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Herodotus (; ''Hēródotos'', ), a contemporary of Socrates, was a Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria (modern-day Bodrum, Turkey) and lived in the fifth century BC ( 484–425 BC). Widely referred to as "The Father of History" (first conferred by Cicero),〔T. James Luce, ''The Greek Historians'', 2002, (p. 26 ).〕 he was the first historian known to have broken from Homeric tradition to treat historical subjects as a method of investigation: specifically by collecting his materials systematically and critically, and then to arrange them into a historiographic narrative.〔''New Oxford American Dictionary'', "Herodotos", Oxford University Press〕 ''The Histories'' is the only work he is known to have produced — a record of his "inquiry" (or ''historía'') on the origins of the Greco-Persian Wars including a wealth of geographical and ethnographical information. Although some of his stories were fanciful and others inaccurate, he states he was reporting only what was told to him and was often correct in his information. Despite Herodotus' historical significance, little is known of his personal history. ==Place in history== Herodotus announced the size and scope of his work at the beginning of his ''Researches'' or ''Histories'': His record of the achievements of others was an achievement in itself, though the extent of it has been debated. His place in history and his significance may be understood according to the traditions within which he worked. His work is the earliest Greek prose to have survived intact. However, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, a literary critic of Augustan Rome, listed seven predecessors of Herodotus, describing their works as simple, unadorned accounts of their own and other cities and people, Greek or foreign, including popular legends, sometimes melodramatic and naive, often charming—all traits that can be found in the work of Herodotus himself.〔A.R. Burn, ''Herodotus: The Histories'', Penguin Classics, 1972, page 23, citing Dionysius ''On Thucydides''〕 Modern historians regard the chronology as uncertain. According to the ancient account, these predecessors included Dionysius of Miletus, Charon of Lampsacus, Hellanicus of Lesbos, Xanthus of Lydia and, the best attested of them all, Hecataeus of Miletus. Of these only fragments of Hecataeus's work survive (and the authenticity of these is debatable)〔A.R. Burn, ''Herodotus: The Histories'', Penguin Classics, 1972, page 27〕 yet they allow us glimpses into the kind of tradition within which Herodotus wrote his own ''Histories'', as in the introduction to Hecataeus's work, ''Genealogies'': This points forward to the 'folksy' yet 'international' outlook typical of Herodotus. Yet, one modern scholar has described the work of Hecataeus as "a curious false start to history"〔Oswyn Murray, 'Greek Historians' in ''The Oxford History of the Classical World'', J. Boardman, J. Griffin and O. Murray (ed.s), Oxford University Press (1986) page 188〕 because, despite its critical spirit, it failed to liberate history from myth. Herodotus mentions Hecataeus in his ''Histories'', on one occasion mocking him for his naive genealogy and, on another occasion, quoting Athenian complaints against his handling of their national history.〔, 〕 It is possible that Herodotus borrowed much material from Hecataeus, as stated by Porphyry in a quote recorded by Eusebius.〔''Preparation of the Gospel'', X,3〕 In particular, it is possible that he copied descriptions of the crocodile, hippopotamus and phoenix from Hecataeus's 'Circumnavigation of the Known World' (''Periegesis''/''Periodos ges''), even mis-representing the source as 'Heliopolitans' (''Histories'' 2.73).〔Henry R. Immerwahr, 'Herodotus', in ''The Cambridge History of Classical Greek Literature: Greek Literature'', P. Easterling and B. Knox (eds), Cambridge University Press (1985), pages 430, 440〕 But unlike Herodotus, Hecataeus did not record events that had occurred in living memory, nor did he include the oral traditions of Greek history within the larger framework of oriental history.〔Henry R. Immerwahr, 'Herodotus', in ''The Cambridge History of Classical Greek Literature: Greek Literature'', P. Easterling and B. Knox (eds), Cambridge University Press (1985), page 431〕 There is no proof that Herodotus derived the ambitious scope of his own work, with its grand theme of civilizations in conflict, from any predecessor, despite much scholarly speculation about this in modern times.〔〔A.R. Burn, ''Herodotus: The Histories'', Penguin Classics, 1972, pages 22-3〕 Herodotus claims to be better informed than his predecessors, relying on empirical observation to correct their excessive schematism. For example, he argues for continental asymmetry as opposed to the older theory of a perfectly circular earth with Europe and Asia/Africa equal in size (''Hist.'' 4.36 and 4.42). Yet, he retains idealising tendencies, as in his symmetrical notions of the Danube and Nile.