Abstract of "Remembering the Persian War Differently" by David Yates, Ph.D., Brown University, May 2011. The Persian War, culminating in Xerxes' invasion of Greece in 480 B.C.E., was arguably the most remembered event in Greek history. By examining how that event was recalled and commemorated we gain valuable insight into the broad memorial trends of the classical period. I argue (1) that the Greeks recalled the Persian War as members of their respective polities, not collectively as Greeks, (2) that these various and often contradictory memories of the war competed with each other fiercely on the larger panhellenic stage, and (3) that it was not until the rise of Philip and Alexander the Great that a dominant narrative of the war emerged. Trends toward localization and competition speak to a fractured memorial culture in the classical period in which there was not one memory of the past, but several. The dissertation serves to broaden the perspective of scholarship on the Persian War and to contribute to the ongoing debate over the application of memory theory to the ancient world. Most recent studies of Persian War memory either examine the tradition surrounding individual battles or focus exclusively on Athens. Both approaches artificially limit the range of material considered. To gain a fuller appreciation of the Greek response to the war I consider a wider range of evidence from all over the Greek world. The treatment of memory theory has also been quite uneven in scholarship on the Persian War. Although my dissertation does not attempt a full introduction to the burgeoning field of memory studies, I do address question of theory in detail. What emerges is a working guide to retooling memory theory for the Greek world through the example of the Persian War.
Yates, David Carl,
"Remembering the Persian War Differently"
(2010).
Classics Theses and Dissertations.
Brown Digital Repository. Brown University Library.
https://doi.org/10.7301/Z0NP22PD
