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Herodotos and his contemporaries*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 February 2012

Robert L. Fowler
Robert L. Fowler
Affiliation:
University of Bristol
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Extract

Among early Greek historians, Herodotos and Thukydides, owing to their survival, inevitably dominate our attention. But of course they were not alone. We have some substantial citations and numerous shorter fragments of many contemporaries. Difficulties of interpretation and the authority of their greatest modern interpreter, Felix Jacoby, have for many years prevented a thorough re-evaluation of early historiography and the position of Herodotos within it. The present paper is a contribution to this effort. In the first section, the list of Herodotos' contemporaries is drawn up as a necessary starting-point. We shall find that Jacoby's assessment of the evidence, and in particular his late date for some historians, is to be rejected, and that his conclusions about Herodotos' position in the development of historiography, which still dominate the field, lack at least part of their foundation. In section II an alternative method, in the absence of certain chronology, is developed for identifying the salient characteristics of the individual historian; the method owes something to narratology. It is illustrated from the fragments of the authors listed in section I, together with those of other historians down to the beginning of the fourth century. Section III then focuses on Herodotos; it will emerge that the most distinctive thing about him is his constant talk about sources and how to assess them. Other historians (and, indeed, poets) knew that sources contradict each other, but Herodotos first realised that this situation exists as a theoretical problem requiring the development of new methods. His is a second-order, or meta-cognitive awareness. Section IV goes on to deal, as seems necessary, with Detlev Fehling's theory about Herodotos' sources, since if he is right Herodotos is not really serious about them. An epilogue draws attention to a fifth-century passage in the Theognidean corpus with striking parallels to a passage in Plato's Protagoras; the two together throw light on Herodotos' proem, and confirm the picture drawn in this paper of his historical activity.

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The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 116 , November 1996 , pp. 62 - 87
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1996

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References

1 For treatments of the passage see Pearson, L., Early Ionian historians (Oxford 1939) 3 f.Google Scholar; Kendrick Pritchett, W., Dionysius of Halicarnassus: on Thucydides (University of California Press 1975)Google Scholar; Brown, T.S. in AHR lix (1953–1954) 834 ff.Google Scholar; Gozzoli, Sandra, ‘Una teoria antica sull'origine della storiografia greca’, SCO xix–xx (1970–1971) 158–211Google Scholar; Toye, David L., ‘Dionysius of Halicarnassus on the first Greek historians’, AJP cxvi (1995) 279–302.Google Scholar For details of the textual criticism I may refer to my forthcoming edition of the early mythographers.

2 Following Usener's deletion and Aujac's supplement. Dionysios, of course, has no independent knowledge of early archives and pre-literary chronicles; he infers their existence from the text of the historians, especially Herodotos and Thukydides.

3 For the reading cf. Thuc. 23.4 sqq., where Dionysios carefully reminds us that each dialect has its own character.

4 The truest form of the name (Euagon) is given in IPriene 37 = FGrH 535 F 3. He wrote local history of Samos (no title transmitted).

5 Transmitted titles are and

6 Parian or Naxian; no titles transmitted.

7 No titles transmitted.

8 Hekataios wrote (also cited as and once as FGrH 1 F 8) and the Periodos; Akousilaos wrote

9 Transmitted titles are

10 Strabo i.3.1 p. 47 = FGrH 5 T 7, F 8.

11 Porph. fr. 409 Smith apud Eus. Praep. Evang. x.3.16 p. 466b = FGrH 5 T 5 = Hellan. FGrH 4 T 17.

12 Wrote local history (no title transmitted).

13

14 See Pearson (n. 1) 115. The Olympic date in this fragment, which is preserved by Clement, might be someone else's calculation on the basis of some synchronism in Xanthos; on this assumption the fragment may be accepted as genuine.Google Scholar

15 See Drews, R., The Greek accounts of eastern history (Princeton 1973) 102Google Scholar, who, however, thinks that Ephoros may have drawn an incorrect inference about their chronological relationship from Xanthos' subject matter which for the most part seems to treat an earlier period than Herodotos. Against this see Kingsley, Peter, ‘Meetings with magi: Iranian themes among the Greeks, from Xanthus of Lydia to Plato's Academy’, JRAS v (1995) 173–209 at 174 n. 12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 RE A.2(1967) 1354.

17 Of course this list and the others I have given are attended by the usual problems, but there is no need here to discuss the various efforts of scholars to combine or otherwise modify the list of Hellanikos' works, which must remain impressive on any reconstruction.

18 (deleted by editors as a gloss) (but see below, p. 67)

19 Jacoby, F., Atthis (Oxford 1949) 184Google Scholar; introduction to FGrH 323a pp. 8 f.

20 ‘Über die Entwicklung der gnechischen Historiographie und den Plan einer neuen Sammlung der griechischen Historikerfragmente’, Klio ix (1909) 80–123 = Abhandlungen zur griechischen Geschichtsschreibung ed. Bloch, H. (Leiden 1956) 16–64Google Scholar; RE articles on Hekataios (v [1912] 2666–2769), Hellanikos (viii.l[1912] 104–53), and Herodotos (suppl. ii[1913] 205–520), all reprinted in Griechische Historiker (Stuttgart 1956); Atthis ch. III §4 et passim; introduction to FGrH 323a. Support (with some qualifications) in von Fritz, K., Die griechische Geschichtsschreibung (Berlin 1967)Google Scholar; more recently in Hornblower, S., Greek historiography, ed. Hornblower, S. (Oxford 1994) 15 f.Google Scholar; compare his Thucydides (London 1987) 19 n. 14.

