WAR AND MEMORY: THE BATTLE OF PSYTTALEIA BEFORE HERODOTUS' HISTORIES. (21st December 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: PROIETTI, GIORGIA
• Is Part Of: Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies. Volume 58:Number 2(2015:Dec.)
• Page Start: 43
• Page End: 54
• Publication Date: 2015-12-21
• Subjects: Classical philology -- Periodicals; 480.05
• DOI: 10.1111/j.2041-5370.2015.12011.x
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0076-0730

Abstract

Abstract: Summary: Before Herodotus, the Persian Wars underwent a multifaceted process of memorialization. As a consequence of the homeostasis of historical memory with contemporary social and semantic needs, pre-Herodoteanand Herodotean narratives about the same event can differ a great deal. This is well exemplified by the development of the historical tradition about the clash between Greeks and Persians at Psyttaleia. Reduced to a trivial appendix to the battle of Salamis by Herodotus, it seems instead to have played a prominent role within Athenian contemporary memory, as both literary and epigraphic evidence suggest. This paper first explores the different phases of the memorialization of Psyttaleia; second, it investigates the reasons for its re-shaping, arguing against political propaganda from above and dwelling instead on the deeper mechanisms of collective memory.