Herodotus' oriental monarchs and their counsellors: a study in typical narration

271 Pages·1990·6.517 MB·English

by  Kenneth D. Bratt

HERODOTUS' ORIENT AL MONARCHS AND THEIR COUNSELLORS:
A STUDY IN TYPICAL NARRATION
KENNETH D. BRATT
A DISSERTATION
PRESENTED TO THE FACULTY
OF PRINCETON UNIVERSITY
IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE
OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
RECOMMENDED FOR ACCEPTANCE
BY THE DEPARTMENT OF CLASSICS
JUNE, 1985
ii.
@ Copyright by Kenneth D. Bratt 1985
All Rights Reserved
iii.
PREFACE
This document represents the culmination of a prolonged effort
in which I have been the grateful recipient of encouragement from more
friends and colleagues than I can name individually. First thanks must go
to my primary advisor, Prof. T. James Luce, whose wise counsel has
diverted me from many pitfalls and without whose persistent support this
project may never have come to completion. I am also grateful to Prof.
John J. Keaney and Prof. W. Robert Connor for their assistance along the
way. I am happy to share with them any praise which this work may earn,
but I accept full.blame for any errors or misjudgments which remain.
I wish to acknowledge with gratitude the friendship and
encouragement of my teaching colleagues: special thanks go to Professors
Dorothy Koonce and Peter Westervelt of Colby College, and to Professors
Robert T. Otten, Richard F. Wevers, and George Harris of Calvin College.
This work is dedicated with affection to my patient wife Laurel and to our
children, Christina, Jessica, and Justin. ·
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Abstract 1
Introduction 2
Chapter One: Typical Elements in Herodotus'
Portrayal of the Oriental Monarchs 5
A. Emotional extravagance 9
B. Aggressiveness 15
C. Deficiency in judgment 19
D. Resistance to warnings 29
E. Positive qualities 31
Chapter Two: Typical Elements in Herodotus'
Scenes of Consultation with the Monarchs 39
A. A classification of the kings' counsellors 40
1. Counsellors in aporia. 44
2. Protreptic counseliors 45
3. Apotreptic counsellors 49
B. Typical characterization of the counsellors 53
c.
Typical aspects of advisory speeches
to the monarchs 60
]. Protreptic speeches 61
a. Style 62
b. Argumentation 70
2. Apotreptic speeches 83
a. Style 83
b. Argumentation 89
D. Typical aspects in the monarchs'
response to counsel 107
1. Reactions to protreptic counsel 107
2. Reactions to apotreptic counsel HO
3. The monarchs' speeches in scenes
of consultation 112
a. Style 115
b. Argumentation 118
v.
Chapter Three: Herodotus' Method of Introducing
Typical Elements 126
A. Distinctive vocabulary 129
B. Selection: 141
1. Omission 142
2. Elaboration 147
C. Emphasis: extension and compression 161
D. Arrangement: parallel structure
and cross-references 166
Chapter Four: Epic Influence on Herodotus'
Scenes of Consultation 178
A. P rotreptic counsel in the epics 190
B. Apotreptic counsel in the epics 201
C. The heroic paradox in Homer
and Herodotus 220
Notes to the Introduction and Chapter One 222
Notes to Chapter Two 226
Notes to Chapter Three 240
Notes to Chapter Four 248
Bibliography 257
l
ABSTRACT: Kenneth D. Bratt. Herodotus' Oriental Monarchs and their
Counsellors: A Study in Typical Narration. Princeton University: 1985.
This dissertation is a study of Herodotus' narrative technique in
those sections of the Histories which are dominated by the orient-al
monarchs and their counsellors. It investigates the typical characterization
of the monarchs and their counsellors, the typical aspects of their speeches
and of the kings' responses to advice, the historian's method of introducing
typical elements into his account, and the evidence ~for epic influence on
Herodotus' scenes of consultation.
This study systematically examines aJl scenes of consultation
with the oriental monarchs from Croesus to Xerxes, and proposes a new
classification of the advisors into three categories: protreptic and
apotreptic types, and those who offer advice to the king in aporia. This
taxonomy excels earlier proposals in completeness and consistency, and
produces important new insights into the purposes for which the historian
deploys advisory scenes. A systematic comparison of selected Homeric and
Herodotean scenes of consultation indicates the probability of epic
influence on Herodotus' technique in thls respect.
This investigation yields important modifications in earlier views
of Herodotus' narrative technique: first, the degree of parallelism in his
characterization of the kings is greater than previously observed. Second,
Herodotus has weighted the speeches delivered to the monarchs in favor of
the apotreptic position despite the fact that it is generally not adopted.
Third, Herodotus' use of distinctive vocabulary, his method of selection and
his allocation of emphasis all contribute to a unified interpretation of the
events he records--a "philosophy of history" which is largely communicated
through the consultation scenes.
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INTRODUCTION
The Histories of Herodotus, comprising the earliest extensive body
of prose in extant Greek literature, represent an extraordinary
achievement even by modem critical standards. For the range of interests
they address, the wealth of detailed information they supply, and the
cultural objectivity they display, the Histories remain unique in the corpus
of classical Greek literature. The energy involved in Herodotus' research
and compilation of the Histories has always won critical admiration, the
more so from those who are sensitive to the difficulties he faced in
undertaking his travels and his research. But the artistic qualities of his
narrative, long undervalued, have also begun to win appreciation.
Dismissed by some from antiquity to the present day as mere storytelling,
