Table Of Contenti
Pushing the Boundaries of Historia
Pushing the Boundaries of Historia collects together 20 chapters, whose
coverage extends from the prehistory of Greece through early Christianity
in the Roman Empire to the reception of classical texts by contemporary
playwrights and poets. The essays range beyond Greece and Rome to the
ancient realms of Persia and China and explore a vast array of ancient authors –
Homer, Herodotus, Thucydides, Euripides, Vergil, Ovid, Livy, and Tacitus.
Written by philologists, historians, epigraphers, palaeographers,
archaeologists, and art historians, it brings together the best of old and new
traditions of classical study, from senior emeritus faculty with established
records of scholarly productivity, to the newest generation of classics and
archaeology professors. What draws together the disparate strands of aca-
demic inquiry found in these pages is a passion for understanding how the
lessons of the world of the ancient Greeks, Romans, and their still lamentably
understudied neighbors, can offer commentary on the contemporary world.
Mary C. English is currently Professor of Classics and General Humanities
at Montclair State University, USA. In addition to publishing articles on
Aristophanes as well as on the reception of Greek tragedy, she is the coauthor,
with Georgia L. Irby, of A Little Latin Reader (2011; 2nd edn 2017) and A
New Latin Primer (2015).
Lee M. Fratantuono is Professor and Chair of Classics at Ohio Wesleyan
University, USA. Among other works on Latin literature and Roman history,
he is the coeditor of Aeneid 5 (2015) and Aeneid 8 (2018).
ii
Routledge Monographs in Classical Studies
Titles include:
Aeschylus and War
Comparative Perspectives on ‘Seven Against Thebes’
Edited by Isabelle Torrance
The Etruscans and the History of Dentistry
The Golden Smile through the Ages
Marshall J. Becker and Jean MacIntosh Turfa
Masculinity and Dress in Roman Antiquity
Kelly Olson
Juvenal’s Global Awareness
Circulation, Connectivity, and Empire
Osman Umurhan
The Greek and Roman Trophy
From Battlefield Marker to Icon of Power
Lauren Kinnee
Rethinking ‘Authority’ in Late Antiquity
Authorship, Law, and Transmission in Jewish and Christian Tradition
Edited by A.J. Berkovitz and Mark Letteney
Thinking the Greeks
A Volume in Honour of James M. Redfield
Edited by Bruce M. King and Lillian Doherty
Pushing the Boundaries of Historia
Edited by Mary C. English and Lee M. Fratantuono
Greek Myth and the Bible
Bruce Louden
For more information on this series, visit: https:// www.routledge.com/
classicalstudies/ series/ RMCS
ii i
Pushing the Boundaries of
Historia
Edited by Mary C. English and
Lee M. Fratantuono
iv
First published 2019
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2019 selection and editorial matter, Mary C. English and Lee M. Fratantuono;
individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Mary C. English and Lee M. Fratantuono to be identified as the authors
of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted
in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks,
and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing- in- Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: English, Mary C., editor. | Fratantuono, Lee, 1973– editor.
Title: Pushing the boundaries of Historia / edited by
Mary C. English and Lee M. Fratantuono.
Description: First edition. | London ; New York, NY :
Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group, 2018. |
Series: Routledge monographs in classical studies |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018029524 (print) | LCCN 2018044303 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781315171487 (ebook) | ISBN 9781351695008 (web pdf) |
ISBN 9781351694995 (epub) | ISBN 9781351694988 (mobi/kindle) |
ISBN 9781138046320 (hardback : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Civilization, Classical. | Classical antiquities. |
Classical philology. | Historiography.
