the empire
of Rome
She continually exercises her power
in the lives of men and brings abo ut many changes
yet never before did she achieve such a labo u r as
she has wrought within our memory
Thus the
Roman conquests produced upon Polybius the
same impression which the M acedo n ian conq u ests
had produced u pon D emetrius Elsewhere Poly
b iu s quo tes the very words which D e m etrius had
“
used
Fortune who exhibits her power in
compassing the u nexpected is even now I think
displaying it to the world having made the
M acedonians the inheritors of Persian prosperity
She has lent them these blessings till she forms
a n e w resolution on their destiny
In m an y
other places too Polybius recognises the active
operation of Fortune and co m ments on her
,
.
,
,
-
,
,
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,
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,
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2
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,
,
,
,
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,
”
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,
,
,
1
i 4 5
.
.
.
xx i x
21 5 6
-
.
.
.
AN CIEN T GREEK HI STORIAN S LECT
202
.
instability her paradoxes her caprices quite in
the tone of D emetrius
But there are other passages in which Polybius
sounds a very diff erent note Thus he finds fault
with writers who ascribe public calamities or
private misfortunes to Fortune and Fate and
only allows that when it is impossible or diffic ult
for man to discover causes as in the case of storm s
or droughts he m ay in his embarrassment refer
“
them to God or Fortune
but when you can
discover the cause of an event it is not in m y
1
O pinion admissible to impute it to God
Before
you pray for rain it is wise to look at the barometer
Again he deprecates the practice of ascribing to
fortune or the gods what is due to a man s ability
and prudence These and other similar observa
tions are not perhaps ultimately inconsistent with
the doctrine of D emetrius but the note is different ;
they show a desire to restrict the O peration of the
external power within as narrow li mits as possible
But there are other assertions which are directly
opposed to that doctrine W h en he inquires into
the causes of the power and eminence attained by
the Achaeans a people who were not numerous
“
an d lived in a small country
it is clear he
says
that it would b e quite unsuitable to speak
of Fortune that is a cheap explanation ; we must
rather seek the cause Without a cause nothing
c an be brought about wheth er n ormal or apparently
abnor m al
When he wr o
te this he had reac hed
,
,
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,
,
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,
”
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,
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,
,
’
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,
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.
,
”
,
,
2
“
,
.
,
"
.
1
xxxvi .
,
11 1-4
.
.
2
u.
38 5
.
.
AN CIENT GREEK H I STORIAN S LECT
2 04
.
It is probable that Stoicism had something to
do with his change of view
It is certain that
he came under the influence of th e n ew school of
liberal Stoics through intercourse with P anae tius
who like himself was an inmate of the house of
“
Scipio at Ro m e
I remember says a speaker
“
in Cicero s D e R ep u blics
that you Scipio often
conversed with P an aetiu s in the presence of Poly
b iu s two Greeks the most deeply versed in
poli tics
Polybius did n ot
r er u m
civi liu m )
(
become a Stoic but he assimilated some Stoic
ideas as in his earlier life he had been influenced
by the Peripatetics
In his actual treatment and presentation of
historical events the fluctuation in his views on
this question probably did not make much diff er
ence A change in his views as to the freedom
of the will would have affected his treatment far
more deeply
I know for myself that on days
when I am a determinist I look on history in one
way and on days when I am an indeterminist
in quite another Polybi u s was an indeterminist
like most Greeks ; he believed in free will The
particular Stoic influences to which he submitted
did not touch this doctrine For P an aetiu s did
not share the doctrine of Chrysippus and older
Stoics that the world is governed by laws of iron
necessity which exclude free will
We can see the results of his contact with
Stoicism in the account which Polybius gives of
.
,
,
,
,
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,
’
1
,
,
,
,
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,
,
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,
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,
,
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,
-
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,
-
.
1
i 21 3 4
.
.
1
.
P O L Y B I US
v1
2 05
the rise and fall of political constitutions
He
adopts the newer Stoic version of the theory of
a cyclic s u ccession of forms of government
When the human race is swept away (this h as
happened and may be expected to happen again )
through deluges plagues or famines and a ne w
race takes its place the work of civilisation has
to begin afresh ; mo n archy is the first form in
which society constitutes itself ; this passes
through successive corruptions and revolutions
tyranny aristocracy oligarchy democracy ) into
(
an anarch ical democracy which Polybius calls
c kezr ocr a c
y th e rule of might ; from which a
dissolving society can only be rescued by a return
to mon archy and then the cycle begins again
In the interval between two cataclysms there may
be any number of such cycles Polybius accepts
catastrophic occurrences not as a mere a ncient
tradition or philosophical speculation but as a
proved scientific fact
The theory of a recurring cycle of political
constitutions whic h comes from Plato and the
Stoics is an application of the cyclical theory of
the world process which was propounded by early
philosophers Such a theory is more or less im
plied by Anaximander and H e rac le itu s but it was
clearly formulated in very d efinite terms by the
Pythagorean school
You remember the passage
in V irgil s Fo u rth Eclogu e where a new Argonautic
1
.
.
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
’
,
.
,
.
,
2
.
-
.
,
,
,
3
.
’
1
3
In
Book
VI
2
.
C p G om p erz, Gmechische Den ker , i 46 , 54 , 113
vi
5 5
.
'
'
.
.
SCH
.
206
A N CI ENT GREEK HI ST O RIAN S LECT
.
expedition is contemplated and a second Troj an
war
atq u e item m ad Tr oiam m a nu s m ittetur Ac h illes
g
.
That is the cyclical doctrine and logically it
applied to small things as well as great I may
illustrate it in the V i vid manner of the philosopher
According to the Pythagorean theory
E u d em u s
some day I shall again with this manuscript in my
hand stand here in this hall and lecture on
Polybius and you each and all will be sitting
there j ust as you are this evening ; and every
thing else in the world will be j ust as it is at
this moment In other words the cosmical pro
cess consists of exactly recurring cycles in which
the minutest occurrences are punctually repeated
W e do not remember them— if we did they would
not be the same
But the cyclical doctrine was not perhaps
generally taught in this extre m e form
Polybius
does not appear at first to have held even the
universal validity of the law of growth bloom
an d decay
He considered that it holds good of
simple constitutions pure monarchy for instance
or pure democracy but he thought that the setting
in of decay could be evaded by a j udicious mixtu re
of constitutional principles He has submitted to
a minute analysis the Spartan and the Roman
systems of government as eminent examples of
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1
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,
b ve th at Diony si s (H pi
planation of th e Attic
1
It is intere sting to O ser
er odic it as an e x
su gge sts
p i
‘
r
y
wos dpga vr os elr e (
pun
/(7 s 1repc66 0u r
3
u
ip! dpxalav
ni
e
fty
63V dpxa lwu fi
nr é pwv, 2)
’
re na ss an c e : eir e 06 00
7
i
d vaxvxh oé c
ms
.
AN CIENT GRE EK HI S T O RIAN S
208
LEOT
.
induced him to abandon it ? Undoubtedly his
observation of the revolutionary movements in
the time of the Gracchi These mo vements came
as a great surprise to him ; nothing could have
seemed to enj oy a more sec u re stability than the
fabric of the Roman state in the days when he
began writing his book But the G racc han rev olu
tion opened his eyes Its significance was brought
home to the friend of Scipio by S cipio s assass ina
tion
These stormy years flashed a lurid light
on the past and Polybius could now look back
with ill u minated vision and see in the agrarian
23 2 B C ) the beginning of the
law of Flaminius (
degeneration of the people
W ithout touching
what he had written before he introd uced into
his work ne w paragraphs which meant the sur
re nder of his former belief in the permanence of
the constitution He now recognised that Rome
too was destined to decline and he could con
sequently accept unreservedly the principle of
anacyclosis
Stoic teaching may have gradually
prepared him for this change of theo ry ; and
Scipio assuredly had not been blind to the signs
of the times The revolutionary outbreak illus
trate d the melancholy prediction which he hear d
from the lips of his friend on the ruined site of
Carthage
.
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’
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1
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,
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,
,
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'
é a v er a t fi
p ap dr aw 7107 Ok oSXy D uos 5p?)
’
z
ea l H ta os [ca t h u bs e v
a p oao
p p
p p exfw
"
-
'
’
.
1
11.
21 8
.
.
l
.
PO L Y B I U S
v1
209
w ill c om e th e d ay
O f d oom for T oy d i vin e an d Pri am s s w ay
An d Pri am an d h is fol k sh all p as s aw ay
S om
e
tim
e
’
r
,
.
M ore than an epitaph on Carthage it was a
,
prophecy on Rome
Both Polybius and Thucydides as I have already
observed held with equal conviction that the first
obligation of a historian is to discover and relate
facts as they actually occurred and herein they
both represented a reaction against the history
which held the field
Each alike feels that the
purpose of his work is to be instructive and not
to be entertaining Polybius is fully aware that for
the m aj ority of the reading public his work will
have no attractions ; it is intended for statesmen
not for antiquarians or people who want to be
amused Just as Thucydides is conscious that his
conception of how history should be written is
O pposed to that of Herodotus so Polybius r e pu d i
ates the fashion of historiography which was in
vogue and denounces the r h etorical effects or
exciting sensations of the works which were most
popular such as those of Timaeus and D uris He
is severe upon P hylar c h u s for introducing into
history effects which are appropriate to tragedy
He was
P hylar c h u s was always forcing th e note
ever attempting to arouse the pity and sympathy
of the readers by pictures of despairing men and
dish evelled wome n children and aged parents
embracing weeping and making lo u d lamentation
.
,
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"
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1
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1
ix
.
1
.
5
ii 56
.
.
210
AN CIEN T GREE K H I ST O RIAN S L
‘
ECI
.
in the extremity of woe Tragedy and history says
Polybius severely have diff erent obj ects The aim
of tragedy is to move the soul ; but the aim of
history is to instruct the mind Again j ust as
Thucydides ignores all the gossiping anecdotes
which memoir writers like I on and S tesim b rotu s
collected so Polybius condemns writers of a later
day for retailing what he calls the vulgar babble
of a barber s shop
what we should call the gossip
l
of th e clubs or the canards of the daily press
Polybius then represents a return tho ugh not a
conscious return to the principles of Thucydides
and a reaction against some of the most c onspic u
ous tendencies which had marked historiography in
the interv al But Thucydides exercised no direct in
flu enc e upon him and the extant parts of his work
indicate that he was not one of the historians with
whom he was familiar Polybius has been aff ected
by the speculations in political science and by the
s chools of philosophy no less than by the changes
in the political world which had come to pass since
the lifetime of Thucydides Any one who turns
from one to the oth er is struck by the salient con
tr asts between their m ethods of treatment
Th u cy
d id es is an artist P olybius is a teacher Thucydides
as we saw employs the obj ective treatment of
a dramatist and rarely comes forward himself to
address directly to the reader brief criticisms or
explanations Pol ybius on the contrary is entirely
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1
iii 20 5
.
.
insinuations
fi
xovpea ic s m
of
l
afi
p ov
r av
w
an es
Tim aeus against Aristotle
.
,
Com pare h is
x11
.
8 5-6
.
.
c ritic ism on
the
AN C IENT GREE K HI STORIANS
2 12
a
r
.
historia s may partly be set down to the influence
n
of popular philosophy which tended to promote a
didactic style We might indeed say that the history
of Polybi u s contains the material for a handbook
of historical method ; and this adds greatly to its
value for us
Like Thucydides and the ancients in general
Polybius believed in the eminent significance of the
individual in history He reiterates the platitude
that one mind is more efficacious than a m ass
“
of men quoting the saying of Euripides
O ne
wise plan prevails o v er many hands
He takes
a deep interest in the characters of the men who
appear on his scene O n the other hand he sees
that there are potent forces at work besides great
men A student of the history of Rome which
h ad won her supreme position unsteered by single
men of transcendent powers could not be blind
to this Polybius recognises the importance of
national character He considers the influence of
climate upon it and finds a key to a nation s char
acter in its institutions and political life We have
seen the importance which he ascribed to the
mechanism of political constitutions
B ut he
had no idea of history as a continuous progress
no eye for what we call historical tendencies no
notion of the way in which historical changes are
brought about by the innumerable and almost
invisible activities of tho u sands and thousands of
nameless people He possessed a knowledge of the
,
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1
viii
.
5 3 ; i 35 3
.
.
.
.
