Daniel Crowley

Daniel Crowley (MA in Classics), Herodotus’ Mirror: Unpacking the Purpose of the Plupast

This thesis is a narratological analysis of the ‘plupast’ in Herodotus’ Histories. The plupast is a narrative technique where a historian embeds historical stories within their overall work of history. Most commonly, this happens when a character recounts an earlier historical event. For instance, in Book 5 of the Histories, Socles recounts stories about the Corinthian tyrants Cypselus and Periander during a meeting of Greek allies. The plupast is a meta technique, in that the historian is embedding a version of their own text within the text itself. Accordingly, it is commonly thought that a historian like Herodotus is making some kind of ‘metahistorical’ association between himself and his plupast narrators. By analysing how Herodotus frames the plupast, we can thus infer how he conceived of the nature, purpose and value of his own discipline.

This thesis challenges scholarship by Jonas Grethlein, Emily Baragwanath and Deborah Boedeker, who have all analysed Herodotus’ use of the plupast. The orthodox view of these scholars is that Herodotus tends to emphasise the problematic aspects of his characters’ plupast recollections. Thus, these characters act as metahistorical foils, accentuating the strengths of Herodotus’ historiographical method. Through close analysis of each of Herodotus’ 11 plupast episodes, I argue that this conclusion needs to be revisited. In 2 notable instances, Herodotus paints plupast narrators in a decidedly positive light, highlighting their tremendous rhetorical success. Elsewhere, the plupast functions as a more straightforward dramatic technique, helping Herodotus convey the tension, irony, or suspense that a particular scene requires. In one final instance, the plupast allows Herodotus to make a wider point about how and why historical consciousness is formed. Ultimately then, I set out a new, more multi-faceted interpretation of the plupast than existing scholarship has provided.

Supervisors: Prof. Hyun Jin Kim, Assoc. Prof. James H. K. O. Chong-Gossard