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History of the Peloponnesian War
Written four hundred years before the birth of Christ, this detailed contemporary account of the long life-and-death struggle between Athens and Sparta stands an excellent chance of fulfilling its author's ambitious claim. Thucydides himself (c.460-400 BC) was an Athenian and achieved the rank of general in the earlier stages of the war. He applied thereafter a passion for accuracy and a contempt for myth and romance in compiling this factual record of a disastrous conflict.
648 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 412
About the author
Thucydides
1,184 books457 followersThucydides (c. 460 B.C. – c. 395 B.C.) (Greek Θουκυδίδης, Thoukydídēs) was a Greek historian and author of the History of the Peloponnesian War, which recounts the 5th century B.C. war between Sparta and Athens to the year 411 B.C. Thucydides has been dubbed the father of "scientific history" due to his strict standards of evidence-gathering and analysis in terms of cause and effect without reference to intervention by the gods, as outlined in his introduction to his work.
He has also been called the father of the school of political realism, which views the relations between nations as based on might rather than right. His classical text is still studied at advanced military colleges worldwide, and the Melian dialogue remains a seminal work of international relations theory.
More generally, Thucydides showed an interest in developing an understanding of human nature to explain behaviour in such crises as plague, genocide (as practised against the Melians), and civil war.
Excerpted from Wikipedia.
He has also been called the father of the school of political realism, which views the relations between nations as based on might rather than right. His classical text is still studied at advanced military colleges worldwide, and the Melian dialogue remains a seminal work of international relations theory.
More generally, Thucydides showed an interest in developing an understanding of human nature to explain behaviour in such crises as plague, genocide (as practised against the Melians), and civil war.
Excerpted from Wikipedia.
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January 30, 2020Towards the end of this book I had a flashback of watching an episode of Mastermind in the 80s, the contestant had chosen the Spartan military as their specialist subject was asked being asked by Magnus Magnusson, the Icelandic Viking who swooped down from the north to Britain as a child to become a TV quiz host, why the Spartans had stopped their campaign on one particular occasion and gone home. The correct answer was that this was in response to an earthquake. Judging by Thucydides' history that could have been a lucky guess. The best way to maintain a reputation as fierce-some warriors is not to fight, but to be frightening, and the Spartans seem to have displayed a rare skill in finding reasons in the shape of a sacrificed animal's liver or a passing earthquake or a religious festival for either staying home or returning there.
I found Thucydides difficult to start but increasingly intriguing. His history is a book that can be reread, studied, attention paid to each word as much because of what he doesn't say and how he says what he does.
It is an ambitious book in several ways. Thucydides was writing after Herodotus and his epic on the Persian war but opens by telling us that this war was "more worthy of of relation than any that had preceded it...the greatest movement yet known in history" (p1). Secondly Thucydides makes great claims for his precision and accuracy implicitly a dig here at Herodotus and his giant gold gathering ants or the baby Cyrus lowered in a basket into a river to be brought up by step parents (but you've heard that story before). Both claims are dubious, the first has become a common place, people invariably want to claim that the story they want to tell is about the biggest, most impressive, amazing, far-reaching, and influential story ever in the history of history and they can't all be right,the other requires the reader's trust in Thucydides. He has decided what to trust as reliable information and what to include in his history. While he mentions a couple of times comparing accounts he never gives any clue as to whose accounts he is comparing or indeed when. The composition of the book is unclear, some parts seem more complete than others. Parts of the book were presumably being written or revised decades after the events and since he doesn't reveal his sources there are untold layers of interpretation between the pages. While with Herodotus I had more of a feeling that I knew where I was in terms of what source materials were going into the finished work
Thucydides does have some clear biases. He is fan of Pericles, he can live with Athenian democracy but doesn't seem to be enthusiastic about it, he doesn't like Cleon and while he lived among the Peloponnesians after his exile seems to find the Athenians a superior bunch in terms of their élan.
Remarkably given his stress on accuracy and reliability he tells us that he makes up the speeches that he has people say . About mid way through I wondered if the speeches were a key, it was unhelpful to think of this a history, better to frame it in my imagination as a drama. In which case this is a tale about hubris. The pride of Athens that came before its fall.
Thucydides tells a very familiar story of Machtpolitik. Athens through fighting off the Persians obtains an Empire. Sparta comes to fear Athenian power and is motivated by that to fight Athens. Pericles has a wise policy of avoiding battle but this is undone, first by his death but then by the ambition of reckless, feckless and self serving politicians . At the same time in speeches a reoccurring criticism of Athens is its arrogance. Given the opportunity, the subject parts of its empire will break away. Athens can compel the rebels to obedience, but only for as long as its politicians are able to respect the foundations of Athenian power. Some have read this as Thucydides believing that might is right and that a state should use power directly in pursuit of its own ends, simply taking what it wants. I'm not so sure, in the context of the history that isn't an approach that works out well for Athens . Nor is Thucydides direct, the political attitudes are expressed in speeches (made up to reflect what he felt was demanded of the speaker at the time) and are typically paired - one person arguing for a position, the other arguing against it. This is a cleaned up, parred down, staged account of a decision making process played out in the theatre of public assemblies that runs counter to what he describes happening in book eight where we have political clubs , rumour and discussion between small groups of people going on in the aftermath of Athenian defeat in Sicily and the seizure of power by a Junta in Athens itself.
This is intriguing, there is a sense of purpose beyond a historical inquiry into the twenty-sevenish year war between Sparta, Athens, and their allies that is never quite spelled out but hangs elusive over the whole work. The influence is clear in Livy's The War with Hannibal there is the same assertion of the epic and unique scope of the conflict , the same use of paired speeches to stage a policy debate, the same use of a cart to block a gate to allow one side to gain entry to an enemy town - which made me wonder if Livy (or his sources) were reusing Thucydides or if Hannibal & co were themselves keen readers and took their tactical ideas from history or if some plans are just so basic that they are unwittingly repeated. Perhaps this is why the long siege of Syracuse gets so much attention in Livy - here victorious Rome clearly surpassed Athens.
This was a very intimate conflict, when Athens lost in the region of five thousand of its citizens killed or captured in Sicily, this was about one in eight of its entire citizen population . It was fought at close quarters, the bitter rivalry between Thebes and Potidaea is between a town and a village a couple of miles apart but will eventually end in the execution of every man left to defend Potidaea after a lengthy siege .
I was then a little taken aback by Thucydides treatment of the Corcyrean Revolution. For him this outbreak of inter-communal violence seemed particularly horrific yet from an outsiders perspective it just seemed to be the application of a similar degree of violence within a community as they were prepared to visit upon a neighbouring community: kill the men and sell the women and children into slavery - this was the time when Euripides' Trojan Women was first performed, the resonance must have been inescapable
Fear plays its part in the revolution in Corcyra too. Those who have power fear those who are excluded from it , masters fear their slaves, Sparta fears Athens. Yet this isn't entirely convincing. It doesn't make a lot of sense that Sparta's conduct of the war until the first truce is so limited and so doesn't seem particularly fear driven - invading Attica each summer (providing the omens were favourable and there were no earthquakes or festivals). This is another level at which Thucydides is intriguing, fear can be the general psychology background of a society yet the practical application of policy is capable of a range of nuance. One of the Spartan kings (they had two at any one time) Agis seems to be the key figure here. Through the speeches we get an illusion of being close to the mind of a character, yet the information that Thucydides does share with us holds us at arms length too, and much is obscure. Is there enough in Thucydides' description to imagine a power struggle between the king and the ephor - the senior magistrate who speaks in favour of immediate war with Athens, that is realised in Agis' conduct of the war? Is the debate expressed to show how politicians manoeuvre with human emotion to win personal advantage?
Then again Thucydides is writing from hindsight. In his remarks on Pericles and poor decisions made after his death he refers to the eventual ending of the war (pp107-109), while at the time his fellow citizens did not enjoy quite the same advantage of perspective. My feeling was that Thucydides came close to blaming the citizens for being capable of being manipulated by others, but perhaps I was reading too much into him.
If you are tempted to dip your toes in and test the waters of Thucydides I'd suggest starting with the Sicilian expedition. It comes relatively late in the war but is a good narrative block with swings of fortune and the sad picture of Nicias, the commander of the Athenians on the verge of battle with the Syracusians, appalled by the position of affairs, realising the greatness and the nearness of the danger...and thinking, as men are apt to think in great crises, that when all has been done they have still something to do, and when all has been said that they have not yet said enough, again called on the captains one by one, addressing each by his father's name and by his own... (p399)
Also of interest two new books on Thucydides' history:
http://www.the-tls.co.uk/tls/public/a...
The Edition and the Translation
I bought while I was still at school. Then I'd stop off on the way home and root about boar like in a second hand book shop and exchanged an entire one and a half UK pounds for this small, old, Everyman pocket sized edition. True to my on going austerity reading project I decided to finally read it all the way through.
The edition uses the 1876 Richard Crawley translation , perhaps stylish in its day but some of the word choice introduces its own distance between the original and the contemporary reader for instance his use of the term capital (ie in terms of finance rather than centre of government), heavy infantry for hoplite (which I was ok with until I remembered my paternal Grandfather served in a light infantry regiment), with 'first rate' and 'cruiser' used to describe the ships. The more you are familiar with the mid Victorian British military the clearer you'll find Crawley's account of the Peloponnesian war. The problem for me was that this introduces doubt as to what else is obscured through his word choice and AC's recommendation in a comment on one of my status updates is to go for the Rex Warner translation available in Penguin if, gentle reader, you are tempted to give Thucydides a go in English.
I found Thucydides difficult to start but increasingly intriguing. His history is a book that can be reread, studied, attention paid to each word as much because of what he doesn't say and how he says what he does.
It is an ambitious book in several ways. Thucydides was writing after Herodotus and his epic on the Persian war but opens by telling us that this war was "more worthy of of relation than any that had preceded it...the greatest movement yet known in history" (p1). Secondly Thucydides makes great claims for his precision and accuracy implicitly a dig here at Herodotus and his giant gold gathering ants or the baby Cyrus lowered in a basket into a river to be brought up by step parents (but you've heard that story before). Both claims are dubious, the first has become a common place, people invariably want to claim that the story they want to tell is about the biggest, most impressive, amazing, far-reaching, and influential story ever in the history of history and they can't all be right,the other requires the reader's trust in Thucydides. He has decided what to trust as reliable information and what to include in his history. While he mentions a couple of times comparing accounts he never gives any clue as to whose accounts he is comparing or indeed when. The composition of the book is unclear, some parts seem more complete than others. Parts of the book were presumably being written or revised decades after the events and since he doesn't reveal his sources there are untold layers of interpretation between the pages. While with Herodotus I had more of a feeling that I knew where I was in terms of what source materials were going into the finished work
Thucydides does have some clear biases. He is fan of Pericles, he can live with Athenian democracy but doesn't seem to be enthusiastic about it, he doesn't like Cleon and while he lived among the Peloponnesians after his exile seems to find the Athenians a superior bunch in terms of their élan.
Remarkably given his stress on accuracy and reliability he tells us that he makes up the speeches that he has people say . About mid way through I wondered if the speeches were a key, it was unhelpful to think of this a history, better to frame it in my imagination as a drama. In which case this is a tale about hubris. The pride of Athens that came before its fall.