POLYBIU S
v1
2 13
facts and conditions of his own age and of the men
of his own age to which we could not attain even
if we had h is whole work in our hands
Yet frag
mentary as our kn owledge is we can say with some
confidence that we have a deeper insight than he
into the tendencies of his time and of the time
immediately preceding and a clearer comprehension
of the change through which the Roman state was
then passing and of the causes at work He never
discerned how the new circumstances of Rome
in the latter half of the third century were altering
her commercial and economic condition and were
already modifying the character of the state We
owe our power of divini ng this to the enlarged
experience of the human race
To return to his treatment of individuals
While Thucydides leaves us to form our own
impressions from their public acts and from th e
words which he makes them say Polybius in
accordance with his method analyses and discusses
th eir qualities
But it is impo rtant to observe
that he does not like Xenophon in the A nabaszs
and nearly all modern historians attempt to dra w
complete portraits of Philip or Hannibal or Scipio
or any of the lead ing persons of his history but
condemns on principle such a mode of treatment
For he says men are inconsistent : they constantly
act in a manner which belies and contradicts their
real nature sometimes under the pressure of friends
at others on account of the peculiar complexion of
the circumstances It is therefore misleading to
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AN CIENT GRE EK HI S T O RIAN S LECT
214
.
character ize a man when he first appears on the
stage or to infer his whole character from particular
acts The right method is to criticize his actions
1
as they occur
The same man must be prais ed as
well as blamed ; he is changed by vicissitudes of
aff airs ; his conduct for instance may become
2
better or worse
Characters such as that of Philip
I I I of M acedon which seems to have specially
attracted him as a problem impressed him with the
necessity of adopting this principle ; and in the
treatment both of Philip and of Hannibal we must
admire the conscientious fairness of Polybius in
endeavouring to u nderstand and estimate their
characters
Psychology indeed was a s ubj ect on which Poly
W e can see
b iu s seems to have reflected much
his interest in it for example in the account which
he gives of the mental process of learning to read
in his observation that in fighting those have
an advantage who have a stronger will to conquer
s o that a battle is in a certain measure a contest
4
in his insistence on the importance of
of wills
az
i o d eem ) ; or in such a re m ark
personal experience (
as that change from one kind of activity to another
is a relief His psychological ideas have furnished
material for a treatise to a German scholar O ne
principle must special ly be noticed because he
applies it to his own work : the importance of
,
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,
r
vr
.
.
On this princ iple h e only d raw s g e neral p ortraits of su b ordinate
p ersons who appear b u t onc e or twic e Th e preli m inary acc ount of S cipio
in x 2 is c oncerned only with his y ou th
1
.
.
.
xvi.
28
.
3
x
.
47
.
4
Fr 58
.
.
2 16
N
I
R
T
O
A
S
S
I
K
H
E
AN C I E N T G R E
LECT
.
coloure d h is accoun t of A ch aean p oliti cs and he is
distin ctly unj ust to the A etolians The danger of
“
such p artiality di d not escape him
A good
he says
should b e fond of his friends and
m an
of his country h e must share in the hates and
aff ections of his friends B ut when he undertakes
to write history he must forget these attachments
he must o ften bestow the highest praises on
enemies when facts require it and on the other
hand censure severely his most intimate friends
1
Else
whe n their errors demand such censure
2
where in censuring two Rhodian historians (
Z eno
and Antisthenes ) for twisting facts to the credit of
their country he disc usses the question whether a
historian should allow himself to be influenced by
“
“
patriotic feelings
that
Admitting he says
historians should lean to their countries I deny
that they shou ld make assertions inconsistent with
W e writers must unavoidably fall into
facts
many errors through ignorance but if we write
what is false for our country s sake or to please
our friends or to win favour and measure tr u th by
utility we shall discredit the authority of our
works and be no better than politicians
The
indefeasible claim of historical truth cannot be
more explicitly expressed or emphatically enforced ;
and the significance of these passages lies in the
challenge which was thrown down to the prevail
ing practice of the rhetorical school of history
But Polybius has not absolutely adhered himself
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”
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1
i 14 4
.
.
1
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x vi
.
14
.
POLYBIU S
v1
2 17
to his admirable doctrine He is disposed to make
their attitude to the Achaean League the measure
for j udging other Greek states
On the other
hand he is impartial towards Rome The j usti
fic ation of Roman dominion is the m otif of his
work and the practical lesson for his fellow Greeks
was acquiescence in that dominion B u t if he
fully recognised the great qualities of the Romans
his Greek sympathies secured him from being
bl ind to their faults
Polybius then stands out among the few
ancient writers who understood the meaning and
recognised the obligation of historical truth and
impartiality Belonging to no school he opposed
the tend encies of the current historiography of the
day But while he protests against straining after
pathetic effects and s u ch bids for popularity he
shows occasionally that he possessed the art of
telling a moving tale as in his description of
Hannibal s passage of the Alps and he can display
powers of realism in describing an insurrectio n at
Alexandria or the M ercenary war of the C arth a
But there is no attempt at striking word
ginians
pictures or purple passages ; when he is effective
he succeeds like Herodotus by the simplest means
He followed the received usage of inserting
speeches and laid stress upon their importan ce
But he held that they should reproduce the tenor
of what was actually said and he cen sures Timaeus
severely for hav ing invented orations entirely out
of his own imagination Some of the speeches
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2 18
AN CIE NT GREEK H IS TORIA N S LECT
.
have a P olyb ian flavour but we are bound to
believe him that he had always evidence to work
upon in their construction
He was not ind ifferent to style ; his care is
shown in his scrupulo us avoidance of hiatus It is
highly significant that in the Greek versions which
he made of the Latin texts of the treaties of R ome
with Carthage he neglected the rules of hiatus the
observance of which would have embarrassed or
harmed the accuracy of the translation He did
not so far as we kno w follow literary models To
ill u strate his diction and vocabulary we must look
not to belles lettres but to the language of ofli cial
dom — decrees and despatches — and technical
treatises on philosophy and science Y et he had a
wide acquaintance with literature and the classical
poets He quotes lyric poets Pindar and Si m on
ides as well as E uripides Like all educated Greeks
he was fam iliar with Homer and the fragments of
his thirty fourth Book which was concerned with
the geography of the West show that he was in
The question was
ter este d in Homeric criticism
debated in ancient as well as modern times
whether th ere was any real geographical back
ground to the adventures of Odysseus D o the
islands of the Cyclops of Circe of Calypso do
Sc ylla and Charybdis correspond to actual places
“
on the M editerranean coasts
Or are they faery
lands forlorn and is it vain to seek their names
on the traveller s chart ? Eratosthenes held that
Homer had here created a world of poetical
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22 0
AN CI ENT GREEK HI STORIA N S LECT
.
Polybius Any superiorities which P olybius seems
to enj oy over Thucydides are due to the richer
experience of two and a half eventful centuries of
which records had been kept to the larger stage on
which M editerranean history had come to move
and to the inspiration of the world power of Rom e
pointing to a new idea of u niversal history
The positive value of the historical labours of
P olybius as a trustworthy source can hardly be
appraised too h ighly I may quote the j udgment
of M ommsen who was not attracted towards the
personality of the author
His books are like the
sun in the field of history ; where they begin the
veils of mist which still enshroud the wars with
the Samnites and with Pyrrhus are lifted ; where
they end a new and if possible more vexatious
twilight begins
O f that part of the work which was most
original because he wrote as a contemporary and
had not to rely entirely on other writers only frag
m ents have been preserved and of the last years
which saw the destruction of Greek independence
very scanty fragments indeed
But much of the
material has passed directly or indirectly into the
books of later historians ; h e became indeed for
the period which he treats the chief ultimate
source of information
If another Polybius a
man of his political experience and his historical
faculty had appeared in the next generation our
knowledge of the period of the great democratic
moveme nt a period so critical for the Roman state
.
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P O S EID O NIU S
—from Tiberius Gracchus to the dictatorship of
Sulla— would have been far clearer than it is The
task of continuing Polybiu s was however under
taken by a remarkable man of exceptional talent
P ose id on iu s of Apamea (
0
51
whose
235 1
wide influence as a thinker is becoming more an d
more recognised— recognised even to exaggeratio n
He was a pupil of the Stoic P anaetius ; he ta ught
in Rhodes w here Cicero heard his lectures he was
a friend of Pompey and well known to cultivated
circles in Rome He travelled in western Europe
and embodied his geographical researches in a book
O n the O cean which was much used by Strabo
Besides being a philosopher and a geographer he
was a mathematician an astronomer (
he wrote a
book on the size of the sun ) a student of natural
science a meteorologist He made an important
contribution to the study of tides in relation to the
phases of the moon
He had the encyclopaedic
interest and the encyclopaedic faculty of an
Aristotle or a Leibniz
History was only one
and not the chief
of his many pursuits
His
historical work (in fifty two or perhaps sixty two
Books ) beginning with 144 B C where Polybius
ended appears to have come down to 82 B C We
have only a few fragments of it but it is the source
of our knowledge of those times — the source from
which Livy D iod oru s Appian Plutarch and
Josephus drew The leanings of P oseid on iu s were
somewhat oligarchical and he was partial to his
friend Pompey Like Polybius he was a traveller
.
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,
AN CIEN T GREEK HI ST O RI AN S LECT
2 22
.
and like Polybius he played a part in political life
it was a smaller part and on the tiny stage of
Rhodes He once acted as ambassador of his city
to Rome
Polybius was first of all a man of
action ; P ose id on iu s was fir st of all a philosopher
and a savant and he had a strain of poetical
imagination and enthusiasm a certain passion
which we do not find in Polybius It is to be
feared that for the vagueness of our knowledge on
some of the important facts of this period Posei
d on iu s himself is responsible rather than those who
c ompiled from him
His mental attitude was
certainly diff erent from that of Polybius and the
difference does not conduc e to confidence in Posei
d oniu s
For in philosophy he did not follow the
s obriety of his master P anaetiu s his Stoicism was
of a more mystical strain ; in fact it departed so
far from the earlier tenets of the sect that it may
be described as a theology He believed in the
l
h
e
mantic art on which
wrote a treatise and in
the significan ce of dreams ; and he was thus
disposed to accept what Polybius would have
rej ected as fabulous On the whole I think we
may say that while P oseid oniu s exercised a wide
and deep influence on the intellectual life of his
day and occ u pies a considerable place in the
history of ancient learn ing and while his historical
work was the chief sour ce of the records of his
time and its loss is deplorable he cannot be said
to have ad vanced the study of history by new
U d by Ci o i D Di i ti
B k
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1
se
c er
n
e
v na
one,
oo
1
.
LE CTURE V I I
TH E
I N FLUE N C E O F G REE K O N
H I S TO R I O G RA P H Y
RO M AN
TH E political genius of Rome might lead us to
expect that the Romans would have possessed a
home grown h istoriography of their own reflecting
their national character
But Greek influence
intervened before they h ad time to discover a
form of historiography for themselves ; and in
this as in all branches of literature they found
Greek influence irresistible
The ir history was
moulded by the Greeks ; in its methods and
principles it is Greek
Its birth from Greek history was undisguisedly
proclaimed by the fact that its founders aristocrats
contemporary with the S econd Punic war wrote
their Roman annals in the Greek tongue The
chief of these writers and the only one of whose
work we can form any idea was Q Fabius Pictor
whose book was consulted and respected by
Polybius
Greek was at that time recognised
as the language of the educated world ; it was
the Esperanto of those parts of the universe that
counted ; and this fact outweighed the strong
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VII
CAT O
;
SALLU ST
225
national feeling which would have suggested
Latin
Y ou may remember that Frederick the
Great wrote his M em oir s in French and that
Gibbon at first tho u ght of composing his Decline
and F all in that polite and universal idiom
To break the tradition required an u nc onv en
tional man who carried his national feelings to
the length of miso Hellenism an d who was deter
mined to go his own way M Porcius Cato He
wrote his history of Rome the O fl gi nes in his
native tongue
It expressed his own strongly
marked personality and mirrored his prej udices
D iscarding the annalistic form he introduced
freely his own observations and O pi nions and in
fact liber avzt am m am su am Its significance for
our present purpose is that it was effecti ve in
breaking the tradition : his successors wrote in
Latin
But the change was only in the vehicle The
Romans remained co m pl etely under the influence of
Greek methods and m odels The worst tendencies
of Greek history were exemplified in the A nnals of
Valerius Antias which came down to the time of
Sulla
He outdid G r aeeza m endaar in audacious
falsification ; all claims of truth were sacrificed to
national vanity V Vac h sm u th calls his work a his
O n the
tor ic al romance and of the worst kind
other hand we have Sallust who was a younger con
temporary He belongs to a triu m virate of Roman
historians in which som e think that his true place
is second next to Tacitus and above Livy B ut
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Q
22 6
AN C IEN T GREE K H I ST O RIAN S LECT
.
unluckily of his chief book dealing with a period
of twelve years 7 8 6 7 B C only some speeches
and letters have s u rvived His monographs the
J ugu r tha and the Catlhn e enable us to see that
his work was coloured to the core by a strong
personality ; it sensitively reflected the deep mis
givings and gloomy outlook which the experiences
of the Roman state in the days of Caesar and
Pompey suggested to a pessimistic observer It
is significant that he was deeply attracted by the
m ost original of previous Latin historians
Cato
the Censor But the writers who influenced him
most were Greeks Thucydides and P oseid oniu s
He cam e under the spell of Thucydides but he
was of too different a nature to i m itate him except
in superficial things
Livy was inspired by tne idea of giving to the
Romans a history of the growth of their nation
which in the fuln°s s of its treatment and the
magnitude of its scal e should be adequate to the
He rose to the maj esty of his s u bj ect
theme
and tri u m phantly satisfied the ideal of h istorio
graphy which was popular at the time
The
gentle and even flow of his style his clar isszm u s
But he
cand or and lactea u ber tas are irresistible
had many of the deeply rooted defects O f the
rhetorical school though his history is inc om par
ably superior to that of his Greek contemporary
the rhetorician D ionysius of Halicarnass u s He
wished to be accurate b u t his standard was not
high and his methods were careless
Livy had
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228
ANCIENT GREEK HI STORIAN S LECT
.
