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Tag Archives: Greek History

Who Is the Happiest Man?

03 Saturday Oct 2015

Posted by jrbenjamin in History

≈ Comments Off on Who Is the Happiest Man?

Tags

Ancient Greece, Ancient History, Athens, Croesus, Eleusis, G.C. Macauley, Greek History, happiness, Herodotus, history, Paphlagonians, Philosophy, Syrians, Tellos, The Histories, Tom Holland

Herodotus

“Croesus, king of Lydia, asked him as follows: ‘Athenian guest, much report of thee has come to us, both in regard to thy wisdom and thy wanderings… a desire has come upon me to ask whether thou hast seen any whom thou deem to be of all men the most happy.’ This he asked supposing that he himself was the happiest of men; but Solon, using no flattery but the truth only, said: ‘Yes, O king, Tellos the Athenian.’

Croesus, marveling at that which he said, asked him earnestly, ‘In what respect dost thou judge Tellos to be the most happy?’ And he said: ‘Tellos, in the first place, living while his native State was prosperous, had sons fair and good and saw from all of them children begotten and living to grow up; and secondly he had what with us is accounted wealth, and after his life a most glorious end. For when a battle was fought by the Athenians at Eleusis against the neighbouring people, he brought up supports and routed the foe and there died by a most fair death; and his people buried him publicly where he fell, and honoured him greatly.’ […]

Croesus was moved to anger and said: ‘Athenian guest, hast thou then so cast aside our prosperous state as worth nothing, that thou dost prefer to us even men of private station?’ And he said: ‘Croesus, thou art inquiring about human fortunes of one who well knows that fate is apt to disturb our lot. For in the course of long time a man may see many things which he would not desire to see, and suffer also many things which he would not desire to suffer… As for thee, I perceive that thou art both great in wealth and king of many men, but that of which thou didst ask me I cannot call thee yet, until I learn that thou hast brought thy life to a fair ending: for the very rich man is not at all to be accounted more happy than he who has but his subsistence from day-to-day, unless also the fortune go with him to possess things of value. For many very wealthy men are not happy, while many who have but a moderate living are fortunate… But we must of every thing examine the end and how it will turn out at the last, for to many fate shows but a glimpse of happiness and then plucks them up by the roots and overturns them.'”

__________

Excerpted from the opening third of Herodtus’s The Histories, the only surviving work of the earliest known historian. (The excerpt is from the at-times haughtier G.C. Macauley version, which lends some gravity to sections like the one above. I haven’t read Tom Holland’s translation, but I assume it’s the best vernacular version out there.)

In The Histories, Herodotus notes that Croesus is a “Lydian by race,” a “ruler of the nations between the Syrians and the Paphlagonians,” and the “first Barbarian of whom we have knowledge.”

Read on:

  • Alexander the Great’s horse
  • Why those with a Greek idea of human nature may vote Republican
  • From Homer’s Odyssey “When the wealthy fought on the front lines”

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How the Greek Conception of Human Nature Can Shape Your Politics

14 Tuesday Jul 2015

Posted by jrbenjamin in Interview, Political Philosophy

≈ Comments Off on How the Greek Conception of Human Nature Can Shape Your Politics

Tags

classics, Conservativism, Denis Diderot, French Enlightenment, Greek History, Greek philosophy, Greek tragedy, Greeks, human nature, interview, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Philosophy, Thucydides, Victor Davis Hanson

Roman Bust

“I don’t think I would think the way I do if I hadn’t had an affinity for the writings of the Greeks. I think the idea the Greeks had, the tragic view of the world — that there are limitations in the human experience: we all age, we all die, we don’t demand utopian perfection given the brief time we’re on earth — has made me more realistic about things.

So when you see a war, for example, you don’t ask who’s one hundred percent good and who’s one hundred percent evil. There is good and evil in the world, yes, but it can sometimes be very difficult to understand that you have to go to war even though you won’t always be in the right.