Thucydides tells a very familiar story of Machtpolitik. Athens through fighting off the Persians obtains an Empire. Sparta comes to fear Athenian power and is motivated by that to fight Athens. Pericles has a wise policy of avoiding battle but this is undone, first by his death but then by the ambition of reckless, feckless and self serving politicians . At the same time in speeches a reoccurring criticism of Athens is its arrogance. Given the opportunity, the subject parts of its empire will break away. Athens can compel the rebels to obedience, but only for as long as its politicians are able to respect the foundations of Athenian power. Some have read this as Thucydides believing that might is right and that a state should use power directly in pursuit of its own ends, simply taking what it wants. I'm not so sure, in the context of the history that isn't an approach that works out well for Athens . Nor is Thucydides direct, the political attitudes are expressed in speeches (made up to reflect what he felt was demanded of the speaker at the time) and are typically paired - one person arguing for a position, the other arguing against it. This is a cleaned up, parred down, staged account of a decision making process played out in the theatre of public assemblies that runs counter to what he describes happening in book eight where we have political clubs , rumour and discussion between small groups of people going on in the aftermath of Athenian defeat in Sicily and the seizure of power by a Junta in Athens itself.
This is intriguing, there is a sense of purpose beyond a historical inquiry into the twenty-sevenish year war between Sparta, Athens, and their allies that is never quite spelled out but hangs elusive over the whole work. The influence is clear in Livy's The War with Hannibal there is the same assertion of the epic and unique scope of the conflict , the same use of paired speeches to stage a policy debate, the same use of a cart to block a gate to allow one side to gain entry to an enemy town - which made me wonder if Livy (or his sources) were reusing Thucydides or if Hannibal & co were themselves keen readers and took their tactical ideas from history or if some plans are just so basic that they are unwittingly repeated. Perhaps this is why the long siege of Syracuse gets so much attention in Livy - here victorious Rome clearly surpassed Athens.
This was a very intimate conflict, when Athens lost in the region of five thousand of its citizens killed or captured in Sicily, this was about one in eight of its entire citizen population . It was fought at close quarters, the bitter rivalry between Thebes and Potidaea is between a town and a village a couple of miles apart but will eventually end in the execution of every man left to defend Potidaea after a lengthy siege .
I was then a little taken aback by Thucydides treatment of the Corcyrean Revolution. For him this outbreak of inter-communal violence seemed particularly horrific yet from an outsiders perspective it just seemed to be the application of a similar degree of violence within a community as they were prepared to visit upon a neighbouring community: kill the men and sell the women and children into slavery - this was the time when Euripides' Trojan Women was first performed, the resonance must have been inescapable
Fear plays its part in the revolution in Corcyra too. Those who have power fear those who are excluded from it , masters fear their slaves, Sparta fears Athens. Yet this isn't entirely convincing. It doesn't make a lot of sense that Sparta's conduct of the war until the first truce is so limited and so doesn't seem particularly fear driven - invading Attica each summer (providing the omens were favourable and there were no earthquakes or festivals). This is another level at which Thucydides is intriguing, fear can be the general psychology background of a society yet the practical application of policy is capable of a range of nuance. One of the Spartan kings (they had two at any one time) Agis seems to be the key figure here. Through the speeches we get an illusion of being close to the mind of a character, yet the information that Thucydides does share with us holds us at arms length too, and much is obscure. Is there enough in Thucydides' description to imagine a power struggle between the king and the ephor - the senior magistrate who speaks in favour of immediate war with Athens, that is realised in Agis' conduct of the war? Is the debate expressed to show how politicians manoeuvre with human emotion to win personal advantage?
Then again Thucydides is writing from hindsight. In his remarks on Pericles and poor decisions made after his death he refers to the eventual ending of the war (pp107-109), while at the time his fellow citizens did not enjoy quite the same advantage of perspective. My feeling was that Thucydides came close to blaming the citizens for being capable of being manipulated by others, but perhaps I was reading too much into him.
If you are tempted to dip your toes in and test the waters of Thucydides I'd suggest starting with the Sicilian expedition. It comes relatively late in the war but is a good narrative block with swings of fortune and the sad picture of Nicias, the commander of the Athenians on the verge of battle with the Syracusians, appalled by the position of affairs, realising the greatness and the nearness of the danger...and thinking, as men are apt to think in great crises, that when all has been done they have still something to do, and when all has been said that they have not yet said enough, again called on the captains one by one, addressing each by his father's name and by his own... (p399)
Also of interest two new books on Thucydides' history:
http://www.the-tls.co.uk/tls/public/a...
The Edition and the Translation
I bought while I was still at school. Then I'd stop off on the way home and root about boar like in a second hand book shop and exchanged an entire one and a half UK pounds for this small, old, Everyman pocket sized edition. True to my on going austerity reading project I decided to finally read it all the way through.
The edition uses the 1876 Richard Crawley translation , perhaps stylish in its day but some of the word choice introduces its own distance between the original and the contemporary reader for instance his use of the term capital (ie in terms of finance rather than centre of government), heavy infantry for hoplite (which I was ok with until I remembered my paternal Grandfather served in a light infantry regiment), with 'first rate' and 'cruiser' used to describe the ships. The more you are familiar with the mid Victorian British military the clearer you'll find Crawley's account of the Peloponnesian war. The problem for me was that this introduces doubt as to what else is obscured through his word choice and AC's recommendation in a comment on one of my status updates is to go for the Rex Warner translation available in Penguin if, gentle reader, you are tempted to give Thucydides a go in English.
March 12, 2010
What I love about the best ancient Greek literature is how startlingly modern it could be. This is particularly true of Euripides (whom I regard as a 21st century dramatist) and The History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides. The accounts of the Corcycran revolution, the so-called Melian Dialogue (in which Athens shows itself to be somewhat less enlightened than reputed), and the utter disaster of the Sicilian Expedition can just as easily be taking place now in remote parts of the world.
The Peloponnesian War even had its own Neocon in Alcibiades. He was largely responsible for Athens undertaking the Sicilian Expedition, only to be called back by the Athenian leadership for sacrilege. Thereupon, he made his escape at Thurii, went over to the Spartans, where he gave them excellent advice in combating the Athenians. Then, when the Spartans began to suspect him, he went over to Tissaphernes, the Persian Governor of Asia Minor. (Later still, he returned to Athens.)
I recommend the Rex Warner translation but urge readers to have a copy of The Landmark Thucydides at hand for its numerous and excellent maps, if not for its somewhat archaic translation by Richard Crawley.
The Peloponnesian War even had its own Neocon in Alcibiades. He was largely responsible for Athens undertaking the Sicilian Expedition, only to be called back by the Athenian leadership for sacrilege. Thereupon, he made his escape at Thurii, went over to the Spartans, where he gave them excellent advice in combating the Athenians. Then, when the Spartans began to suspect him, he went over to Tissaphernes, the Persian Governor of Asia Minor. (Later still, he returned to Athens.)
I recommend the Rex Warner translation but urge readers to have a copy of The Landmark Thucydides at hand for its numerous and excellent maps, if not for its somewhat archaic translation by Richard Crawley.
July 3, 2020
Όποιος αποφασίσει να διαβάσει, θα του πρότεινα την παρούσα έκδοση σε μεταφραστή του διπλωμάτη και συγγραφέα Αγγέλου Βλαχου. Παραμένει για μένα αξεπέραστη και προέρχεται από έναν διπλωμάτη που είχε διαβάσει και ασχολήθηκε με τον Θουκυδίδη και την αρχαιότητα όλη του τη ζωή.
February 9, 2016
It has been said that Earthling civilization, so far, has created ten thousand wars, but only three intelligent commentaries on war—the commentaries of Thucydides, of Julius Caesar and of Winston Niles Rutherfoord.
—Kurt Vonnegut, The Sirens of Titan
Some years ago, I waded through the Barnes & Noble edition of Herodotus’ Histories. It was one of the most painful reading experiences of my life. I blame 95% of this on the translator (G.C. Macaulay), who broke new ground in dry, prolix, knotty prose. The final result was to make Herodotus’ narrative—already full to the brim with digressions and asides—into a tangled mess that gave me a never-ending headache.
However, Donald Lateiner’s introduction to that edition was so good that I was left wanting to read more of him. So when I found out that the B & N edition of Thucydides’ famous history also featured an introduction by that scholar, I picked up a copy. But the memory of the pain wrought by Herodotus still burned. It took a few years before I could bring myself to give Greek history another go. But I’m glad I did.
In many ways, Thucydides is the polar opposite of Herodotus. Whereas the latter is relaxed and easygoing, Thucydides is forceful and dogmatic. Herodotus is more than willing to report an entertaining anecdote, to indulge in an aside, or to report multiple occurrences of the same event. Thucydides, by contrast, is always on topic, never indulgent. From the first few sentences, one is aware that he is cutting down and refining his material with ruthless precision. Every fact that makes it to the page has been culled from an ocean of information; every sentence has been written and re-written dozens of times.
The merits of Thucydides are twofold. The most obvious is that he virtually invented modern history—concentrating on political and military developments, and keeping scrupulously to verifiable facts. The other is his rhetorical prowess. From what I’ve been told, his Greek prose was cutting-edge. There is only the faintest echo of this quality in Crawley’s translation (which I still liked, by the way). Nevertheless, the History is at times as gripping as any good novel. The speeches (however closely they adhered to actual fact) are without exception masterpieces—both of drama and of political analysis. The battles, the intrigues, the plots, the strategies, the movements of men and ships—all come alive in Thucydides’ terse, muscular writing.
The Greeks were truly remarkable. In mathematics, Euclid was the standard textbook for over two millennia; in philosophy, Plato and Aristotle still cast their long shadows over the present-day; in literature, there are few authors whose influence can compare with Homer, Sophocles, or Aristophanes. And now we must add Thucydides to their ranks of geniuses. The man managed to set the stage for an entire field of enquiry, and do so with a book that remains both readable and relevant after over two thousand years. If America suffers the same fate as Athens, I at least hope we leave behind half as many great books
November 6, 2018
Courage in the face of reality ultimately distinguishes such natures as Thucydides and Plato: Plato is a coward in the face of reality--consequently he flees into the ideal; Thucydides has himself under control--consequently he retains control over things. ------Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols
July 21, 2020
«Tout commence en mystique et finit en politique.»
Charles Péguy
Desconfiava que a política é o que resta dos ideais depois da digestão. Agora, não tenho muitas dúvidas. Acho desinteressante, porque nunca tive Machtwille e a coprofilia passa-me ao lado. Garantem-me, no entanto, que esta atitude é tão política como qualquer outra, o que me deixa bastante triste. Não sabia que a minha vida privada tinha um significado, ainda por cima político, e só me resta cagar (politicamente, claro) nessa ideia.
Não participo, mas gosto de ver os debates políticos nas redes sociais como quem vê documentários da BBC; os documentários da BBC têm David Attenborough a explicar o que aquela fauna anda lá a fazer; nas redes sociais, ando à deriva. Ignorância minha, certamente. Decidi, então, ler uma data de livros — que toda a gente nas redes sociais já leu — sobre o tópico, para melhorar a minha compreensão do espectáculo.
Decidi começar pelos antigos. Há muita gente que jura que se pode entender Trump a ler Chateaubriand. Eu acredito que conhecer superficialmente uma realidade antiga, usando instrumentos modernos, é a melhor maneira de usar instrumentos antigos para não perceber a realidade moderna. Assim como assim, sempre gostei dos Flinstones. Mas estou a ser pessimista. Bismarck dizia que só uma pessoa estúpida aprende com os seus próprios erros; uma pessoa inteligente aprende com os erros dos outros. É um bom argumento para ler história, mas ninguém consegue aprender tanto, e os historiadores são prova disso.
«Indeed this was the greatest movement yet known in history, not only of the Hellenes, but of a large part of the barbarian world—I had almost said of mankind.»
O leitor de poesia épica vai ter uma grande desilusão; The History of the Peloponnesian War é uma anti-épica. Não há feito grandioso que não seja prontamente admoestado com várias considerações que o tornam trivial e, muitas vezes, acidental. Não há favores divinos, mas há o aproveitamento da crença em favores divinos; há coragem, mas sempre misturada com ganância e imbecilidade em doses iguais; e a honra existe mais na retórica do que em acto.