decessor who so mercilessly exposed the corrup
tion of the Roman aristocracy and of his greater
successor who painted the dark sides of the
Imperial r é gime Tacitus was not only a writer
of far stronger individuality than Livy but also
a far greater historian He was more critical and
was guided by a higher standard of what historical
research required Our distrust in reading him is
n ot of his facts or of his use of sources but of his
innuendo and his ill u m ination
Haupt said he
was born to be a tragic poe t and his pages are
s aturated with
his personality
The dominant
note of all he wrote is expressed in those words of
doom u rg ent imp er iz f ata
The historian who
exercised most influence on him was undoubtedly
Sallust whose political and ethical pessimism was
akin to his own
He outdid Sallust in br evitas
S a llu stzana ; he resembled him too in solemn and
deadly seriousness in his passion for psychological
analysis But here he was also affected by the
tendencies of the rhetorical schools of his own
time ; there too psychological analysis and epi
grammatic brevity had come into fashion Tacitus
though an acco m plished student of rhetoric is very
careful and sparing in the use of rhetorical artific es
which he always reserves for the production of
some definite eff ect
But in his descriptions of
battles he sacrifices accuracy to style ; his motive
for describi ng them at all was not military but
rhetorical interest
It so happens that we have a means of testing
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VII
TACITUS
229
the relations of the speeches which Tacitus has
introduced to those actually delivered A bron ze
tablet of Lyons preserves a considerable portion
of the harangue which the Emperor Clau d ius
addressed to the Senate wh en he conferred the
Tacitus
ins hon or u m on the inh abitants of Gaul
pro fesses to reproduce this speech A comparison
of his version with the original shows that he took
it as his basis but rem odelled it rearranging the
order add ing some new matter cutting do wn
tedio u s passages adapting it to his own style and
eliminating the Emperor s ungainly mannerisms
For instance Claudius in the middle of his speech
suddenly addressed himself : “ It is h igh time
0 Tiberius Caesar Germanicus to disclose y ourself
to the S enate and show whither your oration
tends
This eccentric transition does not appear
in Tacitus But the general tenor and argument
are the same The case is highly instr u ctive as
exemplifying how the best historians like Tacitus
and Thucydides constructed their speeches When
historians
an original speech had been published
refrained from reproducing it The literary canon
of homogeneity of style which the Tacitean treat
ment of the oration of Claudius illustrates so well
forbade them to transcribe it ; and it would have
been obviously out of place to challenge com
parison by a paraph rase W e can prove this rule
in the case of Livy who expressly declines to give
a S peech of Cato for the Rhodians which Cato
had included in his own history an d in the case of
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23 0
AN C IENT GREE K H IS T O RIAN S LECT
.
Tacitus who similarly omits the dying discourse of
Seneca on the ground that it had been already
published E xceptions were only made in favour
of very short pieces For instance Tacitus repro
duces verbally a brief c ommunication of Tiberius
to the Senate j ust as Xenophon reproduced the
laconic message of a Lacedaemonian admiral
O the rwise the rule which the Roman historians
inherited from th e Greeks was never to reproduce
documents or speeches in their original form and
to avoid reproducing at all such as had been
published Suetonius and Cornelius Nepos were
exceptional in not obeying this rule ; they could
quote the example of Polybius
Sallust had skilfully emp loyed the Thucydidean
method of exhibiting the motives and personalities
of historical actors in S peeches But he had not
confined himself to this method ; he also freely
pourtrayed characters himself ; for example his two
contrasted pictures of Cato and Caesar are famous ;
and he had freely introduced personal comments of
his own Tacitus adopted the dramatic and indirect
m ethod but he developed that method with such
elaborate skill and refinement that it became a new
thing in his hands One of the simplest exampl es
of h is art is the portrait of Augustus which he
exhibits reflected in the mirror of men s j udgments
about him It is managed j ust as a dramatist
might make two people O f O pposite views meet
in the street and argue over somebody s character
in order to show what manner of man he was
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ANCIENT GRE EK HI ST O RIAN S LECT
23 2
.
late Lord Acton whose first principle in reading
history was the application of the strictest rules
of private morality to the actions of public men
It m ay be thought by som e that this attitude in
examining the past is somewhat futile S ociology
is still in its infancy and it may be asked Has
the time come for verdicts ? Is n ot Thucydides
more reasonable and is not his political analysis
more instructive th an the ethical criticism of
Tacitus ? The predominating moral interest is
of course one of the features which Tacitus shares
w ith the rhetorical school
The ethical side had
been emphasized without passion by Greek his
torian s since the fourth century ; with Tacitus it
was a question of life and death
I have still to refer to an illustrious Latin
historian who stands altogether apart from the
rest in method and style as well as in his own
relation to the facts which he records
As a
clear businesslike narrative of external events
told from the inside by one who had fuller know
ledge than any other m an the Com m en tar ies of
Caesar are a model of excellence
In reading
them indeed we have to remember that it was
not a purely historical interest that moved the
writer to assume the historian s part
He had
political p u rposes in view The M emoir of the
Gallic War was written to show the necessity
of his actions and to prove or illustrate his com
The history of the Civil War which
p eten c e
he left unfinished was designed to shift th e b lame
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VII
CAE SAR
233
his own shoulders Thus the works are in a
certain sense political pam phlets In the story of
the conquest of Gaul w e cannot control the nar
rativ e ; it is possible that much has been sup
pressed ; and Caesar s artless simplicity may have
been the instru m ent of most artful m isrepr esenta
tion Our present concern however is not the
criticism of his facts but his choice of that
plain straightforward method of narration which
had been introduced by the men who had worked
in the service of Alexander the Great Of this
gen u s of historical literature Caesar s Com m ent
ar ies are the o n ly extant specimen ; we can have
little doubt that they are the best which antiquity
produced ; but they were not an original growth
on Roman soil ; the M emoirs of Pyrrhus and
Aratus were precedents It is however signifi
cant that Caesar regarded his own work as merely
material for the professional that is the rhetorical
historian to work up
You see then that the most eminent Roman
historia ns m oved entirely within the limits of
Greek traditions in regard to principles and
methods For them all history was as Cicero
considered it a branch of the art of rhetoric We
may indeed say that from the beginning of the
Empire the distinction between Greek and Latin
historians has only a subordinate significance I n
st udying historical literature from the time of
Livy and D ionysius of Halicarnassus Greek and
Latin writers must be considered together
from
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23 4
AN C IENT GREEK HI ST ORIAN S LECT
.
Rhetorical history remained in the ascendant
but antiquarian history also had some devotees
Rome has a distinguished roll of antiq u arians to
point to such as V arro Hyginus Asc oni us and
it was the distinction of S u etonius to have written
history which aimed simply at the industrious
collection of facts without any tho u ght of
rhetorical e ff ects
His political attit ude was
very similar to that of Tacitu s but in his bio
graphies which (
as Leo h as shown ) are built
up on a conventional scheme he keeps his own
personal v iews in the background and lets the
facts speak
The development of the G rae c o Roman his
tor iogr aph y under the early Empire up to the
time of Theodosius the Great can now be studied
in the elaborate work of Peter the special value
of which consists in treating the Greek and Latin
historians together and in showing how the writ
ing of history was aff ected by the Court and by
the public
He has illustrated abundantly how
a writer s freedo m in treating contemporary history
was limited by fears and hopes ; and how his scope
was narrowed by the lack of interest of the public
of these ages in any contemporary events except
the scandals of the Court Exceptions were few
We have been accustomed to think of Ammianus
M arcellinus as the only Latin historian after
Tacitus whose merits entitle him to a high place
Recently a new star has been announced who m
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S ee
Bibliog ap hy
r
.
AN CIENT GREEK HI S TORIAN S LECT
23 6
.
world as if it were one town have in their
works supplied mankind with a sort of bourse
D iod oru s
for exchanging records of the past
himself however was quite unequal to the task
There is no central idea in his work ; there is
no grasp of lines of development no discernment
of interconnexion between the parts of h is sub
j ec t no independent thought of his own The
special histories of the various peoples rest side
by side in the framework of his forty Books
was the number suggested by Polybius
His
(
history is a rhetorical compilation of excerpts
from older writers which he has paraphrased and
its value for us lies in the circumstance that its
extant portions contain so much of lost writers
like Ephorus and P ose id oniu s
Far superior in conception and grasp see m s to
have been the lost work of P om pei u s Trog us
of which we know something from its Epitome
by Justin
It was a u niversal history of the
Hellenic and oriental world Roman h istory was
e x cluded up to the point at which Greek and
E astern peoples came into contact and collision
w ith Rome
It has been plausibly conj ectured
that the author omitted Roman history because
it had been so fully treated by his contemporary
Livy
But tho u gh its universal character was
thus limite d it showed a sense of unity and con
tin u ity like that of Polybius ; and th is was r e
fl e c ted in the title of the work P hilip p ica which
indicated that M acedonian history was more or
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UNI V ERSAL HI STORY
vn
23 7
less the guiding or binding thread Older history
had culminated in the M acedonian Empire and
out of it had developed the great mon archies after
Alexander
The work was thus an intelligent
development of P olyb ian ideas
Such reconstructions helped to prepare for the
new framework i nto which history was co m pressed
and the n ew meaning which was given to it by
the Christians They undertook the ta sk of syn
chro mizing Gracco Roman with Jewish records
and constructing a u niversal history in theological
interests
The Church could not avoid grappling
with this problem
Appealing to the ci vilised
world Christianity was forced to take account of
the past of the non Hebre w peoples ; making ex
tr aor d inary and paradoxical clai m s for the s u per
lative importance of Jewish history it had to
assign to the histories of the Greeks and Romans
their proper place in the universal scheme The
Hebre w Scripture determined the six great ages
of h uman history distinguished by Augustine of
which the last began with the birth of Christ and
would end u re — such was the confidence of these
interpreters of history— to the end of the world
The Christian interpretation found the central idea
of world history in a religio u s and not in a political
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The Chr i stian
1
wo ld c h onicle was const ct d by
ba i of h s wo k by E bi
n on th
r
ru
r
-
e
S extus
Juli
us
us
i
r
us e
Afri c an us and th e
e
s s
2
Assy rian Pers ian
Th e s uc c es sion of th e four g re at m onarc h ies (
Mac e d onian and Rom an) in whic h G reek wr iters had alr ead y s e e n a
,
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p in ipl
p oph i
r
Rom
,
l i l d iv ion
ni l by J e om e ;
e of c h rono og c a
c
r
,
ec e s
an
of
Da
wa s th e
e
last
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is
r
,
was
and
,
b o ght into onn ion With th
J om h d no do bt th t th
r
er
c
u
e
a
ex
u
a
e
e
AN C IENT GREEK HI STORI AN S LECT
23 8
.
pheno m en on and it introduced into historiography
a new an d pern icious principle Hitherto history
h ad be e n per fectly free
Homer had indeed en
j o y ed an excessive authority among the Greeks
b u t belief in Homer was not a religious doct rine
and m e n like Thucydides and E ratosthenes used
the H o m eric poems j ust as we do like any other
ancie nt source
It was with imperfect methods
and i n adequate conceptions of the conditions of
the p roblem that the Greeks had attempted to
order the traditions of their own and other races
into a c o n sistent whole ; but they had worked
q u ite freely guided by reason alone and u nfettered
by dogma Christian historiography installed the
superior guidance of an indefeasible authority the
divinely inspired tradition of the Je wish records
whereby they determined the general frame and
perspective of the history of the world This was
the first appearance of the principle which Car
dinal M anning expressed in his famous saying
that d og m a must overcome history and which
guides all the historiography of the Ultramontane
school
The Christian reconstruction of history held
men s minds throughout the M iddle Ages im
posed as it was by the highest ecclesiastical
authority
But though it marked no advance
ment of knowledge though the synthesis was
si m ply grotesque it served to emphasiz e and in
tensify the idea of the u n ity of mankind which
had already been preached by the Stoics With
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240
ANCIEN T GREE K HI ST O RIAN S LECT
.
G eschichtsp hilosop hie
is a modern invention and
Herder was its founder the Christian construction
marks an important stage : for the historical pro
cess was for the first time definitely conceived
as including past and future in a totality which
must have a meaning
,
.