21 Atthis 201.

22 Frr. 13–13a West.

23 Vorsokr. 21 A 1.

24 Panyasis Test. 1 Davies. Cf. also Kallinos fr. 7 West. On ktisis-poetry see now Dougherty, C., ‘Archaic Greek foundation poetry: questions of genre and occasion’, JHS cxiv (1994) 35–46CrossRefGoogle Scholar; to her discussion of the occasion of elegy add Fowler, R.L., The nature of early Greek lyric (Toronto 1987) ch. 3.Google Scholar Her general scepticism about the genre's separate existence does not affect the point made here.

25 The attributed to Semonides of Amorgos (test. 1 West), though scarcely a title originating with the author, presumably treated the island's foundation. Cf. Lasserre, F., ‘L'historiographie grecque à l'époque archaïque’, QS iv (1976) 113–42 at 119 ff.Google Scholar

26 Jacoby repeatedly questioned Dionysios' evidence because it was ultimately based only on the style of the authors concerned; consequently he simply ignored him (e.g. ‘ganz unbrauchbar’ RE viii.l 109). But style is no very bad criterion—indeed, it is a better one than Jacoby's, if you have nothing else to go on.

27 Atthis 182; RE suppl. ii 404.

28 Jacoby, ‘Über die Entwicklung’ (n. 20) 49 ff., insists that anything called must have proceeded But we do not know if these titles were assigned by their authors (note the variance in the title of Aristophanes' work, below n. 54, and see on Charon, below n. 44), and anything that proceeded in chronological order using expressions such as ‘during King X's reign’, ‘in the time of his son’, ‘a few years later’, ‘twenty years after the destruction of Y’ (expressions we often see in the fragments of early historiography and in Herodotos) might have earned such a title from a later scholar looking for the right pigeon-hole in which to place the work.

29 FGrH 4 FF 171–172 = 323a FF 25–26 (references to events of 407/6 BC).

30 [Lucianus] Macr. 22 = FGrH 4 T 8, 323a T 6 (lived to 85 years of age).

31 Vit. Eurip. (i 2.5 Schwartz) = FGrH 4 T 6, 323a T 4 (he and Euripides both born on the day of Salamis). Wilamowitz, Kleine Schriften iv 673 n. l explains the name on the analogy of and as ‘victor over the Greeks’ in athletic contests (he might have cited also ) Cf. Pearson, L., The local historians of Attica (Philadelphia 1942) 5 f.Google Scholar

32 The name is then the ethnic with changed accent. For other occurrences of the name see Fraser, P.M. and Matthews, E., A lexicon of Greek personal names i (Oxford 1987)Google Scholar s.v. (One example from the 3rd century AD is written for what it is worth; the name of the historian himself may also occur, so spelled, twice in POxy liii 3711.)

33 Aul. Gell. 15.23 = FGrH 4 T 3, 323a T 5; Suda δ 41 = Damastes FGrH 5 T 1, Hellan. 4 T 9 (quoted above p. 64). Aulus' source is Pamphila, FHG iii 521 fr. 7, who places his birth in 496/5 (reckoning inclusively; she says he was 65 in 432/1); this would place his in 457/6, close to the year of Euripides' first production (456/5), which Rühl, F., RhM lxi (1906) 475Google Scholar, argued was the foundation of her (Apollodoros') date; Hellanikos' Suda article(= FGrH 4 T 1, 323a T 1) synchronises the two writers. See further Mosshammer, Alden A., ‘The Apollodoran Akmai of Hellanicus and Herodotos’, GRBS xiv (1973) 5–13.Google Scholar At Eus. (Hieron.) Chron. p. 107e Helm = FGrH 4 T 4a, Hellanikos is said to have been ‘clarus’ in Ol. 70.1 (a. 500/499; the Armenian version gives Ol. 69.3, the Chronicon Paschale Ol. 67.1); on the assumption that this date represents a misreading of as a floruit rather than a birthdate, we have another testimony to the standard ancient view, which should not be tossed aside without reason: whether born in 495 or 480, he was born early in the century like Herodotos.

34 Pomp. 3.6 = FGrH 4 T 12, 323a T 2b, 687a T 1, referring to work(s) which treated the same subject as Herodotos; there are several candidates The Suda entry synchronises him with Herodotos.

35 Plut. Them. 27.1 = FGrH 262 F 11.

36 Suda χ 136 = FGrH 262 T 1.

37 Jacoby, F., ‘Charon von Lampsakos’, SIFC xv (1938) 207–42Google Scholar = Abhandlungen (n. 20) 178–206. Westlake, H.D., ‘Thucydides on Pausanias and Themistocles- a written source?’, CQ xxvii (1977) 95–110 at 108 n. 74CrossRefGoogle Scholar, finds Jacoby's arguments weak; detailed criticism in Gozzoli (n. 1) 169 n. 33; Drews (n. 15) 24 ff.; Maggi, Mauro, ‘Autorigreci di Persika. II: Carone di Lampsaco’, ASNP vii (1977) 1–26 at 5 n. 17Google Scholar; Accame, Silvio, ‘La leggenda di Ciro in Erodoto’, MGR viii (1982) 1–43 at 26 ff.Google Scholar

38 P. 179.

39 P. 182.

40 Drews (n. 15) 25. One might think a discussion of Themistokles' exile points to a treatment of the Pentekontaetia; but he could have looked briefly forward to the admiral's demise after a treatment of Salamis. (Jacoby p. 178 calls this idea ‘very improbable’; the reasons given on pp. 202 ff. in support of this judgment are of a very general kind. Obviously, it is perfectly possible.)