O livro é essencialmente político, logo as minudências preambulares são tão importantes como as batalhas. Não é, então, surpreendente que as assembleias sejam mais interessantes do que as batalhas. As conspirações, traições, os abusos de ideias gerais não diferem muito do que se vê agora, mas Tucídides arruma tudo com bom estilo, e nós não temos essa sorte.
Os rivais Atenas e Esparta estão muito bem divididos, demasiado bem divididos. Atenas é apresentada como amante da liberdade (nos discursos) e inovadora, e Esparta como amante da disciplina e tradicionalista. Parece demasiado conveniente, mas os primeiros passos da guerra reflectem essas tendências. Esparta, mesmo espicaçada pelos excelentes embaixadores coríntios, aparece morosa e Atenas parece ter resposta para tudo. Atenas só parece abrandar quando, em Siracusa, perde no seu elemento, o mar.
De resto, as batalhas decidem-se pelos atrasos, acasos e pelo horário das refeições. Política, no fundo.
Charles Péguy
Desconfiava que a política é o que resta dos ideais depois da digestão. Agora, não tenho muitas dúvidas. Acho desinteressante, porque nunca tive Machtwille e a coprofilia passa-me ao lado. Garantem-me, no entanto, que esta atitude é tão política como qualquer outra, o que me deixa bastante triste. Não sabia que a minha vida privada tinha um significado, ainda por cima político, e só me resta cagar (politicamente, claro) nessa ideia.
Não participo, mas gosto de ver os debates políticos nas redes sociais como quem vê documentários da BBC; os documentários da BBC têm David Attenborough a explicar o que aquela fauna anda lá a fazer; nas redes sociais, ando à deriva. Ignorância minha, certamente. Decidi, então, ler uma data de livros — que toda a gente nas redes sociais já leu — sobre o tópico, para melhorar a minha compreensão do espectáculo.
Decidi começar pelos antigos. Há muita gente que jura que se pode entender Trump a ler Chateaubriand. Eu acredito que conhecer superficialmente uma realidade antiga, usando instrumentos modernos, é a melhor maneira de usar instrumentos antigos para não perceber a realidade moderna. Assim como assim, sempre gostei dos Flinstones. Mas estou a ser pessimista. Bismarck dizia que só uma pessoa estúpida aprende com os seus próprios erros; uma pessoa inteligente aprende com os erros dos outros. É um bom argumento para ler história, mas ninguém consegue aprender tanto, e os historiadores são prova disso.
«Indeed this was the greatest movement yet known in history, not only of the Hellenes, but of a large part of the barbarian world—I had almost said of mankind.»
O leitor de poesia épica vai ter uma grande desilusão; The History of the Peloponnesian War é uma anti-épica. Não há feito grandioso que não seja prontamente admoestado com várias considerações que o tornam trivial e, muitas vezes, acidental. Não há favores divinos, mas há o aproveitamento da crença em favores divinos; há coragem, mas sempre misturada com ganância e imbecilidade em doses iguais; e a honra existe mais na retórica do que em acto.
O livro é essencialmente político, logo as minudências preambulares são tão importantes como as batalhas. Não é, então, surpreendente que as assembleias sejam mais interessantes do que as batalhas. As conspirações, traições, os abusos de ideias gerais não diferem muito do que se vê agora, mas Tucídides arruma tudo com bom estilo, e nós não temos essa sorte.
Os rivais Atenas e Esparta estão muito bem divididos, demasiado bem divididos. Atenas é apresentada como amante da liberdade (nos discursos) e inovadora, e Esparta como amante da disciplina e tradicionalista. Parece demasiado conveniente, mas os primeiros passos da guerra reflectem essas tendências. Esparta, mesmo espicaçada pelos excelentes embaixadores coríntios, aparece morosa e Atenas parece ter resposta para tudo. Atenas só parece abrandar quando, em Siracusa, perde no seu elemento, o mar.
De resto, as batalhas decidem-se pelos atrasos, acasos e pelo horário das refeições. Política, no fundo.
September 18, 2017
This book is impossible to review but I still wanted to give my opinion on this as I try to do with every outstanding book I come across. I mean impossible because this book is the cornerstone for different disciplines, mainly History and International Relations. This is no surprise as Thucydides was intending to provide a historic account of the greatest war of his time, the war between Sparta and Athens while not focusing on any superstitious beliefs. Being the first historian, he set about trying to understand this great powers struggle over control of the Greek world paying no attention to prophecies (unless it impacted the actions of the actors, as it usually did with Sparta).
Having framed the book on its actual importance, I am left with my impressions. I had assumed the book was going to be a boring account of ship and hoplite numbers per battle as well as one or two mentions to Greek commanders. Obviously, I had completely underestimated Thucydides' skills as well as the great job the translators have done since its time of publication (I guess we owe Hobbes the bulk of it back on the 17th century). The book does have that, but it is so much more.
Thucydides was an important Athenian figure during this conflict. He was a general while one of the greatest Spartan commanders -Brasidas- was fighting in Thrace and he lived some time on Sparta as well after being exiled by the Athenians. This allowed him to provide insight on the conflict while not being completely one sided. Additionally, his involvement in the everyday struggle the leaders had, allowed him to provide a unique account on human nature of his time. The book immerses you in this conflict in a way that I thought impossible to do. You will hear the speeches of the Athenian politicians; you will feel the disgust Thucydides had when writing about the demagogue Cleon, as well as Cleon exploits of his fame and good fortune against the Spartans on Sphacteria; you will smell the sea, sweat, and tears of the Athenians fighting for their survival on Syracuse; all this embedded on a page turning narrative where diplomacy, treason, political maneuvers, and personal traits of different leaders shaped the world.
This is an excellent book that anyone interested in the ancient Hellenic world must read.
Having framed the book on its actual importance, I am left with my impressions. I had assumed the book was going to be a boring account of ship and hoplite numbers per battle as well as one or two mentions to Greek commanders. Obviously, I had completely underestimated Thucydides' skills as well as the great job the translators have done since its time of publication (I guess we owe Hobbes the bulk of it back on the 17th century). The book does have that, but it is so much more.
Thucydides was an important Athenian figure during this conflict. He was a general while one of the greatest Spartan commanders -Brasidas- was fighting in Thrace and he lived some time on Sparta as well after being exiled by the Athenians. This allowed him to provide insight on the conflict while not being completely one sided. Additionally, his involvement in the everyday struggle the leaders had, allowed him to provide a unique account on human nature of his time. The book immerses you in this conflict in a way that I thought impossible to do. You will hear the speeches of the Athenian politicians; you will feel the disgust Thucydides had when writing about the demagogue Cleon, as well as Cleon exploits of his fame and good fortune against the Spartans on Sphacteria; you will smell the sea, sweat, and tears of the Athenians fighting for their survival on Syracuse; all this embedded on a page turning narrative where diplomacy, treason, political maneuvers, and personal traits of different leaders shaped the world.
This is an excellent book that anyone interested in the ancient Hellenic world must read.
October 29, 2016
3.5 stars
Finally I could finish reading this book after many intervals of being content with what I knew, I didn’t claim I enjoyed all of eight-book Thucydides’s account. Compared to the other history classic of similar stature, Herodotus’s “The Histories” translated by Aubrey de Selincourt, I think, is more enjoyable and impressive regarding the world as viewed by the Greek historian in the fifth century B.C. Contrastively in a smaller scale, Thucydides has ambitiously depicted the twenty-seven year conflicts between Athens and Sparta with innumerable sieges, commanders, strategies and so on till we simply can’t help getting confused, praying when each book would ever end.
The reason why I decided to read it is that many years ago I read some excerpts of Pericles’ funeral oration somewhere and longed to read it in full. Definitely one of the greatest orators in history, he has since impressed posterity to the extent that few can surpass him as we read from his 7.5-page oration (nos. 35-46). It’s a bit lengthy, I think, for those who would read him for the first time; therefore, the following three extracts should suffice in the meantime.
First, his opening statement:
Many of those who have spoken here in the past have praised the institution of this speech at the close of our ceremony. It seemed to them a mark of honour to our soldiers who have fallen in war that a speech should be made over them. I do not agree. These men have shown themselves valiant in action, and it would be enough, I think, for their glories to be proclaimed in action, as you have just seen it done at this funeral organized by the state. Our belief in the courage and manliness of so many should not be hazarded on the goodness or badness of one man’s speech. … (p. 144)
Then, in praise of those fallen soldiers:
This, then, is the kind of city for which these men, who could not bear the thought of losing her, nobly fought and nobly died. It is only natural that every one of us who survive them should be willing to undergo hardships in her service. And it was for this reason that I have spoken at such length about our city, because I wanted to make it clear that for us there is more at stake than there is for others who lack our advantages; also I wanted my words of praise for the dead to be set in the bright light of evidence. And now the most important of these words has been spoken. I have sung the praise of our city; but it was the courage and gallantry of these men, and of people like them, which made her splendid. … (p. 148)
Finally, in conclusion:
… I have now, as the law demanded, said what I had to say. For the time being our offerings to the dead have been made, and for the future their children will be supported at the public expense by the city, until they come of age. This is the crown and prize which she offers, both to the dead and to their children, for the ordeals which they have faced. Where the rewards of valour are the greatest, there you will find also the best and bravest spirits among the people. And now, when you have mourned for your dear ones, you must depart. (p. 151)
In brief, I think reading this book should inform and inspire its readers on the futility in terms of atrocities of war, being those ancient, medieval, premodern or modern ones till we wonder if there is really peace to all humankind and when.
Finally I could finish reading this book after many intervals of being content with what I knew, I didn’t claim I enjoyed all of eight-book Thucydides’s account. Compared to the other history classic of similar stature, Herodotus’s “The Histories” translated by Aubrey de Selincourt, I think, is more enjoyable and impressive regarding the world as viewed by the Greek historian in the fifth century B.C. Contrastively in a smaller scale, Thucydides has ambitiously depicted the twenty-seven year conflicts between Athens and Sparta with innumerable sieges, commanders, strategies and so on till we simply can’t help getting confused, praying when each book would ever end.
The reason why I decided to read it is that many years ago I read some excerpts of Pericles’ funeral oration somewhere and longed to read it in full. Definitely one of the greatest orators in history, he has since impressed posterity to the extent that few can surpass him as we read from his 7.5-page oration (nos. 35-46). It’s a bit lengthy, I think, for those who would read him for the first time; therefore, the following three extracts should suffice in the meantime.
First, his opening statement:
Many of those who have spoken here in the past have praised the institution of this speech at the close of our ceremony. It seemed to them a mark of honour to our soldiers who have fallen in war that a speech should be made over them. I do not agree. These men have shown themselves valiant in action, and it would be enough, I think, for their glories to be proclaimed in action, as you have just seen it done at this funeral organized by the state. Our belief in the courage and manliness of so many should not be hazarded on the goodness or badness of one man’s speech. … (p. 144)
Then, in praise of those fallen soldiers:
This, then, is the kind of city for which these men, who could not bear the thought of losing her, nobly fought and nobly died. It is only natural that every one of us who survive them should be willing to undergo hardships in her service. And it was for this reason that I have spoken at such length about our city, because I wanted to make it clear that for us there is more at stake than there is for others who lack our advantages; also I wanted my words of praise for the dead to be set in the bright light of evidence. And now the most important of these words has been spoken. I have sung the praise of our city; but it was the courage and gallantry of these men, and of people like them, which made her splendid. … (p. 148)
Finally, in conclusion:
… I have now, as the law demanded, said what I had to say. For the time being our offerings to the dead have been made, and for the future their children will be supported at the public expense by the city, until they come of age. This is the crown and prize which she offers, both to the dead and to their children, for the ordeals which they have faced. Where the rewards of valour are the greatest, there you will find also the best and bravest spirits among the people. And now, when you have mourned for your dear ones, you must depart. (p. 151)
In brief, I think reading this book should inform and inspire its readers on the futility in terms of atrocities of war, being those ancient, medieval, premodern or modern ones till we wonder if there is really peace to all humankind and when.
