The classical bulletin - Creighton University BSCW

34 book Reviews
The editors identify their book as a hybrid of different scholarly genres: a
combination of the monograph (it is univocal in that each chapter focuses
on a specific topic), the edited volume (it contains multiple interpretations
and approaches), and a commentary (it focuses on one book and analyses
it chronologically). This self-reflexive approach usefully frames the volume
in Herodotean terms and provides an ideal format for modeling Herodotus’
own approach to historiography—gathering multiple voices and approaches
and unifying them under one narrative umbrella.
Elizabeth Irwin provides an auspicious start with an insightful chapter
analyzing two seemingly inconsequential logoi: a historical anecdote about the
Paionians followed by an ethnographic account of the Thracians. Building on
this approach, Robin Osborne argues persuasively for the narrative and thematic
significance of two, again, seemingly unconnected logoi (historical then
ethnographic) about two Paionian tribes. David Fearn explores the ways in
which Alexander I and the Macedonians are portrayed as pro-Greek though
their cultural and political credentials are undermined by the narrative. The
logos of Darius’ bridge over the Hellespont provides Emily Greenwood with
the perfect opportunity to examine the geographical, cultural, and textual
implications of the bridge metaphor. In her excellent and engagingly written
chapter, Rosaria Munson argues that Herodotus absorbs and transcends
competing oral traditions surrounding the Ionian revolt, often undercutting
the political motivations that gave rise to them. Simon Hornblower examines
the ways in which the Dorieus episode dramatizes the interconnectedness of
events in and around the Mediterranean. Christopher Pelling analyzes the
use of the words diaballein and eupetees in Aristagoras’ bid to garner support
for the Ionian Revolt and concludes that Aristagoras’ ability to “put one over”
on the “pushover” Athenians raises questions about the validity of Athenian
and Spartan national stereotypes. Vivienne Gray argues that Herodotus’ digressions
about the ancestry of prominent figures in Athenian history (Harmodius,
Aristogeiton, and Cleisthenes) casts the relationship between Athens
and Ionia in ambivalent terms and reflects the ideological tension contained
in different attitudes to Ionianism at the time. Johannes Haubold expands
Gray’s political and cross-genre approach by mapping the digression on the
beginning of Athenian-Aeginetan hostilities onto early poetic models of historical
change—from divine to human agency, from sacred aetiologies to cultural
politics. In his chapter on Socles’ speech against tyranny, John Moles first
addresses the questions of whether the speech is any good (it is) and whether
it was appropriate for the occasion (it was). He then argues that through this
speech Herodotus asserts the value of democratic ideals and the necessity of
striving to live up to them despite the Athenians’ own frequent failures to do
so. Anastasia Serghidou’s nuanced and stimulating chapter examines how
Herodotus exploits Cyprus’ own ambivalent representations of its identity in
relation to Hellenicity and Persian rule.
Like the Histories itself, each of these essays investigates the seemingly
insignificant in connection with larger historical and narrative patterns and
reflects upon the ambiguity and the shifting nature of the lessons of the past.
As such, they act as an object lesson in Herodotus’ goals and methods. It is