Comparing history and tragedy : the case of Polybius and Plutarch

Abstract

One of the distinct features of Greek historical thought – if we are inclined to accept the existence of one in classical Greek culture and do not regard it as totally unhistorical - is that it was greatly influenced by the poetry and was expressed primarily in poetry; according to C. M. Bowra, “poetry has been the normal method of remembering the past”. The first historical dimension of man in Greek culture was poetical. When historiography came into existence, it, though very popular, had never become the central axis of Greek culture and education: this position from the very beginning steadily belonged to poetry, especially to epic and tragic poetry, and later to rhetorics. Basic historical knowledge was usually acquired through the knowledge of literature. [excerpt]