Read
January 6, 2024Tremendously important book, from a historical point of view. But to be honest: Thucydides brings a boring story: he just gives a sequence of facts; no dramatic depth, no psychological dimension in the speeches, emphasis on the military events.
I also was a bit disappointed by his so-called objectivity: Book 1 is slightly anti-Athenian (imperialism), book 2 light pro-Athenian (Pericles). In comparison with Herodotus for me Thucydides is a little step back, because at least Herodotus gave different opinions, Thucydides leaves no room for uncertainty, he decides on the cause-effect relationship.
I also was a bit disappointed by his so-called objectivity: Book 1 is slightly anti-Athenian (imperialism), book 2 light pro-Athenian (Pericles). In comparison with Herodotus for me Thucydides is a little step back, because at least Herodotus gave different opinions, Thucydides leaves no room for uncertainty, he decides on the cause-effect relationship.
July 11, 2018
যুদ্ধের একপাশে অষ্টাদশ শতকের ব্রিটিশ রাজ, যে আপনার রাজরাজড়াদের পগারপার করে দিয়ে এরপর আপনাকে শেখাবে গণতন্ত্র, আপনাকে করবে এথেনীয় কায়দায় শিক্ষিত, বিনিময়ে নেবে কর, আর অন্যদিকে আছে বিংশ শতকের মার্কিনী সাম্রাজ্য, যার কাজ করও নেয়া না, আপনাকে গণতন্ত্র খিলানোও না, শুধু জায়গায় জায়গায় মনঃপূত পুতুল নবাব বসানো। কে জেতে এই যুদ্ধে, বিলেত না মার্কিন? অ্যাথেন্স না স্পার্টা? এই কথা জানানোর আগেই এই বই শেষ হয়ে যায়, শেষদিকের মাঝপথে, আচমকা।
কিন্তু যতক্ষণ চলে, চলে ফুল গিয়ারে। ম্যাপ দেখতে দেখতে আপনি তড়তড় করে সামনের দিকে আগায়ে যাবেন, আর আবিষ্কার করবেন, এইটুক একটা জায়গার মধ্যে পৃথিবীর সব দেশ সেঁধিয়ে বসে আছে, ছোটো ছোটো শহর, আর তাদের নিজেদের মধ্যে যুদ্ধ যুদ্ধ খেলা, শুধু কি খেলা, ট্র্যাজেডিও, দুর্ভিক্ষ আছে, আছে বারবার যুদ্ধে বাঁক বদল, আছে অগণিত জোট নিজেদের ভেতর। একটু বড়, পড়তে পড়তে এক পর্যায়ে বইটারে জীবনের চেয়ে দুই কাঠি বড় মনে হয়, সত্য। লেখক সেই যুগে এই ঢাউস বই কী করে লিখলেন জানি না, কোত্থেকে এতো তথ্য পেলেন না জানা গেলেও তার মধ্যে একটা সাংবাদিকসুলভ বলে যাওয়া আছে, আবার বেশ একটা ভেঙে দেখবার ক্ষমতাও আছে। আর বাড়তি পাওনায় আছে অসংখ্য ভাষণ, যেগুলি সত্যনিষ্ঠ না হোক, ভাষণের বাড়া।
শুনলাম যুদ্ধের শেষে অ্যাথেন্স হেরে যায়। স্বাভাবিক, সাম্রাজ্যবাদের দুই চেহারার মাঝে মার্কিনীরাই আগায়ে থাকবে, যদিও মানুষ মনে রাখবে ব্রিটিশ রাজরেই, স্পার্টা নিয়া বড়জোর দুই চারটা আমেরিকান স্নাইপার আর ব্ল্যাক হক ডাউন বানানো সম্ভব। সেও শুধু হলিউডে।
কিন্তু যতক্ষণ চলে, চলে ফুল গিয়ারে। ম্যাপ দেখতে দেখতে আপনি তড়তড় করে সামনের দিকে আগায়ে যাবেন, আর আবিষ্কার করবেন, এইটুক একটা জায়গার মধ্যে পৃথিবীর সব দেশ সেঁধিয়ে বসে আছে, ছোটো ছোটো শহর, আর তাদের নিজেদের মধ্যে যুদ্ধ যুদ্ধ খেলা, শুধু কি খেলা, ট্র্যাজেডিও, দুর্ভিক্ষ আছে, আছে বারবার যুদ্ধে বাঁক বদল, আছে অগণিত জোট নিজেদের ভেতর। একটু বড়, পড়তে পড়তে এক পর্যায়ে বইটারে জীবনের চেয়ে দুই কাঠি বড় মনে হয়, সত্য। লেখক সেই যুগে এই ঢাউস বই কী করে লিখলেন জানি না, কোত্থেকে এতো তথ্য পেলেন না জানা গেলেও তার মধ্যে একটা সাংবাদিকসুলভ বলে যাওয়া আছে, আবার বেশ একটা ভেঙে দেখবার ক্ষমতাও আছে। আর বাড়তি পাওনায় আছে অসংখ্য ভাষণ, যেগুলি সত্যনিষ্ঠ না হোক, ভাষণের বাড়া।
শুনলাম যুদ্ধের শেষে অ্যাথেন্স হেরে যায়। স্বাভাবিক, সাম্রাজ্যবাদের দুই চেহারার মাঝে মার্কিনীরাই আগায়ে থাকবে, যদিও মানুষ মনে রাখবে ব্রিটিশ রাজরেই, স্পার্টা নিয়া বড়জোর দুই চারটা আমেরিকান স্নাইপার আর ব্ল্যাক হক ডাউন বানানো সম্ভব। সেও শুধু হলিউডে।
May 13, 2011
I need more stars! Thucydides is the man. In 1947, George Marshall "doubt[ed] seriously whether a man can think with full wisdom and with deep convictions regarding certain of the basic issues today" without having read this book. The parallels between the Cold War and the Peloponnesian War as T. describes it are certainly striking. My two favorite sections of this book are the civil war in Corcyra, which T. describes as representative of many civil wars going on in the Aegean at the time--and which he would not be at all surprised to learn was a pretty good description also of many 20th century internecine conflicts; and the siege of Plataea.
The sociological insight of the Corcyra section is breathtaking, as T. describes the values of a society crumbling as its citizens adapt to the demands of a war with no fronts, in which every friend might secretly be an enemy and anything is justified in the name of the faction's cause.
The siege of Plataea is, in T.'s telling, by turns exciting, inspirational, terrifying, and heart-rending. Both sides show great ingenuity in their attempts to outwit each other; there is a great escape story; and it ends with the battle of political, religious, patriotic and ethical motives as the Spartans must decide how to deal with their prisoners.
I could go on and on. The point is, read it! The "Landmark" edition with the maps and stuff is the best one.
The sociological insight of the Corcyra section is breathtaking, as T. describes the values of a society crumbling as its citizens adapt to the demands of a war with no fronts, in which every friend might secretly be an enemy and anything is justified in the name of the faction's cause.
The siege of Plataea is, in T.'s telling, by turns exciting, inspirational, terrifying, and heart-rending. Both sides show great ingenuity in their attempts to outwit each other; there is a great escape story; and it ends with the battle of political, religious, patriotic and ethical motives as the Spartans must decide how to deal with their prisoners.
I could go on and on. The point is, read it! The "Landmark" edition with the maps and stuff is the best one.
March 30, 2013
For over three years I was a history major at Grinnell College. In the junior year only one course requirement remained, historiography, a course taught by only one faculty member. That was fine by me until we got to Augustine's City of God which, at the time, I thought was absolutely crazy and unreadable (I've since read it). Having almost completed the requirements for a religion degree as well by then, I switched majors and graduated on schedule.
Although Augustine was unsupportable, I very much enjoyed being made to read Thukydides' History as anyone would because of how his seems so modern and objective an account.
What is interesting in this regard is how unique Thukydides is. To my knowledge, no other historian approaches what we regard as serious historical scholarship until the Enlightenment, until more than a thousand years later. Read Herodotos, Diodoros, Livy or Suetonius to see what I mean. Tell me if you can think of an exception. The only one who comes to mind is Caesar whose account of the Gallic Wars approaches history.
Although Augustine was unsupportable, I very much enjoyed being made to read Thukydides' History as anyone would because of how his seems so modern and objective an account.
What is interesting in this regard is how unique Thukydides is. To my knowledge, no other historian approaches what we regard as serious historical scholarship until the Enlightenment, until more than a thousand years later. Read Herodotos, Diodoros, Livy or Suetonius to see what I mean. Tell me if you can think of an exception. The only one who comes to mind is Caesar whose account of the Gallic Wars approaches history.
June 17, 2023
Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War is a fascinating and gripping account of the war between the Delian League and the Peloponnesian League, with democratic Athens and oligarchic Sparta respectively at the head of these alliances. This was a was a drawn out, brutal, thuggish and opportunistic war of Greeks against Greeks with the respective state models (democracy versus oligarchy) having nothing to do with the actual politics of the war. As Thucydides mentions in the beginning of the book, Sparta and her allies decided to wage war against Athens because of the growth of Athenian geopolitical power at the time. In this sense, the Peloponnesian war was a pre-emptive one.
Thucydides describes events as they happened year to year, summer to winter. Some reviewers on Goodreads find his choice to be problematic - I love it. He takes readers all across the theatres of war and from event to event as they happened chronologically. This helps (a lot!) to grasp the spatial and temporal dimensions of the war. It also emphasizes all the limitations and conditions of warfare in the Ancient world: the (small) scale of warfare, natural boundaries and limitations, dependencies on seasonality and geography, importance of community for survival, political tensions, the mythical foundations of 'poleis' (mostly relating to the Trojan War) etc.
Truly a masterpiece in Ancient literature. The only reason why I won't give 5 stars is the final chapter which is unfinished and unedited. This is a minor disappointment.
Thucydides describes events as they happened year to year, summer to winter. Some reviewers on Goodreads find his choice to be problematic - I love it. He takes readers all across the theatres of war and from event to event as they happened chronologically. This helps (a lot!) to grasp the spatial and temporal dimensions of the war. It also emphasizes all the limitations and conditions of warfare in the Ancient world: the (small) scale of warfare, natural boundaries and limitations, dependencies on seasonality and geography, importance of community for survival, political tensions, the mythical foundations of 'poleis' (mostly relating to the Trojan War) etc.
Truly a masterpiece in Ancient literature. The only reason why I won't give 5 stars is the final chapter which is unfinished and unedited. This is a minor disappointment.
May 31, 2017
The Peloponnesian War is something that historicly interests me the most from the ancient greek history, so this book was something that I've read with ease. In addition the writing is quite understandable and easy to follow.
May 3, 2015
BABT
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05s2pbmDescription: 'My work is not a piece of writing designed to meet the taste of an immediate public, but was done to last for ever,' Thucydides
Ancient Greek historian Thucydides' spellbinding first-hand account chronicles the devastating 27-year-long war between Athens and Sparta during the 5th century BC. It was a life-and-death struggle that reshaped the face of ancient Greece and pitted Athenian democracy against brutal Spartan militarism.
Thucydides himself was an Athenian aristocrat and general who went on to record what he saw as the greatest war of all time, applying a passion for accuracy and a contempt for myth admired by historians today. Looking at why nations go to war, what makes a great leader, and whether might can be better than right, he became the father of modern Realpolitik. His influence fed into the works of Machiavelli, Thomas Hobbs and the politics of the Cold War and beyond.
