Genealogy Books - The Histories (Oxford World's Classics)

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Summary: 10,000 Rabbit Trails
Comment: This is a very fine translation of one of the most important books from the ancient world. Be
forewarned, this is not easy reading for the ordinary or casual reader of history. The university
level teacher or classical scholar will savor every page. Herodotus does not give you a simple
narrative. He starts you out and then runs you down ten thousand rabbit trails so you may forget
where you started and where you were trying to go. He introduces names and places in a staggering
volume in just a few pages. He will introduce a person and then tell you all about his great
grandfather,grandfather,father,mother,siblings, every person he killed and every woman he ever slept
with. He goes to great length to tell you how the Greeks chose their commanding general at the
Battle of Marathon but he gives you sparse detail about how they actually won that famous conflict.
The breadth of people and events Herodotus covers is huge but the pathway is not linear.

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Summary: Huzzah for Herodotus! The Ultimate Enquiry Mind
Comment: What amazed me about this book was Herodotus'curiosity and lack of ethnocentrisism. Herdotus wasn't
simply interested in chronicling major events, but delving deeper to understand why the events
occured in the first place. Furthermore, he does something that many scholars and policy makers
today should do more of; that is, he trys to understand other cultures in order to make more sence
of their actions. In this endeavor, he should not only be called the "Father of History", but also
the Father of Anthropology. But, perhaps he understood way back then that history and anthropology,
as well as geography are all complimentary.

While Herodotus - being a Greek himself -
undoubtedly sees the Greeks as heroes in their struggle against the Persian invasion, he shows them
to be extremely jealous, greedy, arrogant and even treacherous. This is something that many of the
ancient world - including the Greek world - would rarely do to their own kind. Therefore, Herodotus
is also one of the first examples of someone critquing their own culture.

Herodotus
makes it clear that the causes of conflict were complex - often stemming from selfishness, such as
the Greek Histiaeus wanting to start an Ionian revolt just so he could leave the Persian court - and
the "heroes" were no knights in shining armour. The best example is Themistocles, who was
instrumental in saving Athens due to his insistence in forcing a sea battle in the Salamis
straights. Rather than dying with the reputation as a heroe, he ended his life in excile
collaborating with the Persians against Greece. It would be as if after leading the Americans to
victory in the American Revelution and being President, George Washington was exciled to England and
became and an advisor to the British king on how to retake America.

While it may not
have been his intention, one irony that becomes apparent regarding the Spartans and Athenians is
that democratic Athens has an imperialist impulse from the outset of their victory at Salamis, while
the oligarchic - some may even say proto-facist - state of Sparta is very reluctant to take any
offensive measures and are rather content to stay in their peninsula. They were complaining about
simply sending troops into central Greece to stop the Persians.

Unfortunately, many
"progressive" historians cut out the inconvenient truths of this history and make it into more of a
black and white affair. For me, it was Herodotus' inquisitive mind, search for the truth - by
revealing contridictory accounts - and, relative to ancient authors, very unbiased account that
makes this work a must read for anyone interested in western civilization, ancient history, and
world history in general.

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Summary: Fun book
Comment: This is great, fun book to read. This is a book you can read for enjoyment. I was reluctant to read
it because I assumed it would be difficult because it was written around 425 BC. I assumed because
it was ancient it would be difficult to read. That was wrong. It's a very entertaining read. It's
also extremely interesting. Herodotus was a very smart and learned man for his time and it is
interesting to read what he thinks. And the commentaries at the back of the book are also well done.
Often the commentaries will note that Herodotus is just wrong in what he says, but sometimes he's
right. I find myself switching between Herodotus and the commentaries. If you're at all interested
in ancient history, you will not regret buying and reading this.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Magnificent text, great translation, helpful notes, misguided organization
Comment: Herodotus's Histories are a treasure trove of wisdom, anecdotes and sheer joy. In the words of
Robert D. Kaplan, "Thucydides may have been the more trustworthy historian, but Herodotus would have
been more fun to share a wineskin with--and is a better guide to the god-filled geopolitics of the
current era." (Kaplan's remarkable article on Herodotus, titled "A Historian for our Time", is
available at [...]

I fully agree with other reviewers about the beauty of this
translation, which results in a fluent and pleasant text. I am also overwhelmed at the abundance of
notes and commentaries about perhaps most paragraphs in the book.

The problem is,
while the translation increases our reading pleasure, the organization of this edition does not help
the reader: the use of endnotes rather than footnotes means that readers have to keep moving to and
fro between the text and the end of the book. Worse still, there is no footnote numbering, so
readers must turn at virtually every paragraph to the end of the book, so as not to miss possible
clarification. Eventually, I decided to check before reading each of the nine chapters ("Books") and
mark the endnoted paragraphs myself.

Perhaps Oxford's intention was, as another
reviewer put it, to ensure that notes were "unobtrusive" and the reader would have the clean text
before his eyes. I beg to differ: few modern readers could do without the additional explanations
provided in the notes. And, if they felt they could, or so wished, they would have a wealth of
translations to choose from, much poorer in notes than this one.

I think no other
edition of the "Histories" has so many maps. These are necessary and helpful. But they could have
been clearer. In some of them, it is hard to tell land from sea, for example.

I do look
forward to a "Landmark Herodotus" similar to the magnificent "Landmark Thucydides", with notes AND
maps exactly where they are needed, so the reader never has to leave the page he is reading. This
may sound shallow, but it greatly facilitates concentration. And this, after all, is supposed to be
one of the main benefits of a fluent and pleasant text in the first place.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Joy to read!
Comment: Growing up in Turkey, every student had to study world history including the events covered in this
book. However, our history lessons consisted of memorizing dates and names of what was in the state
approved text books. The contrast of that approach, to learning history by reading the original
works is huge. What a joy it is to read Herodotus' book! The book is about the Persian Empire which
was huge extending from India and Central Asia to the Danube in Europe. I loved the diversions from
the main events and all the stories and myths. Besides the well known Persian/Greek wars there were
so many other lesser known but just as exciting events. One of them was Darius's expedition into
Southern Russia to attack the nomadic Scythians. I didn't realize that Darius attacked them from the
West crossing the Danube. The building of the bridge over Danube and the hardships in crossing
rivers in old times was eye opening. I also loved the maps and read all the 200 pages! of
historical notes and a section on ancient weights, units, and money.

If you enjoyed
this book you might also enjoy the "Peloponnesian War" by Donald Kagan. Although written by a
contemporary historian, it reads as if you are watching the events in person. Fantastic reading for
history lovers.

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