41 See Jacoby, intro to FGrH 323a p. 4; Gomme on Thuk. iv 133.2–3.

42 P. 187. He might have added, given his penchant for arguments from silence, that Thukydides might have been expected to use the data of such a book at least once or twice, just as he used Hellanikos' book of priestesses.

43 Vorsokr. 88 B 32–7.

44 In his re-edition of Vossius' De historicis graecis, p. 21 n. 63. If the emendation is correct (it is certainly plausible, though Jacoby p. 187 thought it ‘most improbable’), the further question arises whether this is not simply an alternative title for the listed immediately before in the Suda. It is possibly relevant that a Spartan king bore the name Prytanis (Hdt. viii 131).

45 De Hdt. mal. 20 p. 859b = FGrH 262 F 9. Similarly Tert. De Anim. 46 = FGrH 262 F 14.

46 FGrH 709; pseudo-Skylax in GGM i 154 ff. Transmitted titles are [ coni.quidam] Herodotos, of course, names Skylax himself at iv 44.

47 FHG iv 408; GGM i 1 ff.

48 FGrW 687. Only transmitted title, Synchronised by the Suda s.v. (= FGrH 1 T 1) with Dareios; the same entry says Herodotos borrowed from him.

49 Wrote genealogical (once cited as FGrH 3 F 54, no doubt by confusion with the Syrian). He is probably to be dated to about 470: see Huxley, G., ‘The date of Pherekydes of Athens’, GRBS xiv (1973) 137–43Google Scholar; Thomas, R., Oral tradition and written record in classical Athens (Cambridge 1989) 161 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

50 FGrH 555; Died sometime after 424/3 (below, n. 109).

51 FGrH 392, Vorsokr. 36, TrGF 19, IEG ii 79; wrote plus poetic, philosophical, and other works. First tragedy produced Ol. 82 (452/48); dead by 421 (Ar. Pax 827 ff.).

52 FGrH 8; son of the poet's daughter Wrote perhaps also

53 FGrH 536;

54 FGrH 379; (also cited as and

55 FGrH 378;

56 FGrH 417;

57 FGrH 769;

58 FGrH 13, IEG ii 97;

59 Damastes' (a phrase, as Jacoby ad loc. remarks, presumably taken from the proem) was, it seems, a Hellenika, but was probably later than Herodotos. The fragments of Charon contain tantalizing references to Persian affairs; for discussion of possible connections with Herodotos see Accame (n. 37) and Piccirilli, L., ‘Carone di Lampsaco e Erodoto’, ASNP v (1975) 1239–54.Google Scholar

60 The qualification ‘by named authors’ excludes the works in the Hippocratic corpus. Known beginnings are: Hekataios FGrH I F 1; Herakleitos fr. 1 Marcovich; Ion of Chios fr. 20 von Blumenthal; Antiochos of Syracuse FGrH 555 F 2; Alkmaion of Kroton Vorsokr. 24 B 1; Philolaos of Kroton 44 B 1; Diogenes of Apollonia 64 B 1; Kritias 88 B 32; Herodotos and Thukydides. Depending on the reading, Anaxagoras 59 B 1 may be included as an eleventh example: that is, whether or is correct.

61 This chest-thumping habit of early writers is commented on by Aristeides (xxviii 68) in a minor testimonium that escaped Jacoby's notice: Cf. Joseph. Ap. i 16 = Eus. Praep. Evang. × 7.12 p. 478c = Akous. FGrH 2 T 6, Hell. 4 T 18 on the frequent disagreement between Hellanikos and Akousilaos; Thuk. i 97.2 = FGrH 4 T 16, 323a T 16 (the celebrated attack on Hellanikos); Aristophanes FGrH 379 F 5 (attacking Herodotos). See also Hippias FGrH 6 F 4, a verbatim quotation of a passage that might well be from a proem, in which Hippias brags about his Koenen, L., ‘Der erste Satz bei Heraklit und Herodot’, ZPE xcvii (1993) 95–6Google Scholar, argues that the deictic pronoun refers to the book itself; ultimately (once the book was deposited somewhere) it must have that effect, but the original reference is to the performance, and thus effectively to the author.

62 For Thukydides' proem see the study of Bowie, A.M., ‘The beginnings of Thucydides’, in Tria lustra. Essays and notes presented to John Pinsent (Liverpool Classical Monthly, Liverpool 1993) 141–7.Google Scholar

63 B.phil.Woch. xlv[1925] 778 ff.

64 A referee helpfully notes Hdt. i 114.2 and iii 72.3 as parallels for this position and meaning of at i 181.4, by contrast, κου is spatial, at iii 120.1, temporal.