Thucydides' masterful account of the end of Greece's Golden Age, depicts an age of revolution, sea battles, military alliances, plague and massacre, but also great bravery and some of the greatest political orations of all time.
Today: With Spartan distrust of the rising power of Athens, is war inevitable?
Abridger: Tom Holland is an award-winning novelist and historian, specialising in the classical and medieval periods. He is the author of 'Rubicon: The Triumph and Tragedy of the Roman Republic', which was shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize, as well as 'Persian Fire', 'Millennium: The End of the World and the Forging of Christendom', 'In the Shadow of the Sword', as well as several novels. His latest non-fiction book, 'Dynasty', chronicling the Roman Emperors, will be published in 2015.
He has adapted Homer, Herodotus, Thucydides and Virgil for the BBC. His translation of Herodotus was published in 2013. In 2007, he was the winner of the Classical Association prize, awarded to 'the individual who has done most to promote the study of the language, literature and civilisation of Ancient Greece and Rome'."
Reader: David Horovitch
Producer: Justine Willett.
Machiavellian long before that book, and even earlier, by ~200 years, than 孫子兵法: The Art of War.
1. War Begins
2. From Funerals to Plague
3. Spartan Surrender at Pylos
4. An Athenian Atrocity
5. The Beginning of the End
July 1, 2020
This is the best book on geopolitics ever written. It’s very difficult, too. His style isn’t that difficult and the subject matter is straightforward. The difficulty, as the school of Leo Strauss would later point out, is a dialectic between a surface reading and a deeper reading.
Part of the book’s popularity is the parallel to the American Empire, prompting such devices as a “Thucydides Trap.” Will American overextend itself and force China to attack it? I think that line of questioning is wrong, but the parallels remain. America, like Athens, is a sea-based power (in the classical Halford Mackinder sense). America, like Athens, believes in spreading Democracy by force whether others want it or not. America, like Athens, doesn’t really practice democracy.
We also see in Athens the “rhetoric of empire.” We must rule you because if we don’t someone will rule us.
The fatal moment for Athens is the invasion of Sicily and the Battle of Syracuse.
The first set of causes is the Corcyraen and Potidean affairs. This put Athens in a bind. On one hand, they were bound to a peace treaty and couldn’t get involved by helping Corinth. They decided to risk open confrontation because they couldn’t risk Sparta’s allies gaining that much power (I.44ff). Corinth, Sparta’s ally, saw this as Athen’s breaking a peace treaty (56).
Thucydides gives a penetrating analysis of Athenian democracy. He points out that democracy and empire are connected. In the aftermath both sides then recruit their vassals and allies to prepare for war against the other.
Key idea: “War is not so much a matter of armament as of the finance which gives effect to that armament, especially when a land power meets a sea power” (83). Sparta fears that Athens is getting too powerful and has to act before it is too late (118). Athens, on the other hand, knows (or at least believes) that it can “outspend Sparta to death.”
Platea was hostile to Thebes, so the Thebans launched a pre-emptive strike to seize the key ground (II.2). Athens saw this action as breaking the peace treaty, so she began preparing for war.
The highlight of the first year of war is Pericles’ speech to the Athenians (II.35). It’s beautiful, but whitewashed, since his noble talk of democracy doesn’t include slaves or women.
Sections 48ff show the effect of plague upon the war. It hampered Athens’ war effort, but more importantly it illustrated the social decay. In times of plague and crisis, men reduce to their natural levels (II.53).
The book ends with Athens in chaos. Sparta could have really exploited the situation and conquered most of Greece. Unfortunately, they didn’t. The democracy in Athens begins eating itself, which I suspect is the nature of democracy.
Pericles is the main figure of this narrative. He is honest about empire. Athens is an empire. We shouldn’t be fooled by silly talk about democracy. The danger with empire is that when you lose it, your enemies smell blood. Pericles notes: “The empire you possess is now like a tyranny--dangerous to let go” (63).
Later on Athens is even more crass (but honest) in its desire for empire. She tells the Melians: “If the independents survive, it is because we are (perceived) as too frightened to attack them….It is particularly important that we, as a naval power, should not let islanders get away from us, especially you in your weak position” (V:97).
If that leaves it in any doubt, Athens goes on to say, “We dominate people at home so that others should not control us” (VI:87).
Conclusion
It’s hard to overstate this book’s importance. It isn’t simply military history. It explores what happens to a society during war time. Social morals often reflect external situations.
Part of the book’s popularity is the parallel to the American Empire, prompting such devices as a “Thucydides Trap.” Will American overextend itself and force China to attack it? I think that line of questioning is wrong, but the parallels remain. America, like Athens, is a sea-based power (in the classical Halford Mackinder sense). America, like Athens, believes in spreading Democracy by force whether others want it or not. America, like Athens, doesn’t really practice democracy.
We also see in Athens the “rhetoric of empire.” We must rule you because if we don’t someone will rule us.
The fatal moment for Athens is the invasion of Sicily and the Battle of Syracuse.
The first set of causes is the Corcyraen and Potidean affairs. This put Athens in a bind. On one hand, they were bound to a peace treaty and couldn’t get involved by helping Corinth. They decided to risk open confrontation because they couldn’t risk Sparta’s allies gaining that much power (I.44ff). Corinth, Sparta’s ally, saw this as Athen’s breaking a peace treaty (56).
Thucydides gives a penetrating analysis of Athenian democracy. He points out that democracy and empire are connected. In the aftermath both sides then recruit their vassals and allies to prepare for war against the other.
Key idea: “War is not so much a matter of armament as of the finance which gives effect to that armament, especially when a land power meets a sea power” (83). Sparta fears that Athens is getting too powerful and has to act before it is too late (118). Athens, on the other hand, knows (or at least believes) that it can “outspend Sparta to death.”
Platea was hostile to Thebes, so the Thebans launched a pre-emptive strike to seize the key ground (II.2). Athens saw this action as breaking the peace treaty, so she began preparing for war.
The highlight of the first year of war is Pericles’ speech to the Athenians (II.35). It’s beautiful, but whitewashed, since his noble talk of democracy doesn’t include slaves or women.
Sections 48ff show the effect of plague upon the war. It hampered Athens’ war effort, but more importantly it illustrated the social decay. In times of plague and crisis, men reduce to their natural levels (II.53).
The book ends with Athens in chaos. Sparta could have really exploited the situation and conquered most of Greece. Unfortunately, they didn’t. The democracy in Athens begins eating itself, which I suspect is the nature of democracy.
Pericles is the main figure of this narrative. He is honest about empire. Athens is an empire. We shouldn’t be fooled by silly talk about democracy. The danger with empire is that when you lose it, your enemies smell blood. Pericles notes: “The empire you possess is now like a tyranny--dangerous to let go” (63).
Later on Athens is even more crass (but honest) in its desire for empire. She tells the Melians: “If the independents survive, it is because we are (perceived) as too frightened to attack them….It is particularly important that we, as a naval power, should not let islanders get away from us, especially you in your weak position” (V:97).
If that leaves it in any doubt, Athens goes on to say, “We dominate people at home so that others should not control us” (VI:87).
Conclusion
It’s hard to overstate this book’s importance. It isn’t simply military history. It explores what happens to a society during war time. Social morals often reflect external situations.
July 21, 2022
This is only about the Plague of Athens, interpreted by Thucydides in The Peloponnesian War.
One of the scariest pandemics on the record, the Plague of Athens was recorded by Thucydides in his famous History of the Peloponnesian War.
Why should one read this fragment? It offers a short and concise description, but one which contains ambitious ideas. It reminds us that the mix of war, pandemic and economic issues is not a novelty and that we should take all of them seriously. The typical Byronian motive also matters: who goes to Athens and meditates at the ruins has something to gain from the awareness that another disease has led to this. The reader should be wary that the depictions can be though.
The context is well known. Brief, the war starts between Athens and Sparta. The Athenian mastermind Pericles gathers the population behind the wall, impregnable at that time, gathers a big war treasury and uses the fleet to harass his enemies.
Then the plague strikes. Thucydides' story grows from the cold facts to deep conclusions about the basis of society and politics. It also has something to say about democracy and military strategy. He hoped that his description will be useful to future generations who try to understand not only plagues, but how communities work in times of stress, too.
This very old story still has something meaninful to tell us.
One of the scariest pandemics on the record, the Plague of Athens was recorded by Thucydides in his famous History of the Peloponnesian War.
Why should one read this fragment? It offers a short and concise description, but one which contains ambitious ideas. It reminds us that the mix of war, pandemic and economic issues is not a novelty and that we should take all of them seriously. The typical Byronian motive also matters: who goes to Athens and meditates at the ruins has something to gain from the awareness that another disease has led to this. The reader should be wary that the depictions can be though.
The context is well known. Brief, the war starts between Athens and Sparta. The Athenian mastermind Pericles gathers the population behind the wall, impregnable at that time, gathers a big war treasury and uses the fleet to harass his enemies.
Then the plague strikes. Thucydides' story grows from the cold facts to deep conclusions about the basis of society and politics. It also has something to say about democracy and military strategy. He hoped that his description will be useful to future generations who try to understand not only plagues, but how communities work in times of stress, too.
This very old story still has something meaninful to tell us.
Read
June 22, 202377th book of 2023.
I began this, without realising, exactly two months ago in April. I then stopped for a duration of time as my girlfriend and I flew to Athens and I spent the next two weeks exploring, island-hopping, etc., those who follow me already know all this. At one point, on an island, I was right across from the Peloponnesian region of the mainland; in fact, it was so close between the mainland and this island, it looked swimmable. It's taken me some time to get back into it, and I've mostly read the rest of this book whilst at work in short but concentrated bursts around, well, work.
The fact that we can read this is fascinating enough, some two-thousand odd years later. Thucydides was a general in the Peloponnesian War (an Athenian), and dedicated himself to writing an unbiased history book* about the 20+ years of the War. He mostly succeeds, though certain scholars far smarter than I am see through his supposed unbiasedness. The most interesting fact about the text are the many speeches, that are like Shakespearean monologues, littered throughout, from generals and politicians. Many of these Thucydides would have heard in the flesh, others by word-of-mouth; the world was still very much orientated around the oral tradition, so though their validity can be questioned, I imagine the essence of the speeches are very much intact. Thucydides takes us through the war chronologically, apparently a fairly modern concept in history telling, and reports as the seasons pass. In many respects, large portions of this are dry, dense and crammed with information and names. I'm no stranger to ancient texts or names as I studied Classical Civilisation for three years myself at college, though my focus was on the Romans and my study revolved around writers like Cicero, Suetonius and Tacitus (the last of whom I dreaded). Suetonius and Cicero were more readable and compelling, particularly the former, and I would recommend both of them as ancient writers before Thucydides, though they are of course Roman. My trip to Greece has fuelled my interest in Ancient Greece and I will explore more primary sources in the years to come. In my final year of college I did study The Odyssey, but that's as far as I got with Greek history/epics. I'd say this is a book for those who are truly interested and not an easy window into the primary sources; that said, I found it worthwhile and interesting, if not long and slow-going.
After mooching around on some islands my girlfriend and I went back to Athens and went to the park where Socrates's prison is held. Not far from there is the entrance to a tomb, where two bodies were buried. One of these was Thucydides himself. Below is the single photograph I took of the site.
_____
*This is, by many, considered one of the earliest 'history books' ever, if not the first. Thucydides is, as we would understand, a sort of 'modern' historian in his unbiased and chronological telling of the War and its events.
