Sicilian Colony Dates, The

By Molly Miller

Hardcover : 9780873950497, 287 pages, June 1970

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The Problem
Part I. Evidence from Complete Texts
A. Pindar
B. Thucydides
i. The date of Akragas
ii. Relation of the Poetic and historiographic in ancient dating
iii. The characteristics of the Thucydidean account
C. The Eusebian Derivatives
i. The entries
ii. The formula-groups
iii. The main Eusebian sources for Sicily
iv. Doubtfully Eusebian entries
v. Relation to Thucydides' list
vi. Historiography
a. The Sicilian items
b. The Italian items
c. The Eastern items
vii. The problems of the historiographic original and the first chronicler
D. The Problem of the Singleness of the Sicilian Tradition
Part II. Evidence about Primary Sources
A. Oracles and Oecists
B. Deinomenids and Emmenids
i. The Deinomenids
ii. The Emmenids: the controversies
a. The Emmenid name
b. The genealogical position of Xenokrates
c. The origin of the Emmenids
d. The heroic ancestry
iii. The Emmenids: doctrines of the disputants
iv. The Emmenids: periods of controversy
C. The Deinomenid Dates
D. General Observations

Part III. The Chronographic Hypothesis
A. Arithmetical Relationship in the Colony Dates
i. Calculations with the factor 9
ii. Calculations with the factor 13
B. General Hypothesis
Part IV. Evidence from Fragmentary Texts
A. The Predecessors of Thucydides
i. Hekataios
ii. Hellanikos
iii. Antiochos
a. His chronographic detail
   1. Naxos and Trotilon 737/6; Selinous 629/8
   2. Leontinoi (with Megarians) 731/0; Katane undated; Megara 729/8
   3. Syracuse 736/5; with dependent calculation
   4. Gela 691/0; Akragas three generations later
   5. Zankle and Himera
   6. Leontinoi and Akrai
b. Antiochos' chronography and history
B. Between Antiochos and Timaios
i. Ephoros
ii. The Parian Marble
iii. Philistos
iv. Hippys of Rhegion
C. Timaios
i. The fragments
ii. The dating formulae
iii. The genealogical framework
D. The Later Tradition
i. Anonymous dates reported by the Pindaric scholiasts
ii. Anonymous dates reported by Diodorus
iii. Other scattered references
iv. The Eusebian chronography
E. Chronography as Historiography
Part V. Kinds of Generations
A. An Ancient Demographic Model
i. Direct skeletal evidence
ii. Demographic and historical generations
iii. The life-table from ten years of age
iv. The death rate up to age 10 (the birth rate)
a. Assumptions
b. Mathematics
v. The life-table
vi. Derivation of a random experimental card-index
vii. Non-quantitative evidence
B. Democracy and Historical Time
i. The proportion of children born who survive their parent in the Ancient Model
ii. Historical material
iii. Survival periods: distributions and averages
iv. Historical material
v. Ithagenic survival periods: distribution and averages
vi. Historical material
vii. Reproductive periods (demographic generations)
viii. Historical material
ix. Experimental material
x. The ithagenic dividend
xi. General method
C. The Chronographic Generation-Lengths
i. The 23-year generation
ii. The 27-year generation
iii. The 36- and 39-year generations
a. Attribution of a 36-year generation to the Neleids of Miletos
b. Attribution of a 39-year generation to the Spartan kings
D. The Meeting of Herodotus and Hellanikos
Part VI. The Original Information and the Historians' Inferences
A. The Chalkidian and Megarian Cities
i. Naxos and Trotilon
ii. Katane and Leontinoi
iii. Megara Hyblaia and Selinous
iv. Zankle and her colonies
v. The chalkidian and the Megarian tradition in general: the 'Euboian lacuna'
B. The Rhodian and Knidian Cities
i. Gela
ii. Akragas
iii. Ebesos
iv. Lipara
v. Pandosia and Makalla
C. The Corinthian Cities
i. Syracuse
ii. Corcyra
iii. Kamarina
iv. Akrai and the Kasmenai
D. Conclusions
Part VII. Relations of Mainland and Colonial Historiography
A. The Corinthian Connections
i. The orthodox chronography
a. Ephoros
b. Apollodoros
The pre-Ephoran datings
a. Herodotus on the tyranny
b. Hellanikos on the Kypselids of Athens
c. Hippias' Olympic Register and Kypselid relations with Olympia
iii. The formation of the orthodox chronography
a. Kallisthenes
b. The survival of a historical date?
iv. The main contacts
a. The foundation of Syracuse
b. Syracusan estrangement from Bacchiad Corinth
c. The first ever Corcyrean revolt
v. Conclusions
B. The 'Messenian' Correlations
i. The foundation traditions ii. The kingdom of Hyameia
iii. The unity of Messenia
iv. Western and mainland historiography
v. The Ionian Sea
Part VIII. The Organization of the International Market c. 760-c. 560
A. c. 760-c. 695: The Euboians
B. c. 695-c. 645: Bacchiad Corinth
C. c. 645-c. 630: Results of the Kimmerians
D. c. 630-c. 600: The Recovery
E. c. 600-c. 575: Corinth and Aigina
F. c. 575-c. 560: Rise of Athens
G. The Market c. 760-c. 560

Indexes
1. Abbreviations
2. Ancient Sources
3. Bibliography
4. People and Places
5. Years
Figures
1. Age-Distribution of the Model Population
2. Distribution of Survival Periods
Tables
I. The Thucydidean Register of Sicilian Colonies
II. The Eusebian Colony Entries
III. The Thucydidean list if Syracuse was founded in 736/5 B. C.
IV. Eusebius' Sicilian Dates
V. The Deinomenid Genealogy
VI. Dates Attributable to Antiochos
VII. Dates Attributable to Phlistos
VIII. Pedigree of Timaios' Surviving Dates
IX. Eusebius' Major Source
X. Ancient Demographic Model
XI. Types of Paternity Achieved by Men of Sixteen Years and Over in the Model Population
XII. Final Model dates
XIII. The Ionian Sea and the International Market

Description

Although the fifth century B. C. marks the beginning of Greek historiography, the Greek historians claimed the ability to cite dates for events occurring and personages living before the fifth century B. C. as well as to correct each others' dates in detail. Their work was summarized in the Chronicle of Eusebius, and, through translations, became part of the accepted historic body of knowledge in Europe and the Near East.

How did the Greek historians arrive at precise year-dates for events to which there were no contemporary witnesses? Why did different historians arrive at different dates for the same event? Dr. Miller, in this carefully organized and highly readable work, demonstrates remarkable knowledge of the primary sources in a difficult area of Greek history in her attempt to penetrate beyond extant source to the original—now lost—material from which the historians of antiquity derived their records.

This is a model of the art of historiographic discussion of demographic data—a major step forward in scholarship dealing with generations in antiquity. Her work has major implications not only for the study of the wide ranges of ancient history treated in this book, but also for examinations of demographical data available from other periods.

Another volume by the same author continuing her studies in chronography, The Thalassocracies, is now in preparation.

Molly Broadbent Miller was graduated with a B. A. degree in classics from the University of Manchester and received a Ph. D. degree from the University of Glasgow in 1953, completing her dissertation on "Prologomena to the Study of Greek Chronography. " She has taught at the University of Glasgow and, as Visiting Professor of Classics, at the State University of New York at Buffalo. She has authored Studies in Greek Genealogy (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1968) and several learned articles on chronographic and demographic aspects of Greek history. Dr. Miller is now at work on a study of Athenian legendary history in relation to the archeological evidence and is collaborating on a study of Aristotelian economic theory.