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Although Herodotus considered his "inquiries" a serious pursuit of knowledge, he was not above relating entertaining tales derived from the collective body of myth, but he did so judiciously with regard for his historical method, by corroborating the stories through enquiry and testing their probability.[96] While the gods never make personal appearances in his account of human events, Herodotus states emphatically that "many things prove to me that the gods take part in the affairs of man" (IX, 100), so by this logic he was justified in including stories that evoked miracles or supernatural events, not only to please his readers but also to edify them — because as he saw it, these stories pointed toward the essential features of the order of things. In Book One, passages 23 and 24, he relates the story of Arion, the renowned harp player, "second to no man living at that time," who was saved by a dolphin. Herodotus prefaces the story by noting that "a very wonderful thing is said to have happened," and alleges its veracity by adding that the "Corinthians and the Lesbians agree in their account of the matter." Having become very rich while at the court of Periander, Arion conceived a desire to sail to Italy and Sicily. He hired a vessel crewed by Corinthians, whom he felt he could trust, but the sailors plotted to throw him overboard and seize his wealth. Arion discovered the plot and begged for his life, but the crew gave him two options: that either he kill himself on the spot or jump ship and fend for himself in the sea. Arion flung himself into the water, and a dolphin carried him to shore.[97] The story is fantastic, but it introduces the themes of perfidy, resourcefulness, and heroic action that recur throughout the book. Herodotus included stories with a fairy tale quality in part because such stories share repetitive patterns that point toward commonly accepted truths and thus serve to underline the moral themes in a particularly economical manner, as in the story of Candaules's bodyguard, Gyges, who supplanted his sovereign at the behest of Candaules's wife, the Queen. The uxorious Candaules, proud of his wife's beauty, arranged for Gyges to bear witness to the spectacle of her naked form, but the Queen inadvertently espied Gyges when he sneaked from his hiding spot. She demanded that Gyges kill Candaules, because the King had seen fit to shame her, and after doing so Gyges assumed the throne.[98] Thus Herodotus draws out the themes of sex and power that, it so happens, are also the main themes of the History as a whole. Herodotus begins his History with an account of the abductions of three women (Io, Europa, and Medea) in mythic times, which he claims were the "grounds of feud" between the Greeks and the Barbarians. It is interesting in this context to note the identification of women and geography, over both of which the armies of men fight. In the 42nd passage of Book IV Herodotus states, "For my part I am astonished that men should ever have divided Libya, Asia, and Europe as they have, for they are exceedingly unequal." And later in the 45th passage he adds, "I cannot conceive why three names, and women's names especially, should ever have been given to a tract which is in reality one." In these observations are contained some of the most basic elements of myth, or mythemes, that recur throughout the text. Herodotus depicts a Fall from a state of harmony: what was once a unified tract (accord) is now divided unequally (discord) and fought over by men because of lust for land and women. Much like the biblical story of Eve, women in this scenario appear to be cast in the role of seductress. Of course, every Fall brings with it certain compensations, such as knowledge. Knowledge of the good and evil that men do is the historian's charge, but unlike the poet or theologian, the historian in Herodotus's view is concerned to bring myth into a logically consistent relation with present realities. Thus Herodotus sifts through the ancient myths, rejecting some, accepting others, depending on whether he considers them probable and thematically apt, because they must contribute to an understanding of the present history.[citation needed] |
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