I began this, without realising, exactly two months ago in April. I then stopped for a duration of time as my girlfriend and I flew to Athens and I spent the next two weeks exploring, island-hopping, etc., those who follow me already know all this. At one point, on an island, I was right across from the Peloponnesian region of the mainland; in fact, it was so close between the mainland and this island, it looked swimmable. It's taken me some time to get back into it, and I've mostly read the rest of this book whilst at work in short but concentrated bursts around, well, work.
The fact that we can read this is fascinating enough, some two-thousand odd years later. Thucydides was a general in the Peloponnesian War (an Athenian), and dedicated himself to writing an unbiased history book* about the 20+ years of the War. He mostly succeeds, though certain scholars far smarter than I am see through his supposed unbiasedness. The most interesting fact about the text are the many speeches, that are like Shakespearean monologues, littered throughout, from generals and politicians. Many of these Thucydides would have heard in the flesh, others by word-of-mouth; the world was still very much orientated around the oral tradition, so though their validity can be questioned, I imagine the essence of the speeches are very much intact. Thucydides takes us through the war chronologically, apparently a fairly modern concept in history telling, and reports as the seasons pass. In many respects, large portions of this are dry, dense and crammed with information and names. I'm no stranger to ancient texts or names as I studied Classical Civilisation for three years myself at college, though my focus was on the Romans and my study revolved around writers like Cicero, Suetonius and Tacitus (the last of whom I dreaded). Suetonius and Cicero were more readable and compelling, particularly the former, and I would recommend both of them as ancient writers before Thucydides, though they are of course Roman. My trip to Greece has fuelled my interest in Ancient Greece and I will explore more primary sources in the years to come. In my final year of college I did study The Odyssey, but that's as far as I got with Greek history/epics. I'd say this is a book for those who are truly interested and not an easy window into the primary sources; that said, I found it worthwhile and interesting, if not long and slow-going.
After mooching around on some islands my girlfriend and I went back to Athens and went to the park where Socrates's prison is held. Not far from there is the entrance to a tomb, where two bodies were buried. One of these was Thucydides himself. Below is the single photograph I took of the site.
_____
*This is, by many, considered one of the earliest 'history books' ever, if not the first. Thucydides is, as we would understand, a sort of 'modern' historian in his unbiased and chronological telling of the War and its events.
June 9, 2020
‘Spartan dogs!, Turkish Taffy’, I’ve always wanted to use that line from Woody Allen’s Japanese redubbed into English movie ‘What’s Up Tiger Lilly’. Now the Spartan’s really aren’t dogs and taffy and Turkey have nothing to do with this book, but this book ranks as one of the greatest books ever written, and it’s clear that the Spartan’s were more than just laconic warriors and Athenians might have been lovers of wisdom but were also lovers of hegemonic domination.
It is not necessary to understand all the players, the interlocking rivalries or the specifics as they are brilliantly told in this war chronicle. The book takes the particular and connects them to the universal, truths across time. What is justice, what is deserving of our time or what makes the good? All this is laid out in this story telling about the war and the often fatal hubris of humans and what motivates us as human beings.
This book surprised me. I was reluctant to try it because I thought it was going to be a boring telling of war and its inner details. I was wrong. Yes, it does have actual war details but that is only a prelude in order to let the narrative allow the author to get at the universal truth of discovering our meaning of being human, and yes, even why we choose to fight and go to war. (‘Only an admiral can lose a war in a day’)!
I would bet Abraham Lincoln read this book and understood it beyond a story of just the war itself. Pericles funeral oration as dramatized in this book is clearly as moving and meaningful as the Gettysburg Address and probably influenced Lincoln’s thought on sacrificing a life for the sake of one's country, and shows that in each cohort even separated by over 2000 years of time that what we want from life and what matters has a constancy embedded within it and that we as humans are willing to give all for a belief that transcends the material. Each oration has within it the reason why humans will give the ultimate for a cause (ideology), a person (family) or their country (culture). (There are actually shades of ‘God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son in order for you to have eternal life’, within both orations. That just shows that our meaning often lies within us from the value that we place on our own self dignity or self worth).
The description of the plague in Athens in 429 B.C.E. is unlike anything I’ve read elsewhere. History is often best told by observation. Thucydides understands why it mattered and describes the particular while providing the context inside the web of moving parts which make up history and determine the future. I wonder what would have happened to world history if Athens was not devastated with a plague.
Regarding the siege of Syracuse I was totally enraptured by the unfolding of the events. As with most moderns, I had no idea who was going to win the battle and couldn’t wait to find out. The story telling was that good, no, it was better than good, it was great!
But, I haven’t even hinted at the best part of the book. The speeches and the motivations that key players use to rationalize their reasoning. Life is complex and we are easily misled by the framing of the arguments. As an objective observer because of the remoteness of time, I would listen to the first speaker give his piece and think ‘his arguments are irrefutable’, then the contra argument was made and I would think the same. Should we attack, should we not, or should we kill every single man woman and child in the defeated city in order to send a message. The same arguments are used today and politicians always love to ‘send a message’ by projecting strength so the others don’t perceive us as weak. ‘The more things change, the more they remain the same’.
‘Silence and order’ is what the sailors were told before their sea battle. That is what they were told they needed in order to survive. In life ‘silence and order’ serve us well. Two words to describe our modern day perceptions of ancient Spartans: silence and order, also ‘silence and order’ could be a two word definition for ‘stoic’. Conversely, two thoughts to describe our modern day perceptions of ancient Athenians and also serve us well for life: ‘speak and act as an individual’, also a two thought definition for ‘epicurean’.
This book transcends the story that is being told. For those who don’t like it, or think it has no relevance with today, the problem is with them not the book. This is a rare book for which I would recommend to anybody because of the truths that abound within it. This book precedes Plato’s Republic, but one can’t help feeling the echo from this book intentionally reverberating within ‘The Republic’. At least Plato’s contemporary readers would have seen the similarities within this book and would have understood the intentional connections.
It is not necessary to understand all the players, the interlocking rivalries or the specifics as they are brilliantly told in this war chronicle. The book takes the particular and connects them to the universal, truths across time. What is justice, what is deserving of our time or what makes the good? All this is laid out in this story telling about the war and the often fatal hubris of humans and what motivates us as human beings.
This book surprised me. I was reluctant to try it because I thought it was going to be a boring telling of war and its inner details. I was wrong. Yes, it does have actual war details but that is only a prelude in order to let the narrative allow the author to get at the universal truth of discovering our meaning of being human, and yes, even why we choose to fight and go to war. (‘Only an admiral can lose a war in a day’)!
I would bet Abraham Lincoln read this book and understood it beyond a story of just the war itself. Pericles funeral oration as dramatized in this book is clearly as moving and meaningful as the Gettysburg Address and probably influenced Lincoln’s thought on sacrificing a life for the sake of one's country, and shows that in each cohort even separated by over 2000 years of time that what we want from life and what matters has a constancy embedded within it and that we as humans are willing to give all for a belief that transcends the material. Each oration has within it the reason why humans will give the ultimate for a cause (ideology), a person (family) or their country (culture). (There are actually shades of ‘God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son in order for you to have eternal life’, within both orations. That just shows that our meaning often lies within us from the value that we place on our own self dignity or self worth).
The description of the plague in Athens in 429 B.C.E. is unlike anything I’ve read elsewhere. History is often best told by observation. Thucydides understands why it mattered and describes the particular while providing the context inside the web of moving parts which make up history and determine the future. I wonder what would have happened to world history if Athens was not devastated with a plague.
Regarding the siege of Syracuse I was totally enraptured by the unfolding of the events. As with most moderns, I had no idea who was going to win the battle and couldn’t wait to find out. The story telling was that good, no, it was better than good, it was great!
But, I haven’t even hinted at the best part of the book. The speeches and the motivations that key players use to rationalize their reasoning. Life is complex and we are easily misled by the framing of the arguments. As an objective observer because of the remoteness of time, I would listen to the first speaker give his piece and think ‘his arguments are irrefutable’, then the contra argument was made and I would think the same. Should we attack, should we not, or should we kill every single man woman and child in the defeated city in order to send a message. The same arguments are used today and politicians always love to ‘send a message’ by projecting strength so the others don’t perceive us as weak. ‘The more things change, the more they remain the same’.
‘Silence and order’ is what the sailors were told before their sea battle. That is what they were told they needed in order to survive. In life ‘silence and order’ serve us well. Two words to describe our modern day perceptions of ancient Spartans: silence and order, also ‘silence and order’ could be a two word definition for ‘stoic’. Conversely, two thoughts to describe our modern day perceptions of ancient Athenians and also serve us well for life: ‘speak and act as an individual’, also a two thought definition for ‘epicurean’.
This book transcends the story that is being told. For those who don’t like it, or think it has no relevance with today, the problem is with them not the book. This is a rare book for which I would recommend to anybody because of the truths that abound within it. This book precedes Plato’s Republic, but one can’t help feeling the echo from this book intentionally reverberating within ‘The Republic’. At least Plato’s contemporary readers would have seen the similarities within this book and would have understood the intentional connections.
June 26, 2022
Herodot jeste otac istorije, ali čitanje njegovih Istorija na trenutke podseća na čitanje bajki. A te bajke, skoro uvek jako zabavne, ponekad su bliže Homeru nego istoriji.
Tukidid je otprilike istorija kakvom je zamišljamo. Vikipedija neka ti bude pri ruci kako bi bolje razumeo kontekst, ali pred tobom jeste vrsni istoričar. Ovde možda imamo manjak romantike, ali dešavanja su opisana jasno i gusto - i mnogo približnije istoriografiji. Iz prepričavanja dešavanja razumemo da je neke događaje preživeo i sam, ali i da je potrošio godine razgovarajući sa ljudima sa atinske i sa spartanske strane. Opis ekspedicije na Siciliju je i detaljan i tragičan - a iako je bio jedno vreme atinski general, objektivan je, često i podsetnik da zlatno doba Atine i nije bilo toliko zlatno za sve koji su se s Atinom susretali u to vreme.
Osim što je odličan istoričar, Tukidid je i dobar pisac. Piše jasno, direktno. Možda mi se činilo da je negde štedeo na rečima - ali kad stigne do govora... Kakav je to vatromet svaki put! Da ovo delo sadrži samo govore državnika i generala, bilo bi vredno najviše ocene. Ma, vredelo bi i da sadrži samo Periklove govore (zašto političari danas ne govore tako?) Kako Tukidid kaže u jednom trenutku, trudio se da dođe do zapisa stvarno održanog govora, ali ako to nije moguće, sastavljao ga je onako kako najbolje odgovara govornikovoj ličnosti, situaciji i idejama strane koju govornik zastupa. Ti govori su filozofija za sebe - etika, moral, vrline, mane, retorika, religioznost...
Da bi potpuno uživao u Tukididu, treba da ti je jasna istorija 5. veka p.n.e. Pomoći će ako si čitao Herodota, Platona ili grčke tragičare. Još bolje ako si bio na mestima o kojima priča. Ali i da nisi... ova knjiga objašnjava zbog čega su neka dela - klasici za sva vremena.
Tukidid je otprilike istorija kakvom je zamišljamo. Vikipedija neka ti bude pri ruci kako bi bolje razumeo kontekst, ali pred tobom jeste vrsni istoričar. Ovde možda imamo manjak romantike, ali dešavanja su opisana jasno i gusto - i mnogo približnije istoriografiji. Iz prepričavanja dešavanja razumemo da je neke događaje preživeo i sam, ali i da je potrošio godine razgovarajući sa ljudima sa atinske i sa spartanske strane. Opis ekspedicije na Siciliju je i detaljan i tragičan - a iako je bio jedno vreme atinski general, objektivan je, često i podsetnik da zlatno doba Atine i nije bilo toliko zlatno za sve koji su se s Atinom susretali u to vreme.