Herodotus' work is proof of both the artistry and sophistication required to
tell a story well--well enough to endure through twenty four centuries as a
vivid testimony not only to the Persian Wars but also to the full texture of
human experience in his time.
From the opening words of the Histories, the epic breadth of
Herodotus' intention is apparent:
'Hpo66Tou 'AALHapvnoofoG toToplnG anOoEEL~
noE,
00~ UnTE Ta YEV6UEVa ~E av8pronwv T~
xp6v~ t~CTnAa yevnTaL, UnTE fpya UEYaAa
6e
~E ua\ awuaoTa, TU UEV VEAAnoL, TU
~ap~UPOLOL ano6EX8EVTa, UHAEa YEV~TaL ••••
This is the publication of the research of Herodotus
the Halicarnassian, undertaken to assure that the
accomplishments of mankind may not be forgotten in
the passing of time, and that the great and wonderful
works of both the Greeks jnd the barbarians may not
be uncelebrated .... (proem)
3
As if invoking Clio, daughter of Mnemosyne, Herodotus affiliates his
enterprise with that of epic poetry from the start. Like Homer, he intends
to memorialize great achievements, to preserve heroic deeds--the klea
andron-from oblivion. Werner Jaeger puts it well in saying:
/i:ierodotus'] work was, so to speak, a resurrection, in
the age of scientific research and sophistic logic, of
the epic tradition ... , orlather, it was a new growth
from the old epic root.
The affinity of Herodotus' purposes with those of epic poetry can
hardly be surprising when one considers the power of the Homeric poems in
the consciousness of Herodotus' age. The Iliad and Odyssey were not only
the most familiar of all epic songs among his contemporaries; they were
also undoubtedly regarded as the finest poems in the epic form,
comprehensive and eloquent commemorations of the values central to
Hellenic culture. In this sense, as Jaeger puts it, Homer was the educator
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of all Greece: " •••t he epic is the root of all higher Greek culture.
Yet Herodotus was also a man of the fifth century. His medium
was prose, his method was investigative, and his interests were catholic,
extending beyond the heroic achievements of humanity to the wonders of
geography and anthropology. With no sense of incongruity his publications
juxtapose discussions of subjects as dissimilar as the snakes of the Libyan
desert and Babylonian courtship rituals. The Histories must be regarded as
a hybrid: though they spring from the old epic root, they flower into
something very different, something indelibly marked with a new spirit of
inquiry, with a fresh appreciation for the vastness of the world and the
variety of human cultures. Most of all, the Histories bee.r the imprint of
the Greek encounter with Persia: they reflect a deepening recognition of
the dimensions of that conflict and a conviction that the Greeks'
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astonishing survival was no accident, but the execution of some cosmic
justice.
This dissertation is a study of one vital literary aspect of
Herodotus' Histories: his narrative technique in deploying and elaborating
scenes which feature the oriental monarchs and their counsellors, both
separately and together. In such episodes, it will be argued, one perceives
the historian working as an artist with the data from his sources, moulding
the raw information into an integrated composition which discloses the
relationships among events and communicates the author's interpretation of
their meaning.
The first three chapters of this study focus on the Histories
themselves, and explore successively the typical elements in Herodotus'
characterization of the monarchs, the typical elements in his scenes of
consultation with those monarchs, and the methods he employs to introduce
and emphasize such elements. In the fourth chapter the focus shifts from
the Histories to their epic roots; there evidence is presented to support the
thesis that in his formulation of such typical elements and his deployment
of anticipatory parallels throughout the narrative Herodotus is working in
an epic manner.
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CHAPTER ONE: TYPICAL ELEMENTS IN HERODOTUS' PORTRAYAL
OF THE ORIENT AL MONARCHS
The Histories of Herodotus are dominated by individual
personalities, and particularly by the figures of the oriental monarchs.
Distinctive as each of these characters is in some respects, and unique as
each may be in the role he plays in the development of events, Herodotus'
major personalities share important similarities--similarities which many
have regarded as crucial factors in the interpretation of the Histories as a
whole. The historian seems to have formulated a general pattern for the
presentation of his leading figures--a pattern which he employs to organize
his bulky material, to unify its disparate parts, to build dramatic interest
,,
steadily to a climax in the account of Xerxes' reign, and to suggest an
interpretation for the whole course of events he traces.
The present study is indebted on many counts to previous
scholarship on the subject of Herodotus' major characters. In particular, it
builds upon earlier studies which have demonstrated to the satisfaction of
most critics that "generic characterization" is a feature of Herodotus'
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sty le. But this study differs from all predecessors in three respects: in its
definition of the specific elements which constitute the typical royal
portrait, in its comprehensive measurement of the parallelism which may
be observed in the historian's treatment of the monarchs, and in its analysis
of the means by which Herodotus communicates such parallels. In the
definition of the typical elements of the monarch's temperament, for
example, this study brings a thorough scrutiny to aspects previously
disregarded or given little emphasis--among them, the monarchs' emotional