Herodotus

Herodotus . Greek historian, considered the father of historiography. He traveled throughout the entire Mediterranean world . He compiled his findings in a work entitled “Histories” which provides valuable information about ancient Greece , North Africa and the Middle East .

Table of Contents

Summary

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1 Biography
2 The work of Herodotus
3 The Story according to Herodotus
4 His travels
5 Death
6 Sources

Biography

Greek historian born in Halicarnassus (now Bodrum , Turkey ) shortly before Xerxes’ expedition against Greece ( 480 BC ). On the occasion of the revolt in which Paniasis died , Herodotus had to leave his homeland and go to Samos , where he could have a closer contact with the Ionian cultural world; It is thought that from there he returned to Halicarnassus and participated in the overthrow of Lígdamis ( 454 BC ), son of Artemis , representative of the Carian tyranny that dominated the political life of the colony at that time.

The next date known with certainty biography of Herodotus is the foundation of the colony of Thurii in 444 – 443 BC at the hands of Pericles next to the ruins of Sybaris . It is not known if Herodotus was part of the first founding expedition, but he did obtain the citizenship of the colony. Some of his biographers report that, between the fall of Lígdamis and his arrival in Turios, Herodotus made trips to various Greek cities, in which he offered readings of his works; It is even said that he received ten talents for a reading offered in Athens , a fact that today seems quite unlikely, although it shows the good reception that Herodotus had in the city.

His stay in the Athens of Pericles allowed him to contemplate the great political and cultural moment that the city was experiencing: in Athens, Herodotus was able to meet Protagoras , standard-bearer of the sophistic revolution, and Sophocles , the great tragic poet who would so influence his historical work. Also in the time before the founding of Turios, Herodotus made those trips that he tells us about in his work: it is known that he was in Egypt for four months and that, afterwards, he went to Phenicia and Mesopotamia . Another of his trips took him to the country of the Scythians.

All these trips were inspired by the desire to increase their knowledge and to satisfy their desire to know, constant spurs of Herodotus’ thought. He appears through his work as a curious man, observant and always ready to listen, qualities that he combined with a great encyclopedic and scholarly training.

The parody that Aristophanes made of Herodotus’ work allows us to suppose that it was already known around the year 425 BC Back to his work, the last events mentioned about Greece refer to the year 430 BC , the date on which it had to end his story.

Herodotus’s work

The great historical work of Herodotus, multiple and complex, is difficult to summarize: its purpose and its narratives are various and very different from each other, which is why, at first, it is difficult to see the unifying principle of such diverse materials. To bring them together Herodotus drew, as has already been said, on his many travels throughout the known world; From there, he extracted his sources of information and data: sometimes, Herodotus collects what he has seen with his own eyes; others, what they have told you; many others, the result of his investigations and inquiries after contrasting the oral traditions received with archaeological remains and monuments or after resorting to priests and scholars of the places visited: thus, for example, his research on the myth of Hercules led him toPhenicia .

It is striking to see how he is connecting these elements so different from each other and how, on occasions, he collects them even when, in his opinion, they are not reliable: “My duty is to report everything that is said, but I am not obliged to believe it everything equally “(lib. 7, 152). In short, Herodotus was a great storyteller and an experienced compiler of data of an ethnographic or geographical nature, characteristics that make him similar to many other logologists; However, since Antiquity distinguished Herodotus with the title of “father of history” and a deeper analysis of his History reveals his novelty in the face of contemporary writers.

Already from the beginning of the work, which the scholars later distributed in nine books (each of which bears the name of one of the nine Muses), Herodotus himself announces that his task is to narrate the events and exploits of men and, more specifically, the war between the barbarians and the Greeks. The central nucleus of the story is, then, the narration of the Medical Wars, those that confronted the East with the West, which leads Herodotus to insert numerous digressions throughout his work; These allowed his public to approach those strange and distant countries, which were related to a greater or lesser extent with the Persians. In this way, his narration is not unitary but is broken following an associative principle,

However, if these digressions are especially frequent in the first books of the work, it is observed that in the central part of it, the one in which the confrontation between Greece and Persia is narrated, these decrease. Thus, a much more concise and objective account appears, with a much more detailed analysis and investigation of the data. In this way, a great multitude of styles is discovered in Herodotus’ work in direct dependence on his sources: for his description of exotic countries, Herodotus had to resort to his travels and second-hand information, either oral or written (such as the accounts of other logographers); on the contrary, to narrate the war, the center of his story, Herodotus had more accessible and reliable documents about those events. Herodotus thus combines the gifts of a great storyteller and those of a historian (that is, a researcher) in his attempt to elucidate the truth through the tangle of its multiple sources.

