To writers like Herodotus and Ctesias, India was on the periphery of the Greek understanding of the inhabited world, drifting the between outright fantasy and the faintest tidbits of reality. Though the invasion of Alexander the Great and the Macedonian army into the Punjab in 327 BC was something of a bloody introduction, it marked …
‘Did the Greeks believe their own myths?’ This question, which was central to Paul Veyne’s 1988 book of the same name, is also important in this series on the deeper connection between myth and politics among the Greeks. After all, as I pointed out in the previous entry, to us it might seem strange that …
Elke Close Mythological stories and figures influenced the daily life of the ancient Greeks in different ways. They were at the heart of Greek religion, taught valuable life lessons to young and old and provided an explanation for unusual natural phenomena. Greek mythology was thus very much a part of the Greek identity. It is …
One of the most prolific historians of the Hellenistic Age was without a doubt Polybius of Megalopolis. His Histories not only provide us with a plethora of information on ‘Rome’s rise to power’, but the wider political reality of the Hellenistic World of the third and second centuries BC. Our series on the ‘great’ Hellenistic figures …
So you like the Ancient World? Good, then you are in the right place. Have you ever wondered how the research is done for the articles, blogs or books that you love reading? Yes? Then look no further! Of course, any good researcher starts with the traditional books and articles on the topic that you …
