Question

herodotus and thucydides compare and contrast

Answer 1

Thucydides is regarded as the ‘scientific historian’, relying on facts, dates, events and personalities to present the ‘factual’ narrative of history. He detested any reliance on the supernatural, abhorred subjectivity and strived to be as objective as possible, and was concerned about writing on solely the events of his own time, the only area of history where he could personally verify through examination of written records and eyewitness accounts. He is seen as the ‘Father of the Historical Method’.

Thucydides never mentioned Herodotus by name but is thought to have taken a swipe at him in one of his introductory statements in The Peloponnesian War:

Herodotus, on the other hand, is seen as the ‘sensational historian’, relying on a blend of oral accounts, gossip, myths, rumors, and synthesizing it with his own view of the events, allowing the reader to make of it what they will. He is seen as the antithesis of what it is to be a historian as he made no attempt to find ‘truth’ on a factual basis and was content to provide multiple accounts of events and leave the reader to ascertain for themselves which one they identified with the most.

An example of where the two historians diverge in their interpretation of history is within their ideas of war itself:

Thucydides sought to explain conflict a resultant of preceding events that were based on emotion and erroneous logic and relied on factual reports of contemporary political and military events, based on unambiguous, first-hand, eyewitness accounts to describe how the events transpired. He sought not to infuse his works with moral lessons, seeing history along political lines and history itself as political and was one of the earliest people to decry the use of conventional morality when analyzing past historical events.

For Thucydides, conflict represented another political tool that could and should be wielded, with logical considerations, and had been attributable to three, time-honored motives: honor, fear, and interest. Thus, war could be avoided if people made logical decisions based on the factual circumstances of their positions, que The Melian Dialogue.

Herodotus sought to explain conflict as a result of personal motives, flawed personalities, and divine intervention, absent of more abstract ideas that cause conflict. Emotion plays a key part in his understanding of how events proceed and he relies heavily on the supernatural to answer questions that he himself cannot explain. Herodotus was essentially an author who sought to explain historical events in a ‘fashionable’ way, i.e. a way that appealed to many and could give history a ‘dramatic flair’ that would entice people to study it.

For Herodotus, conflict represented folly and the failure of man to use the better of his sense and represented a continual cycle of revenge, aiming to right the wrongs of generations past. War was a source of moral lessons that future generations could learn from in order to prevent further occurrences and were something to avoid at all costs. Subsequently future historians, despite their detestment of Herodotus’ style and historiography, continued to treat history as a source of moral lessons.

Thucydides: Facts, Reason, Abstraction, Objectivity.

Herodotus: Myths, Legends, Emotion, Subjectivity.