65 In looking for interesting examples I have extended the list of authors to include slightly later ones, but no later than the early fourth century: Agias/Derkylos (FGrH 305); Anaximander of Miletos the younger (FGrH 9); Andron of Halikarnassos (FGrH 10); pseudo-Epimenides (FGrH 457); pseudo-Eumelos (FGrH 451); Herodoros of Herakleia (FGrH 31); Metrodoros of Chios (FGrH 43); Polos of Akragas (FGrH 7); Skamon of Mytilene (son of Hellanikos; FGrH 476); Hippias of Elis (FGrH 6); Stesimbrotos of Thasos (FGrH 107); Kratippos of Athens (FGrH 64); Akesandros (FGrH 469); Thibron (FGrH 581); Kritias (Vorsokr. 88 B 32–7). I cast an occasional glance sideways at Thukydides; at Xenophon not at all.

66 FGrH 1 FF 27, 26

67 FGrH 1 F 15.

68 FGrH 4 F 191; further examples at frr. 28, 72, 104b, 148, 168a.

69 Lloyd, G.E.R., Magic, reason and experience. Studies in the origin and development of Greek science (Cambridge 1979)Google Scholar; id., The revolutions of wisdom. Studies in the claims and practice of ancient Greek science (Berkeley 1987).

70 On rationalization in Herodotos see Lesky, A., ‘Aithiopika’, Hermes lxxxvii (1959) 27–38Google Scholar = Gesammelte Schriften (Bern/Munich 1966) 410–21; Lloyd, A.B., Herodotus Book II (Leiden 1975) i 135 ff., 162 ff.Google Scholar; Hunter, Virginia, Past and process in Herodotus and Thucydides (Princeton 1982) 107 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

71 FGrH 31 FF 4, 13, 14, 19, 21, 22, 28, 30, 57, 58, 63 bis. On the other hand Kerberos growls still at fr. 31.

72 FGrH 2 F 29: the Cretan bull captured by Herakles was the one that bore Europa—which was not, therefore, Zeus metamorphosed; 2 F 37: the fleece was not golden, but dyed purple from the sea. See also Agias/Derkyllos 305 F 6; Xanthos 765 F 20.

73 On etymology see Risch, E., ‘Namensdeutungen und Worterklärungen bei den ältesten griechischen Dichtern’, in Eumusia, Festschrift Ernst Howald (Erlenbach/Zurich 1947) 72–91Google Scholar = Kleine Schriften (Berlin/New York 1981) 294–313; Salvadore, M., Il nome, la persona. Saggio sull' etimologia antica (Genova 1987)Google Scholar; and other references listed by Woodbury, L.E., Phoenix xxxiv (1980) 114 n. 12Google Scholar = Collected writings (Atlanta 1991) 341 n. 12.

74 FGrH 1 F 22; further in Hekataios notefr. 15 (‘Oineus’ from what the ancients called

75 FGrH 3 F 102.

76 FGrH 392 F 1;43F3 bis.

77 Something like an etymology at iv 189: the Greeks, it is argued, got their custom of dressing Palladia in (something like a goatskin) from the Libyans, who use (real goatskins) for the same purpose. See Immerwahr, Henry R., Form and thought in Herodotus (Cleveland 1966)Google Scholar index s.v. ‘etymologies’. If pressed to state how ‘popular’ and ‘scientific’ etymology are to be distinguished, one might not be successful in stating universally valid criteria, but the latter usually seems more self-conscious and displays a pretence of being based on some theoretical understanding of the phenomenon; in particular, it may be used to construct or confirm an historical hypothesis.

78 FGrH 4 FF 89, 19b; cf. 33 (Maloeis), 38 (Areopagos), 71 (Sinties), 108 (Agammeia), 111 (Italy), 123 (Pelias), 130 (Aphetai), 188 (Helots). Instances in other writers: Andron 10 FF 4 (Selloi), 8 (Parnassos); Aristophanes of Boiotia apud Phot. p. 237 Porson = Suda γ 867 s.v. (Arist. of Byzantium fr, dub. 421 Slater; not in FGrH 379; the rites were so named Charon 262 F 12 (Hamadryads); Herodoros 31 F 45 (Miletos); Hippias 6 F 6 Menekrates 769 F 2 (Lykia); Stesimbrotos 107 FF 12 (Daktyloi), 13 (Dionysos); Xanthos 765 F 15 (Mysoi); Xenomedes 442 F 4 (Telchines). The concentration of this activity in the later part of the fifth century is obvious.

79 FGrH 4 F 125 = 323a F 23. Unfortunately this assumption is crucial to P. Vidal-Naquet's enormously influential theory of the Hunter, Black: ‘The black hunter and the origin of Athenian ephebe’, PCPS xiv (1968) 49–64Google Scholar; reprinted with corrections most recently in id., The black hunter. Forms of thought and forms of society in the Greek world (Baltimore 1986) 106–28. See also ‘The black hunter revisited’, PCPS xxxii (1986) 126–44.