Classification: LCC DE60 (ebook) |
LCC DE60 .P87 2018 (print) | DDC 938.0072–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018029524
ISBN: 978- 1- 138- 04632- 0 (hbk)
ISBN: 978- 1- 315- 17148- 7 (ebk)
Typeset in Times New Roman
by Out of House Publishing
v
Contents
List of contributors viii
Preface and acknowledgments xi
Introduction 1
MARY C. ENGLISH AND LEE M. FRATANTUONO
PART I
Herodotean narratives and cross- cultural comparisons 5
1 Different ways of saying historia in the prose of
Herodotus and Thucydides 7
GREGORY NAGY
2 Tyrants’ spectacles in Herodotus 13
DEBORAH BOEDEKER
3 Thinking with Sima Qian’s Shiji about Herodotus’
fragmented narrative of the story of Miltiades 26
THOMAS R. MARTIN
4 Settling family feuds: Lysias 1 and Herodotus’ Lydians 53
NINA C. COPPOLINO
5 East and West in the Histories of Herodotus
and Tacitus 69
TIMOTHY JOSEPH
vi
vi Contents
PART II
Historia and the ancient world 87
6 Thucydides’ use of Homer in his Archaeology 89
MARY EBBOTT
7 Models of gift- exchange and practices of hostage- giving
and hostage- taking in classical Persian poetry 104
OLGA M. DAVIDSON
8 Michael Ventris, Sterling Dow, and the initial reception of
the decipherment of Linear B 115
STEPHEN TRACY
9 Citizen scholarship in the Homer Multitext project 133
NEEL SMITH
PART III
The development and reception of historical exempla 145
10 Othryadas: The development of a historical and literary
exemplum 147
ALISSA VAILLANCOURT AND ANDREW G. SCOTT
11 No peeking! Athene and Alcibiades 166
JOSEPH FALAKY NAGY
12 A furious fury: Virgil’s Camilla, Livy’s Camillus, and the
reconciliations of Juno 172
LEE M. FRATANTUONO
13 Ovid’s autobiography (Tr. 4.10): Poetic identity and
immortality in the poetry of exile 185
MATTHEW M. MCGOWAN
14 Billy Collins as a modern- day Ovid: An Ovidian reading
of Collins’ Ballistics 202
JILL A. COYLE
vi i
Contents vii
PART IV
Fury, honor, and historia: Conflict and struggle in the
Greek and Roman imaginations 217
15 Sound effects: Aural aspects of Euripides’ Bacchae 219
KATIE LAMBERTO
16 Evander’s love of gore and bloodshed in Aeneid 8 232
JAMES J. O’HARA
17 A disquiet follows my soul: Civil war in Livy Book I 246
MARK J. B. WRIGHT
18 Saint Pilate and the conversion of Tiberius 264
PAUL F. BURKE
19 Julius Caesar in the 1960s: Jerome Kilty’s stage
adaptation of Thornton Wilder’s The Ides of March 269
MARY C. ENGLISH
20 Edward Robinson’s plaster casts and the battle for the
Museum of Fine Arts 280
ELLEN E. PERRY
Index 299
viii
Contributors
Deborah Boedeker is Professor Emerita of Classics at Brown University. From
1992 to 2000, together with Kurt Raaflaub, she codirected Harvard’s Center
for Hellenic Studies. Her scholarly publications include monographs, art-
icles, and edited or coedited volumes on Greek poetry (epic, lyric, elegy,
and tragedy), religion, and historiography. Her current work focuses on
Hipponax, Herodotus, and Sappho.
Paul F. Burke worked at Clark University as Professor of Classics and
Adjunct Professor of History from 1976 to 2018. His research interests
include Vergilian literature, ancient medicine, and ancient religion. He has
also served as President of the Vergilian Society.
Nina C. Coppolino earned her B.A. in Classics at College of the Holy Cross
and her Ph.D. at Fordham University. She served as editor-i n- chief of New
England Classical Journal, following upon her term as book review editor.
She is Assistant Professor in Residence in the Department of Literatures,
Cultures and Languages at the University of Connecticut at Storrs. In add-
ition to Greek rhetoric and historiography, her publications include topics
in Latin poetry and Roman history.
Jill A. Coyle is a professor of English at Spartanburg Methodist College.
