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The moral interpretation of the ‘second preface’ to Arrian's Anabasis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 October 2013

V. J. Gray
V. J. Gray
Affiliation:
University of Auckland
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Extract

Arrian's Anabasis is distinguished by two prefaces. The first takes the form of an introduction explaining his use of previous historians. The second takes the form of a digression after Alexander has crossed the Hellespont. It asserts the need for an historian worthy of Alexander's achievements and proclaims Arrian's own worthiness for that position, dismissing previous historians (i 12.2–5). Alexander did not find his Homer as Achilles did, choral poets did not write for him as they wrote for the tyrants of old Greece, and Xenophon made even the inferior exploits of the Ten Thousand better known than his. Yet no man had achieved so much before.

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Notes
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 110 , November 1990 , pp. 180 - 186
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1990

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References

1 The position of the ‘second preface’ is discussed on p. 202 The ‘first preface’ is henceforth called the ‘introduction’, and the ‘second preface’ the ‘preface’. Stadter, P. A., Arrian of Nicomedia, (Chapel Hill, 1980)Google Scholar, and Bosworth, A. B.From Arrian to Alexander (Oxford, 1988)Google Scholar are the main monographs on Arrian. The standard commentaries on the ‘Anabasis’ are Bosworth, A. B., A historical commentary on Arrian's History of Alexander i–iii, (Oxford, 1980)Google Scholar and Brunt, P. A., Arrian: History of Alexander and Indica, 2 vols. (Cambridge Mass, 1976, 1983).Google Scholar

2 I shall explain his choice of model historians pp. 202–3 f.

3 ἒνθεν καὶ αὺτὸς ὸρμηθῆναὶ φηυι ὲς τὴνδε τὴν ξυγγραφὴν οὶδε οΙ

Some points of translation are contentious. I believe that λὸγοι refer to ‘these stories of Alexander I am making the substance of my history’, following among others Moles, J. L., ‘The interpretaion of the “second preface” in Arrian's Anabasis’, JHS cv (1985) 167.Google Scholar Bosworth, Arrian to Alexander 34 rejects this in favour of ‘my literary works in general’, but this is not a natural translation, and he is forced to the argument by his own interpretation of the preface. I also believe, following Schepens, G., ‘Arrian's view of his task as Alexander historian’, Anc. Soc. ii (1971) 260 f.Google Scholar that epi toide sums up what has preceded, and εὶπερ οῦν conveys a conditional force with the implication that the condition is fulfilled, as in Anabasis iv 9.8.

4 Bosworth, Arrian to Alexander 32–7 summarises the view he shares with Moles, 162–7, Brunt ii 540–1, Stadter 60–6, that Arrian's claim is based on literary worth. Schepens, 254–68, whom Brunt and Bosworth reject, fully reviews the controversy.

5 Most works on Arrian refer to his sources. Most of his sources now exist only in paraphrased fragments, Pearson, L., The lost histories of Alexander the Great (New York, 1960).Google Scholar Arrian names only Ptolemy and Aristobulus in the introduction and no writers at all in the preface, causing us the same problems Theopompus caused Photius when he left his predecessors unnamed: FGrH 115 F 25. He could refer to historians contemporary with or subsequent to Alexander, contemporaries in his own time, or even (Stadter 104) contemporary Roman philosophic writings. I give my own views on pp. 202–3. There is debate whether Arrian read all the sources available. He need not have read them before criticising them if his criticism is part of a tradition with standard targets, as I intend to show. He might have misunderstood the nature of the works of some of these historians, but the present inquiry seeks to discover, what he did understand, right or wrong, and how he intended to improve on them.

6 See Stadter 5–14, 64 and Bosworth Arrian to Alexander 32–7 for the topos on personal details, with Syme, R., ‘The career of Arrian’ HSCPh. lxxxvi (1982) 181–211.Google Scholar Appian is not a particularly good choice as a self-advertiser because he mentions his name only at the end of the preface, which indicates some reserve. So also D. H. AR 1 8.4. But Theopompus FGrH 115 F25 shows the topos is valid when he boldly claims first place in ‘literary culture’ on the basis of his ‘philosophy’ and ‘philomathy’ along with Isocrates, Theodectes and Naucrates, and stresses the advances made in this field in his day. Marincola, J. M., ‘Some suggestions on the proem and “second preface” to Arrian's Anabasis’ forthcoming in JHS cix (1989)Google Scholar, suggests that Theopompus was a model for Arrian, but his self promotion would have been anathema. The state of Arrian's career when he wrote the Anabasis is unclear. Stadter (17 f). says he wrote after the commencement of his senatorial career, Bosworth (35–7) says before. Bosworth argues that Arrian's reference to ‘any office I may have held in my own land’ must mean that he had at the time of writing held no office in Rome, but he takes the understated language too much at face value. Arrian may make the least claim to fame possible, and then reject even that, the better to display his avoidance of self promotion. I take the view that he is implying in the preface that his political and military career was widely known at the time of writing.

7 The topos goes back to the Greek poetic tradition, where wives like Andromache (Homer, , Iliad vi 429–30Google Scholar) and Tecmessa (Soph. Ajax 514–9) declare their dependence on their husbands in these terms. Epictetus has several versions of it: ii 22.16, iv 1.87, equating father, brother, relatives, country with selfinterest. Moles (66), rejects the influence of Epictetus on this passage and promotes that of Homer alone, wrongly in my opinion. For Arrian and Epictetus, Stadter 19–31.