80 FGrH 3 F 13; 31 F 16; 9 F 1. The words in a paraphrased fragment of Xanthos (FGrH 765 F 29) may well come from him.

81 Paus. v 18.3.

82 The use of eponyms is so common and universal that I have not bothered to illustrate it.

83 FGrH 378 F 6 (a verbatim quotation).

84 FGrH 31 F51; cf.fr. 31.

85 FGrH 417 F 1.

86 Further instances of the phenomena discussed in this paragraph: Hek. FGrHGoogle Scholar 1 FF 10, 84, 119, 127–9, 234, 239, 275, 308–9, 372; Pher. 3 FF 54, 64a, 79a, 84, 125, 145, 155; Hell. 4 FF 4, 6, 23, 25, 26a, 51, 59–60, 77, 79a, 109, 115, 117, 150, 163, 165, 197 bis; Aethlios 536 F 3; Agias/Derkyllos 305 FF 4, 7, 8, 8 bis; Andron 10 FF 6, 16a; Antiochos 555 FF 3, 11, 12; Aristophanes 379 FF 2, 4, 9; Armenidas 378 FF 3, 5; Charon 262 FF 7, 8, 12; Deilochos 471 FF 3, 5, 7a, 9; Epimenides 457 F 11; Eumelos 451 F 4; Herodoros 31 FF 34a, 48; Menekrates 769 F 2; Xanthos 765 F 17; Xenomedes 442 F 1.63.

87 As for instance Hdt. i 94.1: ‘[The Lydians] are the first people we know of to mint coins of gold and silver.’ On the theme generally see A. Kleingünther, Philol. suppl. xxvi.l (1933). In addition to the examples listed in the text, note Hellanikos FGrH 4 FF 71 b, 86, 175, 189; Damastes 5 F 6; Xanthos 765 F 4; Hippias 6F8; Andron 10 F 13.

88 Hekataios FGrH 1 F 20; Dionysios 687 F 1; Anaximander 9 F 3; Hdt. v 58; Andron 10 F 9.

89 FGrH 10 F 10.

90 FGrH 4 F 178.

91 FGrH 262 FF 7, 3.

92 Diog. Laert. i 24 = FCrH 6 F 5 but the word may be Diogenes' (and is in fact attributed, via Hippias and Aristotle, to Thales!). However, the word appears also in Pindar and the tragedians, so nothing much should be made of this.

93 FGrH 31 F 22a. This word is not so common in the two surviving historians, either: in Herodotos, only at ix 71 in Thukydides, at i 6.2, 10.1, 21.1, ii 42.2.

94 In Hekataios note fr. 21, Herodian, who reports the fragment ( ii 912.23 Lentz), says that Hekataios himself reports that this is the Phoenician equivalent of Further examples are Hek. FGrH 1 FF 322, 370; Charon 262 F 5; Hell. 4 FF 54, 60, 111; Xanthos 765 FF 16, 20d, 23; Menekrates 769 F 1. Similar is fr. 15: Hekataios says that is the older word for and draws therefrom an historical inference.

95 Local curiosities etc.: many fragments of Hekataios and Skylax; Aethlios FGrH 536 FF 1, 3; Agias/Derkyllos 305 F 7; Antiochos 555 F 1; Armenidas 378 F 4a; Charon 262 FF 1,5; Damastes 5 F 5 = Hellanikos 4 F 195 (a marvel: some Epeians live 200, even 300 years); Demoklesfr. 1 Müller; Hell. 4 FF 53, 54, 66, 67, 71a, 137, 174, 184, 190; Herod. 31 F 31; Kritias Vorsokr. 88 B 32 sqq.; Metrodoros 43 F 3; Pher. 3 F47; Xanthos 765 FF 13, 31; Xenomedes 442 F 1. For statistics see Damastes 5 FF 2 (distance between the pillars of Herakles), 10 (size of Kypros); Pher. 3 F 30 (size of Ares' field); Hek. 1 FF 197 (size of the Aegean, though the stade figure is not his), 332 (three days to cross the ). Catalogues of Niobids and the like as a feature of mythography need hardly be illustrated. The geographer's list of cities along a coastline makes a telling reappearance in Herodoros 31 F 2 (a verbatim quotation), where the Iberian coast is charted, Hekataios-like, in an account of Herakles' westward progress. It is all part of Herodoros' rationalistic programme.

96 References to earlier literature may be found in Vandiver, E., Heroes in Herodotus. The interaction of myth and history (Frankfurt a.M. 1990) 133Google Scholar n. 1 and Mosshammer, Alden A., The chronicle of Eusebius and Greek chronographic tradition (Lewisburg and London 1979) 105–11Google Scholar; see also the important work of Vannicelli, Pietro, Erodoto e la storia dell'alto e media arcaismo (Sparta - Tessaglia - Cirene) (Rome 1993) 9 ff.Google Scholar

97 Meyer, E., Forschungen zur alten Geschichte i (Halle 1892) 153–209.Google Scholar

98 See above p. 72 on the failure to universalize.

99 Cf. Prakken, D.W., Studies in Greek genealogical chronology (Lancaster, PA 1943) 22 f.Google Scholar If this conjecture is correct, it removes the basis for Meyer's inference of a 40-year generation, which was this figure of 900 divided by the number of Spartan kings. The only real hint of a 40-year generation left in early sources, therefore, is Thuk. i 12.3 (Dorian invasion 80 years after Troy). Multiples of 40 in Herodotos at i 163.2 and iii 23.1 are suggestive, but hardly probative. See now Burkert, W., ‘Lydia between East and West, or how to date the Trojan war: a study in Herodotus’, in Carter, J.B., Morris, S.P., edd., The ages of Homer. A tribute to Emily Townsend Vermeule (University of Texas 1995) 139–48Google Scholar, who argues with much probability that the 505 years are ultimately derived from Assyrian records.

100 Von Fritz (n. 20) ii 177 n.3 argues that the last sentence of Hdt. ii 146.2 implies that others before him had produced chronological calculations based on genealogies.

