earlier Persian, Peloponnesian, Spartan, Theban, Sicilian, and Macedonian conflicts, but there was little reason to rewrite them (again, with the exception of Alexander’s story).
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9
Concluding Observations on Greek
Historical Writing
The seven centuries of Greek historical writing covered in this survey
exhibit a rich variety of subjects and styles under the genre. History would not have the shape it does without Homeric epic, lyric poetry, Athenian drama, rhetoric, and the prose and poetry of fifth‐century philosophers and scientists who influenced its formation. The Greek culture of warfare, interpersonal and political maneuvering, speeches, and search for verifiable truth led to its inception and fed its growth. In perspective, one can very broadly posit four major stages in the development of historical
writing. First, Herodotus and Thucydides, jointly, really defined the
fundamental style and content of the genre and inspired development
by others. Second came a philosophical and rhetorical shift in the
fourth century, fostered by Xenophon and epitomized by Ephorus and
Theopompus. Then, third, the universal history of the Hellenistic era
evolved, stimulated by the expeditions of Alexander and by his first chroniclers, given shape by Timaeus and further developed by Polybius. The
final great shape shift came with strongly Rome‐centrist writing, begun of course by the rise of Rome, marked first by the works of Polybius and
Fabius Pictor, and finally proceeding to the string of late republican and imperial Greek historians. Remarkably, almost without parallel in ancient literature, this genre survived with a sense of worth and continuity in which many authors picked up where the last left off: Thucydides begins where Herodotus stopped, Xenophon resumes Thucydides, Polybius
continues Timaeus, and Posidonius resumes Polybius. They also each car-
ried forward many stylistic and formal conventions related to speeches, digressions, proems, source citation, and the like. There is generally a sense of collegial respect despite different perspectives and an awareness Greek Historiography, First Edition. Thomas F. Scanlon.
© 2015 Thomas F. Scanlon. Published 2015 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
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that the big project is to produce the best account of knowable events
from mythical times to the present.
Many, though not all of these historians had direct experience of some
of the events they covered and sought input from the oral testimony of
participants or informed witnesses, visited sites of events, and indeed had personal experience in political and military affairs (Meister 2005: 420–1). This form of data gathering makes these historians highly valuable (if we are careful in our scrutiny of them too), and often it arguably produces a wisdom uncommon among later, purely “academic” historians,
whose works are based mainly on the books of predecessors. The ancients also offer abundant commentary on method, theory, and general ideology informed by philosophies of their day. We note that Greek historiography was in a constant and lively dialogue with its historical context, and the shape of the narrative often adapted to the interests and events of its era.
Despite the obvious evolution to greater diversity without ever losing
options, the genre is held to a core of claiming the deeper truth about events, preserving the memory of a culture’s most crucial deeds, and
usefully offering an indirect paradigm for the analysis of future events.
The following sections offer, first, general reflections on the proposed four major stages of the genre and, second, a view over time of some
shared, formal aspects of writing and of select major themes discussed in this survey. We conclude by offering a few observations about the value of Greek historical writing today.
The Evolution of a Genre
We sketch here the four major stages of the tradition: this is just one suggestion as to how to visualize the complex sequence. The logographers,
prose protohistorians of the sixth and fifth centuries, began with genealogies and traditions in individual city states, a pattern notably improved upon by Hecataeus. Later, Hellanicus, a contemporary of Herodotus and
Thucydides, contributed ethnographic and chronographic works, most
notably the Atthis. Herodotus made a huge leap by establishing themes of character, of ethnicities, and of individuals; of law and of authority; of human reciprocity and revenge, and of the divine hand directing human
aspirations even as Homer had seen it. Herodotus does appreciate and
emphasize the realistic and sophisticated “gray” quality of reality, the mix of good and bad, virtue and vice in individuals and in states. No man is self‐sufficient, and also no man is heroically successful, until he dies in that status. The historian is alive to the ironies of material success and
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reputational failure, and even of the lowly in status surpassing the elite.