The Greeks were much more realistic about the fallibilities of human nature. That’s had a very profound influence on me…

The idea that people are predictable across time and space, as the historian Thucydides said. That they have appetites and urges which are often identifiable. That people seem to respond to status and honor and fear, and that civilization — whether it’s religion, or custom and tradition, or politics — tends to save us from our selves.

It’s a very different view from the Rousseauian, Diderot, French enlightenment idea that we’re born into the world perfect human beings, but that religion or the family or the government repress us and ultimately ruin us.”

__________

Victor Davis Hanson, checking off the important boxes in the first minute of his three-hour-long C-SPAN In-Depth interview in 2004. If you want to read Hanson, pick up his acclaimed study of nine pivotal battles in history, Carnage and Culture. I just ordered my copy.

Watch Hanson’s answer (along with the other two hours and fifty-nine minutes) below.

Then move on:

  • An illuminating passage from Arthur Schlesinger’s biography of RFK — how the Kennedys read the Greeks differently (and how Robert took solace in them after Jack’s death)
  • A summary: the Christian worldview vs. the Greek worldview
  • How ancient Greeks partied

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How the Greeks Grieved

11 Sunday Jan 2015

Posted by jrbenjamin in Literature, War

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Antilochus, Atreus, casualties, combat, Greek History, grief, Helen, Homer, Ithaca, Memnon, Menelaus, Nestor, Odysseus, Stanley Lombardo, Telemachus, The Odyssey, War

Greek Bust

Menelaus, the head of the table, overheard
And, speaking to both of them, had this to say…

“I would gladly live with a third of my wealth
To have those friends back who perished
Far from the bluegrass pastures of home. And yet,
Though I weep for each of them often in my halls,
Easing my heart, I do not grieve constantly —
A man can get too much of chill grief.
I miss them all, but there is one man I miss
More than all the others. When I think of him
I don’t want to sleep or eat, for no one
In the entire Greek army worked as hard
As Odysseus, and all he ever got for it
Was pain and sorrow, and I cannot forget
My sorrow for him. He has been gone so long,
And we do not know whether he is alive or dead…

I used to think that if he came back
I would give him a welcome no other Greek
Could ever hope to have — if heaven
Had brought us both home from over the sea
In our swift ships. I would have given him
A city of his own in Argos, built him a house,
Brought him over from Ithaca with his goods,
His son and all of his people — a whole city
Cleared out just for him! We would have been together,
Enjoying each other’s company, and nothing
Would have parted us until death’s black cloud
Finally enfolded us. But I suppose fate itself
Begrudged us this, for Odysseus alone,
That unlucky man, was never brought home.”

His words aroused in all of them
A longing for lamentation. Argive Helen,
A child of nobles, wept; Telemachus wept;
And Menelaus wept, the son of Atreus.
Nor could Nestor’s son keep his eyes dry,
For he remembered Antilochus,
His flawless brother, who had been killed
By Memnon, Dawn’s resplendent son,
And this memory gave wings to his words:

“Son of Atreus, old Nestor used to say,
Whenever we talked about things like this,
That no one could match your understanding.
So please understand me when I say
That I do not enjoy weeping after supper—
And it will be dawn before we know it.
Not that I think it’s wrong to lament the dead.
This is all we can do — cut our hair
And shed some tears. I lost someone myself
At Troy, my brother, not the least hero there.
You probably knew him. I am too young
Ever to have seen him, but men say Antilochus
Could run and fight as well as any man alive.”

And Menalaus, the king:

“No one could have put that better, my friend,
Not even someone much older. Your speech,
wise and clear, shows the sort of father you have.
It’s easy to spot a man for whom heaven
Has spun out happiness in marriage and children,
As he has done for Nestor throughout his life.
And now he has reached a sleek old age in his halls
And his children are good and fight with the best
So we will stop this weeping, and once more
Think of supper.

__________

From Book IV of Homer’s Odyssey.