In these lectures I hope that I have in some
measure explained how the Greeks did n ot sudde nly
create but rather by a gradual process of criticism
evolved history disengaging it from the mythic
envelope in which fact and fiction were originally
blended ; how this process corresponded to the
development of critical thought and scientific
inquiry first in I onia and then at Athens ; how
the early historians were sti m ulated b y those polit
ical events which brought Ionia into close contact
with the East and by the simultaneous beginnings
of geographical exp loration ; and how history com
l
eted the first stage of its gro wth and definitely
p
extricated itself from the mythological mists which
hung about its infancy and childhood through the
brilliant inspir ation which occurred to the genius
of Thucydides the idea of studying critically and
recording political events as they occurred We
saw that the chief events i n Greek history re
acted upon Greek historiography The Persian
conquests led to the investigation of “ modern
history ; the defeats of Persia by Greece inspired
Herodotus ; the Ath enian Empire stimulated Thu cy
d ide s ; the rise of the M acedonian power suggest
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SU MM ARY
VII
241
a new possib ility of Hellenic unity suggested
also the conception of a co m prehensive or universal
history of Hellas ; the M acedonian conquest of the
East enlarged the range of historical interest ; and
finally the Roman conquests created in the mind
of Polybius the largest conception of history that
had yet emerged We saw too that history was
intimately aff ected by the general intellectual move
ments of each successi ve age— b y the scepticism
and science of Ionia by the great illumination of
the Sophists by the literary ideals of Isocrates by
the literary reaction of Asia against Attic c on v en
tion by the Peripatetic philosophy which created
antiqu arian history and afterwards by Stoicism we
saw that it was governed in its general develop
ment by the transcendent influence of rhetoric in
Greek life and we noticed that it was aff ected by
the fact that in some measure it supplied the
demand which is now supplied by ficti on Finally
we have seen how Roman historiography follo wed
the li nes of Greek historiography from which it
S prang
It still remains to consider the ideas which the
ancients entertained as to the use and purpose of
studying history and recording it in the light of
modern ideas on the same subj ect
ing
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LE CTURE V II I
VIEWS
OF
TH E A N C I E N TS C O N C E R N I N G TH E
U SE
I
H S TO R Y
OF
was not reserved for modern historians to ask
themselves why history should be studied and why
it should be written The question was considered
by ancient writers and it was first posed by Th ucy
Herodotus indeed announced that the
d id es
general purpose of his work was to preserve the
memory of past events and record great actions
This statement
which deserve the meed of fame
shows that Herodotus had not asked himself the
q u estion ; he assumed and rightly assumed the
human interest of history but he did not examine
what it meant He was prompted to write his
prose epic by the same instinct which prompted the
H omeric minstrels to compose their epic poems
IT
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nov a
Th e
m u se
\
a
8
act
.
ov
p
9
3
A
(Ll/ 1
716 6 1!
a ei
8eaeva i
I
r h ea.
8pa w
A
av
.
in sp ire d th e h ar d to sing of gloriou s d eed s of m
en
.
He esteemed the aim of the historian to be exactly
the same as the aim of the epic poet—to entertain
an audience S o lo ng as it was written from this
.
2 42
2 44
ANC IE N T GREE K HI S TO RIAN S LECT
.
served a practical purpose supplying examples and
warnings and enabli ng men to j u d ge the present
and future by th e past M oralists (
and with many
historians the moral interest was predominant )
would have insisted further that history supplied
obj ect lessons in ethics
Now the point I would draw your attention to
is that the ancients generally regarded history as
possessing a practical use and found the c hief j u sti
Before going on to
fic ation of its study therein
consider the assumptions on which their particular
view of its utility depends I must say a word about
the general proposition that history is a subj ect of
practical value It seems to be opposed to a vie w
promulgated in the last century which repudiates
all practical ends and asserts that history must be
studied purely for its own sake as an end in itsel f
without any ulterior obj ect and that any bearings
on practical life which may be assigned to it are
incidental This view if interpreted in an absolute
and literal sense seems to me to be no more than
simple nonsense History cannot be isolated (
except
provisionally for methodical p urposes ) from the
total complex of human knowledge ; and human
knowledge has no value out of relation to human
“
But if we explain history for its own sake
life
as a regulative maxim it is important and u seful
In this sense it means that history m u st be studied
as
if it had no bearing on anything beyond itself ;
the historian in investigating the facts of the past
must not at least in the first instance consider any
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III
H I STORY FOR IT S OWN SAKE
V
24 5
thing beyond the facts themselves In other words
it assumes that history is a science The study of
natur al phenomena intimately affects society in its
ethics religion and politics ; the study of histor ical
phenomena m u st a ff ect them too But like physical
science s and all other branches of knowledge history
requires for its scientific development complete
freedom and independence ; its value is annulled
and its powers are paralysed if it consents to be
ancillary to politics ethics or theology in order to
fulfil its function it must (
like all sciences ) be treated
as if it were an end itself This is the true value
and so far as I can see the only value of the cry
History for its own sake i nscribed on the banner
under which history has made such a striking
advance in the nineteenth century But this value
I repeat is only that of a regulative principle ; it
concerns only the methods and immediate aims of
historians it does not express the fin al purpose of
their labours
The Greeks were the founders of antiquarianism
and in a previous lecture I spoke of this as one
of their precious contributions to human progress
O nce it was started it was pursued instinctively
unr eflec tin ly without asking the question why ?
g
But a general answer was given in the circumstances
of its origin It was founded as I said by the Aris
totelian school of philosophy and was the result of
the importance which Aristotle attached to all
phenomena as things worth stu dy and possessing
significance for man s synthesis of the universe
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.
AN C IENT GREE K H I ST ORIAN S LECT
246
.
And without being Aristotelians or belonging to
any school of philosophy we must admit that as
all things are interrelated there must be a point at
which every fact has a possible significance for
man s view of his world and therefore a practical
value Take historical phenomena In the final
synthesis of history which may at least conceivably
be achieved in the indefinitely distant future all
facts must have a place
And when we con
sider the inevitable lacunae in our records it is clear
that every fact is precious ; for instance one trivial
detail may b e the means of leading us to the right
reconstruction j ust as in a detective s investigation
an apparently insignificant circumstance (
such as
the S pelling of a word ) may put the clue in his
hands Y ou never can tell Thus the antiquarian
historian is playing the long game He collects
S ifts and interprets facts which if you take the short
view may seem merely curious without relation
to h u man li fe not the business of a man whose
interests are human ; but at any time one of these
facts may enable us to solve a problem or prove a
theory the human interest of which is evident We
may say then that the cry of history for its own
sake means that history has begun systematically
to play the long game
L et u s remember that
however long be the game and however technical
the rules human interest is its ultimate j u stifi
cation
Let u s not take the phrase “ history
for its own sake to mean that it is not the
proper function of history to serve any ulterior
,
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2 48
AN CIENT GREE K HI STO RIAN S LECT
.
his usual elaboration and rests it on a philosophical
theory W e saw how he presented the theory of
a cyclical movement of history At
anac closis
y
the end of each cycle a new circuit begins and
history follows as it were along the l ine of its
former tracks
This view was widely current ;
Cicero expresses it in the phrase m ir i or b es et qu asi
“
certain strange orbits and revolutions
r
ci cu ita s
The a p r ior i synthesis of universal history which
was launched on the world by the early Christian
fathers in the interest of their religion threw the
cyclical theory into th e background That theory
was plainly incompatible with the central dogma
A lter er it tu m Tip hys would
of Christianity
have meant alter er il tu m Chr istu s and this
would have stu ltifie d the Christian faith
But
cyclical theories reappeared at the Renaissance
M achiavelli who agreed with the ancients and
went further than they in h i s high estimation
of history as an instructress in politics S imilarly
based his view on the pr i nc i ple of a cyclical
movement G uic c iar dini likewise believed in the
doctrine
O ur longer experience has taught us that the
assumptions on which the ancien ts grounded the
claim of history to practical utility are untenable
The theory of cycles has been abandoned for the
“
idea of indefinite progress and we have ascertained
that history does not repeat itself ; that the like
nesses between historical phenomena at diff erent
times are superficial and far less important than
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,
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”
,
VIII
THE ORY OF CYCLE S
2 49
the d ifferences It follows that the particular kind
of use which the ancients ascribed to history
cannot be upheld and that if it does possess
value for the ed u cation of men of aff airs that
value is either of a more general nature or entirely
different from what they supposed
And as a matter of fact we have ceased to look
on history as a storehouse of examples and warnings
for the politician though we recognise that it has
an educative value by familiarising him with the
variety of political phenomena and by enlarging
his horiz on But the conceptions of causality and
development which govern our view but did not
govern the Greek vie w O f the world have shown
us that any given situation or any social or
political phenomenon cannot be understood unless
we know its antecedents ; or in other words th at
to comprehend the S ignificance of the present we
must be acquainted with the history of the past
This I think you would agree is the main reason
according to our present ideas ) why a study of
(
history is desirable if not indispensable for the
man who undertakes to share in the conduct of
public aff airs and is desirable also for the private
citiz en who votes and criticiz es and contributes to
the shaping of public opinion
We may there fore still make the same claim
for the study of history which Polybius made for it
that it is a school for statesmen and citizens
though we base the claim on a d ifferent ground
But beyond this direct utility it has a larger and
.
,
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,
AN CIE NT GREE K H I S TO RIAN S LECT
250
.
deeper practical importance
For the last two
generations historical investigation has been exer
cising steadily and irresistibly an influence on our
mental attitude ; it has been aff ecting our sense of
our own position in the world and our estimate of
the values of things History in the ordinary and
narrower sense of recorded human transactions has
been advancing concurrently with that wider his
tory which is the business of physical science and
which embraces the evolution of life on our planet
the evolution of the planet itself and the evolution
of the cosmos
But certain results of histor ical
science though less sensational have been in some
respects n ot less e ff ective than the results of
p hysical science because they are closer to us
and at present at least concern us more directly
These res ults may perhaps be s ummed up most
concisely in the phrase used by German writers
historical relativity
We have come to see that
all events in the past howe v er diff ering in import
ance were relative to their historical conditions ;
that they cannot be wrenched out of their chrono
logical context and endowed with an absolute
significance They are parts of a whole and have
n o meaning except in relation to that whole j ust
as a man s arm has no meaning apart from his
body The recogn ition of this truth at once aff ects
our view of th e present ; for it follows that the
ideas and events of to day have no absolute value
b ut merely represe nt a particular stage of human
development
Ideas and facts are thus put in
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’
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-
,
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252
AN CIENT GREE K HI STORIAN S LECT
.
the advance of physical science have respectively
operated on theology The discoveries of geology
the doctrine of evolutio n and the D arwinian theory
created loud alarm in th e Churches but they really
only touched outworks ; an d their acceptance by
ecclesiastical authorities could not have h ad a much
greater e ff ect on the received body of essential
doctrine th an the acceptance of the heliocentric
system which seemed a diabolical idea to the per
sec u tor s of Galilei
Contrast the effects of the
histor ical criticism which began with Strauss and
Bauer
It has been operating as a steady and
powerful solvent of traditional beliefs ; and to d ay
we see that within the Ch u rches the men who have
brains and are not afraid to use them are trans
forming the essential doctrines under the aegis of
historical criticism so radica lly that when those doc
trines emerge it will be difficult to recognise them
I m ay observe here and by the way that it is
highly important for the historian to be aware that
the doctrine of historical relativity applies no less
to his own historical j udgments than to other facts
H is view is cond itioned by the mentality of his
own age ; the foc u s of his vision is determined
within narrow limits by the conditions of contem
There can therefore be nothing
porary civilisation
final about his j udgments and their permanent
interest lies in the fact that they are j udgments
pronounced at a given epoch and are characteristic
of the tendencies and id eas of that epoch The
Greeks had no notion of this They would have
,
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,
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,
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.
HI STORI CAL RELATI V IT Y
vn i
25 3
said that the j udgment of a wise man at any time
might be final or absolutely valid O lder Christian
historians thought that they were in possession of
absolute criteria ; and the illusion that a historical
judgment may be the last word is still prevalent
It must ultimately yield to the principle of his
toric al relativity which as the expe rience of the
race grows will be more and more fully recognised
Before I pass from this principle I may note
another point One might think a p r ior i that the
study of history is eminently adapted to form an
antidote to chauvinism self satisfaction and iii
tolerance
It cannot however be said that
hitherto it has actually done much to counteract
these habits of mind ; it has been m ore inclined to
subserve them B ut it seems probable that it may
be more effective in the fu ture The new historical
conception which we have been considering is
evidently calculated to promote the spirit of
tolerance and cool the spirit of self satisfaction
more efli cac iou sly than any previous idea The
tolerance of the ordinary man who nai vely urges in
“
excuse of the heathen that they know no better
must be applied on the principle of historical rela
tiv ity to ourselves that prin ciple bids us remember
that we know no better that we stand within
the strict barriers of our historical conditions and
that we S hall be j udged hundreds or thousands of
years hence by critics who look forth from a higher
S pecular platform of civilisation
The thought of the j udgment of a distant
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”
,
,
.
AN CIENT GREEK HI ST ORIAN S LECT
2 54
.
posterity leads us to another though closely related
conception which has only in recent times become
alive and real for u s It is remarkable how little
the Greeks and Romans thought or speculated
about the future of the race The S hortness of the
period over which their historical records extended
their doctrine of cyclical recurrence and the wid ely
S pread belief in a decline from a golden age may
have hindered them from taking a practical interest
in the subj ect ; tho u gh they contemplated long
periods of time for instance the m ag nu s annus
equivalent in duration to
ordinary years
Tacitus in a very interesting passage asks : What
do we mean by using the terms ancient and
“
modern
The four hundred years which separate
u s from D emosthenes
seem long in comparison
with the brevity of hu m an life but they are almost
a vanishing quantity if you compare them with the
ad n atu r am
duration of the ages (
saecu lor u m ) ;
wh y if you consider even the m agn u s annu s
D e m osthenes whom we call an ancient seems to
belong to the same year nay the same month as
ourselves
This passage stands almost alone I
think in its appreciation of historical perspective
But such flashes of consciousness of our position
in time did not awaken any serio u s or persistent
curiosity a b out the future fortunes of the race
The Greeks were imbued with what may j ustly be
called a progressive spirit ; but they did not asso
ciate their labo u rs for the i m provement of civilisa
tion with any notio n of an indefinite adv ance of the
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”
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.
