HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
Introduction
Sources for Greek History offers an introduction to some of the main sources for
archaic and classical Greek history, and to Greek ways of representing the past. It
tackles not only the major historical narratives - incorporating both oral traditions
about the recent and distant past, written records, and eyewitness accounts - but
also the key sources for our understanding of the politics, society, and culture of
ancient Greece. The latter include inscriptions, comedies, and law court speeches,
as well as epic and didactic poetry. The aim is to show what the peculiarities,
strengths, and weaknesses of each of these sources are, and how these shape our
knowledge of Greek social and political history.
Teaching
The course will be taught over a single term, by Julietta Steinhauer. The course will
be taught in ten two-hour seminars which meet weekly, on Wednesdays 10 a.m. to
12 noon in room G09, ground floor, Gordon House.
Course requirements
(1) Attendance : students must attend all seminars. Illness is a valid excuse for
missing a class only when verified by a certificate from a GP or from the Student
Health Centre. Failure to attend to the satisfaction of your tutor means that you may
be de-registered from the course.
(2) Class presentations : each student is required to offer one or more oral
presentations in class, on subjects assigned by the tutor. Students are also required
to prepare for and participate in class discussions.
(3) Total workload : apart from 20 contact hours, the course demands approximately
60 hours of private reading, and 40 hours spent in writing up essays.
Essays : each student must write 2 essays. Essays should be 2,500 words in length
(50% each). Students need a combined mark of 40 to pass the module.
Essay Titles Part I:
a) To what extent do ancient historical writers perception of class shape their
presentation of events?
b) ‘The ability of the ancients to invent and their capacity to believe are
persistently underestimated’ (M. Finley). Discuss with reference to the ancient
historians.
c) ‘The inclusion of speeches ultimately detracts from the credibility of ancient
historical narratives’. Do you agree?
d) To what extent and in what ways is ancient historiography intended to be
‘useful’?
HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
Essay Titles part II and III:
a) What does the representation of slaves in comedy tell us about their roles and
status in classical Athens?
b) To what extent do the Attic orators inform us about the lives of lower-class
Athenians?
c) How far can we reconstruct the daily lives of lower-class people from nonhistoriographical texts?
d) What does the representation of women in Homer tell us about the reality of
their lives?
Essay deadlines :
HIST1011A
First essay:
Second essay:
Monday 16 November 2015 by 12 noon.
Monday 11 January 2016 by 12 noon
You will be penalised if you fail to meet either deadline unless you have been
granted an extension by the Chair of the Board of Examiners. Application forms are
available from the History Office. Such extensions are likely to be granted only in
cases of bereavement or serious illness (see the Student Handbook on our website).
Submission Procedures
Coursework essays must not exceed the advertise word length and must include
footnotes/endnotes, but exclude the bibliography.
In order for your submissions to be deemed complete, you must:
1.
Submit to Turnitin a full and final version of your coursework essays,
including bibliography, to the relevant moodle page by the stated deadline.
2.
Submit TWO identical hardcopies and attach ONE coversheet and place in
your tutor’s pigeon hole no later than one working day after the submission
deadline.
Before you submit your work, please ensure that you have read the following
guidance carefully:
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Submission procedures
Penalties relating to over-length coursework and late submission
Rules regarding plagiarism (see pages 11-14)
Study Skills Booklet (for advice regarding citing, referencing, style and
mechanism of writing)
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HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
Formatting
All essays must be well presented and clear. Please use double-spacing, 10, 11 or
12 point text, and leave margins of at least 2.5cm. Proof-read your work carefully
and do not rely entirely on spell-checkers – they can introduce mistakes, particularly
when using historical terminology and names. Please include your student reference
number as a header on each page and do not write your name anywhere on your
essay. One of the hard copies you submit will be returned to you with corrections and
feedback.
PROGRAMME
1. Introduction
Part I: Historical narratives
2. Herodotos, Histories
3. Thucydides, History
4. Xenophon, Hellenica
5. Plutarch, Parallel Lives
READING WEEK
Part II: Evidence for Athenian political organization
6. [Aristotle], Athenaion Politeia / Inscriptions
Part III: Evidence for Greek society and culture
7. Old Comedy : Aristophanes
8. Law court speeches : the Attic Orators
9. Epic poetry : Homer, Iliad and Odyssey
10. Closing discussion: literary texts and other sources, family and women
BIBLIOGRAPHIES
Each seminar requires a considerable amount of preparatory reading : you should
read the main source texts indicated below at the very least; further reading (as
suggested in the bibliography for each class) is strongly recommended.