Osim što je odličan istoričar, Tukidid je i dobar pisac. Piše jasno, direktno. Možda mi se činilo da je negde štedeo na rečima - ali kad stigne do govora... Kakav je to vatromet svaki put! Da ovo delo sadrži samo govore državnika i generala, bilo bi vredno najviše ocene. Ma, vredelo bi i da sadrži samo Periklove govore (zašto političari danas ne govore tako?) Kako Tukidid kaže u jednom trenutku, trudio se da dođe do zapisa stvarno održanog govora, ali ako to nije moguće, sastavljao ga je onako kako najbolje odgovara govornikovoj ličnosti, situaciji i idejama strane koju govornik zastupa. Ti govori su filozofija za sebe - etika, moral, vrline, mane, retorika, religioznost...
Da bi potpuno uživao u Tukididu, treba da ti je jasna istorija 5. veka p.n.e. Pomoći će ako si čitao Herodota, Platona ili grčke tragičare. Još bolje ako si bio na mestima o kojima priča. Ali i da nisi... ova knjiga objašnjava zbog čega su neka dela - klasici za sva vremena.
November 8, 2016
Not quite as fun to read as Herodotus' eccentric Histories, but still an important primary source. I could get through it quite well with my limited knowledge of Greek history and the Peloponnesian War, but I would recommend brushing up for context. Also the Jowlett translation from 1881 (which can be found on Perseus online) is the clearest and easiest to follow.
January 25, 2010
Thucydides sounds surprisingly modern for a writer who lived 2,400 years ago. He provides a record of over 21 years in strict chronological order and describes the interests of the two sides with more objective fairness than can be expected today from modern journalists (especially the TV kind). He mentions in the middle of the book that he spent 20 years away from Athens in exile, so that may explain why he can describe the non-Athenian view with such poignancy.
"I lived through the whole of it, being of an age to comprehend events, and giving my attention to them in order to know the exact truth about them. It was also my fate to be an exile from my country for twenty years after my command at Amphipolis, and being present with both parties, and more especially with the Peloponnesians by reason of my exile, I had leisure to observe affairs more closely."
This book deserves honor and respect due to its antiquity, and the fact it has survived all those years. It was written about 400 BCE and the oldest surviving manuscript dates from 900 CE. That is 1300 years over which the equivalent of a 700 paged book needed to be hand copied at approximately 100 year intervals in order for it to still be available today.
In addition to his strict adherence to chronology, Thucydides also includes dozens of speeches assigned to the principal figures engaged in the war. These include addresses given to troops by their generals before battles and numerous political speeches, both by Athenian and Spartan leaders, as well as debates between various parties. Of the speeches, the most famous is the funeral oration of Pericles. Thucydides undoubtedly heard some of these speeches himself while for others he relied on eyewitness accounts. Some of the speeches are probably fabricated according to his expectations of, as he puts it, "what was called for in each situation." While the inclusion of long first-person speeches is somewhat alien to modern ears it makes sense within the context of ancient Greek oral culture.
The gods play no active role in Thucydides' work--very different from Herodotus. Instead, Thucydides regards history as being caused by the choices and actions of human beings. When referencing myth he clearly so indicates:
”The earliest inhabitants spoken of in any part of the country are the Cyclopes and Laestrygones; but I cannot tell of what race they were, or from where they came or to where they went, and must leave my readers to what the poets have said of them and to what may be generally known concerning them.”
Thucydides correlates, in his description of the 426 BC Maliakos Gulf tsunami, for the first time in the history of natural science, quakes and waves in terms of cause and effect:
“The cause, in my opinion, of this phenomenon must be sought in the earthquake. At the point where its shock has been the most violent the sea is driven back, and suddenly recoiling with redoubled force, causes the inundation. Without an earthquake I do not see how such an accident could happen.”
Another interesting reference to natural phenomena is his description of the volcanic action of Mt. Etna:
”In the first days of this spring, the stream of fire issued from Etna, as on former occasions, and destroyed some land of the Catanians, who live upon Mount Etna, which is the largest mountain in Sicily. Fifty years, it is said, had elapsed since the last eruption, there having been three in all since the Hellenes have inhabited Sicily.”
Another interesting quotation I found contains a hint of Thucydides' skepticism of divination and soothsayers:
"... they gave orders as secretly as possible for all to be prepared to sail out from the camp at a given signal. All was at last ready, and they were on the point of sailing away when an eclipse of the moon, which was then at the full, took place. Most of the Athenians, deeply impressed by this occurrence, now urged the generals to wait; and Nicias, who was somewhat over-addicted to divination and practices of that kind, refused from that moment even to take the question of departure into consideration, until they had waited the thrice nine days prescribed by the soothsayers."
As it turns out, the 27 day delay caused by the lunar eclipse probably resulted in the Athenians losing the battle, and consequently the war as well.
Despite being an Athenian and a participant in the conflict, Thucydides is often regarded as having written a generally unbiased account of the conflict and all the sides involved in it. In the introduction to the piece he states, "My work is not a piece of writing designed to meet the taste of an immediate public, but was done to last forever." Some historians have challenged this assertion, but it appeared true to me.
The book has an unsatisfactory ending. It suddenly ends in the 21st year of the 27 year long war. Historians are not certain as to why it ends there. One possibility is that he died. But there are some sources that suggest that he lived beyond the end of the war. He mentions in his own text that the war lasted 27 years. So answer me this! If he died before the end of the war, how did he know the length of time for the duration of the war? Maybe his pet dog ate the last 6 years. Or maybe he did things as I do, just never got around to finishing the job.
I find it interesting to note what is not in the book. There is no mention of the two individuals who subsequently became the most famous Ancient Greek names of the era, Socrates and Plato. (There is one reference to "Socrates son of Antigenes," but that it is not the Socrates we know about from Plato.) Socrates and Plato were contemporaries of Thucydides, but they were mere civilians of little consequence--although Socrates did fight in the early parts of the war as a young man. The importance of Socrates and Plato only became evident with the later popularity of Plato's writing. It's interesting to note that writers of contemporary history don't always know what will be considered important to later readers--e.g. Josephus' making no mention of Jesus and writing one sentence about his followers.
The only reason I listened to this book was because it was selected for discussion by the Great Books KC group. I listened to the LibriVox audio recording of the translation by Richard Crawley. Otherwise I would have never had the patience for it.
A much more pleasant way to learn about the Peloponnesian War is the historical novel, Tides of War by Steven Pressfield. Link to my Review.
"I lived through the whole of it, being of an age to comprehend events, and giving my attention to them in order to know the exact truth about them. It was also my fate to be an exile from my country for twenty years after my command at Amphipolis, and being present with both parties, and more especially with the Peloponnesians by reason of my exile, I had leisure to observe affairs more closely."
This book deserves honor and respect due to its antiquity, and the fact it has survived all those years. It was written about 400 BCE and the oldest surviving manuscript dates from 900 CE. That is 1300 years over which the equivalent of a 700 paged book needed to be hand copied at approximately 100 year intervals in order for it to still be available today.
In addition to his strict adherence to chronology, Thucydides also includes dozens of speeches assigned to the principal figures engaged in the war. These include addresses given to troops by their generals before battles and numerous political speeches, both by Athenian and Spartan leaders, as well as debates between various parties. Of the speeches, the most famous is the funeral oration of Pericles. Thucydides undoubtedly heard some of these speeches himself while for others he relied on eyewitness accounts. Some of the speeches are probably fabricated according to his expectations of, as he puts it, "what was called for in each situation." While the inclusion of long first-person speeches is somewhat alien to modern ears it makes sense within the context of ancient Greek oral culture.
The gods play no active role in Thucydides' work--very different from Herodotus. Instead, Thucydides regards history as being caused by the choices and actions of human beings. When referencing myth he clearly so indicates:
”The earliest inhabitants spoken of in any part of the country are the Cyclopes and Laestrygones; but I cannot tell of what race they were, or from where they came or to where they went, and must leave my readers to what the poets have said of them and to what may be generally known concerning them.”
Thucydides correlates, in his description of the 426 BC Maliakos Gulf tsunami, for the first time in the history of natural science, quakes and waves in terms of cause and effect:
“The cause, in my opinion, of this phenomenon must be sought in the earthquake. At the point where its shock has been the most violent the sea is driven back, and suddenly recoiling with redoubled force, causes the inundation. Without an earthquake I do not see how such an accident could happen.”
Another interesting reference to natural phenomena is his description of the volcanic action of Mt. Etna:
”In the first days of this spring, the stream of fire issued from Etna, as on former occasions, and destroyed some land of the Catanians, who live upon Mount Etna, which is the largest mountain in Sicily. Fifty years, it is said, had elapsed since the last eruption, there having been three in all since the Hellenes have inhabited Sicily.”
Another interesting quotation I found contains a hint of Thucydides' skepticism of divination and soothsayers:
"... they gave orders as secretly as possible for all to be prepared to sail out from the camp at a given signal. All was at last ready, and they were on the point of sailing away when an eclipse of the moon, which was then at the full, took place. Most of the Athenians, deeply impressed by this occurrence, now urged the generals to wait; and Nicias, who was somewhat over-addicted to divination and practices of that kind, refused from that moment even to take the question of departure into consideration, until they had waited the thrice nine days prescribed by the soothsayers."
As it turns out, the 27 day delay caused by the lunar eclipse probably resulted in the Athenians losing the battle, and consequently the war as well.
Despite being an Athenian and a participant in the conflict, Thucydides is often regarded as having written a generally unbiased account of the conflict and all the sides involved in it. In the introduction to the piece he states, "My work is not a piece of writing designed to meet the taste of an immediate public, but was done to last forever." Some historians have challenged this assertion, but it appeared true to me.
The book has an unsatisfactory ending. It suddenly ends in the 21st year of the 27 year long war. Historians are not certain as to why it ends there. One possibility is that he died. But there are some sources that suggest that he lived beyond the end of the war. He mentions in his own text that the war lasted 27 years. So answer me this! If he died before the end of the war, how did he know the length of time for the duration of the war? Maybe his pet dog ate the last 6 years. Or maybe he did things as I do, just never got around to finishing the job.
I find it interesting to note what is not in the book. There is no mention of the two individuals who subsequently became the most famous Ancient Greek names of the era, Socrates and Plato. (There is one reference to "Socrates son of Antigenes," but that it is not the Socrates we know about from Plato.) Socrates and Plato were contemporaries of Thucydides, but they were mere civilians of little consequence--although Socrates did fight in the early parts of the war as a young man. The importance of Socrates and Plato only became evident with the later popularity of Plato's writing. It's interesting to note that writers of contemporary history don't always know what will be considered important to later readers--e.g. Josephus' making no mention of Jesus and writing one sentence about his followers.
The only reason I listened to this book was because it was selected for discussion by the Great Books KC group. I listened to the LibriVox audio recording of the translation by Richard Crawley. Otherwise I would have never had the patience for it.
A much more pleasant way to learn about the Peloponnesian War is the historical novel, Tides of War by Steven Pressfield. Link to my Review.
November 16, 2021
Goodbye Thucydides may we never meet again
November 1, 2019
What a valuable historical source this is! It has to be placed a little higher even than historians like Tacitus and Livy (who probably had a better idea of what they were doing, given that that they were working as historians in an exisiting field, rather than pretty much creating the field as they went along). There's something quite strange reading about these events from the perspective of someone who doesn't simply want to record history, but also to mention their own part in making it. I still have to remind myself: Thucydides really lived through these events, and played a role in many of them.
The party opposed to the traitors were sufficiently strong in number to prevent the immediate opening of the gates, and with the assistance of the general Eucles (who was there from Athens to protect the place) they sent for help to the other general in the Thraceward region, Thucydides the son of Olorus, the author of this history. He was at Thasos, an island colonized from Paros, about half a day’s sail from Amphipolis. As soon as he received the message he sailed at full speed with the seven ships at his disposal, wanting to reach Amphipolis, if possible, before any move to surrender the city, or, failing that, to secure Eïon.