Thucydides, by contrast, promotes a materialist basis for analysis and achievement and illustrates the striving for survival on the part of those in power and those not. He offers occasional but important observations on reputation derived from achievement whatever the ambiguity of ethical behavior, as is notably the case with Themistocles, Pericles, Nicias, and Alcibiades.
The second‐stage shift comes in the fourth century, with impetus from
Plato to the extent that he endorses a Socratic method of inquiry and refutation that follows a consistent “line of reasoning” ( logos; Marincola 1997: 9 and 220) and he questions conventional divine causation. The
development of epistemology and the systematic attempt to understand
abstract concepts like justice and consistent cycles of constitutions lead to a new framing of historical narratives thereafter. Aristotle and, after him, the Hellenistic philosophical schools, notably the Stoics, also contribute much to the new paradigms of history. History is never as systematic as philosophy in questioning all premises and seeking to define the truth.
But Xenophon is the first early hybrid figure blending philosophy with
history. He is intensely literate and thoughtful by inclination, as well as an accomplished military officer by experience. He embraces conventional
mores, has a strong sense of religious piety, fosters devotion to fatherland, and holds Sparta and Cyrus as models (of a sort) for states and leaders.
His historical narratives may lack a rich critical analysis and seldom focus on irony; in these respects Xenophon is clearly different from Herodotus and Thucydides, yet one has the sense of being guided by a mostly sober and ethical judgment.
The third point of great change occurs when Alexander’s journeys and
the reports of his historians arouse a strong appetite for history beyond the shores of Greece proper; and about this time Timaeus’ writings on
Sicily open up the perspective of a more global, universal history. Polybius also writes in the universal mode but, in great sympathy with Thucydides and in sharp antipathy to Timaeus, he uses sparingly the sensationalist, emotional stories (e.g. surrender of Hasdrubal to Scipio, public execution of Agathocles in Alexandria) and seeks to apply principles of human
nature and carefully considered causation on a large scale. Polybius is also alive to the ethical differences between peoples – notably Greeks and
Romans, but also Gauls and othe
rs – whose actions are constantly held up to scrutiny. Polybius particularly seeks to find the origins of Rome’s greatness; he also notes the working of Fortune (Tyche), a strong religious
notion in the Hellenistic period.
A sharp fault‐line occurs in the Greek writers of the fourth stage, the Roman era – when, in view of the master superpower, all histories lead to
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Rome, metaphorically speaking. The prominence of a series of strong
leaders culminating in the imperial rulers lends itself to stronger biographical content. The writers come not from mainland Greece proper,
but from the wealthy fringe cities in the Greek West, Asia Minor, and
Africa, and the audiences are mainly the Greek speakers of the Eastern
Mediterranean, but also importantly the Roman elite. Hence their broad
aims are to explain the evolution of power, highlight extremes of success and failure, and offer paradigms of human behavior, both for the ruler to follow best practices and for the subjects to realize that a stable government is in everyone’s interests. Almost all of these authors ascribe the rise of Rome to some supernatural force, though Dio and Herodian also have an
affinity for more Thucydidean motives based on human truisms and
evidenced in invented speeches that spell out rationales.
Formal Aspects of Ancient Historiography
We close with some comments about general aspects of ancient Greek
historical writing both in form and in thematic content, aspects that often distinguish it from modern historical writing. Among the many formal
topics we discussed, we will focus here on prefaces and speeches.
Digressions, the structure of the works, and narrative features change
almost from work to work, depending on their appropriateness to the
topic, and these changes are discussed in each chapter. Prefaces, since Herodotus and Thucydides, delimit the author’s topic and hint at major
interests guiding the narrative. But later historians seem to play with the established tradition of prefaces by postponing them (Polybius) or by
omitting them entirely (Xenophon), for the purpose of prompting readers to notice and consider these authors’ alteration of the received form.
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