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The Interpretation of ΚΑΛΟΙ ΚΑΓΑΘΟΙ in Thugydides 4. 40. 21

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

A. W. Gomme
A. W. Gomme
Affiliation:
The University, Glasgow
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Extract

The interpretation of in this context raises some nice problems. (i) It is a term, a very flattering one, which had been appropriated to themselves by a certain class, in many cities at least (cf. 8. 48. 6 ), and by Dorians in relation to ‘Ionians and islanders’; it had thus become a cant phrase in current usage, the kind of phrase which when used tauntingly, as here, or ironically should be given inverted commas.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 3 , Issue 1-2 , May 1953 , pp. 65 - 68
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1953

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References

page 66 note 1 We are reminded of the phrase ‘officer and gentleman’, which was at one time current and even official (‘conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman’); for this emphasizes the moral qualities expected of an officer at a period when officers were, in fact or by convention, ‘of good birth’. We could not of course use the phrase to translate Thucydides, both because it is too local, and because these Spartiates were not officers; but it has the right kind of colour.

page 68 note 1 ‘It takes two hoplite armies to make a hoplite battle’ (Hammond, , in J.H.S. lxx, 1950, p. 51,Google Scholar n. 50). This is not quite true, for the Greeks made both Marathon and Thermopylae, in effect, into hoplite battles; but it fits admirably with the Athenian tactics at Sphakteria.