Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War: An Ethic of Facticity and the Realness of Exemplary Horror

Russell Zych

Rhet 103A, Sec. 102 (Tu 5-6)

Dale Carrico, Kuan Hua

  

In the early parts[1], of Thucydides’ written history of The Peloponnesian War, he explains the tenets of his historical method. By creating his own method of facticity and imparting on his reader what it takes to make a text believable as well as working to ascribe this believability onto the facts before him, Thucydides constructs his own ideal of reality. The following paragraphs will explicate how he defines this reality and how the application of reality, as wielded by Thucydides, changes the cultural importance war for Greek society and humanity at large.

Thucydides defines his very own historical method as one against both the epic tradition of oral poets like Homer and the fabulist composites of Herodotus. Instead of those, he finds that, “having proceeded upon the clearest data, and having arrived at conclusions as exact as can be expected in matters of such antiquity,” there should be only one satisfyingly clear and definitive account, one that has been whittled down, sharpened, and polished into an obvious truth. It is a method more objective than a compilation due to its rejection of clearly fantastical or false data, and more truthful through editing and intervention—in short, a method of reality through construction, a more valid account. It is through a refutation of other historical texts’ validity and believability that he affirms his ethic of sharpened realness with his readers. An ethic of skepticism and rhetoric of realness or facticity, not style or exaggeration, mark Thucydides’ claims of grandeur. He takes pride in an, “absence of romance in [his] history,” conceding that while it may, “detract somewhat from its interest,” the pared down factual method is far more useful for “those inquirers who desire an exact knowledge of the past.” His writing is “not as an essay which is to win the applause of the moment, but as a possession for all time.” Far less interested in pleasing audiences than he is creating facts and accounts that are primarily believable regardless of whether or not they are boring. In fact the separation from Homer and Herodotus assures readers that the dry aspects of this work guarantees its factuality, its commitment to an ideal or realness. By announcing the intentions and scope of his project out right, Thucydides gives more than a description of his method; he imposes on his readership a description of what truth and true, factual history looks like. His historical method creates an ethic of believability that necessitates data, proofs, and above all nothing worthy of applause. This disapproval of a beautiful or fantastic history makes the relationship between humans, war, and reporting of violence in the case of the Peloponnesian war far more solemn than exciting, more horrifying than tragic.

Thucydides uses the ethic of realness established by his method to assert the Peloponnesian war’s solemn importance and exemplary destructiveness. Earlier in his passage he qualifies, “despite the known disposition of the actors in a struggle to overrate its importance… an examination of the facts will show that it was much greater than the wars which preceded it.” Because it is an examination of facts that prove the greatness of The Peloponnesian War rather than prose, style, or tradition, the importance of war can only refer to its material impact on society not its spiritual impact or its glory. This is why Thucydides doesn’t mention any positive qualities of the war but rather that it, “was prolonged to an immense length, and, long as it was, it was short without parallel for the misfortunes that it brought upon Hellas.” The legacy of the war as he sees it is far from impressive; it is destructive and haunting. For him the, “old stories of occurrences handed down by tradition, but scantily confirmed by experience, suddenly ceased to be incredible,” after this gritty and harrowing experience due to, “earthquakes of unparalleled extent and violence… great droughts in sundry places and consequent famines, and that most calamitous and awfully fatal visitation, the plague.” For Thucydides, the sheer horror and great destructiveness of these consequences make any poetic, fantastical, or composite record deceptive and all too immaterial. In order to feel the true terror of these events, one must read a “true” account, no matter how constructed or manipulated the true-ness of which may be. His ethic of realness, facticity, and believability thereby leaves the more shocking moments history with due dignity and didactic value.

While historical poetry may be beautiful and in many cases uplifting, for Thucydides history has a didactic and humbling purpose; it is supposed to bring its readers a self-proven and believable account that is only as important as its material or functional impact on society.  To speak of the past factually is to vanquish doubts about bring the experience of others onto a status of incontestability. Thucydides’ historical method uses a stubborn ethic of facticity to make his audience materially accept, feel, and revere the exemplary horror of The Peloponnesian War.

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[1] The passage I am using for this Précis is the last four paragraphs of Chapter One of Book One of Thucydides’ History of The Peloponnesian War, Beginning from “Having now given the result of my inquiries…” and ending at the chapter mark.