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Rethinking Hellenistic Historiography
This book offers a new examination of the so-called tragic historiographers Duris and Phylarchus, as well as the 2nd century BCE historiographer Agatharchides, using Polybius as a foil throughout. Lisa Irene Hau investigates the fragments and discusses the characteristics of each historical work in terms of themes, style and historiographical method. The analysis shows that these three historiographers deliberately wrote a different type of history from Ephorus and Theopompus, aiming to engage the reader sensually and emotionally in the historical narrative. Hau suggests 'immersive historiography' as a more fitting term than 'tragic history', and argues that the purpose of this experiential engagement of the readers was didactic: to teach them what it had been like to live through events of the past. In the second half of the book, immersive historiography is placed in the context of ancient literary theory, Peripatetic philosophy and Hellenistic poetry and visual art. Applying the theory of immersion to ancient texts and placing these 'tragic' historians in their contemporary cultural context provides a new and innovative way of understanding of Hellenistic historiography.
Moral History from Herodotus to Diodorus Siculus
Lisa Irene Hau argues that a driving force among Greek historians was the desire to use the past to teach lessons about the present and for the future. She uncovers the moral messages of the ancient Greek writers of history and the techniques they used to bring them across.
Defining Greek Narrative
An examination of what is distinct, what is shared and what is universal in Greek narrative traditions of a wide range of ancient Greek literary genres.
Experience, Narrative, and Criticism in Ancient Greece
Drawing on cognitive approaches to literary studies, this volume pursues a new approach to ancient Greek narrative that transcends the taxonomies of structuralist narratologies, deploying concepts such as immersion and embodiment in order to establish a more comprehensive understanding of ancient Greek narrative and ancient reading habits.
The Fight for Greek Sicily
The island of Sicily was a highly contested area throughout much of its history. Among the first to exert strong influence on its political, cultural, infrastructural, and demographic developments were the two major decentralized civilizations of the first millennium BCE: the Phoenicians and the Greeks. While trade and cultural exchange preceded their permanent presence, it was the colonizing movement that brought territorial competition and political power struggles on the island to a new level. The history of six centuries of colonization is replete with accounts of conflict and warfare that include cross-cultural confrontations, as well as interstate hostilities, domestic conflicts, and g...
Recognizing Miracles in Antiquity and Beyond
In recent years, scholars have extensively explored the function of the miraculous and wondrous in ancient narratives, mostly pondering on how ancient authors view wondrous accounts, i.e. the treatment of the descriptions of wondrous occurrences as true events or their use. More precisely, these narratives investigate whether the wondrous pursues a display of erudition or merely provides stylistic variety; sometimes, such narratives even represent the wish of the author to grant a “rational explanation” to extraordinary actions. At present, however, two aspects of the topic have not been fully examined: a) the ability of the wondrous/miraculous to set cognitive mechanisms in motion and b...
Future Knowledge and Imperial Acceptance in Late Antique Historiography and Epideictic Rhetoric
This book analyses late antique historiography and epideictic texts, focusing on how divine knowledge of imperial futures safeguarded the legitimacy of Roman emperors. It begins with Constantine and his tetrarchic colleagues (A), before moving to Constantius II and Julian (B), then Valens (C), and ending with Theodosius and Honorius (D).The impact of future knowledge in these texts could be felt both in the present circumstances of their composition and in perpetuity, as visions of the future reflect either the confidence or boastful arrogance of history’s protagonists, their divine inspiration or doom, and ultimately, their place in imperial memory.
The Intellectual Climate of Cassius Dio
Cassius Dio (c. 160–c. 230) is a familiar name to Roman historians, but still an enigmatic one. His text has shaped our understanding of his own period and earlier eras, but basic questions remain about his Greek and Roman cultural identities and his literary and intellectual influences. Contributors to this volume read Dio against different backgrounds including the politics of the Severan court, the cultural milieu of the Second Sophistic and Roman traditions of historiography and political theory. Dio emerges as not just a recounter of events, but a representative of his times in all their complexity.
Emotion and Historiography in Polybius’ Histories
This volume explores emotion and its importance in Polybius’ conception of history, his writing of historiography, and the benefits of this understanding to readers of history. How and why did ancient historians include emotions in their texts? This book argues that in the Histories of Polybius – the Greek historian who recorded Rome’s rise to dominion in the ancient Mediterranean – emotions play an effective role in history, used by the historian to explain the causes of actions, connect events, and make sense of human behavior. Through analysis of the emotions in the narrative and theory of Polybius’ Histories using critical terminology and frameworks from modern philosophy, psyc...
An Age of Iron and Rust: Cassius Dio and the History of His Time
Cassius Dio described his own age as one of “iron and rust.” This study, which is the first of its kind in English, examines the decline and decay that Cassius Dio diagnosed in this period (180-229 CE) through an analysis of the author’s historiographic method and narrative construction. It shows that the final books were a crucial part of Dio’s work, and it explains how Dio approached a period that he considered unworthy of history in view of his larger historiographic project.