More from Homer:

  • The Odyssey’s opening lines and the journey home
  • Homer’s lyric description of Odysseus falling sleep
  • When the wealthy fought on the front lines

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The Hero Sleeps

24 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by jrbenjamin in Literature

≈ Comments Off on The Hero Sleeps

Tags

Arete, Greek History, Homer, literature, Lord Alcinous, Mythology, Odysseus, Stanley Lombardo, The Odyssey

Roman Bust

‘You’re a hard man, Odysseus, stronger
Than other men, and you never wear out,
A real-iron man.’ […]

Then Odysseus
Stood up and placed a two-handled cup
In Arete’s hands, and his words rose on wings:

“Be well, my queen, all of your days, until age
And death come to you, as they come to all.
I am leaving now. But you, Lady — enjoy this house,
Your children, your people, and Lord Alcinous.”

And godlike Odysseus stepped over the threshold.
Alcinous sent a herald along
To guide him to the shore and the swift ship there,
And Arete sent serving women with him,
One carrying a cloak and laundered shirt,
And another to bring the strong sea-chest.
A third brought along bread and red wine.
They came down to the sea, and the ship’s crew
Stowed all these things away in the hold,
The food and drink, too. Then they spread out
A rug and a linen sheet on the stern deck
For Odysseus to sleep upon undisturbed.
He climbed on board and lay down in silence
While they took their places upon the benches
And untied the cable from the anchor stone.
As soon as they dipped their oars in the sea,
A deep sleep fell on his eyelids, a sleep
Sound, and sweet, and very much like death.

And as four yoked stallions spring all together
Beneath the lash, leaping high,
And then eat up the dusty road on the plain,

So lifted the keel of that ship, and in her wake
An indigo wave hissed and roiled
As she ran straight ahead. Not even a falcon,
Lord of the skies, could have matched her pace,
So light her course as she cut through the waves,
Bearing a man with a mind like god’s,
A man who had suffered deep in his heart,
Enduring men’s wars and the bitter sea —
But now he slept, his sorrows forgotten.

__________

Odysseus’s departure from the island of Scheria in books 12 and 13 of Homer’s Odyssey (Lombardo translation).

Read on:

  • The unbeatable opening words that set off The Odyssey
  • Thomas Cahill describes how and why the Greeks partied
  • Epictetus on why we should practice moderation in all things

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Alexander’s Horse

12 Wednesday Nov 2014

Posted by jrbenjamin in History

≈ Comments Off on Alexander’s Horse

Tags

Alexander, Alexander the Great, Ancient Greece, Arrian, Bucephalus, Greek History, History of Alexander's Expeditions, horseback riding, Horses, Life of Augustus, Philip II of Macedonia, Philoneicus the Thessalian, Suetonius

Ranch - Thanksgiving 3

“There came a day when Philoneicus the Thessalian brought Philip (Alexander’s father) a horse named Bucephalus. The king and his friends went down to the plain to watch the horse’s trials, and came to the conclusion that he was wild and unmanageable, for he would allow no one to mount him. The king became angry at being offered such a vicious animal unbroken, and ordered it to be led away.

But Alexander, who was standing close by, remarked, ‘What a horse they are losing, and all because they don’t know how to handle him, or dare not try.’…

Alexander went quickly up to Bucephalus, took hold of his bridle, and turned him towards the sun, for he had noticed that the horse was shying at the sight of his own shadow, as it fell in front of him and constantly moved whenever he did. He ran alongside the animal for a little way, calming him down by stroking him, and then, when he saw he was full of spirit and courage, he quietly threw aside his cloak with a light spring vaulted safely on to his back… Finally, when he saw that the horse was free of his fears and impatient to show his speed, he gave him his reigns and urged him forward.

