The Histories

What I learned from this book (in no particular order): 1. Ancient Greeks are quarrelsome and love to waste each other’s city-states for the pettiest reasons. 2. From all forms of government known to man, democracy is the best. Tyrants and oligarchs suck. 3. The Persian Empire is a mighty barbarian na......more

I can see why this book is held in such esteem; for the first time the acts of men are looked at through the optics of investigative inquiry - "Circumstances rule men; men do not rule circumstances" is still the lesson we seem to learn and forget every decade - "Circumstance is the hub of the wheel;......more

Hubris in History: A Recurring Terror “The conversion of legend-writing into the science of history was not native to the Greek mind, it was a fifth-century invention, and Herodotus was the man who invented it.” ~ R.G. Collingwood The prime subject of The Histories is the twenty years (499-479......more

It wasn't just Vollmann's fourth reference to Herodotus in a span of 20 pages in Rising Up and Rising Down, it was the reality and shame that I'm in my 40s and the most I know about the war between Persia and the Hellenic city states is what I learned from the movie 300. Thus, The Histories. First: I......more

When reading this book, I was a bit obsessed, something that is not out of the ordinary for me when reading a book that I thoroughly enjoy, and I found myself incessantly offering up unsolicited little tales from the histories to friends and family, finding good use of these stories in many situatio......more