101 P. 169, 184 f. Cf. Mosshammer (n. 96) 326 n. 6; Lloyd (n. 70) i 193 concludes after a lengthy discussion: ‘That he was interested in chronological questions admits of no doubt.’

102 See above, p. 66. I do not share Toye's (n. 1) view of the Priestesses of Argos.

103 For further indications of chronographical activity see Agias/Derkyllos FGrH 305 F 2; Andron 10 F 13; Damastes 5 F 7; Hell. 4 FF 74 sqq. (the Priestesses of Argos,) 85–6 (the Karneonikai,) 152, 168, 169, 201 bis; Herod. 31 F 33; Ion 392 F 1; Xanthos 765 F 32.

104 cf. Denniston, J.D., Greek prose style (Oxford 1952) 6Google Scholar (reminder from H. Lloyd-Jones).

105 Cf. Hornblower, S., ‘Narratology and narrative technique in Thucydides’, in Hornblower, S., ed., Greek historiography (Oxford 1994) 131–66 at 151Google Scholar; Canfora, L. and Corcella, A., ‘La letteratura politica e la storiografia’, in Lo spazio letterario della grecia antica edd. Cambiano, G., Canfora, L., Lanza, D. (Rome 1993) i 1.433–71 at 454 ff.Google Scholar; and especially Hunter (n. 70) chs. 1 and 3.

106 In i 1–21, ii 15–16, and vi 1–5, I count the following markers: or the like (including and congeners, which demonstrably have the same force), 18 examples; use of an expression such as , or ‘which is now called’, 26 examples; use of an expression like , or reference to the first inventor, 10 examples; chronological markers, whether in terms of a span of years to his own day, or more vaguely ‘a few years later’, ‘shortly before the Persian War’, ‘some generations later’ and the like, 28 examples; appeal to 7 examples; references to sources or possibilities of discovery, 8 examples, including two instances of one and one instance of alternative versions; one foreign language equivalent; and, revealingly, five instances of or the like: Thukydides cannot here command the truth in his usual sovereign manner. This is an astonishing list and is a very powerful argument against Fehling's thesis (see the last section of the article). Cf. also vi 54–9.

107 Hipp. Maior 285d = FGrH 6 T 3. Cf. Toye (n. 1) 289, 297.

108 After Dover, K.J., ‘La colonizzazione della Sicilia in Tucidide’, Maia vi (1953) 1–20Google Scholar = ‘Die Kolonisierung Siziliens bei Thukydides’, in Herter, H., ed., Thukydides (Darmstadt 1968) 344–68Google Scholar; see also HCT iv 198 ff.

109 FGrH 555 T 3 explicitly gives this as the last year covered by the work.

110 Thebes: FGrH 3 F 84, an aetiological myth concerning Alkmene; Delphi: 3 F 64, an aetiological myth concerning Neoptolemos; Thorikos: 3 F 34, conjectured to be aetiological by Fowler, R.L., ‘The myth of Kephalos as an aition of rain magic (Pherekydes FGrH 3 F 34)’, ZPE xcvii (1993) 29–42.Google Scholar For the citation of local sources cf. Hell. 4 FF 23, 71a, 137, Herod. 31 F 31, Metrod. 769 F 2 ( in a verbatim quotation), and Arist. 379 F 6, who quotes from local archives

111 Luetke, Carolus (a pupil of Wilamowitz), Pherecydea (Diss. Göttingen 1893) 26.Google Scholar See Pher. FGrH 3 FF 26, 54, 60, 72, 82, 133; Hell. 4 FF 104a, 117; Andron 10 F 13; Deilochos 471 F 5.

112 Bosworth, A.B., ‘Plutarch, Callisthenes, and the peace of Callias’, JHS cx (1990) 1–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

113 Cf. Westlake, H.D., ‘γέγεται in Thucydides’, Mnem. xxx (1977) 345–62CrossRefGoogle Scholar, who finds interesting similarities to and differences from Herodotos' usage.

114 Suda α 942 = FGrH 2 T 1.

115 ε 360 = FGrH 2 T 7 = Hec. FGrH 1 T la.

116 Diog. Laert. i 41 = FGrH 2 T 11a; Clem. Al. Strom, i 59.5 = 2 T 11b.

117 See Stinton, T.C.W., ‘“Si credere dignum est”: some expressions of disbelief in Euripides and others’, PCPS xxii (1976) 60–89Google Scholar = Collected papers on Greek tragedy (Oxford 1990) 236–64.

118 On Herodotos and the Sophists, see Dihle, Albrecht, ‘Herodot und die Sophistik’, Philologus cvi (1962) 207–20Google Scholar (p. 218 on arguments from probability); on contemporary methods of reasoning, see Lloyd, G.E.R., Polarity and analogy (Cambridge 1966)Google Scholar index s.v. Herodotus; on early rhetoric, see the references given by Fowler, R.L., HSCP xciii (1987) 15 n. 24.Google Scholar A.B. Lloyd (n. 70) i 149 f., 156 ff. provides a detailed discussion of the connections between Herodotos and the intellectual climate of his day; cf. also Hunter (n. 70) 93 n. 1.