〔Henry R. Immerwahr, 'Herodotus', in ''The Cambridge History of Classical Greek Literature: Greek Literature'', P. Easterling and B. Knox (eds), Cambridge University Press (1985), page 430〕 His debt to previous authors of prose 'histories' might be questionable but there is no doubt that he owed much to the example and inspiration of poets and story-tellers. For example, Athenian tragic poets provided him with a world-view of a balance between conflicting forces, upset by the hubris of kings, and they provided his narrative with a model of episodic structure. His familiarity with Athenian tragedy is demonstrated in a number of passages echoing Aeschylus's ''Persae'', including the epigrammatic observation that the defeat of the Persian navy at Salamis caused the defeat of the land army (''Hist.'' 8.68 ~ ''Persae'' 728). The debt may have been repaid by Sophocles because there appear to be echoes of ''The Histories'' in his plays, especially a passage in ''Antigone'' that resembles Herodotus's account of the death of Intaphernes (''Histories'' 3.119 ~ ''Antigone'' 904-20)〔Henry R. Immerwahr, 'Herodotus', in ''The Cambridge History of Classical Greek Literature: Greek Literature'', P. Easterling and B. Knox (eds), Cambridge University Press (1985), pages 427, 432〕—this, however, is one of the most contentious issues in modern scholarship.〔Richard Jebb (ed), ''Antigone'', Cambridge University Press, 1976, pages 181-82 n.904-920〕 Homer was another inspirational source. Just as Homer drew extensively on a tradition of oral poetry, sung by wandering minstrels, so Herodotus appears to have drawn on an Ionian tradition of story-telling, collecting and interpreting the oral histories he chanced upon in his travels. These oral histories often contained folk-tale motifs and demonstrated a moral, yet they also contained substantial facts relating to geography, anthropology and history, all compiled by Herodotus in an entertaining style and format.〔Oswyn Murray, 'Greek Historians' in ''The Oxford History of the Classical World'', J.Boardman, J. Griffin and O. Murray (ed.s), Oxford University Press (1986) page 190-91〕 It is on account of the many strange stories and the folk-tales he reported that his critics in early modern times branded him 'The Father of Lies'.〔A.R. Burn, ''Herodotus: The Histories'', Penguin Classics, 1972, page 10〕〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Herodotus: Father of History, Father of Lies )〕 Even his own contemporaries found reason to scoff at his achievement. In fact one modern scholar〔Rawlinson, George ''The History of Herodotus Vol.1'', D. Appleton and Company, New York (1859), page (details later)〕 has wondered if Herodotus left his home in Asiatic Greece, migrating westwards to Athens and beyond, because his own countrymen had ridiculed his work, a circumstance possibly hinted at in an epitaph said to have been dedicated to Herodotus at Thuria (one of his three supposed resting places): Yet it was in Athens where his most formidable contemporary critics could be found. In 425 BC, which is about the time that Herodotus is thought by many scholars to have died, the Athenian comic dramatist Aristophanes created ''The Acharnians'', in which he blames The Peloponnesian War on the abduction of some prostitutes—a mocking reference to Herodotus, who reported the Persians' account of their wars with Greece, beginning with the rapes of the mythical heroines Io, Europa, Medea and Helen.〔''The Peloponnesian War'', Lawrence A.Tritle, Greenwood Publishing Group 2004, page 147-48〕〔''Herodotus and Greek History'' John Hart, Taylor and Francis 1982, page 174〕 Similarly, the Athenian historian Thucydides dismissed Herodotus as a 'logos-writer' or story-teller.〔Oswyn Murray, 'Greek Historians' in ''The Oxford History of the Classical World'', J. Boardman, J. Griffin and O. Murray (ed.s), Oxford University Press (1986) page 191〕 Thucydides, who had been trained in rhetoric, became the model for subsequent prose-writers as an author who seeks to appear firmly in control of his material, whereas Herodotus with his frequent digressions appeared to minimize (or possibly disguise) his auctorial control.〔Waterfield, Robin (trans.) and Dewald, Carolyn (ed.), ''The Histories by Herodotus'', University of Oxford Press (1998), Introduction pages xviii〕 Moreover, Thucydides developed a historical topic more in keeping with the Greek lifestyle—the polis or city-state—whereas the interplay of civilizations was more relevant to Asiatic Greeks (such as Herodotus himself), for whom life under foreign rule was a recent memory.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Herodotus」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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