256
A NCIENT
GREE K H I ST O RIAN S LECT
.
of Leibniz
In 17 5 0 Turgot stated a theory of
historical progress very clearly B ut though the
doctrine was n ot new at the time of the French
Revolution the full S ignificance of the idea was
fir st impressed on the world in the famous book of
Tu rgot s friend Condorcet E squ isse d u n tableau
.
.
,
’
’
,
,
‘
histor iqu e des p r og r es de l esp r it hu m ain
’
Here the meaning of the historical process was
declared to be social and political progress It
is easy to see that this view which was d i ff used
by the writings of Comte and Buckle as well as
by the speculations of Saint Simo n and Fourier
was calculated to stimulate interest in the past
more powerfully than any previous conception
It imparts to history an intenser meaning W e are
led to conceive the short development which is
behind us and the long development which is
before us as coherent parts of a whole our prag
matic interest in the destinies of our race neces
“
pragmatic interest to its
sarily communicates a
past fortunes
“
Progress of course implies a j udgment of value
and is not scientific
It assumes a standard
some end or ends by relation to which we j udge
historical movements and declare that they mean
progress We have no proof that absolute pro
gress has been made for we have no knowledge of
an absolute end ; and therefore scientifically we
are not j ustified in S peaking of the history of
civilised man as progress we can only be sure that
it is a causal sequence of transformations
.
,
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,
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”
”
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.
I D EA OF PRO GRE S S
VIII
25 7
It may then be obj ected that the indefinite
progress of the race is only an assu m ption which
time may disprove It may be asked too what
guarantee have we that our Western civilisation
granting that it is on an upward gradient and that
no bounds or bars to its ascent are yet in sight m ay
not some day reach a definite lim it through the
operation of so m e cause which is n ow obscure to
our vision
Fully admitting that such theoretical
scepticism is j ustifiable and that persistent progress
is an assu m ption I submit that it does not affect
my point The idea of progress is in the present
age an actual living force ; and what I have said
as to its bearing on the study of history remains
valid
M ay we not even say that the uncertainty
which hangs about the question with the possi
b ility of man s progress on the one hand and of
his decadence on the other communicates an
appealing interest to the study of the past as a
field in which we may discover if we can penetrate
deep enough some clue to the destinies of civilisa
tion
The absence of the idea of an indefinite progress
in Greek and Roman speculation is one of the
gulfs which separate us from the ancients
Its
em ergence has had the con sequen ce of m aking
history far more alive With the Greeks who
applied the inadequate conception of Tyche or
Fort u ne the reconstructio n of the past was an
instinct which they j ustified by reasons whic h were
superficial For us because we have a deeper
s
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258
AN CIEN T GREE K H I STO RIAN S L
ECI‘
’
.
insight into the causal connexion of past and
future because we have grasped th e idea of develop
ment and dreamed the dream of progress the
reconstruction of history has become a necessity
It has also become a science The promotion of
history to the rank of a science or l/s senschaf t is
due to the conception of development We con
c e iv e every historical event or phenomenon as a
mo m ent in a continuous process of change and the
historian s problem is to determine as completely
as possible its connexions with what went before
and with what came after to define its causal rela
tions and its significance in th e development to
which it belongs The unattainable ideal of his
tor ic al research is to explain fully the whole
development of h uman civilisation
This is as
m u ch a scientific problem as to trace the history of
the solar system or of animal life on the earth
though natural and historical science deal with
very different kinds of data and employ different
methods
If the Greeks had possessed records
extending over the history of two or three
thousand years th e c onception of causal develop
ment would probably have emerged and they
The limita
m ight have founded scientific history
tion of their knowledge of th e past to a few
centuries disabled them from evolving this idea ;
and history therefore always remained subordinate
to immediate practical ends
But we must not
u nderrate th e importance of the new v iew w h ich
Thucydides announced to the world that history is
,
,
.
.
.
,
’
,
.
.
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,
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,
,
.
.
,
AP P E N D I X
THE RE H ANDLI NG O F H I S H ISTOR Y BY
-
TH U CYDIDES
TH E
natu r al
of
h is
re
v ising
ex ile
pr ob ab ility that Thu cyd id es oc c u pied th e years
’
after th e Fift
y Ye ar s P eace in fi nishing and
th e h istory
of
th e war
which
ppar ently ov er ,
w h ich e v id ently con
was
a
b y a nu m b er of passages
"
te m plate only th e Te n Years W ar , and m u st h a v e b een
d iff er e ntly ph rased if th ey had b een c om posed after 4 04 B C
Bu t, on th e oth er h and , th ere ar e also a n u m b er of p assages
w h ich refer to later events, and im ply the S ic ilian e xped ition
The ob v iou s exp lanation is th at th e
and th e fall of Ath e ns
is b or ne
ou t
.
.
.
a nu m
v
d
au th or
addition s
of
b er
portion of his w or k, and
and alte r ation s, b u t allow ed
fi r st
th e
o er
rea
m ad e
som e
1
i
s e e
h
y
p
Th e m ost u n m istakab le of th ese add itions is th e passage 2
w h ich the au th or escorts P eric le s fr om th e sc ene and
inc onsiste nt ph rases to
in
esc a
e
.
his statesm ansh ip in th e ligh t of th e su b se qu ent
olic
r ov ed its w isd om , sh ow ing th at if h is
e v ents w h ich a
p
y
pp
h ad b een pu r su ed , an d if he h ad h ad a su cc essor like him
c har ac ter izes
se lf,
c om
e
w ou ld
th e issue
m ents on
v ents
of
As iv 48 5
2
3
ii
65
.
Th e
l
.
ii
.
5 to
en d
ped ition
and
to the later
re fer s
.
a
.
ex
H ere Th u c yd id e s
3
th e war
.
.
th e S ic ilian
Bu t th ere is
1
h a v e b ee n d iffe rent
far longer
94
.
w i
1( h
ch
.
ast se nte nc es of i i
.
81
and
im p or tant
m or e
v
was not re ise d
w
e re
p o t io
s er
r
in
th e
ligh t of
l
to th e S ic i ian
vu i
ex
p
.
.
96
i
lik
e
,
‘
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
26 1
.
.
.
e dit on .
i i 100 2 i s a late inserti on
413—
3 99
Th e notic e of Arc h e lau s (
ii
wise iv 7 4 4 E Me yer h as noted th atKpiiuai y ap odi r w fiaa u
points to a d ate af te r 414 B C (sc h ol Arist Av
.
in
se c tion
.
48 2,
.
ANCIENT GREEK H I ST O RIAN S
26 2
fi r st Book w hich
th e
j u dged a su b se qu e nt inser tion
gr ow th of Ath en s from the year
m u st b e
th e h istor ic al sketc h of th e
47 8 to 435
B C
.
The pu r pose of this sketc h is to exh ib it the
Athenian h egem ony, and its j u stifi cation is
.
gr ow th of th e
that th e tr u e c au se
th e war ,
of
far
so
w ere
th e S par tans
as
d , was to pre v ent Ath ens fr om in creasing that
h egem ony stil l m ore
Now if Th u cyd id es h ad grasped th is
idea fr om th e fi rs t, th e appr opr iate p lace for h is h istorical
c onc er ne
.
ketc h , b oth
logic ally
s
w or k
h is
gically, was at the
I ntr od u c tion
I t w ou ld hav e
c h r onolo
and
in th e
b eg in ning
of
form ed
natu ral c on tinu ation
w hich
a
,
.
of
the
l
stil
ear
lier history
I nstead, it c om es in after
ketc h ed th ere
the acc ou nt of th e F irst Assem b ly of allies at S arta,
p
I
s tr ange l
i
nter ru ting th e narrati ve
t serves perha s an
y
p
p
he h ad
s
.
.
p ur pose ; for it afford s a not
str ain of th e fou r s eech es in the
p
artistic
w elcom e
pause after
First Assem b ly, b efore
th e
we pass to th e im m e d iately following speec h of the Corin
B u t w hile this c onsideration
thians i n the S ec ond Asse m b ly
un
.
h a v e d eterm ined th e plac e ch ose n for its insertion, it
Th ere is internal e v idence
I b elie v e, an after th ou ght
m ay
was,
.
not orig inall
y
th at it was
d u c tion, w h ere,
su c h a sketc h,
v
rele ant
I
as
w or k of
this
till 411 B
.
C
.
,
.
p
w or k su pplied
ad e
m or e
in
ll
a u sion
re ssed , as i t m
and
en
d ing in th e
v
a s ec ial m oti e
p
v
n arr ati e ;
ac c u r a te
and
.
ph e
war
v
narrati e
of
i
a
v b
e
ee n
i ntrod u c e
i
.
th e
c.
u
.
w ith
d ing
s
e
Ath enian
en
long wall ( 93
d alon
B t it
146
whil i 23 6
to th e d estru c t on of th e
igh t h a
of
c atastr o
th at th e Pe ntekontaete ri s is g nore d in i
ater in se rtion
l
w ith
not
.
i
re th an in th e
p
The
qu ate
h im
pu b lish ed in its ear lier for m
its later till 404 B C
An d m ay we not fair ly
pr olegom ena h ad a fu ller j u stifi c ation in a
at th ese
t
h
y
h istory of a war
1
we
H ellan ic u s was
sa
em
said ,
.
y c ontains a b r ie f su m m ary of the
2
f
h
e
i
o
d
Fu r th er, Th u cydid es had
o t
p er
te lls u s, th e Attic c h r on ic le of H ellanicus ;
b efore him , as he
th e d efe c ts of th at
a
p
th e
ac tu all
featu re s
for wr iting
w ork 1 F or the Intro
m igh t h a ve exp e c ted to find
ar t of
e
5)
.
.
c an not
be
to b e noted
is
.
th e
see m s
to b e
a
.
2
414
Cc
13 c
m ay
l
.
.
18, 19
.
Th e
a s a Pre fac e
.
v b
ha
e
I nt od
r
to
u c ti on
th e h istor
y
ee n c h ange d or add e d ,
fal of Ath e ns was introd uce d
.
i 1 23 ) wa s
(
-
.
of
th e
e
vi d
Te n Ye ar s
b u t not s o m u c h
’
ly w
ritte n
e nt
War
.
b
e fore
A fe w ph rases
ll
as an a u s ion
to the
ANC IEN T GREE K HI ST ORIAN S
26 4
v
Th e
d em anded
re
v ision
m ay
hav e
au th or
was
fi rst war
th e last years of th e
for anoth er r eason
narrati e of
The
.
from Ath e ns e v er sinc e h e assu m ed th e c om m and
fleet in Thrac e, and th ere w ere d oc u m ents and infor m a
w h ic h p er hap s h e had no oppor tu nity to pr ocu re u ntil
ab sent
of a
tion
he
re tu r ne
d to his
y
ex ile
h is
after
c ou ntr
I t has b een
.
ggested b y K ir c h h off that th e tex t of th e ar m istic e b etw een
A th ens and S par ta in 423 B C 1 was a su b se q u e nt insertion
su
.
.
.
tex t too of th e
h av e b een pr ocu red at Sparta
The
P eac e of 421 B C 2 is in ser ted in a narrativ e
w h ich
h
It
m
of
igh t,
c ou rse,
.
.
.
if it had b ee n c om posed w ithout
acc u rate know le d e of the
g
p re c ise stipu lations ; b u t this
c an h ar d l b e
I n gene r al it seem s pr ob ab le that all
y
pre sse d
ds
rea
r at er
as
.
b al c opies of d oc u m ents wh ic h appear in th e text
wo u ld , in th e fi nal re v ision, h a v e b een rep rod u c ed in the
au th or s own w or d s
Alth ou gh Thu cyd id es r e h and led h is ear ly w or k, which
was n ow to b e only par t of a m u c h greater work, h e ne v er
th e
v er
’
.
-
p repared it fi nally for p u b lic ation or gav e it th e last tou ches
of re v ision
P assage s rem ain w h ic h e xhib it the ear lie r v ie w
th at th e war was ov er in 421 and th ere ar e d iffi cu lties h ere
and th ere w hi ch
ar e
pr ob ab ly d u e to want of fi nal c or
.
rec tion
.
I n th e transition fr om th e
(v
histor y
.
are c lear
20 26 ) th ere
-
d u e to th e su c c essi v e
th e war , nam e ly
first to the
v ie w s
si
gns
w hich Th u cyd id es
(1)
B efore 4 14
2)
(
386 , 20 I ) ;
Afte r 414 B C two wars,
3)
(
in th is year
After 404 B C
7 01
B C
.
:
.
d part of his
of im er fec t j oining,
p
sec on
one
war
of
ined
e nter ta
ten years
1 06
(
of
'
ir
e p ov
.
.
.
fir st
.
of
w h ich
th e
d b egan
sec on
was in pr ogress ;
one war of tw en t se v e n
y
years
we c an see , I th in k, h ow Thu cyd ides
and
-
.
