Utopian Sources in Herodotus Author(s) : Moses Hadas Source: Classical Philology, Apr., 1935, Vol. 30, No. 2 (Apr., 1935), Pp. 113-121 Published By: The University of Chicago Press
Utopian Sources in Herodotus Author(s) : Moses Hadas Source: Classical Philology, Apr., 1935, Vol. 30, No. 2 (Apr., 1935), Pp. 113-121 Published By: The University of Chicago Press
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms
The University of Chicago Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend
access to Classical Philology
BY MOSES HADAS
1 I cite More from the edition of V. Michels and T. Ziegler, No. 11 in Lateinische
Litteraturdenkmdler des XV. und XVI. Jahrhunderts. The present passage is at p. 64,
11. 24 ff.
(iii. 18), there was a Table of the Sun, that is, a place where the magis-
trates deposited food during the night, which was then freely taken by
the populace during the day. Here is another striking anticipation of
Utopia. Since Herodotus does not himself stress the moral aspect of
the Ethiopian arrangements, it is his authority probably that had
the moral purpose. Perhaps Herodotus accepted as literally true a
story which had been invented as a vehicle for doctrine and tricked out
with enough geographical information to lend verisimilitude. There
are many instances in ancient literature, several in Scripture, where
an odd account is the result of a chronicler's accepting the idiom of
poetry as literal truth.
The kind of thing I should like to posit as a source for Herodotus in
his Ethiopian and other accounts was common enough a century after
Herodotus. Felix Jacoby has described the genus so well in his Pauly-
Wissowa article on "Hekataios" that I can do no better than borrow a
paragraph from his account:
Es ist gewiss nicht nur der Zufall der Erhaltung, der uns als H.'s wichtigste
Werke die Buicher IIHpL 'T7rEpfopC-wP und die AllyvirrtaKa erscheinen lasst. Sie
gehoren Beide zu im saec. IV wie Pilze aufschiessende Werken, in denen Phi-
losophen oder philosophisch interessierte Schriftsteller gewisse moralische
Tendenzen, gewisse Ideale vom Staate und vom gesellschaftlichen Leben dem
Publikum schmackhaft zu machen suchen durch Einkleidung als Reiseer-
zahlung oder Beschreibung zunachst meist fiktiver Lander am aussersten Erd-
rande oder in unbestimmten geographischen Breiten. Diese Tendenzerzah-
lungen sind die alteste Literaturform der Popularphilosophie .... sicherlich
sind diese Schriften von der Mehrzahl der Leser weniger ihres philosophischen
Endzweckes als der romanhaften Einkleidung willen gelesen worden. Begreif-
lich genug; denn die Einkleidung wurde vielfach mit soviel Liebe und Kunst
ausgearbeitet, dass sie den vollen Schein der Wahrheit erhielt und weniger
scharfsichtige Beurteiler uiber den wirklichen Charakter der Werke vollkom-
men tauschte. Diodor hat die 'IEpa avaypa4r' so gut wie die AlyvorrLaKa fuir
historische Werke angesehen. Wir bezeichnen sie, um einen bequemen Namen
zu haben, als "philosophische Romane" oder "ethnographische Utopien."5
In addition to the examples from Hecataeus, mention might be
made of the Meropis of Theopompus, the Panchaea of Euhemerus,
5 VII, 2755. Interesting remarks on the Hellenistic Utopias will be found in Erwin
Rohde, Der griechische Roman3 (Leipzig, 1914); Edgar Salin, Platon und die griechische
Utopie (Munich, 1921); Robert von P6hlmann, Geschichte der sozialen Fragen und des
Sozialismus in der antiken Welt (dritte Auflage .... von Friedrich Oertel; Munich,
1925), Vol. I.
of the earth. Pindar similarly couples the two extremes (Isth. vi. 23):
7r1pav NELXOLO KacL b' 'T7repf3Op&ovy. So in Homer the other refuge and
solace for the gods is with a remote people in the opposite direction,
though they are not called Hyperboreans. When Zeus wishes to avert
his eyes from the battle at the ships he turns them (Iliad xiii. 4-6)-
vo6cLv f4' Lww7rowoXwov Opp7K&w KC) co/tEvoy ataP
Mvc-w- T' a'yXE/qa'XWP KaL aW'yavcLV 'IW7rrq/.o)V/yWV
,yXaKTO4a'yWV, 'A/3lcv TE, &LKaLOTaTWZv avOpwwwv.
These people, it should be noticed, combine traits that are probably rea
(,yXaK0To4avywv) with others that are probably idealized (3LKaLOTaTWV).
A more completely idealized characterization of the same people (if,
as is likely, Abioi and Gabioi are both intended for the same people)
is found in a fragment of the Prometheus Unbound of Aeschylus:
VrEcTa 3' ELs 5'7/.LOV EV5LKc*)TaTOV
/pOTTwv a' 7aVTWV Kal. 4LXOtEV(.TaTOV,
Fa/3ovs, 2iV OVT apOTpOV OvTE yaTO'/.OS
TE/WVEL 3LKEXX' apovpav, aXX' avTo'T2ropot
-yi5ac 4spovot /MOTOV cEIOOVOV /pOTOIS.8
plicit statements that his poem described strange places and people
(iv. 13, 16). It is altogether likely that some of Herodotus' informa-
tion regarding the remoter Scythian peoples is derived from Aristeas,'4
and some of the material likely derived from Aristeas is of a distinctly
Utopian character. The Argippaeans, for example, are a peaceful,
vegetarian folk who subsist on fruit and possess no warlike weapons.