119 Pl. Apol. 21; for the chronology, Guthrie, W.K.C., History of Greek philosophy (Cambridge 1969) 405 ff.Google Scholar; for a carefully reasoned explanation of the connection between the oracle and the see Brickhouse, T.C. and Smith, N.D., Socrates on trial (Oxford 1989) 87–100.Google Scholar

120 E.g. Herakleitos frr. 5–6 Marcovich; Xenophanes Vorsokr. 21 B 34–6; Alkmaion 24 B 1; Anaxagoras 59 B 21a; see further Hussey, E., ‘The beginnings of epistemology: from Homer to Philolaus’, in Epistemology, ed. Everson, S. (Cambridge 1990) 11–38.Google ScholarCf. Lateiner, Donald, The historical method of Herodotus (Toronto 1989) 66CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Schepens, G., L' ‘autopsie’ dans la méthode des historiens grecs du Ve sièecle avant J.-C. (Brussels 1980).Google Scholar

121 See e.g. i 95 on Kyros: ‘In my account I will follow those Persians who do not want to glorify Kyros, but rather to tell the truth though I know there are several other versions of Kyros' tale.’ Cf. iii 16.

122 See i 24.7–8, 117, 122, 209 (a passage which clearly illustrates Herodotos' own awareness of the problem of knowledge), ii 2, 119. Cf. Connor, W.R., ‘The histor in history’, in Nomodeiktes. Greek studies in honor of Martin Ostwald, edd. Rosen, Ralph M., Farrell, Joseph (University of Michigan 1993) 3–15Google Scholar, who stresses the old sense of ‘arbitration’ in the root ( already in II. xviii 501, xxiii 486). Connor's rather speculative explanation of why the word is less common in the last books seems to overlook one pertinent factor, which is that they treat a period much closer to Herodotos' own time and place, thus needing less

123 Fehling, Detlev, Herodotus and his ‘sources’. Citation, invention, and narrative art, tr. Howie, J.G. (Leeds 1989; German original 1971).Google Scholar

124 Fehling 154 f.; cf. 11, 214 f.

125 E. Will, review of Fehling, , Rev. de phil. xlviii (1974) 119–21Google Scholar; Erbse, Hartmut, ‘Über Herodots Kroisoslogos’, Ausgewählte Schriften zur klassischen Philologie (Berlin and New York 1979) 180–202 at 181 f.Google Scholar; id., ‘Fiktion und Wahrheit im Werke Herodots’, GGN 1991, 131–50 (in my judgment the best reply yet); Murray, Oswyn, ‘Herodotus und Oral History’, in Sancisi-Weerdenburg, H. and Kuhrt, A., edd., Achaemenid history II: the Greek sources (Leiden 1987) 93–115 at 101 n. 12Google Scholar; Hornblower, Simon, Thucydides (London 1987) 19 ff.Google Scholar; id., introduction to Greek historiography, ed. Hornblower, S. (Oxford 1994) 18 f.Google Scholar with further references; Evans, J.A.S., review of Fehling, in EMC/CV xi (1992) 57–60Google Scholar; id., ‘The Faiyum and the Lake of Moeris’, AHB v.3 (1991) 66–74; Kendrick Pritchett, W., The Liar school of Herodotus (Amsterdam 1993)Google Scholar; Canfora and Corcella (n. 105) 448 ff.; Rhodes, P.J., ‘In defence of the Greek historians’, G&R xli (1994) 156–71 at 160 f.Google Scholar Qualified support and sensible remarks from Immerwahr, H.R. in Easterling, P.E., Knox, B.M.W., edd., The Cambridge history of classical literature i (Cambridge 1985) 439 f.Google Scholar Evans well notes that Herodotos compares very favourably in point of accuracy with other early travelers, for instance reporting from the Americas (a point made again in his Herodotus, explorer of the past [Princeton 1991] 135, 141). I might add that Fehling makes little allowance for the distortions of memory, for instance when he writes (243): ‘Could anyone who had ever seen the Pyramids get it all so wrong?’ I recently re-visited Kenilworth after seventeen years and was amazed to discover that someone had put up two 400-year-old buildings in my absence.

126 See 120 ff. on the features Herodotos shares with ‘lying literature; (e.g. wealth of detail, occasional expression of scepticism, avowal of inability to discover the truth on some points); cf. 8, 33. Fehling grants that some history is found in Herodotos, but only the merest amount (213 f.); although Herodotos worked into his account all the genuine information he had (83), his primary purpose was not the discovery of such information, but the construction of an entertaining narrative.

127 Fehling 252. On his hypothesis, even if the audience was duped, many other historians who decided to play at the same game were not; did Herodotos then take them into his confidence backstage after the performance?

128 Fehling 154 f. To put everybody but Thukydides out of the historian's court is absurd. Fehling has not considered the differences that result from Thukydides' decision to concentrate on contemporary history; see below, p. 83.

129 An objection to Fehling first raised by Dover and reported by Hornblower, S., Thucydides (London 1987) 22.Google Scholar

130 West, S., ‘Herodotos' epigraphical interests’, CQ xxxv (1985) 278–305 at 303CrossRefGoogle Scholar: ‘The confident assurance of his historical reconstructions is bluff… The inadequacies of his argumentation may well be a matter of period rather than personality. Certainly we find rather similar procedures in the early Hippocratic writings…’; she goes on to cite Lloyd's work, and draws a telling parallel with the ‘confident rationalism of a Victorian scientist confuting a literal interpretation of the opening chapters of Genesis’.