And that is probably a pretty indicative passage in terms of the style of this text. Yes, it's dry. But Thucydides is not entirely without skill as a story-teller. If you are thinking about reading this, you shouldn't let the lack of liveliness put you off. Thucydides is not a bad writer. In fact, his analysis is often what makes this text enjoyable. Not only was he an eye-witness to events, he was also a knowledgable strategist in and of himself, and could often break down why things went wrong.
They did not have the same opportunity to learn the enemy password, as the Syracusans, getting the better of the battle and keeping their forces concentrated, had less difficulty in recognizing their own side. The result was that if a superior force of Athenians encountered a group of enemy, the enemy could get away by knowing the Athenian password, whereas the other way round, if the Athenians could not respond when challenged for the password, they were killed. But nothing did greater harm than the confusion caused by the singing of the paean, which had a virtually identical sound on both sides. Whenever the Argives, Corcyraeans, or other Dorian contingents on the Athenian side raised their paean, the effect was to frighten the Athenians just as much as the enemy’s paeans.
But yes, it's a comendable text. It's not easy to imagine what our knowledge of the period would look like without it. No doubt, our knowledge of the war would be enormously impoverished.
The party opposed to the traitors were sufficiently strong in number to prevent the immediate opening of the gates, and with the assistance of the general Eucles (who was there from Athens to protect the place) they sent for help to the other general in the Thraceward region, Thucydides the son of Olorus, the author of this history. He was at Thasos, an island colonized from Paros, about half a day’s sail from Amphipolis. As soon as he received the message he sailed at full speed with the seven ships at his disposal, wanting to reach Amphipolis, if possible, before any move to surrender the city, or, failing that, to secure Eïon.
And that is probably a pretty indicative passage in terms of the style of this text. Yes, it's dry. But Thucydides is not entirely without skill as a story-teller. If you are thinking about reading this, you shouldn't let the lack of liveliness put you off. Thucydides is not a bad writer. In fact, his analysis is often what makes this text enjoyable. Not only was he an eye-witness to events, he was also a knowledgable strategist in and of himself, and could often break down why things went wrong.
They did not have the same opportunity to learn the enemy password, as the Syracusans, getting the better of the battle and keeping their forces concentrated, had less difficulty in recognizing their own side. The result was that if a superior force of Athenians encountered a group of enemy, the enemy could get away by knowing the Athenian password, whereas the other way round, if the Athenians could not respond when challenged for the password, they were killed. But nothing did greater harm than the confusion caused by the singing of the paean, which had a virtually identical sound on both sides. Whenever the Argives, Corcyraeans, or other Dorian contingents on the Athenian side raised their paean, the effect was to frighten the Athenians just as much as the enemy’s paeans.
But yes, it's a comendable text. It's not easy to imagine what our knowledge of the period would look like without it. No doubt, our knowledge of the war would be enormously impoverished.
June 12, 2018
Masterwork
January 30, 2016
One on the reading bucket list down. A must for the ancient world. Sparta versus Athens. Post Thermopylae history is primarily known because of Thucydides. I am still amazed that this history made it to us over the centuries. I am very happy I picked this one up and finally finished it off.
Read
April 7, 2023"História da Guerra do Peloponeso" foi escrito no século V a.C por Tucídides, sendo por isso mesmo um registo histórico de incomensurável valor, mas é também um marco da História enquanto disciplina académica. Neste último sentido, fez-me compreender que apesar de na última década me ter dedicado a ler mais e mais História, na verdade continuo longe da mesma, em termos académicos. Interessam-me as histórias sobre a História, não me interessam tanto os relatos descritivos, mesmo que mais fidedignos ou verdadeiros. Não me move chegar “à verdade”, move-me mais a ideia de que aquilo que se conta é baseado numa realidade. Desde logo, porque mesmo num livro tão descritivo, tão emocionalmente neutro e objetivo, é possível denotar viés a ponto de hoje alguns historiadores o classificarem mesmo como apenas literatura. Claro que falo de um ponto de vista externo, não leio estas obras para documentar a minha investigação, se assim fosse falaria de modo distinto. Como leio apenas pelo prazer de ler, esse é maior quando a História usa o melhor da arte narrativa para chegar a nós, mesmo colocando em causa parte da sua factualidade que aceito bem quando é feito por via da especulação, mas não tanto quando pela mera invenção.
continua no VI: https://virtual-illusion.blogspot.com...
continua no VI: https://virtual-illusion.blogspot.com...
July 17, 2019
Let it first be said, in reference to that discipline involving the examination of events which, though passed, may have relevance to, or lessons for, the current era, or even perhaps future eras, that it is my primary interest and avocation to extend my own understanding of the various persons -- statesmen, generals, men of wealth and influence, and others -- who contributed to the origin and who shaped the outcome of these events; and also, when I may reasonably do so, to draw whatever general conclusions from such accounts as may, in the course of time, prove useful to me in better understanding my own life, the times in which I live, and those other times to which my attention might be applied with similar intent.
That, my friends, is my attempt to share my own experience of how Thucydides writes. He beats even Hegel on the "average number of clauses per sentence" metric. He digresses within his digressions. He qualifies his qualifiers. What's more, in the translator's introduction, that worthy artisan confirms with some chagrin that all of this is there in the original Greek; that in fact two millennia of critical analyses have failed to untangle in any satisfactory way some of Thucydides' more ambitious grammatical performance art.
Put simply, this book was a long, hard slog. As an avid student of history, I had been meaning to read this seminal work by the Father of History for decades, and in fact I am very glad I did so -- but wow, that was a lot of work. Compounding the complexity of the style is the tendency of the text to drop into pages of excruciatingly boring lists of people and places with barely a linking action verb to be found between them. I very often had the experience of having my eyes reach the bottom of a page, only to sheepishly realize that I had actually registered none of what I had "read" there. I will freely admit that I revived the skimming skills I last used regularly in college in order to finish the book before the sun reaches its red-giant phase.
And again, all that being said, I am glad I read this. For when Thucydides takes a break from listing every commander in a minor battle or the fleet sizes of every city in the Aegean, he delivers wonderful, brilliantly worded insights into eternal truths of politics, war, and society. He is not often a "poetic" author, but his wrenching, carefully escalating description of the catastrophic Plague of Athens broke my heart. The speeches quoted (and, he admits, reconstructed) from various luminaries are riveting, brilliantly worded, and full of examples of rhetoric at its most finely honed. That they all sound the same, and thus very likely all sound like Thucydides, is a small cavil indeed.
Being a great admirer of Tides of War, a carefully researched historical novel set during the same period addressed by Thucydides, I was especially interested in seeing Thucydides' portrayal of Alcibiades, a remarkable man who managed during his tumultuous life to lead and betray most of the major parties in the Peloponnesian War. Thucydides' account was (of course) sparser than Pressfield's and rather jumbled, but it captured the essence of this complex figure. I came away with a fresh appreciation for both authors.
For all its faults (which are examined at length in the introduction), this work stands as the first attempt to write history in the modern mode -- analytical, dispassionate, and evidence-based. It falls far short of those goals in countless ways, but to even conceive of this task in 400 BCE is evidence of genius. His successes are far more remarkable and important than his failures. Despite the many times this book came close to being bounced off the far wall of my living room, I am happy that I took the time and effort to read it. If you have the same interests and stamina as I, you may find the same. Otherwise, stick to Pressfield. Or Wikipedia.
That, my friends, is my attempt to share my own experience of how Thucydides writes. He beats even Hegel on the "average number of clauses per sentence" metric. He digresses within his digressions. He qualifies his qualifiers. What's more, in the translator's introduction, that worthy artisan confirms with some chagrin that all of this is there in the original Greek; that in fact two millennia of critical analyses have failed to untangle in any satisfactory way some of Thucydides' more ambitious grammatical performance art.
Put simply, this book was a long, hard slog. As an avid student of history, I had been meaning to read this seminal work by the Father of History for decades, and in fact I am very glad I did so -- but wow, that was a lot of work. Compounding the complexity of the style is the tendency of the text to drop into pages of excruciatingly boring lists of people and places with barely a linking action verb to be found between them. I very often had the experience of having my eyes reach the bottom of a page, only to sheepishly realize that I had actually registered none of what I had "read" there. I will freely admit that I revived the skimming skills I last used regularly in college in order to finish the book before the sun reaches its red-giant phase.
And again, all that being said, I am glad I read this. For when Thucydides takes a break from listing every commander in a minor battle or the fleet sizes of every city in the Aegean, he delivers wonderful, brilliantly worded insights into eternal truths of politics, war, and society. He is not often a "poetic" author, but his wrenching, carefully escalating description of the catastrophic Plague of Athens broke my heart. The speeches quoted (and, he admits, reconstructed) from various luminaries are riveting, brilliantly worded, and full of examples of rhetoric at its most finely honed. That they all sound the same, and thus very likely all sound like Thucydides, is a small cavil indeed.
Being a great admirer of Tides of War, a carefully researched historical novel set during the same period addressed by Thucydides, I was especially interested in seeing Thucydides' portrayal of Alcibiades, a remarkable man who managed during his tumultuous life to lead and betray most of the major parties in the Peloponnesian War. Thucydides' account was (of course) sparser than Pressfield's and rather jumbled, but it captured the essence of this complex figure. I came away with a fresh appreciation for both authors.
For all its faults (which are examined at length in the introduction), this work stands as the first attempt to write history in the modern mode -- analytical, dispassionate, and evidence-based. It falls far short of those goals in countless ways, but to even conceive of this task in 400 BCE is evidence of genius. His successes are far more remarkable and important than his failures. Despite the many times this book came close to being bounced off the far wall of my living room, I am happy that I took the time and effort to read it. If you have the same interests and stamina as I, you may find the same. Otherwise, stick to Pressfield. Or Wikipedia.
March 20, 2022
"Είναι γνώρισμα των φρονίμων ανθρώπων να κάθονται ήσυχα, εφόσον δεν αδικούνται, είναι όμως γνώρισμα των γενεών, όταν αδικούνται, να αφήνουν την Ειρήνη και να πολεμούν, και αντιστρόφως, εάν κρίνουν κατάλληλη την περίσταση να σταματούν τον πόλεμο και να έρχονται πάλι σε συμβιβασμό. Κι ούτε να τους συνεπαίρνουν οι επιτυχίες στον πόλεμο ούτε πάλι να ανέχονται να τους αδικούν απολαμβάνοντας την ησυχία της ειρήνης. Γιατί και εκείνος που διστάζει να πράξει εξαιτίας αυτής της ευχαρίστησης, μπορεί, παραμένοντας ήσυχος, να στερηθεί πάρα πολύ γρήγορα την ευχαρίστηση της ανεμελιάς που εξαιτίας της διστάζει, κι εκείνος που επαίρεται στον πόλεμο για τις επιτυχίες του να μην έχει συλλογιστεί πόσο απατηλή είναι η αυτοπεποίθηση που τον παρασύρει."
Μετάφραση: Ν. Μ. Σκουτερόπουλος
Εκδόσεις ΠΟΛΙΣ
Μετάφραση: Ν. Μ. Σκουτερόπουλος
Εκδόσεις ΠΟΛΙΣ
May 3, 2008
Is 600 pages long, 10 of which are amazing. The other 590 don't justify the 10. Contains long sections which are lists of where ships came from. Basically not worth reading unless you are desperate to know the minutiae of the war. Author touches on a few interesting points such as the role of perspective in history, the importance of objectivity, and a few timeless characteristics of human nature. However he does not bother to dwell on these points. Spoiler: it ends in mid sentence!
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