.
plac e
originally c onc lu d ed his history of th e fi r st war , b efore h e
414
W e ha v e two c on clu
th ou gh t of a c ontin u ation (
C 20 i s th e natu r al c onc lu sion ; it im
s ion s, c 20 a nd c 24
I n th e
m ed iate ly
war
.
.
.
.
follow s th e
B u t th en
1
iv
cc
.
Fifty Year s
’
21 24
-
.
118 119
th e
w h ic h te r m inated th e
allianc e
2
-
.
l
r e ate
P eac e
.
v
.
18- 19
b etwee n the
.
APPEN D IX
Athenians
and
Laced aem onian s which followed
phr ase in
404 B C
and a
after
.
v
ele enth
wé key os
c
.
y
w
a
little later
;
24 b etr ays the fac t that this was inser ted
.
Ka i
ear , of
After th ese
26 5
Oépos
Tb
w hat ?
ord s
3 é vSeKofi
fipxe
7 01
O f th e war
w
th e r e follo
'
of
ou
twe nty
Th e
ér ov é
'
-
.
-
se
v en
year s
.
82 r d 8am é m 6 7rp 63r os
O b v iously th is is (
1) ou t
’
s :
y evdy evos
; it ou ght to
gvvexffi s
c om e in c 20 after th e P eac e ;
place h er e
2) in point of gr am m ar, m fim is not intelligib le, for n o
and (
B u t i f it
ten years h av e b een m ention ed in th e c ontext
cam e or i inall in c 20 (
wheth er after the las t sentenc e or
g
y
w ou ld b e eq u ally in
after the fi rst ; in b oth
m
p ositions m a
ace), it was c onsid erab l
alter ed , for the
oint of gw exas
l
y
p
p
of
.
.
.
is th e
c ontrast
Twenty
-
se
v en
b etw een
Years
’
W ar
But th e
.
W ar
Ten Years
th e
’
and
was
alter ation
th e
m ad e
prov isionally ; and m i n , which b etrays it, show s
the lac k of a c ar e ful fi nal r e v ision
Cc 25, 26 form the intr od u ction to th e sec ond par t of
C 26 d ec lares itself to h av e b e en wr itte n after
the h istory
404 B C
C 25 m ay h ave b een wr itte n wh ile Thu cyd id es
and
h astily
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
id ered th e sec ond par t to b e th e history of a sec ond
b u t th ere is no proof of this hyp oth esis 1 O n th e oth er
still c ons
war
.
h and
,
th e intr od u c tion of
first part (20 ad fin
m ad e
w h en h e
,
'
parr i , 7rp631 os
1r
'
g
at
th e
d
of
en
the
igh t natu r ally h av e b een
h is c ontinuation after 414 B C
24
ad
fin )
m
b egan
I t is an interesting philologic al pr ob le m to penetr ate into
’
th e secrets of th e h istor ian s w or ksh op, b u t h er e I h a v e b ee n
only c onc er ned to illu str ate th e im p or tant fac ts th at th e
.
fi rst par t of th e w ork was re handled
-
it nee d ed fur th er
1
1)
21 24
.
—
.
e c
e
r
e
th at in
som e
p arts
vision
.
volves th o olla y
w d
wer sub sequ ntly added c onc
It in
25
(
re
and
.
r
th at th e
,
or s «a tw y
upp axlav
h g
ly with
u rre nt
th e
A01; valwu
insertion of
’
AN CIENT GREEK H I ST O RIAN S
26 8
G OMPERZ , TH
etc
LEo,
G r ie ch isch e Denker,
.
v ol.
L eip zig, 1893,
1
.
.
F
Die
.
g i
r ec
h isch
-
r om
isc h e
Leipzig,
B iographie
.
1901
.
MAH AFFY J P
H istory of C lassica l G r eek Literature, vol
Ed 3
London, 1890
ii , Parts I and
MAH AFF Y, J P G r eek Life and Th ought, 323 -146 D C
Lond on, 1896
Ed 2
ME YE R, E G eschi ch te d es Altertu m s, vols 11 -v
S tutt
,
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
gar
M EYE R
t
,
1
3
1902
8
9
,
E
Forschu ngen
.
.
.
lteren griechi schen
M ULLER, C
.
Paris,
G eschichte,
alten
zur
.
G esc hich te
a
M iiLLE R,
.
.
I
Z ur
.
H all e, 1892
.
Fr agm ents H istoric or u m G raec or u m ,
1841-51
.
l
vo s.
i -iv
.
.
.
C
S cr iptor es r eru m Alex andr i Magni (
alon with
g
works, in th e Did ot ser ies)
Paris, 1846
.
Arrian s
M URRAY, G ILBE RT H istory of Ancient Greek Literature
L ond on, 1897
NO RDEN, E
Die antike Ku nstpr osa Leipzig, 1898
PETER, H
Die geschic htlich e Litteratur tib er die rom ische
Kaiserzeit b is Th eod osiu s I u nd ih re Quellen, 2 vols
Leipzig, 1897
’
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Charakter istische Er sc heinu ngen in der
S CHI RMEISTE R, H
antiken G esch ic h tsc h reib u ng
Pyr itz, 1896
Die Entwic klu ng d er antiken G eschichtschrei
S EECK, 0
.
.
.
.
Berl in, 1898
p opu lar e S c hr iften
U eb er d en Zu sam m enhang d er altesten grie
S TAH L, TH
ch isch en G esc h ic htschre ib u ng m it d e r e isc hen Dichtung
p
J ahrb ii cher fur klassisc h e Philologie , 153, 369 sqq 1896
b ung
und and ere
.
.
.
.
.
.
Geschi ch te d er gr iech isch en Litteratur in der
S USEMI H L, F
L eipzig, 1892
Alexandr iner ze it 2 v ols
W ACH S M UTH , C Einleitu ng in d as S tu diu m d er alten Ge
Leipzig, 1895
sch ic h te
WACH S M UTH , C U eb er Ziele u nd M eth oden d er griechischen
R ec toratsred e ) L eipzig, 1897
G eschichtsch reib u ng (
Z ur E ntw ic klu ng d er rationalistischen
W IPPRECH T, F
Mythendeutung b ei d en G riech en, i Tilbingen, 1902
.
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,
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'
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BIBL IOGRAPH Y
S PECIA L
2
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KO RDT A
Antiochu s
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De Ac u silao
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,
Basel, 1903
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WBLF FLIN
J
,
Antioc hu s
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Antipater
Ar istotle
S yr aku s
v on
Le ip zig, 187 2
.
u nd
C oeliu s
.
.
S EE CK, O
Qu ellenstu d ien
.
Ath en s
B eitr age zu r
iv 16 4 sqq and 27 0 sqq
su ngsgeschicb te
Klio)
(
sch ich te
,
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U
,
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,
a lte n
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WILAMO WI TZ M O LLENDO RF F
Ber lin
Ath en 2 v ols
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des Ar istoteles Ver fas
zu
.
VO N
1893
,
Ge
1904
.
Aristoteles
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.
u nd
.
Crateru s
.
KE IL
B
,
xx
KBECH ,
ali
Der Perieget H eliod oru s v on Ath en
.
1894
199 sqq
J
De Crater i T wpw juar wv
.
.
H erm es,
.
.
f
'
.
O v i/ a
'
y wy fl
‘
et
d e loc is
G reifs wald , 1888
qu ot Plu tarchi e x ea p etitis
.
.
Cratippu s
.
Oxyr hync h u s Papyr i, Par t V
L ond on, 1908
an d H u n t), No 842
CRATIPPUS
.
.
.
ed
(
.
G renfell
.
.
L Attid e di An dr ozione
d i O xyr hyn ch os
Tur in 1908
DE S AN CTI S , G A ETA N O
papiro
Dionysiu s of M iletu s
alten
Ephor u s
.
.
.
.
Dionysios
Klio)
(
G eschich te
,
von
“
Ar tic le
.
Milet
.
ii 334 sqq
.
.
S CH WA RTZ , E
e un
,
.
LEH MA NN C F
,
’
Eph or os
.
Beitrage
and
zu r
iii 3 30 sq q
.
.
in Pau ly—
W issowa,
’
Realency klop d dze
.
H eca taeu s
.
P RASE K, J
H ekataios a ls H er od ots Qu elle zu r G e
B e itr age zu r alten G esc h ic hte
sch ic h te V or d er asien s
0
K
1
4
i
o) iv 193 s qq
l
9
(
.
V
.
.
H ellan ic u s
.
.
,
.
.
KULLM ER, H
.
H ellan ikos
,
J ah r b u c h er f u r
klassisch e
Philologie, S u pp le m e ntb an d xx v ii, 455 sqq
l
u d e s a ne w e d ition and r e distr ib u tion
I
n
c
[
.
1902
.
of
th e
fr ag m e n ts !
LE H MA NN H A UP T, C F H ellan ikos, H er od ot, Thu ky
Klio, v i 127 sqq 1906
d id e s
-
.
.
.
.
.
.
270
ANC IENT GREE K H I ST ORIAN S
H er od otu s
.
BA UE R , A
Die Entstehu ng d e s her od otisc h en C c
.
Ber lin, 187 8
htswer kes
H A UVE I I E, A H é rod ote h istorien d es gu erres
sc h ic
’
.
.
'
.
m
é d iqu es
.
Par is, 1894
.
K I RC H H O FF
Die E ntsteh u ngszeit d es h er od otischen
A
,
.
G esch ich ts w erkes, E d 2
.
KRA USSE R
LE H MANN C
,
.
.
Be itrage
.
s
.
M ACAN
,
R
1895
qq
W
.
G esc hic hte
alten
zur
H er od otu s, Books i v
.
v ii
.
to ix
2
.
v ols
.
A
,
I onic ae
H er od ots
.
B e m erku ngen
.
vols
.
In
l 5
vo
of
.
.
Qu ae stiones
.
2
.
.
‘
.
vi
to
.
1908
.
.
W IEDE MANN
Klio),
(
.
P LUTA R CH , H epi Tfi
oOcir ov Ka k o eefa s
s i
q
th e M oralia ed Ber nard akis
S CH WA RTZ , E
u nd
1901
.
B ooks
.
.
.
H er od ot
i 256
.
De Panyassid e
H an ov er , 1891
F
Die h istor isch e S e m iram is
.
,
B er lin , 187 8
.
z
.
w e ites
R ostoc k, 1891
Bu c h m it sac h lichen
.
Leipzig 1890
,
.
I socr ates
.
I sokrates u nd d ie G esc h ic h tschr e ib u ng
Vor trag a u f d er 4 1 Versam m lu ng d eu tsc h er Ph ilo
(
loge n ) Leipzig , 1892
S CA LA , R
VO N
.
.
.
.
.
.
Ph erecyd es of L er os
BE RTS CH , H
Pherekyd e isc h e S tu d ien
.
.
.
Taub erb isch ofs
h eim , 1898
.
P olyb iu s
.
GUN TZ , O
P olyb iu s
.
DA VI DS O N , J
un
d
S TRACH AN
.
se in
W er k
Leip zig, 1902
.
.
S ele c tions
.
O xford , 1888
Ch arakter istik
R O CH E , P
fr om
P olyb ius
.
.
LA
-
.
1857
v on
Polyb iu s
.
Die O ekon om ie d e r G esch ic h te d es Poly
Rh einisch es M u seu m , x x v i 24 1 sqq
187 1
R VO N
S tu tt
Die S tu d ien d es Polyb ios, i
NI SS E N , H
b ios
.
.
S CA LA,
Leipzig,
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
gart, 1890
TH O MM EN, R
.
A b fassu ngszeit d er G esch ich ten d es
H er m es, xx 196 sqq
1885
Polyb ios
Die psyc h ologisc h en Ansc h auu ngen d es
DE RE R, C
H istor ikers Polyb ios
E rlangen, 1905
.
.
.
WU
N
.
.
.
.
.
I NDEX
Ach aea
lybi
Po
p
s,
on, 202, 216 ,
us
21
Acton , Lord , 232
Ac us ilaus O f Argos,
ph
30
m yth ogra
18, 19 21, 25, 103
Aegi ii a, m irac e of statues in , 58
Aesc hines , Di alogues of, 180
e r,
-
l
Aesc hyl u s , 66 , 6 8, 109
Afri c ai i us, S e xtus J u l iu s, 237
Agath oc l es, books on 16 8, 16 9,
172
AgeS i lau s, 152, 153
in Th u c yd i d es, 93, 94, in
at
r ia
.
lyb
Po
i u s, 200
Alci iad e s, c ouj ec tu r al r e ations
ith Th u c d id es (
Kir c hh off),
84 ; tr e atm en t of, b y Th u c y
d id e s, 88, 120, 127 s q
f or c i e st e , 109
Alcidam as , 17 0
Alc m aeonid s, H er od otu s on, 6 1,
64
A exander th e Gr eat, 159, 16 2 ;
HegeS i as on , 17 1 in u e nc e of
h is c onqu ests on h istor io
g r a h , 175 s qq , 17 8
A exand r a, i rar ies , 187 ; anti
qu ar ianism at, 187 s qq
Am m ian us Mar c e in u s , 23 4
Anacycloszs
S ee und e r C c ic a
Anax ag oras , 129
Anax im an de r , 11, 15, 205
Anax im e n e s, h istor ian, 16 2
And r otion , 156 , 179, 183
Annu s, m agnus , 254
Anticle ides , 183
Antioc h u s of Com m ag ene, 170
Antioc h u s of S yi ac u se, 26 s q , 103
Anti h on , 103 , 120 sq , 144, 179,
b
w
l
y
bl
.
yl
l
fl
p y
i lb
l
.