131 Even though Herodotos criticises others for imposing symmetry on their maps (iv 36), he notoriously does the same himself (ii 33–4).

132 Fehling 84, 188. The presence of any literary motif and the imposition of any pattern on the data (Fehling catalogues many of them) must, in his theory, fall under the same verdict; pressed to its logical limits it would probably condemn not only ancient but modern historians, including Gibbon, Mommsen, and maybe Fehling himself. As will become clear, I too find much in common between Herodotos' methods and those of the poet; but I differ toto caelo from Fehling in my assessment of Herodotos' intentions.

133 Contrast Fehling 97: ‘A remarkable thing about all these passages is that they reveal that Herodotus' standards of credibility and incredibility are little different from those of the twentieth century.’

134 Lewis, D.M., ‘Persians in Herodotus’, in The Greek historians. Literature and history, Festschrift A.E. Raubitschek (Saratoga 1985) 101–17.Google Scholar Contrast Fehling 213 ff.: a very small amount of real historical information, he says, would account for Herodotos' narrative; he knew no more about the past than the rhapsodes knew about the Trojan War. At 243 ff. Fehling develops the view that Herodotos may have composed the whole work sitting in Athens, without ever having travelled anywhere.

135 Fehling 179 ff. For him, it seems, Herodotos must be a perfect positivist historian (a thing that never existed anyway) or no historian at all. Historians are still a cross between scientists and artists. Cf. E. Will (n. 125) 121.

136 See Evans, J.A.S., Herodotus, explorer of the past (Princeton 1991) 105 f.Google Scholar, who also connects the passage on Ocean with the prologue; Erbse (n. 125) 183; cf. Lateiner, Donald, The historical method of Herodotus (Toronto 1989) 41CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Nickau, K., ‘Mythos und Logos bei Herodot’, in Memoria rerum veterum, Festschrift C.J. Classen (Stuttgart 1990) 83–100Google Scholar; Hunter (n. 70) 104 ff.

137 For a study of the thought-processes of see Fowler, R.L., The nature of early Greek lyric (Toronto 1987) ch. 2.Google Scholar

138 Hdt. ii 143.1 = Hekataios FGrH 1 T 4.

139 Cf. Evans' review of Fehling (n. 125) 60; Asheri, D., Erodoto: Le storie i 2 (Fondazione Lorenzo Valla 1989) xxxviiiGoogle Scholar; and P. Vannicelli's book (n. 96), which develops the thesis that Herodotos' focus throughout his work is on the three generations preceding the Persian Wars.

140 Fehling 58.

141 Fehling 247.

142 See above p. 83; id. in Burn, A.R., Persia and the Greeks 2 (London 1984) 597 ff.Google Scholar; id., Sparta and Persia (Leiden 1977) 12 ff.; cf. Diggle, J., Euripidea (Oxford 1994) 447.Google Scholar With respect to Phoenicians, apart from the well known connection at Al Mina, note that Phoenicians and Greeks resided together at Pithekoussai from the mid-eighth century; see Ridgway, D., The First Western Greeks (Cambridge 1992) 111–18.Google Scholar

143 Above, n. 94.

144 Hdt. vii 61, Hellanikos FGrH 4 F 60.

145 Kepheus father of Andromeda already in Hes. fr 135 Merkelbach-West; Hdt. vii 61, Hellanikos FGrH 4 F59.

146 Fehling 118f.

147 Cf. Erbse (n. 125) 187 f. At vii 62 Herodotos says the Medes were named after Medeia–as the Medes themselves say.

148 Cf. Hek. FGrH 1 F 322 and Hdt. ii 77.4.

149 Thus I can agree partly with Fehling 152: Herodotos' work is ‘a carefully thought-out picture of what any enquiries would have had to yield’, though ‘any enquiries’ suggests (consistently with Fehling's theory) that the whole process of inquiry is just pretence. But I think he inquired, thought a bit, inquired some more, then thought some more; he did not intend to deceive, and thought he was telling the truth.

150 No doubt this reply was improvised on the spot (though Fehling 54 f. finds the idea ridiculous), and strictly speaking it implies nothing about the extent of Phoenician knowledge of Greek myth. On such improvisations cf. J.A.S. Evans in his review of Fehling (n. 125). Fehling is contemptuous of the ‘suggestive questioning’ theory, but his characterization of a complex process, at all events tendentious, comes close to parody (e.g. at pp. 5, 54). At all stages of an inquiry conducted over a period of decades Herodotos will have laid before his interlocutors knowledge already obtained elsewhere; in the course of conversation he will have obtained new information from them, engendering modifications in the views of both sides. On the complexity of the decades-long process by which the final text was produced see also Canfora and Corcella (n. 105).

151 Erbse, ‘Fiktion und Wahrheit’ (n. 125) 137 ff. is particularly cogent on this point, showing that the line reveals genuine historical thought, and is of a piece with many other examples of such thought in Herodotos. He also advances some reasons for thinking that the Persians really pushed this line about vengeance for the Trojan War as a kind of official propaganda.

152 See above, p. 69.

153 Woodbury, Leonard E., ‘Poetry and publication: Theognis 769–772’, Collected writings, edd. Brown, C.G., Fowler, R.L., Robbins, E., Wallace Matheson, P. (Atlanta 1991) 483–90.Google Scholar

154 488 n. 16.