The vast majority of relevant written sources is available in so-called ‘Loeb’ editions
(in the Loeb Classical Library series), which have the original Greek or Latin and an
English translation on facing pages. You will find these in the Library, which also
holds a number of other editions and translations of, and commentaries on, each
text. Most sources are also available in paperback translations in the Penguin
Classics or Oxford World’s Classics series. Translations of passages from less
accessible texts may be found in source books. Most primary sources are also
available online both in original language and English translation.
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HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
A strongly recommended general introduction to the problems discussed in the
course is:
Pelling, C., Literary Texts and the Greek Historian (2000)
1. On the sources/ Source books
Crawford, M.H. (ed.), Sources for Ancient History (1983)
Momigliano, A.D., Studies in Historiography (1966)
Momigliano, A.D., The Classical Foundations of Modern Historiography (1977)
Nagle, D. B., Burstein, S.M., Readings in Greek History: Sources and Interpretations
(2007)
Austin, M., & Vidal-Naquet, P., Economic and Social History of Ancient Greece
(1977)
Crawford, M., & Whitehead, D., Archaic and Classical Greece (1983)
Dillon, M., & Garland, L., Ancient Greece. Social and Historical Documents...(1994)
Fornara, C.W., Archaic Times to the End of the Peloponnesian War (2nd. ed. 1983)
Harding, P., From the End of the Peloponnesian War to the Battle of Ipsos (1985)
Rhodes, P.J., The Greek City States: A sourcebook (2007²)
Stanton, G.R., Athenian Politics 800-500 B.C. (1990)
General historical background
Bury, J.B., & Meiggs, R., A History of Greece (4th ed. 1975)
Forrest, W.G., The Emergence of Greek Democracy (1966)
Sealey, R., A History of the Greek City-States (1976)
Jeffery, L.H., Archaic Greece: The City-States (1976)
Murray, O., Early Greece (2nd ed. 1993)
Osborne, R., Greece in the Making 1200-479 BC (1996)
Snodgrass, A.M., Archaic Greece (1980)
Davies, J.K., Democracy and Classical Greece (2nd ed. 1993)
Hornblower, S., The Greek World 479-323 B.C. (4th ed. 2011)
Powell, A., Athens and Sparta (2nd ed. 2003)
Fornara, C.W., The Nature of History in Ancient Greece and Rome (1983)
Hornblower, S. (ed.), Greek Historiography (1994)
Luce, T.J., The Greek Historians (1997)
Marincola, J. (ed.), A Companion to Greek and Roman Historiography (2 vols.,
2007)
Marincola, J., Llewellyn-Jones, L., Maciver, C. A. (eds.), Greek Notions of the Past in
the Archaic and Classical Eras: History without Historians (2012)
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HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
Reading for individual seminars
2. HERODOTOS, HISTORIES
Question: What are the main themes of Herodotus’ work, and how do these
influence his understanding of historical events and foreign cultures?
Read : Herodotos, Book I.
English translation online:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0126
Further reading :
Asheri, D., Lloyd A. B., Corcella, A., A Commentary on Herodotus I-IV. (Edited by
Oswyn Murray and Alfonso Moreno 2007)
Bakker, E., de Jong, I., and van Wees, H. (eds.), Brill’s Companion to Herodotus
(2002)
Dewald, C., Marincola, J., The Cambridge Companion to Herodotus (2006)
Fehling, D., Herodotus and His ‘Sources’ (1989)
Fornara, C.W., Herodotus : An Interpretative Essay (1971)
Foster, E., Lateiner, D. (eds.), Thucydides and Herodotus (2012)
Gould, J., Herodotus (1989)
Hart, J., Herodotus and Greek History (1982)
Hartog, F., The Mirror of Herodotus (1988)
Herodotus and the Invention of History : papers in Arethousa 20 (1987)
Lateiner, D., The Historical Method of Herodotus (1989)
Luraghi (ed.), The Historian’s Craft in the Age of Herodotus (2001)
Murray, O., ‘Herodotus and Oral Tradition’, in Sancisi, H. & Kuhrt, A. (eds.),
Achaemenid History II: The Greek Sources (1987), 93-115
Redfield, J.M., ‘Herodotus the Tourist’, Classical Philology 80 (1985), 97-118
Romm, J., Herodotus (1998)
3. THUCYDIDES, HISTORY
Question: What are the main themes of Thucydides’ work, and how do these
influence his understanding of historical events?
Read : Thucydides, Book I.