.
ll
yl l
.
p
Antisth enes of Rh od es , 216
Ap oll od or u s , h is u se of H ellan ic u s,
.
.
Ap oll oniu s of Rh od es, 16 8
App ian, 221
Ar atus , M em oir s of, 176 , 233
Ar c hid am us , 9 1, 113
apm a 119, 14 4
Ar isteas of Pr oc onnes u s , 7, 25
Ar istob u l us , Me m oir s of, 175, 176
Ar istop h anes, 99, 122
Ar istotl e , 17 9 182 s qq 246
Ar r iam, 175
Arta x er x e s I , re fer ence to, in
,
.
.
H er od otu s, 3 7
Anti q u ar iai i is m 188 s qq
An ti sth ene s, 180
.
e
n ot rec or d e d
of
inc id ent
H e r od otus ,
by
25
Asc on iu s, 234
Asian ic st e , 16 9 sqq , two kind s
e , 17 1 s q
e xa m
of , 170 sq
Assu r an pal, h is h istor of h is
own r e ig n , 3
Astyoc h u s , S ar tan ge ne ra , 84
’
A01) va fo w 1roh tr efa , anon m ou s , 179
Ath ens , ar tia t of H e r od otu s to,
H er od otu s at, 36 , 6 5 ,
6 2 sqq
6 9 ; Ath enian tr adition of Pe
s ian war , 6 6
Lec tur es I II
and I V p assim , 15 5 ; e d u c a
iter ar
c e n tre ,
tional and
16 1, 16 7
A tth idogr aph ers, 183
Attic is m , 148, 170, 206
Aug u s tine, S t 237 , 239
Au gu stus , Em er or, 227 , 230
yl
-
b i
.
.
y
‘
.
pl
-
p
p
li y
.
y
l
.
r
.
.
l
y
p
Be a d V 7 100 219
B e t h H 19 nd B ibl iog ph y
B iog ph y 147 153 q 234
Bi
p gn nt m ning of 153
r
r
,
r sc
.
,
ra
180
battl
Artem isiu m ,
c
.
a
ra
s
,
a
p 187
.
,
,
,
re
os,
,
,
ea
.
,
,
,
ANC IENT GREEK H I ST O RIAN S
27 4
Bism arck, 143
156
B l ass,
Br asid as, 141
Br u n s, I 117 , and Bibl iograph y
B uc kl e, H T , 256
F
.
.
.
B urrows
M
R
.
,
Cadm u s
.
86
.
Mil etu s,
of
v idence fo
r,
e
14- 15 ; 16 ; 25
Caesar, u ius, C om m e ntar ies of,
176 , 232 sq
Ca ig u a, Em er or , 227
Ca im ac h u s, oet, 16 8
Can nae, att e of, 197
in Ae gean
Car ian
o u ation
is an ds, 104
Car th age, 208, 217, 218
Car th age, New, 86 , 194
Cato, M Por c i u s, th e Cen s or , 225,
22
i iogra h
119, and
Cau e r,
Ca ou r, 143
Ch ar inus, dec ree of, 87
Charon of Lam sac us , 21 s q 23,
26 note, 29, 6 7
Ch eir ocrac y, 205
or d
Ch r is tian c onstr uction of
h istor , 23 7 sqq
h istor ian s,
Ch rono og , of ear
u n c er taint of e ar
27 sqq
,
ant of a
xed er a, ih
of
O f H e rod otus,
72 sq
Thuc yd id es , 105 sq ; O m
iad s , 16 7, 194
Ch r si us, a d eterm inist, 204
Cicer o, 16 0, 221, 233, 248
Cim m e rians , in asi on of, 7
Cim on , 75 , 77
Ci i isation
See u nder Hi stor
C a ud i u s , Em e ror, 229
Cle id em us, 183
Cle itarc h us O f Co o h on, 176
C eon, h is s e ec h on M ti e ne ,
137 ; tre atm ent
115 sq
Th uc d id es, 118, 123
Com te , Aug u ste, 256
Cond orce t, 256
J l
l l
ll
p
p
b l
p p l
l
.
.
F
v
B bl
.
p y
p
.
w l
y
l y
.
ly
.
w
fi
y
ly
.
.
.
ly p
y pp
v
vl
l
.
p
l
p
y
y
l p
y l
.
by
Con on ,
Cor b ulo, Mem oir s of, 176
instigation
C or inth , h er
Pe o onnesian war, 96 sq
Corne i us Ne os, 230
M , 92, 100, 123,
Cornfor d ,
124, and Bi iogra h
Crater us, 189
l
l p
F
.
.
p
.
bl
p y
Cratinu s, 99
Cratipp u s, 155 sqq , 16 5
Cr ete, th a assoc rac of, 104
Cr itias , 179
Critob ulus, 149
ith S o on,
Cr oes u s, inter ie w
r e of, 58
4 4 , 57 ;
Ctes ias, 16 6
194, and Bi iogra h
Gu ntz, O
Cu r ios itas, antiquar ianism , 188
C c ic a
th eor
of h istor , 205
sq
248
CyclOpes , ege nd of th eir d eath,
Ph erec yde s, 18
tr eated
.
l
y
v
py
w
bl
.
yl
l
l
p y
y
.
l
y
by
Dam astes , 26
David s on , J S trac han, 194,
an d
.
B i bl iog aph y
r
Deioc h u s, h istorian, 25 note, 26
De lb r ii c k, H 198
De l os, digr ession of Th u cy dides
.
on, 89 s q
Delph i ,
10
.
l egends
em anatin g
l
fr om ,
l veran e
de i
m ir ac u ous
c
f rom Persians, 6 9 s q
his
Dem etrius Ph alereus, 187
Hepl r é xns, 200 sq
Dem oc les , 25, 26
Dem oc r itus , 130
De m on , 183
Dex ippu s , 148
Dic aear c h us, 187
Did m u s, Com m entar on Dem o
sth e nes, 183
Diod or us , u se of H ellanic us
,
30 note ; u sed Tim ae u s, 168,
Uni
u se d Pose id oniu s, 221
e rs a H istor
of, 235 sq
Diod otu s, 115, 137
Dion s i u s of H a ic ar nassus , on
Ch ar on, 22 note, on th e st e
of th e ear
h istori ans, 25 ;
ist O f e ar
h istorians, 26
n ote 3 ; on H erod otu s, 42 ; on
Th u c d id es, 90, 102, 106 ; on
th e st e of Th u c did es, 110
s q , 113 s q , 148 ;
c h arges
ant of
Th u c dides
ith
on ex
patr iotism , 13 1 sq
of
agger ate d
ad m iration
Th u c d ides, 146 ; on Cra
tipp u s, 157, 158 on Philistus,
159 ; on Th eO pom pu s, 16 6 ;
on Attic ism , 206 ; h is H istor ,
226
.
.
y
y
by
v
l
y
y
l
l
ly
ly
y
yl
.
y
.
yl
y
.
w
w
.
y
y
AN C IEN T GREE K H I STORIAN S
27 6
He rod otu s — contd
debts to H ec ataeus , 12, 13, 48,
49 s qq ; c ritic ism on H eca
.
.
tae u s ,
h istor
6 6 s qq
50
y
Of
for
sou rces
sq
.
v
Pe rsian in asion,
in ue nce d
Ath e n
ian d r am a, 6 8 ; n o trac es of
s o h istic in u e n c e on, 5 4, 56
on ian stor ies a out Pe r sia,
5 4 s qq
on
Ar isteas , 7 ;
om its i n c id e n t at Ar te m isiu m
r ec or d ed
S os ylu s, 25
m ax im s of h istor ic a c r tic ism ,
6 9 s q ; e r r ors a ou t Eg t
m is
a
on , 7 0 sq
an d
ae 7 0 ; in
or ie nts Th e r m o
ac c ou nts
c om ete n ce ln
of
ar far e , 7 2
hi
an ti on ian s ir it, 6 1 sqq
Ath eni an se ntim e nts, 6 2 s qq
on Pe r ic es an d Alc m ae oni d s,
6 4 ; tre atm ent of Th em is
.
fl
p
I
by
fl
b
.
by
l
b
.
B byl
pyl
p
w
-
I
i
yp
.
,
p
p l
.
.
l
l
too es ,
s ce
pti
ih
.
an d
c ism
li m
r ation a
l ity
an d
s
,
46
in c r e d
ir on , 47 ;
u it ,
58 s qq
age
distinc tion
et een
of
g od s and h er oic age, 48 ;
e i e f i n s u er h u m an c ontr o
of e ents, 6 8, 124 s q ; on
or ac es , 129
of
Asia and
on antagoni sm
on Eg
t,
Eu r o e , 52 sqq
50 s q 7 0
Th u c did es, 103
a u d e d to
c anoniz e d , 151
H esiod , sc he m e of s u cce ss i e
age s, 5 , 187
Hie r on m us of Card ia, 177 , 190
H im e r iu s, 170
H i ias of E is, 3 2
H is tor ic Augusta, 235
H istor and h istoriogr a h
or d (onic lar opln), 16
or igin of
acc u r ac , 81, 197 , 209
“
“
m od e rn
an d
an c ie nt
G r ee k h istor , 17 16 4 , 190 ;
m th ogr a h ),
18
an c ient
(
s qq
33, 46
h istor , 188 s qq ,
antiq u ar ian
246 sq
c au ses, h istor ic a , 93 s q , 200
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h istor , 12, 18,
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in H e r od otu s, 6 9
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c r itic a h istor ian, 7 4
of h istor , 205
th e0 r
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e ics re gar d ed a s h istor , 2
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onian sc ie nce , 9 s qq
34 °
Pe rs ia, 11, 34 ; S o h ists , 75
77 r h etor ic , 16 1s qq 209 sq
228 ; A exand er s c onqu ests,
o itic al
175 s q
177 sq
Pe ri
s ec u ation , 17 9 s qq
patetics, 187 sqq ; S toics,
204 sqq 235 s q 238
of h istor , 21
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e rs ec ti e of h istor , 254
of h istor , 239 sq
ph iloso
fou nde d
h istor
o itic a
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Th uc d ides ), 78, 150
r a m atic a
h istor , 199, 243
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p y h ol ogy in h isto iog aphy
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r ea istic h istor , 173
r e ati it , h i s tor ic a , 250 sqq
Rom an h istor iog ra h , 224 sqq
sc ie nti c , G ree k h istor ians not,
147 , 258
s eec h es
h istoriog ra h ica c on
in
ve ntions as to,
sq ;
He r od otu s, 42 s q
in Th u c y
d id e s, 108 s qq
in
e no h on,
152 ; in E h or u s, 16 4 ; ii i
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C r atippu s
on , 157
s u m m ar
of
d e e o m ent of
G reek h istor iog ra h , 240 sq
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IN D EX
Histor y
p y
h istor iogr a h — c ont
u n i er sa h i stor
H er od otu s ),
(
45
E h or u s), 16 2 sq 199
(
Po
ius ), 193 , 199 ; u n d e r
(
R om an e m ire , 235 sqq
Ch ristian
c on str u c tion
of,
23 7 sqq
H o za fel, L , 84, an d
i io
gr a h
H om er , res tige of, 2 ; au th orit
238
h is tor ic a
ac k
of ,
g rou nd , 4 ar c h aism , 6 ge o
gra h ic a inter est iii Odyssey,
7 ; sc e tic a s ir it in ate
ar ts of I liad an d Odyss ey , 9 ;
in uenc e on H er od otus, 4 1
sqq , 45
tr eatm ent
Th u c y
d ides, 104 ; Er atosth enes on,
189, 218 s q
ge og ra h of,
218 sq
H o ar d , A ert, 227
S ee G r enfe
H unt, W S
H gin us , 234
H yper b olu s, 121 sqq
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Je om e 237
Jo eph s 221
J tin epitom i
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Kaerst, J 178
Kir ch h off, A
Tr ogu s,
.
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26 4,
and
236
B ibl io
gr a h
Korn em ann E , 23 5
Kor te, A 32 note
Krom ay e r , 198
Ku llm er , H , 29, and Bibli ogr ap h y
,
.
.
.
l
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Laom ed on , e ge n d of , r ation a ise d ,
20
Le h m an n H au t, C , 30, 6 8, 7 1,
i iog r a h
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Le i n iz , 256
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Le o,
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Bibl io
and
gr a h
Lib aniu s, 170
Li , 221, 226 sqq , 229
Logogr ap hoi
or
logop oi oi = pr ose
r ite r s ,
15 16 ; ist of ear
h is tor ic a , 25 n ote 3 ; u se of
te r m
Th u c d id e s , 43
Long inu s, on H er od otu s, 42
Lu c ian , 149, 15 1
L c o h r on, oet, 16 8
Lygd am is, 36
L ons , ronze ta e t of (
s eec h of
C au d i u s), 229
Lysicles, 122
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H er od otu s, 7,
40, 70, an d
3 7, 3 8, 39,
i iogr a h
M acedonian c onqu ests, Dem etr iu s
on , 201 ; fa
of Mace d onia,
B bl
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Mac ed onian hege m ony 16 1,
Mac h iav e ll i, 142 sqq , 248
Mah affy , J P 6 , 32, 43 ,
,
16 5
.
