Herodotus: The Father of History (The Great Courses) | Date: 12 April 2011, 04:21
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Witness the "works and wonders" of the ancient world through the eyes of its first great historian.
Given the number and the superb quality of the courses on classical literature that Professor Elizabeth Vandiver has contributed to The Great Courses, we knew that we had to bring her into our studio to lecture on Herodotus.
His monumental work, the Histories, was the subject of her doctoral dissertation and first book. And it remains one of her great loves among Greek and Roman writings.
[b]An Exceptional Teacher[/b]
If you've enjoyed any of Professor Vandiver's previous courses on the epics of Homer and Virgil, Greek tragedy, or classical mythology, you will surely want to add this one to your library of recorded learning.
If you are new to Professor Vandiver or The Teaching Company, however, this course is still a great investment in learning.
She presents the material to you as a self-contained unit that is readily accessible and requires no special background knowledge.
Herodotus (c. 484–420 B.C.E.) was a Greek who was born in what is now the modern Turkish resort town of Bodrum (called Halicarnassus, in his day) and who died, so tradition says, in the south of Italy.
[b]A Tireless Mind[/b]
In between, his tirelessly inquiring mind took him from one corner of the known world to another. And he reported on or visited all of its continents (Europe, Asia, and Africa) to write about the vast array of subjects that captured his interest, including:
[list][*]the "great works" (erga megala) of the ancient land of Egypt
[*]the remarkable kings who built the vast and mighty Persian Empire
[*]the strange customs and unlikely origins of the Scythians, a warlike, mounted people who lived beyond the Danube and whose repulse of Darius and the Persians in 513 B.C.E. made them the first Europeans to throw back an eastern invasion.
[/list]These lectures introduce you to the book—Herodotus's only known work—that came out of these "inquiries." (The title Histories, by the way, is a now-common mistranslation of the original title, as Professor Vandiver explains.)
You learn what makes Herodotus one of those rare, landmark figures in the story of thought as Professor Vandiver traces the influences Herodotus assimilated and the new methods he used in crafting this monumental work.
[hide=Course Lecture Titles][list][*]1. Herodotus and History
[*]2. "Inquiry" and the Birth of History
[*]3. Myth, Legend, and Oral Tradition
[*]4. Homeric Epic and the East-West Conflict
[*]5. The Ionian Enlightenment
[*]6. Athens in the Archaic Age
[*]7. Politics and Culture in Fifth-Century Athens
[*]8. Scope, Design, and Organization of the Histories
[*]9. The Beginnings of the Conflict
[*]10. Croesus, Solon, and Human Happiness
[*]11. Cyrus and the Foundation of the Persian Empire
[*]12. Herodotus' Account of Egypt
[*]13. The Ascension of Darius
[*]14. Darius and the Scythians
[*]15. Sparta and the Spartan Way of Life
[*]16. The Ionian Revolt and the Battle of Marathon
[*]17. Xerxes and the Threat to Greece
[*]18. The Battles of Thermopylae and Artemisium
[*]19. The Victory of Greece
[*]20. Persons, Personalities, and Peoples
[*]21. The Gods, Fate, and the Supernatural
[*]22. History or Literature-Or Both?
[*]23. Herodotus, the Peloponnesian War, and Thucydides
[*]24. Aftermath and Influence
[/list][/hide]
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