At First Philip and his friends held their breath until they saw Alexander reach the end of his gallop, turn in full control, and ride back triumphant. Thereupon the rest of the company broke into loud applause, while his father, we are told, actually wept for joy, and when Alexander had dismounted he kissed him and said, ‘My boy, you must find a kingdom big enough for your ambitions. Macedonia is too small for you.'”

__________

A modern translation of the semi-mythic story “Alexander Tames Bucephalus” by Plutarch. This event would have occurred in 344 BC, when Alexander was 13.

Bucephalus, which means “ox head,” is the most famous horse of antiquity. According to his extensive wiki, he was black with a white star; his massive head, which would have been the foremost point of the charging Grecian army, was cast into busts and adorned some of the currency of the Greek empire in the century following his death.

Two more excerpts:

When Alexander’s sarcophagus was brought from its shrine, Augustus gazed at the body, then laid a crown of gold on its glass case and scattered some flowers to pay his respects. When they asked if he would like to see Ptolemy too, ‘I wished to see a king,’ he replied, ‘I did not wish to see corpses.’
Suetonius, Life of Augustus (121 AD)

As for the exact thoughts in Alexander’s mind, I am neither able nor concerned to guess them, but this I think I can state, that nothing common or mean would have been his intention; he would not have remained content with any of his conquests, not even if he had added the British Isles to Europe; he would always have searched beyond for something unknown, and if there had been no other competition, he would have competed against himself.
Arrian, History of Alexander’s Expeditions (140 AD)

One more post:

  • Meet Alexander the Great

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When the Wealthy Fought on the Frontlines

22 Wednesday Oct 2014

Posted by jrbenjamin in Literature, War

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

combat, Glaucus, Greek History, Homer, Sarpedon, Stanley Lombardo, The Iliad, Trojan War, War

Greek myths

“Glaucus, you know how you and I
Have the best of everything in Lycia —
Seats, cuts of meat, full cups, everybody
Looking at us as if we were gods?

Not to mention our estates on the Xanthus,
Fine orchards and riverside wheat fields.
Well, now we have to take our stand at the front,
Where all the best fight, and face the heat of battle,
So that many an armored Lycian will say,
‘So they’re not inglorious after all,
Our Lycian lords who eat fat sheep
And drink the sweetest wine. No,
They’re strong, and fight with our best.’
Ah, my friend, if you and I could only
Get out of the war alive and then
Be immortal and ageless all of our days.
I would never again fight among the foremost
Or send you into battle where men win glory.

But as it is, death is everywhere
In more shapes that we can count,
And since no mortal is immune or can escape,
Let’s go forward, either to give glory
To another man or get glory from him.”

__________

Sarpedon speaking to Glaucus during the height of the Trojan War. Lines 320-342 in book 12 of Homer’s Iliad (Lombardo translation).

The wealthy, the heads of government fighting at the front lines. What a concept.

More war:

  • Meet the photographer who stormed Omaha Beach on D-Day
  • Doulas MacArthur on why we need an international law with teeth
  • ‘Your leaders are crazy’: the leaflet we dropped on Nazi Germany

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Meet Alexander the Great

30 Friday May 2014

Posted by jrbenjamin in Biography, History, War

≈ Comments Off on Meet Alexander the Great

Tags

Alexander, Alexander the Great, Arrian, Biography, combat, Conquest, Egypt, Empire, Greece, Greek History, history, History of Alexander's Expeditions, leadership, Military, military history, Philip II of Macedonia, Robin Lane Fox, Toughness, War

Alexander the Great

“Most historians have had their own Alexander, and a view of him which is one-sided is bound to have missed the truth. There are features which cannot be disputed; the extraordinary toughness of a man who sustained nine wounds, breaking an ankle bone and receiving an arrow through his chest and the bolt of a catapult through his shoulder. He was twice struck on the head and neck by stones and once lost his sight from such a blow. The bravery which bordered on folly never failed him in the front line of battle, a position which few generals since have considered proper… There are two ways to lead men, either to delegate all authority and limit the leader’s burden or to share every hardship and decision and be seen to take the toughest labour, prolonging it until every other man has finished. Alexander’s method was the second, and only those who have suffered the first can appreciate why his men adored him.

