The School of History: Athens in the Age of Socrates / Edition 1

by Mark H. Munn

Overview

History, political philosophy, and constitutional law were born in Athens in the space of a single generation—the generation that lived through the Peloponnesian War (431-404 b.c.e.). This remarkable age produced such luminaries as Socrates, Herodotus, Thucydides, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, and the sophists, and set the stage for the education and early careers of Plato and Xenophon, among others. The School of History provides the fullest and most detailed intellectual and political history available of Athens during the late fifth century b.c.e., as it examines the background, the context, and the decisive events shaping this society in the throes of war. This expansive, readable narrative ultimately leads to a new understanding of Athenian democratic culture, showing why and how it yielded such extraordinary intellectual productivity.

As both a source and a subject, Thucydides' history of the Peloponnesian War is the central text around which the narrative and thematic issues of the book revolve. Munn re-evaluates the formation of the Greek historiographical tradition itself as he identifies the conditions that prompted Thucydides to write—specifically the historian's desire to guide the Athenian democracy as it struggled to comprehend its future.

The School of History fully encompasses recent scholarship in history, literature, and archaeology. Munn's impressive mastery of the huge number of sources and publications informs his substantial contributions to our understanding of this democracy transformed by war. Immersing us fully in the intellectual foment of Athenian society, The School of History traces the history of Athens at the peak of its influence, both as a political and military power in its own time and as a source of intellectual inspiration for the centuries to come.

A Main Selection of the History Book Club

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520236851
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	01/01/2003
Series:	A Joan Palevsky Book in Classical Literature Ser.
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	537
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.30(d)
Lexile:	1460L (what's this?)

About the Author

Mark Munn is Associate Professor in the Departments of History and Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies at the Pennsylvania State University and the author of The Defense of Attica: The Dema Wall and the Boiotian War of 378-375 b.c. (California, 1993).

Table of Contents

	List of Illustrations	x
	Acknowledgments	xi
	Maps	xiii
	Introduction	1
Part 1	The Spirit of Democratic Athens, 510-415
1	The Past of Democratic Athens	15
	The Past and the Truth
	The Origins of Democracy
	Choral Songs and Tragedies
	Praise in Song
	Enacting the Immanent Past
	Performance and Public
	The Dead and the Living
	Everyman's Past
	Witnesses to the Past
2	The Aristocracy of Democratic Athens	46
	The Privileges of Empire
	The Best of the Athenians
	The Public Display of Private Arete
	Prowess in War
	The Impression of Power
	The Best of the Greeks
3	Servants of the Athenian Democracy	64
	The Power of Numbers
	Slaves of Slaves
	Friendship with Foreigners and Loyalty to the Demos
	The Sycophants
	The Demagogues
	The People's Money
	The Tyranny of the Demos
	The Sophists
	The Speech-Writers
	Victory, the Measure of Virtue
	The Oracle Mongers
	The Expertise of Syngrapheis
	The Conspirators
Part II	The Crisis of Athens, 415-403
4	The Expulsion of Alcibiades, 415-413	95
	Alcibiades
	Sicilian Ambitions
	Antiphon the Sophist
	Spoiling the Moment
	Athens Turned Inside Out
	The Conspiracy of the Mysteries
	Alcibiades' Defense
	The Destruction of Alcibiades
	Hearing the Testimony of History
	The Limits of Power
	The Will of the Gods
	Alcibiades in Flight
	The Flight of the Birds
5	Rationalizing Oligarchy, 413-411	127
	On the Boundaries of Asia
	Saviors and Phantoms
	Sage Advice
	The Ancestral Constitution
	The Best Laid Plans
	Desperate Straits
	Moderation and Accommodation
6	A Procession of Victories, 411-408	152
	Victory at Cyzicus
	Immutable Change
	The Generals and the Men of Athens
	Realizing Vision
	Alcibiades Triumphant
	Alcibiades and the Laws
	Beloved of the Mother of the Gods
7	The Limits of Democratic Imperative, 408-405	175
	Lordship of Asia
	The Eclipse of Alcibiades
	Victory at Arginusae
	The Trial of the Generals
	Playing on Reason
	Finding the Right Perspective
	To Humor the Lion
8	Surrendering to Sparta, 405-404	195
	The Friendship of Cyrus
	The Battle of Aegospotami
	Conon, Cyprus, and the New King
	The Siege of Athens
	Negotiating With Sparta
	Theramenes' Secret
	The Surrender of Athens
	The Agents of Oligarchy
	Again, the Ancestral Constitution
	Breaking the Back of the Democracy
	Pulling Out the Roots of Empire
9	The Athenian Civil War, 404-403	218
	Freedom and Slavery
	The Thirty "Establishers of the Laws"
	Social Engineering
	More Ancient Virtues
	Those Who Are In and Those Who Are Out
	Beating Out the Lion
	The Return of the Exiles
	War Between Piraeus and Athens
	The Spartan Settlement
Part III	Resurrecting Athens, 403-395
10	The Laws of Athens, 403-400	247
	Sources
	The Few and the Many
	The Restoration of a Democracy
	The Heroes of Piraeus
	True
	Athenians
	Andocides and the Laws
	The Work of the Nomothetai
	The Laws of Athens
11	Eliminating Socrates, 401-399	273
	The Case Against Nicomachus
	Amnesty and Remembrance
	Ominous Reminders
	Socrates' Offense
12	Athenian Democracy and History, 399-395	292
	A New Past for a New Beginning
	A Passion for Books
	Socrates and the Laws
	Remembering the Spoken Word
	The Account Compiled by Thucydides
	Thucydides in Exile
	Thucydides in Athens
	Why Thucydides Wrote
	The Unfinished Condition
	The Beginnings of Posterity
Appendix A.	Epigraphic Chronology	331
Appendix B.	Euripides' Helen and Aristophanes' Thesmophoriazusae	333
Appendix C.	Chronology of the Events of 410-406	335
Appendix D.	The Surrender of Athens and the Installation of the Thirty	340
	Abbreviations	345
	Notes	347
	Bibliography	441
	General Index	469
	Index Locorum	495

Editorial Reviews

So thorough, exhaustive and wide-ranging an investigation. . . . The attentive reader can still confront most of the enigmas and inconsistencies that bedevil this key period, and form his or her own theories from the ample materials provided.

Times Literary Supplement

A work of considerable research . . . closely argued and detailed.
—Joint Association of Classical Teachers Review

Terry Edwards

This is perhaps the fullest and most detailed cultural and intellectual history of the Athenian democracy that I have seen, dense with profound, comprehensive, and original insights. It is not an uncritical hymn of praise but an informative, intelligent, and well-balanced critical account, readable and accessible to both professional scholars and interested laypersons.

Martin Ostwald

It is a dull reader indeed who will not be provoked by Munn's arguments.
—The Classical Review

David J. Schenker

Munn's book is a substantial contribution to the literature on the political world of the late fifth century. His sense of the continuities and dissonances between the traditional elite political culture and the exigencies created by democratic imperialism is a particularly valuable theme, and the collation of primary and secondary sources for a whole series of complex events spanning more than two decades will make the book useful to many.
—The Review of Politics

Robert Vaca