Herodotus: "The Histories" - Book One

Getting, with lisacurcio's blessing, a thread started for discussing the books within the book.

Some things I found interesting in the first book:

The Moses-like story of Cyrus.

H's science observations: evaporation is the sun drawing water toward itself. Didn't he think about steam from boiling water/cooking? I suppose you could view that as the fire encouraging the water to seek the sun...but what about making tea at midnight?

The decision making process of the Persians.

If an important decision is to be made, they discuss the question when they are drunk, and the following day the master of the house where the discussion was held submits their decision for reconsideration when they are sober. If they still approve it, it is adopted; if not, it is abandoned. Conversely, any decision they make when sober, is reconsidered afterwards when they are drunk.

There is a lot of other fun stuff in that section too. Can you believe the Persians think it impolite to vomit or urinate in the presence of another?! You can? Well, H's audiences apparently would have felt otherwise.

All the consultation of oracles made me wonder something I have often wondered - how much and by what means have oracles, priests etc. capitalized on the information they have learned from those who consult them, seek penance, etc.? Being the top oracle is a great gig because you will learn the most. Of course your answers will be best!

Another speculation: Can these ancients really have amassed such treasures? The descriptions of Croesus treasures and various items the nations have donated to the oracles are outrageous!

Two great military conversations/speeches that I will type when I get more time: the conversation with Croesus that dissuades him from mounting an attack on the island Greeks (after defeating the continental Greeks) and Cyrus's speech to the enslaved Persians that causes them to rise up.

In the Landmark Herodotus, there are pictures of some of the treasures that have been recovered by archeologists. If I ever get a chance to look at it, I will be more specific!

>1 slickdpdx:: slickdpdx,

That decision-making process is very interesting. Presumably when they were sober, they made decisions based on reason, when drunk, instinct and feelings. So if both agree, it's a GO. I would adopt it for myself if I were not averse to being drunk.

I just got my copy of the Landmark book yesterday, and so haven't read that part yet, hopefully will by the end of this week.

Finished Book I.

Cyrus was suckled by a bitch, and Romulus a she-wolf. I wonder which other peoples have their patriarchs raised by animals in their legends / mythology.

The Landmark Herodotus is a fine publication. I have had it out on loan from the library.

The edition I read was Everymans Library which is great value for money.

>6 LesMiserables:: LesMiserables,

I downloaded the Everyman's edition (translated by Rawlinson) as an audiobook. Great listen.

I wondered as I read Book One about the oracles--It seemed that what they foretold came true, but not always as the hearer interpreted it. As in the oft-recited story of Croesus believing that he would always rule because a mule could never take the throne. He didn't think outside the box, there did he? And given the oracles' proclivity for speaking metaphorically or symbolically, wouldn't you think that people who went to them so often and spent so much money thanking them would have stopped to think what they were really saying? Human nature then and now--we hear what we want to hear.

Does anyone know about the history of the oracles?

And on the note of the oracles, it seems like some of their prophecies are downright straightforward, without the many interpretations that e.g. the mule one lends itself too. Take for example the one about Croesus's son speaking his first word on a day of sorrow. I guess what I'm wondering is what the oracle's internal process was like. How did they come up with their prophecies? What did they feel their communion with the gods to be like? What, in their own perception, was inspiration, and what was their own creation? I know we can't necessarily draw those distinctions in the same way with the Greeks, and in say Homer people are always acting the way they do because they are possessed by gods, but I still wonder what it would have looked/felt like IRL.

>8 LisaCurcio:: LisaCurcio,

With all the prodigious gifts that Croesus dedicated to the gods, you would think that the least they could do was to give him a straightforward answer, and not lead him astray with a "mule". When Croesus made his case against them, they defended themselves by saying that the Fates ordained all these, and there was nothing much they could do. Well then, what's the point of consulting them? After all, Cyrus, the "mule" who defeated Croesus, didn't sacrifice to them but prospered regardless.

>10 booksontrial: well, he would have known better than to make war against cyrus if he had interpreted the oracle properly, so it was useful in that sense ....

>11 MeditationesMartini:: MeditationesMartini,

Every good teacher knows how to teach their pupils in a way that they can understand. If the oracles really wanted to help Croesus, they would/should have spoken so that he could interpret them properly. (I'm borrowing / paraphrasing Cicero's arguments in The Nature of the Gods).

>12 booksontrial: well, totally. I just meant, you were raising the question of the usefulness of the oracles, so from Croesus's perspective that is a use. From the oracles' perspective, being cryptic is obviously also in their interest.

> 13: MeditationesMartini,

The gods were interested in securing more sacrifices and having more temples build to them. Croesus made the sacrifices but derived no benefits from them whatsoever.

>I don't actually think we're disagreeing. Sacrificing and building temples did not/would not have done Croesus any good, for sure; but if he had listened to the oracle's advice about not fighting Cyrus, he would have saved his empire, so that would have been good, regardless of whether it came from any real place of supernatural insight. I guess the lesson of cryptic prophecy is "always assume the worst"?

>15 MeditationesMartini:: MeditationesMartini,

I just thought that even if Croesus interpreted the oracles correctly, he still could not have saved his empire, just as he could not save his own son. So there was no point for him to consult the oracles at all. He was truly a tragic character. On the one hand, the gods could not / would not save him, on the other hand, he brought about his son's and his own doom.

Now if you don't mind me changing the topic. What do you think about their wedding custom, the one Herodotus thought the wisest? Or the custom of sacrificing their elders and not allowing them a natural death?

I forget--was the wedding custom something about women going into brothels, or being purchased for sex in some way? There sure is a lot of that.

I think it was the one where they held auctions. The men had to pay for the pretty ones and the ugly ones had to pay to get married. There was some rationale like the family could use the money from the pretty one to pay to get rid of the ugly one.

The best part of the sacrificing the elders was that it was considered bad to get sick and die before one could be sacrificed.

Auctioning off beautiful women at the highest price and use the money to buy husbands at the lowest price for the ugly ones. It corresponds to what's later called bride price and dowry, I think.

Sacrificing the elders and eating their flesh. The sick ones don't qualify for obvious reasons. I can't think of any modern counterpart. Organ donation, maybe?

One wonders how accurate Herodotus is on the cannibalism, though many cultures have practiced exposure of their elderly.

But endocannibalism is not unknown. The Luiseno of Southern California are known to have occasionally ground up the cremated remains of their departed and consumed them. In his book Yanomamo, Napolean Chagnon describes the same among the South American tribe he's describing.

Years ago I read in a vampire book that there was a custom somewhere in the Balkans that, if an individual was suspected of vampirism, he was exhumed and examined. If he showed signs of being a vampire, the remains were ground to a fine paste which was then eaten by friends and relatives. I've often told friends that I want to be served as a funerary dinner to mourners at my closed-casket funeral, who will be informed after dinner of what (whom) they've eaten. Alas, I think I've told too many people for it to actually work now.

But cannibalism is so important in Greek myth that one wonders how accurate any of Herodotus' stories are. Remember, also in this book Astyages allegedly serves Harpagos his own son. And Tatalos' great crime was having sacrificed his own child and served him to the gods. And Agamemnon's curse was that his ancestor had served a cannibal meal to his killer's family. There's a reason Freud used the Greeks to understand bizarre psychological complexes.