Problems in The History of Ancient Greece: Sources and Interpretation

This collection of contested problems in the history of Ancient Greece aims to enhance and deepen the experience of any student.

Each chapter within Problems in the History of Ancient Greece is a self-contained unit that presents a key problem of continuing interest among historians.  In each case there is a selection of pertinent ancient sources in translation, with a number of modern viewpoints also presented.  In this way, students may experience the nature of weighing and evaluating sources; the problem of posing mean­ingful and enlightening questions; the need to change hypotheses in the light of new evidence or new insights; and the necessity, in some cases, of suspending judgment.

Note: The problems selected for this collection span the chronological period usually covered in ancient Greek courses.  Second, they were selected because they have been the subject of relatively recent study.  Finally, they are meant to be sufficiently varied in topic and approach; in order to expose the student to a variety of historical methods and techniques. 

DONALD KAGAN is Sterling Professor of History and Classics at Yale University, where he has taught since 1969. He received the A.B. degree in history from Brooklyn College, the M.A. in classics from Brown University, and the Ph.D. in history from Ohio State University. During 1958 to 1959 he studied at the American School of Classical Studies as a Fulbright Scholar. He has received three awards for undergraduate teaching at Cornell and Yale. He is the author of a history of Greek political thought, The Great Dialogue (1965); a four volume history of the Peloponnesian war, TheOrigins of the Peloponnesian War (1969); The Archidamian War (1974); The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition (1981); The Fall of the Athenian Empire (1987); and a biography of Pericles, Pericles of Athens and the Birth of Democracy (1991); On the Origins of War (1995) and The Peloponnesian War (2003). He is coauthor, with Frederick W. Kagan of While America Sleeps (2000). With Brian Tierney and L. Pearce Williams, he is the editor of Great Issues in Western Civilization, a collection of readings. He was awarded the National Humanities Medal for 2002 and was chosen by the National Endowment for the Humanities to deliver the Jefferson Lecture in 2004.

GREGORY VIGGIANO received his Ph.D. in Classics from Yale University. He is an Assistant Professor in the history department at Sacred Heart University, where he teaches courses on ancient Greece and Rome, and Western Civilization. He is currently co-editing a book on Ancient Greek Hoplite Warfare with Donald Kagan.