ARCHIVE - 3. HERODOTUS - THE HISTORIES~BOOK II/SECTIONS 1-106 (09/29/08 - 10/05/08) ~ No spoilers, please

[[deleted user]]

Did anyone else think of the Iraq War when H described the Trojan War? Helen=weapons of mass destruction. Were they there or not? H claims that Priam could not have been so "demented" as to fight a war for l0 years if Helen really was in in Troy. She must have been in Egypt or he would have handed her over to the Greeks.

That was our thinking about the weapons in Iraq. Could Sadaam have been so demented? I think so!

[[deleted user]]

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I totally agree! I am a confirmed caffeine adddict. I've noticed that drs. usually give caffeine a pass, i think because they depend on it so heavily!
I do think that caffeine effects our lives...maybe that's why so many people have trouble sleeping? So, the thought that lotus eaters may have a slight buzz all day is an interesting thought, no?

I won't even go into the "cocktail hour"!

[[deleted user]]

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It seems the one constant in human interaction is conflict.

[Bentley, Group Founder, Leader, Chief]

Response to Message 72:

Hello Antoine,

I do not know if you noticed but we also have a discussion going on regarding Travels with Herodotus by Kapuscinski; we have also been reading those books which had as their basis Herodotus. That thread is in the book club also. Antoine, I will have to check up on the Marozzi article.

Response to Vanessa:

As far as Iraq; that would make a good Off Topic Cafe discussion but I think there are many analogies to present day events where personages unnamed did not learn from history (I was not thinking of Saddam per se as my example). I am not sure what the one constant is in human interaction but conflict seems to be one component. It is too bad that folks and countries cannot get along but it is all mistrust of the unknown and greed I believe.

Response to Oldesq:

I too thought it was an artichoke but then again we could be wrong. I think there are a lot of people who even use coffee as self medication; I drink decaf myself.

[Bentley, Group Founder, Leader, Chief]

Folks, I am bumping this thread; because I have added all 14 weeks of threads for the entire Herodotus discussion. Only 5 threads of the weekly topics show; you have to select view all on the topic header (Spotlighted Topics) to see all 14 weeks and threads. At any time by selecting view all; you can see all of the threads in any topic and post to any of them that have been opened already.

Bentley

[BCKnowlton]

In the Glossary and Resources thread I have posted a few things about the Black Athena debate, as it is called after the book of that name by Martin Bernal. It is now over twenty years old, but the debate goes on. Bernal's book is famous, or notorious, for claiming that Greece got much of its culture from Egypt, and that the Egyptians were black. Mary Lefkowitz, a classicist at Wellesley College, is Bernal's best-known antagonist. Her book, Not Out of Africa, is, however, aimed as much at those who have taken up Bernal's analysis. Her claim, and the subtitle of her book, is that because of Black Athena, Afrocentric myths are being taught as history in schools and colleges.

There are several passages from Book 2 of Herodotus' Histories that some of the debate is about. We have seen from the beginning of Book 1 that it seems important to Herodotus to inquire into the origins of things; and it has seemed important to the Egyptians to claim that they and their ways are ancient if not original. But it doesn't bother Herodotus at all that the Egyptians were older than the Greeks, and that the Greeks seem to have gotten a lot of their culture from them. Of course, one of the things that historical inquiry can now do is show where Herodotus is wrong about this. And one of the things his own inquiries shows is that though the Egyptians have records of their past going back thousands of years, they don't have history as Herodotus does it.

In any case -- the first passage that generates debate is 2.43, which has to do with the origins of Heracles. There seem to be two of them -- the Greek hero and the Egyptian god -- though Herodotus seems to consider them a single figure. He claims that "it was not the Egyptians who took the name Heracles from the Greeks. The opposite is true: it was the Greeks who took it from the Egyptians." As proof of this he cites the fact that the parents of Heracles were "of Egyptian origin." This is a particular point of debate between Martin Bernal and Mary Lefkowitz; and it is a debate of a particular kind. Lefkowitz argues in Not Out of Africa that to translate ap 'Aigyptou as "of Egyptian origin" is a mistake; and that the real meaning of the phrase is that heracles is a descendant of Aegyptus. Bernal points out what Lefkowitz acknowledges, namely that "every English translation" understands the phrase to refer to Egypt and not Aegyptus; and he goes on to give three reasons for this, one of which refutes Lefkowitz's understanding of the Greek. Her reply cites the Oxford Classical Text. The Penguin editor of Herodotus explains that the parents of Heracles "were descendants of Perseus and thus (see ch. 91) Egyptian." What we see at 2.91 is an account of the one custom the Egyptians seem to have gotten from the Greeks: the cult of Perseus. Herodotus describes the Greek ceremonies involved, and inquires as to why Perseus should be worshipped in Egypt. He is told that Perseus was of Egyptian origin. Lefkowitz argues that these Egyptian ancestors of Heracles and Perseus are originally Greek, but she also points out that they are mythical. Perseus also appears in 6.53, very far back in a list of Greek kings. Further back,his descent is Egyptian; but that is still the Greek account. Herodotus adds that according to the Persians, Perseus was originally Assyrian. In 7.150, the Persians claim that they are descended from Perseus. In 7.220, the Delphic oracle refers to Persians as "Perseus' sons."

The second debatable passage occurs in chapter 49, in which Herodotus tells us about the worship of Dionysus. He has an idea that Melampus, who was a Greek of the Homeric era, learned about Dionysus from Egypt, and then brought what he knew to Greece. But Herodotus also tells us that Melampus learned about Dionysus from Cadmus of Tyre, with whom he travelled from Egypt to Greece. This episode can serve to remind us that Bernal's argument involves the Asians as well as the African roots of Greek civilization.