When their neighbors fall out, the Argippaeans make up the quarrel,
and they provide a safe asylum for all refugees (iv. 23).15 The Agathyr-
si enjoy a life of luxury and in particular have an abundance of gold.
To promote brotherliness and abolish malice and envy they hold their
wives in common, so that they may all be mutually related by blood
(iv. 104). I shall revert to this point presently. Other passages are not
so definitely Utopian as these, though several may arouse suspicion, as,
for example, the story of Targitaus and his three sons as founders of
the Scythian race (iv. 5). The account of the belief of the Getae in an
immortality with their god Zalmoxis (iv. 94) is not unlikely drawn
from a work of the Abaris mentioned above, for Abaris is mentioned
in connection with Zalmoxis by Plato (Charmides 158 B). When
Herodotus insists that the Scythians are not in his opinion a wise peo-
ple and states definitely that he does not approve of their customs
(iv. 46), it certainly seems as if he is protesting against inordinate ex-
altation of this primitive people, which again, if we are not carrying
speculation too far, would most likely be the case in some ethnographic
Utopia.
Some such work must have been Herodotus' source for his story of
Anacharsis (iv. 76-77). In the Roman period so-called Letters of
Anacharsis were composed to advocate the superiority of the simple
14 Wilhelm Tomaschek, "Kritik der altesten Nachrichten uiber den skythischen Nor-
den: I, Ueber das Arimaspische Gedicht des Aristeas," in Sitzungsber. der phil.-hist. Cl.
der kaiserlichen Akad. der Wissenschaften (Wien, 1888), CXVI, 715-80, suggests, on the
basis of the places described in the Scythica of Herodotus which he believes derived from
Aristeas, that the Arimaspeia was written in the seventh century on the basis of a cara-
van journey to China. The view that the Hyperboreans are Mongols is not generally
accepted. However, Minns (op. cit., pp. 195 f.) cites certain monumental representa-
tions of Scythians with Mongol characteristics, and also the description in Hippocrates
On Air, Waters, Places xix-xxii, which would suit a Greek's first impression of a Mongol.
For Aristeas see also E. Rohde, Psyche (1894), pp. 382-85.
15 It is quite probable that Herodotus' description here refers to some Asiatic priestly
caste; cf. the commentaries. But a basis in fact does not alter the Utopian character
of a work.
17 Tusc. di8p. v. 90. 18 I, 136 (Haines, "Loeb Classical Library" [ =242 (Naber)]).
19 This is more or less true of most of the works in Charles, Apocrypha and Pseudepi-
grapha of the Old Testament. I should instance the Epistle of Jeremiah or the Sibylline
oracles.
ries him off to the land of the Hyperboreans.2' This variant from the
account of Herodotus (i. 86) is also represented on the famous Louvre
vase, where Croesus evidently ascends the pyre voluntarily.22 Herod-
otus' account of Croesus is largely derived from Delphian sources.
Bacchylides' account is, as Jebb suggests,23 a Delian version; we recall
the Delian connection with the Hyperboreans and their relations in the
matter of the Apollo tradition. Here Croesus has become canonized as
a model of piety-compare Pindar's reference to his /nXO6pcop aperan
(Pyth. i. 94)-as is implied, indeed, in his representation on a vase at
all. It would appear fantastic and put too heavy a burden upon Aris-
teas besides to suggest that parts of even Herodotus' Croesus logos
were derived from the Arimaspeia; on the other hand, Herodotus may
well have gone to the Delian as well as the Delphian sources. At any
rate the logos is not all of a piece, for i. 92, which describes Croesus'
end, shows him the traditional cruel oriental monarch.
The speculative nature of the enterprise makes the pursuit of fur-
ther instances in other parts of Herodotus hazardous, though some
Utopian narrative may well underlie passages where long travels (as
of the Nasamones [ii. 32]) or strange customs with doctrinal implica-
tions (as the curriculum of Persian education [i. 136],24 or the bridal
auctions of the Babylonians [i. 196]) are mentioned. Another type of
doctrinal source is certainly represented in such a passage as iii. 80,
where a group of Persian grandees is pictured engaged in a discussion
of the relative merits of monarchy, oligarchy, and democracy. An in-
stance of the same thing is iii. 38, where Herodotus closes his account
of Cambyses in Egypt with a philosophic observation involving the
sophistic contrast between vo',os and 4touis.
But we must return to the luxurious Agathyrsi, for the light they
may throw on a vexed problem in Greek literature. In iv. 104 Herodo-
tus writes: 'AyaiOvpoot be dL3porarot 5az'VpEs EL0L KacL xpvo-oq/pot rda
LaXLc-Ta, fIrKOLVOV i ' VlTKW V T'V pe-fLEtLV rLevrat ''va KaofCUy7-qroL
'E aXX7XWv EcWOL KaL. OLK77LOL C6uOiEs raurEcs -E q$o6vzx,c Ai-'pr `xOcE xp'eui-c
S 4XX Xovs. Now there are other passages where Herodotus speaks of
21 iii. 23-62; cf. R. C. Jebb, Bacchylides (Cambridge, 1905), pp. 256-61.
22 Furtwiingler-Reichhold, op. cit., II, 277-82, and P1. 113.
23 op. cit., pp. 195-97.
24 It is interesting to note that Xenophon emphasizes the same points in his Utopian
romance: Cyropaedia i. 3.