Introduction As Herodotus explores how much and in which ways human societies are mutually different, he takes for granted the generally recognized subdivision of the world into Greeks and barbarians. [1] But this common-view discourse provides only a partial framework of explanation for the text of the Histories. [2] The language of the Greek-barbarian antithesis stands in… Read more
1. Greek Speakers Greeks and Pelasgians In his narrative of Miltiades’ conquest of Lemnos (6.137–140), Herodotus begins by reporting how at that time Pelasgians were occupying the island. In the heroic age these Pelasgians used to live in Attica but the Athenians expelled them, “either justly or unjustly,” depending on the source one believes. According to Hecataeus, the Athenians had allowed the Pelasgians to inhabit an… Read more
2. The Ethnographer and Foreign Languages Another histōr: Psammetichus and the origin of language One passage in the Histories appears to raise the anthropological problem of the beginning of human speech and therefore, potentially, of the origin of language differentiation. But it does so in an indirect way, through the eyes of the Egyptian king Psammetichus who is, moreover, interested in a different problem. Psammetichus “wants… Read more
3. Herodotos hermēneus Metalinguistic glosses Herodotus himself assumes the role of interpreter when he translates a foreign word into Greek or provides a native term. Aside from Psammetichus’ discovery that bekós is Phrygian for bread (2.2), all switches of the linguistic code in the Histories occur in metanarrative. [1] In about twenty cases the narrator deliberately introduces a common noun denoting some… Read more
4. The Meaning of Language Difference On misunderstanding language difference In relation to the standards against which he measures himself, the histōr of the Histories possesses a multi-lingual competence that contrasts with the sense of strangeness most Greek-speakers experience when confronted with any barbarian speech. In his narrative of the common origins of the oracles of Zeus-Ammon in Libya and of Zeus at Dodona, [… Read more
Bibliography Alty, J. 1982. “Dorians and Ionians.” JHS 102:1–14. Armayor, O. K. 1987. “Hecataeus’ Humor and Irony in Herodotus’ Narrative of Egypt.” AW 16:11–18. ———. 1978. “Herodotus’ Persian Vocabulary.” AW 1:4. Asad, T. 1986. “The Concept of Cultural Translation in British Social Anthro-pology.” In Clifford and Marcus 1986:141–164. Asheri, D. Read more
Acknowledgments It is a pleasure to acknowledge the many people who have contributed in large and small ways to the development of this book. They are: Susanna Braund, Don Cameron, Jenny Strauss Clay, Erwin Cook, John Miles Foley, Andrew Ford, Michael Gagarin, Traianos Gagos, John Garcia, Simon Goldhill, Richard Janko, Ludwig Koenen, Andre Lardinois, Richard Martin, Gregory Nagy, Jim Porter, Sara Rappe, Ruth Scodel, and Eva Stehle. Some were… Read more
Introduction: Toward an Understanding of Greek Poetic Contestation Denn weshalb soll Niemand der Beste sein? Weil damit der Wettkampf versiegen würde und der ewige Lebensgrund des hellenischen Staates gefährdet wäre. Why should no one be the best? Because then competition would end and the eternal source of life of the Hellenic state would be jeopardized. Nietzsche, Homer’s Wettkampf 1872 The purpose… Read more
Part I. Dramatic Representations of Verse Competition ἀγὼν γὰρ ἄνδρας οὐ μένει λελειμμένους The contest does not wait for men left behind. Aeschylus, fr. 37 TGF 1. Stichomythia Our point of departure will be to survey a variety of competitive verse sequences that are represented in tragedy and Old Comedy, starting with the phenomenon of stichomythia. In stichomythia… Read more
2. The ἀντιλαβή and Aristophanes’ Frogs 1198–1248 Old Comedy furnishes us not only with parallel statements that seem to include virtual definitions of tragic stichomythia (as e.g. above, Clouds 1374–75 with Eumenides 586), but it also provides examples of “stichomythic” exchanges that would lose their point if they were not meant to be understood as modeled on instances from tragedy. Heated confrontations, such as that between the… Read more
