Myth, Truth, and Narrative in Herodotus PDF
Preview Myth, Truth, and Narrative in Herodotus
MYTH, TRUTH, AND NARRATIVE IN HERODOTUS This page intentionally left blank Myth, Truth, and Narrative in Herodotus Edited by EMILY BARAGWANATH AND MATHIEU DE BAKKER 1 3 GreatClarendonStreet,Oxford,OX26DP, UnitedKingdom OxfordUniversityPressisadepartmentoftheUniversityofOxford. ItfurtherstheUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellenceinresearch,scholarship, andeducationbypublishingworldwide.Oxfordisaregisteredtrademarkof OxfordUniversityPressintheUKandincertainothercountries #OxfordUniversityPress2012 Themoralrightsoftheauthorshavebeenasserted FirstEditionpublishedin2012 Impression:1 Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced,storedin aretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans,withoutthe priorpermissioninwritingofOxfordUniversityPress,orasexpresslypermitted bylaw,bylicenceorundertermsagreedwiththeappropriatereprographics rightsorganization.Enquiriesconcerningreproductionoutsidethescopeofthe aboveshouldbesenttotheRightsDepartment,OxfordUniversityPress,atthe addressabove Youmustnotcirculatethisworkinanyotherform andyoumustimposethissameconditiononanyacquirer BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData Dataavailable LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData Dataavailable ISBN 978–0–19–969397–9 PrintedinGreatBritainby MPGBooksGroup,BodminandKing’sLynn Preface and Acknowledgements Inthisvolumewetakeasourpointofdeparturetheoneelementon whichallthosewhoseektodefinethemeaningof‘myth’inHerodo- tusagree:itsnarrativecharacter,whichitshareswithallworksofthe ancient historiographical tradition. Our present era has witnessed a kindofrebirthoftheappreciationofnarrativeinhistoriography.This maybe attested by the work of such writers as Simon Schama, Niall Ferguson,andTomHolland,whopresenttheirinvestigationsintothe past through an engaging, fluent narrative that appeals to a wider audience.Buttheblurringofboundariesbetween‘story’and‘history’ isvisibleinothergenrestoo.A.S.ByattinherBookerPrizewinning novel Possession (1990) employed a historical Victorian setting as a stage for fictional characters, while the acknowledgements to aca- demic and scientific institutions in Dan Brown’s mystic detective novelsbuttresstheauthorityofanotherwiseentirelyfictionalnarra- tive. Herodotus himself can be considered the father of narrative historiography. To communicate his story of the past he made use ofliteraryelements,oftenthroughpatternsthatwereassociatedwith tales known from the Greek legendary heritage. The aim of this volume is to study such elements in an attempt to contribute to the ongoing reconciliation of Herodotus the purveyor of fictional tales andemployerof‘mythic’paradigmswiththehistorianofthePersian Wars. In September 2007 we invited an international group of scholars who were working in the fields of Greek historiography and mytho- logy to Christ Church, Oxford, for a conference on Herodotus and Myth.Theatmosphereoftheconferencewascongenialandstimulat- ing, and fresh approaches were measured up against the merits of more traditional ones. This volume brings together the papers of eleven of its participants, along with two further contributions soli- citedinabidtoenrichfurtherthewhole.Together,thepapersbring out a variety of ways in which one can deal with the ‘mythical’ material of Herodotus’ Histories, and we hope that they open up ample possibilities for future theoretical, historical, and philological debate.Althoughtheeditorsandcontributorshave triedtokeepthe vi PrefaceandAcknowledgements contentsofthevolumeuptodate,itshouldbenotedthatitwasfirst submittedtothepublisherforconsiderationin2009. The conference would not have taken place, and the volume that grew from it would not have appeared, were it not for the generous intellectual, financial, and organizational support of many. First we would like to thank the participants of the conference for their numerous observations on individual papers. In particular, we thank the panel presiders Roger Brock and Robert Fowler, and ChristopherPelling,ThomasHarrison,andTomHolland,forliven- inguptheeventwiththeircontributionstotheprogramme.Deborah Boedeker, Angus Bowie, and John Marincola provided us with sage early advice and with support in raising funds. Christ Church we