English translation online:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0200
Further reading :
Cawkwell, G., Thucydides and the Peloponnesian War (1997)
Connor, W.R., Thucydides (1984)
Crane, G., ‘Power, prestige, and the Corcyraean affair in Thucydides 1’, Classical
Antiquity 11 (1992), 1-27
De Romilly, J., Thucydides and Athenian Imperialism (1963)
Dover, K.J., Thucydides (Greece & Rome New Surveys 7, 1973)
Foster, E., Thucydides, Pericles, and Periclean Imperialism (2010)
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HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
Hornblower, S., Thucydides (1987)
Hornblower, S., A Commentary on Thucydides (1996), introduction to vol. 2
Hornblower, S., A Commentary on Thucydides: Volume III (2008)
Hunter, V.J., Thucydides the Artful Reporter (1973)
Greenwod, E., Thucydides and the Shaping of History (2005)
Kagan, D. Thucydides: The Reinvention of History (2009)
Kallet-Marx, L., Money, Expense and Naval Power in Thucydides (1993) and Money
and the Corrosion of Power in Thucydides (2001)
Morrison, J. V. Reading Thucydides (2006)
Price, J., Thucydides and Internal War (2001)
Rhodes, P., ‘Thucydides on the causes of the Peloponnesian War’, Hermes 115
(1987), 154-65
Rood, T., Thucydides: Narrative and Explanation (1998)
Westlake, H. D., Individuals in Thucydides (2010)
4. XENOPHON, HELLENICA
Question: Did Xenophon’s admiration for Sparta significantly influence his account of
Greek history?
Read : Xenophon, Hellenica, Books II and III
(translated in Penguin Classics as A History of My Times)
English translation online:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0206
Further reading :
Xenophon, Lakedaimonion Politeia/The Spartan Constitution (Loeb: Xen., Scripta
Minora;
Penguin Plutarch on Sparta) and Cyropaedia/The Education of Cyrus (Loeb;
Everyman’s Library)
Anderson, J.K., Xenophon (1974)
Dillery, J., Xenophon and the History of His Times (1995)
Due, B., The Cyropaedia: Xenophon’s aims and methods (1989)
Gera, D., Xenophon’s Cyropaedia (1993)
Gray, V. The Character of Xenophon’s Hellenica (1989)
Gray, V. (ed.), Xenophon. Oxford Readings in Classical Studies (2010)
Grayson, C.H., ‘Did Xenophon intend to write history ?’, in B. Levick (ed.), The
Ancient
Historian and His Materials (1975), 31-43
Higgins, W.E., Xenophon the Athenian (1977)
Hobden, F., Tuplin C. (eds.), Xenophon: Ethical Principles and Historical Enquiry
(2012)
Krentz, P., Xenophon, Hellenica (commentary), two vols. (1989, 1995)
Strassler, R. B. (ed.), The Landmark Xenophon's Hellenika (with a new translation by
John Marincola) 2009
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HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
Tatum, J., Xenophon’s Imperial Fiction (1989)
Tuplin, C.J., The Failings of Empire : A Reading of Xenophon’s Hellenica (1993)
Tuplin, C., ‘Xenophon, Sparta and the Cyropaedia’, in A. Powell and S. Hodkinson,
The
Shadow of Sparta (1994), 127-182
Tuplin C. (ed.), Xenophon and his World. Papers from a conference held in Liverpool
in July 1999 (2004)
English translation online:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:2008.01.0066
5. PLUTARCH, PARALLEL LIVES
Question: Plutarch is a biographer rather than a historian. What difference does that
make for his handling of historical evidence?
Read : Plutarch, Life of Themistocles (in Loeb, and in Penguin: Plutarch, The Rise
and Fall of Athens, also, with Greek text and commentary: J.L. Marr, Plutarch,
Themistocles (1998); another commentary: F.J. Frost, Plutarch’s Themistocles: A
historical commentary (1980))
Further reading :
Aalders, G.J.D., Plutarch’s Political Thought (1982)
Barrow, R.H., Plutarch and His Times (1969)
Duff, T., Plutarch’s Lives: exploring virtue and vice (1999)
Humble, N. (ed.), Plutarch's Lives: Parallelism and Purpose (2010), esp. Pelling, C.