Despite the enormous success achieved by Herodotus, criticism soon began from later historians, who accused him of being lax with the data. One of his first critics was Thucydides , who refers to his method as something ephemeral and valid only for an instant, that is, suitable only for reading and enjoyment.

The truth is that Herodotus became an inexcusable source for all historians of the ancient world, who little by little were rectifying some of their information about distant and exotic countries. With Hellenism, the work of Herodotus acquired greater relevance thanks to the somewhat romantic character of some stories (something very popular at the time); in fact, the famous Alexandrian scholar, Aristarco , commented on his works. Thus, Herodotus’ work was always, as said, a point of reference either as a conscious model or simply as an anti-model.

The Romans also surrendered to the figure of the famous historian, whom they called, like Cicero , the “father of history.” Many Roman historians used it as a source and quotes from his History abound. However, during the Middle Ages , a period in which Greek became a true arcanum, Herodotus stopped being read, although, indirectly thanks to the Latin historians, some of the anecdotes inserted in his stories were known. His star shone again thanks to the achievements of humanism: Lorenzo Valla was the first who dared to translate his work into Latin and already, at the beginning of the 16th century (in 1520 ), he left the presses ofAldo Manuzio the first edition of his Historia, with which the original text of Herodotus entered again the wealth of scholarship of the following centuries.

The History according to Herodotus

His work was written in the Ionian dialect, and was later divided by Alexandrian grammarians into nine books named after the nine muses of Greek mythology: Calliope , Clio , Thalia , Euterpe , Terpsichore , Melpomene , Erato , Urania, and Polymnia . All of them, daughters of Zeus and Mnemoside . These muses were considered as the protectors of the arts, memory and Astronomy .

His work was simply called Historiae , whose name derives from the Greek word research or search. This is what impresses us the most, because he did not dedicate himself only to writing what they told him, but he was a tireless traveler who traveled all over Egypt , Magna Graecia , Anatolia , and much of the Persian Empire.to be able to interpret reality with your own eyes. In addition, he was the first to order the events in a rational way, with the chronology and geography of the environment he was studying. In fact, the first sentence of his work was Histories apodexis, that is to say, “exposition of investigations.” His main historical work was The Medical Wars, or what is the same, the union of the Polis against the Persian Empire (The Medes)

Later it was even labeled as fanciful and exaggerated by Greek authors such as Ctesias , Isocrates or Plutarch , opinions that were maintained until the archaeological discoveries of the ancient east in the 19th century , where the veracity of much of his work was demonstrated. However, it is true that Herodotus only spoke Greek and that he always needed guides and translators, which could influence the narration of events that he could not see and that undoubtedly led him to trust what they said. the natives.

Your travels

His first trip was to the surroundings of his polis, Halicarnassus , and Hellas of Asia Minor . Possibly he did so before going into exile on Samos. Apart from Caria, his country of origin, he visited Lydia and its capital Sardes, as well as Misia , Troas and the cities of the Hellespont.

His second trip was to the East, probably using the Persian royal road, which led from Ephesus to Susa , the capital of the Empire at the time, and ended in Babylon , where he marveled at the buildings he saw. Later, around 449 BC , he traveled to Egypt, where he was amazed at the incredible Egyptian architecture and society. He visited Thebes , Memphis, and Heliopolis , where he obtained most of the information about ancient Egypt. He came down to Elephantine Island , next to Aswan , at what was the southernmost point of his journey up the Nile . Did not get to knowEthiopia .

Later he visited the Greek colony of Cyrene , in North Africa , where he gathered as much information as possible about the tribes of the coast and interior of Libya , an ancient name for North Africa. It is also known that he did not see Carthage .

In a third great trip he dedicated himself to the country of the ” Scythians “, present-day Bulgaria and Romania , following the Black Sea coast ( Ponto Euxino ), which at that time was populated by Greek colonies. It went beyond the mouth of the Danube and reached the Dnieper River , located in present-day Moldova . He also visited all the Greek regions and islands, as well as Thrace and Macedonia .

Ultimately, Herodotus should be understood as a polygraph, an encyclopedist who in his magnificent travels gathered an inexhaustible wealth of news about everything interesting and worth knowing that the world offered at that time. Not only is his expressive geography and the repertoire of anecdotes impressive, but also the finding out about customs and cults of the towns he visited. In addition, wherever he was, he did not forget the fauna and flora, and especially the rare plants and exotic animals. It also described the climate and geographical particularities, as well as its history, legends, architecture and characteristics of its rulers. To all this should be added the difficulties of communications at the time, which give even greater merit to this titanic project. That’s how I saw it, that’s how I tell you.

Death

It is thought that he died at Turios ca. 420 BC