Alexander was not merely a man of toughness, resolution and no fear. A murderous fighter, he had wide interests outside war, his hunting, reading, his patronage of music and drama and his lifelong friendship with Greek artists, actors and architects; he minded about his food and took a daily interest in his meals, appreciating quails from Egypt or apples from western orchards… He had an intelligent concern for agriculture and irrigation which he had learnt from his father; from Philip, too, came his constant favour for new cities and their law and formal design. He was famously generous and he loved to reward the same show of spirit which he asked of himself… Equally he was impatient and often conceited; the same officers who worshipped him must often have found him impossible… Though he drank as he lived, sparing nothing, his mind was not slurred by excessive indulgence; he was not a man to be crossed or to be told what he could not do, and he always had firm views on exactly what he wanted…

A romantic must not be romanticized, for he is seldom compassionate, always distant, but in Alexander it is tempting to see the romantic’s complex nature for the first time in Greek history. There are the small details, his sudden response to a show of nobility, his respect for women, his appreciation of eastern customs, his extreme fondness for his dog and especially his horse… He had the romantic’s sharpness and cruel indifference to life; he was also a man of passionate ambitions, who saw the intense adventure of the unknown. He did not believe in impossibility; man could do anything, and he nearly proved it.”

__________

From the final chapter of Robin Lane Fox’s biography Alexander the Great.

In the book’s prologue, Fox includes the following assessment, sourced from Arrian’s History of Alexander’s Expeditions (150 AD):

As for the exact thoughts in Alexander’s mind, I am neither able nor concerned to guess them, but this I think I can state, that nothing common or mean would have been his intention; he would not have remained content with any of his conquests, not even if he had added the British Isles to Europe; he would always have searched beyond for something unknown, and if there had been no other competition, he would have competed against himself.

Below in red, the empire Alexander amassed in seventeen years as King of Macedonia, Persia, and Asia.

Make some more introductions:

  • Meet Isaac Newton
  • Meet Thomas Jefferson
  • Meet Saint Augustine

Map of Alexander the Great's Conquests

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The Christian Worldview Versus the Greek

15 Wednesday Jan 2014

Posted by jrbenjamin in Philosophy, Religion

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Ancient Greece, Andromache, Christians, Faith, fate, Fideism, God, Greek, Greek History, Greek philosophy, Hector, history, hope, Jews, New Testament, reason, Roman History, Sailing the Wine Dark Sea: Why the Greeks Matter, Scripture, the Bible, The Roman empire, Thomas Cahill, Worldview

Raphael's School of Athens

“The worldview that underlay the New Testament was so different from that of the Greeks and the Romans as to be almost its opposite. It was a worldview that stressed not excellence of public achievement but the adventure of a personal journey with God, a lifetime journey in which a human being was invited to unite himself to God by imitating God’s justice and mercy. It was far more individualized than anything the Greeks had ever come up with and stressed the experience of a call, a personal vocation, a unique destiny for each human being. The one God of the Jews had created the world and everyone in it, and God would bring the world to its end. There was no eternal cosmos, circling round and round. Time is real, not cyclical; it does not repeat itself but proceeds forward inexorably, which makes each moment—and the decisions I make each moment—precious. I am not merely an instance of Man, I am this particular, unrepeatable man, who never existed before and will never exist again. I create a real future in the present by what I do now. Whereas fate was central to Greeks and Romans, hope is central to Jews and Christians. Anyone who doubts the great gulf between these two worldviews has only to reread the speeches Hector makes to Andromache (in Chapter I) and to realize the impossibility of putting such speeches on the lips of any believing Jew or Christian:

And fate? No one alive has ever escaped it,
neither brave man nor coward, I tell you—
it’s born with us the day that we are born.”

