Creating Barbarians VI: Conclusions

Paul Cartledge notes that the Greeks had an “ideological habit of polarization that was a hallmark of their mentality and culture.”[1] Peter Hunt explores the effects of this habit on the accuracy of the Greek historians in reporting the role of slaves in Classical Era Greek warfare.  He argues that the existence of a Free/Slave dichotomy in the minds of the Classical Greek historians caused them to misrepresent the critical role the “unfree” played in the warfare of that era.[2]

I have attempted in this work to extend Hunt’s argument for distortion and suppression of the non-Free/Male/Greek “other” in terms of a Greek/Barbarian dichotomy, with a specific focus on the Achaemanid Persians.  While Hunt restricts his study to the Classical Era historians, I have broadened my focus to include the genres of epic, drama, history, and biography/autobiography, and sought to give an analysis of the origin of this dichotomy and its transmission from the works of Homer.  My means of tracing this transmission is a set of three “identifiers.”  These identifiers are: the numberless and discordant barbarian hordes versus the well disciplined and unified Greeks, barbarian effeminacy through luxury versus Greek martial prowess through discipline, and the barbarian “great leader” versus the Greek coalition of equals.

The texts I have chosen to examine constitute one branch of transmission of the Greek/Barbarian dichotomy: the transmission of stock scenes and motifs from the works of Homer into era drama, from drama to history, and from history to biography/autobiography.  My specific focus has been on examining how Homer’s portrayal of the Trojans in his Iliad influenced the Classical Era authors’ portrayal of the Persian Wars, and the Achaemanid Persians.  The authors I have selected to represent each category form an inter-textual set, with scenes, themes, and motifs passing on from earlier authors to be modified and employed by later ones.   

In the Iliad of Homer, I have found the identifiers I have laid out present in an early and less refined form than that of the Classical Era documents.  The identifier of the discordant barbarian hordes versus the disciplined and unified Greeks can be seen in the description of the two battle lines.  The Achaeans come on in silent, unified, and ordered discipline, while the Trojans come on with wild cries like birds flying south for the winter.[3] The identifier of barbarian effeminacy through luxury versus Greek martial prowess can be seen in way the Trojans attempt to ransom their lives with their vast riches while the Achaeans fight, retreat, or die, neither giving nor asking quarter.[4] The third identifier finds its embodiment in the person of Hector, the lone defense of Troy, and the only worthy opponent of Achilles.[5] These scenes from Homer will be repeated and refined again and again by the Classical Greek authors to articulate the solidifying Greek/Barbarian dichotomy in the wake of the Persian Wars.

Aeschylus, as a veteran of the Persian Wars, represents the extension of the Greek/Barbarian dichotomy to the genre of drama.  In keeping with the first identifier, his picture of the discordant Persian voices and the unified Hellenic shout follows the scene laid out by Homer.[6] Aeschylus also presents us with a picture of barbarian luxury and love of wealth.[7] This luxury and love of wealth in turn leads to the sin of pride, an Aeschylian contribution to the second identifier and the evolution of the Greek/Barbarian dichotomy.[8] Aeschylus presents us with a “great leader” in the person of Xerxes but, unlike Hector, this “great leader” runs for it and saves his own skin.[9] Thus, Aeschylus remains in discourse with the Homeric scenes, but at the same time modifies them as the Greek/Barbarian dichotomy hardens after the period of the Persian Wars.

In the Persian Wars, I note a sharpening of the dichotomy as Herodotus adds to the established scenes of negative “othering” a belief in the inherent “slave nature” of the “barbarians.”[10] The stereotypes become harsher as Herodotus’ inquiry essentializes the non-Greek “other” in order to explain the reasons for the Greeks’ remarkable and unexpected victory over the Persians.  In terms of the first identifier, this means that the Persians move from being portrayed as clamorous and disordered to “having no plan in anything they did.”[11] In terms of the second identifier, I find that Herodotus moves from portraying the Persians as softened and prideful from a life of “oriental luxury” to claiming that they “fight like women.”[12] Xerxes as the “great leader” moves from Aeschylus’ tragic character fatally undone by pride to a petty tyrant meeting out the beatings to his slaves that their servile nature requires.[13]

