Hiero the Tyrant and Other Treatises (Penguin Classics) Read Online Free Page A

an invented biography of the founder of the Persian empire) correspondingly tedious. The appreciably lower current estimate of the quality of Xenophon’s mind (though not of his prose) seems to have set in first in early to mid nineteenth-century Germany, whence it passed to Britain and points further west. The main reason for this negative rating, I suspect, is unfavourable comparison of Xenophon with other writers in themany genres he attempted, most conspicuously with Plato in philosophy, and with Thucydides in history. But that depreciation has probably also been aggravated by failure to appreciate duly the nature of Xenophon’s rhetoric – an aspect of ancient (as of modern) writers to which a great deal of attention is now belatedly being paid. It remains to be seen whether as a result of such fresh reassessments of his style Xenophon’s stock will continue to rise significantly on the scholarly market. The present collection will, it is hoped, help to make any re-evaluation of Xenophon, if not necessarily wiser, at any rate better informed.

NOTES
    1 . In Penguin Classics the
Memoirs of Socrates
is translated by H. Tredennick and R. Waterfield in the volume entitled
Conversations of Socrates
(1990);
The Persian Expedition
(1972) and
A History of My Times
(1979) are by R. Warner, with introductions and notes by G. Cawkwell. For these and other bibliographical details and recommendations, see Further Reading.
    2 . The ‘Old Oligarch’ is conveniently available in English translation with commentary in J. M. Moore,
Aristotle and Xenophon on Democracy and Oligarchy
(Chatto & Windus and University of California Press, 2nd edn., 1983). On sophistry, see the next section of this Introduction.
    3 .
Spartan Society (Lakedaimonion Politeia)
is translated with commentary in the Penguin
Plutarch on Sparta
(1988), pp. 166–84. Modern scholarship on Xenophon is reviewed in the works by Morrison and Nickel.
    4 . Further detail, and references to the relevant passages in Xenophon’s works, may be found in Cawkwell’s excellent introductions to the Penguin
Persian Expedition
and
History of My Times
; it was a particular privilege for the present writer to attend George Cawkwell’s Oxford lectures on Xenophon in the early 1970s.
    5 . For an attempt to situate Aristophanes’ plays within their social and political context, see Cartledge,
Aristophanes and His Theatre of the Absurd
(Duckworth, 1995).
    6 . The
Apology
(as
Socrates’ Defence
) is included in the Penguin
Conversations of Socrates
.
    7 . Xenophon’s account of the defeat of Athens and its oligarchic aftermath is given in the first two books of
A History of My Times
; these may usefully beread with the commentary of P. Krentz (Aris & Phillips, 2 vols., 1989–94). See also his
The Thirty at Athens
(Cornell University Press, 1982).
    8 .
A History of My Times
7.4.35 (and note), 7.5.1. On Xenophon’s exile, see Green.
    9 . On Spartan education, see Xenophon’s
Spartan Society
, in the Penguin
Plutarch on Sparta
. For the career of Agesilaus generally, see Cartledge,
Agesilaos
.
    10 . The extreme ‘unitarian’ view is argued or assumed by Higgins; the extreme ‘analyst’ position by Delebecque,
Essai sur la vie
.
    11 . On the sophists see Kerferd, Rankin and de Romilly.
    12 . The view that the sophists caused rather than exploited or contributed to a grave spiritual crisis in Greece, not confined to Athens, is argued by Burkert,
Greek Religion
, pp. 311– 17.
    13 . On changing patterns of literacy and orality in Greece generally and in democratic Athens specifically, see Thomas.
    14 . See Waterfield’s introduction to
Memoirs of Socrates
, but contrast more favourable assessments in Vander Waerdt.
    15 . The phrase quoted is that of Dillery,
Xenophon and the History
.
    16 . T. H. Irwin, as quoted in Cartledge,
Agesilaos
, p. 61.
    17 . Y. L. Too,
Classical Review
45 (1995), 248 reviewing Pomeroy. See also n. 14 .
    18 . See J. R. Hamilton’s Penguin Arrian,
The