__________

From chapter 7 of Thomas Cahill’s Sailing the Wine Dark Sea: Why the Greeks Matter.

Any loyal visitor to this blog will be aware that much of my reading over the past year has orbited around the intersection of Athens and Jerusalem. Fideism, which has been the most compelling idea I have encountered in that time, explicitly locates itself in the murky terrain between — or above — faith and reason. I’ve not forgotten that I’m past deadline on some paragraphs about this subject and the other central themes of the past year, and I can only excuse my laziness by saying that part of my distraction has come in the form of Cahill’s incredible book.

I find this particular section pretty intriguing, and though I’ve been mulling it over for the past few days, am not exactly sure what to make of it. In the context of Cahill’s entire narrative it takes on some added shadows and contours, but for the sake of brevity, I’ll merely supplement it with a selection from Arthur Schlesinger’s biography of Robert Kennedy, in which he writes the following about Robert’s spiritual response to his brother’s death:

As John Kennedy’s sense of the Greeks was colored by his own innate joy in existence, Robert’s was directed by an abiding melancholy…

The fact that [Robert] found primary solace in Greek impressions of character and fate did not make him less faithful a Catholic. Still, at the time of truth, Catholic writers did not give him precisely what he needed. And his tragic sense was, to use Auden’s distinction, Greek rather than Christian—the tragedy of necessity rather than the tragedy of possibility; ‘What a pity it had to be this way,’ rather than, ‘What a pity it was this way when it might have been otherwise.’

Hence, the Greek emphasis on fate, which was the foundation of Robert’s reflexive view of the world, absorbed tragedy as an unavoidable consequence of the unchangeable cards one is dealt in life. On the contrary, the Christian perspective, with its emphasis on hope (and its cousin possibility), assessed negative events with an eye to past decisions and potential future choices: not only could it have been different, but I now can choose how to react.

Read another fragment from Cahill’s book:

Greek SymposiaPartying with the Greeks

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The Top 5 Posts from the Greeks and the Romans in 2013

08 Wednesday Jan 2014

Posted by jrbenjamin in History, Philosophy

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

2013, Ancient Greece, General Philosophy, Greek History, review, Roman History, Rome, The Top 5 Posts from the Greeks and the Romans in 2013, Top 10

Greek Bust

The top 5, in order:

1. Partying with the Greeks by Thomas Cahill (from Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea: Why the Greeks Matter)

I think any twenty-first century American could be forgiven for reading Cahill’s version of the Greeks and their symposia with a certain amount of identification. On a more personal level, the reflections of Archilochus accord with many of the transient, recurring thoughts and melancholic moods I’ve had while leaving parties in the early hours of the morning.

2. The Odyssey Home by Homer (from The Odyssey)

During a year in which I read heavily about war and its million unseen impacts, especially those which are felt at home, Homer’s Odyssey provided, among other things, insight into some eternal truths about military conflict. While the opening stave is by no means the strongest section of the text, it is probably the best summary of the Odyssey’s basic plot line and themes. It’s also a stark, dramatic introduction to Odysseus, one of the great heroes in fiction.

3. The Discourses of Epictetus by Arrian (from The Handbook of Epictetus)

A stirring argument for two distinctly Aristotelian insights: practice moderation in all things and make the most of your days. These exhortations are especially noteworthy when one considers the guy speaking them was born a slave.

4. Do Not Act as If You Were Going to Live Ten Thousand Years by Marcus Aurelius (from The Meditations)

This is nothing you haven’t read before, though it’s still essential, because in addition to bering one of the first to say it, Marcus Aurelius was also one of the best. It’s especially worth noting his nod to Heraclitus in the image of time as a river that is forever flowing.

5. Friends with Socrates by Xenophon (from Memorabilia)

It’s amusing to read an epistemic breakdown of something as delicate and natural as friendship. Still, Socrates’s voice here is at its most eccentric and convincing, as he explains how exactly relationships with others can come to result in non-zero sum paradigms.

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