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Aeschyli Septem contra Thebas

The Cambridge History of Greek and Roman Warfare

Book VI of the Histories is one of Herodotus' most varied books, beginning with the final collapse of the Ionian Revolt and moving on to the Athenian triumph at Marathon (490 BC); it also includes fascinating material on Sparta, full of court intrigue and culminating in Kleomenes' grisly death, and there is comedy too, with Alkmeon's cramming clothes, boots, and even cheeks with gold dust, then Hippokleides 'dancing away his marriage'. In Herodotus' time, Marathon was already reaching almost legendary status, commemorated in epigrams and monuments, and in this edition a substantial introduction discusses Herodotus' relation to these other memorials. It also explores the place of the book in the Histories' overall structure, and pays particular attention to Herodotus' treatment of impiety. A new text is then accompanied by a full commentary, covering literary and historical aspects and offering help with translation. The volume is suitable for undergraduates, graduate students, teachers and scholars.

Herodotus: Histories Book VI

Close examination of ancient historical narratives, whose authors' methods and attitudes need to be evaluated, is essential for all reconstructions of ancient warfare. This chapter discusses the problems of this material. The fullest and most regular information about ancient warfare is provided by the sequence of Greek and Latin historians whose accounts of significant public events were usually dominated by military action, but these are complex texts. The dominance of literary convention affected the earliest historians, Herodotus and Thucydides, since they were still subject to the influence of earlier traditions of narrative, especially the Homeric poems in the case of Herodotus. The basic business of gathering information created problems for constructing a clear narrative, both of the chaos of battle and the wider dimensions of warfare; in addition to the 'Whatley' problem of the partial memory of any participants, personal interests of key informants and national agendas must be considered.

Reconstructing ancient warfare

Wars and fighting are very prominent in the literature of classical antiquity. This chapter looks at literary sources about war and fighting and the problems of using them. It concentrates on three types of fighter: archers, women, slaves. The chapter deals with the interaction between military and non-military institutions: the relationship between the state and organized violence, and attitudes to that relationship as they are displayed in the literary sources, are topics of central importance to the ancient historiography of warfare. It explores why there is so much about war in ancient literature if war was not regarded as the natural, normal state of affairs. Homer's Iliad, with its nearly incessant fighting, might seem to provide a complete reply to any notion that war was viewed by Greeks as unnatural. The chapter ends with six suggestions for the resolution of the paradox of war.

Warfare in ancient literature: the paradox of war

A defining feature of Greek society was the distinction between those who could afford to live off the labour of others, 'the rich' or leisured classes, and those who had to earn a livelihood, 'the poor' or working classes. A second defining feature of Greek society was pervasive competitiveness. Competition for wealth within a community aggravated the pressure on resources created by the leisure-class aspirations of its citizens. Aristotle noted that 'people commit the greatest acts of injustice for the sake of superiority, not for the sake of necessity': the root of conflict was pleonexia. Aristotle briefly argued in his Politics that the growth of hoplite forces had led to wider political participation, and added that it was in particular the small size of the 'middle group' which had previously allowed oligarchic regimes to flourish. Wars were common, and links between social and political structures on the one hand, and military institutions on the other, were close.

War and Society

/pdf/aeschyli-septem-contra-thebas-3xexs2ebl7.pdf

Aeschyli Septem contra Thebas

Citations

The Cambridge History of Greek and Roman Warfare

Herodotus: Histories Book VI

Reconstructing ancient warfare

Warfare in ancient literature: the paradox of war

War and Society

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