Pathos with a Point

This chapter discusses accounts of violence in so-called tragic history and suggests that this Hellenistic subgenre may better be understood as an attempt to write experiential history. It begins with defining what characterized ‘tragic’ or ‘sensationalist’ accounts of violence and atrocities, taking Diodorus Siculus’ account of the sack of Selinus (Diod. Sic. 13.57) as its case study, comparing it with passages of Thucydides and Polybius to illustrate the differences. The second part of the chapter examines the possible purpose with such experiential representations of atrocities. It proceeds by examining Polybius’ famous criticism of Phylarchus for confusing history and tragedy (Plb. 2.56) as well as fragment 21 of Agatharchides’ On the Red Sea, which discusses the correct way to write about disasters, and finally some of Diodorus’ many remarks on the didactic purpose of historiography. It concludes that the ‘tragic’ historiographers, like Thucydides and Polybius, considered their works (moral-)didactic and believed that certain things can best be learned through an experiential representation. In the third and final part of the chapter, this ideal is compared with modern history writing and parallels are drawn both with the presentist/experientialist movement and with the call from some quarters for historians to take a moral stand on their subject matter, particularly when writing about atrocities.