Plutarch’s tale of two cities: do the Parallel Lives combine as global histories?
pp. 217
235
Lamberton, R., Plutarch (2002)
Momigliano, A., The Development of Greek Biography (1993)
Mossman, J. (ed.), Plutarch and His Intellectual World (1997), esp. chs. 4-5, 13
Pelling, C., Literary Texts and the Greek Historian (2000), 44-60
Pelling, C., Plutarch and History: eighteen studies (2002)
Scardigli, B. (ed.), Essays on Plutarch’s Lives (1995)
Stadter, P. (ed.), Plutarch and the Historical Tradition (1992)
Wardman, A., Plutarch’s Lives (1974)
Lenardon, R., The Saga of Themistokles (1978)
Podlecki, A., The Life of Themistokles (1975)
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HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
6. [ARISTOTLE], ATHENAION POLITEIA / INSCRIPTIONS
Question: To what extent does the evidence of inscriptions add to the picture of the
workings of Athenian government presented in The Athenian Constitution?
Read : [Aristotle], The Athenian Constitution (in Penguin Classics; also in J.M.
Moore,
Aristotle and Xenophon on Democracy and Oligarchy (1975))
and selected inscriptions as translated in sourcebooks (some listed above;
some below).
English translation online:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0046
Further reading :
Hansen, M.H., The Athenian Democracy in the Age of Demosthenes (1991)
Hansen, M.H., The Athenian Assembly (1987)
Hignett, C., A History of the Athenian Constitution (1958)
Murray, O., and Price, S., The Greek City from Homer to Alexander (1990)
Ober, J., Mass and Elite in Classical Athens (1989)
Osborne, R., Demos : The Discovery of Classical Attika (1985)
Osborne, R., Athens and Athenian Democracy (2010)
Rhodes, P.J., A Commentary on the Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia (1981)
Rhodes, P.J., ‘Political activity in classical Athens’, Journal of Hell. Studs. 106
(1986), 132-44
Rhodes, P. J. (ed.), Athenian Democracy (2004)
Sinclair, R.K., Democracy and Participation in Athens (1988)
Stockton, D., The Classical Athenian Democracy (1990)
The Athenian Empire (sourcebook: LACTOR 1)
Athenian Politics (sourcebook: LACTOR 5)
Millar, F., ‘Epigraphy’, in M. Crawford (ed.), Sources for Ancient History (1983), 80136
Osborne, R., and Hornblower, S., Ritual, Finance, Politics (1995), 157-64 (Hedrick),
201-225
(Davies, Harris)
Rhodes, P.J., with D.M. Lewis, The Decrees of the Greek States (1997)
Woodhead, A.G., The Study of Greek Inscriptions (1959)
7. OLD COMEDY : ARISTOPHANES
Question: Can we extract from Aristophanes’ comedies a reliable picture of Athenian
social and/or political life?
Read : Aristophanes, Clouds and Wasps, or Lysistrata and Assemblywomen
(Ekklesiazusai),
and/or any other of his comedies (all in Penguin, Loeb and other translations).
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HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
English translations online:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/searchresults?q=aristophanes
Further reading :
Bowie, A.M., Aristophanes: Myth, Ritual and Comedy (1993)
Cartledge, P.A., Aristophanes and his Theatre of the Absurd (1990)
David, E., Aristophanes and Athenian Society of the Early Fourth Century (1984)
Dover, K.J., Aristophanic Comedy (1972)
Ehrenberg, V., The People of Aristophanes. Second edition (1962)
Handley, E., ‘Aristophanes and the real world’, Proceedings of the Class. Ass.
(1982), 7-16
Heath, M, Political Comedy in Aristophanes (1987)
Konstan, D., Greek Comedy and Ideology (1995)
McDowell, D., Aristophanes and Athens (1995)
Pelling, C., Literary Texts and the Greek Historian (2000), chs. 7-8, and pp. 209-18
Robson, J. Aristophanes: An Introduction (2009)
Sidwell, K. Aristophanes the Democrat: the Politics of Satirical Comedy during the
Peloponnesian War (2009)
Taaffe, L.K., Aristophanes and Women (1993)
Ussher, R., Aristophanes (Greece & Rome New Surveys, 13; 1979)
8. LAW-COURT SPEECHES : THE ATTIC ORATORS
Question: Do law-court speeches offer good evidence for classical Greek norms and
values - or even for classical Greek law?