.
I nta ph ern es, stor of ife of, 54
I on , m em oir r ter, 88, 103, 210
onia, sc e tic a s ir it in, 8 ; s c ie n c e
and
h i oso h of, 9 h is tor
of, 23 sq
H er od otus on , 6 2
or ks of
onian geogr a h e r s,
69
soc rates, Evagor as , and in u e n ce
on iogra h , 153
in u e nce
on h istor , 16 1 sqq
P ane
gyr ic, 180 note
Y
c r wp, 16
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110,
223, an d i
og ra h
Manning, Car dina , 238
Me gara, Ath e nian de cr e es c on
r oi m en t
c er ning ,
87
em
with Ath ens , its c onnex ion
ith Pe o onnes ian war , 95
im ort
s qq
geogr a h ic a
an c e, 100
Me anth iu s , 183
Meles agor as, 26 note
Ath e ns , 138
Me os, c on qu est
b l
w
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p
.
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p
l
l
Me m
q
s il
by
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l
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h istor ic a
ear iest, 176 ;
178 ; 232 s q
Me r o e, an d of , 16 6
M e e r, E , 63, 6 4 , 156 , 26 1, 26 3,
i iog r a h
an d
Mi etu s, c entre of on ian c u tu r e
y
c ir s ,
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178
Manon , 172
M inos , 104
M ith r a, i n H er od otu s, 7 1 n ote
M om m se n , Th , 220
M u c ian u s , 190
M ur r a , G i e rt, 4 , 9, 21, 14 5
M th s, ater t e of (
7th , 6 th
c e n tu r ies ) , 9 , 56 s q
th o og , 4 8
c0 m par ativ e m
M ti e ne , r e o t aga nst Ath ens,
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ANC IENT GREEK H I ST ORIAN S
27 8
N aup actia, 6
N ear c h u s, 176
‘
Nic ias, l h u c yd idean ortraitof, 119
Nico e, J , 180
Nisse n, H , 92, 194, 195, and
i iogr a h
N itoc r is (
Ne u ch ad nezzar ) , 7 1
Nor d e n, E 170, 17 1, and i io
gl aph y
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B bl
.
Oecu m ene, id ea of, 178
O enob ius , d e c r ee of, 76
O m iad s , r ec kon ng
16 8, 194
,
Or bzs ter r ar u m , 17 8
Ph ere
O r h e us , treatm e nt of,
e d es, 18
O tanes, c ons irac of, 55, 56
ly p
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by
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P alaeph atus, 21
Pan, s on of Pe n e o e , 48
Pan aeti u s, 204, 221, 222
Pan yas s is, oet, 26 , 3 6
Pau sanias , d igr ess ion of Th uc y
d ides on , 89
Peisistratid s, d gr ession of Th u c y
d id e s on , 89
P entekontaeter zs, th e , 105, 26 2
Pe rgam on, 188
Per ic es , e x ed ition to th e Pontus,
f un e r a or ation in 43 9
41
B C , 63
H e r odotus on , 6 4
r
ate ife ig n or e d
Th ne
did es , 87 ; d e tac h e d attitud e
of Th u c d id e s to ar d s, 95 ,
133 s qq
S e ec h es of, in
Th u c d ide s , 113 s qq 133 s qq ;
id ea is m , 115 sq
c h ar ac te r
iz e d
Th u c d id es , 120, 127
am r pé s,
128
h i s pe r
n ot A
n ot
in
s on ality
r e ea e d
Th uc d id es , 147
Per i ate tic sch oo , in u e nc e on
i us,
h istor , 187 sqq ; on Po
200 s qq 246
Per se u s, H er od otu s on , 46
P ersia : in u e n c e of Pe r s ian c on
on ia on th e r ise
que st O f
of h istor , 11, 22, 3 4, 240 ;
onian stor ies a ou t, 54 sqq
Pe rsian war , tre atm en t of,
e ar
h istor ians , 22 s qq
H e r od otu s, 6 6 sqq c onqu est
of Pe r sia
A exand e r , 17 5
Pete r , H 234, an d i iogr a h
Ph anod e m us, 183 note
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Ler os), m ytho
a
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r , 18—
19, 21
r
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of S r os) , 15
P h er ecyd es (
Ph i
of Mac ed on , 16 5
Ph i i
of Mace d on , 213, 2 14
Ph ilistu s, 159 sq , 16 7
Ph iloc h or us, 183
Phi os o h , i n ue n ce on h istor ,
17 9 s qq 219 S ee u nde r Per i
patetic sc hoo , and S toic sm
Ph iloso h of H is tor , 239 sq
of
(
Ph er ec ydes
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P hor onis , 6
Ph ylar c h u s, 173, 209
Pind ar , on c u stom , 55 ; on form s
of c on stitu tion , 5 6
218
P ataea, H e rod otu s at, 70 siege
of, 85 , 86
P ato, 17 9
Gorgias , 180 ; on
or igins of
C i i isation ,
184
sqq
on c c e of c onstitu
tions, 185, 205
P u tar c h , on H er od otu s, 54, 6 5 ;
iog ra h ies , 154 ; on Cra
tippu s , 155 h is Consolation to
Ap olloniu s, 200
Pole m on of
ion , 190
woh tr e fa , in Ath en s, 0 411 B C ,
WdTpLO S, 181
135
P o itic a iter atu r e, in ast ar t of
fth c entu r B c , 179 sqq
woh ur pa yaom i wq
anti quar ianis m ),
(
188
Po
i us
fe , 191 s qq ; tra e s, 192,
198 at Ne w Car th age, 194
or k,
192 ;
of,
r st d e sign
sec ond
an , 193 ; add itiona
su
ins ertions, 193 s q
osed
s m m etr
c h r ono
of , 195 s q
og , 194 ; s eec h es , 217 s q ;
n arr ati e
s t e,
o e r , 2 17
218 Mom m se n on, 220
on r e qu isites of h istor ian, 197
sq ; on ac c u r ac , 197 ; de
n ounces
r h etor ic , 209, and
gossi , 210 ; d id ac tic , 211;
on
atr iotism ,
215 ; fair
m ind ed ness of, 215, sq
on
a i u s , 197 ; on Ar atu s , 198
on E h or u s, 19 9
ar
on Ph
c h u s, 173, 209 ; on Hom er,
218 sq
to ogra h ,
Lake
198 ;
on
Trasim en e, 70 ; on New
Carth age , 86 194
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ANCI E NT GR EEK HI ST ORIA N S
280
Th u c yd id es— com et
Th eoph r as tu s, 172, 190
O x yrh yn
Th eopom p u s, 16 5 s qq
.
b
c h u s,
re
frag m e nt as c r i e d to,
s om e , 156
c on d em n e d
Dur is , 173 ; 180
Th er am e nes, 121, 181
Th ir t Year s Peac e (
44 5
instr u m ent of, 85
Th rac e , Th u c d id es in , 7 5, 76 ;
89
Th ras ym ach u s, 179, 181
Th u c did es
ife , 75 s qq stages and ch anges
in c om osition of h is
or k,
c
A pend ix )
sqq
79
(
p
in itiate s tr ue c ontem orar
h istor , 78 ; fou nd er of o i
h is ork a
tic a h istor , if)
gr eat ste in h istor iogra h ,
147
in u enc e of S o h ists on , 7 5, of
Ath en ian e m ir e on , 76 sq
r in c i
e of acc u r ac , 81 s q ;
r inc i
e of re e an c e , 87 sq
100 ; om is sions, 86 s q
im itations
d igr e ss ion s, 88 s qq
of, 146 s q
u r ose of h istor io
View of th e
gra h , 81, 242 sq 258 sq
r en ou nc ed
o u ar it , 16 7
of
inform ation, 83
c o ec tion
u se of d oc u m e nts , 84
s qq
r efe r en ce
to an in
sq
daua
r itten
sc r i tion as
pots
W a rs aw, 3 1 ; refer ences to
H e rod otu s, 81, 103, 90 ; r e
fe re nc es to o d er or ks , 103
on H e llan ic u s , i b , 104 s q ;
on anc ient ir ac , 252
sq ;
m e th od ,
ar tistic
90
d ram atic m eth od , 108, 117
s qq
d ifl’e r e n ces in h is st e,
s qq
o sc u r it ,
e tc , 110
d ram a, 124
st e in u en c ed
of
108 s qq
s e e c h e s, 99 sq
133
sqq
113,
Per ic e s,
Ep itap hios) , 114 sq 13 3, 136 ,
(
146 sq
of C e on , 109, 115
sq
of Diod otu s, 115, 13 7 ;
of Corc yr ean en o , 94 ; of
Cor inth ians , 96 sq , 116 , 117 ;
dia og u e
of A c i iad e s, 109
of Arc h id am u s an d P ataean s,
113 ; Me ian d ia og u e , 111,
Cp A en d ix
113, 138 sqq
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with Co cyra)
on c i
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c onne x ion
r
,
113, 145
tr eatm e nt O f ch r ono og , 73 , 105
of ec on om ic fac ts, 91
sq ;
h istor
s q ; s ketc h of ear
O f G reec e, 102 s qq ; of th e
P en tekontaeter i s, 104 s q
on
the h er oic ag e , 103
on th e c a u ses O f th e Pelopon
r ia
mes ian war , 92 s qq u s e of a t
an d r pdqba a i s, 93 ; on ge nera
c ou r se of th e war an d c au ses
of c o a s e of Ath e ns , 124
on
th e
Ath en ian
sqq
e m i r e , 135 sqq
on T
yc he,
125 on or ac es, 129 ; c h arg ed
ith
ant of
atr iotis m , 131
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c om p a i
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138, 140
i th
s on
,
w
23 2 ;
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Mac h ia e i, 143 sqq
to og r a h ic a
m istakes,
86 ;
e r rors in text of, 2b
ook
85, 26 4 sq ;
ook V
84 , 85
on Th em istoc les, 6 4 , 120, 121
128 ;
ie
of Pe r c es , 115
116 , 12 1, 127 s q , 132 sqq
on C eon , 118, 123 on
ic ias,
118 sq
on A c i iad es, 120,
127 sq ; on Anti h on, 120
s q ; on H e rm oc rates , 12 1 on
Th er am ene s , i b
on H
er
o us , 121 sqq
c om
arison
of Ath ens and S ar ta, 116
in u e nce of, on h istoriog ra h ,
148 sq , 150 ; on Philistu s,
159 sq ; im itator s of, 150 ;
c an on ize d , 15 1; c ontinu ations
or k, 152, 154 ; c om
of h is
are d
ith Cratipp u s, 157
c om ar ed
ith
Po
ius,
209 s qq
Ti er us, Em er or , 231
Tim aeu s, 16 7 s qq
o u ar it O f,
17 2 ; antiq uar ianism ,
188 ;
stu dies
Po
iu s , 193, 194
195, 198, 209,
211, 217
in u e n c e on S a u st, 226
Tr a an, h istor of Dac ian war ,
176
Trasim e ne , att e of, 227
Tr ogu s S ee Pom ei as Tr ogus
sq
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IN D EX
Tr oj an war,
to
or igin
Ac u silau s , 19 ;
era,
32
u se d
; tr eatm
103 s q
s qq
Th u c yd id e s,
.
b il d ing of wall
u
to H e r od or u s , 20
Tu rgot, A R J , 256
.
.
lybius
Tyrr e ll , R
by
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s, acc or di n
g
in
125 ;
200 sqq
16 0 note
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h istor ian, 26
X e nom e d e s, h istor ian , 26
e no h ane s, h is r at ona ism , 10 ;
oe m s , 11, 17
e ic
Anabas is ,
eno h on ,
15 1 sqq
H ellem c a, 1b
152,
176
Agesilaus , 153 ; Mem or abzlza,
154 ; as a iogra h er, 153 sq ;
2 13 230
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.
.
C , 37, 16 5, 225, and
i iogra h
W a ker , E M , 157
W ied em ann , A 70, and i io
gr a h
W ilam owitz- Mollen d or fl, U vqn ,
on
Pherec ydes,
on
B bl
p l
Xanth
l
Wach sm uth
26 ; on Th ne
did es, 85, 86 , 88, 91, 114,
150 ; on Th eopom pu s , 156 ;
on
o itic a
iteratur e , 180 ;
on Atth id ogr a h e rs, 183 , an d
p
i
ogr a h
W ilc ken , U , 25
W olfli in , , 103, and i iogra h
W oodh ou se ,
70
W un de re r , C 214, an d i io
g ra h
p y
Va er ius Antias, 225, 227
Varr o, 234
Velle i u s Pater c ulus, 23 1
Vir gi , 205
Vi rtd , 145
y
Melesagoras,
J
.
,
Y
.
!
.
Tyc he, in Th u c y did e s,
Po
n
a
as
in H er od
or igi n of,
52
otu s ,
Troy,
of, ac c or d in g
2 81
,
.
p y
.
B bl
.
'
.
b
p
Z alm ox is , 6 1
Z en o of Rh odes, 198, 216
Z oi us , 162
l
THE END
.