thankforbeingsuchagracioushostoftheconference.Audiencesat theUniversityofTexasatAustinandtheUniversityofPennsylvania helped us in sharpening our thoughts about the introduction, as did valuableobservationsmadebymembersoftheAmsterdamHellenist Society, and by Sean Braswell, who read several versions of it. At various stages we received administrative and other support from PhilippaDuffin,EleniKechagia,JohnEsposito,SaskiaWilligers,and John Beeby. We also thank the anonymous reviewers of the OUP bookproposalfortheircarefulreadingofthemanuscriptanduseful observations,HilaryO’SheaandtherestofhersuperbteamatOUP, oursplendidcopy-editorHilaryWalford,andourproofreaderJames Eaton. The department of Classics at UNC-Chapel Hill and its gracious Chair Cecil Wooten provided invaluable assistance with the final preparations for publication. Finally, we owe acknowledge- ment to the generous sponsors of our conference: the British Acad- emy, the John Fell OUP Fund, the Christopher Tower Fund, the UniversityofOxfordClassicsFacultyBoard,theCravenCommittee, the Hellenic Society, the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research, and the Institute of Culture and History of the University ofAmsterdam. Weshouldliketonotethattheorderofoursurnamesasitappears onthevolume’stitlepageandintroductionwaschosenforeuphonic reasonsanddoesnotreflectanunevenworkload. E.B.andM.deB. June2012 Contents ListofContributors ix Introduction:Myth,Truth,andNarrativeinHerodotus’ Histories 1 EmilyBaragwanathandMathieudeBakker PartI: FromMythtoHistoricalMethod 1. MythandLegendinHerodotus’FirstBook 59 CarolynDewald 2. Herodotusandthe‘Myth’oftheTrojanWar 87 SuzanneSaïd 3. Herodotus’Proteus:Myth,History,Enquiryand Storytelling 107 MathieudeBakker 4. TheHelenLogosandHerodotus’Fingerprint 127 IrenedeJong 5. ‘StrangersarefromZeus’:HomericXeniaattheCourts ofProteusandCroesus 143 ElizabethVandiver 6. HerodotusonMelampus 167 VivienneJ.Gray PartII: MythandHistory 7. HerodotusandtheHeroicAge:TheCaseofMinos 195 RosariaVignoloMunson 8. MythandTruthinHerodotus’CyrusLogos 213 CharlesC.Chiasson viii Contents 9. HerodotusandEasternMythsandLogoi:Deioces theMedeandPythiustheLydian 233 RosalindThomas 10. TheMythicalOriginsoftheMedesandthePersians 255 PietroVannicelli 11. MythologyandtheExpeditionofXerxes 269 AngusM.Bowie 12. ReturningtoTroy:HerodotusandtheMythicDiscourse ofhisownTime 287 EmilyBaragwanath References 313 IndexLocorum 343 GeneralIndex 357 List of Contributors Mathieu de Bakker is University Lecturer of Ancient Greek at the University of Amsterdam. His research concentrates on Herodotus, Thucydides,andtheGreekorators. EmilyBaragwanathisAssistantProfessorofClassicsattheUniversity ofNorthCarolinaatChapelHill.HerresearchfocusesonHerodotus, Thucydides, and Xenophon. She is the author of Motivation and Narrative in Herodotus (Oxford University Press, 2008), which won Oxford’s Conington Prize and the CAMWS Outstanding Publication Award. Angus M. Bowie is Lobel Praelector in Classics at The Queen’s College, University of Oxford. He was editor of the Journal of Hellenic Studies until 2011, and is now Chairman of the Faculty Board of Classics. He has published widely on the Greek historians, tragedy,comedy,lyricpoetry,andVirgil.In2007hiscommentaryon Herodotus Book Eight appeared with Cambridge University Press, andheissoontopublishanotheronOdyssey13–14. Charles C. Chiasson is Associate Professor and Distinguished TeachingProfessorinthePhilosophyandHumanitiesDepartmentat the University of Texas at Arlington, where he directs the Classical Studiesprogramme.HisresearchfocusesonarchaicandclassicalGreek literature,andhe haspublishedimportantarticlesontherelationship betweenlyricandtragicpoetryandHerodotus’Histories. Carolyn Dewald is Professor of Classical and Historical Studies at BardCollege,whereshedirectstheClassicalStudiesprogramme.She has published extensively on the Greek historians and is currently working on a Cambridge Commentary to Herodotus Book One together with Rosaria Munson. In 2005 her book Thucydides’ War Narrative: A Structural Study appeared with the University of CaliforniaPress. Vivienne J. Gray is Professor of Classics at the University of Auckland. Hermain areas of interestare Herodotusand Xenophon. SherecentlyeditedtheXenophonvolumeintheOxfordReadingsin
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