Spartan Oliganthropia

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-106
Author(s):  
Timothy Doran
Keyword(s):  
Population Dynamics ◽  
Family Planning ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek History

Abstract The population of the Spartiates declined from some 8,000 to fewer than 1,000 in the Classical and Hellenistic eras. The causes and consequences of this decline are important for an understanding not only of ancient Greek history, but also of the study of pre-industrial populations and population dynamics more generally. This work surveys a range of representative modern scholarship on this phenomenon and discusses topics such as family planning, elite under-reproduction, wealth polarization, and notions of eugenic exclusivity, and suggests avenues for further research.

scholarly journals A FAKE OR GENUINE ARTEFACT? THE PARIAN CHRONICLE AND PERCEPTIONS OF AUTHENTICITY IN EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY BRITAIN

2019 ◽  
Vol 99 ◽  
pp. 271-295
Author(s):  
Peter N Lindfield
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
University Of Oxford ◽  
Greek History ◽  
Eighteenth Century Britain ◽  
The University ◽  
Opening Up

A remarkable controversy raged in the late 1780s concerning the authenticity of the Parian Chronicle, a supposedly genuine carved fragment recording ancient Greek history that was included in the 1667 Arundel bequest to the University of Oxford. Drawing in figures in British antiquarianism, including Richard Gough who, as Director of the Society of Antiquaries of London, intervened in the debate with a pamphlet that came out in support of the artefact’s authenticity, this was an important moment in eighteenth-century antiquarian study. Hot on the heels of the now much more well-known Ossian controversy of the 1760s, the Chatterton–Rowley–Walpole debacle from 1770, Chatterton’s subsequent death and the publication of his forgeries from 1777, the literature variously refuting and supporting the Parian Chronicle’s authenticity strikes at the heart of antiquarianism, in particular opening up to dispute assumptions made about or accepted interpretations concerning the authenticity of the fragments upon which subsequent antiquarian work and interpretation was based. This debate took the form of a very public attack upon, and defence of, the Parian Chronicle’s status as a genuine third-century bc antiquarian fragment, and the controversy within antiquarian circles that it occasioned is reconstructed here.

Thucydideses: authorship, anachrony, and anachronism in Greek historiography

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 32-45
Author(s):  
Emily Greenwood
Keyword(s):  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek History ◽  
The Future ◽  
Greek Historiography

Abstract This article revisits the theme of temporality in ancient Greek historiography through the lens of the Byzantine Histories of Laonikos Chalkokondyles, who fastened onto the device of the anachronic, proleptic future in Herodotus and Thucydides to license his apparently anachronistic device of writing in the language and persona of both, eighteen centuries after they wrote. In Laonikos’ account, his narrative is part of the future of ‘Greek’ history anticipated by Herodotus and Thucydides. Laonikos’ clever assimilation of Herodotus and Thucydides sheds new light on Thucydides’ own reduplication of himself to project an authorial and textual future. This strong, anachronic move has made Thucydides’ work assimilable by future readers and also opened up the work to the contingencies of reception, with its potential for anachronism.

The Greek Kitchen

1962 ◽  
Vol 82 ◽  
pp. 121-137 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. A. Sparkes
Keyword(s):  
Complete Picture ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek History

The utensils which I am going to describe and discuss in the following pages are the ordinary utensils of Greek, mainly Athenian, households in the classical period; they have been found in abundance, are not special articles and may therefore serve to furnish a fairly complete picture of the classical batterie de cuisine. It is only in the last generation that material has come to hand which enables us to venture some way to understanding the methods of ancient Greek cooking. The Excavations of the Athenian Agora, in which the majority of the cooking pots on plates IV–VIII have been found, have produced evidence for the contents of Greek kitchens in most periods of Greek history, objects for the most part thrown away when broken as the result either of public or of private sacrifices. Rarely, in contrast with Pompeii, are the contents of the kitchen found in the places where they were used. Thus other evidence must be brought forward to supplement the archaeological, and this evidence is of two kinds: literary and artistic. Our literary knowledge of Greek cookery is derived in the main from the quotations preserved by Athenaeus; other authors refer to cookery incidentally and rarely provide a straight description.

Population Dynamics and Family Planning

1968 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 202 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur A. Campbell
Keyword(s):  
Population Dynamics ◽  
Family Planning

scholarly journals The Dancing Floor of War: A study of Theban imperialism within Boeotia, ca. 525-386BCE

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Alex Wilson
Keyword(s):  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Early Period ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Methodological Consideration ◽  
Military Alliance ◽  
Federal Constitution ◽  
Greek History ◽  
Three Stages ◽  
City States

<p>This thesis is a reexamination of Thebes’ relationship with the neighbouring Greek poleis (city states) of Boeotia in early Greek history, including but not limited to the so-called Boeotian League or Confederation. Although it is generally acknowledged that Thebes was the dominant city of Boeotia in the Archaic and Classical Periods, scholarly opinion has varied on how to classify Thebes’ dominance. At some point in the period considered here, the Boeotian states gathered themselves together into a regional collective, a confederation. The features of this union (in which Thebes was the leading participant) obscure Thebes’ ambitions to subjugate other Boeotian states. I argue here that it is appropriate to define Thebes’ relationship with Boeotia as imperialist.  I begin with a methodological consideration of the application of imperialism to ancient Greek history. The thesis considers in the first chapters three stages of development in Theban imperialism: firstly an early period (ca. 525) in which Thebes encouraged nascent Boeotian ethnic identity, promoting its own position as the natural leader of Boeotia. Secondly, a period (ca. 525–447) in which a military alliance of Boeotian states developed under the leadership of Thebes. Thirdly, a period which was the earliest true form of the Boeotian Confederation, contrary to scholarship which pushes the date of the Boeotian collective government back to the sixth century. I argue that the Boeotian federal constitution of 447–386 gave Thebes sufficient control of Boeotia to be classified as an imperialist structure.  A final chapter independently considers the evidence of Boeotian coinage, which has often been used problematically to inform historical analysis of Boeotian relations. I argue that on cultural and economic grounds alone the numismatic evidence suggests that Thebes’ dominance in Boeotia extended to monetary influence.</p>

scholarly journals Ancient Greek History and Contemporary Social Science

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
State Government ◽  
Quantitative Methods ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Qualitative Approaches ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Theories ◽  
Greek History ◽  
The Relationship

Social scientists and political theorists have recently come to realize the potential importance of the classical Greek world and its legacy for testing social theories. Meanwhile, some Hellenists have mastered the techniques of contemporary social science. They have come to recognize the value of formal and quantitative methods as a complement to traditional qualitative approaches to Greek history and culture. Some of the most exciting new work in social science is now being done within interdisciplinary domains for which recent work on Greece provides apt case studies. This book features essays examining the role played by democratic political and legal institutions in economic development; the potential for inter-state cooperation and international institutions within a decentralized ecology of states; the relationship between state government and the social networks arising from voluntary associations; the interplay between political culture, informal politics, formal institutions and political change; and the relationship between empirical and formal methods of analysis and normative political theory. In sum, this book introduces readers to the emerging field of “social science ancient history.”

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