8 Herodotus begins the equation of the literary achievement of the writer and practical achievement of his subject with his use of apodeixis for both activities in his preface. See Moles, (167). Sallust, Cat. 3.1–2 is another example. Writers had a status equivalent to that of their subjects too. Herodotus and Thucydides magnified the greatness of their subject in order to claim their own. No historian reached the first rank with an inferior subject.

9 Theopompus' preface is the best example (FGrH 115 F25).

10 There is a strong tradition that too much direct self-promotion in prefaces is unacceptable, however justified. Isocrates adopts the fiction of a lawsuit to cover his self-promotion (Antidosis 8). Theopompus' preface was criticised for self-promotion (FGrH 115 F 25–7). D. H. in his preface to AR i I expressed a reluctance to praise himself or criticise others, in spite of his later advertisement of his name (i 8.4).

11 There has been some recent debate about the relationship between Lucian and Arrian: Anderson, G., ‘Arrian's Anabasis Alexandri and Lucian's Historia’, Historia xxix (1980) 119–24Google Scholar, Vidal-Naquet, P., ‘Flavius Arrien entre deux mondes’ in Savinel, P. (trans.) Histoire d' Alexandre: L'Atiabase d'Alexandre le Grand et l'Inde (Paris 1984).Google Scholar Whether Lucian wrote with Arrian in mind or not, he shares the topoi with him.

12 It is of course significant that Homer is one of Arrian's model historians. J. M. Marincola (n. 6) has collected some very interesting examples of the view of Homer as one who refused to promote himself in his work and of writers who used this as a model: Dio of Prusa, Or. liii. 9–10, Cephalion in FGrH 93 T2.

13 I emphasise the tradition of those who wrote in Greek rather than Latin. Those who wrote in Greek but lived in the Roman world, like Diodorus, Dionysius and Plutarch, were themselves adapting the purely Greek tradition to Roman circumstances, so that they really represent both traditions. Tacitus, Hist. I is a classic example of the topos in Latin, referring to ambitio and obtrectatio. Arrian specialises in blending Greek and Roman traditions: Stadter, 164–9.

14 Polybius xii 12b.

15 Diodorus recalls Polybius' strictures against deliberate lies (xii 7.6, 12.4–7, 25.)

16 The tradition treated Callisthenes in various ways. Polybius (xii 12b) criticised him for his flattery as reprehensible in a philosopher. Quintus Curtius (viii 5.18) had him assert that his work could make Alexander divine, as Arrian does, but in a sarcastic spirit as a response to the claims of the flatterers. Arrian gives the claim no such context. Plutarch Alex. 53–5 suggests that he was an austere man but he lacked judgement.

17 He refers twice to his writings (syngraphē ): 4 10.1–2. The tradition of the self-promoting passions regularly thinks in terms of personal relationships rather than literary ones because they are bedded in the personal relationship.

18 Stadter, (108) is well aware of the subversion.

19 D. S. xiii 90.7, Polybius vi 11.9.

20 Boorishness is the mark of the rustic, the opposite of the educated man idealised in the tradition. Epieikeia can have a variety of meanings, but here it specifically means the waiving of one's own rights in deference to a higher claim and is certainly an educated quality. Arrian vii 29.2 asks it of those who judge Alexander. K. J. Dover, Greek popular morality in the time of Plato and Aristotle (Oxford 1974) defines it through examples, 61, 191. Antiphon Tetralogies i 2.13 shows its meaning very clearly when the defendant says he will forgo the opportunity to blacken the reputation of his opponent ‘more out of charity than justice’, ὲπιεικὲστερον ῆ δικαιὸτερον Arrian uses it when he describes Alexander's originally deferential attitude to his Macedonians before he ‘went oriental’ (vii 8.3). This is best seen in the incident when the men proved reluctant to proceed with the invasion of India, and Alexander gave up his perfectly just claim to their obedience and deferred to their reluctance, giving them the victory he would give to no others (vi 25–9). That attitude was in marked contrast to his later ungenerous refusal even to listen to their complaints on the occasion in question, when he wished to dismiss them home (vii 8.12).

21 Lucian (12) sees Aristobulus and Onesicritus as flatterers (40). Aristobulus regularly sought to conceal Alexander's excessive drinking, but Arrian remained sympathetic: iv 13.5–6, vii 29.4. Cp. vi 11 for his treatment of the battle of Gaugamela.

22 Q. C. 9 5.14 says Ptolemy was ‘scilicet gloriae suae non refragatus’, which might suggest he was given to self-glorification in general, but the ‘scilicet’ shows that the remark is special to the context and not meant as a general condemnation. Bosworth Arrian to Alexander 80 I identifies the ‘scilicet’ as part of a topos.

23 Arrian Anab. i 9.10 for Alexander's ‘reverence’. Pindar, , Olympian i 113–4Google Scholar for the king as pinnacle of perfection, and his warning to them.

24 D. H. Ep.ad Gn.Pomp.Gem. 3–4 on Xenophon's historical works. See Stadter 31, 59 on Arrian's more general imitation of Xenophon.

25 Photius in Jacoby, FGrH 156 T2. Stadter 152–61 discusses the statement and the lost history of Bithynia. Marincola, JHS cix (1989) pp. 188–9Google Scholar, responding to Moles, 164 n. 13, believes the autobiographical silence in the Anabasis is the result of its being non-contemporary history.