Unlike the other authors examined in this work, Xenophon had experience not only fighting against, but also working along side of the Persians.  Even more so than Aeschylus, Xenophon’s work is an outflow of his actual experiences.  Xenophon discourses through the Homeric motifs, as do the other authors, but we can see in his works a tension between his efforts to satisfy the Homeric expectations of his audience while still communicating his actual experiences.[14]  In his presentation of the first identifier, Xenophon gives the nod to the Homeric expectation that the Persians will come on with wild shouts by placing this scene in a speech by Cyrus.[15] When it comes to recording the actual events of the battle of Cunaxa, however, Xenophon asserts his actual experience: that the Persians came on silently in well-ordered formations.[16] Xenophon breaks with Herodotus in his articulation of the second identifier in that he does not see the Persians as having a fixed “slave nature,” but rather as a race that has fallen from its former glory through decadence.[17] In terms of the “great leader,” however, Cyrus the Younger still follows in Hector’s footsteps.  However admirable he may be, Cyrus’ glory is subordinated to that of the Greeks.  It is his death that that allows Xenophon’s odyssey to begin.

The reason that we should consider this evidence of the Classical authors’ reliance on the works of Homer in articulating a Greek/Persian dichotomy is that we are highly dependant on the Ancient Greek sources for our understanding of the Achaemanid Persians.  History written by the victor always carries with it certain biases.  However, if the Ancient Greek view of Persians goes beyond mere bias toward a defeated foe and enters the realm of “type-casting” an entire people group as a symbol for everything that Greece is not, then it presents serious historiographic problems.  For instance, it raises the question of whether Herodotus relies on his sources’ descriptions of the battle of Salamis for anything more than the bare-bones outline of events, and fills in the narrative with purely literary material.  If Xenophon felt that his audience’s narrative expectations were so firmly fixed that he needed to mention them in his work even when his experience contradicts them, then are their other places where he may have bowed to his audience and blurred the facts simply to produce a pleasing narrative?  To put it plainly, the significance is that what had been assumed to be historical personages and events may in fact be closer to literary creations; like studying Shakespeare’s Richard III in order to learn more about the War of the Roses.

To clarify, this is not meant to be an attack on the use of narrative in historical writing.  Humans, as a species, have shown themselves fundamentally reliant on narrative for the communication, conceptualization, and contextualization of phenomena.  What is important for modern historians is to understand where and to what extent ancient authors were willing to blur or flatly contradict the historical facts in order to satisfy the narrative expectations of their audience. 

As a final note, this examination should not be construed as a direct attack on the Greek sources.  If there is to be an accurate understanding of the Achaemanid Persians, however, there must be an awareness of the biases present in the Greek works, and an understanding of how deeply these biases influence their narratives.  This is not an effort to shelve the Greek authors as fiction, but to understand the intricacies of their works on both the literary and historical levels; as works written to inform, but also to entertain. As work continues to be done in the field of Achaemanid studies, hopefully more sources of Persian origin will become recognized and available.  The goal, then, is that the two cultures should each shine in their own light, neither one at the expense of the other, but each complementing and enhancing our collective understanding of the period. 

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[1] Paul Cartledge, The Greeks: A Portrait of Self and Others, op. cit., 11.

[2] Peter Hunt, Slaves, Warfare, and Ideology in the Greek Historians, op. cit., 5.

[3] Homer, Iliad, ed. Loeb, trans. A. T. Murray, op. cit., III.1-9, IV.422-338.

[4] Ibid., XI.122-135, XXI.34-135.

[5] Ibid., VI.402-403.

[6] Aeschylus, Persians, ed. Loeb, trans. Herbert Weir Smyth, op. cit., lines 401-406.

[7] Ibid., 40-48.

[8] Ibid., 93-132.

[9] Ibid., 465-471.

[10] Peter Hunt, Slaves, Warfare, and Ideology in the Greek Historians, op. cit., 49.

[11] Herodotus, Persian Wars, trans. George Rawlinson, op. cit., 8.86.

[12] Ibid., 8.88.

[13] Ibid., 8.90, 92.

[14] One need only look at the negative reception of Oliver Stones’ “Alexander” among the American public to see the costs of not giving an audience what they expect in an attempt to be closer to the historical facts.

[15] Xenophon, Anabasis, ed. Loeb, trans. Carleton L. Brownson, op. cit., 1.7.4.

[16] Ibid., 1.8.11.

[17] Xenophon, The Education of Cyrus, trans. Wayne Ambler, op. cit. 8.8.27.