History-Makers: Thucydides

Ahh ancient Greece, it has been *entirely* too long. Today we'll take a look at the foundational work of my entire career path — Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian war, a book that almost single-handedly set the standard for how we engage in historical inquiry. Also it has the added benefit of being about Ancient Greece so win-win!

SOURCES & Further Reading: "History of the Peloponnesian War" by Thucydides, "Histories" by Herodotus, "Hellenica" by Xenophon, and the 4 straight years I spent studying this in university — Boy do I love doing a video about a topic I'm specifically trained in.

Our content is intended for teenage audiences and up.

[tyto]

..."They shared their latest playthrough of The Entitled Zeus Game."

That, Blue, is one of the best lines on OSP, as a whole.

[jimluebke]

"Luckily, the Internet is purpose-built for shouting into the void"

So true!

[morgoth_bauglir]

Achievement unlocked: Blue's backstory

[ImperatorIke]

Here's a story my professor once told me about how she got into teaching history:

As a college student she was given a History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides and LOVED IT. She loved it so much her classmates would visit her in her dorm and she would help them understand the material in her class.

Fast forward a decade or so and she finds herself at a garage sale where she found a couple copies of a History of the Peloponnesian War, she bought one and another older gentleman was buying one too.

She got into a conversation with him and she asked him why he was buying it, he said when he was in college he read it as a history major, he wanted to see if it was still as terrible as he remembers and he claims he hated it so much he switched majors

[Armaggedon]

Even history books don’t want to finish themselves.

[Just_Some_Guy_with_a_Mustache]

Legends say that Thucydides and Herodotus would jointly teach the people. Although, Herodotus was more into talking about stories and tropes, ending all his lectures with "...so...yeah", and Thucydides was a lot more into the history talk. He also really insisted upon Sparta. Like, he would find a way to talk about it somehow in most of his lectures.
You don't need to cite my sources. Just trust me.

[erilobar]

'Let's do some History'
or, as the Spartans would say:
*'HISTORY'*

[lirazel]

I became so enamored with Thucydides' book -- read in a philosophy class about war and peace -- that I asked the professor to let me read an excerpt aloud in class. I chose the bit about how some bored Athenians who were waiting out a storm in a little cove began building a fort *because they were bored* and provoked one of the greatest battles of the war. The descriptions of the battle are as exciting as any movie.
The moral pointed by my professor is that much of history just happens by accident.
So yes! Please! How about the Theban Band next?

[HiHello-jotp]

Ah yes, "Ma Boi", one of the most honorable of historic titles

[vacuous]

As a person who grew up in Greece i took how fun history was as a granted... thanks ancient greek historians you made my school years a bit less miserable!

[jackukridge]

Entitled Zeus game is just Zeus in a variety of animal disguises trying to score while Hera tries to catch him.

[dinodude]

"I want a untitled Zeus game"
-zeus

[albertamalachi]

Thucydides: "I need to finish thi~" _ded_
Xenophon: _hides Thucydides under a table_ "...and after all of that. We'll continue." _clears throat_

[borantandogan]

blue's laughter at absurd moments of history is absolutely contagious and fills me with joy

[justablexican]

Greece be like: imagine being one unified nation

[abthedragon]

"...Red graciously let me channel this new enthusiasm into my first ever history video. It is very bad and I am sorry that it exists"

Well Blue, considering how great you are doing now and the fact that you made a more polished version later, I don't think it really matters how "bad" the start was.

[allanolley]

I'm glad you acknowledged how complicated Thucydides Greek can be, I remember once having to translate a short excerpt in the class textbook that was basically impossible, it basically consisted of two dozens repetitions of indefinite articles in various declensions with a few negations etc. thrown in "My plan for this work is not this but this by way of this so that this and not that." this was supposed to make sense apparently (it is actually part of his explanation of his plan and style of work).

Of course not all of his writings achieved that level of impenetrability another excerpt used in the same text book (copying from a translation I found on-line translator one Richard Crawley) goes:

"For I suppose if Lacedaemon [Sparta] were to become desolate, and the temples and the foundations of the public buildings were left, that as time went on there would be a strong disposition with posterity to refuse to accept her fame as a true exponent of her power...
Still, as the city is neither built in a compact form nor adorned with magnificent temples and public edifices, but composed of villages after the old fashion of Hellas, there would be an impression of inadequacy. Whereas, if Athens were to suffer the same misfortune, I suppose that any inference from the appearance presented to the eye would make her power to have been twice as great as it is." [because Athens had a lot more magnificent temples with large stone foundations.] from Book I, Chapter 1, section X.
So Thucydides may not have been much of an anthropologist, but as an archaeologist I mentioned this to commented this is a worthwhile insight in Archaeology.

My other favourite Thucydides quote is attributed by a later (Roman era) author Dionysius of Halicarnassus "`ιστορια φιλοσοφια 'εστιν 'εκ παραδειγματων" ("history is philosophy by way of examples")

[gabrielreed]

For Trope Talk: Can you guys go over a musical trope called "Dies Irae". It's a musical trope with orgins over a millenium old, and is practically evrywhere un music scores. It's honestly amazing and I get super excited whenever a score uses it. The Dies Irae is the themesong for the Shining. It's used in Star wars and plenty of other movies. It is easily able ti be recognized as the whistle chant that AURORA sings in Frozen's "Into the Unknown". It would be pretty cool ig you guys could do a video on it

[serenissima]

I'm Greek and I had to read both Thucydides and Xenophon in the original for my high school Ancient Greek classes. Thucydides' sentence construction is so complex it gives you a migraine and the text is drier than the Sahara desert. Xenophon on the other hand, is truly a joy to read. Much simpler sentences, without losing anything in depth and gravity. And the events are narrated in such an immediate and exciting way that sometimes you think you're reading an adventure novel - and yet it all happened!

[casual-owl]

Blue: "Go read the Iliad."
Me: *is in the middle of Book 22*