Thucydides Biases In Greek History

Biases and Their Consistencies in Greek History Humans have made notable accomplishes for many centuries. Only recently in human history, recently being the start of civilization, did people start recording events. As a species we naturally have a bias, be that toward our culture or an ideology. Thucydides and Herodotus both had distinct source types as well as biases, but conform to them in different ways reflective of their different writing styles. First, we will examine the sources that Thucydides used and why he uses speeches. Thucydides was the main source of the information as he lived and held command as a general during the Peloponnesian War up until his exile to Peloponnesian territory (Thucydides p. 102). His position as a general

A long winded speech can better foreshadow events and analyse the current events. A conversation based speech can be used to gain insight into the person as you see their immediate response to the other speaker. Herodotus and Thucydides have different styles of writing speeches to pander to each’s use of speeches. Humans naturally have biases toward our personal beliefs, and Thucydides is no exception to human nature. Thucydides bias may not be glaringly obvious, but it still lies in his portrayal of the two sides of the Peloponnesian War. Thucydides bias lies with anidealized form of government, and even though Thucydides is from Athenian allegiance fell after his exile.

We can see Thucydides bias against Athens, most likely due to their proclaimed democracy and existence as an empire, in the Melian dialogue (Thucydides p. 102-108). In this passage the tone of the Athenians is that of a stuck up, over-confident people who think that they have a right to any land they want. The Athenians continuously talk down to the Melians (Thucydides p. 102 & 106). The tone in which Thucydides portrays the Athenians shows that Thucydides disapproved strongly of their claimed form of

Thucydides introduction of Brasidas’ shows his bias against the other aggressor of the war, the Spartans. Before he speaks Thucydides makes the jab at him that he is “a powerful speaker, for a Lacedaemonian” (Thucydides p. 97). Thucydides remained consistent in his bias against democracies and oligarchies by putting down the intelligence and speaking abilities of all Lacedaemonians, of which the Spartans were apart of. In this we see how he keeps his bias consistent, as it is not toward a specific people group, and how that bias extends from the Athenians to the Spartans. Herodotus shows his difference from Thucydides in having a bias toward a people group, but in having an inconsistent bias. In Herodotus’s history, he paints a clear image of the Persians as the bad aggressors and the Greeks are simply the poor victims. He also mentions how the Persians knew nothing of luxuries until they took over Lydia (Herodotus p. 17) and how they were a barbarian people (Herodotus p. 113). Herodotus sided with the Greek people and their desire to remain free as he was part Greek