The Greek Historians Author:Norman Austin This work consists of a long introductory essay on the development of historiography among the ancient Greeks, followed by selections beginning with Herodotus and concluding with Plutarch. It provides in convenient form long excerpts from the major Greek historians, who are often omitted from courses in Western Literature and Western Civilizati... more »on. This book helps to remedy that deficiency.
The Greek historians, in turning away from myth to examine the present, and in their insistence on accuracy, were creating not only a new genre of literature but new concepts and a new ideal of scientific truth. In his introductory essay, Dr. Austin points out the obstacles which Greek historiography had to face in its progress toward becoming a serious and intellectually rigorous discipline. He discusses such aspects as the difference between a predominantly oral cultyre and one predominantly literate, the effect of this orientation on the culture's concept of history, and the serious concern of having to invent a chronology.
The selections have been chosen which best illustrate the historians' various methods, their style, the range of their interests, and the problems which engaged their minds.« less