But as he continues to tell us about what Greece got from Egypt, Herodotus comes to a story about the origin of a Temple of Zeus in Dodona in Greece. The priestesses there told him that a black dove flew from Egypt to Greece, and told the Greeks to build a temple of Zeus. "Those who heard her understood the words to be a command from heaven, and at once obeyed" (2.55). Herodotus' understanding of this story is interesting in that he interprets it critically; and according to his critical interpretation the bird is black because it came from Egypt.

This anticipates the next debatable episode, in which Herodotus tells of the adventures of the (mythical) Egyptian king Sesostris, who is said to have conquered Scythia. On his way back to Egypt, he is said to have left part of his army at Colchis on the Black Sea (the blackness of which has not been taken up in the debate). Herodotus visited Colchis, and declares that "it is undoubtedly a fact that the Colchians are of Egyptian descent" (2.104). He goes on to explain that "my own idea on the subject was based first on the fact that they have black skins and woolly hair (not that that amounts to much, as other nations have the same), and, secondly, and more especially, on the fact that the Colchians, the Egyptians, and the Ethiopians are the only races which from ancient times have practiced circumcision" (2.104). The first part of this statement is the main basis of the claim that the Egyptians were black. It is significant that Herodotus immediately undercuts this claim, and then sets it aside. It also seems to me worth observing that anyone of Egyptian descent living in Colchis will be more dark-skinned than anyone else living thereabouts. A note here in the Penguin edition points out that the word Herodotus uses here to refer to the black skins of the Egyptians -- melanchroes -- can actually signify anything from bronze to black. The editor refers to recent arguments that the Egyptians were black, but clearly doesn't think much of them.

But the fact that the Colchian descendants of Egyptian soldiers have black skin and woolly hair doesn't mean much to Herodotus; more telling evidence of the Colchians' descent from Egypt is to be seen in their circumcision. What it tells is that, whether or not "black" skin is actually either brown or bronze, there are more significant attributes than skin color. Herodotus has a lot more to say about circumcision, and he goes from there to a method of weaving linen that Egypt and Colchis share with no one else. All this had begun with Herodotus' account of the Egyptian king, Sesostris; when he resumes that account we are reminded of just how unhistorical it is...

[Bentley, Group Founder, Leader, Chief]

Thank you BC; you cover the issues better than we could phrase them; also in the Glossary and Resources section of this board; BC and I had quite a discussion concerning this topic and the urls and dialogue are on that thread. I would encourage folks to visit there and also to view the Black Athena videos; they were extremely interesting and vital to our understanding of this segment of The Histories. BC points out some other books which would also make for some very interesting reading. I personally wish that I had the time to read all of them; but I think Bernal's book cuts to the heart of the matter.

Bentley

[[deleted user]]

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Thank you so much BC. I have printed this out to share with my husband as he teaches art at an inner-city university. He has told me that his students have been educated on afro-centric lies. For instance, they believe that Egyptians invented the helicopter and were flying them for centuries before Europeans. A generation has grown up this way and they have gone into the schools to teach.

I was wondering if you have any idea about the parrallels between the Greek and Egyptian gods. H seems to think that they are the different in name only. I had been under the impression that they were different.

[[deleted user]]

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Also, I wonder if the Egyptians who settled in Colchis might have been ethnically different as they were soldiers. I always had the impression that Egyptians were of mixed race but H describes these Egyptians as sub-Saharan Africans.

[BCKnowlton]

Vanessa,

Your husband may want to read Not Out of Africa. Lefkowitz was inspired to write it not by reading Bernal's book but by noticing that some of her students had been taught afrocentric myths. She has also just recently published a memoir of her experience in the Black Athena debate, called .

The idea about the parallels between the Greek and Egyptian gods is one that has always seemed worth researching; but I have never gotten around to those researches. My sense is that Herodotus, who really believed in his Greek gods, probably assumed that they were the gods of other peoples as well, even if those peoples called them by different names.

The Egyptian King Sesostris was at best a semi-mythical figure. A note in the Penguin edition calls him "an amalgamation" of several historical kings, though it adds that "the idealization of this pharaoh probably represents genuine Egyptian tradition." But the stories told about him are probably at least as semi-mythical as he is. A note in the Landmark is more blunt: "This identification of Egyptians with Colchians is, of course, entirely wrong."

[[deleted user]]

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Thanks BC, I will definitely suggest Lefkowitz' book to my husband although he might not want to get involved in that debate, I can imagine A Race Odyssey would be fascinating reading as well.

I understood H conception of the gods as you have. When I told my husband about it however, he was shocked and said that the Egyptian gods were so different from the Greek. You're right, it would take a lot of research to figure that one out.

I wonder how Landmark can be so sure that H is "entirely wrong". I've heard that more and more of H is being corroborated.

[Bentley, Group Founder, Leader, Chief]

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[[deleted user]]

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I've been thinking about this post and why it was that H did not seem to mind that Egypt came first. Could it be that Egypt, at the time, was the standard for a great civilization? To say that the Greeks came from the Egyptians may have been raising their status in the eyes of the world. Perhaps it is a bit like the US saying that we took from the Greeks? We hold the Greeks in such high esteem that to be an heir to their culture raises our opinion of our own. It may be that our high opinion of Greek culture makes it harder for us to understand the Greek admiration for the Egyptians!

I think Plato traveled to Egypt and Sparta before he wrote the Republic and incorporated aspects of both societies into his Utopia. He admired the stability of Egypt and Sparta. Just a thought that popped into my mind, not sure how valid it is.

[Bentley, Group Founder, Leader, Chief]

Vanessa it sounds good and plausible.