She holds a B.A. in Classics from College of the Holy Cross, an M.A.
in English from North Carolina State University, and a Ph.D. in
Classical Studies from Duke University. She has a strong interest in
creative writing, and her poems and essays have appeared in numerous
journals.
Olga M. Davidson earned her Ph.D. in Near Eastern Studies in 1983 from
Princeton University. She is on the faculty of the Institute for the Study
of Muslim Societies and Civilizations at Boston University, where she has
served as Research Fellow since 2009. From 1992 to 1997, she was Chair
of the Concentration in Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies at Brandeis
University. Since 1999, she has been Chair of the Board, Ilex Foundation.
She is the author of Poet and Hero in the Persian Book of Kings (1994; 2nd
ed. 2006; 3rd ed. 2013) and Comparative Literature and Classical Persian
Poetry (2000; 2nd ed. 2013).
ix
Contributors ix
Mary Ebbott is a Professor of Classics and Dean of Faculty at the College
of the Holy Cross. She is the author of Imagining Illegitimacy in Classical
Greek Literature and coauthor of Iliad 10 and the Poetics of Ambush as well
as coeditor of the Homer Multitext project (www.homermultitext.org).
Mary C. English earned her degrees in Classics from the College of the
Holy Cross and Boston University. She is currently Professor of Classics
and General Humanities at Montclair State University. In addition to
publishing articles on Aristophanes as well as on the reception of Greek
tragedy, she is the coauthor, with Georgia L. Irby, of A Little Latin Reader
(2011; 2nd ed. 2017) and A New Latin Primer (2015).
Lee M. Fratantuono studied Classics at the College of the Holy Cross, Boston
College, and Fordham University, and is Professor and Chair of Classics
at Ohio Wesleyan University. Among other works on Latin literature and
Roman history, he is the coeditor of Aeneid 5 (2015) and Aeneid 8 (2018).
Timothy Joseph is Associate Professor in the Department of Classics at the
College of the Holy Cross. He earned his B.A. in Classics at Holy Cross
and his Ph.D. in Classical Philology from Harvard University, and is the
author of Tacitus the Epic Successor (2012), as well as numerous essays on
Latin historiography and epic poetry.
Katie Lamberto received her undergraduate degree in Classics from the
College of the Holy Cross. She went on to obtain her Ph.D. in Classics
from the State University of New York at Buffalo. She has taught at the
College of the Holy Cross and Clark University.
Thomas R. Martin is the Jeremiah W. O’Connor Jr. Professor in Classics
at the College of the Holy Cross. His teaching and research focus on
ancient Greek and Roman history and historians. His books include
Sima Qian: Uomini e storie dell’antica Cina (with Ivy Sui-y uen Sun and
Monica Berti, Edizioni Tored, 2008); Herodotus and Sima Qian: The First
Great Historians of Greece and China (2010); and Ancient Greece: From
Prehistoric to Hellenistic Times (2nd ed. 2013).
Matthew M. McGowan is Associate Professor and Chair of Classics at
Fordham University. His research focuses on Roman literature, Latin peda-
gogy, and the reception of classical antiquity, especially Neo-Latin texts. He
is the author of Ovid in Exile: Power and Poetic Redress in the Tristia and
Epistulae ex Ponto (2009) and co-editor with Elizabeth Macaulay-Lewis of
Classical New York: Discovering Greece and Rome in Gotham (2018).
Gregory Nagy is the author of The Best of the Achaeans: Concepts of the
Hero in Archaic Greek Poetry (1979; 2nd ed., with new Introduction, 1999).
Other publications include Homer the Preclassic (2010) and The Ancient
Greek Hero in 24 Hours (2013). Since 2000, he has been the Director of
the Harvard Center for Hellenic Studies, while continuing to teach at the
Harvard campus in Cambridge as the Francis Jones Professor of Classical
Greek Literature and Professor of Comparative Literature.