Read :
Lysias I (On the Murder of Eratosthenes) or Demosthenes LIX (Against
Neaira),
and/or other speeches by these and other orators (in Loeb translations). Note
collection of extracts from orators in Fisher, below, and in Isager, S., and
Hansen,
M., Aspects of Athenian Society in the Fourth Century BC (1975)
English translations online:
On the Murder of Eratosthenes:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0154
Against Neaira:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0080%
3Aspeech%3D59
Further reading :
Carawan, E. (ed.), Oxford Readings in the Attic Orators (2007)
Carey, C., ‘Rape and adultery in Athenian law’, Classical Quarterly 45 (1995), 407-14
Christ, M., The Litigious Athenian (1998)
Dover, K., Greek Popular Morality (1974)
Edwards, M., The Attic Orators (1995)
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HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
Fisher, N., Social Values in Classical Athens (1976)
Hamel, D., Trying Neaira (2003)
Harris, E., ‘Did the Athenians regard seduction as a worse crime than rape?’,
Classical
Quarterly 40 (1990) 370-7
Humphreys, S.C., ‘Social relations on stage’, History and Anthropology 1.2 (1985),
313-69
Johnstone, S., Disputes and Democracy. The Consequences of Litigation (1999)
Pelling, C., Literary Texts and the Greek Historian (2000), 218-31
Phillips, D. D., Athenian Political Oratory, 16 Key Speeches (2004)
Todd, S., ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover and the Attic Orators’, JHS 110 (1990), 146-73
Todd, S., ‘The Use and Abuse of the Attic Orators’, G&R 37 (1990), 159-78
9. EPIC POETRY : HOMER, ILIAD AND ODYSSEY
Question: To what extent and in what ways does Homer’s poetry reflect the
institutions, customs, norms and ideals of early Greek society?
Read : Homer, Iliad, I; VI; IX (preferably in Penguin translation by M. Hammond)
and Odyssey, II; VI-VIII (preferably in Oxford World’s Classics translation).
English translations online:
Iliad: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0134
Odyssee: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0136
Further reading :
Crielaard, J. ‘Homer, history and archaeology’, in id. (ed.), Homeric Questions
(1995), 201-88
Classen, C. J., Vorbilder - Werte - Normen in den homerischen Epen (2008)
Dickinson, O., ‘Homer, poet of the Dark Age’, Greece & Rome 33 (1986), 20-37
Finley, M.I., The World of Odysseus (2nd ed. 1977)
Graziosi, B., Haubold, J., Homer: The Resonance of Epic (2005)
Griffin, J., Homer on Life and Death (1980) or Homer (1980)
Geddes, A.G., ‘Who’s who in “Homeric” Society ?’, CQ 34 (1984), 17-36
Halverson, J., ‘Social order in the Odyssey’, Hermes 113 (1985), 129-45
Morris, I., ‘The use and abuse of Homer’, Classical Antiquity 5 (1986), 81-138
Morris, I., and Powell, B., A New Companion to Homer (1997)
Powell, B., Homer (2004)
Raaflaub, K.A., ‘A historian’s headache: how to read “Homeric society”’, in N. Fisher
and
H. van Wees (eds.), Archaic Greece (1998), 169-94
Rutherford, R., Homer (1996)
Sherratt, E.S., ‘Reading the texts : archaeology and the Homeric Question’, Antiquity
64
(1990), 807-24
Snodgrass, A.M., ‘An historical Homeric society ?’, JHS 94 (1974), 114-25
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HIST1011A: SOURCES FOR GREEK HISTORY
Van Wees, H., Status Warriors. War, Violence and Society in Homer and History
(1992)
Van Wees, H., ‘Homer and early Greece’, in I. de Jong, Homer: Critical
assessments, vol. 2
(1999), 1-32; also in Colby Quarterly 38 (2002), 94-117
10. CLOSING DISCUSSION: LITERARY AND OTHER TEXTS
Brulé, P., Women of Ancient Greece (2003)
Maclachlan, B., Women in Ancient Greece: A Sourcebook (2012) esp. the
introduction
Patterson, C. B. The Family in Greek History (1998)
Chiasson, C.C., ‘The Herodotean Solon’, GRBS 27 (1986), 249-62
Rihll, T., ‘Hektemoroi : Partners in Crime ?’, JHS 111 (1991), 101-27
Powell, A., & Hodkinson, S. (eds.), The Shadow of Sparta (1994)
Andrewes, A., The Greek Tyrants (1956)
Ferrill, A., ‘Herodotus on Tyranny’, Historia 27 (1978), 385-98
Waters, K., Herodotus on Tyrants and Despots (1971)
Burn, A.R., Persia and the Greeks (2nd ed. 1984)
Hall, E., Inventing the Barbarian (1989)
Hall, E., ‘Asia Unmanned’, in J. Rich & G. Shipley (eds.), War and Society in the
Greek
World (1993), 108-33
McGregor, M.F., The Athenians and Their Empire (1987)
Meiggs, R., The Athenian Empire (1972)
Rhodes, P., The Athenian Empire (Greece & Rome New Surveys, 1985)
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