Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- List of abbreviations
- INTRODUCTION
- I THE CALL TO HISTORY
- II THE HISTORIAN'S INQUIRY
- III THE HISTORIAN'S CHARACTER
- IV THE HISTORIAN'S DEEDS
- V THE ‘LONELY’ HISTORIAN: CONTRAST AND CONTINUITY
- CONCLUSION
- Appendices
- I Table of historians
- II Name and nationality
- III Isocrates on autopsy and inquiry?
- IV Variant versions
- V The Roman convention of ‘nos’ and ‘nostri’
- VI Greek continuators
- VII Roman continuators
- Bibliography
- Index locorum
- Index of Greek words
- General index
II - Name and nationality
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 January 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- List of abbreviations
- INTRODUCTION
- I THE CALL TO HISTORY
- II THE HISTORIAN'S INQUIRY
- III THE HISTORIAN'S CHARACTER
- IV THE HISTORIAN'S DEEDS
- V THE ‘LONELY’ HISTORIAN: CONTRAST AND CONTINUITY
- CONCLUSION
- Appendices
- I Table of historians
- II Name and nationality
- III Isocrates on autopsy and inquiry?
- IV Variant versions
- V The Roman convention of ‘nos’ and ‘nostri’
- VI Greek continuators
- VII Roman continuators
- Bibliography
- Index locorum
- Index of Greek words
- General index
Summary
Imitation of predecessors may occur in many ways; I discuss briefly here one of those ways, the manner of an historian in the formal introduction of himself to the audience.
Hesiod, of course, is the first poet to name himself in his work. In a similar way Theognis, although beginning with one (or several) prefaces to the gods, inserted his name into the text as what he calls a ‘seal’ (σφραγίς). The nature of this seal has been much discussed, some seeing it as a mark of poetic pride, others as an attempt to guarantee the authentic character of the text itself. Both in fact may be present. Of the other lyric, elegiac, and iambic poets we can single out Alcman, Phocylides, Demodocus, Solon, and Susarion as those who name themselves in their poems, yet we must also recognise that such a procedure need imply neither Dichterstolz nor the presence of the author as a character in the text itself.
Both pride and presence in the text can first be unmistakably seen in the philosophers, who as a group exert the strongest influence on the early historians. Here names are used with evident pride and as an emphasis on the originality of the work.
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- Authority and Tradition in Ancient Historiography , pp. 271 - 275Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1997
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